I swear to fucking god if I see anyone else refer to “Spiderman: brand new day” as bnd one more time I’m gonna lose my shit because I can’t read it as brand new day all I hear is ddok ddok ddok bnd coming at your door and Peter Parker is no longer just the boynextdoor so refer to brand new day by it’s government name PLEASE
╰┈➤ you and sunghoon are going through a divorce but then finds out your pregnant.
✴ husband!sunghoon x preg!reader ✴ Warnings: Angst with a happy ending, divorce, marriage in crisis, arguments, emotional turmoil, secret pregnancy, morning sickness, crying, guilt, miscommunication, reconciliation.
The divorce papers had been sitting untouched on the dining table for six days. Every morning, you walked past the cream-colored envelope with your eyes fixed anywhere but there, convincing yourself that if you ignored it long enough, maybe the end of your marriage would disappear with it. It never did. The signatures waited patiently beneath the flap, yours written with trembling hands, his clean and effortless, just like everything Park Sunghoon ever did. Five years of marriage had somehow been reduced to ink on paper, and neither of you had found the courage to send them to the lawyers. Perhaps it was fear. Perhaps it was denial. Or perhaps, deep down, neither of you was ready to admit that the love you had fought so hard for was slipping through your fingers.
Sunghoon hadn't always been this distant. Before becoming the CEO of PARK Group, he had been the kind of husband who insisted on driving you everywhere because he claimed the roads were "full of idiots."
He'd leave little sticky notes inside your handbag just to make you smile during work, surprise you with late-night convenience store dates after exhausting weeks, and hold your hand whenever the two of you crossed the street, even though you constantly teased him for it. Somewhere between endless board meetings, overseas investors, and the pressure of keeping a billion-dollar company alive, those little gestures disappeared.
At first, you told yourself it was temporary. Then weeks became months, and months became years, until the silence between the two of you became louder than any argument you'd ever had.
The front door unlocked just after eleven that night. You heard the familiar click of expensive leather shoes against the marble floor before his coat landed over the back of a chair.
"You're still awake?" he asked quietly, surprised to find the television still glowing in the dark living room.
You looked up from the untouched mug of tea in your hands and forced a tired smile that didn't quite reach your eyes. "I couldn't sleep."
He nodded as if he understood, although the truth was neither of you understood each other anymore. He loosened his tie, rolling his shoulders with a wince. "The meeting ran longer than expected. I tried calling."
A bitter laugh escaped before you could stop it. "You always have a meeting, Sunghoon." His expression hardened ever so slightly. "I'm doing this for us."
"No," you whispered, standing from the couch. "You keep saying that, but somewhere along the way, there stopped being an 'us.' It's just you... and your company."
The argument didn't explode all at once. It built slowly, quietly, through years of missed dinners, forgotten anniversaries, and conversations cut short by another ringing phone. You couldn't even remember what had started this one. Maybe it was the fact that he'd canceled yet another weekend away because an investor had flown in unexpectedly. Maybe it was because he'd answered three work calls while you were trying to tell him about your day. Or maybe it was because you were simply exhausted from feeling like you came second to a company that would still exist long after the two of you had fallen apart.
"I don't even recognize you anymore," you said, your voice trembling despite your attempts to stay composed. "Do you know what the worst part is? I don't think you recognize yourself either."
Sunghoon stood across the kitchen island, still dressed in his tailored charcoal suit. He looked just as tired as you felt, his tie hanging loose around his neck and the sleeves of his dress shirt rolled to his forearms. He opened his mouth to respond before closing it again, rubbing a hand over his face in frustration.
"You think this is easy for me?" he asked quietly. "Do you think I enjoy leaving before you're awake and coming home after you've gone to bed? I'm trying to keep everything together."
"And what about us?" you whispered. "Who's keeping us together?"
He looked away.
That was answer enough.
The next morning, the divorce papers were drafted.
Neither of you cried when the lawyers handed them over.
Neither of you protested.
It almost scared you how calm everything had become.
The screaming had stopped.
The tears had stopped.
It felt like your marriage had simply... run out of emotion.
For the next week, the penthouse became nothing more than a place the two of you happened to share. Sunghoon slept in the guest room. You stayed in the master bedroom. Meals were eaten separately. Conversations were reduced to polite questions that sounded more appropriate between strangers than husband and wife.
"Have you seen my watch?"
"It's on your desk."
"Thank you."
"You're welcome."
That was it.
No warmth.
No affection.
Just silence.
Then the nausea started.
The first morning, you barely thought anything of it. Stress could make people sick. Anyone going through a divorce would feel exhausted. But when you found yourself gagging at the smell of breakfast three days in a row, a tiny voice in the back of your mind began whispering something you refused to believe.
Standing in the pharmacy after work, you stared at the pregnancy tests for what felt like forever. Your fingers hovered over the shelf before finally grabbing one and shoving it into your basket as quickly as possible. You prayed nobody you knew would see you.
The drive home felt endless.
Your hands wouldn't stop shaking.
You locked yourself inside the bathroom before finally opening the small box, reading the instructions three separate times because the words refused to register. The timer on your phone counted down three agonizing minutes while you paced back and forth across the marble floor.
One line.
Relief flooded your body.
Then...
A second line appeared so faintly you almost convinced yourself you were imagining it.
You blinked.
It grew darker.
Your heart stopped.
"...No."
You picked up the test with trembling fingers, staring at it as if it might somehow change if you looked hard enough.
Positive.
The room spun.
You slowly slid down against the bathroom wall until you were sitting on the cold floor, your knees pulled tightly against your chest.
Pregnant.
You were pregnant.
A sob escaped before you could stop it.
It wasn't because you didn't want the baby.
It was because the timing felt impossibly cruel.
Only a week ago, you and Sunghoon had agreed your marriage couldn't be saved.
Now there was another heartbeat growing inside you.
One that belonged to both of you.
Tears blurred your vision as you instinctively rested a hand against your stomach. It was too early to feel anything. Too early to even look pregnant. Yet knowing that your child was there made everything feel different.
A sharp knock at the bathroom door made you jump.
"Y/N?"
Sunghoon's voice was muffled through the wood.
"You've been in there for a while."
Your heart leaped into your throat.
Quickly wrapping the test in tissues, you hid it beneath spare towels inside the cabinet before splashing cold water across your face.
"I'm okay," you called back, though your voice cracked.
The door opened as soon as you unlocked it.
Sunghoon frowned the second he saw you.
Your eyes were red.
Your cheeks were damp.
"You've been crying."
You immediately shook your head. "It's nothing."
"It doesn't look like nothing."
He took a hesitant step toward you, his usual guarded expression replaced by genuine concern. Carefully, almost instinctively, he reached out and brushed a loose strand of hair behind your ear. The gentle touch caught you off guard. He hadn't touched you like that in months.
"You don't look well," he murmured. "You've barely eaten this week, and every morning I hear you getting sick."
"It's just stress."
"You've been saying that every day."
"I know."
His brows knitted together. "Maybe we should go to the hospital."
"No."
The answer came far too quickly.
His eyes searched yours, confusion flickering across his face.
"...Why not?"
You forced a smile that felt painfully fake.
"I just need some rest."
For several long seconds, he simply looked at you.
Then he sighed softly.
"If you start feeling worse..." His voice was quieter now. "...please tell me."
You nodded even though you had no intention of doing that.
As he turned to leave, he paused at the doorway without looking back.
"I know things between us are... complicated right now."
Your chest tightened.
"But that doesn't mean I stop caring about you."
The bedroom fell silent after he walked away.
The tears you'd been desperately holding back finally spilled over again.
Because hearing those words only made your secret feel heavier.
And for the first time since seeing those two pink lines...
You wondered how long you could keep it from him.
The following morning, you woke before the sun had fully risen. A dull ache settled behind your eyes while another wave of nausea rolled through your stomach, forcing you to sit up abruptly. You barely made it to the bathroom before gripping the edge of the sink, your breathing uneven as you waited for the feeling to pass.
When it finally did, you leaned against the cool marble countertop, staring at your reflection. You looked exhausted. The dark circles beneath your eyes had become impossible to hide, and your cheeks had noticeably lost their color. You quietly opened the cabinet beneath the sink, pulling out the pregnancy test one last time before slipping it into your pocket. A few hours later, you found yourself sitting alone in your obstetrician's office, nervously twisting the sleeve of your sweater while waiting for your name to be called.
"Mrs. Park?" the nurse smiled warmly.
You stood, following her into the examination room. Everything happened so quickly after that—blood tests, questions about your health, and finally the ultrasound. You hadn't expected to cry, yet the moment the tiny image appeared on the monitor, your vision blurred.
"There," the doctor said gently, pointing toward the screen. "It's still very early, but everything looks healthy."
Healthy.
The word echoed in your ears.
Your hand instinctively rested against your stomach as tears silently rolled down your cheeks. You couldn't stop staring at the tiny flicker on the monitor. It didn't look like much to anyone else, but to you, it was everything.
The doctor handed you a small black-and-white ultrasound photo before smiling kindly. "Congratulations. Judging by the measurements, you're just over eight weeks pregnant. Morning sickness and fatigue are completely normal. Try not to skip meals, even if eating feels difficult. If your symptoms become worse, give us a call."
You nodded absentmindedly, clutching the ultrasound picture so carefully it felt as though it might disappear if you held it too tightly.
On the drive home, your eyes drifted toward the passenger seat where the envelope rested. You couldn't stop imagining what would happen if Sunghoon saw it.
Would he smile?
Would he cry?
Or would he stay...
Only because he felt obligated?
That question had haunted you since the moment you found out.
You knew your husband better than anyone.
Park Sunghoon never walked away from responsibility.
If he learned about the baby now, he'd tear up the divorce papers without a second thought.
Not because the two of you had fixed your marriage.
Not because the hurt had magically disappeared.
Because he would convince himself that staying was the right thing to do.
You refused to let your child become the reason someone stayed in a loveless marriage.
You wanted your baby to grow up in a home filled with love, not guilt.
By the time you reached the penthouse, you'd made up your mind.
The pregnancy would remain your secret.
At least for now.
When you stepped inside, the house was unusually quiet.
Sunghoon's shoes were by the front door, meaning he'd gotten home before you for once. You slipped the ultrasound into your handbag before walking farther inside.
The smell of food drifted from the kitchen.
You froze.
Sunghoon stood at the stove wearing a simple white shirt with the sleeves rolled to his elbows. His suit jacket was tossed over one of the dining chairs, and an apron—one you'd bought him years ago as a joke because he insisted he was a "great cook"—was tied around his waist.
He looked over his shoulder when he heard you.
"You're home."
You blinked in surprise.
"...What are you doing?"
He glanced back at the pan.
"Cooking."
"You hate cooking."
"I know."
A small, awkward smile appeared on his face.
"But you haven't been eating."
Your heart squeezed painfully.
"I thought... maybe soup would be easier."
You didn't know what to say.
For months, you'd begged him to come home before dinner.
Now, when your marriage was already hanging by a thread, he was standing in the kitchen making soup because he was worried about you.
The irony hurt more than it comforted.
"I didn't ask you to do this," you said quietly.
"I know."
He turned the stove off before facing you completely.
"I wanted to."
Silence settled between the two of you.
His eyes slowly wandered across your face, lingering on the exhaustion you could no longer hide.
"You look pale."
"I'm alright."
"You've been saying that every day."
"I'm just tired."
He walked closer until only a few feet separated you.
"You've barely eaten."
"I'll eat later."
"You've been getting sick every morning."
"It's stress."
His brows furrowed.
"Did you at least go to the doctor?"
Your heart skipped.
"...Yeah."
"What did they say?"
You looked down at the floor.
"They said I need more rest."
Technically...
It wasn't a lie.
Sunghoon let out a quiet sigh before reaching for your handbag.
"I'll carry—"
"No!"
The word escaped much louder than you intended.
Both of you froze.
His hand stopped midair.
Confusion immediately crossed his face.
"...I was just going to put it on the table."
"I..."
You tightened your grip around the strap.
"I'm sorry."
"I just... have something important inside."
He slowly lowered his hand.
"I'm not trying to invade your privacy."
"I know."
Another silence followed.
This one heavier than the last.
Finally, he gave you a small nod.
"The soup's ready whenever you're hungry."
He turned away, pretending not to notice the tears gathering in your eyes.
The moment he disappeared into his office, you rushed upstairs.
Locking yourself inside the bedroom, you pulled the ultrasound from your bag before carefully sliding it into the back of your bedside drawer beneath a stack of old photographs from your honeymoon.
Your fingers lingered on the picture.
"I'm sorry," you whispered, though you weren't sure whether you were apologizing to your baby...
Or to the man sleeping only a few rooms away.
The days that followed settled into a strange routine. The arguments had disappeared, but they hadn't been replaced with happiness. Instead, there was a quiet understanding between the two of you, as though you were both too exhausted to keep hurting each other. Sunghoon still left for work early, though not as early as before. Some mornings, you'd find a glass of water and your vitamins sitting on the kitchen counter without a word. Other days, he'd send a simple text asking if you'd eaten lunch. They were such small gestures—ones that would've seemed insignificant months ago—but now they only made your chest ache. He was trying. It was simply too late.
Morning sickness, however, wasn't nearly as forgiving.
You had barely managed two spoonfuls of breakfast before the familiar wave of nausea forced you to excuse yourself. The bathroom door had barely clicked shut before you were kneeling on the cold tile floor, one hand gripping the edge of the bathtub while the other instinctively rested against your stomach. By the time the nausea finally settled, your eyes were watery and your breathing uneven.
A gentle knock echoed through the room.
"Y/N?"
It was Sunghoon.
His voice was careful, almost hesitant.
"You've been in there for almost twenty minutes."
You quickly splashed cold water over your face before unlocking the door.
He frowned immediately.
"You look awful."
A small laugh escaped you despite yourself.
"Thanks."
"You know I didn't mean it like that."
"I know."
His eyes searched your face, lingering on the redness around your eyes.
"You've been getting sick every morning for weeks."
"I'm just... run down."
"You've lost weight."
"I'm trying to eat."
"I can see that."
He sighed quietly before reaching out. His hand hovered near your cheek for a second, silently asking permission before gently brushing a strand of hair behind your ear. His touch was so familiar that it almost broke you.
"I hate seeing you like this," he admitted softly. "I know we're... where we are right now, but that doesn't mean I stop worrying."
Your throat tightened.
"I'll be okay."
"You keep saying that."
"Because I don't know what else to say."
For a long moment, neither of you spoke.
Then, to your surprise, he opened his arms ever so slightly.
"Can I...?"
You stared at him.
He hadn't hugged you in months.
When you didn't pull away, he slowly wrapped his arms around you, careful and gentle, as if he were afraid you'd disappear if he held you too tightly.
It was warm.
Comforting.
Painful.
You closed your eyes for just a second, breathing in the familiar scent of his cologne.
"I've missed this," he whispered.
Your heart shattered.
Because so had you.
But missing someone wasn't always enough to save a marriage.
That evening, the two of you sat together in the living room for the first time in weeks. The television played quietly in the background, though neither of you was paying attention. Sunghoon had rolled up the sleeves of his white dress shirt, his laptop balanced on his knees while he answered a few emails.
You were reading a book you hadn't turned a page of in almost fifteen minutes.
The silence wasn't awkward anymore.
It was... peaceful.
"I spoke to the lawyer today," Sunghoon suddenly said, closing his laptop.
Your fingers tightened around your book.
"Oh."
"He asked if we'd decided on a date."
You nodded slowly.
"I told him..."
He paused.
"...that I wanted to wait."
You looked up.
His gaze stayed fixed on the coffee table.
"I don't know if waiting changes anything."
"It might not."
"But rushing into it doesn't feel right either."
Your eyes softened.
"Why?"
He let out a tired laugh.
"Because despite everything..."
He looked at you.
"...I still come home looking for you."
The confession stole the air from your lungs.
"I still wonder whether you've eaten."
"I still catch myself reaching for my phone whenever something funny happens because you're the first person I want to tell."
His smile was bittersweet.
"I don't think people stop loving each other overnight."
A lump formed in your throat.
"They just get lost."
Tears threatened to spill, but you forced them back.
"I don't know if I know how to find us again."
He nodded.
"I don't know either."
For the first time in months, there were no raised voices.
No accusations.
Just two people admitting that neither of them knew how to repair what they'd broken.
At that exact moment, your stomach lurched.
You shot to your feet so quickly that your book fell to the floor.
"Y/N?"
"I'll... I'll be right back."
You hurried upstairs, pressing a hand over your mouth before disappearing into the bathroom.
Sunghoon watched you go, worry etched across his face.
A few seconds later, the sound of retching echoed faintly through the hallway.
He immediately stood.
His first instinct was to go after you.
Instead, he stopped outside the bathroom door, resting a hand against the wood.
"...I'm here if you need me."
You squeezed your eyes shut on the other side, fresh tears sliding down your cheeks.
"I know," you whispered so quietly he couldn't hear.
Outside, your phone began ringing from where you'd accidentally left it on the coffee table downstairs.
Neither of you noticed.
The screen lit up with a familiar name.
Dr. Han.
His stomach tightened.
You'd told him you'd seen a doctor because of stress. Seeing your doctor call twice in less than a minute made him wonder if something was wrong.
He answered.
"Hello?"
There was a brief pause before a warm voice spoke on the other end.
"Good evening, Mrs. Park. This is Dr. Han calling from Evergreen Women's Clinic. I wanted to follow up regarding the symptoms you mentioned during your appointment. Have the morning sickness and dizziness improved at all?"
Sunghoon frowned.
"...I'm sorry?"
Another pause.
"Oh... am I speaking to Mr. Park?"
"...Yes."
"I'm terribly sorry. I assumed Mrs. Park had already told you."
His grip around the phone tightened.
"Told me... what?"
The doctor fell silent for a second, clearly realizing she'd made a mistake.
"It's regarding her pregnancy," she answered carefully. "Considering she's approaching her ninth week, nausea, fatigue, and food aversions are perfectly normal. We were also hoping to schedule her next prenatal appointment before the end of next week."
Everything around him seem to disappear, except you.
Sunghoon couldn't take his eyes off you.
The words from the phone call echoed endlessly inside his head.
Morning sickness... nine weeks... prenatal appointment... both mother and baby are healthy.
His hand was still wrapped around your phone, his knuckles turning white from how tightly he was gripping it. You stood frozen at the foot of the staircase, every bit of color draining from your face the moment you realized he knew.
Neither of you spoke.
The silence stretched until it became unbearable.
"You were pregnant..." he whispered, his voice so quiet it barely reached you. "This whole time."
You swallowed hard, unable to look him in the eye. "...Yes."
A hollow laugh escaped him, though there wasn't an ounce of humor behind it. He looked away for a moment, blinking rapidly as he tried to compose himself, but the hurt was written all over his face.
"So every morning..." he began, "when I heard you getting sick... when I kept asking if you were okay... when I asked if you wanted me to take you to the hospital..." He looked back at you, his eyes glossy with unshed tears. "You already knew."
You nodded weakly.
"I found out after we agreed to the divorce."
"And you decided not to tell me."
"It wasn't that simple."
"It feels pretty simple to me."
His voice wasn't loud, but it was enough to make your chest tighten.
"You looked me in the eye every single day and lied."
"I wasn't lying."
"No?" His eyebrows pulled together. "You told me it was stress. You told me you were fine. You let me think something was wrong, and every time I asked, you pushed me away."
"I didn't know what else to do!"
The words escaped before you could stop them.
Sunghoon fell silent.
Your breathing grew uneven as tears blurred your vision. "What was I supposed to say? 'By the way, I'm carrying your baby while we're signing divorce papers?'"
"I deserved to know."
"I know you did!"
Your voice cracked.
"I know that!"
The tears you'd been holding back finally spilled over.
"I thought about telling you every single day."
You covered your mouth, trying to steady your breathing.
"I even picked up my phone so many times..." you admitted through sobs. "I wrote messages... I deleted them... I practiced what I'd say if you came home early... but every time I looked at the divorce papers, I couldn't do it."
Sunghoon's expression softened for only a second before the hurt returned.
"So you chose for both of us."
"No."
"Yes, you did."
He shook his head, running a frustrated hand through his hair.
"You decided I didn't deserve to know I was going to be a father."
"I decided I didn't want you to stay because you pitied me!"
The room fell silent.
Your words hung heavily between you.
"I know you, Sunghoon," you whispered, wiping your cheeks. "You would've canceled everything. You would've torn up those divorce papers before I even finished speaking."
"Of course I would've."
"Exactly!"
His answer caught you off guard.
"You just proved my point."
"No." He stepped closer, stopping a few feet away. "I would've torn them up because my wife had been carrying something this huge all by herself."
"You would've stayed because of the baby."
"I would've stayed because I still love you!"
His voice cracked for the first time.
The confession echoed through the house.
Neither of you moved.
Sunghoon looked away, taking a shaky breath before speaking again, this time much quieter.
"Do you really think I've spent these past few weeks sleeping in the guest room because I stopped loving you?" He laughed bitterly, shaking his head. "I slept there because every time I looked at you, I was reminded that I'd failed you. I convinced myself that maybe you'd be happier without me."
Your heart clenched.
"I never stopped loving you either," you admitted. "But loving someone isn't always enough when all you do is hurt each other."
He nodded slowly.
"I know."
Another long silence settled between you.
It wasn't angry anymore.
It was heartbreaking.
Sunghoon glanced at the phone still sitting on the coffee table before quietly placing it down. When he looked back at you, his eyes were red.
"I missed everything."
His voice was barely above a whisper.
"The first doctor's appointment."
"You hearing our baby's heartbeat."
"You finding out."
He swallowed hard.
"And I wasn't there."
A fresh wave of guilt crashed over you.
"I didn't want to do it alone."
"Then why did you?"
"Because I was scared."
Your shoulders shook as another sob escaped.
"I was scared that if I told you, I'd never know whether you stayed because you loved me... or because you felt responsible."
Sunghoon closed the distance between you, but he didn't touch you.
Not yet.
"I can't change the mistakes I've already made," he said quietly. "I can't take back the nights I chose work over you or the arguments that pushed us here."
His voice trembled.
"But don't ever believe that our child would be a burden to me."
He paused, fighting back tears of his own.
"Or that loving you was ever an obligation."
Your eyes met his.
For the first time in months, neither of you was pretending to be okay.
There were no walls left.
Just two broken people standing in the middle of the home they'd built together, finally admitting how deeply they'd hurt each other.
The divorce papers were still waiting on the dining table.
Neither of you looked at them.
Not because everything had suddenly been fixed.
But because, for the first time in a very long while, they no longer felt like the only possible ending.
my first write about my ult!! tell me why writing taesan angst just feels so natural... enjoy!
- berry 🍓
“it feels like you’re never around, taesan. and when I need you the most, you’re not there!”
“you ever thought about how often you ‘need’ me? because to me, it feels like you’re a goddamn parasite.”
your grip on the wheel tightened as his words rang through your ears. your boyfriend had never been the affectionate type, and your standards for quality time had dropped to accommodate for him. but after arguing with him for hours (ironically the longest he’d focused on you in the last month), you felt like you’d never get anywhere, and had stormed out of his apartment, slamming his door so loudly the neighbours would be sure to complain. maybe you’d expected him to follow after you, or at least, you’d hoped. but he never did.
with your head pounding and your heart aching, you sped through the streets, determined to make it home as quickly as possible. your foot pressed down on the accelerator without release, the tears already starting to stream down your cheeks and blur your vision.
it happened so fast. you swore the car came out of nowhere, from an intersection you didn’t know existed. and when you saw its lights through the fog, it was already too late. the impact threw your car sideways and to a stop against the gutter. your head snapped forward, causing a burst of pain at the base of your neck, and the air bag crushed you against the seat, pieces of metal flying everywhere as other cars came to a stop around you. that’s when everything faded to dark, and the only sounds you picked up were the sirens of the approaching ambulances.
taesan had been sitting on his couch for what felt like hours, staring off into space as your argument replayed in his head. you’d argued before, always about the same thing, but it was the first time you’d actually left. and he felt like a fool for not going after you.
the shrill ring of his phone snapped him out of his daze, and he looked down to see an unfamiliar number. usually, he’d ignore it. but something propelled him to pick up.
“hello, is this,” —a pause— “han taesan?”
“...yes. who is this?”
“this is the seoul asan medical centre. we’ve just admitted a patient who says she is your girlfriend.”
everything after those words felt like a blur. slamming the door behind him and forgetting to lock his apartment. speeding to the hospital with his heart in his throat. yelling at the front desk when they said he couldn’t see you. every tiny thing seemed to push taesan further toward insanity. because he was the reason you’d left. and he was the reason you’d gotten into the accident.
when they finally called him into your ward, he rushed over to your bedside, almost knocking over the doctor in his haste. his hands curled into fists at his sides when he saw you; your eyes closed, bruises painting your neck and cheek. how could you look so angelic? it only made taesan hate himself more.
“fuck, y/n,” he cursed through gritted teeth, pain seeping through his usually cold voice. the doctor and nurses could only stand in the doorway and watch as he tentatively reached down to touch your cheek before pulling his hand away as if it was burned.
“she’s alive.”
the doctor’s voice rang through the ward, firm but empathetic. taesan couldn’t even listen to him as he continued the diagnosis—it felt like someone had stabbed him in the heart and twisted the knife. because even though he knew you’d be okay, he was the reason you’d ended up in a goddamn hospital ward in the first place. and the last words you’d shared had been full of anger and hate. he’d never truly listened to you, even when you’d yelled at him—and now, he felt the full weight of your absence.
would you ever forgive him? or would your memories of this relationship be the scars of your accident? when he was finally left alone with you, nobody would have to know that he cried at your bedside, his hand interlaced through your limp one, as if attempting to hold onto whatever of your relationship he had left.
╰┈➤ you and sunghoon are going through a divorce but then finds out your pregnant.
✴ husband!sunghoon x preg!reader ✴ Warnings: Angst with a happy ending, divorce, marriage in crisis, arguments, emotional turmoil, secret pregnancy, morning sickness, crying, guilt, miscommunication, reconciliation.
The divorce papers had been sitting untouched on the dining table for six days. Every morning, you walked past the cream-colored envelope with your eyes fixed anywhere but there, convincing yourself that if you ignored it long enough, maybe the end of your marriage would disappear with it. It never did. The signatures waited patiently beneath the flap, yours written with trembling hands, his clean and effortless, just like everything Park Sunghoon ever did. Five years of marriage had somehow been reduced to ink on paper, and neither of you had found the courage to send them to the lawyers. Perhaps it was fear. Perhaps it was denial. Or perhaps, deep down, neither of you was ready to admit that the love you had fought so hard for was slipping through your fingers.
Sunghoon hadn't always been this distant. Before becoming the CEO of PARK Group, he had been the kind of husband who insisted on driving you everywhere because he claimed the roads were "full of idiots."
He'd leave little sticky notes inside your handbag just to make you smile during work, surprise you with late-night convenience store dates after exhausting weeks, and hold your hand whenever the two of you crossed the street, even though you constantly teased him for it. Somewhere between endless board meetings, overseas investors, and the pressure of keeping a billion-dollar company alive, those little gestures disappeared.
At first, you told yourself it was temporary. Then weeks became months, and months became years, until the silence between the two of you became louder than any argument you'd ever had.
The front door unlocked just after eleven that night. You heard the familiar click of expensive leather shoes against the marble floor before his coat landed over the back of a chair.
"You're still awake?" he asked quietly, surprised to find the television still glowing in the dark living room.
You looked up from the untouched mug of tea in your hands and forced a tired smile that didn't quite reach your eyes. "I couldn't sleep."
He nodded as if he understood, although the truth was neither of you understood each other anymore. He loosened his tie, rolling his shoulders with a wince. "The meeting ran longer than expected. I tried calling."
A bitter laugh escaped before you could stop it. "You always have a meeting, Sunghoon." His expression hardened ever so slightly. "I'm doing this for us."
"No," you whispered, standing from the couch. "You keep saying that, but somewhere along the way, there stopped being an 'us.' It's just you... and your company."
The argument didn't explode all at once. It built slowly, quietly, through years of missed dinners, forgotten anniversaries, and conversations cut short by another ringing phone. You couldn't even remember what had started this one. Maybe it was the fact that he'd canceled yet another weekend away because an investor had flown in unexpectedly. Maybe it was because he'd answered three work calls while you were trying to tell him about your day. Or maybe it was because you were simply exhausted from feeling like you came second to a company that would still exist long after the two of you had fallen apart.
"I don't even recognize you anymore," you said, your voice trembling despite your attempts to stay composed. "Do you know what the worst part is? I don't think you recognize yourself either."
Sunghoon stood across the kitchen island, still dressed in his tailored charcoal suit. He looked just as tired as you felt, his tie hanging loose around his neck and the sleeves of his dress shirt rolled to his forearms. He opened his mouth to respond before closing it again, rubbing a hand over his face in frustration.
"You think this is easy for me?" he asked quietly. "Do you think I enjoy leaving before you're awake and coming home after you've gone to bed? I'm trying to keep everything together."
"And what about us?" you whispered. "Who's keeping us together?"
He looked away.
That was answer enough.
The next morning, the divorce papers were drafted.
Neither of you cried when the lawyers handed them over.
Neither of you protested.
It almost scared you how calm everything had become.
The screaming had stopped.
The tears had stopped.
It felt like your marriage had simply... run out of emotion.
For the next week, the penthouse became nothing more than a place the two of you happened to share. Sunghoon slept in the guest room. You stayed in the master bedroom. Meals were eaten separately. Conversations were reduced to polite questions that sounded more appropriate between strangers than husband and wife.
"Have you seen my watch?"
"It's on your desk."
"Thank you."
"You're welcome."
That was it.
No warmth.
No affection.
Just silence.
Then the nausea started.
The first morning, you barely thought anything of it. Stress could make people sick. Anyone going through a divorce would feel exhausted. But when you found yourself gagging at the smell of breakfast three days in a row, a tiny voice in the back of your mind began whispering something you refused to believe.
Standing in the pharmacy after work, you stared at the pregnancy tests for what felt like forever. Your fingers hovered over the shelf before finally grabbing one and shoving it into your basket as quickly as possible. You prayed nobody you knew would see you.
The drive home felt endless.
Your hands wouldn't stop shaking.
You locked yourself inside the bathroom before finally opening the small box, reading the instructions three separate times because the words refused to register. The timer on your phone counted down three agonizing minutes while you paced back and forth across the marble floor.
One line.
Relief flooded your body.
Then...
A second line appeared so faintly you almost convinced yourself you were imagining it.
You blinked.
It grew darker.
Your heart stopped.
"...No."
You picked up the test with trembling fingers, staring at it as if it might somehow change if you looked hard enough.
Positive.
The room spun.
You slowly slid down against the bathroom wall until you were sitting on the cold floor, your knees pulled tightly against your chest.
Pregnant.
You were pregnant.
A sob escaped before you could stop it.
It wasn't because you didn't want the baby.
It was because the timing felt impossibly cruel.
Only a week ago, you and Sunghoon had agreed your marriage couldn't be saved.
Now there was another heartbeat growing inside you.
One that belonged to both of you.
Tears blurred your vision as you instinctively rested a hand against your stomach. It was too early to feel anything. Too early to even look pregnant. Yet knowing that your child was there made everything feel different.
A sharp knock at the bathroom door made you jump.
"Y/N?"
Sunghoon's voice was muffled through the wood.
"You've been in there for a while."
Your heart leaped into your throat.
Quickly wrapping the test in tissues, you hid it beneath spare towels inside the cabinet before splashing cold water across your face.
"I'm okay," you called back, though your voice cracked.
The door opened as soon as you unlocked it.
Sunghoon frowned the second he saw you.
Your eyes were red.
Your cheeks were damp.
"You've been crying."
You immediately shook your head. "It's nothing."
"It doesn't look like nothing."
He took a hesitant step toward you, his usual guarded expression replaced by genuine concern. Carefully, almost instinctively, he reached out and brushed a loose strand of hair behind your ear. The gentle touch caught you off guard. He hadn't touched you like that in months.
"You don't look well," he murmured. "You've barely eaten this week, and every morning I hear you getting sick."
"It's just stress."
"You've been saying that every day."
"I know."
His brows knitted together. "Maybe we should go to the hospital."
"No."
The answer came far too quickly.
His eyes searched yours, confusion flickering across his face.
"...Why not?"
You forced a smile that felt painfully fake.
"I just need some rest."
For several long seconds, he simply looked at you.
Then he sighed softly.
"If you start feeling worse..." His voice was quieter now. "...please tell me."
You nodded even though you had no intention of doing that.
As he turned to leave, he paused at the doorway without looking back.
"I know things between us are... complicated right now."
Your chest tightened.
"But that doesn't mean I stop caring about you."
The bedroom fell silent after he walked away.
The tears you'd been desperately holding back finally spilled over again.
Because hearing those words only made your secret feel heavier.
And for the first time since seeing those two pink lines...
You wondered how long you could keep it from him.
The following morning, you woke before the sun had fully risen. A dull ache settled behind your eyes while another wave of nausea rolled through your stomach, forcing you to sit up abruptly. You barely made it to the bathroom before gripping the edge of the sink, your breathing uneven as you waited for the feeling to pass.
When it finally did, you leaned against the cool marble countertop, staring at your reflection. You looked exhausted. The dark circles beneath your eyes had become impossible to hide, and your cheeks had noticeably lost their color. You quietly opened the cabinet beneath the sink, pulling out the pregnancy test one last time before slipping it into your pocket. A few hours later, you found yourself sitting alone in your obstetrician's office, nervously twisting the sleeve of your sweater while waiting for your name to be called.
"Mrs. Park?" the nurse smiled warmly.
You stood, following her into the examination room. Everything happened so quickly after that—blood tests, questions about your health, and finally the ultrasound. You hadn't expected to cry, yet the moment the tiny image appeared on the monitor, your vision blurred.
"There," the doctor said gently, pointing toward the screen. "It's still very early, but everything looks healthy."
Healthy.
The word echoed in your ears.
Your hand instinctively rested against your stomach as tears silently rolled down your cheeks. You couldn't stop staring at the tiny flicker on the monitor. It didn't look like much to anyone else, but to you, it was everything.
The doctor handed you a small black-and-white ultrasound photo before smiling kindly. "Congratulations. Judging by the measurements, you're just over eight weeks pregnant. Morning sickness and fatigue are completely normal. Try not to skip meals, even if eating feels difficult. If your symptoms become worse, give us a call."
You nodded absentmindedly, clutching the ultrasound picture so carefully it felt as though it might disappear if you held it too tightly.
On the drive home, your eyes drifted toward the passenger seat where the envelope rested. You couldn't stop imagining what would happen if Sunghoon saw it.
Would he smile?
Would he cry?
Or would he stay...
Only because he felt obligated?
That question had haunted you since the moment you found out.
You knew your husband better than anyone.
Park Sunghoon never walked away from responsibility.
If he learned about the baby now, he'd tear up the divorce papers without a second thought.
Not because the two of you had fixed your marriage.
Not because the hurt had magically disappeared.
Because he would convince himself that staying was the right thing to do.
You refused to let your child become the reason someone stayed in a loveless marriage.
You wanted your baby to grow up in a home filled with love, not guilt.
By the time you reached the penthouse, you'd made up your mind.
The pregnancy would remain your secret.
At least for now.
When you stepped inside, the house was unusually quiet.
Sunghoon's shoes were by the front door, meaning he'd gotten home before you for once. You slipped the ultrasound into your handbag before walking farther inside.
The smell of food drifted from the kitchen.
You froze.
Sunghoon stood at the stove wearing a simple white shirt with the sleeves rolled to his elbows. His suit jacket was tossed over one of the dining chairs, and an apron—one you'd bought him years ago as a joke because he insisted he was a "great cook"—was tied around his waist.
He looked over his shoulder when he heard you.
"You're home."
You blinked in surprise.
"...What are you doing?"
He glanced back at the pan.
"Cooking."
"You hate cooking."
"I know."
A small, awkward smile appeared on his face.
"But you haven't been eating."
Your heart squeezed painfully.
"I thought... maybe soup would be easier."
You didn't know what to say.
For months, you'd begged him to come home before dinner.
Now, when your marriage was already hanging by a thread, he was standing in the kitchen making soup because he was worried about you.
The irony hurt more than it comforted.
"I didn't ask you to do this," you said quietly.
"I know."
He turned the stove off before facing you completely.
"I wanted to."
Silence settled between the two of you.
His eyes slowly wandered across your face, lingering on the exhaustion you could no longer hide.
"You look pale."
"I'm alright."
"You've been saying that every day."
"I'm just tired."
He walked closer until only a few feet separated you.
"You've barely eaten."
"I'll eat later."
"You've been getting sick every morning."
"It's stress."
His brows furrowed.
"Did you at least go to the doctor?"
Your heart skipped.
"...Yeah."
"What did they say?"
You looked down at the floor.
"They said I need more rest."
Technically...
It wasn't a lie.
Sunghoon let out a quiet sigh before reaching for your handbag.
"I'll carry—"
"No!"
The word escaped much louder than you intended.
Both of you froze.
His hand stopped midair.
Confusion immediately crossed his face.
"...I was just going to put it on the table."
"I..."
You tightened your grip around the strap.
"I'm sorry."
"I just... have something important inside."
He slowly lowered his hand.
"I'm not trying to invade your privacy."
"I know."
Another silence followed.
This one heavier than the last.
Finally, he gave you a small nod.
"The soup's ready whenever you're hungry."
He turned away, pretending not to notice the tears gathering in your eyes.
The moment he disappeared into his office, you rushed upstairs.
Locking yourself inside the bedroom, you pulled the ultrasound from your bag before carefully sliding it into the back of your bedside drawer beneath a stack of old photographs from your honeymoon.
Your fingers lingered on the picture.
"I'm sorry," you whispered, though you weren't sure whether you were apologizing to your baby...
Or to the man sleeping only a few rooms away.
The days that followed settled into a strange routine. The arguments had disappeared, but they hadn't been replaced with happiness. Instead, there was a quiet understanding between the two of you, as though you were both too exhausted to keep hurting each other. Sunghoon still left for work early, though not as early as before. Some mornings, you'd find a glass of water and your vitamins sitting on the kitchen counter without a word. Other days, he'd send a simple text asking if you'd eaten lunch. They were such small gestures—ones that would've seemed insignificant months ago—but now they only made your chest ache. He was trying. It was simply too late.
Morning sickness, however, wasn't nearly as forgiving.
You had barely managed two spoonfuls of breakfast before the familiar wave of nausea forced you to excuse yourself. The bathroom door had barely clicked shut before you were kneeling on the cold tile floor, one hand gripping the edge of the bathtub while the other instinctively rested against your stomach. By the time the nausea finally settled, your eyes were watery and your breathing uneven.
A gentle knock echoed through the room.
"Y/N?"
It was Sunghoon.
His voice was careful, almost hesitant.
"You've been in there for almost twenty minutes."
You quickly splashed cold water over your face before unlocking the door.
He frowned immediately.
"You look awful."
A small laugh escaped you despite yourself.
"Thanks."
"You know I didn't mean it like that."
"I know."
His eyes searched your face, lingering on the redness around your eyes.
"You've been getting sick every morning for weeks."
"I'm just... run down."
"You've lost weight."
"I'm trying to eat."
"I can see that."
He sighed quietly before reaching out. His hand hovered near your cheek for a second, silently asking permission before gently brushing a strand of hair behind your ear. His touch was so familiar that it almost broke you.
"I hate seeing you like this," he admitted softly. "I know we're... where we are right now, but that doesn't mean I stop worrying."
Your throat tightened.
"I'll be okay."
"You keep saying that."
"Because I don't know what else to say."
For a long moment, neither of you spoke.
Then, to your surprise, he opened his arms ever so slightly.
"Can I...?"
You stared at him.
He hadn't hugged you in months.
When you didn't pull away, he slowly wrapped his arms around you, careful and gentle, as if he were afraid you'd disappear if he held you too tightly.
It was warm.
Comforting.
Painful.
You closed your eyes for just a second, breathing in the familiar scent of his cologne.
"I've missed this," he whispered.
Your heart shattered.
Because so had you.
But missing someone wasn't always enough to save a marriage.
That evening, the two of you sat together in the living room for the first time in weeks. The television played quietly in the background, though neither of you was paying attention. Sunghoon had rolled up the sleeves of his white dress shirt, his laptop balanced on his knees while he answered a few emails.
You were reading a book you hadn't turned a page of in almost fifteen minutes.
The silence wasn't awkward anymore.
It was... peaceful.
"I spoke to the lawyer today," Sunghoon suddenly said, closing his laptop.
Your fingers tightened around your book.
"Oh."
"He asked if we'd decided on a date."
You nodded slowly.
"I told him..."
He paused.
"...that I wanted to wait."
You looked up.
His gaze stayed fixed on the coffee table.
"I don't know if waiting changes anything."
"It might not."
"But rushing into it doesn't feel right either."
Your eyes softened.
"Why?"
He let out a tired laugh.
"Because despite everything..."
He looked at you.
"...I still come home looking for you."
The confession stole the air from your lungs.
"I still wonder whether you've eaten."
"I still catch myself reaching for my phone whenever something funny happens because you're the first person I want to tell."
His smile was bittersweet.
"I don't think people stop loving each other overnight."
A lump formed in your throat.
"They just get lost."
Tears threatened to spill, but you forced them back.
"I don't know if I know how to find us again."
He nodded.
"I don't know either."
For the first time in months, there were no raised voices.
No accusations.
Just two people admitting that neither of them knew how to repair what they'd broken.
At that exact moment, your stomach lurched.
You shot to your feet so quickly that your book fell to the floor.
"Y/N?"
"I'll... I'll be right back."
You hurried upstairs, pressing a hand over your mouth before disappearing into the bathroom.
Sunghoon watched you go, worry etched across his face.
A few seconds later, the sound of retching echoed faintly through the hallway.
He immediately stood.
His first instinct was to go after you.
Instead, he stopped outside the bathroom door, resting a hand against the wood.
"...I'm here if you need me."
You squeezed your eyes shut on the other side, fresh tears sliding down your cheeks.
"I know," you whispered so quietly he couldn't hear.
Outside, your phone began ringing from where you'd accidentally left it on the coffee table downstairs.
Neither of you noticed.
The screen lit up with a familiar name.
Dr. Han.
His stomach tightened.
You'd told him you'd seen a doctor because of stress. Seeing your doctor call twice in less than a minute made him wonder if something was wrong.
He answered.
"Hello?"
There was a brief pause before a warm voice spoke on the other end.
"Good evening, Mrs. Park. This is Dr. Han calling from Evergreen Women's Clinic. I wanted to follow up regarding the symptoms you mentioned during your appointment. Have the morning sickness and dizziness improved at all?"
Sunghoon frowned.
"...I'm sorry?"
Another pause.
"Oh... am I speaking to Mr. Park?"
"...Yes."
"I'm terribly sorry. I assumed Mrs. Park had already told you."
His grip around the phone tightened.
"Told me... what?"
The doctor fell silent for a second, clearly realizing she'd made a mistake.
"It's regarding her pregnancy," she answered carefully. "Considering she's approaching her ninth week, nausea, fatigue, and food aversions are perfectly normal. We were also hoping to schedule her next prenatal appointment before the end of next week."
Everything around him seem to disappear, except you.
Sunghoon couldn't take his eyes off you.
The words from the phone call echoed endlessly inside his head.
Morning sickness... nine weeks... prenatal appointment... both mother and baby are healthy.
His hand was still wrapped around your phone, his knuckles turning white from how tightly he was gripping it. You stood frozen at the foot of the staircase, every bit of color draining from your face the moment you realized he knew.
Neither of you spoke.
The silence stretched until it became unbearable.
"You were pregnant..." he whispered, his voice so quiet it barely reached you. "This whole time."
You swallowed hard, unable to look him in the eye. "...Yes."
A hollow laugh escaped him, though there wasn't an ounce of humor behind it. He looked away for a moment, blinking rapidly as he tried to compose himself, but the hurt was written all over his face.
"So every morning..." he began, "when I heard you getting sick... when I kept asking if you were okay... when I asked if you wanted me to take you to the hospital..." He looked back at you, his eyes glossy with unshed tears. "You already knew."
You nodded weakly.
"I found out after we agreed to the divorce."
"And you decided not to tell me."
"It wasn't that simple."
"It feels pretty simple to me."
His voice wasn't loud, but it was enough to make your chest tighten.
"You looked me in the eye every single day and lied."
"I wasn't lying."
"No?" His eyebrows pulled together. "You told me it was stress. You told me you were fine. You let me think something was wrong, and every time I asked, you pushed me away."
"I didn't know what else to do!"
The words escaped before you could stop them.
Sunghoon fell silent.
Your breathing grew uneven as tears blurred your vision. "What was I supposed to say? 'By the way, I'm carrying your baby while we're signing divorce papers?'"
"I deserved to know."
"I know you did!"
Your voice cracked.
"I know that!"
The tears you'd been holding back finally spilled over.
"I thought about telling you every single day."
You covered your mouth, trying to steady your breathing.
"I even picked up my phone so many times..." you admitted through sobs. "I wrote messages... I deleted them... I practiced what I'd say if you came home early... but every time I looked at the divorce papers, I couldn't do it."
Sunghoon's expression softened for only a second before the hurt returned.
"So you chose for both of us."
"No."
"Yes, you did."
He shook his head, running a frustrated hand through his hair.
"You decided I didn't deserve to know I was going to be a father."
"I decided I didn't want you to stay because you pitied me!"
The room fell silent.
Your words hung heavily between you.
"I know you, Sunghoon," you whispered, wiping your cheeks. "You would've canceled everything. You would've torn up those divorce papers before I even finished speaking."
"Of course I would've."
"Exactly!"
His answer caught you off guard.
"You just proved my point."
"No." He stepped closer, stopping a few feet away. "I would've torn them up because my wife had been carrying something this huge all by herself."
"You would've stayed because of the baby."
"I would've stayed because I still love you!"
His voice cracked for the first time.
The confession echoed through the house.
Neither of you moved.
Sunghoon looked away, taking a shaky breath before speaking again, this time much quieter.
"Do you really think I've spent these past few weeks sleeping in the guest room because I stopped loving you?" He laughed bitterly, shaking his head. "I slept there because every time I looked at you, I was reminded that I'd failed you. I convinced myself that maybe you'd be happier without me."
Your heart clenched.
"I never stopped loving you either," you admitted. "But loving someone isn't always enough when all you do is hurt each other."
He nodded slowly.
"I know."
Another long silence settled between you.
It wasn't angry anymore.
It was heartbreaking.
Sunghoon glanced at the phone still sitting on the coffee table before quietly placing it down. When he looked back at you, his eyes were red.
"I missed everything."
His voice was barely above a whisper.
"The first doctor's appointment."
"You hearing our baby's heartbeat."
"You finding out."
He swallowed hard.
"And I wasn't there."
A fresh wave of guilt crashed over you.
"I didn't want to do it alone."
"Then why did you?"
"Because I was scared."
Your shoulders shook as another sob escaped.
"I was scared that if I told you, I'd never know whether you stayed because you loved me... or because you felt responsible."
Sunghoon closed the distance between you, but he didn't touch you.
Not yet.
"I can't change the mistakes I've already made," he said quietly. "I can't take back the nights I chose work over you or the arguments that pushed us here."
His voice trembled.
"But don't ever believe that our child would be a burden to me."
He paused, fighting back tears of his own.
"Or that loving you was ever an obligation."
Your eyes met his.
For the first time in months, neither of you was pretending to be okay.
There were no walls left.
Just two broken people standing in the middle of the home they'd built together, finally admitting how deeply they'd hurt each other.
The divorce papers were still waiting on the dining table.
Neither of you looked at them.
Not because everything had suddenly been fixed.
But because, for the first time in a very long while, they no longer felt like the only possible ending.
» you thought that wiping the spoon after your boyfriend ate from it was just a silly joke, but it seemed like he took it personally
♯. taesan x reader, fluff, 0.8k
𝄢. hihi thank you 🎸 anon for requesting! ദ്ദി(ᵔᗜᵔ) it’s such a cute trend, i wanted to write it for either taesan or woonhak ><
you were sitting at the dinner table, eating spoonfuls of rice when you remembered a tiktok you scrolled past the other day – wiping the spoon after my boyfriend eats from it. looking across from yourself was your boyfriend, eating from a spoon. the perfect opportunity lay right in front of you.
after thinking about it, which only took about half a millisecond, you decided to try the trend for yourself.
“san,” you said innocently, the complete opposite of what you had planned. taesan’s head popped up, looking at you with keen eyes. “can i try your food? it looks good.” you pointed at his food, a small smile played on your face.
and of course, taesan being taesan, agreed and gave you his spoon. now was the time to act. you took the spoon into one hand, grabbed a tissue with the other, and wiped the spoon clean before digging into taesan’s bowl.
more under the cut!
it took you everything in you to act normal after what you had just done. you always shared food and utensils with taesan, it was hard to not let a giggle slip out.
“thanks, sannie.” you thanked him, giving him another smile, but this time your lips dipped a little deeper as you attempted to suppress a laugh.
just seeing the look on taesan’s face was enough for you to spit out the food from how funny it was. he was completely mind-boggled, because what were you doing? did you think he was sick? did you think he had some sort of infection? did you watch a video on how sharing a spoon with your boyfriend would kill you? but despite the look on his face, he kept quiet.
you tilted your head at your boyfriend’s silence but continued eating your meal. maybe taesan was just the sort of boyfriend who didn’t care about that sort of stuff. the trend left your mind and you had completely forgotten about it in the next three minutes.
as for taesan… for the rest of his meal, he was overly conscious about it. even when he got up to wash his dishes, he couldn’t get the memory of you wiping his spoon out of his head.
he was completely paranoid. he had to test his theory – that you hated him. okay, maybe saying that you hated him was an overstatement, but you wiping the spoon after he used it was enough for him to sulk for a whole year.
taesan headed to the fridge, pulling a soda can from the fridge. he took a sip from it before offering it to you.
“do you want some?” he asked, his arm stretched out toward you, holding the can.
you nodded eagerly, walking toward him. you were about to drink from the can when you remembered what you were doing. you plucked a tissue from the box and wiped the lip of the can then quickly took a swig out of it.
“thanks, tae.” you handed him back the can and thanked him before going back to whatever you were doing, leaving taesan in complete disbelief.
now, it was dark outside, and in your room – the only light in your room came from the screens of you and taesan’s phones. from all the time up till now, taesan had been oddly quiet. it wasn’t unlike himself to be quiet, but to this extent? absolutely impossible. he could barely stand a minute without interacting with you, even if it was just a small touch. there was no way that he could stay silent for a whole hour.
the both of you were laying down, room still, when taesan broke the silence.
“y/n,” he started, voice a little shaky. “do you… hate me?”
you immediately sat up properly. “taesan, what?”
“i mean, you keep wiping whatever i eat or drink from. you never did that before.” he sighed, lips jutted out. “it’s okay if you don’t wanna share utensils anymore.” but you knew that in his heart, it wasn’t really okay to him.
a wave of relief rushed over you, your hand flew to your heart. “oh, taesan.” a breath of relief escaped your lips. “it’s just a trend i saw online. i didn’t know it meant that much to you.” you scooted closer to him, ditching your phone somewhere on the bed, and took him into your arms.
a soft “oh” left his mouth as you held him close. “angel, please don’t do that again, i was really scared.” he turned to his side, placing a gentle kiss to your cheek.
“i’m sorry, baby.” you giggled, running your hand through his hair. “i promise i won’t.” you snuggled your face into the crook of taesan’s shoulder.
your head was tucked under his chin, when taesan whispered softly. “so you love me, right?”
“of course, taesan.” you let out a breathy laugh, your thumb stroking his cheek.
and as he drifts off to sleep with you in his arms, the paranoia finally faded away, leaving only the quiet comfort of being loved.
boynextdoor's favorite place to kiss by @lynnimini | headcannon
boynextdoor when you make them jealous on purpose by @chewnotchoke | reaction
boynextdoor when they want attention by @lynnimini
darling you are the only exception by @serejae | bnd has a soft spot for you
how boynextdoor loves you by @eunandonly | how boynextdoor shows their love for you, even if it isn't always by words.
boynextdoor and kisses by @slytherinshua
getting hit on while they're in a relationship by @000-pawz | reaction
boynextdoor when you kiss them mid-argument by @ihangelic | headcannon
remember the way you made me feel by @serejae
accidental confessions by @minkkumaz | where the boynextdoor boys fail to check who they're texting before letting their hearts spill out of their chest recklessly. | smau
love languages by @petaliice
being their girl next door by @blue-jisungs
⎯ by member ✧˚ ༘ ⋆｡♡˚
myung jaehyun 명재현
kiss me right by @lxvsiick | jaehyun goes to the library everyday to see y/n even though he's never touched a book in his life.
who's that girl? by @prodbyton | after an unfortunate event, y/n needs a new place to stay. she finds a place listed for 5 other people in the apartment, where she meets riwoo, sungho, leehan, taesan, and jaehyun.
I-N-L-O-V-E LIKE THE MOVIES by @juyeoz | you loved the game wordscapes and jaehyun loved you. his long lasting crush was tiresome for his friends, you were only his classmate after all. nevertheless, what other way was there for him to gain your attention other than playing your favourite game, wordscapes? none. Well, completely ignoring the fact he wasn’t the best at word games.
enough for me by @arafilez | when jaehyun finds you blaming yourself for not trying hard enough.
sweet and sour by @doevie | oh how cruel you are for teasing your boyfriend jaehyun.
park sungho 박성호
of pomegranates and love stained fingers by @mountaesan | in which sungho shows you that love could be found at an ordinary kitchen table , amidst a mess of pomegranate peels and love stained fingers
it's the thought that counts by @htaesan | love, to park sungho, is just a waste of time. yet when he falls for you (literally), he might just change his mind.
the perfect view by @miumura | in which, sungho only takes photos of the beautiful things in the world, often leading to him taking scenery ones. regardless of that, it wouldn’t be weird for him to make you be the first person he would take pictures of, right?
lee riwoo 이리우 / lee sanghyuk 이상혁
in the silence by @mountaesan | silence was always the third party in you and riwoo’s friendship , but somewhere , at some point , the silence began to shift to something you couldn’t name.
too sweet by @lxvsiick | after stealing the last donut from him, riwoo declares y/n as his enemy--in which y/n is clueless to the rivalry between her and riwoo after stealing the last donut from the bakery.
i'm right here by @juyeoz | riwoo knows crushing on his best friend’s sibling isn’t the best idea, and luckily for him, karma is able to show him that he is right.
winter heels by @doevie | you decide to go out in heels in the middle of winter.
riwoo as your boyfriend by @lionhanie | headcannon
han taesan 한태산 / han dongmin 한동민
card declined by @chiiyuuvv | after her card declined, y/n swore she met an angel who decided to pay for her food out of the goodness of his heart. taesan, the angel, never thought he would see his crush face to face. would he use this chance to finally talk to her after long years of pining? | mini smau
extra sweet by @doevie | after buying a new fragrance, taesan can't keep his hands off of you.
not that i care or anything by @htaesan | your ex, seemingly sweet anton, spreads malicious rumours about you that could potentially ruin your entire academic weapon career, so you have to take desperate measures𑁋and that includes a fake-dating contract and the bane of your existence, han taesan.
kim leehan 김이한 / kim donghyun 김동현
when pigs fly by @hangup119 | you will only admit that you actually like kim leehan when pigs start to fly. for now, though, everyone else will just have to suffer the push-and-pull that happens whenever the two of you are near each other's vicinity.
it hasn't hit me that you're mine by @soubeomies | both you and leehan were first-timers when it came to forming a relationship, but leehan is always gonna try his best for you.
cute delivery pizza boy by @lxvsiick | to thank her friends for helping her move in, y/n orders them a pizza, not expecting the pizza delivery boy to be super cute -- or in which leehan fights with his coworker to deliver pizza to y/n.
more than a little bit by @jigeuminunbich | you’re not exactly sure what love is supposed to feel like, seeing as you’ve never experienced it and leehan is your first ever relationship. but after scolding him for contemplating a haircut, you realize that you might just be familiar with the sensation.
kim woonhak 김운학
valentine by @kaiyunsim | woonhak wants to ask the reader to be his valentine but doesn't know how to. when he tries to form an idea, his hyungs decide to tease him.
small girl fantasy by @hancorys
i love you(tube) by @juyeoz | going on a date with your best friend for a youtube video was only for pure entertainment, however, after seeing how everyone shipped the two of you, perhaps your real feelings were discovered. | smau
favorite flavor by @guiltysungho | you bump into woonhak at an ice cream truck right outside of your school, feelings ensue.
my first write about my ult!! tell me why writing taesan angst just feels so natural... enjoy!
- berry 🍓
“it feels like you’re never around, taesan. and when I need you the most, you’re not there!”
“you ever thought about how often you ‘need’ me? because to me, it feels like you’re a goddamn parasite.”
your grip on the wheel tightened as his words rang through your ears. your boyfriend had never been the affectionate type, and your standards for quality time had dropped to accommodate for him. but after arguing with him for hours (ironically the longest he’d focused on you in the last month), you felt like you’d never get anywhere, and had stormed out of his apartment, slamming his door so loudly the neighbours would be sure to complain. maybe you’d expected him to follow after you, or at least, you’d hoped. but he never did.
with your head pounding and your heart aching, you sped through the streets, determined to make it home as quickly as possible. your foot pressed down on the accelerator without release, the tears already starting to stream down your cheeks and blur your vision.
it happened so fast. you swore the car came out of nowhere, from an intersection you didn’t know existed. and when you saw its lights through the fog, it was already too late. the impact threw your car sideways and to a stop against the gutter. your head snapped forward, causing a burst of pain at the base of your neck, and the air bag crushed you against the seat, pieces of metal flying everywhere as other cars came to a stop around you. that’s when everything faded to dark, and the only sounds you picked up were the sirens of the approaching ambulances.
taesan had been sitting on his couch for what felt like hours, staring off into space as your argument replayed in his head. you’d argued before, always about the same thing, but it was the first time you’d actually left. and he felt like a fool for not going after you.
the shrill ring of his phone snapped him out of his daze, and he looked down to see an unfamiliar number. usually, he’d ignore it. but something propelled him to pick up.
“hello, is this,” —a pause— “han taesan?”
“...yes. who is this?”
“this is the seoul asan medical centre. we’ve just admitted a patient who says she is your girlfriend.”
everything after those words felt like a blur. slamming the door behind him and forgetting to lock his apartment. speeding to the hospital with his heart in his throat. yelling at the front desk when they said he couldn’t see you. every tiny thing seemed to push taesan further toward insanity. because he was the reason you’d left. and he was the reason you’d gotten into the accident.
when they finally called him into your ward, he rushed over to your bedside, almost knocking over the doctor in his haste. his hands curled into fists at his sides when he saw you; your eyes closed, bruises painting your neck and cheek. how could you look so angelic? it only made taesan hate himself more.
“fuck, y/n,” he cursed through gritted teeth, pain seeping through his usually cold voice. the doctor and nurses could only stand in the doorway and watch as he tentatively reached down to touch your cheek before pulling his hand away as if it was burned.
“she’s alive.”
the doctor’s voice rang through the ward, firm but empathetic. taesan couldn’t even listen to him as he continued the diagnosis—it felt like someone had stabbed him in the heart and twisted the knife. because even though he knew you’d be okay, he was the reason you’d ended up in a goddamn hospital ward in the first place. and the last words you’d shared had been full of anger and hate. he’d never truly listened to you, even when you’d yelled at him—and now, he felt the full weight of your absence.
would you ever forgive him? or would your memories of this relationship be the scars of your accident? when he was finally left alone with you, nobody would have to know that he cried at your bedside, his hand interlaced through your limp one, as if attempting to hold onto whatever of your relationship he had left.
my first write about my ult!! tell me why writing taesan angst just feels so natural... enjoy!
- berry 🍓
“it feels like you’re never around, taesan. and when I need you the most, you’re not there!”
“you ever thought about how often you ‘need’ me? because to me, it feels like you’re a goddamn parasite.”
your grip on the wheel tightened as his words rang through your ears. your boyfriend had never been the affectionate type, and your standards for quality time had dropped to accommodate for him. but after arguing with him for hours (ironically the longest he’d focused on you in the last month), you felt like you’d never get anywhere, and had stormed out of his apartment, slamming his door so loudly the neighbours would be sure to complain. maybe you’d expected him to follow after you, or at least, you’d hoped. but he never did.
with your head pounding and your heart aching, you sped through the streets, determined to make it home as quickly as possible. your foot pressed down on the accelerator without release, the tears already starting to stream down your cheeks and blur your vision.
it happened so fast. you swore the car came out of nowhere, from an intersection you didn’t know existed. and when you saw its lights through the fog, it was already too late. the impact threw your car sideways and to a stop against the gutter. your head snapped forward, causing a burst of pain at the base of your neck, and the air bag crushed you against the seat, pieces of metal flying everywhere as other cars came to a stop around you. that’s when everything faded to dark, and the only sounds you picked up were the sirens of the approaching ambulances.
taesan had been sitting on his couch for what felt like hours, staring off into space as your argument replayed in his head. you’d argued before, always about the same thing, but it was the first time you’d actually left. and he felt like a fool for not going after you.
the shrill ring of his phone snapped him out of his daze, and he looked down to see an unfamiliar number. usually, he’d ignore it. but something propelled him to pick up.
“hello, is this,” —a pause— “han taesan?”
“...yes. who is this?”
“this is the seoul asan medical centre. we’ve just admitted a patient who says she is your girlfriend.”
everything after those words felt like a blur. slamming the door behind him and forgetting to lock his apartment. speeding to the hospital with his heart in his throat. yelling at the front desk when they said he couldn’t see you. every tiny thing seemed to push taesan further toward insanity. because he was the reason you’d left. and he was the reason you’d gotten into the accident.
when they finally called him into your ward, he rushed over to your bedside, almost knocking over the doctor in his haste. his hands curled into fists at his sides when he saw you; your eyes closed, bruises painting your neck and cheek. how could you look so angelic? it only made taesan hate himself more.
“fuck, y/n,” he cursed through gritted teeth, pain seeping through his usually cold voice. the doctor and nurses could only stand in the doorway and watch as he tentatively reached down to touch your cheek before pulling his hand away as if it was burned.
“she’s alive.”
the doctor’s voice rang through the ward, firm but empathetic. taesan couldn’t even listen to him as he continued the diagnosis—it felt like someone had stabbed him in the heart and twisted the knife. because even though he knew you’d be okay, he was the reason you’d ended up in a goddamn hospital ward in the first place. and the last words you’d shared had been full of anger and hate. he’d never truly listened to you, even when you’d yelled at him—and now, he felt the full weight of your absence.
would you ever forgive him? or would your memories of this relationship be the scars of your accident? when he was finally left alone with you, nobody would have to know that he cried at your bedside, his hand interlaced through your limp one, as if attempting to hold onto whatever of your relationship he had left.
syn: where tennis is the sixth and best love language
genre: sports, romance, ACTUAL love triangle, inspired by challengers (2024)
cw: SUGGESTIVE - including mlm (making out, suggestive language etc. etc.), mention of past injury, ts is a bisexual disaster
wc: 3k
a/n: this one is for my junebug @mwotgata who requested a childhood friends love triangle gfz and somehow we yapped it into becoming a whole codependent trio sportfics challengers situation. it was so hard to hold back on how explicit this was about to turn, but i think i managed to save my need to write a codependent trio for the ao3 drafts for now lol. I HOPE YOU LIKE THIS JUNEBUG!!!
main masterlist
Childhood friends are like calluses.
Irksome, distracting things that follow you around wherever you go. But hard to peel off once they've hardened into your skin and you've grown too comfortable with it to get rid off—until you don't know how to live without it.
Sometimes you want to crush them into an all-consuming hug.
And sometimes—sometimes—you want to ram a racket through their heads.
“GET YOUR FUCKING HEAD IN THE GAME, LEEHAN,” you scream from the bleachers, tightening your fingers around the tennis ball in your fist—the one you keep with you for your anger issues, as recommended by your therapist.
It doesn't fucking work; the vein in your temple throbs twice as hard when he misses an easy shot. Taesan is smirking from the other side of the net, proud like he'd done something commendable by flailing his arms around and getting that point on luck alone.
His form’s all wrong, his movements too stiff, and he's as observant as a fucking fruit fly to notice anything amiss.
Leehan, on the other hand, doesn't even care that he sucks. He just shrugs like it's a pastime of his to get on your nerves. Which it probably is—but you aren't going to entertain that shitty personality of his right now, not when championships are in barely a month and you still haven't perfected their playing styles like you'd sworn you would.
If you can't win—then you'll at least make sure that they do. For you, and because of you. Your name will headline one way or another, that's a vow you've engraved into your soul.
“Take five,” you huff before sitting back down, letting the cool evening air brush your cheeks as you calm down from the rage of the game, abusing the heck out of the tennis ball like it's a stress toy.
All you want is some alone time—but Leehan is bounding over like a bunny rabbit as though you hadn't just threatened his life (and/or his potential to have mini Leehans) not even ten minutes ago.
“Pass me the water, Y/N-ie,” he’s gleeful as he takes the seat next to you. When you refuse to budge, he just giggles and leans over to take the bottle himself, easily ignoring the way Taesan regards him with a glare when his arm brushes over your knee.
“I played well, didn't I?” Taesan shifts your attention to him, nudging your shoe with his.
“Meh,” you sigh. He deflates at once, then groans as he slumps into his own seat on your other side.
The thing is—playing well isn't enough. Doing the bare minimum isn't enough to get you that gold medal like you intend to. Collegiate tennis might not be as serious to the two of them, but it's your only ticket to securing a spot in a Grand Slam tourney one day. Not as a player like you'd always hoped for—but as a coach, now.
But what's the point if they can't listen properly?
“Work on your fucking grip,” you say one last time before kicking Taesan’s feet out of the way and leaving them both in the dust, forcing them to watch after your retreating figure in various levels of dejection.
//
Taesan is a good player.
He is—he knows he is. He does his due diligence when it comes to studying the sport, rigorously, until he's all but breathing it. He eats the right things, sleeps the right amount, works out as told by the instructor, has his weekly check-ups to remain in top condition. He's going to go professional eventually, so he's quite proud of all that he's achieved so far.
Except for the fact that he can't seem to make you proud no matter how hard he tries to.
The steam goes hazy over his vision, the running shower drowning out his loud thoughts for some time.
For exactly two minutes actually, because suddenly he's being crowded from the back by a familiar body, pushing into his personal space like there aren't five other shower stalls in the same row.
“Move over. Gotta wash hair,” Leehan demands as he scruffs up his blond hair like a shaggy retriever.
It's a good thing Taesan has learnt to live with his whims—at least he'd been smart enough to wear a towel around his waist this time. A decade of friendship makes you guaranteed to guess the other person’s next actions right. While it works to his favour when he's going up against his best friend in a match, it's detrimental to his sanity during other times.
And Leehan, he has a horrible habit of ignoring boundaries.
“Shampoo my hair, won't you? My arms are all sore to stretch it all the way back,” he whines, sending a weird prickle down Taesan's spine.
Must be annoyance.
But he knows there's no point in pushing back against his demands. He'll just start pouting and pretending to be heartbroken over the rejection and eventually, wear down Taesan into being the one to apologise. He doesn't know how you do it, but the only person who seems to thoroughly render his charm useless is you.
“She went hard on us today, huh?” Leehan says passively, letting Taesan tilt his head sideways to push down on a stiff muscle near his neck, groaning at the relief. “You think her knee’s hurting again?”
“Hm,” is the only response Taesan gives, knowing that you're not the type to like bringing attention to that career-ending injury from two years back even if the sporadic pains eat away at your senses.
“She's doing that thing again, y’know that right?” the blond continues, eyeing Taesan from the corner of his eye. “The ‘vicariously living through us’ thing.”
“I don't mind if she does,” he replies simply.
“Weak, aren't you?” Leehan giggles, but there's no bite there; he's genuine. “I am too. I'd let her do anything to me.”
“Because you love her,” Taesan notes, gently pulling at his scalp, lathering properly. He says it like it's a fact—because how do you not love the person who showed you this sport that's half your life now? The three of you were interwoven from the first day, when you had pulled him into your little duo and turned it into a trio—a bunch of inseparable preschoolers who'd met at the junior tennis club.
“You love her too,” Leehan replies in like. “I'd take her injury for her if I could, and I know you would too.”
He would, but he doesn't say that for now. “Championships are about to start soon. I think she's serious about dropping us if we don't show her what she wants… I don't want that to happen,” he admits instead, letting the anxiety bleed through. You might be a loyal and long friend, but he's aware that nothing comes close to the love you have for this sport—not him, nor Leehan. If he fucks this up, he might as well say goodbye to all of it.
The shower dies down as Leehan twists the tap off, and Taesan only snaps out of his musings when he’s moving to grab his own towel from where he'd haphazardly strewn it over the door, brushing his arm all over Taesan’s exposed ones.
“It won't happen,” Leehan assures, casually fluffing up his wet hair as he rubs it dry. Taesan kind of wants to help; he's doing it all wrong. “We're going to make her proud, okay? You just have to fix that grip of yours,” he winks as he tosses a suggestive look towards Taesan’s hand, making him go red all over.
But before he can make it clear that he is not flustered by the comment and that he's just overheating from the hot shower, Leehan is already brushing past him—but not before backtracking to plant a light kiss on his already pink cheek.
Taesan grumbles at the touch. He's been doing this since they were kids—being all touchy and affectionate—it’s nothing weird.
Whatever he feels for you and Leehan, his best friends—it’s normal.
Normal, he tells himself.
Completely normal.
//
They make it. Regional championships for the doubles teams. You've been staying up all night trying to correct every one of their gaps, studying the opponents with an intensity that almost leaves cracks in your brain.
There's a relief that you've never felt before laving over you as you toss a shot of vodka into your mouth, not minding the obnoxious chatter around you for once in your life.
It's not like you can relax for a long time. But for two days, you can manage with some alcohol in the system. In fact, it might be better to not be sober for the time period if it means you have to engage in small talk with strangers and network all night for the boys’ sake.
“—brilliant for your age. It's such a shame you don't play anymore,” some old, balding guy in a suit is saying. He's someone important to the tennis association, but it was never in your nature to care for the business side of the sport—charming people's pants off is more of Leehan’s department.
“Wow. Barely into the welcome party and you're already getting plastered,” the smug voice shows up at your side, blond hair accompanying it. Speak of the devil.
He makes conversation with the older man, all the while suavely slipping a glass of water into your hand. You swallow it without complaints, knowing you won't want to deal with a headache tomorrow.
“Nervous?” Leehan returns back to you, poking your head with his finger.
“No. Why would I be?” you wave him away.
“Taesanie is. And the two of you are weirdly similar sometimes.” He gestures to the corner of the room where Taesan is squirming on the spot, trying to leave the obviously flirtatious advances from some guy. “Think we should rescue him?”
You don't know why you nod yes. Usually, you couldn't care less about what your friends do outside of tennis in their private lives, as long as it didn't interfere with their work ethic. But maybe that's because they never gave you a chance to see they had lives outside of it—or of you.
Taesan is popular. All three of you are, in your own capacities. But seeing him affected by something that's not you or Leehan…does something to you. A weird bitter feeling on your tongue that isn't alcohol.
Ugh. Why can't you just go back to thinking about tennis? It's better than whatever the fuck this complicated mess was.
“Save him. Yes,” you manage with as less words as possible, but Leehan reads between the lines quick enough.
He loops him arm through yours and makes his way down to where Taesan is desperately trying to excuse himself away with no luck.
“Hello, there!” Leehan greets the strange flirty man with a wiggle of his fingers, flashing his dimpled smile at him. You just watch the scene with interest until your eyes eventually stray to a surprised Taesan’s. But Leehan continues, coy, but also sweetly condescending, “I’m sorry, but can we steal away our Taesanie for a bit? There's something we need to give him.”
He says it with so much conviction that the man immediately backs off, and Taesan’s arm doesn't wait to move to grip Leehan's other side, the three of you maneuvering through the crowd speedily under his control.
There's a decent amount of alcohol swimming between the three of you—Leehan giggling more nonsensically than usual, Taesan wincing at the taste inside his mouth, and a strangely easy smile threatening to creep up near the corner of your lips—all giddy and warm all the way up to their hotel room, never once not touching.
“Keys,” Taesan orders, and it takes Leehan several tries before he finds the card in his suit’s pocket. You kick off your heels the second the door swings open, collapsing onto the bed and feeling the other two do the same on either side of you, peeling off their suit jacket and vests, loosening their ties.
“Ah! This is heaven!” you proclaim funnily, the ceiling looking wonky in your vision.
Taesan still finds a way to debate you in the middle of his drunken state—“I thought tennis was heaven.”
“Two things can be heaven,” Leehan adds with a grin, stretching so that his fingertips touch yours. “Like the two of you. You're both like heaven.”
“You're cheesier when you're drunk,” you scoff, but you're also smiling at his antics.
“M’not,” he protests but the way he scoots closer to you tells a different story. But he's turning around to look at you properly, leaning on his elbows and looking over you with his pretty lashes and his sunny hair falling around his face. “You're nicer when you're not killing yourself over winning,” he whispers.
“I think you're great when you're being an asshole to us,” Taesan chuckles, bumping his head lightly against yours like a cat would. “But yeah—chill you is also…nice.”
There's something about this, the familiarity, the way the three of you know exactly what to say and when to say it, predicting everything that comes after with pinpoint accuracy. Leehan will continue to pinch your cheek, then offer his own up to be pinched, Taesan will huff about it until he gets his pinched too, and then he'll secretly grin about it thinking neither of you notice that he likes it. Then you'll collapse into a bundle, wrapped up in each other until the sun is up and you have to return back to tennis.
Except.
Except, tonight Leehan breaks the innocent tradition by opening his mouth to utter, “Hey—” His eyes shine brightly from where they look down at you, his other hand playing with a loose strand of Taesan's hair from where his head lays touching yours. “—can I try something new?”
He says it so tenderly, like it's something fragile. You nod.
“Can I kiss you?”
If you're surprised, then your second nod doesn't show it. But maybe Taesan’s slightly dilating pupils do it for you as Leehan brings his mouth down to slot against yours, warm and plush, a press that steals the air right out of your lungs. You taste him everywhere in your mouth, sweeter than any cocktail from before.
When he breaks the kiss and leans up, he's smiling. Then his eyes catch Taesan's clueless ones.
“Jealous?” Leehan wiggles his brows, but before the other boy can process the question, let alone come up with a refutal, the blond adds, “you don't have to be. I’ll make it even.”
A tiny gasp-whine slips out of Taesan’s mouth when Leehan dives into his second kiss, catching the other man's bottom lip between the ridges of his teeth, sharp enough to elicit something pleasant.
Taesan reciprocates in no time, almost like the subconscious part of him had been waiting for this moment all along, moving with a rhythm that only comes with knowing each other in and out in all senses.
Leehan pushes him up to sit so they can kiss properly, but he cuts the act short to coax you to do the same, pulling you close enough that you're pressed up against each other now, your face so close to Taesan’s.
And it's desperate and stupid and tempting, when his eyes meet yours. And his hands find your waist. When you're gripping his tie and you're pulling, melting into his open mouth. Leehan's giggle is a distant melody, although his hands on your backs are grounding.
You're friends, the sensible side of your brain tells you. The other one restates—you love each other. There is no one else but them, never was and never will. You're best friends. You love them, they love you. And suddenly, it's the most sensible thing in the world.
Leehan is greedy with it: he’ll watch his best friends make out for each other with a devious glint behind his eyes, then he’ll demand he be pleased as well, coaxing both mouths into his own with the same self-assurance you've seen from him during his matches.
He may be cocky—but god, can he kiss.
It's a mess of Chapstick and undone buttons and hands in hair, not knowing which mouth is whose by the time you've lost yourself in the feeling of it all.
And maybe it's okay for one night. One night when you don't have to think at all, just let yourself feel everything you don't let yourself. The fucking bitterness of the fact that you'll never play on a court again and face a real opponent, the solace you find in the two of them—how they'd try to bring you the moon if you asked, how the only way to your dream now is through them. You love them. And more than that, you need them. They need you, too.
Without one of you, the other two might as well be nothing. You need their company, and their skills, and their loyalty. You need them in order to forget how much you've lost to this game, and for you to remember that you're loved.
The kisses keep coming, shallow, needy breaths that mingle into one in the space between. The three of you are flushed from head to toe, sweaty from the heat of bodies and from the party that had come before.
It's a lovely kind of mess.
But you'll just have to deal with the consequences another day—when you're less drunk, and you can pour all the passion into a game of tennis instead.
a/n: the only reason i haven't expanded on their feelings and the sports aspect in more depth is due to lack of time. its super hard to condense character motivations into just 3k, especially when there's 3 of them involved... but i hope u were able to get a glimpse into their brains. for those interested, i suggest watching challengers (2024) with my whole heart bcs its such a spectacular movie with interesting characters that are complex and 3 dimensional hehe. thank you for reading!!!
two lonely people in the same room.
⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ꨄ.. taesan x f!reader. childhood friends to lovers, soulmate au.
sypnosis: in a world where everyone has a soulmate, han dongmin doesn't have one. in a world where everyone has someone, you have no one. (wc 3.4k)
if you had to put it into numbers, there is around 4% of han dongmin’s 21 years of life that didn’t include [y/n] [l/n].
every birthday, she was there. every walk to school, she was there. every class, she was there, chatting when she wasn’t supposed to be.
perhaps it was an over-exaggeration, but han dongmin did not know life without [y/n] by his side.
everyone who wasn’t born with a soulmate mark was supposed to get it on their 15th birthday. but when that 15th birthday rolled around for dongmin, there was nothing. zip. nada. he did not wake up with a magical tattoo on his back, or a clock counting down til the day he met his soulmate. he didn't wake up with an extra voice in his head or phantom pains. he simply had nothing.
at first, it bothered him. how was he supposed to find his happily ever after if he didn't even have a soulmate like his mom and dad? but as he grew older he seemed to care less - my soulmate is my music, he usually replies when people ask. but he still felt bitter when his younger brother, at 17 years old, experienced colour for the first time when he bumped into his soulmate on some random street. he saw how happy his brother was, and he felt how unhappy and lonely he was.
[y/n] [l/n] did not like to tell people she doesn't have a soulmate. when she comforted dongmin on his 15th birthday, she didn't realise it would happen to her too.
mom had told you to go to sleep on your 15th birthday. don’t put too much hope into it - you might meet your soulmate, but that doesn’t mean it’ll work out. she glanced at her own mark - a tattoo etched onto her arm, a permanent reminder of your dead-beat dad, and sighed.
but you stayed up out of excitement anyways. you thought about what your soulmate might be like. maybe he was like donghyun from down the street, who was gentle with you all the time; or maybe he was more like sungho from two grades above, who laughed at everything and made you feel at ease. the more you thought about it, the giddier you got. your teacher had said that soulmate marks are usually hereditary, so maybe you’ll get a tattoo like mom & dad, or maybe you’ll get a super special one - you’ve heard about how some people could share dreams or even taste the same things on their tongues.
but the clock struck twelve and nothing happened.
“see, i told you,” your mother sighed at your swollen eyes the next morning, “you let yourself hope and you always get let down.”
you cried for hours after that. this was it - the universe telling you that nobody was stupid or crazy enough to love you, and you’d have to be alone forever. people would whisper about you and pity you and say - that’s a child not even her mother could love.
the next day, when dongmin’s younger brother excitedly asked you about your soulmate mark, you mustered up a smile and said, oh, it’s something like - shared feelings. like, i can feel whatever they are feeling.
dongmin kicked over a trash can, and was promptly yelled at by his dad.
“guys, i’m freaking out, i found them!” jaehyun bounded over to your table, and the library lady shushed him.
“sorry,” he apologised, continuing in a whisper, “but seriously, look, i think i have a soulmate mark that makes us have the same handwriting.”
he pulls out a crumpled piece of paper from his pocket - the sign-up sheet for mr. jiho’s class on music production.
“why do you have that?” dongmin asked with a raised eyebrow - that piece of paper was supposed to stay on the bulletin board.
“i’ll put it back,” jaehyun waved away his comment, pointing at something on the sheet, “look, doesn’t that look exactly like my handwriting?”
you squinted at the name.
“i dunno,” dongmin shrugged, “just looks like handwriting to me.”
“no, look!” jaehyun insisted, snatching dongmin’s pen from his fingers and scribbling down a copy of their name.
“doesn’t it look the exact same?”
he held up the sticky note against the sheet of paper to compare.
“well, it does look pretty similar…” you finally admit.
it was the exact same - down to the way their consonants were both massive and rotund.
“exactly! i knew it! i knew i had a soulmate!” jaehyun bounced on his feet excitedly, earning another loud shush from the librarian.
“oh,” he paused suddenly, stricken, “sorry taesan.”
“it’s whatever,” dongmin shrugged, “maybe one day i’ll find a soulmate waiting for me, too.”
“yeah, i’m sure you will,” jaehyun breathed out, “okay, bye. i gotta go find them.”
you could barely get out a ‘good luck’ before jaehyun bounds out of the library, sign-up sheet clutched in his hands.
“and another bites the dust,” dongmin sighs, turning his attention back to his homework.
“maybe if we both can’t find our soulmates by the time we’re 30, we should just get married to each other.”
you laugh as you pick up your pen again.
dongmin’s heart skips a beat and his cheeks heat up, but when he gathers enough courage to spare a look at you, you’re already far too engrossed in the world of quadratic equations and maths to notice how he looks at you.
“i can feel it again, my soulmate is running laps or some shit again,” sumin gasps dramatically, a hand over her heart as she suddenly falls onto the couch.
jinsoul rolls her eyes, “at least you know your soulmate’s fit.”
“do you think it’ll stop after i meet them?” sumin pouts. you can tell she’s doing her breathing exercises again.
“maybe,” jinsoul shrugs, she didn’t have a soulmate either, “how is your soulmate feeling?”
there’s a pause before you register she’s talking to you - “oh, um, can’t really feel anything, so i guess they’re fine.”
“you’re so lucky you have a normal soulmate,” sumin complains, obviously fine enough to start punching the air in anger.
“hey - i heard youngjae found his soulmate too,” jinsoul picks at a loose thread on your carpet.
“seriously? i thought everyone knew he didn’t have a soulmate mark.”
sumin sat up from her chair.
“nah, apparently he was just straight up lying," jinsoul shrugged, "he had a red string mark, thats why he kept tumbling all over the place, because his soulmate kept tugging on it."
"fuck, that's funny," sumin laughed before erupting into coughs, "what the hell, this guy makes me want to run a lap around the house myself."
you pursed your lips as sumin starts doing jumping jacks in the middle of the room. you and youngjae had a lot in common, but lying about having a soulmate and not actually having one seemed really different.
“you won’t believe this,” jinsoul splayed out her hands, “so you guys heard about the soulmate checker thing, right?”
you nodded, eyes watching out in case sumin misses her bus, again.
“i finally got mine done and,” she looked slightly miffed, “i actually have a soulmate. it’s just super difficult to find them.”
“what!” sumin shrieked, grabbing jinsoul’s arms and shaking her back and forth, “what do you mean?”
jinsoul pushed sumin off of her, “i just didn’t know! apparently i get sick whenever they get sick.”
her nose wrinkled, “which is never, i guess.”
“no way!” sumin exclaims, “are you gonna find them?”
“yeah, that’s so cool. by the way, what’s the address - thing?” you rush out a little too quickly, and both sumin & jinsoul turn to look at you inquisitively.
“i - i mean, you know dongmin, right? he doesn’t have a visible soulmate mark either, so i - you know…”
jinsoul nodded sagely, pulling out her phone.
“sending you the address.”
you stare at the message. you weren’t sure what feeling was gnawing in your stomach. this was it - it was going to tell you whether the world actually had someone planned for you after all, and you weren’t a weirdo for not having a soulmate and you were a creature capable of love and being loved.
“the specialist is ready to see you now,” the receptionist calls out from the front desk, and you nearly fall out of your seat. the test was a blur - some scan of your irises and a sample of blood. the incessant whirring of the machines and sterile white walls creeped you out to no end, but you scurried down down the corridor to the room at the end of the hallway.
“[y/n] [l/n]?” the specialist confirmed your name as she beckoned you into the room. you perch yourself on the cold metal chair she gestured to before staring at a computer screen full of numbers and words you don’t understand.
“so it looks like,” she waves a hand at the monitor vaguely, “you don’t have a soulmate.”
“oh,” that was blunt.
"are you sure?” you ask, just to be sure.
"one hundred percent. no soulmate.”
you feel empty inside, “i see.”
she might as well have handed you a piece of paper with YOU’LL BE FOREVER ALONE printed on it.
“sorry,” the specialist purses her lips, “but it’s not a completely bad thing.”
she rolled up her sleeve and pointed at the 00:00:00 in big, bold numbers on her forearm, “met them, didn’t know it was them, now i’ll never know who it is.”
“a ton of people don’t have soulmates,” she smiled sympathetically at you, "don’t feel too bad.”
you nod numbly, “um, yeah. thank you.”
“so, how did it go?” jinsoul slams her textbooks down on the table, and you jump.
“how did what go?” you splutter, trying to pull yourself together.
jinsoul rolls her eyes at you, “the soulmate thing! you know - if the han dongmin actually doesn’t have a soulmate, i might have to start looking more his way.”
she twirled a piece of hair around her finger and you suddenly look incredibly interested in the numbers on the corners of the textbooks she just slammed down.
“i don’t know,” you shrug, biting your cheek, “i didn’t ask.”
jinsoul sighs, “damn. imagine if han taesan actually had a soulmate all along. that would be my youngjae-geddon.”
“what if i have a what?” a voice cuts through as something heavy landed on your head. you brush off han dongmin’s stupidly heavy bag and stare at him pointedly, and he raised an eyebrow in challenge.
“nothing!” you blurt out before jinsoul can open her mouth and completely blow your cover, standing up abruptly, “honestly, i don’t get why your band club always breaks so late! let’s go - my mom says she has something for your mom, so you have to come with me.”
you grab dongmin’s wrist and drag him behind you, completely ignoring jinsoul’s flabbergasted look. you stormed off and didn’t realise you were nearly halfway home until your arm started to get sore from pulling dongmin, and you fume when you realise he had been digging his heels into the concrete to make life harder for her, because he always has.
“something’s off with you,” he squints at you when you finally let go of his hand with a huff. he sounds amused at your misery.
“don’t you ever wish you had a soulmate?” you suddenly say, whirling around to face him.
dongmin blinks, “you fell out of bed and hit your head this morning or something? where’s this all coming from?”
“you know how i said i had a soulmate? and i could feel their emotions or whatever?” you kicked a rock extra hard on the path, watching it skitter across the pavement. dongmin nods slowly.
“well, i lied! i don’t have a soulmate - like it’s scientifically proven!”
a brief silence washes over you before dongmin breaks it, his voice harsh, “so you were lying to me? to everyone?”
“yeah, i was! because you know what? i just wanted to be normal and not a freak who no one can love!” you yell in frustration, before your words dawned on you.
“wait - that’s not what i -”
dongmin scoffs, “so that’s how you see me? a freak who’s not normal?”
“no! that’s not what i -”
“save it, [y/n],” he takes a step back and you see the hurt that flashes across his eyes, “i’m done.”
he shoves past you and leaves you standing in the middle of the road.
so it is true. you’ve just driven away the person who would love you no matter what - soulmate or no soulmate.
you really are unlovable.
“dongmin,” his mother rounded into view, a guilty look on her face, “[y/n] wants to see you.”
dongmin frowns and physically turns away from the door, “tell her that i don’t want to talk to her.”
her mother casts a sad look behind her, where you were waiting by the doorway and shakes her head.
“i’m coming back tomorrow! you can’t avoid me forever, dongmin!” you yell, loud enough for him to hear you from his room. he makes sure that the door slam in response is loud enough for you to hear too.
“maybe you should give him some time to process,” his mother cupped her cheek in worry.
you felt like crying, “i’m sorry. you’re right. i’m sorry for bothering you guys.”
you turn on your heel and u-turned, kicking open your fence and opening the front door to an empty house.
usually you would be able to see dongmin doing homework, or jamming out with his headphones in, or sometimes he’d even open the window so you could listen to his newest song on his guitar, but these past few days his curtain was shut tightly and you couldn’t get even a glimpse of his shadow.
‘i’m sorry!’ you wanted to yell into his window, ‘i’m sorry, i was insecure and scared. i hated myself and i didn’t want to admit it!’
you didn’t even need him to forgive you, you just wanted to say sorry - because you couldn’t live with yourself. his sad look from your words that day were burned into your eyelids, because every time you shut your eyes you could see him.
“and this is for mrs. han next door,” your mother handed you a basket of fresh muffins and you awkwardly scratched your cheek.
“can’t you just give it to them?”
“dongmin hating you is none of my concern. frankly, i’m surprised he hasn’t requested you move away yet,” your mother said bluntly, and you winced.
“now, go, shoo. the least thing you can do is be a good neighbour,” she waved you away and you resigned yourself to an awkward hello and fastest goodbye you’ve ever thrown down.
you trudge up to their house and knocked timidly on their door.
“hi mrs. han, mom and i made muffins and we made too much so you should have some,” you rush out as soon as the door creaks open, staring at the floor as you hold out the basket to her.
“wrong person,” dongmin lazily replied, and your head shoots up, only to see him leaning against the door frame, the meanest look he’s ever given you etched onto his face.
“oh,” your brain short circuits.
“mom and dad left to go to the store,” he kicked open the door wider, “just leave it on the dining table.”
you sidle inside behind him, flinging the basket down onto the table and turning to book it out of his house.
“aren’t you going to say sorry?”
you whip your head around, only to see dongmin sprawled across his sofa, leaning against the arm rest as he watches you.
“it’s been four days,” he adds, “you can say sorry now.”
you bristled, “i was going to from day one - but you kept ignoring me!”
dongmin frowned and you immediately simpered down, staring at the tiles of the kitchen floor, “but - but i’m sorry. i shouldn’t have said those things. i didn’t mean it. i said all those things because i was just angry at myself and for lying to you and everyone else. i lied because i thought - i thought it was written in the stars that i couldn’t be loved, like i was some cosmic mistake. so i lied to make myself feel better. i was just selfish and didn’t think straight. well - i don’t want to excuse myself. i did something really, really wrong.”
“hm,” dongmin mused.
“i’m sorry - if you want to smite me off this planet i promise i’ll never show up in a 50 meter radius around you ever again.”
“no,” he said simply, “i forgive you.”
“i’m really, really sor - what?” you look up in surprise.
“i said, i forgive you,” he repeated.
“no, you shouldn’t,” you frowned, “i said such horrible things and -”
“don’t tell me what to do.”
dongmin grumbled, and you shut up immediately. he beckons you to come over and you do, shuffling over awkwardly in silence. you stand over him and he lazily stretches like a cat and you watch for his usual telltale signs of anger - silence, avoiding your gaze, a permanent frown. instead, nothing. he just looked straight at you and you felt like he saw right through you - he probably did, he always knew you better than you knew yourself.
he suddenly pulls you by your wrist and you yelp as you tumble down, landing squarely in his embrace.
“dongmin!” you whisper, your brain frenzied. you can’t see his face anymore.
“i thought about it,” he shushes you, “i’ve always liked you, you know? since - i don’t know, since forever. when you said you had a soulmate, i made peace that i might never have you. and i thought i was stupid for that - loving someone that couldn’t love me back. but i couldn’t stop loving you.”
“i get it. you were scared, weren’t you? like - you were drowning and the only thing that could keep you alive was lying about it.”
he sighed, “we’re just two lonely people in the same room, [y/n].”
“i love you all the same, soulmate or no soulmate,” his arms come up to loosely wrap around your waist, “you should’ve told me, i would’ve understood. why didn’t you tell me?”
you pushed yourself off him to sit up, and he just watches you, dark eyes pooled with love and sadness and anger and passion -
“i don’t know,” you start hoarsely, “i knew. i knew you liked me - i liked you too. but - but what if i wasn’t enough? what if it was just the universe playing another cruel trick on me?”
you start crying, hiccuping, “what if you don’t actually love me back? then i really am unlovable. no soulmate thing to save me - just me and my repulsive self.
i was so scared. i didn’t want to get my hopes up, that someone would actually like me for me. because the happier i feel the worse the crash feels.
i hate myself for hurting you, i’m sorry.”
you feel dizzy and you squeeze your eyes shut. you feel his hand come up to wipe at your tears.
“you’re not repulsive, or unlovable, or any of those words running around in that silly head of your’s,” he whispered, “you never were. it’s not a soulmate mark that makes someone worthy of love, you know?”
“i love your smile, and your laugh, and the way you get angry at the smallest things. i love how you look at me, talk to me, and hold my hand," he laughed gently.
“[y/n], i love you because you are you. soulmate or not. i choose to love you, and i’ll love you to the day i die,” he nudges his forehead against your’s, “you were so afraid, weren’t you? can’t you be afraid with me?
i can’t tell you how the future is going to go, i can’t promise you i won’t mess up, but i can promise you that i’ll love you forever and ever. so, can’t we two lonely people be together, and be together - a little less lonely?”
you laugh, out of breath, at his little tongue twister in the end, and he gives you that smile you love so much - the one where his eyes crinkle at the corner and his laugh escapes in little breaths.
“okay,” you promise, “no more hiding.”
“no more hiding,” he echoes, “just us two, choosing each other. soulmate marks be damned.”
he pinches your cheek.
a/n: ermmmm SURPRISE....!!!! SIGHHHHH CHILDHOOD FRIEND TAESAN......... the stuff dreams are made of.
♡ or ↻ if you enjoyed, support your writers, thank you!!
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wizard! taesan x f! reader - howl's moving castle au
syn: a heart's a heavy burden. you realise this when he makes yours skip a beat for the first time. wc: 3k
a/n: for @starriniqhts as part of my 1st anniversary event! tysm my aylin for requesting!!!
cw: insecurities, harassment by strangers
main masterlist
Being a dressmaker comes with its downsides.
It's a mess of fabric and string, tape strewn all over the tiny ground-floor room of the boutique that you have to bend your spine to gather it up after every consultation. Customers can get rude if you make them wait for longer than they expect, the stuffy heat of layers upon layers of dresses gets to your senses until you have to step out for air often, and you get your fingers pricked more than on occasion. A somewhat thankless job, considering the measly pay.
But being a dressmaker is child’s play compared to being the eldest daughter of three—which might as well be the hardest job in the world, really.
When you're staying overtime to bring into life a new design, they're expected to go home and scrub themselves clean—as ladies should. They have to prime their skin and coil their hairs, and they enjoy it, but you on the other hand—you’re wiping sweat off your brow well into the night during most weeks. They aren't all that different from you in age, but there's already been talks of them entering society, finding suitors.
You're no good for marriage. Dress-making is your calling. Your destiny.
It's hard, but it's the life you're most suited to fare.
And you're okay with it because you have to be. Any bigger a dream, and high expectations will simply crush you to dust—its best to keep to the known, the little cocoon of a life you’ve lived till now.
Today, today though—you can’t seem to stop look away from the shop window, and from the commotion that seemed to be unravelling through it.
You're so dazed by the trumpets and dancing petals and soldiers on white horses that you barely feel the shadow falling over you from behind.
“Boo!”
It startles you out of your stool, nearly bumping your elbow into the desk’s edge and spilling a pair of scissors and tape onto the wooden floor. Your heart only calms to a safe rhythm once you see that's it just your sister playing her tricks on you.
“Jiyu!” you reprimand feebly, catching your breath, scowling at how she’s giggling without a care. “What is it now? Father said you shouldn't keep hanging around here with nothing to do.”
“He made an exception today,” she tosses back easily, grabbing an eraser off the table to toy with until you grab it back. “Haeum and I convinced him with some sweet talk, of course. After all, it's the Queen’s parade! There will be soldiers to watch and toss flowers at. Do you think one of them will look my way?”
You want to roll your eyes at her bubbliness. She's always like this—the both of them, really. But you're honest when you say, “Yes, no doubt you'll catch everyone's attention. You're beautiful.”
Because she is. The way she smiles so brightly in response, teeth exposed and cheeks full like she doesn't think twice about her flaws—which don't exist—just drives home your point. They're both blessed with kindness and loveliness and beauty, and you were bestowed the duty to carry on the family business, hold up the finances that your father alone couldn't manage.
But it's okay when you love your family and you're quite happy with your job.
It's okay. Really.
“You should come with!” Jiyu brings you back to the present, hopping on her toes and swishing her frilly skirt all over your plain flat one. “C’mon, Y/N, you stay cooped up all day at that desk of yours. Surely you can afford a few minutes away to forage for some handsome fellas.” She winks suggestively.
It doesn't even bring a blush to your cheeks. She should know you've sworn off romance in this lifetime. It's not like you'll have any luck if you try anyways—true love and fairytale magic was for the privileged and the pretty. You were neither.
“It'll be fu-unnn,” she sing-songs enticingly, wiggling her eyebrows in a way that just makes her look even more endearing. “Maybe you'll meet a wizard! Or a flying ship like they've been saying they made. Oh, it'll be novel, won't it!?”
You've never been good at saying no to her requests; she's half your heart, really, and the other half is Haeum. You've been taught to care for them since you were a child—so it's a hard habit to break now. Wherever they go, and if they let you, you would follow.
She's about to try again when you cut her off with a swift, “Fine.” You gather yourself up, dusting off the eraser shavings and chalk powder off your clothes. “But only for a few minutes. Just to look.”
She seems more than happy to settle for that, launching to lead you by the wrist to the parade before you can even check to see if your face is clean yet. Thankfully, you do manage to grab a hat for your unruly hair before you've made it out.
It's noise and colours, everywhere. More vibrant than you have ever seen the city since the war was officially announced months ago.
Fork-tongued flags and streamers hoisted on poles, miniature copies in people's fists, a brilliant shade of blue gracing the city square. The sound of horns is louder than ever, the procession in the middle of the street filled with men in dark hats and big mustaches, in their stiff uniforms. Dancers twirling feathery sticks, in their dreamy dresses that float like air. And through the gap in the crowd, you can see the queen herself hoisted up on a man-powered carriage—her sharp eyes still notable under the solid gold crown.
“Wow,” you hear yourself whisper, tightening your hold on Jiyu’s hand without meaning to. “All this for her birthday… How breathtaking…”
“Isn't it?” your sister whispers from beside you, but her expression has gone distant and lovesick, swooning at the way a young man in uniform winks at her as he passes by. Once he's out of sight and hearing, she squeals in delight. “Oh, did you see that, Y/N!? He winked at me!! Where is Haeum-ie, she needs to know!”
The two are more interconnected than you were ever with either of them, two peas in a pod, so it only takes one small turn of Jiyu’s eyes to find Haeum on the other side of the parade, waving back at you like she'd picked up the conversation from all the way over there, strangely telepathic in the ways only sisters can be.
And without waiting for the people to finish passing by, Jiyu—who is the most impulsive out of you three—rish forward into the crowd to greet Haeum. You jab your hand forward to stop her by the arm, but she's too quick and lithe, already vanished into a mass of bodies.
First, the panic hits. You can't lose your little sister—you’d be dead before sundown if that happened!
Then you see both of them giggling to each other, swiveling around to wave you over, urging you to take a leap of faith and just maneuver through the crowd, too.
“I—” Complaints die on your tongue when you realise no one can hear. You take a step forward, trying to push past someone, but they shove backwards unknowingly. You end up whispering a sorry on instinct and going the opposite direction, again with no avail.
It feels like an awkward dance with yourself, like an ant trying to go around a crumb and failing miserably, pushing into excited people and the occasional lamppost blocking the way. In no time have you almost tripped over a dent in the pavement, spun around three times in dizzying speed, somehow carried by the wave of the crowd all the way to the emptier part of the street, behind everyone.
It's such a sudden relief that you immediately rush for the alleyway on the side, desperate to get away from the uncomfortable ruckus. Your sisters would be fine, you tell yourself to calm down, they have each other. They may be easy to impress with a couple flashy grins, but they can take care of one another at least. You just need to get back to them without losing yourself.
Which might be a problem. Because you can't exactly tell where you are right now—the city is big and maze-like to begin with, the festivities has rendered it somewhat unrecognisable during wartime.
It's your feet that do most of the thinking, moving on its own accord in the direction it feels is the most safe, leading you to a quieter, more shadowed, almost empty lane, seemingly in the middle of nowhere.
Until you hear footsteps approaching.
“Ooh, look, a lost kitten,” someone whistles out from behind you, and you turn in fear.
“Well hello there,” another one joins in a similar teasing tone—a man’s, deep and gruff like he sucks on a smoke-pipe all day. “Mind if you lift that hat of yours so we can get a better look?”
They smirk and guffaw between themselves, their looming height and intimidating soldier-uniforms coming into view when you brave a small peek. A gulp travels down your throat, and they seem to enjoy scaring you even more at that.
“I have to go—” you begin, but one of them shushes you softly, taking a step closer. It forces you to take a step backwards, but it's to your horror that you realise you've landed against a wall, with nowhere to run to as the two of them crowd you on either side. “My sisters are waiting for me,” you manage to spit out. “I need to go to them.”
“They won't mind though, would they? Surely they're busy celebrating out there. Doubt they'll even notice you're gone.”
Your blood freezes, their over-friendly demeanour sending a chill down your spine as they get up in your space. A discreet hand of yours slip into your dress’s pocket (that you'd stitched up for ease of carrying around your yarn in the shop), and thumbs around a tiny needle stuck into it. It doesn't hurt you, but you don't know how you can use it to distract them enough to run away. They keep flirting and proding even after knowing you don't want to engage.
“C’mon now, you don't need to lie to reject us,” one of them says again, sneering. “No need to make up sisters and obligations. I can tell you've got no one waiting for you. So why don't you come along and we can keep you company on a date?”
Tears begin to prickle in your eyes, but the second you think you're going to break, a lilting voice cuts through the echoing alleyway.
“There you are,” he smiles in a greeting, and your head shoots up. “I’m sorry I’m late. I was looking everywhere for you.”
A gentle weight falls over your shoulder—there, but barely touching. The soldiers’ brows furrow in confusion, then anger, as they take in the taller man who has interrupted the scene.
Flaxen hair that shines like sunlight, unmarred skin that seems to brighten up even in the grimy alley, looking so out of place. He has a thick, checkered cape, billowy white shirt underneath, and an emerald earring dangling from one of his ears.
You feel like you should know this person.
“Who in the world are you—” the soldier's protest is cut short when the blond man lowers his head just slightly, to whisper, “Take a walk. Don't come back,” in the most entrancing voice you've heard. It's commanding and playful at the same time. Like a spell, almost.
As though suddenly obedient, the soldiers stiffen like wooden boards, and they march out of the alley like their feet have lost control, panicking the entire time.
“What—”
“It isn't safe here,” the blond says, his silly hair brushing over your cheek when he leans to whisper like it's a secret, like you're being followed and he doesn't want eavesdroppers. “Come with me.”
And maybe it's the way he says it that's so compelling—like his voice is made of sugar and honey and melted wax, or the way he smells like sunshine in a field of flowers. Beautiful. You let him lead you out, your hand somehow having moved to hold his elbow he offers, all gentlemanly.
He walks like he's floating, soft and swift, through the streets and up a flight of stairs that land you at the long hallway-like balcony of several doors—a motel, you think. Downstairs, the procession is thinning in a distance, music reaching you in bits and pieces.
“My sisters are over there,” you hear yourself say.
The man next to you smiles. “I’ll take you there,” he hums. “But you’ll need to be brave for this next bit.”
You look at him, startled, but when that does nothing but bring his features even closer to your sight, it runs reddened heat down your ears and neck.
Everything is so… ethereal about him. As though he isn't real or tangible in any sense, even though your grip on him is solid, and you can wager that this isn't a dream no matter how much it feels like one. His eyes are brown, but there's green swimming in it, like little mossy fish. Then he does the thing that makes you backtrack on considering whether this wasn't a dream after all—he steps up onto the wooden railing of the balcony, and balances himself there like it's easy as pie.
“Now you,” he says, a twinkle in his eye.
“What!? No I can't—”
“You trust me, don't you?” He sounds confident, a palm extended for you to take, spine dipping like he's asking you to a waltz.
And you. You are scared. But you do still trust him, because a strange, inexplicable part of you thinks you know this man. That this is not your first meeting, even if you don't even know his name yet.
So maybe that's why you accept his hand.
“Extend a leg, then walk,” he instructs softly, not minding how you immediately grasp onto his shirt when it occurs to you how high you really are. A fall could injure you terribly.
“Walk? What do you mean, walk?”
“Like this.” He demonstrates by extending a long leg off the railing and into the empty space in front, coaxing you to follow. You press closer to him, not knowing what any of this is, but knowing it feels right to listen. “Good girl,” he adds with a smile when you manage to do it right, one leg in front of another, over air. And you're walking on wind in no time.
Not falling. Not plummeting to your death into the depths below onto the streets and people, but floating. Gliding almost—in a dance without a floor to stay afoot on.
“This is—I’m—”
“Wizardry,” he nods with a soft giggle, steering you over the chimney of a rooftop, gently leaping over the piped ledge and onto another house. “Magic is quite helpful, don't you agree?”
You nod in awe, watching the lamps and lights below turn into specks of shiny dust, like fireflies at noon. Beyond the city, there are ridges of mountains and valleys coming into view, touching the dips of the sky. You feel closer to the clouds than to the ground. Wow.
And his hands are curled around yours now—one around your palm, the other thumbing at your other wrist, slow, steady circles that test your pulse. It spikes and your heart jumps at a particularly low rumble from his chest that you only pick up because you're so close. Is this a dream after all?
“Here,” he is saying, and you don't even realise that your feet have touched solid ground, another balcony that you slowly realise is the upper floor of your boutique, where you'd started.
How had he known where to take you?
“Who are…”
He tilts his head, lowering your arms to your side and stepping back to take his spot on the railing again, ready to leave. You think he's about to disappear without another word like this was all just imagination, but he indulges you one last time. “Taesan. You'll know me by other names, but for you, I am Taesan.”
You test the name on your tongue, tasting magic, “Taesan…”
“That's perfect,” he flashes a perfect smile. “I’m going to see to it that they don't find you again, but stay put for a while before you go back out, alright?”
Wordlessly, you agree, a small smile twitching at your own lips. Something about him does that to you.
With one final curtsey, he floats backwards in lithe grace, like one of the petals that had fallen from a window. By the time you've rushed to lean over the ledge, he's vanished from sight. Gone as quickly as he'd come.
A wizard, maybe? You've heard stories from your sisters about magic users—its not terribly new to this part of town—but in all the retellings and anecdotes, there's a particular wizard that stands out, known to eat hearts of pretty young girls and leave them weeping all alone.
But him… He'd saved you. You don't think you were pretty enough to pull a trick on, so he'd sought you out and brought you to the safety of your home. A good wizard, you think, that has to be it. Jiyu and Haeum won't believe their ears when you tell them—rather, they’ll be too taken with a new object of their affections they would have picked out to fancy, some time during the parade.
Taesan, you echo in your head, gazing at the spot he'd been standing, trying to fashion out his figure from memory alone.
But something inside you tells you this won't be the last time you meet this man.
conquest of spaces
ꨄ.. ⠀⠀riwoo x f! reader. figure skating au.
sypnosis: you and sanghyuk have been training under coach kim since you could remember, but then sanghyuk’s gains success. soon enough, he’s becomes destined for better and greater things - which includes switching coaches to coach lee - who also happens to be coach’s bitter rival. even if you aren’t competing in the same discipline, coach kim decides to draw a line in the sand, and you and sanghyuk are caught in the splash zone. (wc 8.9k)
tags: YURI!!!!, secret relationship vibes, enemies (?) to lovers?
a/n: i'm sooo tired. thank you to aylin @starriniqhts for beta reading! song i looped to this was everywhere by michelle branch.
december, some random tuesday.
it probably didn’t help that you found out through social media.
coach.ty.lee happy to welcome lee sanghyuk to our humble skating club ❤️ please continue to support this brilliant young skater!
you exchanged a look with subin.
“in the middle of the season, too,” subin sighs, “rough.”
you shake your head, “i literally said hi to him last week.”
"do you think coach kim knows about this?” she whispers over the hum of the zamboni.
a shrill scream from coach kim’s office cuts you off before you can reply, and you cock your head - "i think that’s your answer.”
coach appears at the door, clipboard clutched in her hand with whitened knuckles, her hair wild and flying, and her eyes narrowed and furious.
"i take him to junior worlds. i help him rotate his quads. i hand stitch his costumes when they break. i raised him - and this is how he repays me?” she seethes, stomping over to where you and subin are resting.
"she’s mad,” subin whispers.
"go figure,” you wipe your hands on your training towel as you stand, walking over to the door of the rink.
coach kim is fuming now, pacing back and forth across the rubber floor as she mutters to herself. the last time you saw her this angry was when the judges hosed your scores to hell and back for their favourite new wunderchild - and back then she made threats of blowing up the judges box on national tv and nearly attacked one of the judges from behind when she saw them in the hotel lobby.
"ten years,” she mutters when she nears you, jabbing her clipboard towards you like you’re supposed to bear witness, "ten - fucking - years i spent with that boy. teaching him figures and edges when he could barely stand on the ice. sharpening his skates when he couldn’t afford to go to a professional. and taeyeon - she - she just swoops in now that he’s landing quads, winning medals, and getting sponsorships, and suddenly i’m what? chopped liver?”
you and subin elect to remain silent.
"and you know what the worst part is?” coach kim’s voice cracks slightly, and you cringe at the sight of tears springing to her waterline, eyes turning glassy, “i taught her how to choreograph! i got her her first coaching job - at the national rink! and now this is how she repays me?”
she stops abruptly and you suck in a breath, trying not to set her off if you breathe the wrong way.
“fine -” she says sharply, “if this is how she wants to play it, then so be it.”
you definitely breathed the wrong way, because as you exhale coach kim whirls onto you, approaching with a speed that alarms you as she waves her clipboard at you.
“you’re competing at senior nationals next month, correct?”
“yes, ma’am,” your throat is dry.
“good. i want you on that worlds team. not competing - winning, you understand me?” she has that glare in her eyes now, the one that means she’s planning something, “taeyeon thinks she can poach one of my skaters and get away with it? let’s see how much she likes it when her new star has to share a podium with one of my skaters.”
“but ma’am,” you hold up a finger, “sanghyuk is doing men’s singles and i do -”
“i know what discipline you’re in -” she snaps, “that’s not relevant. it’s about making a statement. it’s about proving ourselves.”
you wonder if your coach has gone slightly insane with heartbreak. coach kim takes your silence as agreement.
she storms back to her office, and you let out a quiet sigh.
she pauses and for a moment you panic over whether she heard your exhale.
she points her clipboard at you, “and i do not want to see you chatting up lee sanghyuk. texting lee sanghyuk. or even looking at lee sanghyuk. understand?”
you gulp, “but -”
“no buts,” she snaps, “end of conversation!”
the slam of her office door echoes around the ice rink.
you block sanghyuk that night - up at 11:30PM and scrolling through your text messages. photos from group hangouts, requests for money, and the occasional question and passing of news. deleting it was easy - it was nothing - it meant nothing. you unfollow him on instagram next, and block him on facebook too, as requested by coach kim. she gave you a thumbs up when you text the proof of your loyalty, and you can’t help but repeat to yourself: it’s nothing, just a guy who is no longer part of your life anymore. it’s like… graduating from highschool and deleting all the classmates you don’t care about.
that’s exactly what this is.
january, day one of nationals.
the next time you see sanghyuk is at nationals.
the moment you step onto the rink, your eyes zero in on him, dressed in his team korea jacket with earbuds in as he practices his off ice jumps in the corner of the arena. he looks the same as when he left you - still with the same cropped platinum blonde hair that subin used to say makes him look bald when it blends into the ice. you wince at the thought.
coach kim bristles.
“don’t look at him,” she announces to your group, and you see the younger skaters nod dutifully. you peel your eyes away before he somehow notices your obvious staring and hurry away to the locker room, your bag clutched in your hand as you brush past skaters warming up, coaches giving last minute words of wisdom, camera crew dangerously swinging around large cameras, and volunteers running around with boxes of water bottles in their hands.
the locker room is only just slightly less chaotic. with the smell of hairspray in the air and stepping over dropped hair accessories, you drop your bag onto the bench, pulling out your shoes and starting the journey of lacing yourself into your skates.
"this is so stupid,” subin whispers, her junior bronze medal dangling from her neck as she casts a quick look to where coach kim is fussing over wonyoung’s hair, "you and sanghyuk aren’t even in the same event. what are you gonna do? join the men’s singles competition and come in last place?”
you don’t answer, instead just yanking on your laces even harder.
"coach is even pettier than me,” subin mumbles in answer to your silence.
"it’s a matter of pride,” you eventually say, standing up and testing the feeling of being in your shoes - tight, structured, perfect. exactly how you like it.
"but [y/n] -”
"i’m gonna go warm up,” you interrupt, grabbing your water bottle and marching out of the locker room.
coach kim gave you a purpose. she shaped your life.
you nearly smack into sanghyuk and his new teammate - donghyun - while you’re emerging from the locker room. sanghyuk’s doing that thing again where he’s doing his best to laugh at a joke that doesn’t land to make the other person feel better, and then he’s poking fun at donghyun’s poor attempt at redemption. you shove past donghyun (which elicits a soft hey!) and stomp away as sanghyuk grabs donghyun’s shoulder and to pull him out of the way.
you weren’t going to betray coach now.
you say you’re practising, throwing yourself into the air like a spring wound up too tight on the rubber floor of the upper deck of the arena.
but out of the corner of your eye, you watch the action happening on the ice rink.
sanghyuk is doing his usual routine of crossovers during warmups, and coach kim is watching the rink like a hawk from her place in the spectator stands. you try to look uninterested, brushing past the other skaters that are huddled behind a pillar and whispering about the final group of male skaters.
"i think sanghyuk’s gonna win,” one of them whispers.
"no way, jaehyun totally has it,” another laughs.
“donghyun, anyone?” someone offers weakly.
“no way - he hasn’t even regained his quad toe,” someone else retorts, “my money’s on our ice prince jaehyun.”
you push in your earbuds as the crowd erupts into giggles.
focus, you chide yourself, you come first.
you ignore the rest of the men’s event, but you find out sanghyuk won the short program anyways when a gasp echoes around the stadium as his score appears. a new personal best - the announcer booms, unavoidable with its volume.
ignore him, your mental coach kim scolds as you stretch again, you’re literally going up next.
your competition feels like a blur. you wobble on the landing your opening jump which deducted points and caused looks from the judging panels, and you missed a level in your second spin because you got distracted thinking about the jump and missed a few rotations. when you skate away after your bows you barely register what you’re doing and what just happened, your brain buzzing from that post-program energy.
but coach kim greets you at the exit of the rink, a smile hanging from her face as she pulls you into a tight hug.
“that was good,” she says into your ear, pressing you tighter against herself, “you did exactly what i wanted to see.”
you just give her a tired smile and grab your skate guards out of her hands.
when your scores come in, coach kim cheers and wraps an arm around your shoulders.
“at least third place,” she says breathlessly, “we can do bronze. we can work with that.”
day one ended up with you stepping off the podium with a silver medal in your hands, after the girl who went after you fell on her combination, locking you into second place as you continue to fail to beat the reigning national champion (a work in progress - coach kim mumbles, scribbling harshly into her notebook - we’ll beat her one day, maybe even tomorrow).
your medal slaps against your rib cage as you hurry down the corridor. you’re slinking against walls trying to find a quiet place to catch your breath when you round a corner and nearly bump into someone.
“sorry -” you start, looking up.
sanghyuk.
he’s in his training clothes but his medal is still strung around his neck. you can see your own dumbfounded expression reflected in the gold and you quickly tear your eyes away.
“congratulations,” sanghyuk rushes out before you can say anything or run away.
“yeah, um. you too,” you try your best to squeeze past him, “excuse me.”
“wait,” he says, catching your arm, “are you mad at me?”
you tear yourself out of his grip, eyes staring at the floor, “that’s none of your business.”
“then why -”
“don’t” you say, your vowels wobbling, “just don’t.”
you run away as fast as your feet can take you.
you can feel his gaze still following you as you round the corner, gripping the ribbon of your medal in your hand so tightly it cuts into your palm with a slight sting.
minyoungkim celebrating my skaters 💝 thank you! you’ve made me proud.
you scoff at coach kim’s story, her arms around a younger you as she tags your instagram, in the corner is sanghyuk, deliberately cropped out of the photo but just enough to tick people off on who the third person in the image is. you quickly repost the story onto your instagram out of obligation before shutting off your phone, crawling out from under the blanket to charge your phone on the bedside table.
the silver medal stares at you as it lays helplessly on the table.
you stretch and stare up at the ceiling of the hotel, watching the ceiling fan make its rounds slowly. you think about the way sanghyuk’s voice cracked when he asked are you mad at me?, like he already knew the answer. you see his face when you close your eyes and he’s in the shapes of the fan’s blades.
you weren’t mad at him, and somehow that’s the worst part. it would be easier if you were.
you turn on your side and bury your face into the pillow.
tomorrow is the free skate, you tell yourself, go to bed.
you probably stayed up for two more hours, rolling sanghyuk’s words around your brain like a candy that would melt, before exhaustion finally claimed you.
january, day two of nationals.
the pre-practice briefing is awkward.
coach kim has a whiteboard and is armed with a laser pointer. she also has the energy of someone who also did not get much sleep, only for completely different reasons.
you’re staring at your reflection in your room temperature coffee as coach kim continues to speak, gesturing like she’s about to conduct a military ambush, “[y/n], the judges gave your fairly good components score yesterday. we need to work on the axis when going into our axel. the spin level, i’m sure, was just a fluke. i expect all level 4s today, understood?”
you nod wordlessly and coach kim continues to ramble on. wonyoung catches your eye from across the table and shakes her head. she’s crazy, you see her mouth, and all you can give her is a non-committal smile.
your phone buzzes and you look down as the screen lights up on your lap.
unknown: good luck today. congrats on silver yesterday.
unknown: i got a new number bc you blocked me. pls don’t block me here :(
you know who it is, even without a name or a profile picture.
you turn your phone over, face down in your lap as you down the rest of your coffee and try to focus on coach kim’s barked instructions.
competition first. boys from your past later.
you go clean. you land your triple-triple combination you’ve been working on since last season cleanly for the first time in a while. your spins all score a level 4, as instructed, and you go away with a new season’s best and a bronze medal overall for your efforts.
coach kim nods like it’s expected - all according to plan, all according to what she has laid out for you. you can only clutch onto your bronze medal like it’s a lifeline and steal glances at the spectator stands, where sanghyuk inches closer and closer to subin and the rest of your teammates, desperately trying to catch your attention. you see his hand rise up when you wave in his direction, falling back down when subin yells out your name and gives you an enthusiastic wave back, a look of disappointment flashing across his face before he quickly looks away.
you don’t think about it too hard.
the closing banquet is always awkward - a show for the cameras and journalists as skaters quietly file into the hall in their best formal wear.
your medals hang heavy around your neck as you continue to poke at your food halfheartedly. subin and the rest of the juniors are off dancing in the corner, feeling the music playing through the speakers that is far too upbeat for how tired you feel. wonyoung nudges you under the table with her knee.
“don’t look now. but to your three o’clock,” she warns, which, of course, immediately makes you look.
sanghyuk is sat at one of the tables across the banquet hall, sitting with the rest of coach lee’s team and talking to one of his new teammates. he smiles at one of the girls in his camp and you catch yourself frowning when she giggles in return. the horror of the realisation settles in is enough for you to turn your head back around and glare down at your plate with contempt at yourself (mostly).
“he keeps looking over here,” wonyoung whispers conspiratorially after her theatrical sigh and i told you not to look!
“so what?” you answer, with more bitterness in your voice than you wanted, “he’s no longer of concern to me.”
“oh, come on,” wonyoung grabs your hand, “you’ve known him since forever! surely you must feel some way.”
“just eat your food,” you grumble, stabbing your fish. your phone buzzes in your lap and you think about the text that’s been sitting in your messages since this morning.
you try to recall what coach kim said this morning. about fixing the axel and selling your program more. about getting the right levels on your spins and the momentum you should carry into four continents. about her whiteboard and a whole flowchart of your next career steps laid out after careful consideration. you think about good, stable, and reliable things instead of fickle and unsubstantial ones.
your phone buzzes again, and against your better judgement, you look.
unknown: congrats on the bronze
unknown: and going to 4cc!!
you watch as the three dots appear and disappear, blinking away for a few seconds before appearing again.
unknown: yeah! congrats!!!
when you sneak a look over at sanghyuk’s table, he’s no longer chatting with his teammates or looking at you, instead just staring at his new phone, his thumbs hesitating over his keyboard.
he looks up in your direction, and you whip your head back and grab your glass of fruit punch, sipping it and staring at the spinning centrepiece vase of flowers until your heart stops drumming in your ears.
“you okay?” wonyoung asks in between delicate bites of broccoli.
“fine,” you grit your teeth, “i’m fine.”
the banquet hall is basically empty.
you stumble out of the hall, your medal ribbons all tangled up and your hair falling out of the elaborate hairstyle wonyoung put it in before. your drink that smells suspiciously like fruit punch and vodka is threatening to spill all over your only nice dress and you can barely tell left from right.
"this is harder than skating,” you hiss to yourself, stumbling around in your high heels and nearly slamming into a pillar that seems to have spawned out of nowhere in your drunken state.
"... minyoung, you can’t let it continue on like this.”
you stop short around a corner, before you can even acknowledge the conversation you definitely weren’t supposed to hear. you press yourself into a nook in the wall and listen anyway - because your room was down this way and you weren’t going to figure out a way around it while the world continues to spin upside down.
“i can do what i want, taeyeon,” coach kim’s voice is short, clipped, and simmering with anger.
"using your skaters as pawns? just chess pieces in your vindictive streak against me?”
"i’m coaching them, taeyeon. not that you would know.”
"coach? you’re torturing them, minyoung.”
"torture? i -”
"i’ve seen sanghyuk look at one of your skaters - [y/n], was it? she pays him no mind and i can’t help but think it's due to your machinations.”
"[y/n] is a grown woman. she does what she wants, and maybe she just doesn’t want to associate with a traitor.”
"that’s the word - traitor. that’s what you called me back then, too.”
the silence is so deafening and long you nearly peer around the corner to see if somehow they have evaporated into thin air.
“because that’s what you are!” coach kim’s verbal explosion thankfully stops you before you do, her voice raised to volumes you’ve never heard before.
“that’s because… you left me,” you can hear her struggling to lower her voice, pressing down til her voice is flat.
“i did what was best for me,” coach lee says, almost like a parent placating a child, “and that’s what sanghyuk did, too. you can’t fault the kid for that.”
coach kim is silent, and you can hear coach lee sigh.
“don’t let the children end up like us, minyoung. arguing in the corridors of a hotel, hating each other for nothing in particular. they’re better than us - we need to let them be better than us.”
coach kim doesn’t respond, and the air is thick enough to choke someone. the air conditioning hums in the silence and you feel the ribbons of your medal stick to the back of your neck, it’s fringes prickling against your skin.
you finally hear coach lee’s footsteps walk away, down the corridor. a few breaths later, coach kim’s own hurried footsteps, her high heels clicking against the marble of the floor.
you don’t move, stuck to the wall like fly on honey.
“[y/n]?”
you turn around far too fast and have to catch yourself on the wall, stumbling in your dizziness. sanghyuk is standing there in his fancy grey sweater, neck decidedly empty of his medals, holding two glasses of water with a raised eyebrow.
“i was looking for you,” he says matter-of-factedly, brow furrowing as he takes you in - heels in one drink, drink sloshing dangerously in the other, hair looking like a bird’s nest, “you disappeared.”
“no, i didn’t,” you frown, gesturing to yourself, the floor still swaying under your feet, “i’m right here.”
sanghyuk crosses over in two quick strides, taking your suspicious fruit punch concoction and swiftly replacing it with one of his glasses of water. you make a noise of protest but he gives you a look that makes you look down and sip quietly on the water instead.
“how much did you have?” he says, sniffing your cup before making a face of obvious disgust.
“not that much.”
“[y/n]…”
“wonyoung kept refilling my glass when i wasn’t looking,” you grumble.
sanghyuk lets out a breath that sounds like it might be a laugh, tickling the hair that falls around your neck. he reaches out to take the empty glass back from you, and he’s close enough you can smell his cologne - it’s the same peachy scent that filled your summers at the skating rink - the memory makes you tip your head back against the wall to look at him properly.
sanghyuk is good-looking, you think distantly. you’ve always known that in the same way you know facts about the world - the sky is blue, the ice is cold, flips are the bane of your existence, and sanghyuk has good bone structure.
you’re drunk, you think to yourself immediately after, you’re being delusional.
“you’ve been avoiding me all weekend,” sanghyuk says quietly, cutting through your internal whirlwind, a frown playing on his lips.
“i wasn’t -” you hiccup in the middle of your sentence, “wasn’t avoiding you.”
“at dinner,” he fills in your silence, “you kept looking at me and then looking away when i noticed.”
you purse your lips.
“caught me there.”
sanghyuk shifts, “so? what is it? do you not like me?”
“me?” you stop, pressing the back of your head against the cold of the marble wall in a bid to quell your headache, “he’s not - i don’t - coach kim told me not to.”
“i guessed,” sanghyuk says simply, running his thumb up and down the empty glass in his hand.
then quieter: “is that the only reason?”
you stare at him, the corridor comes to an abrupt halt. a muscle in his throat moves and he squints at you, like he’s trying to stare into your soul for an answer.
“forget it,” he eventually says, shoulders sagging, “you’re drunk. i - i shouldn’t have.”
“no,” the words bubble out of you before you can stop it, “not really.”
sanghyuk scoffs, but it’s non-committal when he looks at you - really looks at you. there’s a look in his eyes that makes it seem like he’s been carrying something but doesn’t want to anymore.
he peers at you hopefully.
“really?” he says, his voice soft enough that you ruminate on the question.
“yeah,” you put a hand over your heart, “and it’s not because i’m drunk right now. i swear.”
there’s a smile tugging on sanghyuk’s lips.
“i’ve liked you - since the first time we met,” he says, voice low and you gesture for him to speak louder, which he laughs at, “since the first time i saw you. you came off the ice at some b comp, and you were so mad at your scores. you said something to coach kim that sounded like you’ve already decided you were just going to be better than everyone who’s ever doubted you. and i just… that was it for me. i don’t know what else to tell you.”
you open your mouth, nothing comes out.
sanghyuk nods like you’ve said something anyways.
“you probably won’t remember this next morning anyways,” he says, more to himself than you.
he pushes the second cup of water into your hands, “you should drink more water,” he mumbles, gentle and resigned.
you don’t remember what happens next. just that you blinked and he was gone, a half empty cup of water in your hands and his footsteps echoing softly until you can’t hear it anymore.
you wake up the next day with a pounding headache, and an empty glass of water on your nightstand, with no explanation of how they got there. all you remember is the conversation you weren’t supposed to hear, and how unfortunate is that?
you're in line at the airport check-in when wonyoung taps you on the shoulder and squeezes into line next to you.
"sanghyuk’s staring again. bet he likes you or something," she whispers, and this time you look up, catching sanghyuk's glance from across the lobby.
his eyes widen instantly, and he quickly looks down, playing with the straps of his training bag with feigned interest as sungho continues to talk at him, pointing at the art pieces hanging from the airport ceiling.
when you turn back around, coach kim is staring at you instead, a raised eyebrow as she taps her foot against the marble floor.
"i wasn't -" you start.
"i don't care what you do in your personal life," coach kim interrupts, turning away pointedly, "just don't let it impact your performance."
"okay," you say slowly, "i won't."
the clerk calls for coach kim next and she steps up, placing her passport onto the table.
wonyoung nudges you, "what the hell happened to her?“
you try your best to give a nonchalant shrug, "maybe she remembered something.“
wonyoung shudders, "not used to her being nice. it’s weird."
its funny, you think to yourself, coach kim loosened the leash ever so slightly, and you’re already thinking about what to say to sanghyuk the next time you see him.
early february, one week before four continents.
you corner sanghyuk in the training room.
"hi?" he squeaks, face still flushed from his workout and bangs sticking against his forehead, "is this allowed?"
you look back outside the training room. the door is slightly ajar and coach kim is instructing wonyoung while coach lee paces on the opposite side of the rink. everyone else is trying to squeeze in more practice into the last few minutes of ice time before the rink closes. you look back at him and shut the door behind you with a slam.
“probably not,” you say back.
sanghyuk drops his towel over his shoulder, letting out a breath and glancing towards the door.
“is this a trap?” he jokes light-heartedly, “are you going to kidnap me back on coach kim’s orders?”
you cross your arms and frown, “i don’t like you that much, lee sanghyuk.”
“figured,” he mumbles, sitting down on the bench heavily, “so?”
the training room’s ventilation continues to hum loudly and music pours in from the outside, occasionally fading as the chords quiet down. you can still hear the sound of blades against ice and the heavy thump of the toe pick coming down. you watch as sanghyuk’s eyes briefly flicker towards the door and back to you as you step forward, towards him until your own knees hit the bench and you sit down heavily next to him.
“you blocked me,” he finally says, head drooping sadly beside you, “you even blocked me on spotify.”
“i had to cover all my bases,” you grumble, “wait - you were looking for me on spotify?”
sanghyuk looks away, “not important.”
“it was because of coach -”
“i know,” sanghyuk finally looks up at you, “i know.”
he stands up and brushes past you, “i’m… i’m just glad you didn’t block my new number.”
you blurt it out before you can regret it, “i heard something i shouldn’t have - after the banquet.”
sanghyuk pauses, his hand halfway to the door handle. there, he wavers. you watch the grip he has on the doorframe tighten and loosen as he grapples with staying behind or leaving before he hears something he shouldn’t have or doesn’t want to.
your hands tremble as they tense around the neck of your water bottle.
“you don’t have to stay,” you eventually say, “but i would like you to.”
sanghyuk chews on the inside of his mouth. he takes a step back into the room, his hand sliding off the doorframe.
“what did you hear?” he says, quietly with his back still turned. his head drops low, like he’s counting the flecks in the rubber flooring of the gym.
“i heard coach lee say something like… not to let this -” you gesture in between the two of you, “- end up like whatever happened between them.”
sanghyuk’s figure stiffens and then relaxes, like he’s releasing a sigh of relief. he finally turns around, dabbing at his forehead with the back of his hand as he sits down on one of the foam blocks near the door.
“i heard they used to be close,” he murmurs, casting a look at the door to make sure none of the juniors have decided to eavesdrop, “at least, that’s what i heard. i’m not sure.”
“coach said she taught her everything,” you cross your arms, “how to choreograph, her first job… and then apparently she just up and left one day.”
“that’s not fair to either of them,” sanghyuk says, with enough conviction it startles you slightly, “nobody except for themselves know why she left. coach kim probably doesn’t even know the whole truth - and that’s why she’s angry. it’s easier to be angry than to sit with the truth.”
you fidget in your sneakers.
“you’re talking about yourself, aren’t you?”
sanghyuk looks up sharply.
“everyone kept asking me why - if i regret it, if i feel guilty. it made me wonder - is wanting something for yourself is just a betrayal? am i just being selfish?”
“of course not,” you blurt, “you’re just doing what you need to do. you’re allowed to want things.”
sanghyuk’s eyes soften, “you know.”
you fiddle with your hands, “coach always said you were destined for bigger and better things.”
sanghyuk winces, “i remember.”
"i guess she just didn’t realise it would be like this.”
the rink continues to move outside the door - a muffled round of applause, a shrill shriek of someone who slipped on the ice.
“do you like it there?”
“it’s… fine,” his thumb traced over his knuckles, “the others are nice, the ice time is competitive, the music choices are… choicing.”
his eyes flicker back up to you, “sometimes i miss our group, and… i miss the people there, too.”
you can feel the unspoken words in between the lines, the ones that seem far too similar to that one conversation you remember hazily, and the ones that you never really noticed.
“we’re too junior-ish and immature,” you swallow harshly, “you’re better off with coach lee, with people like donghyun.”
“you sure?” sanghyuk smiles, “i think about it sometimes. whether i made the right decision, whether it was worth giving up what i had because i thought it would be easier.”
“you didn’t give up anything. it was all you - from the beginning. i knew it from the first time we met, since that time i got off the ice from the b comp and was rightly pissed about my scores.”
sanghyuk stiffens, “you remember what i said.”
“i do.”
“i shouldn’t have made the assumption you wouldn’t,” sanghyuk sighs, looking down at the floor again, “so? what do you think?”
“w - what do i think?” you stutter, suddenly caught off guard.
“yeah,” sanghyuk stands up slowly, like he doesn’t want to disturb the peace the two of you are momentarily in, “about what i said at the banquet.”
before you can even think about your answer, the training room doors creak open and subin’s head peers through the crack. her eyes go comically wide as they dart between the two of you.
“oooh,” she singsongs, the vowel drawn out far too long, “i’m so telling wonyoung.”
“subin!” you hiss, swiping at her even when you’re more than a meter away.
“your secret is safe with me,” subin slaps her hand over her heart before guestering behind her, “but coach is coming this way, so you better get an acceptable distance between the two of you before she flips out.”
sanghyuk sighs loudly and subin scrambles away, giggling as she does so.
“later,” he says, one foot out the door and his ears embarrassingly red.
you pick up his abandoned towel and throw it at him. he catches it in one hand, letting out a laugh of disbelief.
“later,” you say, the word hanging between the two of you like a promise.
you skate out of your y-spin with more finesse you’ve had combined over the past two days. your thighs are burning in that way that tells you you’ve done something right and you’re alight with the buzz of adrenaline. your nerves feel frayed and your arm trembles from the effort.
subin whistles from where she is from the boards, wiggling her eyebrows at you and winking exaggeratedly when you look over at her exasperatedly. wonyoung remains blissfully confused, her eyes shifting between the two of you as she glides over, water bottle in hand.
“what’s up with you guys?” she asks, the sound of your skates on ice drowning out subin’s obvious giggle behind her hand, “you two have been acting so weird for the past hour.”
“nothing’s up,” you emphasise, grabbing onto the boards as you glare at subin, “i don’t know why subin is making such a big deal out of nothing.”
“oh, something is definitely up,” subin singsongs.
“what? did you catch [y/n] and sanghyuk kissing in the training room or something?” wonyoung says absentmindedly, taking a sip from her bottle.
both you and subin fall suspiciously silent.
“wait, really?” wonyoung’s eyes widen as her hand comes up to cover her mouth.
“no!” you blubber, slamming your hands onto subin’s shoulder, “sanghyuk and i were just… talking!”
“is just talking code for something else?” wonyoung blinks innocently.
“sure you were - ‘just talking’ my ass,” subin snickers.
“subin, language!” you scold, your cheeks tingling with shame, “and we were really just talking!”
“you can tell me anything, you know?” wonyoung whispers from behind her palm, “my lips are sealed.”
“i’m telling you - there’s nothing going on!”
coach’s whistle breaks up the conversation, and wonyoung and subin exchange a look that leaves you huffing and embarrassed as the three of you skate over to where the rest of the group is reconvening.
someone hands you your skate guards. coach kim is yelling at everyone to get in a line, even though she really doesn’t have to because you do the same thing every friday session. subin and wonyoung jostle each other for the earlier place in the line while you hang back, letting the younger kids squeeze in ahead of you. coach is barking observations and comments at everyone as they exit the rink, a force of habit she can’t get rid of, or want to.
"keonho, have you thought about my suggestion to reconsider your music choice? ... no? you think its ‘badass’? ... well i don't think the judges will see it the same way. let's circle back on this tomorrow."
you wait your turn, at the end of the line as the rest of the skaters file into the changing room ahead of you with an eagerness that comes after a long skating session. coach kim pats subin on the back.
"subin! lovely work on that choreo sequence, keep it up, okay? we'll run through the step sequence tomorrow."
subin smiles brightly and coach moves on, grabbing onto wonyoung's shoulders and shaking her slightly.
"a little more oomph with the choreography, wonyoung. it's time to step it up! ... no, i don't care if you're tired. the music doesn't wait for anyone!"
wonyoung trudges off, mumbling about her sleep schedule as you approach coach kim.
"[y/n], you've worked hard today," she pats you on the arm, "i would appreciate a little more commitment to the jumps next time, alright? we’re going to land them, not maybe we’ll land them. understood?"
"yes, coach," your chirp dutifully as coach ticks something off her clipboard of observation and logs with finality.
"go get some rest," she says absentmindedly, thumbing through her pages, "i'll see you back here tomorrow."
"night," you roll your shoulders as the fatigue finally takes over, your body suddenly heavy and sore, and the cold from the rink bites into you even through your tights.
you're shoving your skates into your bag when your phone buzzes in your jacket pocket.
LSH: sooo about later
LSH: can later be now?
you catch yourself smiling at your phone before reality hits you like a cold splash to the face. you sit down on the bench and glance around - the changing room is relatively empty except for some of the younger kids lounging around, waiting for their parents to pick them up and chirping excitedly amongst themselves.
you: now?
you: in the rink?
LSH: no silly
LSH: let me take you out
you: you do know every restaurant in a 50 mile radius is occupied by someone from the rink right
LSH: i know a place…
you: fine
you: give me ten minutes
you poke your head out of the building, looking back and forth out the front door. the ground is covered in snow and footsteps from various boots and sneakers. the air is cold enough you can see your breath in front of you and the street lamp in the far off distance wavers as the harsh white lights of the rink continues to glare down on you.
“boo,” sanghyuk breathes into your ear, grabbing your wrist before you can jump up and slip on the snow-covered concrete - an indiscretion coach kim would’ve definitely executed you for.
“you scared me,” you hiss as the two of you scurry away from the door, shoulders brushing against each other - both deadly serious about not being caught within 10 meters of each other and your heads swivel like a ball on a stick to survey the area around you.
sanghyuk is bundled in his white puffer jacket, zipper zipped all the way to his chin as he rubs his glove-covered hands together. the tip of his nose is tinged red from the cold and he stuffs a hand warmer produced from his pockets into your bare hands.
“you look warm,” you mumble from behind your own jacket collar.
“i am,” sanghyuk says frankly, pulling out his phone from his jacket and taking his best stab at the screen with his gloved fingers.
“so, what’s this place you’re going to show me?” you shove your hands, hand warmer and all, into your pockets as you trudge behind him, leaving faint footsteps on the pavement with your boots.
“it’s a hole in the wall,” his footsteps slow down so you can catch up, “i used to go there everyday after practice - well, my mom would bring me there. she knows the owner, i think. it’s grandma’s friend? or a friend of a friend? anyways, donghyun said the food was too greasy, so you know no skater would be caught dead there. except for us, which means -”
sanghyuk looks back at you, blinks like he’s bewildered with the fact you’re still following him, and his neck flushes a light pink that you just about catch under the dim street lamps.
"mean what?” you laugh, "finish your sentence, sanghyuk.”
"nothing,” he mumbles, slapping a hand over the back of his neck as his pace quickens frantically.
sanghyuk hurried into an alleyway and didn’t look back for you, even when you wavered uncertainly at the alley entrance. not until he pulled a door that seemed like it was nearly falling off its hinges and beckoned you over did you scuttle down the alleyway.
the tteokbokki stall was awash in a warm golden light and the floor was appropriately tacky. steam heats up your face as sanghyuk pulled you down to a seat at the bar. he was right - there really wasn’t anyone you knew in the seats - just an elderly man reading a newspaper in the corner and teenage couple sat knee-to-knee near the door, whispering into each others ears.
the old woman behind the bar greets sanghyuk in a way that tells you they’re far too familiar with each other. she doesn’t say much, instead just plopping a steaming, heaping bowl of tteokbokki and a plate of fried mandu between the two of you before shuffling off towards the back, loudly announcing about how ‘sanghyuk-ie brought his girlfriend, dear!’.
“girlfriend?” you raise an eyebrow at sanghyuk, who is diligently unwrapping chopsticks with extreme care and deliberately avoiding your gaze.
“she says that about everyone i come here with,” sanghyuk mumbles, face red, “don’t read into it.”
“like donghyun?” you tease.
sanghyuk just pushes the bowl and chopsticks towards you, eyesight wandering elsewhere, “just eat.”
you pop a rice cake into your mouth and you understand immediately why donghyun would call it too greasy - it’s sweet and spicy and exactly the type of stuff you shouldn’t be eating a week out from competition. the mandu is probably the saltiest thing you’ve eaten this week, and god is it good.
“good?” sanghyuk asks, watching you with an intensity unfitting for… watching you eat.
“it’s fine,” you huff, even though you’re already reaching for another piece.
“liar,” he laughs, nudging you with his knee underneath the table.
he then proceeds to rest his chin on his palm, propped up on the table as he watches you eat out of the corner of his eye, his own chopsticks still wrapped in paper and untouched. you feel guilty enough that halfway through the bowl you push it back towards him and act uninterested enough for him to finally pick up his own pair of chopsticks, ripping apart the paper wrapping and digging into the tteokbokki.
for a while you sit there, awkwardly staring at the table until sanghyuk clears his throat.
“so,” he says, setting down his chopsticks, and turning to face you properly, “you didn’t give me an answer to my question in the training room.”
“i believe subin interrupted before i could,” you thrum your fingers against the lacquered wood counter.
“convenient,” sanghyuk flashes you an awkward smile. there’s no bite to his response, but rather a soft nervousness that makes it almost seem like he regrets asking in the first place, “so?”
you fiddle with a paper napkin, the corner already shredded from your earlier machinations as the same giddy nervousness from the hotel hallway overtakes you. in the background, an dilapidated tv drones on, replaying an old soap opera. the old lady behind the bar clashes with the exclamations from the characters by raising the volume on her radio, playing some old trot song you’ve probably heard before from your father’s collection. the bell above the door rings softly as the elderly man exits the store, and the soup behind the counter continues to bubble and boil.
“i spent the past weeks trying to block you on everything - messages, instagram, spotify - trying to avoid you in a stadium filled with hundreds of people,” you squeeze your eyes shut, “and none of it worked. you’re everywhere to me, even when i close my eyes, you’re right there.”
sanghyuk’s breath hitches - you catch it under all of the noise around you.
you open your eyes and force yourself to meet his eyes even as heat floods your face, “i didn’t want to say it because it felt like betraying coach kim. b - but yeah. not anymore.”
“not anymore?” sanghyuk prods.
you take a deep breath in, “i think i’m tired of coach trying to tell me who i can and can’t care about.”
a smile splits slowly across sanghyuk’s face, like a sun that peeks over the clouds. slowly, as if he’s afraid you’d bolt if he moved too quickly, he reaches out to cup his hand over yours on the table. his hands are colder than your own, and your heart drumming in your ears mirrors the rush of adrenaline you get when you nearly slam out of a jump on ice.
“for the record,” he says quietly, “i’m tired of that too.”
the old woman shuffles back, casts one look at your joined hands, and hums approvingly while refilling your cups. the two of you stare at her in embarrassing silence before she wanders away again, deliberately looking away as she whistles, all without a single word.
“so…” sanghyuk says, watching you cover his colder hands with your own. your warmth seeps into him, “what now?”
the ringing of your phone answers for you.
fs.session someone just spotted @ ynln and @ uriwoo_sh holding hands and eating out?? new couple alert??
“i promise i didn’t say anything,” subin whispers when you brush past her in the morning, your face set in a permanent frown.
“it’s fine,” you set down your equipment with a little more force than usual.
“i - i really didn’t!” subin pleads as she wrings her hands in worry.
“it’s alright, subin. i know,” you take a deep breath in, “you’re not in trouble.”
“i’m sorry,” she whispers.
“it’s gonna happen eventually,” you paused, “i just didn’t expect it to be literally right after.”
“[y/n] [l/n]!” coach kim shrieked from outside the locker room, “office! now!”
you sighed, “if i don’t come out alive, you know where i hid the money.”
subin nods solemnly.
when you enter coach kim’s room, she’s already pacing behind her desk.
“sit down,” she snaps.
she glares at you when you don’t, electing to just stand by the door.
“do you understand what you did wrong?” she waves a finger at you, “[y/n], you are my oldest student. of all people, i didn’t expect for you to do this to me.”
“i didn’t do anything to you,” you say lowly.
“what was that?”
“i said - i didn’t do anything to you!”
horror flashes across her face as you barrel on, “you’re the one who did this to yourself!”
“h - how dare you -!”
“i spent weeks tiptoeing around sanghyuk - pretending i hated him, because you said so. and then before that - jumping, competing, living - just because you said so! i did everything you asked me to - and more! just because you were my coach and i - i trusted you knew what was best for me!”
“that’s not -”
“why do you not want me to see him?” you stomp your feet in frustration, “so that you can feel like you’re winning over coach lee some way? that you finally have some sort of leverage on her? i’m just some sort of statement - pawn - in your game, aren’t i? but i’m not! i’m no longer a part of whatever shit you two have going on! i don’t want to be part of your feud - situationship!”
“[y/n], you’re not listening -” coach kim splutters.
“ten years,” you cut her off, “ten years you gave to sanghyuk. i get it, i really do. seeing him just walk away like that? it must hurt. i’ve always done what you told me to do - because i thought you knew better. but i’m not going to let you - let you just control me like this anymore!”
tears spring to your eyes as the room goes quiet - the humming of the air vents continues, the zamboni continues to truck along the ice, someone is blowing obnoxiously on a whistle. the world continues to spin as you and coach slow into a standstill.
“i do know better,” coach kim said quietly, her voice smaller than you have ever heard it, “i did thirty years of this. i know what it takes to be the best, [y/n]. what it takes to succeed.”
she thunders on, "you think this is all about me and taeyeon - and fine! i admit it! i am a revengeful, petty person! but do you know what happens to skaters who get distracted? they let someone else become the reason for their falls and pops and low scores. i’ve seen it happen. you’ve seen it happen - remember dongmin’s little girlfriend? she got distracted and now what? he’s dancing with another girl and all she can do is watch. i’m telling you, [y/n]. i do know better - i at least know better than you.”
she sits down heavily, breathing hard like her speech took the wind out of her.
“maybe,” you say quietly, “but you don’t get to decide who i love while you’re at it.”
the words land heavier than you meant it, and it feels daunting to say things you’ve never even admitted out loud to yourself before.
"why?” she whispers, "why do you have to make everything so hard? why am i the only one with a brain around here?!”
"you might have a brain, but you also have a heart. we all do.”
coach kim stares at you, her face contorts - into fury - then mellows out into something like grief. she slumps into her chair, like all of the fight was suddenly yanked out of her.
“does he really make you happy?” she asks, voice barely a whisper.
“yes.”
coach kim grows quiet, looking at her hands as she turns them over, back and forth, like she’s debating with herself what to say.
“are you going to leave me too?” she finally looks up.
you ball your fist.
“if i have to,” you eventually say, “if you don’t agree, t - then i don’t see how this can work out anymore…”
coach kim flinches like you slapped her across the face.
“i don’t want you to leave,” her voice cracks, “you’re my first skater - the one i truly made my own. before subin, before wonyoung, before even sanghyuk. you’re my skater.”
“i get it,” your voice wavers and you hate how you sound like that seven year old kid who wandered into the rink for the first time, “it’s hard.”
“i’m not -” she stops, swallowing harshly before speaking again, “i’m not good at this - goodbyes - letting go.”
“i know,” you say sharply, "i’m not saying it has to be now. i’m just saying you have to stop letting me and sanghyuk be part of your feud with coach lee.”
coach kim is silent - long enough for you to start planning your post-competitive career because you’re certain she’s already drafting your notice of dismissal letter in her head.
she steeples her fingers and places her elbows on the table, like she’s trying to hide her face.
"taeyeon and i’s… unique situation - cannot be resolved in just one talk in an office. but if lee sanghyuk truly makes you happy… and you truly feel that way… then i suppose i can’t do anything to dissuade you.”
you hold your tongue, in case a tremor or breath betrays you.
"i still remember when the both of you were still training doubles. the two of you would rather giggle and hold hands at the edge of the rink and i’d have to yell at you two to get to work,” she says quietly, more to herself than you, "where did they go? now look at you - telling off your coach in her own office.”
coach looks up at you.
"sanghyuk -” she stops, ruminating over her next words as her jaw works, "- tell him to lace his skates tighter. he keeps looking like he’s going to fall out of them.”
you nod slowly.
"go,” coach kim mumbles, shooing you away, "i better see a clear entry edge on your lutz tonight during the runthrough. and if i ever catch you slacking because you stayed up all night giggling while texting him, lee sanghyuk is toast. understand?”
"yes, ma’am,” you try to stop your voice from trembling.
coach kim massages her head, "taeyeon was… right. i shouldn’t let you kids pay for what she - we - did…”
she glares up at you, "why are you still standing there? i told you to go!”
you scramble out of her office before she can change her mind, nearly bumping into subin and wonyoung who both tried to pretend they didn’t have their ears pressed to the door.
"are you okay?” subin buzzes with worry, "d - do we have to say goodbye?”
you smile softly, "no - it’s fine.”
"are you sure?” subin frets, "this isn’t one of coach kim’s sick form of revenge, right?”
you pause, "at least for now - sanghyuk and i are okay.”
you pat subin on the head, driving your knuckles into her hair.
wonyoung makes a face, "sanghyuk and i,” she parrots.
subin grins, finally letting herself relax as she wraps her arms around you two, "you two are gross.”
your phone buzzes in your pocket, you don’t even have to check to see who it is.
LSH: are we still on for tonight?
you: only if you ask me nicely (but yes)
LSH: y/n l/n, will you go on a date with me? :)
but no promises ;)
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