synopsis : after a couple of instances of accidental matching clothing, yangyang finds himself in a dating rumor with possibly the most famous person on campus : yn, the bassist of an up and coming band. yangyang doesn’t seem to have a problem with it. unfortunately yn, who has also built up a reputation for being cold as winter, does.
pairing : liu yangyang x gn!reader
also featuring ! nct 00z + mark, xiaojun, hendery, and cc!yn
genre/s : smau, university au, student council + band au, fluff, angst, humor
[ @ fullsun ] : something about the campus flirt and the model student running for council together and WINNING is just *chef’s kiss*
[ @ hrenjun ] : literally shut up no one asked
[ @ vpyn ] : babe omg you’re so sweet <3
suhnshinehaos presents…
crush culture : a renjun smau
synopsis : ln yn has always flirted with huang renjun. but they do that with literally everyone else too, they couldn’t possibly be serious about pursuing him, right? on their final year of university, yn is determined to show that they are. with all the walls that renjun has built around himself, will they be strong enough to succeed in tearing them down?
or as i like to call it : you may have fallen for him first, but he might actually fall harder. only if he tried and let himself go.
pairing : huang renjun x gn!reader
also featuring ! nct 00z
genre/s : university + student council au, fluff, angst, pining, humor, slice of life
also contains : swearing, food mentions, suggestive humor
genre: college au, vampire au, fake dating, darker themes, thrillerish. still kinda unserious
summary: after an unexpected night at the movies, you’re left turned into a vampire. with the help of park jisung and his friends, your new lifestyle adjustments are thankfully made a lot easier. that is until your friends start to call out your flaky behavior. quick, how are you going to cover up your secret? a fake boyfriend taking up your time? perfect! huang renjun is just the right guy!
before you read: this is a remake (re-vamp if you will. sorry.) of my very first social media au on tumblr!! the original is very cringe and old. i want to give it an update, hopefully this one ages better. its pretty much the same. if you follow me for my enha fics, the level of seriousness is higher than dwmb or s4u was (don't expect any cult or staples subplots).
warnings: assault (reader gets turned into a vampire against her will.), violence, abduction. most of this happens in written parts, so the warnings will come back up before the chapter
schedule:
started: 10.11.24
ended: 11.30.24
status: complete!
taglist: open
playlist: here
character previews: one / two
chapters: one / two / three / four / five / six / seven / eight / nine / ten / eleven / twelve / thirteen / fourteen / fifteen / sixteen / seventeen / eighteen / nineteen / twenty / twenty one / twenty two / twenty three / twenty four / twenty five
Everyday, you feel a little bit further away. And I don't know what to say. Are we wasting time? Talking on a broken line
synopsis: they say long distance is hard, but you and renjun are better than that, right? you'll make it through— won't you? pairings: renjun x fem!reader genre: mini smau, angst, hurt warnings: use of petnames, long distance relationship, slowly falling out of love, toxic relationship, jealousy, swearing notes: wanted to do one of these for a while playlist: close as strangers (5sos), drunk text me (lexi jayde), bruises (lewis capaldi), watch (billie eilish) — part 2 | library.
➺ word count: 10.4k
➺ genre & warnings: exes to lovers, angst and fluff, several implied sex scenes (mature/minors dni), making out
➺ synopsis: in which everything’s always been easy with shotaro—your friendship, your first kiss, and even your breakup. seven months after he left to chase a big career opportunity abroad, he’s back for his little sister’s birthday, and you’re invited to the party
➺ author’s note: two shotaro fics in a row… oh it’s getting bad for me. nobody look at me
The doorbell rang, and your stomach twisted. You hurried to open the door, glad that your jaw was already clenched tight or else your heart would’ve leapt right out of your mouth. This had been the longest you’d ever gone in your whole life without seeing Osaki Shotaro, and it felt like you were finally breathing air again when he smiled at you.
As you sat on the train on your usual commute home from work, you felt your phone buzz in your hand, drawing your attention away from the passing views.
[taro 🤎: hey]
Your throat tightened at just the contact name. Your last texts before this were from over seven months ago, arranging for him to pick up a couple things he’d left at your place. That afternoon was somehow both a blur and permanently etched into your memory—he was a only here for a few hurried moments, in a rush because he was on his way to the airport to catch his flight, stepping past the threshold just enough to take the items and you in his arms, pressing a fleeting kiss to your temple, then running off with his things and without you, throwing you a goodbye over his shoulder.
[you: hey ?]
[taro 🤎: this is shotaro btw]
[you: lol i know, i didn’t delete your number]
[you: everything ok?]
[taro 🤎: attached image.]
[taro 🤎: mayu asked to invite you]
You opened the picture to find that it was a colorful invitation to his little sister’s eighth birthday party next weekend at his parents’ house. You’d known her since she was born, having attended all her other birthdays and been around for her whole life. You were sure that this had all been very confusing for her. First quickly checking your calendar to make sure you didn’t have anything else that day, you then texted Shotaro back.
[you: aw omg i would LOVE to come!!]
[taro 🤎: she’ll be thrilled, thanks. i’ll let my parents know]
[you: we should talk first tho. are you free this weekend?]
You couldn’t sit still, anxiously pacing around your apartment and finding random things to tidy up over and over again. Shotaro was coming over today at your request—well, the meeting was your request, the location was his suggestion. You had expected to be scheduling a phone call around timezones and work schedules, but he was apparently already in town. When he asked to come over for your talk, you were a little wary, offering up a coffee shop or something, figuring that there was so much still lingering in this place, but he pointed out that some privacy would be nice. And that was hard to argue.
Really, no matter where you met, there would be so much still between you, around you. More than two decades of so much, overflowing the walls of anywhere that held the two of you.
The doorbell rang, and your stomach twisted. You hurried to open the door, glad that your jaw was already clenched tight or else your heart would’ve leapt right out of your mouth. This had been the longest you’d ever gone in your whole life without seeing Osaki Shotaro, and it felt like you were finally breathing air again when he smiled at you.
“Hey, Y/N,” he greeted you quietly but in an upbeat tone.
“Your hair’s longer…” You reached for the ends that were starting to cover his ears.
He let you mess with his hair, eyes never leaving yours. “Yeah, I’ve been meaning to get it cut.”
“I like it.” The words left your mouth before you could think about them, before you even realized they were a thought.
It was always so natural with Shotaro, so easy. You’d been practically of one mind for your whole lives. You always knew that you’d pick each other for group projects in school, and carpool to parties in college, and that you’d live together after the dorms. That’s why kissing him the first time had hardly taken a second thought, chatting late one night in his room in your tiny two-bedroom apartment, completely sober. Only a split second of surprise from him before he went back in for another, and another, and the conversation at hand was entirely forgotten. And when you moved on some time later from just kissing between bedsheets to out in public, holding hands, that had also been easy.
Which, you figure, is why it had been so easy to end up back here, under your sheets, Shotaro’s chest sticking to your back as his arm loosely encircled your waist.
“So that’s what you meant by ‘privacy,’” you joked breathlessly.
“And that’s what you meant by ‘talk’, hm?” He teased you right back.
“I missed you, Shotaro,” you admitted softly, turning onto your back so you could look at him. “And I don’t just mean like this, I mean—”
“I know.” He nodded and swallowed. “We’ve always been us, even before everything. I missed you too.”
“Do you want to try to be us again? Or, figure out what us, now looks like?” You suggested. “Because I don’t like it so far. Actually, I really hate it.”
He let out a breathy, cynical chuckle. “Same. Too lonely.”
“I want to hear all about how Italy has been treating you. And your new job.” You mustered up a smile. “You’ve got to show me pictures of all the cool places you’ve been.”
A phone rang from somewhere on the floor then, and Shotaro sighed. “Sorry, that’s me.” After scavenging his phone from amidst the mess of clothes, he stated regretfully, “It’s Sungchan…”
“Usually I’d say he can wait, but I’m sure he’s missed you too,” you said, a fond smirk tugging at the corner of your lip at the mention of Shotaro’s other best friend. You were number one, of course. The call rang to voicemail as he hastily pulled his clothes back on, you following at a much slower pace. You only had your big hoodie on as he was already heading for the door.
At the front door, you two lingered in the threshold for a moment, his hand hovering over the handle as his eyes scanned your features over and over again. You grabbed his shoulder, pulling him closer to peck his cheek.
“See you next week,” you promised. “Text me if you need something before, okay?”
“Yeah, next week.” He nodded. “See you then.”
Shotaro was already calling Sungchan as he was turning down the hall, and you watched his back until he disappeared into the stairwell.
[jung sungchan 🥈: so]
[you: so ?]
[jung sungchan 🥈: i heard you and shotaro met up yesterday]
[you: yeah he’s in town for his sister’s birthday and i’m invited to the party so we figured we should talk before]
[jung sungchan 🥈: right]
[you: either say whatever it is you want to say or leave me alone omfg]
[jung sungchan 🥈: nothing, just thought it was interesting]
“‘Interesting’, my ass,” you scoffed under your breath, slamming your front door shut behind you.
The truth was, Shotaro hadn’t left your mind all day long. Now that he was here, back in the same town as you again, you couldn’t focus on anything. The first month after he left, you had been a mess, admittedly, but it got easier. All that progress was just out the window, and before you knew it, you were calling him.
“Hey,” he answered immediately, leaving you no time to think about what you were doing. “Everything okay?”
“Yeah, uhm, I just got home from work,” you said, hanging your purse off the back of one of your kitchen chairs as you traversed the span of your apartment to get the bedroom. “Are you busy? I was thinking we could do dinner or something…?”
“I’d love to.” His smile was evident in his voice. “I’ll pick something up on my way over.”
“Great. I’ll see you soon.”
“See you soon,” he echoed.
You caught a glimpse of the lovestruck smile on your face as you passed by the mirror in the corner.
Shotaro hadn’t just picked something up on his way, you realized as you pulled away from hugging him hello, spotting the bag in his hands. It was your favorite takeout place, a couple blocks away from your apartment—in the opposite direction of Shotaro’s family’s house. You didn’t comment on it, simply smiling and motioning for him to go sit in the living room while you grabbed your drinks.
“I can get my own,” he insisted, opening up the correct cabinet on his first try and bringing down two glasses. “I used to live here, too.”
“I know, I know,” you said, shaking your head fondly. “But what if I had moved all the dishes around since then?”
“That would’ve been really funny,” he agreed with a grin. “Too bad you didn’t plan that far ahead to prank me.”
You poured your drinks into the two mugs that he had fetched—matching souvenirs from a vacation you took a couple years ago. A street vendor had custom painted them for the two of you, half the design on your mug and the other half on Shotaro’s. You smiled bittersweetly to yourself as you took yours, and Shotaro brought his into the living room. He unpacked all the food, and you again noted that he’d not only gotten food from your favorite place, but had even splurged on getting your favorite dessert off the menu too.
“Thanks for all this, Taro.” You picked up your container of food.
“Ah, it’s the least I could do.” He rubbed the back of his neck bashfully. “Thanks for inviting me over.”
“Aren’t your family missing you at dinner?”
“Mayu had a parent-teacher conference at school tonight, so you actually saved me from eating alone,” he said. “What have you been up to?”
“Hmm… Trying to think of the most noteworthy stuff over the past seven months…” You hummed thoughtfully, taking another bite of food and washing it down before you perked up. “Oh! I got a promotion!”
“Congrats!” He held his hand out for you to high-five zealously. “That’s awesome, you deserve it. What’s your role now?”
“Regional Director of Systems Incorporation,” you rattled off your official title. “I’m overseeing the inter-office collaborations and communications for the whole region instead of just in my office.”
“Did Ms. Jo retire then? Finally?”
“Yes, finally,” you chuckled at the memory of your elderly mentor whose position you were now in. “She had her first great-grandchild and decided that maybe enough was enough.”
He whistled lowly. “How old was she anyway?”
“She worked at the company for over fifty years, if that gives you any idea.”
“Wow.”
“I know. I hope they don’t expect that kind of dedication from me,” you snorted. “Thirty years maximum for me, thanks.”
“Are you still volunteering?”
“Yeah, I am. They offered me a paid position at the organization, but I had to decline. As much as I love those kids, it would’ve been like a 70% pay cut.” You shook your head regretfully. “Just not sustainable, you know?”
He nodded in understanding. “Of course. But at least you can still go out there, even with your promotion.”
“And the position they were offering would put me in the back office like all the time—I’d never get to be with the kids.”
“How is your family doing?”
“Same old, same old,” you sighed. “They still ask me if I’ve heard from you at least once a month. I keep telling them to just talk to your parents.”
“My parents do the same thing.” He shook his head. “They’re excited to see you at Yui’s party.”
“I’m excited to see them too.” You smiled warmly. “Will the usual crowd be there?”
“A couple of our cousin’s kids that are her age, yeah, but she’s getting to the age where she just wants to hang around her friends, not a bunch of old people.” He added humorously, “I’m only allowed because you’re coming, I think.”
“Doesn’t want her stinky older brother ruining the vibe?”
“The kid loved me when she was little, but suddenly she’s acting like I’m as old as our parents or something!”
“Because you were cool back then. Now you’re like… a real grown-up with a career who pays taxes and has an IRA or whatever.”
“I’m cool!” He insisted.
You laughed, lifting your mug to your lips. “Not eight-year-old girl cool.”
“You’re also a taxpayer and yet she apparently still thinks you’re cool.”
“Yeah, but I’m not her stinky older brother.”
“Alright, would you stop saying I smell? I swear, I showered before I came over here.” He sniffed his shirt for good measure.
“Aw, you showered just for me?” You teasingly batted your eyes at him.
“You say that as if I never shower,” he scoffed, pushing your arm.
“You’re just fun to tease, Shotaro,” you reminded him, returning the push, your hand lingering on his shoulder.
And then you were on him, and his hands were on your waist, and your lips were on his, and his thumbs were squeezing your upper thighs, and your hips were pushing down on his, and his mouth was on your neck, and your teeth were sinking into his bottom lip, and his shirt was on the floor, and in the haze of it all, his hand found yours and your fingers slotted together as they’d always done.
For just a brief moment when you woke up the next morning, you could pretend. If you didn’t open your eyes, didn’t think, didn’t remember, you could be in any other normal morning. Shotaro’s soft breaths beside you, his warmth under the covers a subtle assurance of his presence. That quaint fantasy—memory?—was ripped away by your work alarm blaring from the bedside table. With a disgruntled noise, you fumbled for the device blindly and snoozed it with only half an eye open.
Facing reality (and Shotaro), you rolled over to your other side to ask quietly, “Breakfast? Or do you need to get home?”
“Breakfast sounds great, if I won’t make you late,” he answered just as softly, slowly blinking the sleep out of his eyes.
“No, not all.”
Breakfast was a quiet and mundane affair, all things considered. It was brief, as you had to get going to work, but heartachingly familiar, an echo of the ritual you two used to do every morning before heading off to your respective workplaces. This time, when you parted ways in front of your building, you hugged him and let him peck the crown of your head, squeezing his arm and promising to see him again soon.
[taro 🤎: hey, are you up?]
It had been three days since you last saw Shotaro. You weren’t avoiding him on purpose, you had your own life. Now, the fact that you were awake at almost three in the morning to see his text did not have anything to do with living your own life, and everything to do with him. While the two of you agreed to see what your relationship would look like now, this couldn’t be it. After Mayu’s party, he’d leave again, and you didn’t want to end right back up where you were seven months ago when that happened.
[you: did you seriously just send me a ‘u up’ text?]
[taro 🤎: omfg i did NOT mean to i just can’t sleep]
[you: want to go for a drive?]
“Hey,” you greeted Shotaro casually as he climbed into the passenger seat of your car.
“Hey.” He got himself situated and buckled in before you smoothly pulled away from his family’s house. “Couldn’t sleep either?”
“Nope.” You shook your head. “But we’ve always been like that. Looks like even timezones couldn’t mess it up.”
“Guess not.” He chuckled, then cleared his throat. “I like the new car.”
“Oh, yeah, that old clunker from high school finally gave out on me,” you snorted. “It would’ve been more money to fix it than to get a new used one. What about your car? I didn’t see it in the driveway, I figured your parents would’ve been holding onto it for you.”
“In the garage.”
“Of course, yeah, to keep it out of the elements.”
“Lot of memories in your old car…” Shotaro mused, drumming his fingers on his knee as he stared out the window.
“Yeah, since you didn’t get your license until our last year of undergrad,” you pointed out, though there was no venom in your voice. The two of you went everywhere together back then, there truly was no need for both of you to have cars. “Oh god, remember when we drove like, two hours to go to that bakery you saw online?”
“And it wasn’t even good,” he groaned. “We got scammed!”
“Everything was simultaneously burnt and undercooked. We’re lucky we didn’t get food poisoning.”
“That strawberry tart was an affront to God.”
“I don’t even remember exactly what happened, but I’d had a really shitty week, so going on some stupid goose chase with you was honestly perfect,” you chuckled, taking a random turn.
He frowned. “Wait, really? I don’t remember that.”
“I don’t think I told you, don’t worry.” You waved off his concerns. “That was our first semester of college. First time away from home, I didn’t get along with my roommates at the time, and you were so much better at making new friends than me. All of that on top of school, I was so stressed. I don’t know, I just remember sitting in my car with you after trying those awful pastries together and thinking to myself that I had nothing to worry about, that I’d always have you.”
“Wh—Y/N…” He trailed off, clearly at a loss for words.
“Sorry to drop that on you almost a decade later,” your tone was still light, and your sentiment genuine. “I’m fine, honestly. If anything, it just shows how you always took care of me even without realizing it just by being around.”
“Yeah but…”
“It’s okay, really.” You patted his arm before putting your hand back on the wheel. “I’m not a socially awkward, insecure eighteen-year-old anymore. I know how to make friends other than you.”
With Shotaro still quiet, you decided to change the topic back to a humorous one, pointing out another familiar location as you passed it, the city hall. “Hey, remember when Sungchan was trying to impress that girl in his math class and almost cracked his head open on those stairs?”
“Oh my god, yeah.” He immediately laughed. “Poor guy had no control of his limbs until we were like twenty.”
“That was before you two were friends, right?”
“Right, right. Our whole grade was on a field trip,” he recalled. “I only found out about why he had been doing that when we got paired up for an assignment senior year.”
“And then she moved away like a week after the field trip, I’m pretty sure.”
“Jung Sungchan and his chronic bad luck.”
“I’m surprised he didn’t burn your dorm down in college.”
“Oh, speaking of Sungchan and college, do you remember our first college party?”
“The parts before I got blackout drunk for the first time in my life? Yes. After? No, absolutely not.” You laughed. “Let’s see… I remember playing some drinking games… you kept me from making a fool of myself on the dance floor as always… and I think you told probably ten guys that you were my boyfriend that night because we made the signal way too vague and I kept accidentally signaling to you that I needed you to intervene when I was chatting with people.”
He cracked up in the passenger seat, clutching his sides as he caught his breath. “I forgot about that, shit. At one point you were talking to Sungchan and I was so confused about why you were signaling me but—”
“You swooped in and rescued me anyway,” you snickered. “I was just asking him if he knew where the bathroom was. God, he was so confused.”
“I was actually horrified that he was doing something to make you uncomfortable like that—”
“And tipsy by then,” you interjected. “You actually shoved him! I couldn’t believe my eyes!”
“I was angry that he of all people would do something!” He defended himself through choked giggles. “I thought I knew him better than that! I thought he was a good guy!”
“And he was, he was!” At this point, you were cackling just as hard, having to pull over into an empty parking lot to avoid crashing. “Poor Jung Sungchan and his chronic bad luck, just telling me where the bathroom was when you suddenly come running over about to fight him, yelling about how he was an asshole who needs to leave your girlfriend alone!”
“And we were just friends then, too!”
“You were lucky he was so confused that he didn’t fight back,” you pointed out. “No offense, but you were a late bloomer. He was like two heads taller than you back then.”
“I know, I know.” He rolled his eyes.
“Oh, and our annual tradition of leaving the school dance early to get ice cream?” You smiled, shifting around in your seat to face him properly.
He turned around too, mirroring your stance with one leg propped up. “Always way better than whatever they got catered.”
“Did you see that Soojin and Hyungyu got divorced?”
“What?! Seriously?”
“Yup, I saw posts from her divorce party. Hold on.” You quickly brought out your phone to find the pictures she had posted on her Instagram recently.
Shotaro’s jaw dropped as you held your phone screen out to him. “I’m surprised they lasted that long, honestly. Getting married the day after graduation…”
“At least the only custody battle they had to deal with was over the dog.”
“Good point.”
“Speaking of kids—Jiwon is pregnant again!”
“What is this? Number four?”
“Five. She had twins, remember?”
“God, right.”
“Like, I know we’re all grown adults but it never gets any less jarring to see people we’ve known since elementary school having kids on purpose.”
“I know.”
“Jiwon chewed on pencils until we were thirteen, what do you mean she’s now in charge of five little humans?”
“You’re somehow making me feel older than Mayu does right now, Y/N,” Shotaro groaned, rubbing his face with two hands.
“Oh, come on,” you laughed and rolled your eyes. “We’re so not old. Our lives aren’t over. We’ve still got so much time left.”
He picked at the skin around his nails, voice tight as he asked, “You think?”
You grabbed his hand before he could successfully rip off a piece of his cuticle. “Of course we’ve got more time.”
This time, your movements were slow, intentional as you maneuvered over your center console to settle on Shotaro’s lap, cradling his face between your hands as he looked up at you with nothing but unabashed devotion. “There’s always time,” you whispered like a prayer, bringing his lips to yours in a kiss that tasted of reverence. Each move of his fingers under your waistband pious, eyes watching you like he was witnessing a miracle.
Today was Mayu’s birthday. You weirdly didn’t feel nervous to see Shotaro—you’d seen him plenty recently. It was his family that you were anxious about reconnecting with. They had been such an integral part of your life for as long as you could remember; a second family. Losing them like that was… jarring to say the least. You had planned to keep seeing them after Shotaro left; stop in to check on his parents and take Mayu out. But after so many of your offers were turned down, you got the message and left them alone.
And so when you knocked on their front door that afternoon, you didn’t know what to expect on the other side. Shotaro’s mom answered, and she immediately swept you into a hug before you could open your mouth.
“Oh, Y/N, hon,” she sighed happily. “How have you been?”
“Hi, I’m good.” You hugged her back tightly. “How are you?”
“I’m so happy to see you again.” She pinched your cheek affectionately then reached for the gift bag in your hand. “Here, I’ll put that with the others. The girls are in Mayu’s room right now, and Shotaro’s out back.”
“I’ll go see the birthday girl first.”
You could hear the girls before you could see them. They were chatting and laughing loudly, sounds that brought a fond smile to your face. Mayu’s door was open but you still knocked anyway. They all looked up from their various crafts that they were doing at you, Mayu dropping her scissors and scrambling to her feet in delight.
“Y/N!” She squealed, launching herself at you.
“Yui!” You picked her up by her underarms like she was still a toddler, and she wrapped her limbs around you like a koala. “Happy birthday!”
“You came!”
“Well, I was invited,” you laughed, rubbing her back. “Can’t miss my BFF’s birthday, huh?”
Leaning back as much as much as you could, you shifted to hold her one-handed, using the other to grab your necklace—one half of a BFF heart pair. Her eyes went wide and her jaw dropped before she started squirming in your grasp. “Wait! I have mine!”
You set her back down on two feet, and she darted around all her friends to get to her dresser, opening the jewelry box that was atop it. She victoriously fished out the matching necklace, running back over to you with it. “Can you help me put it on? Please?”
“Of course.” You held out your palm for her to drop it into. She turned around, leaning back against your legs as you unclasped the necklace then fastened it for her. When you were done, you patted her front. “There you go.”
“Thank you!” She then latched onto your hand. “Come on, you can sit next to me!”
As you settled into a spot to the side and mostly behind Mayu, she went ahead and introduced you to everyone in one fell swoop, “This is Y/N! She’s my brother’s girlfriend.”
You didn’t have it in you to correct her, instead chuckling softly as a chorus of ‘ooh’s erupted around you. Mayu picked her scissors back up and went back to work on her own craft, enthusiastically explaining it to you and chatting with her friends. Eventually, they got bored of crafts and ran out to the backyard, pulling you along with. There was a back patio that fit exactly two chairs—currently occupied by Shotaro and his dad—and a small grassy area taken up by a playset that was as old as you. You could barely give the two men on the patio a wave over your shoulder as the gaggle of girls herded you towards the playset with them.
Every time you thought about sneaking off to talk to Shotaro and his dad, someone would call your name wanting to show off how fast they could get across the monkey bars, or wanting a push on the swing, or wanting to play a word game with you.
“Popsicles!” Shotaro’s mom had stuck her head out the back door to call out.
The kids all immediately made a break for the house, forgetting their previous activities entirely. Finally, you were able to meander under the shade where the two men were reclined, watching all of you with amusement.
“Mayu giving you a workout, huh, Y/N?” The older gentleman chuckled.
You had a breathless grin on your face as you chuckled, “I don’t mind.”
“Here, Y/N,” Shotaro stood up, gesturing to the chair he’d just been sitting in for you. “I’ll grab you something cold to drink.”
“Oh, thanks, Taro.” You smiled at him softly, watching as he disappeared inside before gladly taking his seat.
“I remember when I used to be the one chasing you two around on that,” his father laughed, pointing at the playset.
“I’m amazed it’s held up this long.”
“Quality materials. They don’t make things like that anymore.” He tsked and shook his head.
“Yui has gotten so big. I still remember when she just a baby.”
“They only get bigger. I would know.” There was a twinkle in his eye as he looked at you. “Even if they promise you they won’t.”
You pointed to yourself questioningly. “Wait, did I say that?”
“Mhm. Oh, it was back when I could still pick you up with just one hand.”
You let out a sputtering laugh. “Oops.”
“Ah, it’s alright.” He grinned. “You’ve grown up so well, Y/N. We’re proud of you, you know?”
That made you falter for a second, the indifferent way that you were brushed off before too fresh of a memory still. But the sound of the back door opening brought you back to the reality of where you were, and so you smiled and nodded, replying graciously, “Thank you.”
He stood up with a grunt then, announcing, “I’ve been sitting too long. Doctor says I need to move around, for my back.” And with a fond pat on your head on his way into the house, he left just you and Shotaro on the patio.
Shotaro handed you one of the two sweating glasses in his hands, then took the empty chair beside you.
“This was nice of you,” you commented, eyes following a cloud’s path across the sky.
“You haven’t taken a sip yet, I could’ve put soy sauce in that,” he joked.
“No, I mean for you to come all the way back for Yui’s birthday,” you clarified. Taking a swig of the admittedly refreshing water, you decided to finally address what the both of you had been blatantly ignoring this whole time. Looking over at him, you asked plainly, “When are you leaving?”
Shotaro’s grip tightened on his cup, and his throat bobbed as he swallowed the gulp of water he’d just drank. He set his drink on the ground, running one of his hands through his hair. “I-I’m not. I…”
“You’re staying?” You asked, throat going tight at just the prospect. But the pained, guilty look on his face was making you uneasy. “Shotaro, what’s going on?”
“When I left, when my plane touched down, there was nobody waiting for me. I called the office there, everybody in Italy I possibly could,” he confessed, digging his thumbnail into a loose flap of skin by his nail. “Finally, I called Mr. Shin from the office here on his cell. Don’t even know what time it was, but thank God he picked up, made some more calls. Three hours after I landed, I found out the entire office in Italy wasn’t happening, the company was downsizing, and I no longer had a job at all.” He laughed sharply at that, tearing off some of his cuticle. “Mr. Shin helped cover my hotel that night—I think from his own money because he felt so bad for me—and I paid for my own ticket back.”
“Oh my God, Taro…” Your hand covered your open mouth as you stared at him, chest squeezing with the belated horror of finding out what he’d been going through just hours after you’d wished him well. “You could’ve called me…”
“I wanted to, so bad. All alone in that airport, I’d never wanted to see you, talk to you, so much in my life. Hear you tell me it’d be okay,” he blubbered, openly crying now, pushing the backs of his hands against his eyes in a futile attempt to stop the tears that ran down his cheeks. Shaking his head, he said, “But after everything… I didn’t want you to feel like a safety net. Like I was only coming back to you because it didn’t work out.”
“I can appreciate that you were respecting my space at the time but… that’s exactly what I was supposed to be, Taro. Not a second choice, but a safe place for you. Your first choice when you’re struggling, the first person you turn to. Just like you were for me.” Your vision was blurry, tears gathering at your waterline as you were both hurting for Shotaro and lamenting the past seven months that you had lost with him. “That’s the whole point, to rely on each other like we’d always done. You going away was never supposed to be permanent anyway, remember? This was always temporary. You just came back a lot sooner than we expected.” You couldn’t keep the pain and confusion from your voice as you asked, “Why didn’t you tell me? Why-Why did you hide it from me for so long? For this whole week?”
“I’m so sorry. I was just—I was so ashamed… I’d given you up for nothing and was unemployed and had to move back in with my parents and I just… couldn’t tell you. And the longer it went on, the harder it felt to do anything. I wanted to be ready, at least have a job, to have something to show you for all of this when I finally saw you again but… I have nothing.” His voice cracked over the word ‘nothing’. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry I left, and I’m sorry I lied, and I’m sorry I still don’t—”
“You don’t have nothing. You still have you. That’s what I’ve been missing this whole time—my Taro.” You swallowed against the heavy, sharp lump in your throat, wondering how he could’ve even gotten all this so twisted in his head. “Stop… punishing yourself on my behalf, please. I don’t want that. You’re not in that airport anymore, you’re home.”
“It didn’t feel like it until I saw you again. The other day,” he admitted quietly.
“I think we both need time to really talk and stuff,” you said softly. “But I never gave up on our plan.”
Shotaro looked over at you, utter shock on his face. His wide eyes were red from crying, still glistening with tears, his hair stuck up at odd angle from running his fingers through it, and one of his ears was bright pink from nervously tugging at it. “The plan…”
“You’re back. I don’t think we can exactly just press play like we planned, but… we can take it slow. Talk. Hang out.”
He quite literally threw himself at your feet, knees impacting with the patio pavers with a painful thunk and he rushed to clasp your hand between both of his, pressing his forehead against it.
“Oh my god, Shotaro, are you okay?” You sputtered, resting your free hand on his hair. “Your knees—that sounded like it hurt.”
“Thank you, thank you,” he breathed out.
“Okay, you can—”
The back door was thrown open then, startling you, accompanied by a loud voice, “Did you seriously just propose?! On my birthday?!”
“Mayu!” Their mother came by, grabbing the girl by the arm and pulling her back indoors. “I told you to stay inside!”
She didn’t even look at you as she slammed the back door shut, but the muffled sounds of her continuing to scold Mayu were audible. You and Shotaro made eye contact, immediately breaking into laughter. He let go of your hand to fall back onto his butt, covering his face and shaking his head.
“Nosy ass kid,” he snickered, dabbing at his drying eyes.
“She was so offended you were trying to steal her spotlight.”
“Does she seriously think I’d propose like this?” He gestured to his current casual attire of shorts and a t-shirt. “She really thinks the worst of me.”
You snickered, getting to your feet and offering him a hand up. “Come on, I heard there were popsicles inside.”
He put his hands in yours to let you pull him up. “Good idea.”
[you: im going to kick your ass]
[jung sungchan 🥈: wtf why]
[you: SHOTARO WAS HERE THE WHOLE TIME AND YOU KNEW AND DIDN’T TELL ME]
[jung sungchan 🥈: HE TOLD ME NOT TO]
[jung sungchan 🥈: GO KICK HIS ASS NOT MINE]
[you: IM GONNA KICK BOTH YOUR ASSES]
“I kept telling him to tell you,” Sungchan defended himself through a mouthful of popcorn, long legs taking up your entire couch.
“You didn’t think to tell me yourself anyway?” You scoffed, smacking his shins indicatively.
He scooted up, swinging his legs off the cushions to make room even as he kept bickering with you. “And how do you think that would’ve ended for me?”
Shotaro entered from your kitchen then, another bowl of popcorn in his hands, and plopped down in between you two. He had a wide smile on his face as he shook his head fondly, “I missed this.”
“What? Y/N running her big fucking mouth all the time?” Sungchan snorted.
“Oh you—” You reached over Shotaro to smack the back of Sungchan’s neck. “Asshole!”
“Yeah,” Shotaro laughed, holding his popcorn up so it didn’t spill as Sungchan tried to catch your arm, but you jerked it out of the way before he could. “I missed that.”
“I already said sorry, damn,” Sungchan huffed. “What more do you want from me? To grovel at your feet?”
“Taro did.”
Sungchan looked at his friend in disbelief. “Dude, seriously?”
“Yup.” Shotaro shrugged and picked up the remote. “Who’s picking?”
As you watched the first movie, you filched popcorn off Shotaro, not hungry enough to make your own bowl. After the popcorn was gone, you looped your arm through his under the blanket you were sharing, leaning your head on his shoulder.
The air was turning crisp with the approach of fall, the leaves of Shotaro’s neighbor’s tree changing into brilliant hues of yellows and reds and oranges and falling over the fence into their backyard. The two of you were sat on his family’s patio after a family dinner that you’d been invited to. Mayu had homework to finish, you had already helped his mother with the clean-up from dinner, and the cold wasn’t good for his father’s back, so it was just the two of you.
“After you left—or I thought you left—I tried asking your parents if I could come by for dinner, or take Mayu out. They kept… finding reasons to say no, so I eventually stopped asking,” you stated into the silence. Turning to look at Shotaro, you asked, “Was that because of you? Because you didn’t want me realizing that you were here?”
He nodded, the regret plain on his face. “Yes. I’m sorry, Y/N. I-I told them to say no. I hurt all of you, I’m sorry.”
“Have you talked to them?”
He shook his head. You stood up, tilting your head towards the door. “Come on.”
His mother was sitting on the couch, a book in her hand as her husband sat beside her, faintly snoring. She looked up at the two of you with interest as you approached her.
“Hey, Mom. You guys got a second?” Shotaro asked.
She bookmarked her page, nodding. “Of course, hon.” Then, she lightly smacked her husband on the chest with her paperback. “Wake up.”
He sat up with a start. “Mm? I was just resting my eyes.”
“I missed you guys, a lot,” you said first. “Thank you for… letting me back in, no questions.”
“Oh, sweetheart,” Shotaro’s dad patted your head. “You’ve always been one of ours.”
“We missed you too, hon.” His mom grabbed your hand tightly. “I’m sorry we-we turned you away—”
“No, Mom,” Shotaro cut off her apology. “I’m sorry for making you do that just because I couldn’t tell her the truth. I shouldn’t have made you lie too.”
She smiled, taking her son’s hand in her free one. “Thank you, Shotaro.”
Mayu’s room was next, and you knocked on the ajar door to get the girl’s attention. She picked her head up from where it had been laying on her workbook, watching her pencil scratch across the paper.
“How’s your homework going, Yui?” You questioned knowingly.
“Boring!” She huffed, dropping her cheeks into her palms. “I already know all this stuff, but I have to do it anyway.”
“So, can you take a break for a minute to chat with us?”
“Please!” She slammed her workbook closed and stood up from her desk.
Her bed was a little small for all three of you, but you squeezed on anyway, knees bumping knees as you faced each other.
“I love you bunches, you know that, right, Yui?” You started again.
She nodded.
“I’m sorry I didn’t come hang out with you for so long,” you sighed. “That must’ve been confusing and sad, right?”
Mayu’s face turned pensive as she nodded slower this time. “Shotaro kept telling me you were busy. I-I tried not to be sad, but I was sometimes.”
“I’m sorry, Mayu,” Shotaro said firmly. “I lied to you, and I shouldn’t have. It was wrong. Y/N wasn’t busy. She tried to come see you lots of times, but I said no. I’m so, so sorry.”
“Why would you do that?!” Mayu’s eyes filled with tears as she yelled at her brother. “You’re the worst! Get out of my room!”
“Mayu—”
“Get out!” She screeched, this time planting two hands on his chest and pushing firmly. While she didn’t actually exert much force on him, he held his hands up in surrender and climbed off her bed.
“Okay. I’m sorry,” he offered one last apology as he retreated from the room.
Once it was just the two of you, you asked her quietly, “Do you want some time alone?”
“No, don’t go again!” She threw herself across your lap.
“I’m right here,” you assured her, patting her back. “Talk to me. What are you thinking? Feeling?”
“Why would he do that?” She mumbled against your leg. “He lied…”
“He did,” you agreed patiently. “You don’t have to forgive him right now, you can still feel mad. But he did give a good apology, whenever you’re ready for it.”
“Why did he lie? Why did he tell me you were busy?”
You sighed, combing your fingers through her hair. “He did something wrong with me too. But we talked about it, and he told me the truth and apologized, like he just did right now, and I forgave him.”
“Why?”
“Why did I forgive him?”
“Yeah. He’s an adult. He shouldn’t—He should know.”
You smiled softly, still running your fingers through her hair. “Adults make mistakes too. We’re all learning how to be people, for our whole lives. What’s important is what you do once you make a mistake.”
Mayu rolled over in your lap, pouting up at you. “Do I have to forgive him?”
“Well, no. Nobody’s going to force you to accept his apology,” you informed her. “But you also have to think about what you gain from being mad at him forever versus forgiving him. Sometimes you don’t forgive people for them, you forgive them for you.”
Her brow furrowed thoughtfully. “What?”
“Sometimes when you forgive someone, it makes them feel better, but it makes you feel bad. Sometimes it makes both of you feel better. You won’t always know what’ll happen, but in this case, do you think you’ll be very happy being mad at your brother about this forever?”
Her face relaxed more as she thought this through, then determined, “Well… no.”
“You don’t have to do it right now, you can keep feeling mad tonight if that’s how you’re feeling.” You patted her tummy. “But when you’re ready, you should tell Shotaro.”
“I’ll do it tomorrow.” She let out a remarkably big sigh for an eight-year-old. “I have to finish my homework.”
[taro 🤎: outside]
As soon as Shotaro’s text lit up your screen, you saved your document and hurried down from your floor. Sure enough, he was standing in front of the door to your office building, large bag of food in hand. He offered you a big smile upon spotting you, lifting his free hand in greeting.
“Oh, you’re a lifesaver, Taro,” you gushed, taking the bag from him and throwing your other arm around his neck. “The board just dropped this on us last minute—”
“Hey, don’t worry about it,” he assured you, rubbing your back. “Anytime, Y/N.”
“I’ve got to go. Thank you, thank you!” You pecked his cheek before rushing back inside, throwing a final wave over your shoulder to him.
After badging in at the security desk up front, you returned to your team, bag of food victoriously clutched in your hand. They all let out groans of appreciation at the sight, the mood of the entire conference room immediately lifting. You had placed the online order with a company credit card, and Shotaro came in clutch by picking it up and hand-delivering it himself—the restaurant didn’t offer delivery and you couldn’t spare any employee just to go on a food errand, under too tight of a deadline. As you passed out everyone’s orders and utensils, they expressed their own gratitude.
“Your boyfriend grabbed this, Y/N?” Ahrin questioned through a mouthful of food. “Marry that man.”
“Wait, I thought he was out of the country?” Junhyuk looked up from his laptop. “Why did I think he was in another country?”
“No, he was definitely abroad,” Risa confirmed, then turned her attention to you. “Is he back?”
“Yeah, he’s back.” You focused on opening your own container of food. “And that’s all the time we have to spend on something other than this project. So let’s get back to work!”
“I can’t believe he was here the whole time,” Sooyoung gasped in disbelief, continuing to sort out the supplies for activity bags with you. “And that you just forgave him.”
You rolled your eyes—not that your friend’s reaction wasn’t warranted, but the fact that you had heard this plenty of time already from pretty much everyone you’d told about Shotaro’s unexpected return to your life was getting old. “He suffered plenty for those seven months. It wouldn’t make me feel any better to continue punishing him myself.”
Usually you didn’t come in on the weekends as a volunteer—only paid employees of the organization came in outside of normal operating hours. But next week was fall break for the schools in the area, meaning that many of the kids that the after-school program served would need somewhere to go that wasn’t their home or school, so there was extra preparation to do in order to accommodate them. So you were here on a Saturday morning aiding in those preparations. Assembling activity kits, stocking up on snacks and lunches, cleaning, making sure everything was together for the expanded hours.
“Has he found a job yet?” She questioned pointedly.
“No. Job market sucks. He’s applied to plenty that he’s overqualified for, and they either never get back to him, send him a rejection weeks or months later, or ask him to come in for an interview then tell him they’re going in a different direction.” You sighed bitterly. “He’s been trying to keep himself busy helping his family out, and he does all sorts of community service stuff too, but I know he’s still kicking himself over it.”
“What sort of work does he do?”
“Logistics. He’s got an engineering degree, and he was a project manager at his last company. They hand-picked him to help open a new office abroad, for fuck’s sake! And somehow he’s apparently unhireable! I just don’t get it,” you ranted. “I’ve even tried finding him something at my company, but none of our departments are hiring.”
Sooyoung frowned. “I thought engineering was supposed to be one of those degrees that you’re like, guaranteed to be employable.”
“Me too.” You tossed the finished activity bag into the pile and started packing up the next one. “Even those jobs where they just want you to have any degree—nothing. Today’s his birthday, so I’m going to take him out and try to get his mind off it at least.”
“You know… my sister-in-law works at a shipping company. I can ask her if they might have something,” your friend offered.
You sat up straight. “Really?”
“Of course. Can you get me Shotaro’s CV?”
“Hey,” Shotaro greeted you casually as he climbed into your car that afternoon.
“Happy birthday!” You leaned over the center console to wrap your arms around him.
He beamed, immediately returning the hug. “Thanks, Y/N.”
As you pulled away from his house, he asked, “So are you going to let me know where you’re taking me?”
“Nope. Birthday surprise.”
“Alright, alright.” He leaned back in the passenger seat, humming along to the song playing over your speakers. You turned it up, both of you belting out the familiar song, a favorite of yours from high school. As you navigated onto the highway, you didn’t think twice about reaching for his hand that was resting on his leg.
Several hours later, you pulled into the only parking spot you could find on the busy main street. Shotaro gave you a strange look as you turned the car off and unlocked the doors. He got out with you, squinting against the sun as he looked around. You pulled him by the hand around the corner to your actual destination, which had a line in front of it.
His jaw dropped as he looked at you in horror. “You’re trying to poison me on my birthday?”
“It’s under new management!” You pleaded with him through giggles. “All the recent reviews are really, really good!”
You had, in fact, taken him to the very same bakery that he had convinced you to go to in undergrad, where the two of you had tried to worst pastries known to man. You’d looked it up again the other day on a whim, and found out that it had changed hands since your last visit and was now receiving high praise on the quality of their food, not just presentation.
A fond smile overtook his face, and he nodded. “Well, it’s either going to be really good, or we just wasted our day on a wild goose chase again. And I can’t think of a better way to spend my birthday than on a wild goose chase with you.”
Snaking your arms around his waist, you leaned your weight against him affectionately. The words you wanted to say got stuck behind your teeth, so you swallowed them back down, and instead mumbled, “Happy birthday, Taro.”
He held you to him, murmuring back, “Thank you for being here.”
Leaving the bakery with your box of assorted pastries after quite some time, you opted to sit in your car and eat them—the bakery didn’t have any seating, and all the tables on the sidewalk outside were taken up. Each of you with a piece of pastry in hand, you exchanged an apprehensive look, then simultaneously popped it in your mouth. To your delighted surprise, not only was it edible, but it was also delicious. Perfectly flaky, buttery, and sweet. Making eye contact with Shotaro again, you snorted, both of you nearly choking on your food as you had the same looks of shock and awe on your features—wide eyes and puffed-up cheeks. Covering your mouths as you simultaneously tried not to choke and not spit crumbs on each other, you fumbled for your water bottle that was on the floor of the passenger seat. Shotaro passed it to you even through his coughing fit. After gulping down a few sips to clear the pastry from your esophagus, you offered it to him. He took it gratefully, also drinking from it.
“That was good,” you deadpanned.
“Yeah, before we almost died.” He punctuated his words with another cough.
“That wasn’t the croissant’s fault.”
“Strawberry tart next?”
Stopping in the courtyard out front of your office building, you smoothed down the lapels of Shotaro’s suit and adjusted his bangs fondly. He’d gotten a haircut, the brunette strands now cropped back above his ears again. “Good luck,” you kissed his cheek. “You’re going to do great.”
He was interviewing at Sooyoung’s sister-in-law’s company this morning, the headquarters of which happened to be a couple blocks away from your office, so he commuted into the office district with you. Shotaro offered you a smile, “Hey, I’ve done so many of these, I’m a pro at interviewing. I’ll practically be interviewing them instead of the other way around.”
But the way he tugged on his ear belied his nerves. Taking his face between your hands, you looked him in the eye seriously, “They’d be lucky to have you. You’ve just got to show them that. Call me after, I’ve got a light day, we can get lunch. Okay?”
“Sounds good. Thanks, Y/N.”
“I’ll let you go. Don’t want to make you late.” You gave his cheek one more affectionate pat then released him. “See you in a bit.”
“See you. Bye.” He reached for your hand, giving it one final squeeze before heading off. You waved after him until he disappeared into the crowd of salarymen and women bustling to their own jobs.
Thankfully, you really did have a light day, as all morning you were as nervous as if you were the one who was interviewing for a new job. Every few minutes, you checked your phone to see if you had anything from Shotaro. He texted you when he arrived at the company headquarters, but it was silence since then. It had been some time since you’d interviewed for your own job, but you’d done plenty of interviewing to hire employees in your own department and you never kept prospective hires for this long. Surely that had to be a good sign, right? If they didn’t like him, it would’ve been short.
Finally, your phone buzzed with an incoming call from Shotaro.
“Hey.” You hoped you didn’t sound too eager as you picked up. “All done?”
“Yeah, yeah.” You tried to keep your hopes in check, but he sounded almost… cheery. “Ready for lunch?”
“Of course.”
“I’ll meet you outside your building.”
Shotaro came around the corner at a brisk walk, hands in the pockets of his slacks. You went up to meet him, searching his face for any clue of how it went.
“That was a long interview,” you commented, testing the waters. “What sort of gauntlet did they put you through?”
“I interviewed with the hiring manager first, then she asked if I had time to wait for one of the Divisions Directors to finish a meeting to talk to him some more. His meeting ended up going longer than they expected, but I didn’t really have anything better to do so—” He shrugged. “And then he came in with the Senior Operations Manager and I interviewed with all three of them.”
“So they did put you through a gauntlet.”
“Where are we eating?”
“Uh, there’s a place down the street.” You pointed, starting to lead the way. “Did you like the company?”
“It’s the sort of thing that I was doing before. And—” He pulled one of his hands out of his pockets, a folded piece of paper secured between two fingers. He held it out to you as his face finally split into a wide grin. “They gave me a written offer on the spot.”
You snatched the paper from him, unfolding it to read over the details, feeling as your eyes went wider and wider with each number. “Holy—Taro…”
“More than I was getting before,” he said giddily. “Their Senior Operations Manager is retiring at the end of the year. They hadn’t started looking for his replacement yet when they got my résumé. Good timing, huh?”
“Oh!” You launched yourself at him, practically bouncing up and down in place with him in your arms. “I’m so happy for you! God, I’m so proud of you!”
“I can’t… say thank you enough,” he breathed out next to your ear. “And if I try right now I’m going to cry on this sidewalk.”
You laughed, pulling away to fold his offer back up and tuck it inside his suit jacket. “We’re getting lunch right now! Tears later!”
His laughter followed you as you grabbed him by the elbow and tugged him down the street again.
“First day of work tomorrow,” you reminded Shotaro with a smile, taking a bite of the takeout he’d brought over. “Excited?”
“Yeah, I am.” He pushed his food around in the container. “I’ve been thinking about something.”
“Mm, go for it,” you prompted him, lifting your drink to your lips.
“I know we’ve been hanging out and stuff again, and I’ll never stop being in awe at the fact that you even agreed to do this,” he began, making you quirk up an eyebrow in part-amusement and part-curiosity at what could come next. “But once I get my first paycheck, I want to take you on a real date again.”
You smiled, even as you shook your head, taking his hand in yours. “Shotaro, that’s really sweet, but you’re just getting back on your feet after this long. You need to focus on yourself. We went on dates before either of us had money, too.”
He ran his thumb over the back of your fingers, eyes focused on your connected hands. “I-I know. But I just want to feel like a real person again.”
You could see how important this was to him, and so you acquiesced with one condition, “Okay. Nothing fancy.”
Movie and dinner was your date after Shotaro’s first paycheck (as opposed to dinner and a movie, as this was clearly the superior order in yours and Shotaro’s opinion, so you could talk about the movie while you ate dinner). The movie was some new release that neither of you were particularly invested in, but you would honestly watch anything as long as Shotaro kept his arm resting behind you, fingertips tracing up and down your arm. As always, you had plenty to talk about as you ate after, either about the movie, the other patrons in the theater, or anything else that popped into your minds, feet bumping into each other under the table every so often.
Walking around after dinner and swinging your linked hands between you, Shotaro stated humorously, “You know, I’ve been wracking my brain all night, and I can’t for the life of me remember what our actual first date was.”
“Well—” You snickered. “Guess you’ve got to decide what counts as a date. The first thing we called a date? Yeah, I have no clue.”
“That’s true. Everything was just always so…”
“Easy.”
“I was going to say unanimous, but damn, tell me what you really think about me, Y/N.”
“I didn’t mean it like that!” You insisted through laughter, patting him on the chest. “I meant the same thing as you: We were always on the same page without talking about it. So like, yeah, I don’t remember the first thing we called a date. I also don’t remember when our hang-outs turned into dates before that, either.”
He tsked, “Did I ever even ask you to be my girlfriend?”
“I think we just started calling each other that one day.” You shrugged. “You’re my person, always have been, always will. I don’t think ‘boyfriend’ covers anything more than that to me.”
“Your person,” he echoed, tightening his grasp on your hand. “Yeah. You’ll always have me, Y/N.”
“Hey,” you said softly. “Walk me home?”
At your front door, you stuck your key in then let your keychain dangle, turning back to Shotaro. “Want to come in? It’s Friday, no work tomorrow.”
He smiled, nodding, “Of course.”
Pulling him in by the hand, you had barely shut the door when you had him pushed back against it. Taking a moment to do up your deadbolt next to his shoulder, you smiled at him sweetly. “I missed you, Shotaro.”
You watched his throat bob as he gulped, his hands hovering over your hips. “I missed you, too.”
“We’ve been really good about taking this slow,” you hummed. And you really were—nothing more than a chaste kiss on the cheek or a hug since his sister’s party, to let your thoughts and feelings have room to breathe and really clear the air between you first. The air was plenty clear now, in your opinion. Staring right into his dark eyes, you asked, “Do you still want to go slow? Do you need more time?”
“No, fuck, I need you. I—” That was all you needed to hear, lunging forward to kiss him with enough force that his head made a dull thunk against the door, but he didn’t complain. The kiss almost immediately softened, an unspoken but understood exchanging of too many lost weeks of tenderness, hands roaming with both the easy familiarity of a longtime lover and the uncertain wonderment of a new one. Shotaro kissed you with no urgency, as if the Earth itself were standing still for you at this moment, lips moving against yours sweetly, romantically, in such a way that filled your veins with sticky honey and forced you to slow down to match his pace. Your head was spinning when he moved on to dusting featherlight kisses under your jaw and over your pulse before returning to your lips. One of his hands caught yours that was gripping his tricep, lacing your fingers together, allowing you to feel the warmth of his palm against yours.
Both of you knew this apartment like the back of your hand, and had plenty of experience navigating it like this, locked together, fumbling at zippers and buttons. Shotaro stopped just short of your bed, chest heaving, and pressed a long kiss to your forehead. Your fingers played with the hem of his shirt that you were about to take off, eyes fluttering shut. When he drew back, you looked at him in a wordless question.
“I love you,” he said the words like he was forcing himself to not just blurt them all out in a rush. “You don’t have to say it back right now, but I wanted to. And I’m sorry if I like, ruined the mood, but I was looking at you and it just came out.”
“I love you too,” you breathed out, pulling his lips to yours again and again and again.
SUMMARY: When an ordinary girl transfers to the prestigious SMU on a full-ride scholarship, she instantly becomes the subject of campus curiosity. Among those intrigued is Chenle—a boy who has everything money can buy, yet finds himself longing for the one thing it can’t.
WC: 11.4k
GENRE: Romance, slow burn(they're both shit at communicating their feelings), college AU, fluff(Chenle yearns), angst, suggestive
WARNINGS: Suggestive content but no intercourse, cursing, insecurities
A/N: Hiii this is my first ever fic so I hope anyone who stumbles upon this enjoys. It's kinda bad. The pacing isn't great and it's rushed towards the end, sorry. Maybe I'll write more? Who knows
“There’s going to be a transfer student on Monday,” Renjun said casually, barely looking up from his phone.
“I heard she got in on a scholarship,” Yangyang added, popping another fry into his mouth.
Chenle raised an eyebrow.
Transfers weren’t unusual at SMU — not with everything the school had to offer. Anyone with the right connections or deep enough pockets fought to get in. But a scholarship student? That was something else.
SMU rarely handed out scholarships to begin with. A full ride? That was basically a myth.
“Do you know anything else? Like a name, maybe? I wonder if we’ll have any classes with her.”
At that, Chenle snapped out of his thoughts, glancing up expectantly.
“I think I heard her name’s Y/N,” Yangyang said, shrugging.
~
You were lucky enough to be offered a spot at SMU — but your own apartment just off campus, too? They were spoiling you… unless that was normal here.
This is weird, you thought. Are they going to stare at me? Will they be able to tell?
You already felt like you didn’t belong. But no matter — this opportunity was way too good to pass up.
You took a deep breath before setting off.
As you stepped onto campus, you could only stare in amazement. The place was massive. Gleaming buildings, manicured lawns, and way too many people who looked like they belonged in magazines. You were completely distracted when you suddenly bumped into someone.
“I’m so sorry! I wasn’t looking where I was going — I’m so sorry,” you blurted out, frantically apologizing.
Then you looked up.
Holy shit, she’s gorgeous, you thought.
She let out a small laugh. “Don’t worry about it. You’re the new transfer student, right?”
You nodded.
She gave you a warm smile. “How about I show you around? SMU is huge — I don’t think anyone’s ever ready.”
That put you at ease.
“I’m Joy, by the way,” she said, holding out her hand.
“Oh — I’m Y/N,” you replied, shaking her hand a bit awkwardly.
~
Joy showed you around campus — where your classes were, the cafeteria, and all the other important spots. Now the two of you were sitting outside, chatting like old friends.
You found out Joy was a graduate student here.
No wonder she knew the campus so well.
“Let me know if you ever need anything. I can give you my number,” she offered with a smile.
“Actually, that would be great — if you don’t mind,” you replied.
The two of you exchanged numbers.
“Perfect! I’ll see you around then? Good luck with your classes on Monday.”
And just like that, you were alone.
To be completely honest, you hadn’t expected to meet someone so… nice.
Not to stereotype, but you kind of expected the super rich to look down on you like some kind of ant.
Then again, maybe you just got lucky with Joy.
Whatever.
You weren’t here to make friends anyway. It’s not like you had the luxury of free time to hang out. You were here to work — to prove yourself.
Being on scholarship meant you couldn’t afford to slip. Not even a little.
With that reminder echoing in your head, you headed back to your apartment to prepare for Monday.
~
You woke up way too early.
Anxiety had made it nearly impossible to sleep, so here you were — getting ready two hours before your first class.
You showered, did your skincare, makeup, got dressed, ate breakfast — and now you were sitting at your desk, staring down your class schedule like it was a final exam.
In your mind, you traced the campus map again and again, rehearsing the route to each classroom.
You barely recognized yourself in the mirror.
You looked good.
Not that you were ever unkempt, but at a regular college, you would’ve rolled out in sweats and a messy bun without a second thought.
But this was SMU.
These people came from families with butlers.
They walked around casually sporting designer bags worth more than your entire savings account.
They belonged to country clubs and never had to glance at the price tag — because the price didn’t matter.
Everything about them was polished. Perfectly manicured nails, flawless skin, not a single hair out of place.
You’d never been one to care much about appearances — but here?
You couldn’t afford to look like a troll and risk sticking out even more than you already did.
First impressions mattered.
As much as you hated to admit it.
~
Chenle didn’t expect to run into you.
Honestly, he hadn’t expected anything. He didn’t know what you looked like, your major, your schedule — just your first name, mentioned in passing. That was it.
But when he saw you, he knew.
It had to be you.
A face he didn’t recognize — and he would’ve remembered a face as beautiful as yours.
You were standing alone, nervously tucking your hair behind your ear as you waited for the professor to show up and unlock the classroom. Early.
Of course you were. With a scholarship on the line, he figured you’d be the type to show up early.
Chenle cleared his throat and glanced away. “Let’s get going,” he said quickly, changing the subject.
And technically, they did need to go — their English class was down the hall.
~
“He was deep in it! I had to nudge him, man,” Renjun said, recounting what happened earlier.
“He looked totally love-struck, I’m telling you.”
Chenle groaned. “I did not! I was just surprised to see her, that’s all.”
“Mhm, suuure. And that surprise somehow turned into full-on googly eyes?” Renjun shot back, smug.
Chenle facepalmed.
“So that means she’s pretty, right?” Mark chimed in, stuffing his mouth with fries. “I’ve never seen Chenle show any interest in a girl.”
“You make it sound like he’s gay…” Jisung muttered.
“Oh yeah, she’s really pretty,” Renjun confirmed, reaching for a fry.
“Can we get a description?” Jisung asked, eyes curious. “I wanna know what the scholarship girl looks like.”
“You should ask Chenle,” Renjun said, grinning. “I’m sure he got a good look. Isn’t that right, Chenle?”
He raised his voice on purpose, drawing a few glances from nearby tables.
Chenle gave him a little shove. “Knock it off.”
He paused for a second, then muttered, “I don’t know what to say… She just looked—pretty.”
~
Your first day of classes had gone surprisingly well.
No one gave you a hard time — just a few curious glances here and there. Of course people stared; it was only natural. You didn’t blame them. Still, it made your nerves buzz.
Now, you were sitting outside the campus café, nursing a hot cup of coffee. You needed this.
The warmth seeped into your chest, and for the first time all day, you felt alive again. Hopefully, it would be enough to power you through your evening study session.
You reviewed your notes carefully, highlighting with meticulous focus.
Somewhere along the line, two hours slipped by — but at least you felt confident with the material.
As you packed up your bag, you debated grabbing another drink to-go.
“Wow, she is really pretty,” someone said — loud enough for you to catch.
Your head turned instinctively. A group of guys sat a few tables away.
They quickly looked away when your eyes met theirs.
Awkward.
Not in the mood for weird tension, you got up and headed inside — mostly to escape.
You were just about to tap your card when someone stepped up behind you.
“Hey — I’ve got it,” a voice said, smoothly tapping his own card before you could react.
Black. Of course. Of course students here have black cards.
“Hey, uh… you didn’t have to do that,” you said, turning around.
It was one of the guys from outside. He ran a hand through his hair, eyes darting away from yours.
“Take it as an apology,” he said. “Sorry about earlier. My friends are idiots. I’m Chenle.”
He offered a small, sheepish smile.
You returned it. “I’m Y/N. And… thanks. Really. You didn’t have to pay.”
A pause. “Anyway… I should get going. But, um—thanks again, Chenle.”
And just like that, you were gone.
~
Your face is burning.
Oh god. That was so embarrassing.
Why were they even talking about you? Boys are so stupid!
Wait… they said you were pretty.
Which one of them said that??
Ugh — you’re never showing your face around them again. Ever.
Well… at least Chenle was nice.
And cute. Really cute.
No! What are you even thinking?
He was just being polite. That’s all. Polite and… cute. No—stop!
You groan into your hands.
You need to clear your head.
Boys are stupid. So stupid.
~
Chenle clicked his tongue in annoyance.
“You seriously couldn’t keep your mouth shut, huh?” he muttered, shooting daggers at Jisung — who was hunched over, dragging his feet like a guilty kid.
“I’m sorry… I didn’t know I was that loud,” Jisung mumbled.
Chenle wasn’t actually mad. Not really. He knew Jisung — clumsy, unaware, harmless. He hadn’t meant for any of it to unfold the way it did.
Renjun, as always, found the silver lining.
“On the bright side, you did get to talk to her, right? I think it worked out.”
“I paid for her coffee as an apology and she immediately left,” Chenle groaned, slumping into his seat. “She probably never wants to see any of our faces again.”
“Oof. That’s rough, man,” Mark said around a mouthful of fries. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you overthink like this. Or, honestly, care so much about someone’s opinion of you.”
“And yet…” Renjun grinned, smug. “It’s kinda cute. Chenle with a crush.”
Chenle buried his face in his hands.
“Can you guys not obsess over my love life and focus on your own, please?” he grumbled.
Everyone was curious about the new girl — that was normal. He was just… curious too. That’s all it was. Totally normal. Not weird.
Right?
Even so, Chenle wasn’t sure anymore. Because when she smiled at him — even for just a second — it kind of messed with his whole system.
~
It’s been a couple months since you transferred to SMU, and surprisingly… things have gone pretty well.
You’re excelling in your classes, you found a tutoring job at the library, and best of all — the scholarship program at SMU truly pulled through. Housing, textbooks, food — completely covered. But hey, a girl has other needs too.
You're not living lavishly like most students here, but you still like to treat yourself now and then. There’s a Chagee that just opened near campus — and you’ve already decided that’ll be your next little splurge.
The thought alone makes you grin like a kid.
“What’s got you so smiley?” Winter asks, eyeing you with amused suspicion.
“Just thinking about my next sweet treat,” you reply dreamily.
You skip ahead a step like you’re on a sugar high already, and Winter and Karina burst into laughter at your antics.
You’re happy. Genuinely happy.
Maybe you’d watched too many movies painting the ultra-rich as cold, judgmental snobs — but the people here have been nothing but kind. You’ve even made friends… something you hadn’t expected when you first arrived.
Karina and Winter are your closest. You’re all in the same English class and clicked fast. Joy, the grad student who first helped you settle in, still checks in now and then, though she’s busy. Always kind. Always warm.
Giselle and Ningning hang out with Karina and Winter too, though you’ve never really gotten close. Nothing bad — just different circles. They go to the frat parties together, while you usually stay in and study. You’ve always appreciated that no one ever pressured you.
Until now.
“You know… it’d be fun if you joined us one of these days,” Karina says casually.
You blink. “To… a party?”
She nods. “Yeah. You don’t have to or anything. But don’t you ever wanna dress up, dance a little, get a little wild?”
You hesitate. You know she means well. She always does. And okay… maybe it would be fun. But still.
“I just… I wouldn’t fit in,” you mumble. “I don’t have the clothes for that. I wouldn’t even know what to say to anyone. I’d make a fool of myself.”
“So that’s the problem?” Winter says, grinning like she’s already won.
“Girl. We’ve got more clothes than we know what to do with,” Karina adds.
“Oh my GOD — we could give you a makeover!” Winter practically screams, bouncing on the balls of her feet.
Karina rests a gentle hand on your shoulder, grounding the excitement. “You know we’re all just people, right? Yeah, there’s a class difference. So what? You’re our friend. That’s never mattered.”
You pause. Her words linger — warm and sincere.
Maybe you’ve been so busy proving yourself academically, you forgot it was okay to let loose every now and then. Maybe… just this once.
And that’s how you found yourself at Giselle’s apartment, standing in a pile of shoes, dresses, and makeup — four girls playing dress-up like it was prom night.
"I can’t believe you two actually got her to agree to this," Giselle said, hands on her hips as she scanned you from head to toe.
“I knew she’d crack one day,” Winter grinned smugly, tossing a wink your way.
“I’m really glad you’re coming out with us tonight,” Ningning added warmly.
Flash.
“Karinaaa, my eyes!” you whined, blinking as the camera flashed again.
“Sorry, sorry,” she laughed, snapping yet another picture. “I just had to capture the moment. It’s a big deal getting you out for once.”
“You’re such a mom, Rina.”
“Okay but seriously—Y/N,” Giselle said, giving you a once-over, “you look hot, babe. Like, damn.”
“She’s always been gorgeous,” Winter chimed in. “But this? All of the attention will be on you tonight.”
“That dress hugs your curves in all the right places,” Giselle added, whistling under her breath.
“What can I say?” Ningning shrugged proudly. “My closet’s full of gems.”
“Hey!” Ningning gasped, feigning offense — and the room broke into laughter.
You turned back to the mirror, studying the reflection staring back at you.
Your hair, your makeup, the perfect dress — everything was on point. The girls had really gone all out. For you.
You felt… beautiful. Confident. Seen.
And beyond that — you felt grateful. Even if the party ended up being a total disaster, this night already meant something. A version of you, the one who walked into SMU a few months ago, would never have imagined standing here like this — let alone laughing with this group of people.
Giselle and Ningning weren’t just Karina and Winter’s friends anymore. They were starting to feel like your friends too.
And for tonight… that was more than enough.
~
“Dude…”
Mark’s voice cut through the music, slow and slack-jawed.
Chenle barely glanced at him, answering with a distracted, “Hm?”
“Y/N’s here,” Mark said, eyes wide. “And she looks hot.”
That got his attention.
Chenle's head snapped up instantly — and sure enough, there you were.
Standing under the dim lights, framed by a golden hue, you looked ethereal. Dressed to the nines, glowing in a way that made the whole room blur. Your skin glowed like soft pearl under the flickering lights. Your smile—warm, effortless—was the kind that made time pause.
You were with Karina and Winter as always, but also Giselle and Ningning? Interesting, Chenle thought.
He couldn’t stop staring. You looked… happy. You were having fun, and that alone made something warm settle in his chest.
But the longer he looked, the more that warmth twisted into something else.
Other guys were noticing you too.
Chenle’s eyes scanned the room — subtle but sharp. He didn’t like the way some of them were looking at you. Like you were a prize. A shiny new toy to try and claim.
It made his jaw clench.
You weren’t some trend. You weren’t a challenge. You were you — thoughtful, sweet, sharp as hell. And they didn’t know the first thing about you.
He suddenly hated the idea of you standing here, radiant and unguarded, in a room full of people who didn’t deserve a second of your time.
You deserved so much better than that.
“This is your chance, man. Go talk to her — before someone else does,” Mark said, nudging Chenle with his elbow.
That last part hit its mark.
Chenle took a steadying breath, straightened his jacket, and crossed the room.
“Hey—Y/N, right?”
You looked up, and for a moment, your brain stalled. It was him — the guy who paid for your coffee. You hadn’t seen much of him since that day, but now that he was standing here again, you realized you hadn’t forgotten his face. Or his name.
“Yeah! And you’re Chenle, if I remember correctly?”
His grin stretched ear to ear. “That’s me. So… you enjoying the party? I don’t think I’ve ever seen you at one before.”
Before you could answer, Winter popped in beside you, clearly surprised. “Y/N… you know Chenle?”
The other girls turned their heads too, eyebrows raised.
“Not really,” you replied. “I met him on my first day. Just briefly.”
The girls shared a silent, knowing look — and then, as if by psychic girl code, they all wandered off to “give you space.”
You blinked after them. “What the—did they just abandon me?”
Chenle laughed. “I think that’s their way of being supportive.”
“Supportive of what?” you asked, but your smile gave you away.
He smiled right back. “Well… maybe of us getting to know each other.”
Your heart did a little flip.
“Oh, right,” you said, trying to sound casual. “Yeah, it’s actually my first time coming out to one of these. Parties aren’t really my thing.”
Chenle nodded. “I get that. It’s not really mine either, most of the time.”
You glanced around, at the music, the crowd, the flashing lights. “Still, I figured I’d see what I’ve been missing out on.”
“I’m really glad you did, Y/N,” Chenle said. His voice was soft, sincere.
You looked at him. He wasn’t teasing. He wasn’t trying too hard.
He meant it.
And for the first time that night, you were really, really glad you came.
~
You ended up spending the rest of the night talking to Chenle.
No drinks, no pressure. Just the two of you tucked away in a quiet corner of the party, trading stories over the music and occasional bursts of laughter.
You learned he’s a business major — “following in the family footsteps,” he’d said with a sheepish smile. Apparently, he’d released an album when he was a kid, and now he spends his downtime at the shooting range, cooking, or spoiling his dog, Daegal.
It was all surprisingly… normal. And easy. Talking to him felt effortless — like you’d known him longer than just a few hours.
By the time the party began to wind down, you were reluctant to leave.
“So… can I get your number?” he asked, casual and soft, like he was asking what your favorite color was.
You handed him your phone with a smile. “Sure.”
And just like that, you were friends.
Just friends.
He didn’t make a move. No flirtatious remarks. No “let me walk you home” or “we should hang out sometime.”
Just a warm smile and a “goodnight, Y/N.”
You sighed as you walked away, a small flutter of disappointment settling in your chest. Maybe he wasn’t interested like that.
Still… you couldn’t deny it — you had a new friend. A very handsome, charming, annoyingly easy-to-talk-to friend.
And somehow, that felt like the beginning of something.
Even if you weren’t sure what just yet.
~
It’s been a week since the party. The girls have asked about Chenle more times than you could count, but there wasn’t much to say. Despite exchanging numbers, he still hadn’t texted. A little disappointing, sure — but you had bigger things to worry about. Like the looming chemistry exam.
No party this weekend. Just studying.
The girls pouted dramatically but understood. You figured it was the perfect chance to check out the new Chagee near campus. It wasn’t far, so you packed up your bag and headed out — nearly getting hit by a very bold car while crossing the street.
By the time you made it, you were already feeling better. A little caffeine always helped. You scanned the menu, already halfway to a decision when—
“Y/N?” a familiar voice called.
You turned. Chenle.
He looked just as surprised as you felt. “Didn’t expect to see you here.”
“Same here,” you laughed. “I figured I needed a little pick-me-up before diving into the books.”
“Oh — chemistry, right? Jisung’s been freaking out about that exam, so I know it’s serious.” He offered a sympathetic smile. “Good luck.”
“Thanks, Chenle,” you said, smiling back.
You stepped up to the counter to place your order, reaching for your wallet — but the cashier waved you off.
“The guy before you already paid.”
You blinked, startled. Turning, you saw him at a nearby table, waving with a cheeky grin.
You made your way over. “You didn’t have to do that,” you said, pretending to pout. “You don’t even have anything to apologize for this time.”
Chenle chuckled. “Take it as a good luck gift. Maybe the milk tea will help you ace your exam.”
He was too nice. Ridiculously nice. Unfairly nice.
“Well… thank you. Again.” You gave him a small bow of your head, the drink warming your hands.
You started to gather your things. “I should head to the library.”
“Already?” he asked, sounding genuinely disappointed.
You hesitated. “Sorry, Chenle. But hey—feel free to text me sometime,” you said, giving him a small smile. A hopeful one.
“I will,” he said, without missing a beat.
Then, he looked you over. “Wait… did you walk here?”
You nodded. “It wasn’t that bad—”
“Nope. Absolutely not. I’m giving you a ride,” he said, already getting up.
You barely had time to protest before he was holding the door open to a black Porsche.
Oh.
You climbed in carefully, hyper-aware of everything you touched.
Chenle gave you a look, amused. “You can relax, you know. Put your feet up if you want. I won’t kick you out.”
He threw on a pair of black sunglasses before starting the engine like it was no big deal. Just another day.
What was a 20-minute walk turned into a six-minute drive.
When he parked, he got out… and walked around to open your door.
You stared for a second too long. What kind of guy does that anymore?
“Thanks again,” you said, stepping out.
He just smiled. “Anytime, Y/N. Really.”
~
Like he said he would, he did text you.
A day after the chemistry exam — which he probably remembered because of Jisung — a message popped up on your phone.
Chenle.
Hey, how’d that exam of yours go?
Simple. Straight to the point.
It went well, and that’s exactly what you told him.
Great job 👍
That was it.
And just like that, the conversation ended. Flat. Dull. Frustrating.
Because when you’re with him in person, everything clicks. It’s warm, easy, natural. You laugh without trying. He makes you feel seen.
But when you’re apart?
It’s like you barely exist.
He doesn’t avoid you — not at all. But he also doesn’t seek you out. He doesn’t ask to hang out. Doesn’t start a conversation unless there’s a reason. Maybe you’re just reading too much into it. You are just friends, after all.
You groan into your pillow, dragging it over your face like it could smother the thoughts away.
A guy is confusing you. A guy is distracting you.
You told yourself this semester would be about grades and scholarship requirements — not soft smiles and unread texts.
So why does it bother you so much?
~
It’s now your second semester at SMU.
You’ve grown to really like it here — something you didn’t expect when you first arrived, nervous and unsure. You’re now an occasional frat party attendee, which, honestly, feels like a plot twist.
Your circle has expanded beyond Karina, Winter, Giselle, and Ningning. You’ve become friends with some of Chenle’s friends too. Jisung, Yangyang, even Renjun and Mark.
You’ve adjusted well. You’re proud of yourself.
Balancing school and a social life is no joke, but you’ve found your rhythm. You’re focused, organized, and maybe a little bit unstoppable.
Which is why you’re totally caught off guard when—
You blink, caught mid-scroll on your laptop. “Uhh… I haven’t really been paying attention.”
“Bull. Shit.” Giselle calls from the kitchen without even looking up.
The others don’t say anything — but their smirks say it all.
“Look,” you sigh, “Chenle doesn’t see me like that. We’re just friends. Like how I’m friends with Jisung and Yangyang.”
“Except,” Giselle interrupts, “you’re not with Jisung and Yangyang 24/7. You’re with Chenle. Always.”
“You guys go grocery shopping together,” Winter says, raising a brow. “Grocery shopping, y/n. Be serious.”
“And he takes you out for dinner every Friday night,” Karina adds, arms crossed like she’s been waiting for this moment.
“It’s our weekly dinner to celebrate surviving the week,” you argue. “I was getting super stressed and he suggested it — it’s not romantic.”
“He suggested a weekly dinner to help you decompress,” Giselle repeats. “And pays. Every time. You’re not clocking this?”
“I try to pay!” you exclaim.
“And why doesn’t he let you?” Winter teases. “Face it, babe — he likes you.”
You shake your head. “Guys. It’s really not like that.”
“Okay,” Ningning finally speaks, calm and collected. “But if it were like that… would you be interested?”
The room goes quiet. Your mouth opens, then closes.
You don’t answer — not out loud.
But your silence?
It speaks volumes.
Ningning smirks. “Thought so.”
~
That conversation’s been living rent-free in your head.
Ningning’s words won’t stop echoing:
“But if it were like that… would you be interested?”
Would you?
You already know the answer.
And so do the girls.
But you don’t want to think about it. You don’t want to indulge the idea.
Because that’s when things get weird. Complicated.
And you like the rhythm you’ve built — safe, steady, simple.
If you let yourself feel more, everything might shift. And then what?
He’s a distraction. A nice one — maybe the nicest.
But a distraction nonetheless.
You’ve worked too hard to get here. You have goals. Focus.
You can’t afford to get swept up in someone like—
Your phone buzzes.
Chenle.
You busy?
You glance at the time. 4:28 PM on a Sunday.
Not exactly.
I'm outside.
You shoot up from your bed like you’ve been electrocuted and practically trip over yourself running to the window.
You fling it open.
“WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE??” you shout, bewildered.
Chenle looks up, grinning like a cat who knows exactly what he’s doing.
“Let’s go shopping. Hurry up!”
You blink at him, stunned. He’s wearing sunglasses and a hoodie like this is the most casual thing in the world.
You look like death. Hair undone, comfy sweats, no makeup — you’d planned to spend the rest of your day rotting. Peacefully.
Stupid Chenle.
Still, you find yourself pulling on a jacket and tossing your hair into a messy bun.
Because of course you do.
He opens the car door for you — as always.
“Here you are, Princess,” he says with a dramatic bow, voice all sing-song.
You roll your eyes as you settle into the seat. “So… where are we going?”
He shrugs, eyes forward, smirking.
“Dunno. You tell me. You’re the one who’s always prepared and organized and whatever.”
You blink at him. “You showed up at my window telling me we’re going shopping, and you don’t even have a plan?”
He grins wider. “Guess I’ll have to make it a surprise, then.”
~
When he said shopping, you didn’t think he meant that shopping center — the kind with Chanel, Gucci, Louis Vuitton, and other stores you’d only ever window-shopped through on Pinterest.
Just thinking about the price tags made your stomach turn.
“Earth to Y/N?”
Chenle’s voice cut through your fog. You looked up to find him smiling, expectant.
“So... which store first?”
You blinked. “Chenle, you're crazy. I think you forgot I’m not rich like you are.”
It came out way more blunt than you meant. But it was already hanging there in the air.
His smile faltered for just a second. “Woah, now, Princess. Who said anything about you paying? You don’t have to worry about a thing. Just have fun — try stuff on.”
He meant it. You knew he did. But instead of feeling relieved, that kindness only made your chest tighten.
And then something in you snapped.
“I’m not a charity case, Chenle.”
His brows furrowed, confused.
You kept going — too fast, too loud. “You don’t have to always pay for me, okay? I’m not poor. I can pay for myself just fine!”
The look on his face.
You wanted to take it back the second the words left your mouth.
He winced. That small, quiet flinch of someone trying not to show they’ve just been punched.
The car went still. You stared out the window, willing the tears away.
“…I’m sorry,” you mumbled. “I guess I’m just having a bad day. Can you just take me back? I didn’t mean to ruin everything.”
He gave a small nod. Didn’t say much else. The drive back was… silent. Not angry, just… sad. Like something fragile had cracked between you and neither of you knew how to fix it.
You were too ashamed to look at him.
When he pulled up in front of your place, you practically bolted out. He didn’t get the chance to open your door — and that was the point. You couldn’t let him see your face.
“Thanks,” you said quickly, hoping he wouldn’t say anything else.
But he did.
“By the way,” he called out, making you freeze halfway to the door. “The reason I always pay for you? It’s not because I pity you. Or because of something stupid like that.”
You turned slightly, but didn’t meet his eyes.
“I do it because I want to,” he said gently. “Because I like spoiling you. Not out of guilt. Not out of charity. Never once have I looked down on you. And I never will.”
And then, just like that, he drove away.
It’s been three days since then.
Three long, hollow days.
You haven’t heard from him, and you know why.
You should reach out.
But you’re scared.
Scared he won’t forgive you. Scared he will — and that things will never be the same.
Instead, you’ve locked yourself in your apartment, hiding behind routine.
You go to class. You come home. You study. You repeat.
It’s mechanical. Mindless. Safe.
The girls know.
They haven’t said anything, but they’ve noticed. You told them you’ve got a big project, but they know your schedule. You can tell they’re letting you lie — waiting for you to be ready.
And deep down, you know you’ll have to be. Eventually.
~
It’s been three days.
Chenle hasn’t been sleeping well.
Every night, his thumb hovers over your name in his contacts. Every night, he wants to check in — just to make sure you’re okay — but something tells him to give you space.
He’s terrified that space might become permanent.
What if you never reach out?
What if that moment in the car really was the end?
But what eats at him most isn’t the silence.
It’s why you lashed out.
That you could think — even for a second — that you were some charity case to him.
The class difference had never once crossed his mind. Not like that.
Not as a reason to pity you.
Not as a line between you.
If anything, you were the opposite of him in all the ways that mattered. Everything you have, you fought for. You’re smart. Passionate. Relentlessly driven. You deserve to be taken care of once in a while — which is why he always insisted on paying. Not because you couldn’t afford it. But because you earned a little ease in your life.
Because you worked to get here.
He didn’t.
Meeting you has made him think about his world in ways he never had to before.
Before, Chenle knew he was lucky. That was as far as it went. His life had been a string of gifts wrapped in gold — his own childhood concerts, a place at SMU, every opportunity he could want. He’s never once had to worry about what came next. No matter what path he chooses, the road ahead is already paved.
You made him realize how tilted that road is for everyone else.
He’s seen how hard you work — tutoring spoiled brats who coasted in on their parents’ donations, studying until your notes looked like art, refusing to quit until you got it exactly right.
He knows why. You don’t have the luxury of failure.
Chenle doesn’t think lowly of himself — far from it. He’s always been disciplined with his grades, confident in who he is, capable of chasing what he wants. But he also knows that his safety net is stitched with money and power. That his success has always been cushioned by the life he was born into.
That’s why the grocery runs started.
He still remembers the first time he saw your pantry — instant ramen, crackers, the kind of bare-bones meals that said I’m too busy surviving to care about nutrition. It hit him harder than he expected. So he started taking you along, filling the cart, cooking for you when he could.
Not because he pitied you.
Because the idea of you going without… it hurt.
Could you really not see through him?
Could you really not tell how he feels about you?
Because to him, it’s always been obvious.
~
I’m sorry—
Delete.
Hey, how have you been?
Delete.
How are you supposed to act like things were normal after what happened? After you left him hanging for three whole days?
Your thumbs hover over the screen, heart pounding in your ears.
Finally, you type the safest thing you can think of.
Friday as usual?
Buzz.
He replies almost instantly.
Chenle.
Yep. Should I pick you up at your apartment or straight after class?
My apartment, you type back, keeping it short.
Another buzz.
Cool. 👍
And that’s it.
It was normal.
Like nothing had happened.
No questions. No coldness. No passive-aggressive jabs you probably deserved.
Just Chenle—chill and relaxed.
Too normal.
By Friday night, you were sitting on the couch, bouncing your leg, waiting for the honk of his car.
Would he be able to tell you’d been crying for the past three days?
You’d tried to put yourself together—hoodie, sweats, a quick swipe of lip gloss, concealer over the dark circles. Your hair… well, that was a lost cause.
Ding dong.
Chenle stood at your door in all black—beanie, sunglasses, that same zip-up he always wore. For someone with endless money, he had the closet rotation of a cartoon character.
“Did someone die?” you teased.
“Nope,” he popped the ‘p’ with a little smirk.
Good. Normal. Completely normal.
The little Italian place he’d picked looked like the kind of alley where your phone’s GPS signal would disappear—but, of course, the food was perfect. It always was with him. Conversation flowed as if the past three days never existed.
Until the bill came.
Chenle’s hand went to it automatically. But then he paused, eyes flicking to you. Like he was checking—measuring your reaction. When you stayed still, he handed over his card without a word.
The guilt sat heavy in your stomach.
“You could send me your half if you’re still… against me paying,” he mumbled, voice suddenly unsure.
“Uh, yeah. Sure.” You fumbled for your wallet, but before you could pull it out—
“I just want to take care of you.”
You froze.
Your eyes met his, and his were steady, sincere.
The scene from a few days ago slammed into your chest—the alleyway of luxury shops, your sharp words, the look in his eyes when you’d hurt him.
By the time you reached the car, you couldn’t hold it in anymore.
“I’m sorry,” you blurted, voice cracking. “I knew you never looked down on me. I just—God, I let my own insecurities get in the way and I took it out on you. I’m so sorry, Chenle. I never actually thought I was a charity case, I—”
Your voice dissolved into sobs.
Chenle’s hand found the small of your back, warm and steady. “Hey. It’s okay. I was never mad at you.” He leaned closer, his voice low. “You’re priceless to me. Worth every penny I spend on you.”
You tried to blink away the tears, but he kept going.
“You can’t put a price tag on happiness, Y/N. Money can’t fill that kind of void.” His gaze softened. “And you—you’re my happiness. You’ve brought more into my life than you’ll ever know. If anything, I owe you.”
You didn’t even think. You just hugged him—tight, desperate.
And you didn’t want to let go.
~
Things went back to normal between you and Chenle.
Or at least, the version of “normal” you’d always had.
You felt closer to him after everything that happened—closer in a way that made you want to text him just to tell him something stupid, or to look for him in a crowd without even realizing it. But relationship-wise? Nothing had changed.
You still felt bad whenever you thought about the amount of money he spent on you, but he always brushed it off with a casual, “It’s not even making a dent,” or, “It’s worth it if it’s on you.” He meant it. You knew he meant it. And yet… a small part of you still carried the guilt.
Your friends used to tease you about him—side glances, knowing smirks—but lately, they’d stopped. Maybe they’d gotten bored. Or maybe they’d just realized you weren’t going to do anything about it.
You’d just wrapped up your first year at SMU, grades better than you’d dared hope. To celebrate, the girls dragged you out for drinks. Well—they drank. You didn’t.
It wasn’t that you didn’t want to have fun—you were happy to be there—but it wasn’t your scene. You sat at the edge of the chaos, smiling at their antics, watching Giselle disappear into the crowd with some guy she’d been eyeing all night.
You wondered, briefly, if you’d been playing it too safe. You were fine being single, but sometimes you wished you’d at least had… something. A talking stage, a fling. Anything. The truth was, you didn’t know the first thing about dating. You’d never even been in a relationship. And maybe that was fine. Maybe—
“Hey.”
You looked up. A guy was standing a few feet away, smiling like he already knew you’d turn. He was cute. The kind of cute that made your brain skip a beat.
“You don’t seem to be having fun,” he said, sliding onto the stool next to you.
“I’m not really the party type,” you admitted, eyes flicking down to the sticky surface of the bar.
He nodded. “Nothing wrong with that.”
He turned to the bartender. “I’ll have an old fashioned.” Then he looked back at you. “Want anything to drink?”
“Oh, uh—I don’t drink. But thank you.” You shifted in your seat, suddenly hyperaware of how out of place you must look. Who goes to a bar and doesn’t drink?
“No worries,” he said easily, then called to the bartender again, “And get her a Coke, please.”
“You didn’t have to—”
“I can’t pass up a chance to buy a pretty girl like you something to drink,” he said, flashing a grin that made heat creep up your neck.
Right. This was flirting. He was actually flirting with you.
“I’m Sungchan, by the way.”
“I’m Y/N.”
And just like that, you found yourself talking to Seunghan the entire night.
It was as if the universe had overheard your earlier thoughts and decided to throw you a curveball—a curveball with nice hair, sharp wit, and a smile that made you momentarily forget how to breathe.
Sungchan knew how to flirt. Effortlessly. Like it wasn’t a strategy, just a part of who he was. Every time you thought you’d run out of things to say, he had a comeback ready, keeping the conversation light but charged. You were flattered—really flattered—but also starting to feel that familiar social battery flicker out.
Before the girls swooped in to drag you onto the dance floor, you and Sungchan exchanged numbers.
“What. Was. That.” Karina’s eyes were wide, her voice practically vibrating with intrigue.
The rest of the girls swarmed you like bloodhounds who’d caught a fresh scent.
“OMG, this is so exciting! Y/N’s talking to a boy!” Winter squealed, clutching your arm.
“For real,” Giselle grinned, “I was this close to giving up on you. This… this is progress.”
You rolled your eyes, but the heat creeping up your neck betrayed you.
“To be honest,” Karina tilted her head, “I really thought you and Chenle were gonna end up together.”
“It’s just… nothing’s ever happened, and I don’t think anything is going to happen, you know?” you said with a shrug that was far too casual to be convincing.
“That’s because you’re both too scared to actually do anything about it,” Ningning declared, earning a round of snickers from the others. “Face it, Y/N. Everyone and their mama knows.”
“Actually—” Winter’s tone sharpened in that way that meant trouble, “what if this is a good thing?”
The group turned to her.
“What if… this makes Chenle jealous enough to finally claim what’s his?” she said, wearing the kind of devilish grin that spelled chaos.
You winced. “Don’t say it like that. He doesn’t ‘claim’ anything.”
“Mm-hm.” Winter didn’t look convinced.
“Besides,” you added quickly, “I feel like it would be wrong to use Sungchan like that. If anything, I’ll give him a chance and see where it goes.”
The girls all exchanged glances, their expressions somewhere between fascinated and nosy.
~
For the first time ever, you cancelled on Chenle.
And it was for another guy.
“A date, huh?” he’d said over the phone, his tone maddeningly casual. “Well, yeah, go have fun. Let me know how it goes.”
Too casual. Like it didn’t matter.
Did he really not care?
…And why did you want him to?
You shook the thought off. Tonight wasn’t about Chenle—it was about Sungchan.
He picked you up right on time, leaning against his car with a confident grin. The drive-in movie was a sweet touch—old-fashioned, simple, with the smell of buttered popcorn and the faint hum of engines around you.
From the moment he saw you, Seunghan’s attention was fixed entirely on you. Compliments came easily to him—too easily, maybe—and he insisted on paying for everything without a second thought.
But he was touchy. His hand found your knee halfway through the film. Then your arm. Then your waist. He wasn’t rough or pushy—he even asked softly if it was okay. And you smiled and lied, “Yeah, it’s fine.”
Truth was, it wasn’t fine. Your shoulders stayed tight, your mind darting in and out of the movie, wondering if you were being uptight or if maybe… this just wasn’t your pace.
It wasn’t a bad date. Not at all. But as the credits rolled and he walked you back to your door, you realized you didn’t feel that flutter everyone talks about. Maybe you just needed more time.
“Thank you for letting me take you out tonight, Y/N,” Sungchan said with that same dazzling smile. “I had a lot of fun, and I hope you did too.”
“I did. Thanks for taking me out,” you replied, your voice polite but unreadable.
“I’d love to take you out again—just let me know when you’re free.” He winked before sliding back into his car, and the sound of his engine faded down the street.
You stood there for a moment, your hand on the doorknob, feeling like the night should have left you more… something. Excited. Nervous. Giddy. Instead, you just felt still.
~
Chenle was screaming on the inside.
On the outside, he was just… missing every shot he took.
You had cancelled on him. That was fine—he could live with that.
But it was the reason that gnawed at him.
You’d cancelled for a date.
A date with some guy who wasn’t him.
He could feel his chest tightening, like his ribs were trying to crush his heart.
“Dude… you look constipated. You good?” Mark asked, catching the rebound with ease.
They were supposed to be having a friendly game of basketball, but Chenle was off—and Mark could tell. His usual quick banter was gone, replaced with silent glares at the hoop and shots that barely hit the rim.
“Y/N’s on a date,” Chenle muttered, finally letting the words slip.
Mark’s brows shot up. “Ohhh. That’s why you’re here instead of having dinner with her? I knew something was off. You’re never free on Fridays, man. Never.”
Chenle didn’t answer—mostly because his phone buzzed in his pocket. It was you.
Princess
Hey, just got home. It went well.
Well?
Well? What did well mean?
Smiling? Laughing? Letting him walk you to your door?
Letting him make you laugh in that way Chenle always thought was his thing?
Did he get to see the little crinkle by your eyes when you smile? Did he touch you?
Mark was watching him like he was a science experiment. “Bro, your face. You look like you’re about to pass out.”
Chenle just shoved his phone back in his pocket, jaw tight. He could feel something ugly clawing at his chest. If he stayed here any longer, he might start breaking things.
The basketball match ended abruptly, which Mark understood. He had seen the way his friend looked at you. He watched all of it unfold.
Chenle sat in his living room, restless and unsure how to ease his mind. After a moment of hesitation, he decided to call Kun.
Kun picked up immediately. “Whoa, you never call. What’s up?” he asked.
“Ge, I need advice,” Chenle said, then told Kun everything—from when he first met you to how things stood now.
Kun listened quietly, humming thoughtfully as Chenle spoke. When he finished, there was a brief silence before Kun replied, “Well, Lele, unfortunately, there’s not much you can do now. She’s seeing someone, and yeah, that sucks.” Chenle winced—he knew Kun was right. “But if there’s ever a chance, you should take it. You can’t just keep playing it safe, waiting for her to choose you.”
Chenle sighed, defeated. “I think it’s too late now. She said the date went well.”
“Chenle, don’t give up so soon. And if it’s really over and you truly love her, you’ll let her go. Good luck, Lele.” Kun hung up, busy as always.
Chenle stared at his phone after the call ended, the silence in his apartment suddenly louder than ever. Kun’s words echoed in his mind — “If there’s ever a chance, you should take it.” But what if that chance never came?
He ran a hand through his hair, frustration bubbling beneath his skin. He wasn’t used to feeling so helpless, so unsure. Everything about him screamed control and certainty — except this.
He knew he had been too cautious, too afraid of risking what little connection they had. But now the thought of losing you to someone else was a sting that wouldn’t fade.
Leaning back into his couch, Chenle let out a heavy sigh. Maybe Kun was right. Maybe it was time to stop playing it safe. If he really cared — if you really meant that much — he had to fight for you, even if it terrified him.
Tomorrow, he promised himself, he would stop waiting in the shadows. He would make his move. Because some chances don’t come twice.
~
Chenle wanted to make a move—God, he wanted to—but seeing you with Sungchan made him realize he was too late. The way Sungchan looked at you was painfully familiar, like staring at a reflection of how he used to look at you. And you seemed happy. Chenle wasn’t going to ruin that for you, no matter how much it hurt.
Months passed, and you saw Chenle less and less. He told himself it was out of respect for your relationship with Sungchan, but you’d be lying if you said you didn’t miss his presence. Still, he was never your boyfriend. He wasn’t obligated to be around. He wasn’t yours.
Besides, you had a boyfriend now.
You and Sungchan had been official for a couple of months. It took some warming up, given how different your levels of experience were, but you told yourself you liked him. You tried to believe it.
Tonight, the two of you were curled up on your couch, a bowl of popcorn between you, watching the Twilight saga and debating the eternal question.
“There’s no way you think Jacob is better,” you scoffed.
“Bella and Edward are too toxic,” Sungchan argued.
“Yeah, but Jacob’s toxic now too! Edward actually cares about Bella. Jacob’s just in love with the idea of her.” You threw another handful of popcorn into your mouth, eyes still on the screen.
While you were talking, Sungchan’s hand crept to your thigh, his fingers tracing lazy lines up and down. He inched higher, sliding under your shorts. You swatted his hand away.
“Baaabe, c’mon,” he whined, his voice still playful but edged with something sharper. “You’ve made me wait long enough.”
“I’m sorry, Sung,” you said softly, guilt already prickling at the back of your throat. “I’m just… not ready yet.”
He let out a small, humorless laugh. “Not ready. Right.” He kept his eyes on the TV, but you could feel his irritation radiating off him.
You shifted uncomfortably. “It’s not you. I’ve never done this before, Sungchan. Any of it. It’s a lot for me.”
“Yeah, but we’ve been dating for months,” he said, finally looking at you. “Most people would’ve… I don’t know… gotten comfortable by now.”
Your shoulders tensed. “I can’t just rush something like this.”
He shook his head, a mocking little smile tugging at his lips. “You know, it’s kinda crazy. When I tell people about you, they’re shocked you even go out. You don’t drink, you don’t party, you barely even—” He gestured vaguely toward you. “—touch.”
His words felt like tiny cuts, each one stinging more than the last.
“I’m not saying you have to be someone you’re not,” he added, though his tone made it sound exactly like that’s what he wanted. “It’s just… hard being with someone who’s so… closed off.”
Your throat was tight now. “If that’s how you feel—”
“It is,” he interrupted. His voice was calm, almost too calm, like he’d been building to this for a while. “And honestly? I think I’m done waiting around for you to change.”
You blinked, stunned. “Wait—what?”
“We’re done,” he said simply, standing up to grab his things. “I need someone who actually wants to be with me. Not just sit on a couch and talk about vampires.”
The front door clicked shut behind him.
You sat there, popcorn still in your lap, the room suddenly too quiet. Your chest ached, but underneath the hurt, there was relief—quiet, unwelcome, but real. You hadn’t fought for him. Maybe because you’d known for a while now… he was never right for you.
~
After Sungchan left, you spent the night crying. You had known deep down the relationship wasn’t going to last, but that didn’t make it hurt any less. His words had cut right where you were already weak, the places you didn’t let most people see. And this had been your first relationship—your first everything.
Your first kiss had been with Sungchan.
It was during your fourth date. He’d leaned in, closing the space between you, and your heart pounded so hard it felt like the whole world could hear it. You’d shut your eyes and leaned forward too, breath caught in your throat. Then it happened—his lips met yours. They were soft, warm, unfamiliar. You froze, unsure what to do, and quickly pulled away.
He’d looked at you, puzzled for a second, before smiling. Back then, he’d found your inexperience cute. At least… you thought he did.
When you finally fell asleep, it was out of exhaustion, your cheeks still damp.
You woke up to the buzzing of your phone. Groggily, you reached for it—12:06 PM. You’d overslept. Missed class.
Something in you cracked. The tears came fast, heavy, unstoppable. You never missed class. You prided yourself on being early, on having perfect attendance. Even while dating Sungchan, you’d kept your priorities in check—your education came first.
But now? You’d missed class for the first time. Over a boy.
And for the first time in a long while, you felt truly, utterly pathetic.
~
Chenle sat in the corner of the café, mindlessly scrolling through his phone, one leg bouncing under the table. He was waiting for his lunch order, though he wasn’t particularly hungry.
Ever since you’d started dating Sungchan, Chenle had found himself with more free time than he knew what to do with. A strange, empty space in his life that nothing seemed to fill. He still had plenty of friends—he loved them, really—but time alone had a way of making him think.
Think about you.
He loved you. That much he knew. And maybe that’s why he’d pulled back.
First, because he couldn’t stand to watch another man care for you in ways he once had.
Second, because you seemed happy. Happier than you’d ever been. And if you didn’t need him anymore, he wasn’t going to force his way into your life.
Still… he watched from a distance. Not in a creepy way—just enough to reassure himself you were okay. If you were in the same room, his eyes always found you. If your name came up in conversation, he’d ask about you. If your friends were talking to you, he’d catch himself listening in, quietly cataloging the details.
Just to know you were well.
“Here you are, sir,” the worker said, setting his lunch in front of him.
Chenle blinked, dragged out of his thoughts. “Thanks.”
And just like that, he remembered—he was eating alone.
“CHENLE!”
His head snapped up. Mark and Karina were rushing toward him, their expressions tight with worry.
“Have you heard from Y/N?” Karina blurted.
Chenle froze. “Is she okay?”
“We don’t know—that’s why we’re asking you,” Karina said quickly. “She wasn’t in class, and she hasn’t answered any of our calls or messages.”
You missed class? That didn’t happen. Ever. Even when you were sick, you’d let everyone know what was going on and still sit in the back with a mask, quietly taking notes.
Something in Chenle’s chest clenched hard. His ears started ringing, drowning out whatever Mark and Karina were saying next. He was already on his feet.
He didn’t even think about it—his body just moved.
“Hey! Where are you going?!” Karina’s voice chased after him, but he didn’t answer.
He only knew one thing: he had to get to you.
~
You fell asleep again. Exhausted. You heard your doorbell ringing, over and over again. God it was annoying. All you wanted was to sleep forever. But the ringing persisted. You wanted to drown out the noise.
"y/n, are you in there? I'm coming in" you heard a familiar voice, it was Chenle. He was coming in. Oh right, you had given him a spare key awhile back. A key no one else had, not even Sungchan while you two were dating. After all this time he still had it.
"y/n" he said barging in, he rushed to your side. Putting the back of his hand on your forehead checking your temperature. You couldn't look at him. He lifted your chin up to look at him, his eyes. They were beautiful, sick with worry but beautiful. You missed those eyes.
"What happened?" is all he could ask. "He... he dumped me" you said looking away from him.
That asshole is all Chenle could think. How dare he break your heart. He broke up with you?? Who does he think he is, that you're not good enough for him? He's not good enough for you. Chenle clenched his fist thinking about this.
He looked back your sad and limp figure. His rage dissipated, his eyes soften again. "Let's get you something to eat, y/n"
You sat at the kitchen table, eyes fixed on the floor while Chenle moved around the stove.
The soft clatter of utensils, the sizzle of oil—it should’ve been comforting, but all it did was make the knot in your chest tighter.
You felt so small. Embarrassed.
You hadn’t actually spoken to him in nearly a month. And yet… here he was. Cooking for you. Taking care of you like he always used to. Like nothing had changed.
You didn’t deserve it. You weren’t his responsibility. You weren’t even his. But Chenle—Chenle had always done so much for you, never once asking for anything in return.
“Why?”
It came out so quietly you weren’t sure you’d said it aloud, but Chenle froze mid-motion. Slowly, he turned toward you.
“I thought it was obvious.”
Your heart stuttered. Was he implying what you thought he was?
You lifted your head to meet his gaze, and the warmth in his eyes nearly undid you.
He broke it first, looking down at the pan as if grounding himself. “Here. Eat first. We’ll talk later.”
He set the bowl in front of you—fried rice and his signature tomato eggs, still steaming.
You didn’t know if it was because you hadn’t eaten all day or because Chenle was just that good of a cook—he was—but you devoured the bowl like you’d been starving for weeks. Chenle sat across from you, watching quietly, a faint smile tugging at his lips.
He was glad to see you eat.
But now that the bowl was empty, the weight in the room shifted.
You set it down gently, meeting his gaze. No words—just a silent signal that you were ready.
Chenle took a slow, steadying breath. “Y/N… I love you. I have for a very long time.” His eyes searched yours, desperate for any sign of what you were feeling.
Your stomach twisted. “Why didn’t you ever tell me? Why didn’t you make a move?”
“I thought you knew,” he said, almost in disbelief. “I thought I made it clear. And when you didn’t seem interested… I didn’t want to push. I didn’t want to make you uncomfortable or ruin what we had.”
Something in your chest cracked. You stood, crossing the small space between you, and wrapped your arms around him. No words—just the press of your cheek against his shoulder, the familiar scent of him grounding you.
He hesitated for only a second before his arms came around you too, warm and protective.
You stayed like that for a long time, breathing in sync, feeling each other’s warmth. And even in the quiet, you could feel the faint tension in his hold—like he was memorizing the shape of you in his arms, unsure how many more times he’d get the chance. His chin rested lightly atop your head, but his fingers lingered at the small of your back, reluctant, as if loosening them might mean losing you for good.
Neither of you moved. Neither of you spoke. But beneath the comfort, there was something else—a question that hung between you like a thread pulled too tight: had he already missed his moment?
Finally, you pulled back just enough to look at him.
“I think… it’s too soon for me to be in a relationship again,” you said softly.
Chenle’s gaze flickered, but he nodded without hesitation. “I get it.” He swallowed, eyes darting away for a second before finding yours again. “Then… maybe we can just focus on building our friendship back. If you still want to be friends, that is.” His voice carried a hint of nervousness, like he was bracing for you to say no.
“I’d really like that,” you said, and it was the most honest thing you’d spoken all day.
His lips curved into that familiar smile—the one you hadn’t realized you’d missed until now. It warmed you instantly… but somewhere in the depth of it, you caught a trace of something else. A quiet ache. The unspoken hope that friendship wouldn’t be all you’d ever share.
~
And just like that, everything went back to normal.
No—actually—life resumed as if nothing had changed.
Well, except for the part where your friends gave Sungchan the stink eye every time they saw him. You remembered the day you told them.
“WHAAT!?” they’d all shouted in disbelief.
“Oh, I’m going to kill him,” Giselle said far too casually for your liking.
“Guys, it’s really okay. Truthfully, something in me always knew it wouldn’t work out,” you explained.
“If you say so. I think you’re being too kind, but fine. I won’t do anything… for now,” Giselle huffed, crossing her arms.
Sungchan had tried to reach out, even apologized, saying he’d overreacted and wanted to continue the relationship. You told him it was better if you stopped seeing each other—that he deserved someone on the same page as him, which wasn’t you. He didn’t take it well, resorting to name-calling and tantrums. And just like that, the rose-colored glasses shattered.
You got back on your game. Your grades never suffered, and you felt like yourself again. Chenle never made you feel wrong or awkward about any of it. You didn’t deserve him—of course you loved him, he was hard not to love—but you told yourself he deserved someone better.
Still, it all felt so natural with him. Too natural. You worried you were stringing him along without meaning to. But Chenle never complained, never brought up the subject of “us” again. He was patient, always putting your needs first. And you wished, just once, he’d put his own needs first.
Which led to this very moment.
“It’s not that I don’t appreciate you and all that you do—I just…” you sighed, frustrated. “It makes me feel like I’m taking advantage of you, Chenle.”
“You know I don’t think that,” he said casually, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.
“I want you to have what you want, Chenle. It’s not fair—”
“You know what I want?” he asked, stepping closer.
Your heart stuttered. You already knew the answer, but the tension in the air made you swallow hard.
“I want you,” he said, cupping your face so you had no choice but to look at him.
God. He looked so good.
Your eyes flicked from his to his lips, then back up. They were right there.
“I want you, Y/N. Will you let me have you?” His voice was steady, patient, but his grip was warm, grounding.
“Yes.”
And before the word had fully left your mouth, something else was there—his lips on yours.
Chenle kissed you. Gentle at first, like he was afraid you might pull away.
“Do you know how long I’ve waited for this?” he murmured against your mouth.
This felt… right.
Not like kissing Sungchan, where you’d been hyper-aware of every move. This was instinct. This was natural.
The kiss deepened, the gentleness giving way to hunger. His hands slid to the back of your neck, pulling you closer, and you melted into him.
He kissed you like a starved man finally given permission to eat—and God, you liked it.
His mouth was warm and insistent, moving against yours like he’d been holding back for far too long. Your hands clutched at his shirt, pulling him closer, and he took the hint—pressing you back against the wall, his body flush against yours.
You could feel the heat rolling off him, his breath mingling with yours between kisses that grew deeper, hungrier. His fingers slid into your hair, tilting your head just right so he could kiss you harder—like he wanted to memorize the taste of you. Your bodies moved against each other in rhythm, every shift sending sparks racing through your veins.
And that’s when you felt it.
When he finally broke away for air, his forehead rested against yours, both of you breathing hard. His eyes were dark, intense, and he gave a low, almost disbelieving chuckle.
Then his hand found yours, guiding it down until it rested against the hard, insistent outline straining against his pants. You froze, pulse hammering.
“Do you have any idea what you do to me?” he murmured, his voice low and rough. His other hand brushed down your arm, lingering just enough to send shivers skittering across your skin. “You drive me crazy, princess.”
Before you could form a reply, he stepped back, the sudden distance like a rush of cold air against overheated skin. You blinked at him, breathless and confused, lips still tingling from the kiss.
He glanced over his shoulder, smirking—but there was warmth in his eyes. “What? I’m not letting anything happen before I take you out on an official date… or several dates, even.”
Chenle was a true gentleman—because if he’d wanted you right then and there, you would’ve let him. But instead, he looked almost giddy, grinning like a cat who caught a mouse, more excited about the promise of taking you out than claiming you in the moment.
~
When the news broke out about you and Chenle, everyone celebrated. Everyone. Not just your girls, but all of Chenle’s friends too.
The next time you went to a frat party with the gang, random people—some you barely knew—came up to congratulate you. It was slightly embarrassing, but also… nice. Nice knowing everyone had basically been rooting for you two this whole time. You weren’t someone who sought validation from others, but this? This felt good.
Chenle didn’t waste any time making good on his promise to date you properly. He planned everything—like, meticulously. One week it was a helicopter ride over the city at night, another time he rented out an entire movie theatre just for the two of you. Sometimes it was elaborate, sometimes simple, but he always turned it into a whole day. It wasn’t just about the date; it was about being together.
And even though the night you made out, you already felt like his, Chenle still waited three whole months before asking to make it official. He said he wanted the full dating experience—dates, adventures, even the little moments—before claiming that title.
You loved him for that.
“It took you two long enough,” Karina said with a wide grin.
“Amen. You can say that again,” Mark added, earning a round of chuckles.
“No, but seriously, I was starting to give up hope,” Jisung said, shaking his head.
“Yeah, I thought going on a few dates with Sungchan would’ve made Chenle jealous enough to make a move,” Winter said—then froze. “Oops! I said He-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named.” Her eyes darted nervously around the room.
“Relax,” you laughed, waving it off. “You act like he’s Voldemort or something.”
“So you guys really don’t care at all?” Mark asked, curiosity in his voice.
“I mean, why would they?” Renjun smirked, gesturing toward the couch. “Just look at them—completely smitten.”
“Mhm, yes we are,” Chenle said without hesitation, pressing a kiss to your forehead.
“Aww, gross,” Renjun groaned, sticking out his tongue.
The room erupted in laughter, warmth filling the space as you nestled a little closer into Chenle’s side.
You never thought things would end up like this. When you first stepped onto SMU’s campus, you imagined yourself as a complete shut-in—slipping through classes unnoticed, eating alone, keeping your head down. You were certain you didn’t have the right kind of social currency to mingle with anyone worth knowing.
Looking back now, you couldn’t believe how wrong you’d been. None of that mattered.
Because here you were—surrounded by friends who felt like family, laughter still echoing in the air, and held in the arms of the person you loved most. Chenle’s arm was snug around you, his thumb absently tracing circles against your shoulder like he wasn’t even aware he was doing it. It was grounding, quiet, safe.
And for the first time in a long time, you realized you weren’t waiting for the other shoe to drop.
➺ word count: 15.7k
➺ genre & warnings: fluff, strangers to lovers, modern magical creatures au, college au, siren shotaro, human reader, same universe as strawberry sunday; starts off with some drowning and a scene in a hospital (no needles or anything!), shotaro strips (to his underwear, not fully) in front of reader for siren transformation purposes not sexy reasons, uhm LOWKEY(?) monsterfucker vibes but NO smut as always i promise i just wanted to give y’all fair warning that the vibes are… different in this one lol
➺ synopsis: in which you’re saved from a near-drowning by friendly siren shotaro, who also happens to be the cute bobarista that had caught your eye at the boba tea place near campus. everything seems to be falling into place in the bubbly beginnings of your new relationship, but you just can’t shake the image of the sea monster that you swore you saw that day in the murky ocean depths
➺ extra info: this work is set in the same universe as strawberry sunday but can be read as a standalone! there is no continuing plotline between fics in this universe, they simply take place in the same world/magic system and may have overlapping characters (neos may pop up in more than one work!)
➺ author’s note: bye what even are those tags im sorry y’all. look i love this fic but there’s something about sirens that just make me need to write little freaks (reader/renjun in dr. magic, and now reader in this fic). it’s mostly cute and fluffy but then takes a sharp turn into freakdom. taro isn’t a little freak but he’s 100% supportive of reader letting their freak flag fly
─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ explore the strawberry sunday universe more here!
What felt like a hand grabbed your arm, and you involuntary screamed, the rest of your air escaping in a burst of bubbles as your eyes flew open. Something monstrous had a hold on you, flashes of pale skin, reflective eyes, long claws, and sharp teeth all you could see in the dark water.
The old fishing pier required caution to navigate even on the calmest of summer days. No railings, and it wasn’t well-maintained, so there were the occasional splinters, nails, or loose wood panels. But you knew that, you came here all the time. Which was why you thought you thought you could do this in the first place.
You had gone to the beach in the middle of winter by yourself, and instead of just being content with all the pictures that you took from walking up and down the shoreline, decided that getting on the old fishing pier was a good idea. There were a couple boats further out that you wanted to get a better shot of, if you could just get a little closer. So you inched towards the end of the pier, sea spray from the waves crashing against the pilings hitting your face. There was ice that had been built up from layers of sea spray continuously freezing over itself. Which you realized exactly as your foot hit a patch of it and you slid right off the edge.
Panic shot through you as the freezing cold ocean swallowed you immediately. You kicked your feet in your heavy winter boots and desperately paddled to try to get back up. Your head broke the surface for just a second, and you tried to gulp in any air that you could, but were cut off by a violent wave, inhaling saltwater as the turbulent seas pushed and pulled you down again. All your thick clothes that had been keeping you warm in the cold air were now soaked through and weighing you down, down. You were already exhausted. You stopped trying to swim and instead started pulling off whatever you could reach. First your gloves, then you tried to undo the knots on your boots by feel, but your fingers were frozen and bumbling.
You squinted your eyes open, the ocean water stinging, to try to see anything that you were doing. It was dark, you were sinking further and further down. You were so tired from fighting the water that you couldn’t even lift your leg towards your face to see it. You’d have to leave your boots on. As you went to unzip your overcoat next, a movement caught your gaze. Your heart pounded wildly in your chest. There was something large swimming nearby, and you prayed it wasn’t going to get curious.
You were getting lightheaded now, fumbling with your zipper as you tried to work faster with the fear of whatever that was doubling up on your fear of drowning. Your eyes burned too much, and you closed them as you continued fighting with your zipper. Your lungs felt like they were on fire, and you held back the urge to cough up the saltwater you had swallowed earlier.
What felt like a hand grabbed your arm, and you involuntary screamed, the rest of your air escaping in a burst of bubbles as your eyes flew open. Something monstrous had a hold on you, flashes of pale skin, reflective eyes, long claws, and sharp teeth all you could see in the dark water. Black spots began to fill your already blurry vision, and you—
You were hacking up seawater, scrambling onto your side on the rocky shoreline to not immediately inhale it again. Your fingers and toes were numb, everything that you could feel was freezing cold, made even worse by the seabreeze whipping by.
“There you go,” a relieved voice said from beside you as a hand patted your back firmly. “Water out, air in.”
After you finished spitting the saltiness out, you turned your head to see who was next to you. Your head was still spinning, but you were pretty sure it was a young man about your age, dressed for the beach—in swim trunks. He offered you a bright smile, pushing some of his dripping wet hair out of his face.
“Take a few deep breaths. You should probably get checked out. Hypothermia, dry drowning, all that. You know?”
You weakly tried to sit up, and he helped you with a hand on your back. It took you a few inhales to get enough air to talk. “Were—” You sounded winded and hoarse, and every word hurt. “Were you… swimming?”
“Were you?” He laughed.
“Obviously not!” You huffed, gesturing to your outfit. “I fell in!”
“I didn’t see another car in the parking lot. Do you need a ride to the hospital?”
You patted your jeans pocket to find that your phone had somehow stayed put through this whole ordeal. Pushing the power button, that was where your luck ended. The screen stayed dark. It was entirely waterlogged. You groaned.
“Yeah, I think that’s a good idea.”
The man stood up first, then grabbed your arm to help you to your feet. You thought about the creature you saw underwater, and looked back to the ocean.
“What happened?” You asked him.
“I pulled you out,” he said matter-of-factly. As he looked you up and down, a ray of sunlight finally peeked through the gray cloud cover, catching on a patch of iridescent pink scales on the tip of his button nose. “Can you walk?”
“Oh, you’re a siren,” you realized belatedly. “Did you see it?”
“See what?”
You hesitated to tell him about the sea monster now, feeling a bit silly as his wide eyes searched your face with great concern. Shaking your head, you changed the subject. “Nothing, I don’t know. What’s your name?”
“Shotaro.” He beamed at you again, and you spotted the telltale extra cuspids that sirens had. “And my roommate Sungchan is actually waiting up in the car, so it should be nice and toasty for you.”
“I’m Y/N.”
“Can you walk okay, Y/N?” Shotaro asked again.
“I-I think. I can’t really feel my feet though…” You admitted.
“Here.” He offered his arm out to you. “In case you trip.”
You grabbed his forearm with two hands, already feeling more stable. “Thanks.”
The two of you shuffled across the rocky shore, then up the barely-there path marked by thin posts that once had ropes tied between them that had long disintegrated. Finally, you reached the three parking spaces by the road that were technically for people who were coming to the old fishing pier and accompanying stretch of shore. It obviously wasn’t a popular destination. There was only one car there, an SUV that was a few years old, running with its lights on, the driver slumped down in his seat with one foot up on the dashboard as he scrolled on his phone. He must have seen you two approaching the car in the corner of his vision, glancing up before he scrambled to get out.
“Uh, Taro, what—”
“Sungchan, this is Y/N. Y/N, this is Sungchan,” Shotaro made quick introductions. “Y/N needs to get the hospital before she freezes to death.”
Sungchan’s eyes went wide, and he rushed back towards the car. “Okay, shit, yeah.”
“Towels—”
“Yep.”
Sungchan fetched a couple towels from the trunk, wrapping one around your shoulders as Shotaro started patting your hair dry with another. You pulled the towel tighter around you, grateful to have something dry to block the wind with.
“Thanks, guys.” You offered them both a shaky smile.
“That’s good enough, let’s get you to the hospital,” Shotaro declared, opening the backseat. He didn’t move for you to climb in, though, instead grabbing another heavy winter overcoat from inside and giving it to you. “Since yours is at the bottom of the ocean now.”
You didn’t even realize that your jackets were nowhere to be found, only your knit sweater and longsleeve under that left up top. In no place to turn down some warmth, you took it, cringing at the feeling of stuffing the damp, cold material on your arms into the dry sleeves. But it was something.
Shotaro opened the front passenger door then, and nodded for you to get in. Sungchan turned the heat all the way up before speeding away from the pier. You held your hands in front of an air vent, slowly getting feeling back in your fingers. Your skin began to tingle painfully, and you pulled away, rubbing at the area.
“Do you not know how to drive?” Your question was directed at Shotaro, who was in the backseat, a t-shirt hanging around his neck as he rooted around the floor for the rest of his clothes.
“What? Why do you think that?” He chuckled, tugging his shirt the rest of the way on.
“You didn’t drive yourself here, but Sungchan was just sitting in the car doing nothing. I figured he didn’t come to enjoy the beach…”
The driver laughed. “Yeah.”
“I can drive,” the siren clarified. “He just tags along because he’s paranoid.”
“No, it’s not paranoia if it’s already happened,” his friend argued.
“They outlawed fishing in this area!”
“Murder is illegal and yet somehow that still happens too! Sorry I don’t want you getting poached, dude!”
Feeling bad that you had apparently touched on a contentious subject for the two of them, you scrambled to think of something to say, but Shotaro spoke before you could.
“I wasn’t paying attention when I was out for a swim one time and ended up getting grazed by a longline being pulled in. I didn’t even see the fishing boat, it was so far away from me,” Shotaro explained to you. “Sungchan comes with just in case now.”
“So you were swimming.”
“Walking down the path when I saw you slip, yeah.”
“Good timing.”
“How did you get out there anyway?” Sungchan asked. “To the pier.”
“I rode my bike. I hid it in some bushes by the parking lot so it didn’t get stolen.” After you finished talking, you covered your mouth with the end of the dry jacket sleeve and blew hot air out against it to warm your lips up.
Shotaro jerked around in his seat to look out the back window. “Dude, isn’t the hospital the other way?”
“They don’t have a human unit at that one,” his friend responded. “Closest human ER is this way.”
“Oh.”
“Good thing I came today, or else he would’ve been driving you in circles,” Sungchan joked to you, making a big show out of sighing and shaking his head.
You chuckled into the jacket sleeve, which turned into you choking up a few more mouthfuls of water into the material. You tried to use the end of the towel around your waist to dab at it and your mouth. “Uck… I’m sorry, Shotaro.”
“It’s fine, Y/N,” the siren reassured you from the backseat. “Sungchan, how close are we?”
“Like a minute away.”
Soon enough, you were pulling up in front of the loop of an emergency room, and Shotaro was helping you out as Sungchan went to park the car. The ER was surprisingly quiet, and you were taken back for triage right after signing in. You still weren’t so steady on your feet, especially now that you were no longer numb and were just shivering cold. The temperature of the hospital wasn’t helping either. You weren’t in your soaking wet clothes anymore, thankfully, but the thin hospital gown you’d been provided was no better. The nurse had given you socks and piled on heated blankets to fend off hypothermia, but it was going to take some time for the shivers to stop, you figured.
You’d told the nurse as she left that Shotaro and Sungchan could come back—if they were still there. You didn’t know them, but it was better than nobody, you figured. And sure enough, one familiar head poked around your curtain, followed by another.
“Hey…” Shotaro smiled, walking up to your cot. “What’d they say?”
“Got me on oxygen for now, took some blood, and we’re waiting to do a chest x-ray to check for fluid in my lungs, just in case,” you reported, tapping the cannula in your nose. “But she said everything sounded pretty good when she listened with just the stethoscope. Also need to warm up a bit.”
Sungchan hovered a hand over the mound of blankets on top of you. “Heated blankets, nice.”
“Your jacket is right there, Shotaro.” You nodded to where the garment had been folded up and set on a stool next to your gurney.
“Sorry, hold on.” Sungchan held up his buzzing phone indicatively, stepping back out of the curtains.
“Do you want to call someone?” Shotaro offered, digging his phone out of his pocket. “Since yours is busted.”
“I would, except I don’t know anybody’s phone numbers…” You sighed. “They were all saved in my contacts.”
“That’s… Actually, I don’t think I know Sungchan’s number now that I think about it.”
You squinted up at Shotaro, at his pink scales and dark eyes that flashed amber in the lights. He tilted his head curiously back at you, and you tried to picture a baseball cap atop his dark brown hair and a matching apron over his clothes.
“Weird question…”
The corner of his lips twitched with amusement. “Go for it.”
“Do you work at a boba tea place?”
His eyebrows lifted as he seemed momentarily surprised before he laughed and nodded. “Yeah, I do. Jasmine & Pearl. You been?”
“A couple times,” you confirmed. Maybe more than a couple times, and maybe you had mentioned the cute siren bobarista with the pink scales at the boba tea place near campus to your roommate enough that she had started pestering you to actually talk to him past putting in your order or thanking him when grabbing your drink, but you were not going to say any of that now. “I couldn’t tell if the déjà vu was real or like brain damage or something from the drowning.”
“Real.” He laughed again. “So what were you even doing out there? Since you obviously weren’t swimming?”
“Taking pictures. As stupid as that seems now.”
“I’m sure they would’ve turned out great.”
You looked at your waterlogged phone that the nurse had set aside for you. “I’m still hoping some rice can save it…”
Sungchan reentered the curtained-off area, brushing away snow that had already begun to melt on his hair and shoulders. “Started snowing while I was out there. Want to go roll around, Taro?”
“Maybe later,” the siren replied humorously, though the joke was lost on you.
“Oh, damn, I forgot to grab you another jacket, Y/N,” he cursed, jabbing his thumb behind him in the direction he had just come from. “Since Taro’s is wet. Do you need one now? You’ll at least need it when we leave. I should grab it now so it’s not cold when you put it on.”
You looked between them uncertainly. “I-I don’t know how long they’re going to keep me. You guys have done plenty, I mean…”
“Your phone is dead, you don’t know anybody’s numbers to call… I understand if you don’t want us to stay because we’re two random guys, but don’t tell me you really plan on walking back to your bike after this?” Shotaro recounted your current predicament incredulously.
“At least let me go get your bike and bring it here for you,” Sungchan offered. “It’s in the bushes by the parking lot, right?”
“I—Well, yeah…” You nodded.
Shotaro kept you company while Sungchan went back to the pier. He didn’t make you talk, which you were grateful for, as your chest still hurt. Instead, he went on about this or that, and you only gave your input every so often.
The nurse came back before Sungchan did, informing you that it was finally your turn for the x-ray machine. She had a wheelchair with her to transport you, which you slowly moved over to, goosebumps flaring up at being out from under the warm blankets.
“Do you want me to come?” Shotaro offered as he moved one of your blankets over to the wheelchair with you.
Right as you had started nodding, the nurse spoke up, “Sorry, we can’t have anybody else in there. It’s the radiation.”
“Right.” He had the same easy-going smile on his face as always. “I’ll wait here, then.”
In the radiology room, the nurse stopped your wheelchair. As she helped you onto two feet and over to the table where the images would be taken, she questioned, “How did this happen again, Y/N?”
“How did I drown?” You asked in confusion, the question punctuated by a weak cough. Catching your breath as she got you a short stepstool to climb onto the table, you then sat down, suddenly feeling awkward under her attentive gaze as she nodded. You repeated the same thing you and Shotaro had told the receptionist, triage nurse, this nurse, and the attending doctor, “I was at the old fishing pier and it was icy and I slipped off into the water. My clothes were too heavy and I couldn’t get back up. Thankfully, Shotaro saw me and pulled me out.”
She made a noncommittal noise, then began instructing you on how to lay for the first set of imaging. After, she took you back to your bed, and you were happy to bury yourself back under the mound of heated blankets.
“Hey, how’d it go?” Shotaro asked, tucking you back in.
“The attending will be back with the results,” the nurse informed the both of you, gaze lingering on where he was helping you with the blankets before she ducked out of the curtains.
“I don’t think she believed me,” you sighed once you were fairly certain she was out of earshot. “About falling off the dock. Which, I know it’s stupid of me, but like, what else could have—”
“You came in with a siren,” Shotaro reminded you, pulling up the stool to sit on.
“Yeah, but I doubt she actually—”
“They asked me for a venom sample while you were getting x-rayed.”
Your jaw dropped. “Well that’s fucked! There’s not even going to be any venom in my blood to compare it to! And that’s if you even gave a sample! You didn’t—”
“I did.” He held his hands up in a gesture for you to calm down. “Just like you said, it’s not going to show anything.”
“Yeah, but they’re practically accusing you of trying to kill me!”
“Which we know is ridiculous, because we were there.” He pointed between you two. “But they don’t. They’re medical professionals who are just looking out for you, their patient.”
You huffed, crossing your arms over your chest. “When you put it like that…”
“It almost sounds reasonable, huh?” He snickered.
“Yeah, almost.”
“It’s just a little venom, it doesn’t hurt me or anything,” he continued with a shrug. “Just… Can I ask you a favor?”
“Of course! You literally saved my life today.”
Shotaro peeked through the curtains at the ER entrance, then snapped them shut, turning back to you with big, imploring eyes. “Don’t tell Sungchan about them testing you for my venom? Or any of that, okay?”
“Uh, okay?” You agreed, though the confusion in your voice made it sound like a question. “Why?”
“You saw how he got with the fishing line thing earlier, remember?”
“He cares about you?”
“He has a hard time letting things go.” He added with a smirk, “He’s a dog with a bone.”
“Gotcha. I’ll hold this grudge for the both of you, then.”
“Not exactly what I meant, but I’ll take it.”
A phone buzzed then, and Shotaro brought his out. “Ah, speaking of…” He answered the call that had lit up his screen. “Hey, man. Oh, sure.” He held it out to you. “It’s for you. Sungchan.”
You put the phone up to your own ear, already hearing the wind on the other end of the line. “Hello?”
“Y/N, hey. It’s Sungchan,” said the familiar voice on the call. “I’m at the parking lot. Where exactly is your bike? I cannot find it for the goddamn life of me.”
After talking him through finding your bike hiding spot, you finally heard a victorious scream from him, and ripped the phone away from your ear to protect your eardrum. He puffed with exertion—presumably carrying the bike out of the bushes—then groaned, “Anybody who could actually find this fucking thing deserves to keep it. What the fuck, dude?”
“Please don’t keep my bike,” you joked weakly.
“Fine, I think you’ve been through enough today,” he relented, accompanied by the sound of his trunk shutting. “I’ll be back soon.”
“Okay.”
“See you.” And he hung up.
You handed Shotaro’s phone back to him. “He’s on his way back.”
Shotaro pocketed his phone, then after a beat, cocked his head. “Do you know how to drive?”
“What?”
“You rode your bike out to the pier in this weather. And you already asked me, I think it’s only fair I ask you.”
You crossed your arms over your chest. “I know how to drive, I just… don’t like it. Other cars on the road scare me.”
“And you feel safer on a bicycle around all those other cars?”
“That’s not what I mean.” You chewed on the inside of your cheek as you tried to think of how to explain it. “I don’t like driving something that big… and knowing that all those other cars have other people in them that could get hurt if there was an accident, or God forbid a pedestrian or something… It freaks me out. I haven’t gotten behind the wheel since I got my license.”
“I think most people forget that other cars have people in them, actually,” he mused. “They’re just… cars.”
You shook your head. “I never… could do that.”
“You would probably be a much better driver than most people on the road.”
“You’d think. I just piss everyone off, which makes me panic even more. I’m fine on the bus. Or walking. Or on my bike.”
“Rollerblades?”
“After what you saw today, you want to strap wheels on my feet?”
He laughed loudly, keeling forward a little as his shoulders shook. “Right, my bad.”
“Thank you for saving me, Shotaro,” you said earnestly, watching as he quickly sobered up. “I don’t think I’ve really said that yet. Thanks, for pulling me out, and taking me here, and waiting around with me and making sure I’m okay.”
“Ah, well…” He smiled down at his lap, rubbing the back of his neck. “Thanks for not dying. Would’ve been pretty awkward for me. Siren pulling a dead girl out of the water…”
“Not a great look, yeah,” you chuckled. “I still think that’s fucked. Thinking that you were trying to drown me just because you’re a siren.”
“You ever watched cop shows? Who’s the first person they check at a murder scene?”
“The husband. The wife. The butler.”
“All true. But I meant the person who found the body.”
“You’re not going to talk me out of holding this grudge.”
“Yeah, I was getting that feeling.”
“What other kind of shows do you like? Besides cop shows?”
“I didn’t say I liked them,” he clarified. “But I need background noise when I do stuff. Formulaic crime procedurals with like a bajillion episodes are perfect.”
You laughed a little at this, covering your mouth when you coughed in the middle. “Fair. So what do you like, then? When you’re actually paying attention, instead of just for background noise.”
He frowned, patting your back and fluffing up your pillows with an intense focus. “Are you alright? That didn’t sound—”
“It sounded just like all my other coughs, I’m fine. You’re avoiding my question,” you declared, grabbing his hands so he couldn’t keep fussing. “Come on, I’ll tell you my embarrassing TV habit.”
Shotaro sighed. “Fine. You first.”
“Nuh-uh. You first.”
“You offered—”
“Uhm, who just almost drowned and died?”
“You’re seriously going to pull the ‘I-just-drowned’ card?”
“Yup.”
“Well, who just saved you from drowning and almost dying?”
“And here I thought that was a selfless act.” You gasped teasingly.
“No, this was actually all an elaborate plot to find out your embarrassing TV habit.”
“Fine, fine.” You gave in with a big, dramatic sigh. “I actually do watch an old detective show that my dad likes. It hasn’t been on in like forty years.”
“What show?”
“Clawumbo.”
Shotaro started forward, “How is that embarrassing at all? You like… a beloved TV show? Gods, Y/N, you’re a freak indeed!”
“Shut up!” You whined, smacking one of his hands that was already in your hold. “I’m baring my soul here, Shotaro! You’re the only person who knows other than my parents and my roommate!”
“Why do you think that’s so weird? It’s a good show, I think, from what I remember, from older people talking about it.”
“Exactly! Nobody our age watches it!”
“How do you know I’m your age?” He grinned. “Besides, I’m sure you could totally bond with a very nice vampire who loved Clawumbo at your age.”
“You’re mocking me.”
“Sort of. But I’m also sort of serious. Isn’t that what’s great about living here?”
“Your turn.”
“Alright. I love The Real Sirens franchise. Every iteration, spin-off, I’ve seen them all.”
You knew you were staring. And blinking very fast. But it was taking everything in you to not laugh.
“You can laugh,” he said, eyes on the vitals monitor behind you. “You’re holding your breath trying not to, and I’m watching your O2 sat go down. Laugh before they think you’re dying.”
You finally burst into giggles that hurt your chest, coughing in between breaths. Shotaro patted your back firmly. “Yeah, that’s what I thought.”
“I’m not laughing at you!” You tried to defend yourself as you wheezed. “I was caught off-guard, okay? I promise!”
“I’ll try not to take it personally.”
Someone entered the curtain then, announcing, “Bike is secure, and—What…?” Sungchan had stopped midsentence, gaze focused on where you were still sandwiching one of Shotaro’s hands between both of yours, and his other was resting on your back.
“She was coughing, dude,” Shotaro immediately said.
You let out a couple more hacking sounds for believability.
Sungchan opted to move on, shaking a coat that was in his hand. “Anyway, grabbed an extra jacket for you.”
“Thanks,” you said, reaching for it.
“Actually, you should take this one.” He unzipped the one he was wearing and started shimmying it off. “It’ll be warmer.”
“I’d offer you mine, but he’s actually warm and fuzzy,” Shotaro added, gesturing to his own hoodie. You had half a mind to comment on the fact that you were pretty sure he only had a t-shirt under it.
“Dude, come on,” his friend groaned, handing you the jacket.
“What…?” You looked between them, slipping your arms into the incredibly warm garment.
Shotaro ended your confusion swiftly. “He’s a werewolf.”
“Oh. Warm and fuzzy, ha,” you snickered softly, pulling either side of the jacket tight around you.
“You don’t have to laugh at his bad jokes, Y/N. Seriously,” Sungchan told you, putting on the extra coat he’d brought.
“Yes you do.” Shotaro zipped the jacket up for you. “If you think it’s funny. And especially if it’s at Sungchan’s expense.”
You giggled at the exasperated but fond eyeroll that Sungchan did.
The attending doctor finally came back to tell you that your x-ray looked fine, and that you’d been in the ER long enough to count as the required amount of time for observation, so she was releasing you. You were given a packet of information telling you if anything else happened to come back to the ER, and a reminder to follow up with your primary care doctor in a few days.
“Are you seriously going to bike home?” Sungchan asked skeptically as the three of you walked out of the hospital. A few inches of snow had fallen while you were inside, covering everything in a white blanket. “All this snow…”
“Could you give me a ride?” You asked sheepishly, tugging at the ends of Sungchan’s jacket arms from where they covered your hands. The hospital had given you your damp clothes in a bag and a spare pair of sweatpants and a longsleeve to wear out. “I don’t think I could get back home from here without my phone maps…”
“Of course.” He started leading the way towards his car, and you grabbed Shotaro’s elbow as you eyed the icy ground. “What’s your address?”
“If you can get us to Jasmine & Pearl, I can direct you from there,” you said, eyes glued to where you were putting your feet. “For some reason, maps apps always get turned around trying to get to my place.”
“Hey, Taro works there,” Sungchan commented, entering the address into his phone with one hand and unlocking his SUV with the other.
“I know. I recognized him. Kinda. Not really.” You tried to play it cool.
“Do you go to the university in town too?” The werewolf asked. “Most of the customers are students since it’s close to campus.”
“Yep—Ah!” You yelped as your feet slid on the ice, but thankfully Shotaro kept you upright. He pulled you to safety, and you let out a sigh of relief when your shoes were on more textured ground. “I almost died. Again.”
“How many times a day does that usually happen to you?” Shotaro questioned.
“This is a new record.”
“Maybe it’s our fault,” Sungchan suggested, getting in the driver’s seat. “We’re like your bad luck charms.”
Shotaro opened the front door for you again, but you shook your head, grabbing the door handle for the backseat and climbing in yourself. He froze outside the car for a second before Sungchan yelled at him.
“Come on man! You’re letting all the heat out!”
The siren obliged, hopping into the passenger seat, and you all buckled in before Sungchan took off.
“Where was your little demon today, again?” Shotaro asked his friend.
“She has a name—”
“Mm, pretty sure she prefers little demon, actually.”
Sungchan laughed and gave in, “You know, probably. Club meeting. They were finishing the calendar for this semester I think.”
“So she and the dryads were chatting shit.”
“When are they not?”
“You’re going to her place tonight, right?”
“Yeah, Taro, unfortunately you won’t have an opportunity to harass my girlfriend—”
“She literally cyberbullies me? And real-life bullies me?”
“First of all, I’m staying out of this. Second, you guys bully each other. Even before we started dating. So yeah, I’m staying out of it.”
“You do not stay out of it, you’ve always taken her side. Even before you started dating.”
Sungchan pretended to scratch his chin as if deep in thought. “Huh. Wow. Wonder if that has anything to do with like… being in love with her?”
“Boo! Lame!” Shotaro shook a thumbs-down in his friend’s face.
Sungchan pushed it away as he snickered. “Dude! You want me to crash? Y/N’s already almost died twice today.”
“Maybe you were onto something earlier,” you interjected. “I think you two are bad luck charms.”
Shotaro took his hand out of Sungchan’s face, letting the driver navigate much easier. Eventually, you were pulling up in front of Jasmine & Pearl.
“So, where to next?” Sungchan asked.
“Thanks for everything, guys,” you said, opening the back door and sliding out onto the curb.
“What?” “What are you doing?”
“I can get home from here,” you informed them. “I mean, you still are two random dudes.”
Walking around to the back of the car, you called out, “Can you pop the trunk?”
Sungchan obliged, and you grabbed your bike handles to start tugging it out. You heard a door open and shut, then Shotaro was there, grabbing the back wheel and helping you.
“Thanks,” you offered him a breathless smile, wheeling the bike up onto the sidewalk.
“No helmet?” The siren asked, looking you up and down.
“I guess Sungchan didn’t find it. I’ll walk,” you promised. “See you, Shotaro.”
“Alright. See you, Y/N.” He patted your shoulder, then hopped back into the car.
Sungchan gave you a final honk of his horn, then pulled away from the shop. You took a second to gain your bearings, then started walking your bike, as promised, in the familiar direction of your apartment. You usually hiked up the stairs with it, but decided to risk getting in trouble with your building management just once and took it on the elevator. Thankfully, you were the only person, and hit the button for the third floor. Your keys also miraculously weren’t at the bottom of the ocean, so you were able to let yourself in, propping your bike up in your entryway.
“Did you get my text? About the bagels?” Your roommate Sooyoung called from the couch, not looking up from her computer. “Also, took you long enough, I was starting to think you got hit by a car or something.”
“Not exactly,” you replied weakly.
She finally snapped her gaze over to you, eyes going wide as she stood up and rushed to your side. “Y/N! Blessed Hecate, what happened to you?!”
“I fell off the pier…” You explained sheepishly. “I got checked out at a hospital. I’m-I’m fine, Sooz. It’s kind of a long story—Can I get changed first? And like, shower…?”
“Fuckin, yeah! Go!” She pushed you towards your room.
“Oh, can you put my phone in some rice or something?” You held the device out to her. “I want to try to save it.”
“I’ve got it,” she promised, still pushing you. “Now go!”
Lying in bed that night, bundled up under your warm blankets, you saw the sea monster on the backs of your eyelids. Your hand rubbed over your arm where it had grabbed you, where you could still feel it. You sighed as you tried to piece together the disjointed glimpses that you got of it as you were sinking closer to unconsciousness. You were so certain there had been something down there, but Shotaro didn’t seem to know what you were talking about. Maybe it heard him coming and swam off before he got to you. The claws that had wrapped around you were pale, but there was some larger, dark form behind it. The rest of its body? A tail of some sort? Some of the pieces that you had were almost eerily human, like the hand that had reached for you, but others were undeniably monstrous, like the razor-sharp teeth.
You kicked off your covers, groaning as your feet took you across your room to your desk. Folding your legs up in the chair with you, you clicked on your desk lamp to illuminate the sketchbook and pencil already sitting there. Half-asleep, you let your mind turn over the sea monster again, sketching out all the disparate parts that swam in your memory until finally, your eyelids were drooping, and your head was far too heavy for your hand to hold up anymore.
It was the first day of classes of Spring Semester, and you only had two classes. On your way back to your apartment after your second class, you made an intentional detour. Jasmine & Pearl didn’t have any other customers, which was sensible, as it definitely was not iced tea or slushy weather outside. When the bell above the door rang to announce your arrival, the slumped-over employee behind the counter shot to attention, pocketing his phone. And you were just in luck, as Shotaro’s familiar pink scales flashed with his jerky movements, and his dark eyes widened with surprise.
“Y/N, hey,” he greeted you brightly. “How are you feeling?”
“Good, the chest pain is all gone, got cleared by my doctor yesterday,” you said. “Thanks again, Shotaro.”
“Oh, you know…” He trailed off with a bashful smile, scratching the back of his head.
You shrugged off one strap of your backpack and opened it, pulling out the jacket that you had inadvertently taken home with you the other day. Holding it out over the counter, you said, “Here’s Sungchan’s jacket, by the way. I washed it.”
He accepted it, folding it over his arm. “Thanks.”
“So, do you have classes today?”
“No, just practice later tonight. My class schedule is stacked on Tuesdays and Thursdays. What about you?”
“I just finished.”
Shotaro glanced at the clock on the wall, then said, “My uh, my shift ends in like, ten minutes. If you want to wait?”
“Oh, sure.” You looked up at the menu board above his head. “Can I get a coconut milk tea while I’m here?”
“Of course.”
You started digging around in your bag for your wallet. “Hold on—”
“On the house.”
“What? But I’m supposed to owe you one, not—”
“I get a free drink every shift. And I want to give you this one.” He turned around to start making the drink.
Defeated, you put your wallet away and zipped up your backpack again. Shotaro plopped the drink in front of you when he was done, and you grabbed a straw.
“Thanks.” You stabbed the straw through the top, meandering around the area in front of the register to stretch your legs. “You don’t get a lot of customers this time of year, do you?”
“Not particularly. Mostly the dedicated regulars and for special events.”
“What’s your major?”
“Fine Art. Dance. What about you?”
You furrowed your brow at this revelation. “Wait, what year are you?”
“Senior.”
“Huh. I’m also a senior. Uh, art. I draw, mostly. I was just thinking it’s kind of weird that I haven’t at least run into you in the Fine Arts building before. I mean, it’s pretty small, you know?”
“Maybe we’ve always just been passing ships in the night.”
You squinted at him. “Was that a… nautical pun on purpose?”
“You loved my joke about Sungchan being warm and fuzzy the other day.” He crossed his arms.
“Loved is a strong word.”
“Speaking of ocean—Were you able to resurrect your phone?”
“Yes, a little rice, a little chanting from my witch roommate and it’s like it never took a swim.” You proudly showed off the fact that you could now turn it on.
“How’d the photos come out?”
You opened your camera roll, swiping through to first one to show him. “Not bad.”
“So is it for a project or something?” He asked, looking up from the screen to you, letting you control the phone.
“I don’t know. I take a lot of pictures of stuff that I think I’ll use as reference. Sometimes I do, sometimes I don’t.” You stopped on one that had the far-off boats and waves crashing against each other nicely. “I think it’d be a good for graphite or charcoal or something. Since it’s practically already black-and-white.”
“It’s really cool.” He added earnestly, “I’d like to see it, if you ever make something with the pictures you took.”
You sipped on your drink, smiling faintly as you pretended to think. “Mm, maybe.”
“So, uhm, did you see that the theater is doing a limited screening of the Clawumbo movie?”
“Wait, really?” You couldn’t help the jump of excitement in your voice. “Like, the original TV movie that became the unofficial pilot?”
“Yeah, I think so.” He took his phone out, typing fervently.
“This is the first I’ve heard of it. That’s crazy, it never even got a theatrical release in the first place.”
“Must be a lot more Clawumbo fans around here than you thought,” he said teasingly. “There’s a showing in half an hour, if you want to go?”
“We would be the youngest ones there by decades,” you pointed out.
“So? You can just say you’re a vampire if you’re that embarrassed.”
“My eyes aren’t red.”
“It’ll be dark in the theater, they won’t be able to see.”
You took another sip of your tea. “It would be really cool…”
Shotaro looked at you with his big, round expectant eyes, and you caved.
“Let’s do it.”
After Shotaro’s coworker came in to take over for the next shift, the two of you set off together. As soon as you left the warm confines of the boba shop, you were hit by a cold gust, reminding you exactly what season it was.
“Brr. That wind,” you shivered for emphasis, stuffing your hands in the pockets of your coat.
“Do you need Sungchan’s jacket again?” Shotaro offered the garment out to you.
“No, I’m okay, thanks,” you laughed, the words coming out as white puffs in the air. “Got my own today.”
He surprisingly didn’t put it on himself, keeping it folded over his arm, despite only wearing a t-shirt. Shotaro took a deep breath in before exhaling pleasantly. “I love the smell of winter. It’s my favorite time of year.”
“Wait, really?” You tilted your head curiously. “I thought sirens liked warm temperatures, like dragons.”
“Most do. Tropical and freshwater sirens do.”
“You’re…?”
“An Arctic siren. I love the cold,” he explained happily.
“Ohh…” You nodded slowly, many, many things now clicking into place in your mind. “So does it kinda feel like home?”
“I’ve never been to the Arctic, actually. I was born here. But everything’s still… too warm sometimes.” He said. “I have to take ice baths in the summer on really hot days. It freaks Sungchan out every time, he always thinks I’m going to get hypothermia somehow. At least I didn’t cost us our security deposit because I chewed up the carpet.”
You hadn’t grown up in the most diverse neighborhood, admittedly, most of your childhood friends being either humans or witches (like Sooyoung). But your high school was a bit more integrated, and you always wanted to know more. This was the first time you’d even heard of there being different kinds of sirens.
“Is there anything else different about Arctic sirens?”
“We… look pretty different, since we’re adapted for different conditions than sirens meant for warmer waters,” Shotaro admitted, picking at one of his nails. “When we’re actually more fishy, you know.”
“I’ve seen sirens at the beach before. Their tails were gorgeous, every color of the rainbow,” you recalled with awe.
“You probably saw tropical sirens then.”
Your eyes trailed over his nose, the apples of his cheeks, and even the tips of his ears, where patches of iridescent pink glimmered in the direct sunlight. Since the sun was no longer hiding today, you could map out exactly where the scales were. “Is your tail pink? Like your scales?”
“My scales are pink?” He asked bluntly, reminding you an awful lot of when you were on the beach and you had asked him if he had gone swimming when he clearly did.
You narrowed your eyes at him. “Are you messing with me?”
“No, I—” He faltered, expression softening as his eyes darted around. He seemed to be trying to figure out how to explain something. He settled on, “Arctic sirens are deep sea creatures, so I can see in the dark a lot better, but that means I can’t see as many colors. I don’t even really know what ‘pink’ is…”
“Oh, shit, I’m sorry—”
“It’s fine,” he reassured you with an easygoing smile. “Color is… whatever to me. I never really cared about it.”
“Anyway, yes, your scales are pink. The same pink as…” You chewed on your bottom lip as you tried to think of a good comparison for someone who’s never seen pink. “The way the watermelon guava slush at Jasmine & Pearl tastes!”
Shotaro cocked his head and closed one eye as he seemed to turn over your comparison in his mind, then finally chuckled. “Alright, I’ll take it. It’s a good color? You like it?”
“Yep, it’s super cute!” You promised.
“I think you’re super cute too.” He grinned and nudged your elbow.
“That’s not what I—!” Your jaw dropped as you sputtered over the sudden shift in tone of the conversation. “You—!”
“I…?” He echoed teasingly. “What?”
“You do owe me, actually.” You crossed your arms and looked away from him, trying to ignore the tug in your chest to turn and look at his smile.
“Wait, what?” That clearly wasn’t what he’d been expecting. “For what?”
“My jackets that are now on the bottom of the ocean somewhere. That trenchcoat was my favorite, you know.”
“Oh, and saving your life wasn’t enough?”
“My favorite.”
“I see, of course.” He hummed and tapped his chin. “Boba and paying for your ticket won’t be enough, I presume?”
“Nope.”
“And if I buy you popcorn at the theater?”
“Mm…”
“What if… we got dinner after? And I paid?”
“Getting there…” You sighed pensively.
“We could go on another date? When are you free?”
“This is a date?!” You hated the squeak in your voice as you stared at him with wide eyes.
“Could be,” Shotaro said. “Up to you.”
Fidgeting with the straps of your bookbag, you mumbled, “Okay, sure.”
“Your pick for the next one, then. Arcade, picnic, theme park.” He listed off some ideas as the movie theater came into view. “Think on it.”
Sure enough, Shotaro paid for your ticket, during which you couldn’t even make eye contact with the employee in the box office as he requested two tickets for Clawumbo. After, you two stopped off at the snacks to get two small servings of popcorn: butter for you, and a kelp & fish flavor for Shotaro. The theater that would be screening Clawumbo was, unsurprisingly, pretty empty, so you two got your choice of seats. You were never one for the front rows, hating how you had to crane your neck to see everything, so you picked one a little further back to be able to comfortably view the whole screen.
“What does yours taste like?” You asked Shotaro after watching him stuff a whole handful of popcorn in his mouth.
He chewed, swallowed, then answered, “I mean, fishy. If you like salt and vinegar chips, you might like it. You want to try it?”
You looked between him and the popcorn dusted with green flakes skeptically. But your curiosity got the best of you, and you delicately secured one kernel between your pointer finger and thumb. Before doing anything else, you questioned, “Have any of your non-siren friends ever had it?”
“Just try it,” he urged you.
You tossed the piece of popcorn into your mouth without any further fanfare or hesitation. The taste immediately hit you, overwhelmingly salty like you had just gulped down ocean water again, this time followed by a vinegary brine that instinctively made your mouth water in response to try to wash it out. You tried to control your face as much as possible, to not let your features immediately recoil. You knew that your nose was still scrunching a little bit as you chewed and finally forced yourself to swallow it.
Opening your eyes that had screwed shut, you gave Shotaro a sheepish smile and head shake. “Not for me, I think.”
He was already hiding his own giggles behind his hand, holding his popcorn bucket between his knees to pat you on the back with his other hand. “I appreciate you trying, and I’m so sorry. And I’m extra sorry that I kind of want to see you do that again because the face you made was really cute.”
“Oh, you’re a pest,” you huffed, pushing off his arm.
“A pest?!” He echoed through laughter, slumped against his theater seat as he clutched his stomach.
“You heard me.”
“I said I was extra sorry,” he pleaded. “Seriously, I think it’s cool that you wanted to try something new.”
You rolled your eyes. “Alright, alright.”
The lights went down all the way as the previews turned into the opening sequence. You kept your hand in your own popcorn bucket during the movie. It had been a while since you’d seen the pilot of Clawumbo, and you’d never seen it like this either; on a theater screen, in complete darkness, and without your roommate asking questions or making quips. Sooyoung was funny, and you liked poking fun at movies and shows with her, but sometimes it was nice to just be able to experience something without the layer of irony.
You were happy to hear Shotaro snicker and laugh at the jokes when you did, glancing over at him nervously to see if he was really enjoying it. To your relief, he was leaned forward in his seat, eyes fully focused on the screen and tracking the characters as they walked across it. You smiled to yourself and relaxed back, crossing your legs at the knee and tossing another piece of popcorn into your mouth as the gryphon detective went on with his roundabout way of questioning the suspect.
Since it was a TV movie, it was over much sooner than most modern movies. As the credits started rolling and the house lights turned back on, you turned your head back towards Shotaro expectantly. He already had a bright, fond gaze resting on you.
“It was good,” he said without prompting. “I really liked it.”
“They uhm, they change his character a bit between the this and the rest of the show,” you started rambling. “He’s more bumbling and not as aggressive. He kind of annoys people into confessing, but sometimes it’s like, is he doing it on accident or does he know what he’s doing? I think it’s like a bit of both? Like he’s naturally like that, but he knows how to lean into it to sort of play on people’s nerves, but sometimes he does just genuinely get carried away. You know?”
He was still smiling and nodding. “Sounds fun. You can show me the rest of the show sometime.”
You squinted at him. “You really want to watch it?”
“Well, not tonight,” he said, getting to his feet and ushering you up as well. “We’re going to dinner, remember?”
The two of you had been approaching an older human couple at the end of your row then. Before you could start excusing the two of you to shuffle by, the wife exclaimed with surprise, “Oh! We weren’t expecting to see anybody so young here.”
Shotaro grabbed your hand, squeezing it tightly down by your sides and behind you two. He was slightly cool to the touch, and you couldn’t even question what he was doing as your entire brain had blanked with panic.
“I am!” He answered them with his usual disarming, cheery smile. “She’s a vampire. Dragged me out here to see her favorite old series.”
You had tried to keep shuffling by them, but they didn’t move, apparently too caught off-guard. The husband blinked and pushed his glasses up his nose. “Sorry, your eyes…?”
“Contacts so she doesn’t scare you humans, you know. You can feel how cold she is.” Shotaro offered out your hand that he’d just released from a death grip.
The wife actually did tentatively touch the pad of her middle finger to the back of your index finger, then quickly folded her hands back in her lap. She offered you a sheepish smile. “Oh. Of course.”
“Anyway, we’ve got to go. Dinner!” He pointed at his own neck and took your hand again, opting to just step over their feet instead of waiting for them to move, pulling you behind him. You muttered apologies to them under your breath as you hopped over their legs awkwardly.
As soon as you were in the hallway, you burst into laughter, part-relieved and part-incredulous. “I can’t believe you just did that.”
“It worked!” He pointed out victoriously.
“Did you really have to imply that you were my dinner?”
“Freaked them out enough to let us go.”
You touched your own hand like the woman had. You weren’t sure if it was as cold as a vampire, and your usual warmth was already coming back, so you were skeptical as to how well they were fooled. But Shotaro’s final comment was probably enough for them to give up the conversation as a whole anyway.
Grabbing his hand once more, you asked, “Are you cold because you’re a siren? Or because you’re an Arctic siren?”
“I’m cold because it was freezing in that movie theater. Didn’t you notice?” He laughed, and you dropped his hand with an eyeroll.
“Actually, I didn’t, because I had a jacket on,” you retorted, shoving your well-insulated sleeve in his face triumphantly. “Could’ve put Sungchan’s on if you were freezing.”
“I like it! But sirens aren’t that much colder than humans, really. Not like vampires, at least.” He caught your hand once more, lacing your fingers together. “What do you want for dinner?”
You gasped and bounced on your toes as you suggested, “Ooh! There’s a really good pizza place around the corner!”
“I’m sold.”
After dinner, you let Shotaro actually walk you to your apartment this time. The sun had set while you were in the restaurant, and as you passed under streetlights chatting, your breath came out in clouds that caught the beams of light.
There was something that had been nagging at the back of your mind since he first mentioned making this a date, however. “So when did you decide that you wanted to uh—I don’t think me spitting up water after drowning was really my finest moment. Or at least I hope that’s not what gets you off,” you joked awkwardly. “What made you actually interested in me?”
“Okay, so I actually recognized you from the boba shop, but I thought that might’ve been like way too much to tell you right after you had drowned,” Shotaro admitted, pulling on one of his ears he looked down at the sidewalk. “I promise it was a total coincidence that we were both at the pier. I already thought you were cute and stuff before all that.”
“I’ll take your word for it,” you teased, digging your elbow into his side. You knew it wouldn’t hurt that much thanks to your thick layers. After a beat, you quietly added, “I thought you were cute, too. Before the pier.”
You had arrived in front of your apartment building, and suddenly stopped and pivoted around. Shotaro had kept walking, meaning he smacked right into you, letting out a ‘woah!’ as he stumbled back. You held your hand out towards him palm-up.
“Can I have your phone?” You asked, then tacked on, “To put my number in. I’ll give it back.”
The siren chuckled, opening up the device to a new contact before setting it in your waiting palm. “Thanks for clarifying. I thought this was the most low-stakes robbery ever.”
“Can I text myself? So I have your number?”
“I’d love it if you did.”
You quickly did so, already feeling the message buzz in your pocket. Handing his phone back to him, you glanced up at your apartment building, then at him. “Guess I have to figure out what we’re doing next, right?”
“That was the arrangement, yeah,” he confirmed.
“Goodnight, Shotaro,” you breathed out, nervously going in to hug him. You nearly melted into the concrete when he hugged you back without hesitation.
“Night, Y/N,” he murmured by your ear. “I had a great time today.”
You had started naturally pulling away at that point, and with nothing else intelligent coming to mind to say as a flustered, smitten smile overtook your mouth, you gave him another fleeting hug and muttered a hurried, “Bye.”
To your credit, you didn’t trip on your way into your building. You actually tripped going into the elevator, which Shotaro thankfully couldn’t see. You knew you were still in a bit of a daze when you entered your apartment, absentmindedly locking the door up after you and toeing your shoes off with the rest of them piled up there.
“Hey! I was about to text you—” Sooyoung came bustling out of her room, adjusting her clothes and accessories. “Are you still coming to sacraments with me tonight?”
“Yeah, sounds good,” you answered without really processing her question.
She stopped next to you in the living room, leaning in closer to sniff the air around you, a thoughtful crease appearing between her brows. “Did you—Did you go back to the pier?”
You grabbed the collar of your own shirt to smell it. “What? I don’t smell anything.”
She sniffed one more time, a knowing smirk coming to her face instead. “Not the pier—How’s that cute siren at the boba place doing?”
“You can smell Shotaro on me?” You asked in disbelief, inhaling even deeper.
“You’re not going to be able to,” she chuckled. “I was being generous when I said you smelled like the pier. More like a fish market.”
“Wow, rude.”
“So you were with him?”
You bit your bottom lip, feeling the dopey grin spread across your lips. “I had to return his roommate’s jacket, and then we went to the movies, and then we got dinner, and he walked me home…”
“…And?” She asked emphatically, gesturing wildly for you to continue.
“And I got his number and we’re going on another date!” You finished in a rush, voice pitching up into a squeal.
“Yes! Finally!” Sooyoung cheered. “God, if I had known all it would take was you mildly drowning, I would’ve done something sooner.”
“You would’ve drowned me to get me to talk to him?”
“Just a little!”
Unfortunately, the beginning of the semester hit you like a freight train, all of your professors wanting to kick off classes with assignment after assignment. You and Shotaro texted every day, but it seemed as though your schedules never overlapped. Either he was free and you were in class, or he was in class and you were free. Even the weekends were unyielding in terms of his work schedule. You did a work-study program yourself, assisting in cleaning up the art studios after hours in exchange for reduced tuition and pocket money.
Closing up the last studio for the night, you flicked the lights off before locking it up behind you. You had been there later than you intended, wanting to work on a piece of your own while you still had access to the studio’s tools before actually cleaning up. The janitors had already come through and turned the hallway lights off, leaving you to navigate by the light of your phone flashlight. There were no bike racks by the fine arts wing, so you had to traverse across the entire building to get to the other entrance where your bike was parked. As you passed by a hall, you noticed a single stream of light coming from a room. You felt obligated to go shut that light off as well, veering off your path over to the room.
When you peeked into the room, hand already reaching for the doorknob, you were surprised to see that somebody was in there. It was a dance practice room, you immediately identified by the wood floors and mirrors that took up an entire wall from floor to ceiling. You could just hear the thumping bass of the music playing through the door. The dancer seemed entirely focused on their performance, their back to you and their face obscured by the baseball hat they were wearing.
You checked the time on your watch, snorting softly to yourself. Must be a vampire. Not that you really had room to talk. Deciding that it ultimately wasn’t up to you to inquire about if they were supposed to be here this late, you turned on your heel, heading on your way once more.
The door opened behind you, and while you were fully intending on pretending you didn’t hear it and speedwalking away a little faster, your name was called. “Y/N!”
Pivoting back around, you still couldn’t make out the figure well, the light behind them entirely casting their front in shadow. Then they spoke again, “Hey, it is you.”
This time, you recognized his voice, all tension leaving your body as you took a couple steps back towards the practice room. “Oh, Shotaro. Sorry, I didn’t realize you were in there.”
“It’s me,” he chuckled, shoulders heaving as he caught his breath. “What are you doing here?”
“Cleaning up the studios,” you explained. “I didn’t know the practice rooms were open this late.”
“You have to make a reservation ahead of time,” he explained, taking his hat off and running his fingers through his sweaty hair, then putting it back on backwards. “Sorry, you were leaving, weren’t you? I just—I wasn’t sure the next time I’d see you, so…”
“It’s okay.” You smiled down at your feet. “I’ve wanted to see you, too. Our schedules are just…”
“The worst,” he finished.
“Yeah.” You eyed the practice room through the door he was still holding ajar. “You’re in the middle of something; I don’t want to take your practice time…”
“I’ve only got a few minutes left. Do you uhm, want to hang out?” He offered, pointing behind him with a thumb. “So you’re not walking out alone?”
You nodded. “Sure, yeah.”
Shotaro held the door open wider for you, and you slipped in wordlessly. Music was still playing from the speaker in the corner, and the siren gestured to a corner where a bag and other miscellaneous items were.
“You can stay over by my stuff.”
“Thanks.” You leaned against the wall, not in the mood to sit on a used dance practice room floor. “So what are you working on?”
“Choreographing for the midterm show.” He pulled out his phone, tapping it a few times, the music subsequently pausing. “My group’s first practice is tomorrow but something still feels off.”
“Maybe it’ll come to you once you practice it with your team,” you offered brightly.
“Hopefully.”
You were silent as the music started back up, and Shotaro got into his place. As soon as the beat started, you came to appreciate how well they had sound-proofed these rooms, as your ears were met with much more than just the baseline that you had overheard in the hall. As you watched Shotaro, his moves all powerful, smooth, and seemingly effortless, you could suddenly understand all the stories of sailors being lured to their deaths. You couldn’t force your eyes away if you wanted to, gaze raking over his form again and again. His white tank top was practically sheer with sweat, sweatpants which already hung low on his hips shifting with every move he made. In the back of your mind, you were mortifyingly aware of the fact that he could see you watching him like this in the mirror, but that idea still didn’t tear your focus off him.
The song was simultaneously 10 hours and 10 seconds, as he struck what looked like an ending pose, before falling to his knees with a relieved groan. In the next second, he was splayed out on the ground in a star.
“That still sucked,” he bemoaned, pulling himself up to secure his phone and pause the looping song once more. You had no clue what he was talking about, as far as you were concerned, that was all perfect.
“I thought it was good,” you said quietly, clearing your throat as you looked down at your nails.
Shotaro laughed, meandering over to you. “Well thanks. If only you were the one grading me, I’d be done.”
“A-plus from me,” you joked, still picking at your cuticles. After a beat of silence, you looked up at him curiously to find him already watching you, hands on his hips and an amused smile playing across his lips. “What?”
“Nothing, I just like looking at you.” He grinned, leaning against the wall next to you on one shoulder.
“You—” Your face was hot as your gaze dropped to your feet. “Are you done? Practicing?”
“Mhm.” He didn’t budge despite his affirmative response, and you could feel his eyes still on you.
“Then shouldn’t we go or something?”
“Or something?”
“I—” You let out a huff. “I don’t know.”
“Y/N.”
“Hm?”
He softly cupped your chin, gently lifting it until he could look into your eyes. You gulped, the sound horrendously loud in the quiet.
“I want to kiss you,” he said, the corner of his mouth curling up slightly.
Your breath hitched in your throat. “Okay.”
“Can I?” He questioned. “Do you want to kiss me?”
“Yes.” You nodded fervently, stepping closer to him.
The curl of Shotaro’s smile didn’t leave as he kissed you, lips soft and plush against yours. Your blood roared like the ocean in your ears, your heartbeat thudded like a drum inside your head, and a faint buzzing was somewhere in the background like an old lightbulb whose wiring was on the fritz. Honestly, for all of Sooyoung’s comments about sirens smelling like fish markets or other unpleasant things, you were pleasantly surprised that kissing Shotaro reminded you of nothing more than a hint of sea spray.
Sooner than you’d like, it was over, and he was chuckling, his cool breath fanning over your cheek. “Damn, now I know why you survived for long when you fell off the pier. You’ve got lungs like a siren.”
“You’re exaggerating…” You mumbled.
“Only a little.” He reached up to unfurl your fingers from where they were clutching a fistful of his shirt—you didn’t even realize you’d done that, embarrassingly. “Ready to go?”
“Oh, yeah, yeah.”
After packing up the practice room, the two of you headed out, Shotaro flipping the light off behind you. Your eyes hadn’t adjusted back to the dimness of the building yet, and you let out a small, startled noise as you couldn’t make out your surroundings, skidding to a stop in your tracks.
“I always forget humans don’t do well in the dark,” Shotaro clicked his tongue, hand entwining with yours. “Come on.”
“You can see?”
“This is what I was made for.”
“So, does normal light hurt your eyes?”
“No, we have to come back up to the surface sometimes.”
“I thought you could breathe underwater or something.”
“I can. But there’s no humans down there to lure in,” he said teasingly, nudging your arm with his.
“I doubt there’s enough humans in the Arctic to really make that a staple in your diet,” you snorted lightly.
He laughed again, pushing the door open for you. “Fair point.”
The streetlights scattered around the parking lot provided enough light for you to see, and as you looked over to where your bike was locked up, your stomach dropped upon seeing a completely empty bike rack.
“No no no!” You dropped his hand to run over to the rack, surveying the surrounding area desperately for any trace of your bike. Your lock was on the ground, the mechanism popped open and wire completely intact. “God damn it!”
“Oh shit, did your bike get stolen?” Shotaro caught up to you, also craning his neck around.
You picked up your useless lock. “Yeah.”
“They pick it?” He took the lock from your hands to inspect it.
“No, I just fake lock it. I lost the key a while ago,” you sighed. “My bike is so busted I figured nobody would ever take it.”
“Want a ride home?”
“Please…”
Shotaro’s car was a little older like Sungchan’s, you guessed both were probably their first cars from high school, hand-me-downs or at least purchased used. The siren’s was a sensible sedan, and though you spotted an array of bumper stickers on the rear, it was far too dark for you make out any of the content on them on your quick pass to the passenger seat. Shotaro had to hurriedly toss a textbook, a pair of shoes, and a couple miscellaneous items of clothing into the backseat to make room for you. After starting up the car, he hurriedly cranked up the heat.
“Uh, let me know if you need it warmer,” he said as he continued messing with the knobs and directions of the vents. “Or if it’s too warm. I usually have it off in the winter unless Sungchan or someone else warm-blooded is in here, you know? Or, actually, adjust however you like. Free reign of the temperature, I’m good with whatever.”
You couldn’t help but giggle as he threw his hands up in a motion of relinquishing the controls to you. “Thanks, Shotaro.”
As he reversed out of the parking space and started driving, a thought came to your mind. Chewing on the inside of your cheek for a few moments, trying to decide how to phrase it, you then finally spoke over the music quietly playing from the car speakers.
“I mostly grew up around humans, if you couldn’t tell,” you decided to start with a little preface first. “And some witches.”
He nodded. “I had guessed there at least weren’t many sirens in your neighborhood.”
“So I’m sorry if I’ve been asking some… bad questions.”
“What? You haven’t,” he reassured you, briefly glancing from the empty road ahead over to you, letting you see a glimpse of the concerned knit of his eyebrows. “I appreciate that when you don’t know something, you ask questions and try to understand it—try to understand me—better. And I hope I’ve been making it clear when my answers are generally about sirens or Arctic sirens, and when they’re just specific to me and my experiences.”
“Yeah, you do,” you assured him.
“So, did you just want to tell me that? Or did you think of another question?”
“Well…”
“Come on, it’s fine,” he promised, pushing on your knee lightly.
“Okay, alright,” you sighed. “Seeing you dance, and drive, and stuff… I was wondering if you prefer being on land or in the water? Because like, knee-jerk answer would be that a siren would prefer the water, but you said you didn’t grow up in the Arctic, you’ve never even been there. You grew up here. And you’re even a dance major, clearly you feel comfortable on land, right? You’ve probably spent the majority of your life out of the water, haven’t you?”
Shotaro hummed thoughtfully as he brought the car to a stop at a red light. There were no other cars on the road, but you appreciated him following traffic laws nevertheless. “Yeah… I have been on land for most of my life…” A nostalgic smile played across his lips as his eyes continued watching the light. “My parents were actually so afraid of me having delayed swimming skills that they took me to the beach when I was like a day old to make sure my gills came in okay.”
You chuckled softly, but said nothing else, letting him continue to mull over your question.
“I… don’t think I really have a preference,” he finally answered. “Kind of a chicken-shit response, I know. Sorry. But they’re just different to me. One’s not better than the other. I do different stuff in each, feel different.”
“Apples and oranges.”
“Well, I can tell you that I prefer apples,” he retorted. “But yeah, something like that.”
You snickered as the light turned green, and he accelerated gently. “Noted. Thanks for answering. I don’t think it was a chicken-shit answer. It was honest, and that’s all I want.”
“Thanks. It wasn’t a bad question, either, by the way. I’ve just never been asked. Probably because everyone assumed I liked the water since I’m a siren.” He tapped the cover of the wire-bound book that had been sitting on your lap for the whole ride, switching topics to ask, “What’s this?”
“Oh, my sketchbook.” You flipped to a random page, flashing the doodles of a faceless woman (you had been practicing head and shoulder posing) towards him before just as quickly shutting it. “Just warm-ups and random stuff. My stuff for classes is in my portfolio.”
“Wait, I was turning, I wanted to see.” Shotaro gestured for you to open it back up now that he was on a fairly straight stretch of road.
“Nope, lost the page.”
He waved his hand again, more insistently this time. “Well then show me a different page.”
“Eyes on the road,” you giggled, firmly clutching your sketchbook shut with both your hands.
“So unfair,” he let out a great big sigh, relenting for now.
“A bit.”
Your apartment building was coming into view, and while you didn’t want to leave Shotaro (you didn’t know the next time you’d see him, after all), you were insanely tired.
“Thanks for the ride,” your tone betrayed your melancholy at having to part, one limp hand reluctantly laying on the door handle but not moving to open it.
“Any time.” He picked his phone up from where it had been sticking out of the cupholder in the center console. “When are you free? I’ve still got a date to pay for.”
“Oh, uhm…” You fumbled to open your phone calendar too. “Next… this Saturday? Yeah, yeah, I’m going to morning sacraments with Sooyoung but I’m free all day after that.”
“Saturday it is then. Do you have a back-up bike, or should I pick you up from sacraments?”
“I can’t tell you where it is, sorry.” You flashed him an apologetic smile. “The normal ones are like, open-door, so that would’ve been fine, but this is a super special one so it’s invite-only. This is Sooz’s first year being able to bring someone.”
“I understand.” He nodded.
“But, it’s walking distance to the old pier! You can pick me up there!” You offered enthusiastically.
“Sounds like a date. You’ve got until then to figure out what we’re doing.”
“I’m on it.”
“Can’t wait.”
“Goodnight, Shotaro.” Before you could lose your nerve, you shot forward over the center console to kiss his cheek, then threw open the door and scrambled out with your stuff. “Bye!”
“Goodnight!” He called after you before you shut the door a little harder than you meant to.
You didn’t have whatever magical senses that Sooyoung did, so maybe it was your imagination, but you swore you went to sleep with the smell of an ocean breeze still floating around you. A sensation that persisted into your dreams, as a familiar bitter salt was filling your nose, on your tongue, stinging your eyes. The patchy sunlight that filtered down through the seaweed only afforded you the same glimpses of the sea monster that you knew—sharp claws, eyes that flashed not with their own glow but the reflection of the available light, gaze never moving from you as it circled you, more serrated teeth than you could count or see in the split-second glimpses afforded to you, and at a point unknown to you, its gray skin turned in a massive, dark tail propelling it with a quiet but agile strength. As it wound lazy rings around you, you spun to keep it in your vision, not out of fear, but an insurmountable craving to know. To see. But no matter how many times you went around and around, the kelp never parted to reveal new pieces to you.
It wasn’t as cold today. Or maybe it was just the lack of sea breeze biting at your nose that made it feel warmer. The old pier had shed its icy coating, only the usual bumpy surface of the sunbleached planks stretching out from the shoreline now. You couldn’t help yourself, feet taking you to the end without pause, as if that had been your destination the whole time. You just wanted to look. To see. Shotaro wasn’t here yet, you’d gotten out of sacraments earlier than you’d thought. Kneeling down, you wrapped one arm around the large piling beside you, using your other hand on the edge to balance. You peered into the greenish greyish blackish blue water underneath you, looking for any sign of the sea monster.
The old pier creaked, announcing the presence of someone else. You looked back over your shoulder, immediately spotting Shotaro as he approached you.
“I don’t think I like the look of this,” he gestured to the visage of you at the edge of the dock. “Mind taking three big steps away from the edge for me?”
“It’s not icy today,” you huffed, but obliged nevertheless, standing up and walking over to the siren.
“Water’s still going to be way too cold for you.” He pulled the sides of your beanie further down over your ears. “What were you even doing?”
“Just looking…”
“Mm alright. You ready to go?”
“Yep!” You grabbed his hand, heading back towards the parking lot together.
“So how were sacraments?”
“Really cool! I just wish they weren’t so early.” Your words were punctuated by a yawn. “We had to get up at like five a.m.”
“Well that’s just cruel.”
“I know! I don’t see why the magic couldn’t work just as well at brunchtime or something.”
“Sacraments over mimosas?” Shotaro asked, amused.
“Now that’s an idea I can get behind.”
In his car, you input the location you had in mind into his phone then quickly went to work adjusting the heat settings for yourself.
He looked it over with interest as he started driving. “Natural History Museum?”
“I haven’t been since I was a kid. It sounded fun,” you said, warming up your fingers in front of the air vent.
“It does,” he agreed with a smile.
The museum was even cooler than you remembered as a kid, huge fossils of long-gone creatures of both magical and non-magical varieties, displays of gemstones and rocky formations, and life-size dioramas of habitats thousands of miles and many millennia away. In the oceanic corridor, you found yourself face to face with the fossilized, open jaw of some large sea creature, rows of serrated teeth surrounding you above and below. You craned your neck to look up at the glinting teeth the size of your thumb. You unconsciously leaned forward against the railing separating the patrons from the exhibits, gaze tracing every razor-sharp notch.
“Y/N.” Shotaro startled you, his quiet voice suddenly beside you as his hand gently touched your upper arm. He had been looking at the display behind you last you were aware, but now he was observing you with a tilted head and furrowed brow. “Hey, careful.”
You didn’t even realize you had gone onto your tippy-toes to get a better look, and dropped back onto flat feet, straightening up so you were no longer keeling over the railing. “Right. Sorry.”
“Is everything alright?” He still had an air of concern about him.
“Yeah, uhm, I was just looking.” Your skin heated up as you realized how much of a weirdo you must’ve looked, practically sticking your head right into the fossil’s mouth. “What time is it?”
He checked his phone. “11:45.”
“We should head over to the planetarium for the show.”
“Yeah, we should,” he agreed, and took your hand in his. “And this time I’m not letting you ‘just look’ and end up breaking a telescope or something.”
“I haven’t broken anything,” you huffed, but made no moves to shake off his hand, all too happy to be holding it anyway.
“You drowned, Y/N.”
“Only a little bit.”
The planetarium show was a stunning array of stars, galaxies, and supernovas. And in the darkened theater, as the presenter explained something about oceans forming millions of years ago, you looked away from the domed screen above you, to Shotaro beside you. He must have sensed your eyes on him, as he turned his head towards you as well, quirking a brow up inquisitively. You nudged your chin forward, stopping just short of closing the gap entirely. The siren didn’t leave you waiting, immediately pressing his lips to yours.
“Hey, Taro,” you beamed as you opened your front door for your boyfriend that particular evening, already in your pajamas. “How was practice?”
He leaned in to kiss your cheek first, murmuring his answer against your skin. “Mm, hi, bubs. It was fine.”
“I’ll take your stuff if you want to shower or something?” You offered before your nose caught up to your words. He smelled perfectly fresh, actually. “Wait, you already showered?”
“Yeah, I stopped by the fitness center after we wrapped.” He ran a hand through his damp hair. “Didn’t want to show up to see my beautiful girlfriend all gross and sweaty.”
“I’ve seen you after practice before,” you chuckled, walking further into your apartment. “But thanks. Pizza got here a couple minutes before you did, so it’s nice and hot.”
“Sounds awesome, thank you.”
After eating your separate pizza flavors in the kitchen you returned to your room, where the siren had dropped his bags off earlier. Without prompting, he dropped onto your bed with a soft groan, the mattress springs squeaking. He rolled all the way over against the wall, throwing his right arm over his eyes.
“Tired?” you surmised, sitting next to him cross-legged.
“Just a little,” he agreed, feeling for you blindly with his other arm. You put your hand down in his path so he could hold it contentedly. “Don’t want to go to sleep yet, though.”
“Why not?”
“I just got here.”
“You’re going to be here all weekend. You can sleep now.”
“I think I can make it through one Clawumbo episode, pinky promise.” He stuck his right pinky up without uncovering his eyes.
“Clawumbo can wait until tomorrow,” you laughed.
Then, a knock came at your already cracked door, and you reached over to open it for your roommate.
“Hey, Shotaro,” Sooyoung offered the siren a casual greeting as she went to lean in your doorway.
He waved his right hand. “Hey, Sooz.”
Your friend turned her attention to you, clasping her hands together and begging, “Y/N, please give me the motivation to go to midnight sacraments.”
“That cute witch from your Magical Botany Club might be there. Didn’t they say they were going to try to make it to the next one?”
She immediately perked up. “You’re so right, thank you!”
“Try asking them to get lunch or something this time,” you suggested.
“I'm not taking dating advice from the girl who didn’t actually talk to the siren at the boba shop who she thought was cute until she drowned,” she snorted.
“You—” You swung a pillow at her and she didn’t even bother moving, laughing as you smacked her crossed arms. Shotaro snickered too, squeezing your hand affectionately but staying quiet otherwise.
“Speaking of the incident—Did she ever tell you about her sea monster?” Sooz aimed her question at Shotaro, amusement evident in her tone.
“Huh?” He made a noise of confusion.
“I regret telling you, actually,” you scoffed, rolling your eyes at Sooyoung.
She held her hands up defensively. “Hey, I’m not making fun of you for thinking you saw a sea monster.”
“Yeah, you are.”
“I’m making fun of you for wanting to fuck the sea monster.”
Shotaro’s arm finally dropped from his face. “What?”
“First of all, as my friend, you should be supportive,” you said sarcastically. “Second, don’t you have sacraments to go to right now?”
“Mm, fine, fine.” Sooyoung waggled her brows, stepping back out of your room and closing your door behind her. She shouted her farewell, “Bye!”
“What’s going on?” Your boyfriend questioned, obviously having no clue what the two of you were talking about. You got up, grabbing your sketchbook off your desk. You knew you’d have to talk to him about it eventually, the thing that your mind always wandered to—when it didn’t wander to him, of course.
“When I fell off the pier… I saw something underwater,” you started hesitantly, sitting down again.
Shotaro shifted, pushing himself up into a sitting position behind you, looking over your shoulder with interest. Opening to the first page of sketches that you did of the sea monster, you continued, “Before you got to me. Actually, I don’t remember seeing you at all. Just… this.”
He was quiet, though you could still hear his breaths beside your ear.
“Sooz jokes about me being obsessed because… well…” You continued flipping through the journal, through pages and pages of drawings of the sea monster. Your sketchbook had filled up embarrassingly quick with vignettes from your memory.
“You… saw this?” Shotaro finally spoke, finger hovering hesitantly over a more detailed charcoal of its claws and teeth.
“Not-Not all of it. I still don’t know what it was,” you admitted, your skin prickling with discomfort at finally having told somebody else. On one hand, you were convinced that you saw something—that you saw this—but on the other, you felt crazy admitting it. Turning to the siren, you asked him hopefully, “Do you know what it is?” You then tacked on a guarded, “Is it… real?”
Shotaro almost looked pained, his brows furrowed as he rubbed his face with a grimace. “I didn’t think… Yeah, it’s real, Y/N. The path was so far from the pier when I saw you slip, and between the waves and how heavy your clothes were, you were already so far down by the time I got there, I had to… It was me.”
Setting your sketchbook aside, you tilted your head thoughtfully. “When you said Arctic sirens look a little different…?”
“Yeah. That’s what I—Woah!” He nearly fell backwards from you throwing your arms around his neck, barely catching himself with one arm behind him. The other hand tentatively rested on your hip. “Hey?”
You pulled back enough to hold his face between your hands, scanning his uncertain features earnestly. “Can I see?”
“Wait, really?” He blinked up at you with his big dark eyes.
“If you’re comfortable with it,” you reassured him. “I just… think you’re kind of beautiful.”
A bashful smile overtook his face, and he looked down, away from your gaze. “Gods, when you put it like that, bubs—Okay. Let’s go.”
“Go?”
“Mhm. Your tub is a little small.”
You tried to hide your anticipation as Shotaro drove you out to the old pier. But your legs took turns bouncing, you shifted around in your seat, and you kept looking out the window to gauge how close you were.
“You’re making me even more nervous,” Shotaro teased, putting a hand on your bouncing leg.
“Sorry, sorry,” you muttered, forcing yourself to sit back against the seat and keep your legs still. Placing your hand over his, you smiled when he turned his hand over and slotted your fingers together. “You’re okay with this, right Taro?” You asked softly, searching his profile as he watched the road.
“Of course.” He let out a breathy laugh. “I’m just surprised by it all. Everyone has this image of sirens in their heads, you know? Tropical sirens. This whole time I’ve been trying to figure out how I was going to explain what I look like, and it turns out you’ve already seen me.”
You could still see the tension in his shoulders, though. “Then why are you nervous?”
“Seeing a couple blurry bits and pieces is different than… everything.”
Promising any specific reaction right now would’ve felt hollow and insincere, so instead you squeezed his hand tightly.
The old pier was even more treacherous than usual at night, with only the moonlight and Shotaro’s superior night vision to guide you across the ancient planks. The half moon reflected on the water, distorted by ripples of the passing waves. At the end of the pier, Shotaro made you sit cross-legged a full step from the edge, claiming he wasn’t taking any risks this time by leaving you on your own two feet unattended.
You shook your head, but had absolutely no leverage to argue, accepting his phone and keys as they were handed to you. Next, he stepped out of his shoes, and it dawned on you what was about to happen. You met Shotaro in a pair of swim trunks.
He did provide some explanation after shucking his shirt off and hooking his thumbs in the waistband of his sweats. “The clothes come back after, but not dry. It’s just easier…”
“Right…” You nodded, pretending like you weren’t openly ogling your attractive boyfriend who was now down to just his boxers in the moonlight. For half a second, you forgot about the entire reason you came out here, this was a perfectly successful night in your books, a win—then he dove headfirst off the pier into the ocean. The dark water entirely swallowed him up, leaving behind no clue, no indication that he had just passed through. Clutching his keys tighter in your grip, the odd angles and points of the keys and keychains digging into your skin, you leaned forward as far as you could without moving from your seat. The waves lapped at the pilings of the dock, and far, far in the distance, a foghorn sounded.
“Bubs?” Shotaro’s voice broke the stillness of the night, and made you jump out of your skin.
“God! Are you under the pier?” You asked, pinpointing his voice as coming from somewhere below you.
“Sorry, yeah,” he laughed. “Okay, here I go.”
He moved through the water in absolute silence, your ears unable to track him until the top of his head suddenly appeared above the end of the dock. The back of his head was to you, and you couldn’t immediately spot any differences from what little you could see. In one fluid movement, he’d turned and pulled himself up onto the pier. Your eyes had adjusted to the nighttime, and now darted around, finally putting together all the disparate pieces that had been swimming in your mind for so long. His tail was dark and lacked any colorful scales like you’d seen on sirens before—instead it looked rough like shark skin. The coloring changed at the juncture of his hip, where it met his more human-like upper half. The usual golden hue of his skin was replaced by a light grayish tone, which became mottled with a dark green along his sides, the green covering the entire back side of his upper body. He didn’t have the normal frilly fins decorating his forearms and back of other sirens—his were rigid, sharp angles. His fingers were in fact the same claws that you remembered grabbing you, and you hardly gave pause to the five gill slits on either side of his neck. His face had changed, gaunter and sharper and more angled in some places, his ears now as angular as the rest of him, and razor-sharp teeth glinting whenever he parted his mouth. He was still recognizably your Shotaro—even as colorless, pale eyes met yours then looked away nervously.
“Not just kind of…” You let out a dreamy sigh, “Shotaro… you’re beautiful.”
You realized you’d been staring for probably too long when he rubbed the back of his neck, letting out a nervous laugh, “You’re looking at me like you’re the one that’s going to eat me alive, you know?”
“Sorry, I—Can I…?” You reached a hand out toward him indicatively.
Shotaro nodded, scooting along the edge of the dock to be closer to you. Your hand immediately reached for his cheek—his skin was cool and damp—and you pulled him nearer, resting your forehead against his.
“I didn’t think you’d be mean or anything,” Shotaro whispered. “But I didn’t think you’d… like it.”
You kissed a droplet of water off the edge of his bottom lip, the salt spreading across your tongue. “I love you.”
A smitten smile that was all sharp teeth overtook his face, and he pecked the corner of your mouth. “I love you, too.”
You kissed him again, more deliberate this time, running your fingers through his wet locks. He wrapped a hand around your upper arm, and you immediately sighed into his mouth, digging your nails into his scalp. Shotaro dipped his head, his lips tracing a chilly path down your neck to a spot at the base of your throat. You let out a soft groan of his name when his teeth gently grazed your skin, goosebumps following as his tongue laved over the same place.
“Gods—” He muttered into your burning skin. “Black cherry…”
The unrelated utterance caught your attention, and you made a curious noise in response. “Mm? Taro, what was that?”
He sat up, blinking quickly as if shaken from a trance. “Sorry, bubs. Uhm, humans smell different to sirens when they’re… in a situation like this. I can taste it so much better like this, too…” He lifted the end of his tail up and down once indicatively.
“Yeah, okay,” you replied, nodding probably too many times. “We’re going back right now.”
“I’m s—”
“I don’t want to get splinters,” you explained, pulling him in for one more rushed, dizzying kiss. “Got it?”
You watched his eyes widen as his gaze turned from one of confusion to understanding to excitement. Shotaro blinked, and in an instant, his eyes were back to their deep brown color. “Got it.” Scrambling to your feet, you ran back to the car hand-in-hand, laughing and giggling every time you stumbled over the uneven planks of the pier and into Shotaro, who never failed to steady you. He had a towel in his backseat that he wrapped around his waist, and despite the fact that the sedan reeked of desperation, he never once pushed it past the speed limit or failed to check both ways before turning on the empty roads. Even as you fell into your bed later that night, hungry mouths seeking out more tastes of saltwater and black cherry, your nose bumping into his forehead in your haste, he took just a moment to press an apologetic kiss there. And you said it back in the way that you leaned into him wholeheartedly when you lost your footing, and traced the lines of his palm with your fingertip absentmindedly as he drove, and your hand pushed some of his hair out of his eyes so you could see them, see your adoration reflected right back at you.
