Damn these anonymous haters to hell for sending hate towards the writers here in Enhablr. I swear to God, if these writers lose their passion, enthusiasm, and creative freedom here, I will hunt you all down.
To the wonderful writers here in Enhablr, I genuinely love you all. Reading your works saves me in a way, I hope that none of you guys will stop writing for Enhablr because of those stupid haters but if you do, I can only understand and sympathize. You guys are wonderful souls, I wish that every one of you would have their hearts' desires come true. I may not always leave comments of appreciation under your blogs (I only reblog and click the heart for them) but I want you all to know that there are people out here who are just like me who enjoy reading your works and silently supporting you all. You made Enhablr truly fantastic, and all of you are amazing. I love you all, my fellow Engenes. ❤️
𝟭𝟱𝟯𝟵. εїз ─── stalker hoon. voyeurism. hoon and reader are both pervs. exhibitionism. dirty talking. big dick hoon. petnames used, princess & baby girl. french kiss. missionary. unprotected sex. fingering. oral Ꮗ 𝑀. underwear fetishism. squirting. breeding kink. ꒰ reblog for a smooch. 𑁤
you are new to the neighborhood and you felt like someone’s been watching your every move. however, you brushed it off like you always do as you carry your stuff inside the apartment. after you finished, there was a guy wearing shades in black and you noticed he’s living beside yours.
a hot neighbor.
you mentally slap yourself from thinking inappropriately to someone you never even talk to. then, he stopped in front of his front door and looking at his right side where he saw you were staring at him openly, without care of being judge.
he clicked his tongue, clearly amused.
what he did after, he waved his hand at you with a smirk tugging at his luscious lips and later, he entered his apartment. your eyes widened, flustered from the act.
“cute.”
it was shameless of you to gawk at someone you find attractive, after that embarrassing interaction you’ve had with the guy—you tried your best to ignore him when he called out for you. he was having fun teasing you, yet he was getting impatient as he wants to know more about his pretty neighbor.
sunghoon never stop his plans.
the first thing he do every morning before he go to his work place is to stop by at your apartment and bring you breakfast with a letter “morning pretty, i made you breakfast so don’t starve yourself. :)”
he also buy flowers for you, lilies, your favorite.
you never find it disturbing.
rather, it made your heart flutter. the flowers he gave you, you will put them in the vase. you always made sure to take care of them just like how he tells you to do.
whether he is doing this as a friend, you couldn’t care less as long as you’re happy at the moment. with him.
however, the most unexpected and shocking truth you witnessed from sunghoon was he’s jerking off while his curtains are wide open where anyone could watch shamelessly.
he’s like those men in porn.
you wonder who was he thinking about while touching himself. you felt jealous from that person. you wished it was you.
“what the fuck is wrong with me?” you mentally hit yourself, still watching him there—breathless and hands still playing with his cock.
he has a horse cock and prominent veins.
on top of that, the tip is reddish, swollen and leaking with too much pre-cum.
you instinctively pressed your thighs together, to ease the discomfort. your gaze met his, staring right at your flabbergasted ones.
he caught you.
your hands were quick to close the blinds, as your back slides against the wall, ashamed. will he confront me? is he going to report me? shit.
a yelped escaped your mouth, as your phone on the side table is ringing continuously. you saw his name, park sunghoon. your neighbor who caught you shamelessly watching him jerked off. fuck, i’m dead.
a bunch of messages from him.
park (hot neighbor) :
join me? or are you just going to watch me jerk off while thinking about your pretty mouth sucking me off?
your pussy throbs at that. so without hesitation, you rushed towards his place, knocking aggressively. when he opens the door, his annoying grin appeared.
“impatient, aren’t we? come in, princess.”
once you’re inside, a click came from behind, as he pushed you against the wall—kissing you with need, it’s one of his desire to have his mouth on you.
you moaned, trying to pull away from the intense and passionate kiss. “wait…”
you’re out of breath.
“why? didn’t expect me to be a good kisser, or—“ sunghoons’ hand slides lower, until he cupped your wetness through your lil shorts. “oh…? you’re soaked through, princess. so adorable.”
he chuckled, hands still settled between your thighs. he couldn’t wait any longer, sunghoon told you to jump and carried you in the living room, where he throw your body on the sofa.
you pulled his face, wanting to taste him better this time. there’s a hint of mint and strawberry flavor as you sucked on his tongue. he groaned at that, his hand pulled your legs apart as he kept on grinding his boner. you feel turned on, your cunt releases with more slick.
“fuck, tell me to stop right now, princess.” his voice muffled, while his mouth is attacking your neck with hickeys.
you shook your head, no. “i don’t want you to stop, please.”
so he didn’t stop.
sunghoon tugged your shorts lower, followed by your soaked undies that he instantly crumpled and slipped it into his pocket. you saw it, but didn’t say anything.
he slapped his cock on your wet folds, making squelching sounds. your cunt kept fluttering from the teasing. you just wanted for him to slip it in already and ruin you.
“look at your cunny, princess. it’s pulsating, you love being toyed like this, hm? you want my cock so bad, yeah? come on, tell hoonie.” he taunted.
you whimpered, frustrated.
“i want it so bad, hoonie. i want your big cock to destroy my pussy, god, please—“
the sudden stretch made you cry, scratching his back at the same time. sunghoon hissed, not because of the nails digging on his back, but because of your walls squeezing him in.
“this is what you wanted, right?”
you only nod your head, as the pain subsided. you look broken already and he hasn’t started yet.
“shit—you’re tight as fuck, princess.”
then, he lifted your other leg, pressing it up against your chest. his cock is so deep in your stomach and sunghoon saw how his length bulges through your belly.
he bit his lip, he wants to hold back all his strength not to drive his cock into you.
“fuck me already, hoonie…”
“please…? pleasepleaseplease.”
your whines gave him an adrenaline rush, and he felt his cock throbbing inside you—he didn’t even expect it could be worser than that.
“oh… i definitely will.”
he pulled out his shaft, before slamming it all the way deeper in your cervix. you gasped loudly, as his tip persistently hits the right spot. “right there—nghh—“
sunghoon grunted with a grin carved into his mouth. “right here…?” he asked, as he switched his angle which made your eyes rolled back, vision blurry. he also flattened his hand on your crotch, fingers working on your neglected clit—rolling, rubbing and pinching it.
your legs are shaking uncontrollably.
“i’m gonna come—hoonie—yesyesyes!” you frantically chanted, desperate to come on his cock. “yeah? come on my cock, princess. make it rain.” as he said that, you squirted—some of your liquids spattered on his face. he even tried to catch a drop by sticking out his tongue like a madman.
after getting a taste, his thrust became more feral. the only thing that’s been running through his head: breed her, breed her. fuck, he’d do it over and over until you’re swollen and carrying his babies.
“mhm—i’m coming,” he buried his face on to your neck, and he made sure to pushed his cock deeper into you. plap. plap. plaaap. he let out a deep groan, still bottoming out when he felt his cock getting bigger. a spurt of cum came out of the tip, before pulling out of you. “take it, princess. shit—jesus fuck—s’good.”
you slowly sat up on the couch, grabbing his cock on both of your hands, leaning in so you could lick the head. you moaned at the taste, before you took the entire thing on your mouth—tongue gliding on the base and you made sure to play with his balls. sunghoon placed a hand on the back of your head, pulling you closer to his length and gradually thrusts in your warm cavern.
“you’re doing good, princess.” he praised.
he tipped his head back, groaning. he’s about to come again. so you didn’t halt your movements by sucking harshly on his shaft. you got wet from sucking him off, and he noticed. sunghoon chuckled, leaning over to slide three digits on your needy cunt. ramming it relentlessly to help you come with him at the same time.
“swallow every drop, baby girl.” sunghoon grab your cheeks, tilting your head and watching your throat moves. “good girl.” when you came on his fingers, he stared straight into your eyes before sucking the three digits that was in your hole a while ago. “deliciosa.” your face heats up, embarrassed.
as the night ended, you still have no idea that park sunghoon was the one who has been watching your every move. he made sure that no one will know his dirty little secret—the stolen pictures of you while you’re cleaning your apartment, doing your laundry while wearing your little shorts that he almost could see your fat swollen lips peeking out when you bent down. and lastly, whenever you take a peek at your window to see if your neighbor is there, without knowing he has always been there—hiding and watching you.
they say sharing secrets keeps friends close, but you and jake would beg to differ. it’s because you have secrets, or... one big secret anyway, that you’ve stayed so close. closed mouths don’t get fed though, do they?
pairing ✩ jake sim x fem!reader
genres: summer au, friends to lovers, angst, fluff, smut, idiot in love | warnings: minors dni, #ControlFreakGirlSummer, only one bed but they know, down bad af jakeyn, they're kinda weird tbh, yn is soooo effing scared, jake is lowkey the only person in yn's world, so much kissing, author loves jake so jake mustn't suffer (too much) | word count: 32,154
playlist: same la by tiffany day ✩ tongue tied by grouplove ✩ the moment by tame impala ✩ champagne coast by blood orange ✩ ribs by lorde ✩ the bridge by kelala ft. pinkpantheress ✩ crush by solange ✩ 23:42 by rachel chinouriri ✩ lost island by enhypen ✩ tonight by girlsweetvoiced
from zo: haiiiii everyone hehe back sooner than i thought... thank u @asahicore for beta-reading as always love u so much and im literally the happiest girl on earth bc i get to see u so soon and for so long !!! uhm... for everyone else i hope u have fun w my silly summer couple and let me know what u think no matter what! (also can u believe i started writing this thinking there'd be no angst lmao) :D
There are any number of things to love about summer, but for you, the drive to Minjeong's beach house will always snag a spot in the top three. Of that, you are certain. Mainly it's because it's the only time of year none of your friends volunteer you to drive them somewhere.
Admittedly, without riding shotgun in Jake's car, the drive up isn't quite the same.
Nothing about this summer feels the same. After handing in your final assignment, last month you crossed the stage to receive your diploma, with all of your friends and family cheering competitively in the audience. In two months, you will start your first ever adult job, kissing your girlhood goodbye. In two days, you will turn twenty-two, and for the first time since you met, you won't be spending your birthday with Jake.
But of course, riding with the girls is fun too.
Your focus can be a bit singular when Jake is around, so it's nice catching up properly. Together, you yell along to PinkPantheress with all the windows down, while Minjeong keeps her eyes on the road ahead. Slower songs in the group playlist give you chances to debrief, and laugh to the point of tears remembering some of the shit Aeri puts up with from some of the world's most questionable men.
jaeyunie: How's the drive?
you: it's really good actually i'm having a lot of fun rn, you're genuinely so jealous of all the fun i'm having i can't even talk rn i'm just so busy having fun without you.
jaeyunie: Wrong. You're so wrong I'm actually laughing at you, Yongie.
jaeyunie: I'm jealous of Minjeong getting to drive you around :(
Jake is always… saying things. Things that give you butterflies, and then give your butterflies butterflies too.
you: that could've been you.
jaeyunie: I KNOWWW I KNOW IT COULD HAVE I PROMISE YOU I KNOW
jaeyunie: Quit making me feel bad at work.
you: soz.
jaeyunie: Found out why Jaehyun and Yunjin broke up btw, more of an in person story though so remind me when I see you
you: YAYYYYYY can't believe they even dated genuinely how do they know each other.
jaeyunie: Discord !!!
you: i have more questions
“What you have, YN, is five seconds to put that phone down before I throw it out the window,” Yizhuo says, leaning over the centre console to scowl at you. “And if I hear a word about Jake Sim at any point in the next two hours, I'll throw you out the car too.
“I'm allowed to text my best friend,” you mumble, but you put your phone down anyway, tucking it under your thigh.
At the exact same time, in the exact same tone, all four girls say, “Ouch.”
“Best friend…“ Minjeong trails off, running a hand through her silky blonde hair. “I think you might have it worse than Aeri did with Jungwoo.”
Jungwoo was Aeri's ancient ex-boyfriend who used to smack himself on the head and call himself stupid whenever he made a mistake. Maybe if the thought wasn't so funny, you might have taken offence, might have stepped up to your or Jake's defence. In unison, Jimin and Yizhuo smack their foreheads and say, “Stupid, stupid Jungwoo.”
While you and Minjeong erupt into a fit of cackles, Aeri groans, slumping in her seat. “Don't remind me.”
“Wasn't he, like, forty or something?” you ask.
“He was thirty,” she corrects, defensive. “And that was two years ago, guys. I've done better.”
“I'd consider any guy who doesn't send shirtless selfies with the message, aren't I a big strong boy, to be better,” Jimin points out. “Even Donghyuck was better, at least he didn't send you any messages.”
“Jesus, I get it.” Aeri groans. “Can we go back to bullying YN for her made up problems?”
For a moment, no one says anything, and eyes dart around the car while trees and stretches of motorway blur by through the window. This thing with Jake — your friendship — has become a source of mild irritation with the girls, a bit of a touchy subject. Something you complain often about though make no effort to change. Attempt to change. Relationships, of all kinds, take two unfortunately, no matter how desperately you wish you could take control of Jake's brain and rewire him to like you back. For fear, perhaps, that Aeri's comment might have hurt you, it seems the silence is yours to break.
“You're on your own, Aeri. Yizhuo said we're not allowed to talk about him,” you say, turning the radio up so loud that SZA's new single makes the speakers rattle.
“No, she said you can't talk about him.” Minjeong turns the volume right back down.
“Yizhuo?” you ask, desperate for her to agree with you.
“I'll allow it.”
“You like him, he likes you—your problems only exist in your weird, YN brain,” Jimin says, speaking for Minjeong. And apparently for Aeri and Yizhuo too if their disjointed chorus of, exactly, is anything to go by.
There's no restraining the pit in your stomach. You've seen Jake like someone before, seen it a million times. How he turns to mush when a pretty girl so much as smiles at him, goes out of his way to be wherever she is. You know they're wrong, and that only makes your stomach feel worse.
Jake tells you absolutely everything, whether it concerns you or not, anything he finds out is something you're going to find out as well. The guy's an open book, with you at least, and can't lie to save his life—by omission or otherwise. If he fancied you, you would know. In fact, he would have told you as soon as it occurred to him, blurted it out.
“Only one of those things is true and I don't want to talk about it,” you say, unlocking your phone to text him again.
At your request, they drop the subject. Minjeong goes on a rant about how the dress she ordered for graduation arrived yesterday, one whole month after the ceremony.
you: are you really not coming at all……..
you: you used to be so fun dude i miss you
“YN!” Yizhuo yells, reaching for your phone.
“Done! I'm turning it off, see?” It does not help that you have a picture of Jake as your lock screen, which shows as you hold the power button. For the sake of your phone, and your life, you make a show of opening your bag and shoving it to the bottom before pulling the zipper shut. “Happy?”
In the rear view mirror, Yizhuo grins, leaning back and closing her eyes. “Very.”
At the rest stop, all of you get out to stretch your legs and pee, grabbing enough snacks to feed a small country before piling back into the car where Jimin takes over for the rest of the drive. You fall asleep as soon as you rest your head on the window, bass buzzing against your skull as your eyelids get heavier and heavier.
It's only one long blink until Jimin parks in the driveway.
The Kim family holiday home is a sight to behold. A sprawling wood-clad fortress by the beach that has seen you at your best and your absolute worst. You and your friends have spent summer after summer visiting this large slice of heaven on earth, hoping its original pine floors and floor-to-ceiling kitchen windows will keep all of your secrets. So much has happened here, changed here, it's hard to believe you only stay for one week at a time. That so many of your life's keystone moments could be boiled down to twenty-eight sweaty days over the last four years.
On the couch in the den, Aeri gave you first and only tattoo, a shaky five-pointed star right between your shoulder blades that your mother still hasn't seen even after three years. That was the summer before you and Jake spent two rounds of sardines hidden in the wine cellar. Pressed chest to chest between cool rows of sauvignon blanc, it's the closest to kissing you two have ever gotten, and you're certain if his phone hadn't started ringing, your lips would have bridged the centimetres-wide gap. And maybe then, you would have had something to talk about before bed beyond, that was… and, yeah, it was.
When you get to your room at the very end of the hall, you dump your bag by the door and throw yourself onto the bed, spreading out like a starfish. It feels huge without Jake here to share it. Whether or not there's any real need for you to share a room on this trip is up for debate, but for as long as Jake doesn't make a complaint, you won't either. That first summer, you won rock, paper, scissors and got first pick of a room all to yourself, Jake lost and got stuck sharing with Jay. Before bed that night, he came to check on you and fell asleep at your side. It happened the next night too and by night three, with your heart pounding against your ribs, you suggested you might as well share the room. He agreed.
On the pillow by your head, your phone vibrates. It's him.
jaeyunie: I have a job, dude. You gotta try it !!!
jaeyunie: I miss you more though :(
you: i have a job too you know. i work at the very beautiful woman factory
jaeyunie: Ohhh I get it now…that explains a lot
jaeyunie: You're employee of the month then, yeah?
The great big grin stretching your mouth is humiliating, even in a room by yourself.
you: i've heard this before jaeyun thank you
you: wyd
He replies with a selfie, he's lying in bed frowning, the sweetest thing you've ever seen. On the wall behind him, you see his steadily growing collection of Polaroids. You're in almost all of them.
jaeyunie: Tired af rn I'm gonna slump very soon wbu send a piccc
jaeyunie: Texting w one eye open wanna see you before the end
you: and you look very cute doing it
At his request, you take a selfie right where you are — after tilting your head a little to show your bare neck and tugging the neckline of your tank top down just enough to show the top of your lacy bra and adjusting your boobs in said lacy bra to make them look a bit bigger — sending it without thinking too hard about it.
you: our bed feels so empty bruh what are you doinggggggg
Jake types and deletes for a while before his message finally comes through.
jaeyunie: Noooo darling I'm sorryyyyyyy
jaeyunie: My pretty Yongie holy shit look at you
jaeyunie: Yk if I could be there I would bruh. I'm requesting PTO for next summer as we speak
jaeyunie: Fuck I really miss you :(
The squeal that comes out of you is wretched. Worse than the grinning from earlier, the grinning you haven't quite stopped doing as you writhe around on the bed. Maybe it's for the best that he's not coming this summer, he'll miss you more. And text you all about it.
A throat clearing in the doorway snaps you out of whatever chokehold Jake seems to have on you from the other end of the country. It's Yizhuo and she's not pleased.
you: yizhuo has a Water Gun so i have to go but sleep tight ok ily + imysm
jaeyunie: Ilymmmmmmm
“I'm up, okay? No more Jake, I promise. Just put the gun down,” you plead, getting up from the bed and leaving your phone face down on the sheets. In the doorway, she doesn't budge, only closing one of her eyes and aiming the bright orange nozzle with one arm. “I'm coming, Yizhuo. It's alright.” In a very brave display, you don't even jump to check your phone when it vibrates.
You make it out unscathed, joining the rest of the girls in the kitchen. Open cans of beer litter the worktop, and Jimin's speaker plays at full blast. You can hear Travis Scott so clearly you're not convinced he's not yelling in your head. Locating the blender is a five-woman task, and you celebrate by making a heavy handed cocktail while waiting for the takeaway Minjeong ordered in advance to arrive.
Tonight is girls’ night, the first of the summer so far. Tomorrow, the guys will arrive and your group will be mostly complete. On Sunday, your birthday, Sunoo finally gets back from Erasmus, and everyone else will be here for the rager you throw every summer.
Everyone but Jake anyway.
Minjeong's garden — her mum's garden — is beautiful, always more so than you remember during the gloomy remainders of the year, when you're lying in bed at night, replaying your summer memories and trying to fall asleep. Tipsy lengths swam across the pool; falling asleep on the linen couch, just out of sight behind Ms. Kim's pink cosmos; crawling through the gap in the fence to get their teeny private strip of rocky beach to skinny dip in the ocean—when it's quiet enough, you can hear the tide kissing the shore. An otherworldly saturation permeates the entire yard and even photos don't do it justice. Brilliant turquoise swimming pool and lush green grass. If your friends notice it too, how brightly everything shines out here, they don't mention it. Nothing bad could happen to you out here, you're certain you could weather any storm on earth if it was happening in this garden.
With the long table and sliding glass doors at your backs, the five of you sit on the warm concrete by the pool, an excess of takeaway bags and boxes strewn between you. It's not so much a sharing platter as it is a, this is my dinner for tonight and tomorrow until we eat out on Sunday, situation. As nice as the quiet is, just you and the girls and no threat of being thrown into the pool by Heeseung and Sunghoon, it's a little strange without the boys. Jimin pushes her container away, every last morsel of jalfrezi eaten up, while your dinner still hasn't arrived. You watch as she sighs into the night sky, leaning back on her palms and envy her full stomach while yours rumbles quietly.
“I don't know why you insist on ordering from Ayaz every summer when you know how long they take,” she says when she catches your eye.
You toy with a loose thread on the hem of your nightdress. “It's my favourite.”
“Favourite? They're not even the best Greek place on the high street,” Minjeong points out.
And she's right, unfortunately. Last summer, you and Jake took a trip to Gyros Heaven after the club and well… went to actual heaven on the first bite. However, though apparently none of your friends care, tradition is tradition, and when you first came here, you and Jake ordered from Ayaz and what followed was the best summer ever. Too much is changing this summer, too much already has changed. Graduation, job offers across the continent. In other continents. This could be the last summer you all get together like this and no one seems to care. Jake isn't even coming, and the other boys are skipping the first night. You've already checked the Nessfest website five times since you came outside, just to make sure something hasn't happened to cancel the whole thing.
Call it superstition or batshit crazy, you will have your chicken and lamb gyros with a bucketload of tzatziki to dip it into no matter how obnoxiously late it arrives. It's reliable, as close to something you can control as possible, their constant latecoming a complete non-variable—maybe the only one you have left.
You check the Nessfest site again. Refresh your emails. Reread the ticket confirmation. Text Jake.
you: do you ever feel like everything is changing in a way that none of us have any hold over haha
“It'd be kinda funny if they arrived early for once though,” Aeri says. “Like symbolic, you know? We've finished uni, we're starting our careers — our lives — maybe Ayaz could do with some change too.”
“I think I would shoot myself in the face if that happened,” you say, but it doesn't come out as light-hearted as you'd like for it to.
Yizhuo lets out a surprised chuckle behind her cup, lips swollen and red from her extra hot tteokbokki. “Are you okay?” she asks, seeming truly concerned.
You nod, smiling, even though you wish desperately for Jake to show up somehow. Materialise out of thin air or something, lift himself out of the pool and say, surprise! That was really funny, Yongie! HAHAHA that was just so silly! Isn't she so silly? He'd know you meant what you said, but he'd be able to swing it well, to add to it with his universal charm and help you land. Laugh first, properly, so you and everyone else could join in.
“Well if they came early I wouldn't have gotten to sample your dinners, check for poison and all that,” you point out.
To this, they laugh, genuinely. Thank fuck. It's easy to laugh now that they are.
Now that Aeri's laughing even harder as she turns her phone for you all to see. It's a picture of Jay leaning against one of the walls in the student union, posted to Sunghoon's Instagram story. He's dead asleep with his eyes and mouth half-open. To his credit, Jay's a good drinker. Never too rowdy or too emotional. Nor too argumentative or romantic. He's sleepy though, more so than usual. This photo is just one more in a folder of near-identical photos. Jay sleeping at the dinner table, Jay sleeping on the driveway of his childhood home. If you can think it, he's slept there. In the queue for Thirsty Thursday after pres. And, though not photographed, once during sex.
“Well, it's nice to know he's enjoying the Pickle Club party they absolutely couldn't miss.” Yizhuo rolls her eyes, taking an irritated bite of her last chip. “Come on, it's gonna be our last time seeing some of those guys.” Her Jay impersonation is scarily accurate. “Suck my dick, Jongseong.”
You and Jimin can't stifle your laughter, exploding into cackles when your eyes meet.
“At least Jaeyun has an actual excuse, if he can't get off work it can't be helped, but the rest of them… I swear to fucking God—” Minjeong cuts herself off with a sip of her drink. “Whatever.”
“It's not like he works weekends,” Yizhuo points out.
The desire to leap to Jake's defence is overwhelming, second nature even, but you bite your tongue. You had the same thought when he told you he wasn't coming. Asked if he couldn't even make it just for the weekend. I don't know if it's worth driving so far just for a night or two, Yongie, he said, while you tried not to burst into tears or punch him in the face.
“How about no boy talk?” Aeri suggests, taking a screenshot and sending the picture to the groupchat. All of your phones light up at the same time, buzzing against the concrete. “Not until they get here anyway, can't really avoid it then.”
As soon as she says it, a message from Sunoo lights up your phones once more. It's a screenshot of the folder in his phone with all of the Jay sleeping pictures in it and the total is at 400.
“If they get here,” Yizhuo mutters, raising her glass. “Cheers, then.”
All of you raise your drinks and clink them overhead, as a chorus of cheers! rings out loud enough to settle the unease in the back of your mind, even if only for a moment. You take a slow sip of your sun-warmed beer and the doorbell goes behind you.
Your dinner is here, right on time.
The night slips away before your eyes, and it doesn't feel like long until you find yourself brushing your teeth after a cool shower in the en-suite. It's weird not seeing Jake's things with yours on the countertop. His cologne in the light blue bottle, his watch next to yours between the sinks. The bedroom is worse though, by far, one suitcase and one pair of house shoes. One body in the bed.
As much as you love this house, you hate this bedroom. All of its large windows are on the right side, giving you a beautiful view of the beach, the water. At night, the moonlight kisses the ripples, making it glitter. Having this ocean view however, means the lighthouse at the end of the dock casts its blinding beam into the room with a startling frequency. Even with your eyes screwed shut, you can see the shifting light behind your eyelids.
Your phone lights up as soon as you get comfortable, Jake's name on your screen, stinging your eyes.
“You alright, Yongie?” he asks, calls out more like, as if he wants you to hear him over the distance and not just through the phone.
Holding it an arm's length, you ask, “How drunk are you?”
“I just saw your text,” he says, ignoring the question you asked, but his softer vowels and higher pitch answer for you. He's tipsy. “Thought you were excited to spend time with the girls tonight, darling.”
“Oh,” you say, feeling your cheeks burn. “I was just being stupid that's all.”
Jake says nothing and over his silence you hear the boys laughing. Hear the opening and closing of a door muffle the laughter.
“That was actually your chance to tell me I could never be stupid.” To this, you hear his smile so clearly it's like he's here with you now and despite the ache in your chest, you can't help but smile too.
“I was thinking, Yongie,” he says. “I get it freaks you out, and that's valid, but I don't think everything's changing.”
“Ever heard of hyperbole?”
“Ha ha. That was really funny, Yongie. Aren't you just so silly?” There's some rustling on his end before he speaks again. You can picture him quite clearly, lying down on the end of his bed, his hair covering his forehead, long enough to graze his eyelids by now surely. “How about we try and think of something that's never going to change so you can focus on that instead?”
If you'd been having this conversation last summer, you would have said this trip with no hesitation, but even this, your teenaged promise with — at the time — Jake's friends, feels less and less secure with each passing minute. Slipping like sand through your fingers. This summer, here, right now, you've got nothing.
“How about I come up with something?” he suggests after a while.
“Please.”
Jake doesn't seem as stumped as you, continuing right away. “You love me, right?”
“Sure.” You chew on your lip, concerned like you've made some grand admission, bared some precious part of yourself for him to look at. To hold up to the light and inspect.
Another audible smile takes over his voice. “And you know I love you too, Yongie. That's not going to change.”
Heat lashes your cheeks, coats you from head to toe as your heart thumps away in your chest. That Jake can speak so definitively, with such conviction always scares you. He might be the most sincere person you know, completely earnest for earnestness’ sake no matter what. Everything he cares about he gives the utmost attention to, and you're no exception. He's proven that time and time again, he's proving it now. And yet, that nagging voice in the back of your mind won't quiet.
“But—”
“No, YN,” he says, interrupting you. “But nothing, I always will and you can count on that.” There's a certainty in his voice that forces a flutter in your stomach, a smile on your face. A certainty that makes you desperate to believe him. It feels like a necessity. “Change can be a good thing, you know. I think most of the time it's a great thing,” he adds.
“Why is it so scary then?”
“I'm not sure, darling,” he says quietly, like he really wishes he could give you an answer, like he's disappointed that he can't.
You sigh and he yawns, though he vehemently denies sleepiness when you accuse him. “Good night,” you say anyway.
“Good morning,” he says, and it's the start of an endless back and forth.
The sound of the smile in Jake's voice only makes you smile too, heats you up from the inside out and reminds you just how lucky you are to have him at all, whether he's right next to you or on the other side of the country. “I'm really glad we're friends, Jake.”
A moment passes before he speaks, you can't even hear him breathing down the line. “Yeah, Yongie, I know,” he says before clearing his throat, sounding more awake than earlier. “I'd better get back to the guys. See you when you're back, yeah? I miss you already.”
Jake doesn't even wait for your response before he cuts the phone and you can't keep your eyes open for long enough to think much about it as you fall asleep.
Nessfest is a geographically confusing Loch Ness-themed carnival hosted on the east coast of Scotland. As is tradition, you attend every summer and spend the whole day catching sun and eating pastries. And like every year, you are staunchly against getting on any ride that can just be thrown up and taken back down again at a moment's notice, so you're stuck holding bags while everyone else straps themselves into swinging lawsuits waiting to happen. Without Jake, who's scared too, you have to do it all on your own, taking your job of live-texting him updates very seriously.
you: aeri threw up after the tilt-a-whirl
you: again
The sun is relentless, baking the concrete and your skin. Your feet are already tanning around the crisscrossed straps of your sandals, paler bands of skin on your shoulders where your tank top straps rest. Alone under a parasol next to a ride with five loop-de-loops in a row, you're on high alert, craning your neck and trying to spot the guys in the growing crowd. They were meant to meet you at the house this morning, but last night's drinking rendered them horizontal until noon.
And that is okay. Change is okay.
Inhaling slowly, holding the breath, and exhaling slowly is easier in the shade, but there's nothing you can do to stop the sweat beading along your hairline, no matter how many times you pat it away with the back of your clammy hand.
you: what are you even doing rn
you: please tell me if you're sleeping it's in the car next to hee otw here :/
“There she is!” Jay calls out in a hoarse voice, waving with his whole arm when you turn around. At the sight of him, and Heeseung and Sunghoon trailing behind, your stomach drops. Jake really isn't coming. It's strange seeing everyone without him. Seeing the boys without him. He was your first friend, your only good friend until you went to uni together. And even then, all the friends you have now were his friends first.
If it weren't for all the handbags you were wearing, you'd have jogged over to meet them halfway, but alas. They're gracious enough to do the jogging on your behalf, all three of them pulling you into the middle of a group hug and jumping around you. There are more long, sweaty limbs than you'd like to be embraced by at any one time, but you've missed them so much you can't find it in yourself to complain. Not properly anyway.
“Any chance you left someone in the car?” you ask, squinting up against the sun at them.
Heeseung pulls air through his teeth and shakes his head. “Sorry, princess.”
“No worries though, birthday girl. You won't even notice he's not here!” Sunghoon grins for a split second before pressing his lips in a flat line, saluting and standing at attention like he's ready to serve his country through the fulfillment of Jake duties. “Can't share the bed though, bossman said no way,” he says, taking the girls' bags from your shoulders, so he can carry them. You don't stop him when he takes yours as well. To his credit, he looks kind of wonderful, a buff, compression-shirt-wearing ten out of ten with five handbags slung over him.
“Give me some of those,” Heeseung mutters, taking Jimin's and Minjeong's bags for himself. “Making me look bad.”
Sunghoon rolls his eyes. “You do that on your own. Look after your fucking hair, man.”
It's hard not to laugh at that, at least until Heeseung cuts his eyes at you anyway—that shuts you up quite quickly. Now that the guys are here, there are more targets for the line of fire, and you're not about to do the noble thing and take the fall for Heeseung. You wouldn't even do that for Jake.
you: stupid stupid jungwoo son or heeseung's fried hair daughter?
Unconcerned with how he looks, Jay cranes his neck to watch as the Loch & Key hurls your friends through the air. “Are—uh… are you guys mad at us? For missing last night?”
“Not any more than usual.”
He hums, resting his hands on his hips. “That's good then. A relief, I guess.”
Ice cream wielding children rush by you, glittery green butterflies and purple thistles painted on their smiling faces. Their soft laughter makes you grin as their exhausted parents, miniature backpacks slung over their shoulders, trail after them, weaving through you and the boys while mumbling their apologies. Jake would think it adorable if he were here, clutch his heart and coo over their tiny giggles and hurried waddles. He's always been good with kids, relating and playing with your little cousins better than you ever have, braiding hair and coaching football. He'll be a great father and his children will be very lucky. His partner. It's easy to imagine him running after his own kids like that, keeping up though, and happy to do it. Just the thought of it, future Jake, father Jake, warms your skin, your cheeks.
Meanwhile, present Jake, childless Jake, is ignoring your texts. Missing your birthday. You turn to Heeseung who's scrolling on his phone. “How was Jake before you guys left? He's airing me.”
He lifts his head at once, affronted by the very notion apparently. “Nah, no way. He drank the most last night, for sure. Didn't even wake up to say bye, dude's gonna be hungover 'til at least Christmas.”
A grin splits your face at the revelation that he's suffering for his crimes against you and your date of birth. The universe is fair and just after all. “Was it worth it at least? Your Pickle Party?”
“Pickleball, YN, ball,” Heeseung corrects, though Pickleball Party is not as fun to say. “I was fucked, man, can't really remember it if I'm honest. How about you though, how was your night?”
“I figured as much, we saw the photos, but my night was so good.” You're not even exaggerating, you hadn't realised how much you needed time with just the girls until you got it. “And I have all of my memories.”
“I remember enough to know Jake was with me and not you so…“ He shrugs with a shit-eating grin on his face, and he's very lucky you love him because if not, you would have pushed him to the ground instead of nodding nod with your jaw clenched, and muttering, yeah, well.
Free from Loch & Key's deep blue clutches, the girls stumble down the stairs and into the waiting arms of the boys. Anyone watching might think it had been years since they'd seen each other, rather than a handful of days. It wells your eyes to see them all like this, overjoyed already just by the promise of the next few days spent together. Meanwhile, you struggle to adjust to the sight of them without Jake, feeling the void already. At least you've had time to get used to missing Sunoo, seeing as he left a year ago now, but even he'll be here tomorrow. As Jimin reaches out to pull you into the group hug, you think of Jake. Miss him.
you: what time do you get in tmrw?
suntori: like 9 pm ish at the airport and then ten thousand hours in the car to get to the house
suntori: pls get me a nessfest '26 shirt !!!!!!
“To the bar!” Aeri calls out, pointing in the direction of the margarita truck you frequent.
Heeseung actually shudders. “Sober weekend for me I think, sorry guys.”
Even though he mumbles his agreement, Sunghoon is the first to follow Aeri, Jimin, and Yizhuo through the crowd. Around Heeseung and Jay's waists, Minjeong snakes her arms. “Hair of the dog, boys,” she says, pulling them. “Hair of the dog.”
Under an air conditioned gazebo, you crowd around a picnic table and Jay buys you an Irn Bru margarita in a pitcher. Sitting across from you, Sunghoon tries the first sip of it and hums, his eyebrows knitting together. “It's good, you know. Surprisingly.” He slides the pitcher back over to you, but you slide it back.
“We can share it.”
As if terrified by your offer, his eyes widen and he shakes his head so hard his sunglasses slip from his hair down onto his nose. “No way, YN, I actually can't. Because you'll want me to drink again tonight and tomorrow and for the rest of the week. What do you know about moderation?”
“Not much.” You shrug, taking the drink in your hands and moving the straw to take a big gulp. It is good. Surprisingly.
you: having a pitcher of irn bru marg u are so jealous rn
To sober Sunghoon's credit, he does a pretty good job as a Jake stand-in. Holding all the bags and phones while you sit in the shade, even standing if there's only one seat free so you can take it. The two of you eat candy floss and caramel coated popcorn while he gives you a play by play on last night's jaunt and follow the group from ride to ride, passing a yard glass of melting blue raspberry slushy back and forth. He even tries — and fails — to win you a stuffed animal to add to your collection. As the sun inches lower and lower, the crowd only gets denser, the lines longer. You and Aeri wait twenty minutes to use the toilet, shuffling into the same stall because the attendant is too busy scrolling through short-form videos with her volume on full blast to stop you. You pee first then Aeri goes.
“I feel like a grandma, dude. I'm tired already.” Laughter and squeals and techno music muffle her voice as she shimmies her jean shorts back up over her hips.
Only when you've fully processed what she said does a groan rumble in your throat, agreeing wholeheartedly. There are still nine hours until midnight, never mind whatever godforsaken time it'll be when you crawl into bed and sleep. Alone. “Call me Jay the way I'm gonna nap at any opportunity.” You lean against the stall door with your mouth open and your eyes half-shut to make her laugh.
“Him and Heeseung are kinda opposites like that, don't you think?” she asks, following you to the sinks. “Heeseung only has to close his eyes to fall asleep and that's before a drink.”
“Was that last year or the year before when we lost him because he was sleeping behind the marg truck?”
Aeri cackles, shaking her wet hands out in front of her. “Could Heeseung Lee report to guest services?” she says in a flat tone, just like the tannoy that had blared through the entire festival that day. “That's Heeseung Lee to guest services, please.”
You leave the toilets with your sweaty arms linked together, only to find everyone laying out in the grass. Sure enough, when you reach him, sober Heeseung is dead asleep on his stomach with his head on his arms.
you: was i annoying on call last night or smth… my bad my bad
To this, finally, Jake replies and right away.
jaeyunie: Neverrrrr ❤️
jaeyunie: I miss you sooooooooo much
jaeyunie: Can call before bed if you're free? Facetime and we can watch Bee Movie if you want
you: ok. i miss you an adequate amount. i always want.
Next on Yizhuo's tight schedule, is the least intimidating, but by far most popular ride at the whole festival. The Rock Ness Monster—a Viking ride with peeling green paint where the boat curves towards the bottom. She bumps your hip with hers. “Are you two coming with?”
“Who's gonna hold your bags if we do?”
“Ugh.” Sunghoon's head falls back, clearly sick of standing around while all the slightly terrifying, so-called good stuff happens on these insane portable roller coasters. “Don't be such a baby, YN. Even Jake can ride a viking boat.”
“Wow, Hoon,” you say, nudging his ribs with your elbow. “It's almost like we're two different people.”
At his side, Minjeong actually laughs out loud. “Could've fooled me.”
The burn in your cheeks is immediate, the sting behind your eyes. That no one leaps to your defence, that you feel like someone else should in the first place, is unsettling. Embarrassing, more like, to stand there, sandalled feet glued in place, body heavy with alcohol stirring in your sinking stomach, sweat laden and overheating. Saying nothing while your friends look around at one another and Jay mutters, “God damn.”
“Whatever,” you say, rolling your eyes. You're not in the mood to argue, not sure if you even have much of a case, so you leave everyone's bags at your feet and take the first step towards the Rock Ness queue. “Let's go then, since you all want to so badly.”
You walk quickly and blink even quicker, the only thing that could possibly worse would be to cry and bring the mood down. It's not even really that serious. Not at all. Your friends follow in silence while you pull out your phone to text Jake. Do you think I'm too dependent on yo—sense and shame wash over you, pulling your thumb down to the backspace key and clearing the message. Who cares what your friends think? Even Jake can ride a Viking boat, well so can you! It's not even about him anyway. You like roller coasters, it's just that these particular rides, with their semi-permanent nature, freak you out a little.
At your place in line, a rush of peach hits you and two long arms wrap themselves around your middle. Minjeong. “My sweet lady,” she mumbles. “I'm sorry for saying that.”
Worse than everyone thinking you follow Jake around like a lovesick puppy, is them feeling bad for you, feeling bad about bringing it up. And here you are, with no Jake to follow, ruining everyone's mood. “It's fine,” you say, picking at the fraying hem of your jean shorts. “It's true anyway, I guess.” That's probably what annoys you about it, that she wasn't wrong.
Minjeong kisses the top of your shoulder, her lip gloss sticky on your skin. “We're all a bit too attached to be fair.”
As if to prove her point, the two of you stay clinging to each other, a sweaty waddling mass as the queue grows shorter and shorter until it's your turn to get on. You press your palm to the side of Nessie's carriage for good luck, safe travels maybe, like boarding an aeroplane, and end up sandwiched between Heeseung and Jay, bare thighs sticking to each other and the hot seat. It's a bit of a tight fit, squeezing all of you into the same row, against some kind of safety regulation surely, but the teenaged ride attendant barely looks up from her phone except to push the bar down over your laps. It's fun though, even you can admit that. Fun to laugh and squeal with your friends while Nessie's hinges do the same, rocking you back and forth and back and forth again.
Heeseung's hair is dry as straw and the heat does nothing to help, so that when you get off the ride, wobbly-legged, it sticks up at all angles like he's been electrocuted. Yizhuo can't stop laughing, reaching up to ruffle the strands. A few of them break off when he does, flitting towards the ground, dusting his shoulders.
“Jesus, Heeseung. Do you want a hair mask or something? A buzzcut, maybe?” Minjeong asks, her own bleached hair silky and long, a testament to her twelve step haircare routine.
He rolls his eyes with a smile on his face. “It's not that bad.”
“It's literally breaking off in her hands,” you remind him, taking a tuft from his shoulder so he can see it.
“Good thing it's my hair then,” he says, yanking the cap from Jimin's head and putting it on his own to hide what's left of his hair.
Yizhuo wipes her palms together and Aeri scowls. “Sure, buddy—not for much longer though.”
Sunghoon's film camera goes everywhere with him, but he doesn't trust anyone else but Jay to use it—and even that took proof of him studying up on film and passing a twenty-question quiz. With it — now that you've all reconvened after a much needed, well-timed nap — the two of them capture every single moment, a flash going off in some part of the garden no matter what. Jay standing at the grill in his Meat Master apron. Aeri pouring shots at the table. Yizhuo putting a pink tiara on your head at ten minutes to midnight. Heeseung and Jimin making out on the linen couch. Minjeong napping on the unicorn float. He gets a photo of everything and Jay gets a photo of him in the kitchen doorway flexing all of his muscles like a bodybuilder.
Right when the clock strikes twelve, all of you run and jump into the pool, waking Minjeong who rolls over into the water with a start. A rowdy chorus of Happy Birthday begins before you've even managed to resurface, waterlogged and tipsy in the deep end as your favourite people celebrate you.
“Your shots!” Jimin cries out, pushing her hair out of her face. “You need to start your shots!”
You get out of the pool as fast as you can, running towards the table to get your phone before going into hiding. Jimin doesn't take long to follow, but a text from Jake stops you in your tracks. He'd sent it five minutes ago, right at midnight.
jaeyunie: Happy birthday, Yongiiieeee!!!!!!! I love u so bad, ur my bffieee, I hope today is really special and I'm sorry I can't be there, but I promise I'll make it up to you, yeah? Can't wait to see youuuuuuu 💘🐉
The smile on your face is immediate, and if you weren't surrounded by all of your friends, you'd squeal. But you are, so you slip through the sliding doors back into the house and lock yourself in the downstairs bathroom to squeal — and hide — there. When you call Jake, he picks up right away, his handsome face filling the screen.
“Hey, birthday girl,” he says, a breathtaking grin stretching over his lips and showing all of his teeth. “How are you feeling?”
You're not sure where to start. How to properly express just how much you miss him. Closing the toilet lid, you take a seat and settle on telling him you're mad at him instead. “I'm very, very mad at you.”
“What have I done now?” His eyebrows shoot up and his voice is low, deep, which is very cool and very normal.
“You ditched me.”
When Jake laughs, it fills the room like he's right here with you. “I'm not the one who drove all the way across the country, Yongie. You ditched me, alright? If anything, I should be very, very mad at you.”
“You can't be mad at me on my birthday. Maybe another day?” Against your arm, the tile is so perfectly cool you have to resist pressing your entire body to the wall. “Do you have one in mind?”
His smile only widens. It's unjust that someone so beautiful would be so far away—that that someone would be Jake. “Whatever you say, Yongie—I won't be mad at you today. Tomorrow though? I'm pissed tomorrow.”
Just the thought of it sends a rush of heat to the base of your stomach. You've sat in the stands at enough of his football games, and various other sporting stints, to know just how pissed he can get. And just how good he looks when he is. His clenched jaw and squinting eyes. The crease of his eyebrows, how his neck goes red. Pissed at you would be new, though. Nice, maybe.
“I look forward to it,” you admit. “Will you show me Layla now? She's way more exciting to look at.”
The smile falls from his face right away. “Should I die?”
“Not just now. Maybe tomorrow while you're mad at me.”
“Have I ever told you how funny you are?” He squints a little, getting closer to the screen. “Where are you?”
“I'm hiding in the bathroom. I think Jimin's waiting to force twenty-two shots down my throat.” Just the thought of it makes you shudder. At sixteen, taking a shot for each year of your age was a badge of honour. Now, however, not so much.
“You're in the bathroom? Downstairs, right?”
“Yeah, that's what I just said.”
“Open the door then.”
“Is my signal fucked?” You look at him on your screen, tilting your head. “I just told you Jimin's waiting to give me alcohol poisoning, I can't go out there for at least another twenty-four hours.”
“Wow.” Jake frowns. “I drove all this way and you don't want to see me?”
The words pull you up from your seat so fast you almost smack your head on the wall. “You did what?”
“Open up, Yongie.” This time, when he speaks, you hear him through your phone and through the door.
Hanging up, you adjust the straps of your bikini and straighten your tiara in the mirror, peeling back some of your soaked hair. For how much time you spent in the sun earlier, and in the pool just now, you look quite nice actually. A healthy glow to your slowly tanning skin, a slight dark ring of mascara around your eyes that thankfully looks more fun party girl than tearful party girl. You take a deep breath, it's only Jake after all—a fact that does nothing to ease your racing heart.
“Are you really out there?” you ask through the door, desperate to prolong the time apart that you'd loathed maybe one minute ago.
He lets out a chuckle, knocking gently on the wood. “I promise.”
Like something from your dreams, and just like he said, Jake's standing there with a huge grin on his face. He's the greatest thing you've ever seen. “Surprise!” he says. “Happy birthday.”
“How are you—” You pause, shoving his shoulder just to make sure this isn't a very realistic hallucination. Against your palm, his shoulder is very solid and very real. “How are you here?”
Jake's smile curls into something sheepish, his hands resting heavy on your waist. Burning your wet skin. “If you could take a week off from the beautiful woman factory, I figured I could take some time off too. Turns out having a desk job involves a lot of scrolling through r/niceguys and drinking free Gatorade.”
“You…” There are a million ways to end that sentence, but you settle for hugging him instead. He laughs, soft and happy, taking you into his strong arms. He smells like home, like the sweet citrus and bergamot that crowds all of your memories. It's only been a week since you last saw him, but it feels like a lifetime now that he's here. “I can't believe you're here,” you mumble into his T-shirt.
“You know I'd never miss your birthday, Yongie. Not for anything.” Jake brings his hand to the back of your head, gently stroking your wet hair. “I meant it when I said you could count on me.”
Tipping your head back is a small devastation, you miss his chest as soon as you leave it, but the sight of him is worth it. Of Jake and his sweet round, smiling cheeks, his dark eyes meeting yours right away. “But I thought you—” Realisation sets in belatedly, cutting you off. “So you lie to me now? Great. Your employment has made you ugly, Sim Jaeyun.”
He's the furthest thing from ugly you can think of, especially when he's smiling like this at you. Because of you. “Occupational hazard,” he says. “I'm being really brave showing my face right now, but I was sweating in my ski mask.”
“Good call. And speaking of, I didn't take time off work, I'm working remotely.”
Jake's grin takes up half of his face and sends your heart into a frenzy. “My bad, Yongie. Of course you are,” he says, tucking some of your hair behind your ear. “You must be the exception, your employment's only made you prettier.”
“It's hard work being employee of the century,” you admit.
“Yeah, darling. I'm sure it is.” Before you can respond, or fully process the heat coating every inch of your skin, he speaks again. “How does twenty-two feel so far? I only have a few more months left to get ready, so you have to tell me everything.”
“So far?” There's no platonic way to say that twenty-two is perfect because he's here, so you shrug. “Not sure—” At the sound of Jimin's voice over his shoulders you flinch, hiding behind him even though it's too late.
“There you are!” She's wielding the tall bottle of Pineapple AU the boys got for you. Your gift. Yay! “Don't worry, you don't have to take all the shots right now, you can spread them out over the day. Eleven now, eleven later.” She looks a bit like she's had twenty-two shots.
“Jeez,” Jake mutters, getting a good look at her flushed face.
“I'll come find you, Jimin.”
This seems to be enough to satisfy her, for now at least, and she disappears back down the hall, utterly unsurprised by the sight of Jake.
Alone again, finally, he smiles down at you. “I'll help with your shots, alright? Looks like I've got some catching up to do anyway.”
“Me too.”
While Jake gets changed, you head back outside and jump straight into the pool to shock the heat from your skin. It works. Until he walks through the sliding doors and into the garden. His black swimming trunks sit low on his hips. Arms bigger than usual when he crosses them over his chest, eyes flitting around the space until he finds you and smiles. Your heart beats in your throat as the rest of your friends spot him and rush over, enveloping him in happy hugs and excited chatter. They ask him about the drive and work and catch up like it's been months. Nobody mentions his huge arms or his toned stomach that seems more and more defined every time you see it. Jay hands him a beer and he pulls the tab while watching you, laughing at something, he waves at you, all alone in the pool now that everyone's bagged their spot in line at the Jake meet-and-greet.
Good for them.
You swim lazy laps to give your heart something normal to race over and he finishes his entire can before breaking away from the group and backflipping into the pool. You hate yourself for being impressed, feeling a bit like a ten-year-old girl fancying the fastest boy in class. This feeling, you know it well, because you were that girl. Jake was the boy. And now, when he resurfaces right in front of you, his hair sticks to the edges of his face. He doesn't push it back.
“Good evening,” he says, voice already taking on its soft drunken state.
“You're stealing my thunder, Jakey. At this rate, I'm sure you'll wear red to my funeral, or do the splits during the eulogy, or something else attention-seeking,” you huff, splashing him. “It's my birthday, you know.”
“Trust me, Yongie. No one could ever steal your thunder.” He grins, taking the pink tiara from your head and putting it on his own. It suits him. “And we're dying on the same day, remember? Joint casket.”
“I'm starting to regret our blood pact.”
“Our blood pact?” he repeats, incredulous. “How many times do I need to remind you that someone waited until my middle finger was gushing blood before she backed out?”
“I was fourteen!”
“I was thirteen!”
“And you were so, so brave.”
A moment passes while Jake seems to think about that. The pool lights him up brilliant and blue, water slipping in fast rivulets down his skin. Though not a new feeling, it's definitely an irritating one, an embarrassing one, to be jealous of the water. Jealous of how close it gets to be, tracing his cheekbones and acne scars, his stubble. And all with no consequence, no teasing or accusations of feelings. Feelings of any kind. Your hands twitch at your sides, pruned and desperate. Splashes sound from the middle of the pool, though neither of you look to see who it is. There's no need. You could recognise Jay's squeals and Aeri's laugh with your eyes closed. The price of summers and all the seasons in between spent together, you suppose. You'd pay it over and over happily if you could. If it meant you could always have this. It'll be difficult on Wednesday, when you all go back home and get ready to split off into your corners of actual adulthood.
“I'm a coward now, is that what you're saying?”
“I wouldn't have used those words, but I'm glad you did.”
Jake rolls his eyes and says, “Most people are actually nicer in the summer, you know.”
“Yeah, to you maybe. Because you look like that with your shirt off,” you say, surprising yourself and him.
He tilts his head, eyebrows furrowing. “What does that mean?”
You've already swum into the deep end of this conversation, so it's not hard to say, “I think you underestimate how much justice your body does you, Jaeyun.”
“That means a lot coming from you.” With a smile on his lips, he reaches out, toying with the string on your bikini. Cool water slips from his skin onto yours, painting a trail down your body and back into the pool. His dark eyes follow it the whole way, neck, collarbones, chest, until his gaze hits the surface, lingering on the flimsy blue cups holding up your breasts. It all happens so quickly, his staring and the pounding of your heart. The hitching of your breath. Of his. How he swallows, gulps, like maybe this is affecting him as much as it is you until he says, “You're a dream, YN.”
The word strikes you anew, your name from his sweet mouth. He so rarely calls you by your name that it's always thrilling whenever he does. Only ever beautiful, special, when he's the one saying it. And at the end of a sentence like that no less. A dream. Said so simply and just for you. You should be over this by now, over him, but still — again — your breath hitches and a flare of warmth sets your skin ablaze.
“You know that though, don't you?” Jake's voice is quiet against the sounds of everyone else — cans and cups clinking, lyrics screeched off-key — yet it's the only thing you hear clearly. “I've always known it.”
On his head, your pink tiara sits crooked. He almost looks silly. He does look silly, and maybe, if he'd said literally anything else, this fact, this sight, would make you laugh. But no, he didn't say anything else.
Attraction and romance are not the same. You know that well enough. It's taken a lot of kissing frogs to drill it into your head, but you've done it, and you know. Regardless, hearing those words from your Prince Jake is doing a very good job at shaking that knowledge loose. It's only when your back hits the tile that you realise you've drifted into the corner of the pool. He lets go of your bikini, palm resting by your arm on the pool's edge, boxing you in.
To your silence, he says, “I guess I gotta say it more.”
“Is that right?” you whisper.
When he nods, the tiara falls with a measly splash, bobbing along the surface between you. Neither of you lifts it.
“You've got a lot of catching up to do then. Like, ten years worth.”
“Thirteen,” Jake corrects. “Thirteen years worth.”
“I look forward to it.”
A smile breaks out over his face as he picks up the tiara. All the chlorine has spoiled the rhinestones, turning them matte. Gently, he pushes your hair away from your face and sets it on your head again, fixing the little combs so it stays in place. “You're beautiful, Yongie. You're very, very beautiful,” he says. Admits, maybe.
You let out a breath, hoping it can pass for a laugh. Hoping Jake doesn't notice how all of your breaths have been coming out in a bit of a hurry. “Well, I don't work at the beautiful woman factory for nothing.”
It's Sunghoon's announcement of a very friendly game of chicken fight that breaks up your… moment. You're thankful, actually, it gives you some room to breathe, to smile like a maniac while Jake looks over his shoulder at the group. Nobody has to tell you to get out of the pool, you don't waste a second hoisting yourself over the edge. Jake does the same, trailing water all the way over to the electric grill where he dries his hands and ties Jay's apron around his waist.
“You hungry?” he asks. “The real Meat Master's back in town, baby.”
“Not really.” You scowl, taking a step away from him. “And don't let anyone else hear you say that, okay? They won't be as kind as me.”
Red covers his cheeks and his ears and his neck as he heads for the kitchen. “Yeah,” he says. “You're probably right.”
Despite this, his blunder, you can hardly tear your lusting eyes from his body, the flex of his muscles as he walks, the cinch of his little waist, swimming trunks sitting low enough to show the dimples in his lower back. How the water trickles slowly from his shoulders down, the warm kitchen lights making him glow.
A pair of dripping arms wrap themselves around your waist from behind, making you flinch as Minjeong's chin rests on your shoulder, easy to identify by her touchiness alone, but her shimmery peach tanning oil gives her away. Her damp skin sticks to yours. A kiss pressed to your cheek. “I take it you like your present?” she coos, rocking your bodies back and forth. “It was my idea by the way, to surprise you, if you were looking for someone to thank.”
How touching, that your friends care enough to deeply upset you with your biggest fear and then quickly resolve it like nothing happened. Maybe change, as Jake had said last night, isn't as bad as you think. More than anything, you're alarmed by the fact that the best gift you think you could possibly receive is his presence. How disturbing, that you love him this much.
“Thank you, Jeongie,” you say, dragging the E for as long as you can.
Again, she kisses your cheek, mumbling, of course, against your skin. “What was that in the pool? You two all pressed up in the corner…“ Her voice trails off into a whisper as Jake comes back outside with a plate of samgyeopsal and chicken sausages and mushrooms in his veiny hand. Maybe you are hungry after all. “It was extremely hot to watch, I think he was genuinely a second away from tearing your bikini off.”
The thought of it makes you shudder, what might have been were you two alone out here, if Jake wanted what you did. Wanted you. If he'd tugged on the string of your bikini top and taken what you want him to have. You're a dream, YN. You can't help the heat in your cheeks and between your thighs, can't help but watch as his thick fingers turn the knob that starts the grill. As they skewer sausages and slabs of halloumi before carefully placing them on the rack.
Minjeong uses her clammy hand to close your mouth. “Fuck,” she mutters. “I think I get it now.”
Before you can tell her to back off, she's running over to the pool, waiting to sub in for someone. It'll be Yizhuo most likely, who keeps throwing herself from Sunghoon's broad shoulders, for no reason other than liking the feeling of falling into the water. He's too polite to express his frustration, but you can tell from the way he rolls his eyes every time she does it.
“They're pants,” Jake says, nodding over at them as he flips the skewers. “Utter pants.”
You wrap yourself up in a Spider-Man beach towel and sink into the chair closest to the grill, to him, sitting with your legs crossed. “It'd be unethical to play against them, seeing as we're professionals and they're… well, they're pants, like you said.”
Last spring, Sunghoon announced in the chat that you'd be playing chicken fight for money, and it was all you could to do to take up Pilates in preparation—you had probably the strongest core out of everyone here, and together, you and Jake robbed your friends blind, then blew your winnings on a weekend trip to Naples to celebrate. This year however, you and Jake are barred, and your core strength has gone to shit without something to motivate you in the gym.
It's for the best probably, your practice rounds were always garbage because you couldn't focus with Jake's head between your thighs or his huge hands gripping your soft flesh. The way his breath would hitch if you tugged on the right strands of hair by the nape of his neck.
Fuck.
Pushing some of your wet hair back from your neck, he smiles down at you. “I took three of your shots, by the way.”
“My knight in sweaty, muscular armour, wow, Jake.” Looking at him now, with the overhead lights making him glow around the edges, the sweet curve of his pink lips, it's like looking at an angel. He is an angel, you are absolutely certain. Your lovely, beautiful, soft-lipped angel. “I could kiss you,” you blurt out, covering your mouth with your hand to keep in the rest of your thoughts.
He laughs at that, a rushed exhale that he doesn't address before blowing on a skewer of halloumi. It's hot, clearly, because he huffs around the little chunk he bit off. Again, he blows on it then holds it out for you. “Here, Yongie,” he says softly. “Careful though, yeah?”
For a short while, you eat like this, sharing a Heineken with Jake until, naturally, at the sweet sizzle and smell of pork belly coming off the barbecue, everyone comes rushing out of the pool and over to the table, filling all the seats around you. Jay helps plate the food as Jake shuts off the grill, taking off the apron and mumbling at you to sit properly. It's hardly a second after your feet hit the warm tile that he sits in your lap, settling with his back pressed against you and his plate in his lap. To calm your pounding heart, you have to breathe manually, in for three and out for three, but it's to no avail as Jake plays with your fingers and passes food from his plate straight into your mouth. Trying to follow the conversation is impossible in these conditions, so you strain to listen to Tiffany Day's album whispering out of the speaker and chew on yummy samgyeopsal, ignoring the feel of his fingers on your lips every time he feeds you, ignoring how he makes a point to look straight at you, into your eyes whenever he does.
At Jimin's request you take a shot and then another, both poured carefully into your mouth by Jake who can't stop laughing.
“My good girl!” she cheers, a proud smile on her face as she points at you with her chopsticks. “Two down, twenty to go!”
You take another two, then down a full glass of water.
As the guest of honour, you're relinquished of clean-up duty, and your friends diligently snatch anything you dare to lift or stack to help. Your adamance gets Jake kicked out too, the two of you relegated to the linen couch. As soon as you sit down, he pulls your legs over his. His hand covers your knee, tracing shapes into your skin with his thumb. Sometimes it feels like he has to touch you at all times, like his life depends on his proximity to you—sometimes it feels like yours does too, to him. Given the years you've known each other, the years you've gone on like this, you should be used to it. You're not. When he touches your necklace, the star pendant resting on your chest, you have to put in effort not to shiver.
“I can't believe you still wear this,” he says, the words garbled by a yawn.
“I haven't found one I like better. What's your excuse?” you ask, nodding towards the identical star sitting beneath his collarbones.
“Feels weird when I take it off. It's like a little piece of you or something.”
“Or something,” you repeat, understanding.
It was a Christmas gift, years ago now. They both were. Something you saw that simply screamed Jake. Apparently, he thought the same, seeing the exact same necklace and hearing your name instead. It felt like fate when you exchanged presents that Christmas Eve, and even now, though most days you forget you have it on, you're not convinced it wasn't.
With his rosy knuckles heavy on your skin, the necklace feels brand new. Jake has a funny way of making things feel new, making the simplest of moments exciting just because he's there. Swimming. Eating pork belly. Sitting on the couch. He lets go of the star, tucking your wet hair behind your ear before squeezing your knee.
“What are you thinking about?” he asks.
“I'm just happy, Jake. I'm very, very happy right now.”
“Good, Yongie. I'm very, very happy too.” He yawns again.
You roll your eyes, but you can't stop smiling. Can't stop the flutter in your stomach. “My thunder, Jaeyun. Leave it alone.”
When Jake yawns for the third time, you decide to retire, ignoring the chorus of boos that follow you back inside until he slides the back door shut. “Should I lock it?” he asks.
You actually have to think about it before you shake your head, leading the way up to your room.
In bed, showered and sleepy, the two of you lie very still, staring up at the ceiling. It's far too hot for a duvet, but you can't sleep without being covered, so a thin white sheet sticks to your skin. Each time the lighthouse beams into the room, the two of you laugh into the quiet.
“Can I ask you something?” A giggle breaks through your question, bright white shining through the window.
“Anything, Yongie.” He's more tired, and tipsy, than he let on downstairs. You can hear it in his voice, how slow and whiny he's being. “You know that.”
“Does you being here mean you didn't get me a present?”
Turning to look at you, Jake scoffs. You don't dare to look at him. You can't. Still, he asks, “Am I not enough of a gift?”
For the better you think, he has no idea how much his being here means to you. “I mean… maybe if we were watching Bee Movie or you'd brought Layla with you.”
“Okay, Yongie. Fine. I see how it is.”
Right when you look at him, the lighthouse sends another beam, carving his face out of the shadow. This time, you can't laugh. Can't do much more than stare at him. The curve of his pretty lips, his sleepy eyes on you. Pink on his cheeks, his forehead, his nose. You feel very lucky getting to see him like this, and your birthday of all days.
“I'm kidding,” you whisper, afraid of what your voice might sound like if you speak properly. “Kind of.”
Mercifully, the beam slips out of view, leaving him in the dark. No matter though, because you can make out his silhouette as he sits up and leans over the end of the bed. He opens the drawer of the nightstand and puts a small velvet box into your hands. “It's not Layla, obviously, but I hope you like it anyway.”
“We'll see.”
Sitting up too, you lean on the headboard and open it. A thick heart-shaped pendant greets you, a locket, you realise when you take it out. The metal is cool in your palm and the light shines through the window, showing you what's carved on the front of it. Your stomach drops at the sight.
“Happy birthday, YN.” Jake clears his throat. “It's a dragon.”
When you first met, the first thing he ever told you was that his zodiac sign was a horse. You were nine years old back then, a Leo, and the first thing you did when you got home was look up animal zodiac signs on the family computer. The next day, you got to class and proudly told him that you were a dragon—your favourite of the twelve animals available. Yong, he said. That's dragon in Korean. Unfortunately though, like every other 2002 baby, you were a simple horse, but the nickname stuck.
“Yongie,” you say, heart beating in your throat as you run your finger over the tiny dragon.
He's smiling when you look at him, clearly pleased with himself. “Yeah, Yongie.”
Every last detail of this moment latches onto you with unbearable strength. Small wings against your thumb. Laughter ringing out from the next room. Jake. His eyes on you. His gorgeous smiling face and the tumble of butterflies in your stomach at the sight of that smiling face. Summer's hot claws sink into you, leaving their mark on your sweaty flesh. If he asks again, how twenty-two feels, you hope you can relay this to him. And you hope you can sound very platonic and normal when you do.
“Can you… would you help me put it on?”
“Of course.”
You face the windows and unstick your hair from your back. Jake's hands are warm, burning your skin as he loops the necklace around your neck and fiddles with the clasp. Time seems to slow, his breath fanning the nape of your neck. Against your ribs, your heart races. It doesn't settle even when he's done and his touch is a memory.
“There,” he whispers, the sheets rustling as he moves away.
“I love it, Jaeyun. Thank you.” You can't look at him. Not now. Not with tears stinging your eyes. Instead, you wrap your hand around the locket, warming it in your palm. The word feels small, not enough for the swell of your heart in your chest. Not enough for the tumbling in your stomach.
“Good, Yongie. I'm glad, that makes me really happy.” You can hear the smile in his voice. “I didn't put a picture in it, but if you have one in mind, I can take you to the printer and get it sorted out.”
“That would be really nice.”
For a while he says nothing. And you don't move. You don't even squint when the light shines through the glass, frying your retinas. Before you see Jake, you feel him. Feel the solid heat of his chest pressed to your back, feel his hair tickling your thigh when he cranes his neck to look up at you. In the dark, concern scrunches his eyebrows. “Are you alright?”
“Yeah, Jake. I just—” Saying the words always feels like torture, like you're being punished for your feelings. As if unrequited love isn't punishment enough. You have to swallow around the lump in your throat before you continue. “I really, really love it. I love you.”
His smile crinkles his eyes. “And I love you,” he says. Easy as ever. Because when he says it, he doesn't mean anything more than those words. Anything more than a friend loving a friend in the way they should. “More.”
You don't, you think. You couldn't. “I know,” you say instead.
When Jake rolls over, lying on his back again, you curl into his side. If you can't have him the way you want to, at least you can have him like this. Cuddling in bed despite the sticky heat, his arm around your waist, your head on his chest. Falling asleep together. As friends.
You wake up to your phone ringing on the nightstand, alone in the bed. Jake's side of the bed is still warm when you touch it, his scent tickling your nose. It's ten a.m. and your mum yells into the phone, “Happy birthday, sweet pea!”
Her voice is loud and lovely as always as you pull the phone from your ear. “Thanks, Mum,” you mumble, still adjusting your eyes to the broad daylight and bright sun beaming into the room. “Really.”
“You sound tired, are you still in bed?”
“It's ten in the morning.”
“That's practically five p.m. to you,” she points out. “Hangover?”
“Not really,” you say. “Not yet.” This morning has been gentle to your body, because you were gentle-ish last night. Tomorrow morning, however, you're not sure will be the same. Admittedly, with Jake at your side and your necklace burning hot against your skin, sleep was hard to come by.
“Where's Jake? Can you put him on the phone?”
“I don't know, I just woke up.”
Without another word, your mother hands the phone to your father who says, “Hey, love. Happy birthday!”
“Thank you, Dad.”
“Is Jake around?”
“No,” you say, and the conversation doesn’t last much longer.
Birthdays are very strange, only made stranger with each year that passes. People from all dark corners of your life creep out to greet you. Failed situationships — your fault — worming their way back into your life with an HBD! Since starting university, your messages have been relatively quiet, since you've been spending your birthdays here with everyone who you actually want to hear from.
You're on your tenth variation of, thank you, angel, when Jake opens the door. “Ugh,” he groans, looking over his bare shoulders at you. “I really hoped you'd still be asleep, I haven't even lit the candle yet.”
“Candle singular? Wow, Jaeyun. You really didn't have to. I'm honoured,” you say, though no amount of sarcasm could calm the fluttering in your stomach or cool the heat on your cheeks.
Jake's grinning when he turns around, clearly proud of himself and the stack of pancakes he's holding. Stuck into their syrupy centre is a glittery candle in the shape of a two. “Happy second birthday, Yongie!” he says, kneeling by the side of the bed.
You can't help but grin. “I'm two!”
“This was funny in my head,” he mumbles, scrunching his nose. “If you can believe it.”
“It's funny in mine too.”
He lights the candle and tells you to make a wish. Screwing your eyes, you do just that, blowing out the flame in a hurry so you can look at him again. At the lopsided curve of his pretty lips. Jake climbs back into bed beside you, making sleepy conversation while you eat your birthday pancakes—until he falls asleep anyway, keen to complete his eight hours.
Fed and watered, you wash your dishes in the sink, liking the rush of the warm water on your fingers. The repeated motion of dragging the sponge over your plate. It’s actually fun to do it, to see your progress with each swipe, to have complete control over an outcome. Now that you’re here, enjoying yourself, you tackle the surfaces too, cleaning the stove and the countertops until they sparkle, and Aeri gasps at the sight of you, running into the kitchen. She clambers over the countertop to reach you quicker, handprints left on the dark wood, but you can wipe those up later.
“No way, no way, no way!” she squeals, taking the locket in her hands to get a good look. “I hate to give credit to a man, but this is perfect, YN. I'm so happy for you.” She wraps her arms around you in a tight squeeze, unconcerned by the dripping sponge in your hand. “How did he tell you? Am I the first to find out?”
You don't even have time to process or share in her excitement before Yizhuo comes in from the garden, wet hair pulled into a knot at the top of her head. “Find out what?” she asks, pulling her blue towel tighter around her body.
“I was just about to ask.”
“He gave her the necklace,” she explains, gesturing with both arms to emphasise the the.
Pushing her sunglasses up, a flicker of recognition dances across Yizhuo's face, widening her eyes at your chest when she crosses the room. “Great news, obviously, but I'm not sure how this changes anything.” She hugs you too, kissing the side of your head. “Seeing as you were fucking in the pool last night anyway.”
“Who was fucking in the pool?” Sunghoon asks from the doorway, wet hair clinging to the harsh lines of his face. At the sight of the necklace, he smiles, jogging over to join you all, hugging you just like the girls did. “Took him long enough! Good birthday so far then?”
You pry his ginormous arms off of you, squirming to freedom and stepping away. All of them watch you with huge grins, some of the happiest faces you've ever seen, but before anyone else can come in and continue this ridiculous game of broken telephone, you set the record as straight as possible. “No one was fucking in the pool, no one told anyone anything. What the fuck are we talking about right now?”
Aeri's smile drops. “Wait, so how did you get that?”
“Jake gave it to me, which you seem to know.”
“And he didn't say… anything?” Yizhuo's eyebrows furrow.
“Not much more than, happy birthday, and, it's a dragon.”
“Oh, okay. Ignore us then.” Sunghoon clears his throat. “Pool?”
And so begins a birthday like any other, at least since you started university anyway.
You laze around the garden, day drinking lightly and snacking heavily. Taking bikini pictures for Instagram and slipping in and out of heat-induced naps until it’s time to get dressed and head out to dinner.
At the same long table in Seaside Gusto, you sit between Jake and Jay like always. You and Heeseung switch cocktails because you like each others’ better, and at Minjeong’s request, everyone goes around the table and shares something they love about you.
Tears sting your eyes, beyond touched by all the nice things they say, no matter how silly some of them are about it. Yizhuo loves your boobs and butt; Sunghoon loves your summer birthday, because there’s always something to look forward to after exams; and Jimin loves your commitment to overthinking, crediting it with solving all of her problems with no stress on her end. For Minjeong, it’s your loyalty, and Aeri says you paint her nails the best. Heeseung loves your pretty face, and Jay loves your honesty. Last to go is Jake who only stares down at his plate, his silence making your leg shake under the table—now the only quiet one in the restaurant.
Nobody says anything or makes a sound at all, save for your fork scraping parmesan around your plate. “Wow, Jaeyun, am I that bad?” you ask, and it’s supposed to be a joke but you just sound upset, pathetic.
So much so that his face softens and he shakes his head, hand resting on your bouncing knee. “Are you kidding?” His voice is soft, laced with a concern he usually reserves for when the two of you are alone.
When you don’t respond, Jake clears his throat to get everyone’s attention, taking a sip of water before speaking. “I was thinking about the right way to say this, but I guess it’ll be easier to just start talking and see where I end up, you know? Like Jay kinda.” There’s a smile on his face, handsome as ever, but he’s fidgeting with his trouser leg, scratching the side of his chair, tense even though he’s made you all laugh.
It’s been an age since you last saw him this nervous, this uncertain, so long that you’re just pleased you remember how to calm him down. You take his hand in yours, playing with his fingers the way he liked when you were younger. It takes a beat, but, sure enough, his shoulders fall and his shallow breaths level out.
“I was really shy as a kid, sensitive, so I had no friends until I met YN. She was the first person to make an effort with me, or to make me feel like I was worth the effort, I guess,” Jake says, giving your hand a squeeze.
Some twisted combination of his admission and the pressure is all it takes for your tears to spill, running hot and fast down your cheeks. That anyone could have looked at sweet little Sim Jaeyun with his missing incisors and been anything other than adoring hurts your stomach, that anyone could have made him feel less than, and for all your closeness you had no idea. Your vision blurs, the lump in your throat heavy when Jay hands you his napkin. It’s for the best that Jake doesn’t look up from your locked hands in his lap.
“Everything I know about friendship I learned from her. So what I love about you, Yongie, is that you care a lot about others, and you cared a lot about me, you know?”
Around the table, all of your friends coo and fuss over Jake until his face goes bright red. The heat in your cheeks burns with the same frenzy, spreading to coat your neck and chest. It’s only now that he looks at you, wet-eyed and smiling. Beautiful—always beautiful.
“That was perfect, Jake. You said it perfectly.”
With a brilliant smile on his face, he wraps his arm around your shoulder and leans towards you. “I really think you saved me, YN,” he says.
For dessert, the butterflies in your stomach have a giant wedge of tiramisu with a candle in it, and because your heels ache your feet, Minjeong gives you a piggy back all the way home. Curled around Aeri, you take a nap on the couch in the den and right when you blink your sleepy eyes open, everyone else is setting up the house.
Together in the en-suite, you and Jake get ready for the party you can already hear starting downstairs. Music rumbles in from all angles while he gargles mouthwash and you take your makeup off with a cotton pad. It's always fun getting ready with him, even if you take significantly longer, because he doesn't rush you. He's like Minjeong in that way, or any of the other girls, there's just something nice about doing it with someone. Sharing gossip and mascara, spitballing graft techniques and peeing in the same stall.
It’s only your life-threatening crush that makes him different.
Swiping the cotton pad over your eyes, it’s hard not to think about what he said at dinner. You’d been such similar children, bonding quickly over LEGOs and wrestling and painting your nails. It was you who showed him Rayman Origins and he who showed you Hannah Montana. It didn't matter very much that he was a boy, didn't matter at all, he was just Jake. Your friend. Your person. And how much easier it was then, to be around him. To be hugged by him, to have your hand held, without reading into it. Without wondering how long you'll be able to have him in this way before he inevitably meets someone who doesn't like how close you are. How he tucks your hair behind your ear or calls you darling.
He blocks your view of the mirror with his face, leaning in. At the sight, at his closeness, your stomach does a twirl. Splotchy red around the perimeter, a handful of freckles dotting the bridge of his nose. “What's the matter?” Jake asks.
“Nothing.” Your voice comes out softer than you'd like, hardly a mumble over the music.
His gaze flicks around your face, catching every feature before catching yours again. “Your eyes are all watery,” he says, but doesn't move out of the way so you can see in the mirror or have a try at breathing normally.
It's only when you blink that tears fall. Not a lot, but enough for him to frown. You can't even begin to explain what you're crying about, at least without giving yourself away. He cups your cheeks with his hands, thumbs wiping your tears away, and making your breath hitch.
“Hello,” you mumble, sniffling.
A smile plays at the corners of Jake's lips, giving way to a tiny curve. “Hey, YN.”
“Hi.”
“Do you wanna skip this thing? Sneak out and see the lighthouse instead?”
As tempting as his offer sounds, sitting out on the edge of the dock and eating salty fish & chips while the sun goes down, you're a little too excited for tonight to pass it up. This could be the last birthday you celebrate with all of your friends under one roof for a while now that everyone's employed. You shake your head, leaning into his touch. “I'm good, Jakey. Just really happy.”
“Good, Yongie,” he says, a bright smile covering his face. “I'm glad.”
You're not crying anymore, you weren't ever really crying — not properly anyway — but Jake doesn't let go and you don't move away. The moment stretches for longer than you're sure is fully friendly, long enough that your eyes catch his lips, long enough that you notice when his eyes catch yours. His furrowed eyebrows smooth out before raising for a split second. He's everything, the entire world and more standing right in front of you, with your face in his hands.
It occurs to you now, like this, the fundamental difference between a need and a want. You need to have these summers here with him and everyone else, to fall asleep in his arms and wake up sweat drenched on opposite ends of the bed. Need to have him by your side no matter what, in your corner. Jake. Your Jake, as he's always been and always will be. What you want though, is to lean in, to kiss him. To feel his thick bottom lip pulled between yours, to feel the soft flesh between your teeth, his tongue in your mouth and yours in his.
And as if he's read your thoughts, heard them, something changes in his face, hardens for a beat as he clears his throat and lets go of you, backs away until he hits the counter. “Fuck,” he mutters, rubbing at his hip and looking everywhere but at you. “Did you—uh, you wanna finish up by yourself?”
A salt-coated thorn pokes its way into your chest, jabbing the him-shaped wound in your heart. This chronic ache, your chronic affection, souring before your very eyes and making it easy to foster irritation towards Jake. Genuine irritation for the accent he won't let go of, and the stupid phase he had where he only let you feed him if you moved the utensil like an aeroplane. For his stupid brown hair that always dries perfectly even though he doesn't do anything with it. His eyes, his big, round eyes, and the way they get all sparkly when he's talking about something he cares about or to someone he loves. When he's talking to you.
“Not really,” you admit, though he is clearly desperate to be away from you and you from him.
A new desire for both of you. Surely. If it weren't for the knots in your stomach, you might be fascinated by it. That you've known Jake this long and are still discovering new sides to him. Prickly ones. You'd been so sure you knew him, all of him, so sure that you liked all of him. Loved.
This though — the crease of his brows, the set of his jaw, the distance — whatever it means, is quite bad. Feels quite bad. Yet, when you open your mouth to continue, it's to say, “I don't want to go downstairs on my own.”
As if nothing happened, as if he hadn't been repulsed by your closeness, he nods and sits up on the countertop with a smile. The pointy corners of his curved lips, and the crinkle of his nose and eyes, are enough to quell your irritation. More than. It's like seeing daylight, like the sun coming up on a winter morning to melt the snow. That's just how friendships are though, isn't it? How it is to have friends and to be a friend. Minor offences resolved instantly, forgiven, over nothing more than a look or a smile. Friendships are neat in that way—friendships like yours, bloated by the stench of your unrequited feelings, however? Not quite so neat. Too much has changed here already, more than what you can afford, and it's all you can do to keep things exactly as they are.
While you continue getting ready — washing your face, moisturising your legs — the two of you jump from one topic to the next and he is gracious enough not to mention your tears, or how he leapt away from you. “Has this been your best birthday yet?” Jake asks, leaning back on his palms.
“You know what, I actually think, yeah. One regret though…“ You trail off, turning your head to spray deodorant.
“Is it that we didn't order more toasted ravioli to bring home and eat later?”
“How'd you know?”
Jake is smiling when you look over at him, patting his toned stomach and sighing. “Because I'm lowkey hungry again.”
“Fuck,” you mutter, predicting that your own hunger won't take long to follow.
“Fuck is right,” he agrees solemnly, pressing his lips into a flat line.
Now that your armpits are sufficiently deodorised, you only have to get dressed and put on lip gloss. The lip gloss part is easy, of course, but you've been warring over two coverups in your head since you started packing, so you need a second opinion. Bringing your options from your suitcase, you hold them up side by side for Jake to see. “Which one's cuter?”
He purses his lips, eyes flicking from left to right. “Both of them are cute.”
“Can you not annoy me right now, please?” You sigh, resting your hands on your hips while he watches, an amused slant to his lips. “Don't be such a boy about it, Jake, pick one.”
“Try them on and let me see, darling.”
Leaving him in the bathroom to get changed by yourself, you take off your T-shirt behind the closed door and ignore how much you liked the sound of his voice when he said that. Liked the way it felt to be told what to do. You tie up your pink bikini, pull a black crochet minidress over the top of it and adjust the low-cut back in the mirror before showing him. Instead of saying anything, reacting at all really, he just sits there, his wide eyes trailing over your body.
Still, though, in the face of Jake's silence, there's no stopping the burn in your cheeks or the flutter in your stomach. “This is—uhm… you're supposed to tell me how I look.”
“Yeah, no, for sure, yeah,” he says, snapping into motion and clearing his throat. “Will you twirl for me?”
Again, you do as Jake requests, twirling as slow as possible while willing the twitching corners of your lips to stay put. Neutral. Relaxed. You know you look good, of course you do, you wouldn't have brought this dress if it didn't look good on you, if the low back didn't make your waist look smaller and your butt look bigger. Something about him though, about how he looked at you, like he thinks it too, thinks you look good is more than enough to take your breath away, so that you have to focus on breathing to do it effectively.
He's leaning forward with his arms crossed over his lap, chewing on his bottom lip. His eyes flick upward to meet yours, but he can't hold your gaze, looking up at the ceiling instead. “You look… Yeah, Yongie, nice.”
“Thank you for the glowing review,” you mutter, turning to leave, as if your heart isn't racing.
The next time you join him in the bathroom, you're wearing the white dress, and before he asks you to, you twirl for him, as slowly as you did earlier. This dress is just as short as the first, more sheer though, and the low cut is in the front instead, showing off the centre of your bikini top, your cleavage mainly. Now that you're wearing it, you might like it a bit better, preferring how your necklaces sit against your skin.
Jake's face and ears are beet red, his mouth ajar but nothing comes out. You catch a glimpse of yourself in the mirror, suddenly unsure about the pink bikini you'd bought specifically to wear tonight, and fidget with the neckline, covering your chest as much as you can. “I'd change though, if I wore this,” you say, smoothing it over your hips. “Like white bikini instead, I think it'd look better at the front.”
His eyes fall to your chest, to the locket, and then lower, stuck on the pink fabric, on your boobs. He gulps but he can't look away, doesn't even try. “I think you should wear that one, wear it exactly like that, with the pink.”
“Yeah?”
Jake nods, clears his throat. “You really are a dream, YN. I meant it when I said it.”
Neither of you says anything about that, or the way his hands shake while he takes pictures of you and adjusts your poses. It's basically forgotten about by the time he leads the way to the party, humming along to Minjeong's playlist and holding onto your hand. Despite this, your coming downstairs together, you lose him to the crowd quite quickly. The first hour of your night is mostly just hugging people and accepting snacks from paper plates while having the same conversation five hundred times—how have you been? Great! What are you up to these days? Not much. Having a good birthday? The best! Your necklace is so pretty! Thank you, it's from Jake. Aw, you two are so cute! Haha… yeah.
You pose for pictures and receive tall, sparkly gift bags of wine or vodka that you leave on the kitchen counter and garden table so everyone can help themselves. With Nishimura Riki, you have two Jimin-issued shots, bringing your total up to eight out of twenty-two. To Huh Yunjin, you put in a good word for Jay, talking him up like he's the second coming of Christ or the best thing since Compeed blister patches—like he's Jake, basically. And it's over Yang Jungwon's broad shoulder that you finally reenter the garden for good, while you kick and scream, begging not to be flung into the pool while he laughs maniacally.
“I thought you liked swimming!” he calls out, as if you are ten metres away, while approaching the water.
Trying to reason with Jungwon is like trying to reason with a crazy person—you are mostly certain Jungwon is a crazy person. It's for that reason that you screw your eyes shut and brace yourself, though the touch of the water never comes. Instead, it's warm linen on your skin when he drops you. It's Jake at your side on the garden couch when you open your eyes.
He's laughing and it's the best thing you've ever heard. “You should've seen your face,” he says through his cackles. “Fuck, Yongie. That was great.”
All you can do is close your eyes and enjoy the sun, enjoy the sounds of your friends enjoying themselves and the music and the chatter, the splashing in the water. The heat of his skin through your dress, the weight of his arm around your shoulders. Literally anything other than Jake's annoying laugh. It's only when he stops that you open your eyes again and he's staring with his lips parted, his eyebrows pulled together just a little. Your smile is involuntary, immediate, and he looks away as fast as he can, ears burning red.
Jake doesn't look at you until he's cleared his throat. “Food time,” he says, and lifts the most brilliant plate you've ever seen from the other side of him. It's heaped like a buffet plate with all your favourites. Gimbap, pizza, fried chicken, and chips with cheese on top.
You lick your lips despite yourself. “That looks so good,” you groan, far too lazy to get up for your own.
“It's yours.”
“Really?”
Smiling Jake nods his head and you kiss him on the cheek, mumbling, thank you, into his skin before turning your attention to the plate. You take a bite of everything before starting on the chips. Melted cheddar nearly burns the roof of your mouth, but still, undeterred, you chew on, having worked up quite the appetite with all of your socialising. At your side, Jake twirls the end of your ponytail around his finger and explains the inner workings of the Doki Doki Literature Club roleplay Discord server that Jaehyun and Yunjin crossed paths on.
“It was also like seven years ago,” he points out. “I can't even tell you what I was doing online at age fourteen.”
“Oh, you were looking up how to kiss on my laptop and actually fainting when my mum brought it up at dinner,” you supply since he asked, laughing despite yourself because even after all these years, the image of him crying at the table then passing out still cracks you up.
Jake, however, not so much. You're the only one who finds it funny, this secret you've decided to die with, this secret he continues to deny. A disbelieving scoff comes from him, eyebrows touching his hairline. “I'm telling you, YN, that was not me.”
“Yeah and it wasn't me either, so who does that leave?”
“I don't know, Yongie, it must've been a ghost or something.” Jake shrugs, affronted, like always, by your longstanding, well-founded accusation. He was the only other person who knew that your password was JaeyunFan1511, because he was the one who set it to that. “Do you believe in those?”
“Sure.”
“Anyway…“ And he continues, ignoring your laughter. As the story goes, Jaehyun and Yunjin had been in a locked roleplay channel with a couple of others before exchanging social media and learning they lived relatively close to each other. Their friendship fizzled out after a few months, but when they bumped into each other at a uni party last summer, they hit it off and got together. “But he was still in the server, and he had an RP girlfriend! He had two! And neither of them were Yunjin.”
Setting your slice of pizza down, you look over at him, parsing his face for any indication that he's taking the piss. “Are you, like, trying to be funny?”
“I wish, Yongie.” Jake shakes his head. “That's everything I know, I haven't talked to him since he told me.”
You sigh, leaning further into him. “Onto better things at least, for her, now that the coast is clear for Jay.”
“Mm, I'll have to wingman that tonight.”
“I already started.”
Jake's lips curl upwards. “Are you having fun though, darling? I'd say I'm doing a pretty good job of letting you keep all your thunder, right?”
With a mouth full of gimbap you nod your head, chewing a little more before mumbling, “Yes to both.”
He chuckles when he looks at you, wiping the corner of your mouth with his thumb, which is obviously fine and doesn't set off a flutter in your stomach or a hot flush in your cheeks. He smells faintly of sunscreen and chlorine, water dripping sporadically from his pool-darkened hair. It's cold when it hits your thigh, a nice contrast to the heat by your knee, where your sweaty bare skin touches his.
As if she'd been watching you this whole time, just waiting for you to finish eating, Minjeong snatches you from the couch as soon as you're done and drags you over to the big long table where she covers your eyes with her hands. There's a lot of shuffling and mumbling before the entire garden erupts into a disjointed chorus of Happy Birthday, and when Minjeong uncovers your eyes, Jake is holding your cake in front of you, chest and neck glowing orange from the lit candles. He's the only thing you can see. The only thing that matters.
“Make a wish, Yongie,” he says, and his voice is so gentle there's a sting behind your eyes as you screw them shut.
Making the same wish as this morning, and all of your birthdays since your tenth, you blow out the candles and wish for Jake.
After the cake and all the pictures, the energy doesn't seem to deplete. If anything, the music gets louder, your friends getting rowdier. About an hour later, in the bathroom upstairs, you take a minute to yourself, recharging before stepping carefully over and around the people talking and making out on the staircase. You're halfway down when the front door swings open and Sunoo walks in.
Caution to the wind, you sprint towards him and into his arms, giggling when he lifts you up off your feet. “Hola, señor, welcome back,” you mumble into his collarbone. Pulling away, you take a beat just to look at him. It's only been a month since you all visited him in Barcelona for his birthday, but it feels like an age has passed by without the sweet smiling scrunch of his nose and eyes. Without the lemon tang of his cologne or the warm sound of his laugh. The group is complete at long last, your birthday really beginning now at half eleven at night.
His eyes are big and wet when he opens them. “Happy birthday, sweetheart,” he says, sounding just as moved as you. “Fuck, I thought I was gonna miss it.”
You lug Sunoo's suitcase up to the room he and Heeseung always share and help him unpack. “I wanna hear everything,” you squeal, plugging his charger into the socket by his bed.
“No way, tonight's all about you! And I can't believe you didn't tell me Jake finally gave you that necklace.” He reaches out to look at it, brushing over the baby dragon with his thumb. “It's even better than the pictures.”
You roll your eyes but can't stop the smile on your lips. “Jeez, not you too. It only happened last night.”
Sunoo pulls two bottles of Spanish wine from his suitcase and sets them down on the dresser next to Heeseung's aftershave. “Look, I'm just glad it happened at all. Now it's your problem instead of ours.”
“What’s my problem?”
“Jake’s whole I'm in love with Yongie thing,” he says, delighted by his own bad Australian accent. “I mean, it was sweet, obviously, but it gets to a point, you know. Did you freak when he showed up yesterday?”
It does not feel as good as you thought it might to hear that. It actually does not feel good at all. So much so that if it weren't so surprising, you'd have glossed over it, pivoted to something else. Asked how to say, excuse me, Sunoo, what the fuck? in Spanish or something. But it is, to you, extremely surprising, so you say, “Jake's what?”
And Sunoo's eyebrows pinch together, his head tilting. “He’s been saying he was gonna confess with that necklace for as long as I've known him. Is that not what happened last night?” Now that you're looking at him, really looking at him, you see that his hair is shorter than it was last month, by quite a lot actually, so it doesn't flop over like it would normally. Weird.
Weird that you didn't notice, not that he cut it, it looks good. Suits him. “I like your haircut.”
“Thank you?”
“I have to go.”
Sunoo bursts out laughing, bewildered. “If you say so. Talk later, Mrs. Sim!”
In the safety of your bedroom, alone with your swirling thoughts, you pace back and forth, stepping around your open suitcase and the mess of clothes within instead of moving it to the side. It might be nice to organise though, to complete a task you have full control over. Logically, you know you don't have time to do it, but physically, before you can help it, you're kneeling on the hardwood floor emptying out your bag to repack. You fold up your underwear, rolling it neatly to fit in the zipper compartment with your socks. Swimming costumes are next, bikinis and one-pieces separated. Then it's tops, skirts, shorts, and dresses. And lastly, the black coverup from earlier.
It doesn't take as long as you thought it would, tidying up, nor do you feel any better, so you unpack again and do it twice more. Zipping up your now colour-coordinated suitcase, you wheel it into the corner of the room where Jake's is, so it doesn't get in your way. This time when you pace, you clutch your locket. Jake's locket, technically, if the years he spent holding onto it mean more than the night and day you've had it. Quicker and quicker, you pace the room, but your thoughts won't break, you can't get through to them, not properly.
Jake, AKA Mr. Change Isn’t All Bad, wavering in the face of his own ideology while expecting you to take it on board, to trust him. Is he a hypocrite for keeping this secret? Are you? Obviously he was going to tell you at some point, to confess, the locket is proof of that. Proof that a day would eventually arrive when all of this would come from Jake. A day he imagined could have been on this trip. This week. Between yesterday and Wednesday. Any day since he got the locket.
If change is good, if it can be good, why did he keep this from you?
At the sound of the door opening, you halt in your tracks, startled to find Jake standing in the arch behind you when you turn around. “Good evening, milady. Hath the night treateth thee well?” he asks, stepping into the room and greeting you with a deep formal bow. Light from the dock sweeps in through the window, showing off the grin on his face.
You can't bring yourself to share in his amusement, and you know it's bad when the clear sound of his giggles doesn't summon the same giddy butterflies it normally does. For once, his smile does nothing to move you, to settle your nerves. If anything, his smile scares you, makes you feel worse. That he could be so happy with the way things are, so unwilling to change, even for the better, makes you feel a bit sick. It hurts your throat to swallow, to say the words, we need to talk, when you blurt them out.
In the light once more, his smile falls and his eyebrows rise. “Sure,” he says. “Can I pee first?”
“No.”
“Okay, so I wasn't actually asking, YN. Obviously I'm gonna pee if I need to.”
“I'm coming with you.”
Jake lets out an amused breath. “Come on then.” With each step he takes towards the bathroom, the floorboards creak under foot—they do the same when you follow.
Against the locked door, you play with the hem of your dress, folding it up and up and up until your stomach is out before letting it go, the stretched cotton unravelling to graze your thighs again, before repeating the action. Your thoughts are scrambled, zipping by too quickly for you to get a proper hold on any of them, at least for long enough to figure it out. His feelings and yours, deep enough to discuss and share with others, to wish and complain, say, finally, in the face of the smallest hints of reciprocation, yet kept from each other and for all this time, behind closed mouths that begged to be fed. Closed mouths that still beg. You and Jake, and Jake and you, watching and waiting for divine intervention, some act of God or His blessed hand, of Sunoo as it turned out.
The toilet seat hits the lid and the rustle of fabric follows—his swimming trunks. You can't stop your wanting gaze quick enough, looking from your thighs to glimpse the untanned skin of his hips, his thighs and his small ass for longer than necessary, feeling your heart rate quicken before you screw your eyes shut and his pee hits the toilet water.
There's nothing weird about this. Mostly. You've peed in front of all of your friends. It's just that now that you're here, with him, this doesn't really feel like the right time to say everything you need to say, to get everything that's been weighing you down all these years off your chest. This definitely could have waited, at least for a moment where he wasn't standing with his soft dick in his hands. You're good at waiting after all, it's par for the course in your situation, though Jake hasn't quite taken to patience yet.
“Yongie?” he says, for what you're realising is the second time.
The toilet flushes.
“Huh?”
“What's the matter?” Jake asks. He's at the sink when you open your eyes, spots along the edges of your vision, along the edges of him. It takes a second for him to come into focus, his face flushed more than earlier with a worried look cast across it. Thick eyebrows drawn together, squinting eyes searching face. “You look terrified.”
You can only laugh then, pressing yourself against the door, because that's exactly how you feel too. Turning stomach and racing heart. Palms slick with sweat. Under Jake's gaze, you wipe your hands on your dress and give a smile that feels about right. “No, not at all—” You clear your throat, shaking your head. “—Sunoo's here.”
His face breaks out into a grin as he turns to the mirror, soap suds forming on his skin. “Fuck,” he says. “Finally!”
“Yeah, no, exactly. It's just that he said something really weird about you.”
And even weirder than Sunoo's words, is Jake's reaction. How his smile falls, and his body goes completely still for the fastest second—you'd have missed it if you blinked. “What'd he say?” he asks, clearing his throat afterwards then clearing it again.
“It was about us, I guess. That you… He said that you love me, Jaeyun.”
“Ah.” He lets out a breath, shoulders falling, seeming relieved. “Obviously I love you. And I love Layla, and Minjeong, and Jay, and everyone else.”
“Mm, obviously. Uh, the way he said it though, how he put it, it was like you might love me the way I love you.”
His eyebrows raise for a split second. “Oh, yeah? And what way is that?”
“More than I should,” you admit quietly and as scared as you are, it feels nice to say it. To get it off your chest.
If Jake heard you, or registered what you said, cared even, he gives no indication, only turning off the tap and shaking his wet hands over the sink. It would hurt less if he'd thrown up or said, ew, or, yuck, out loud. If he'd laughed. Anything but silence, anything but the way he approaches you only to dry his hands on the plush white towel by the door. It is unbearable to stand here in this, the aftermath, with Jake watching you from hardly an arm's length away. Still, you can't bring yourself to leave, hostage to your feelings and his reaction — or lack thereof — to them. You know now, just how much you love him, because the only thing you want to do is hide your face in his chest, to feel the beat of his heart against your cheek.
When he finally speaks, it's to say, “More than you should?”
You can only nod.
“Would that be okay with you, Yongie?” Jake asks, and the softness of his voice betrays his worry, the depth of his concern. He tucks your hair behind your ear, his hand trembling against your skin. A spark at the contact. “If I loved you like that, I mean? More than I should?”
“Yeah.”
A smile tugs at the corners of his lips, but he doesn't give in. Doesn't take his hand from your cheek or take his eyes off yours. “Are you sure? Because you look pretty upset about it.”
“It just, it scares me a bit,” you tell him, and it's the understatement of the century. If his eyes fell even slightly, he'd see your heart beating out of your chest, begging to be held in his hands, to be looked after by him, like always.
“That's okay.” Jake bites his bottom lip, watching you for a beat longer before taking your hand in his. He brings your palm to his bare chest, pressing it against his warm skin, right over his heart as it races away just like yours. “See, Yongie? It scares me too, a lot.”
He's trying, trying hard, laying himself bare, his literal heart in the palm of your hand, but it is not a comfort. For as long as you've known him, he's only had two real fears, needles and roller coasters, the only two things on earth he can't be pressured into. Otherwise, he spends a lot of time tempering your fears, weathering your storms for you — at least in the moment — dismantling them in a matter of sentences, but this, his honesty, Jake at his most vulnerable, is only scaring you even more.
You're being unfair. You know you're being unfair. Jake is gentle and accommodating and patient, and if you, for all of your flaws, are allowed to be scared, then so is he. You gulp and gulp again, trying to talk yourself down the way he usually does. And if anything, him opening up to you like this, showing this to you, can only be a good thing. He trusts you, he still trusts you, so things haven't changed that much.
Not yet.
“I know it's not what you want to hear, and I can't promise it'd be perfect or even easy, but I can promise that I'm always going to love you,” he admits, his voice so gentle and so sure. “I always have, YN.”
Like they tend to do, his words sink into you, that sweet look in his brown eyes taking over until you feel it too. Feel his certainty as if it's your own, his earnestness. The great rise and fall of his chest as he breathes intentionally, holding a deep inhale before releasing it. Over and over until his heart steadies itself, slowly but surely—the more you watch, the more you feel your heart doing the same thing. Feel the fear subsiding, feel butterflies swirling in the pit of your stomach, feel a smile breaking free.
“Always?” you ask as excitement takes its first breaths within you.
Finally, he caves too, letting a smile curve over his pink lips, a breathy laugh coming out as he nods his head. “I think so, but I only realised when you gave up on our pact,” he says. “I thought I was crazy, slicing my finger open like that just because you asked. And even while I was bleeding out, halfway to death, I wasn't mad you bailed on me, I was just happy to be with you.”
It's hard not to laugh hearing that, at the memory. After he'd done it, he lifted his hand to show you the tiny dot of red on the tip of his middle finger where he'd pricked himself with a safety pin, and flashed you a nervous smile, braces peeking out between his lips. The sight of it, of him, your wounded Jaeyunie, moved you to tears. Great full-bodied sobs that definitely would have alarmed his parents had they been home, or his older brother if he wasn't too busy yelling at his TV screen over a game of FIFA Street. You were beside yourself, apologising profusely because you just couldn't do it, not only would it hurt, but it was extremely unhygienic and do you know how many blood-borne diseases there are out there, Jaeyun?
And just like he said, he didn't get mad or even upset, he simply bandaged his finger and took you into his arms, stroking your hair until you calmed down.
“I think I was too busy trying to hide how I felt to notice that you felt the same,” you admit, in awe of the fact that while your heart had been secretly beating in his direction, his was doing the same in yours. In awe of the fact that right now, you can feel his heart racing again.
“Been a while since then though,” Jake points out, only continuing when you agree. “So I guess things won't change too much between us, right? Since we've loved each other this long, it'll be the same, don't you think?”
Sometimes it feels as if he holds the key to more than just your heart, but to the anxious muddle of your brain as well, so that he always knows what to say to nip your fears in their buds. And has the patience to do it all over again, reassuring you as best he can when they rear their ugly heads once more.
“Actually, I think there's one thing we could change,” he adds.
Tilting your head, you're pleased to find that the idea of something changing sparks curiosity rather than dread. “What is it?”
“We could, like…“ Jake has to stop to giggle, covering his mouth with his hand as he tries to calm down. “Like, kiss, you know?”
“I'd like that, but I think we could do a lot more than just kiss,” you suggest, and it's all it takes for him to cut the laughter.
Effective immediately—every last trace of amusement gone like it was never there in the first place, simply imagined. Replaced by his teeth biting down on his bottom lip and turning the pink white under the pressure. There's something there, to the look on his face, like his gears are turning slower and slower, overheated and lust-laden as yours at the sight of him. Jake's eyes trail every inch of your body, catching on your curves through your sheer cover-up, bright pink bikini beaming through white cotton. His palms scorch your waist when he takes hold of you, his tongue darting out to wet his lips. “Like what, gorgeous? Had some ideas myself, but I wanna compare notes with you.”
Butterflies, heat and awful, awful thoughts descend on you like a sudden shower. Your legs hooked over his shoulders, his teeth in your neck, grazing and biting, his pretty face all screwed up before his jaw falls slack; whimpers and whines and grunts and moans; his thrusts getting quicker, sloppy, until he comes, without a condom obviously. The ease with which you can conjure the thoughts, the clarity of the image and its familiarity is humiliating, that they've occurred to you on many a night spent with your hand between your thighs.
For fear of him seeing your thoughts written all over your face, you bury it in his chest and screw your eyes shut. “Don't be so untoward,” you mumble into his skin, liking the faint nip of salt on your lips when you lick them.
“You were untoward first,” he points out and you can hear his smile in his voice. “You're so hot, Yongie, don't be shy.”
When you muster up the courage to look at him, the pretty red kiss of alcohol and sunburn on his cheeks makes you smile, lips quirking into a giddy, horny curve. In his eyes though, where there had been heat, deep desire, there's only softness. A gaze that is so startling in its tenderness, in its pure love, that it makes your breath hitch in your throat before you ask, “What is it?”
“You love me,” he says reverently, as if he's informing you or he's only processed it now, taken it in.
“And you love me.”
Jake smiles, giving you a firm nod. “Yes, ma'am,” he says, leaning in to finally — finally — close the gap between your mouth and his.
Your mind blanks completely at the feel of it, of his plump lips on yours. A gentle brush at first, like he's testing the waters, like he doesn't know you're utterly gone for him. He licks slowly along the seam of your lips before you open up to him, and then, suddenly, it's everything. It's the taste of the beers he's had to drink tonight, the slip of his tongue over yours, of his damp hair through your fingers. A decade's worth of want, for him, for this, unfolding and collapsing in and around you.
There's no telling where your mouth ends and his begins, no discernment between bumping teeth and smiling lips, nor the shallow breaths exchanged from one to other. Your bodies are as close as they could possibly be, your Jake warm and solid and so in love against you, no room for anything to get between you. Not even his dick that presses thick and hard into you, long, more so than you'd ever realised.
At the first roll of your hips against his, Jake's grip on your waist tightens, a needy groan rumbling through his chest and into yours as he grinds back even harder. A lick of heat sets your body alight, taking over, so that before you even register it, you're pushing his hands lower, down over the curve of your ass. Moaning at the feeling of his greedy palms slipping under your dress, under your bikini bottoms to grab at your bare skin, to squeeze, to smack.
“Fuck,” he mumbles, the word hot against your mouth. “You're perfect, you know that?”
From your lips to his, a breathy laugh passes, an endless flutter going off in your stomach.
“I'm serious, YN.”
“Good.”
Jake smiles, that boyish grin that's never really changed, that's always had the same effect, always makes you smile too. But it doesn't stick around for long, as his focus seems to shift instead towards rocking his hips with yours. The pace he sets, enforces, is maddening, slow enough for you to feel every last inch of him on you, and with dizzying clarity, how he throbs and twitches. Yet, you miss him for the split second he pulls back before he's on you again. You're not sure you'll ever have enough, no matter how much he gives you, you probably won't be fully satisfied until you can peel his skin off and wear it over yours. For now though, you won't pretend there isn't a pool in your bikini, hot and sticky desire gathering between your legs. He presses wet kisses to your cheek, trailing down your neck and latching onto the sensitive spot that makes you weak in the knees, a shiver rolling down your spine as he holds you tighter.
On an exhale, you cry out his name, head against the door, nails sinking into his biceps. With his head on your shoulder, he lets out a jagged breath, his hips stuttering to a halt. “Fuck,” he whispers. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.”
“You did not,” you mumble, amazed by him, by the new heat coming from his swimming trunks and how you somehow want him even more.
It takes a moment for him to catch his breath, never mind speak, but finally, he says, “I did, Yongie. I promise I'm not usually so fast.” He almost sounds distraught, humming when you stroke his hair, scratching at his scalp with your fingernails.
“My sweet baby.” You can't stop yourself from smiling, from asking to see.
“I'm soft and I know it looks disgusting in there. Need a shower, YN.”
“I don't mind.”
He chuckles, lifting his head to peck your lips. “Go ahead, but don't say I didn't warn you.”
It's probably only because he's Jake, and you love him, that the sight doesn't repulse you when you pull back his waistband and take a look inside. Strings of cum connect the fabric to his soft penis and dark pubic hair. He groans at it, turning his head, but you can't look away. “Can I taste it?”
“Sure, Yongie, do what you want.”
What you want is to suck him off, so while Jake covers his eyes with his hands, you get down on your knees and take his dick into your mouth. It's warm and bland mostly, save for the slight salty tang hitting your tongue.
“YN,” he whispers. “What are you—shit.”
You pull off, stroking him with your hand and liking the heat of it as his tip starts to flush, the soft pink turning richer, redder. “I've never tasted it before, and you said I could,” you explain simply, eager to continue, to sate the pulse between your thighs.
“Yeah, but I…” Jake blinks hard before looking down at you. He's very handsome like this, with the sheen of sweat on his skin, shining under the bathroom lights. The thick length of his neck is flushed too, his ears. Your heart stutters against your ribs, your cheeks heating up as he bites down on his bottom lip and sighs. “You wanna suck me off, darling?”
Instead of answering with a simple, yes, you answer with a kiss to his tip, tonguing tonguing his slit while working your hands over the rest of him. It might be pretty if it weren't so big.
“Always so gorgeous, aren't you? Doesn't matter what you're doing,” he mumbles, pushing your hair away from your face with a soft smile. “It's yours, baby, take it all, yeah? Know you can.”
Desperate to please him, to have him in every single way, you open your mouth as wide as you can to take him in, relishing the weight of him, fully hard, on your tongue, the sting of your stretched lips at the corners. It's all you want, all that matters, to keep hearing those sweet little sounds, soft murmurs of your name along with praise. To see the look on his face, disbelief written all over it. Clear in the knit of his brows, his eyes wide for as long as he can keep them open, his swollen lips stuck ajar. It's getting to you, how much he seems to like it, like that you're the one doing it, so much that you can't help but press your thighs together as you bob your head, chasing friction, pressure.
His hips stutter whenever your tongue flicks at the underside of his head, making him grunt. “Just like that, YN, fuck. You know exactly what I like,” he tells you, fingers getting lost in your hair, guiding you back and forth along the length of him, rougher than he seems to realise. “Think this pretty little mouth was made just for me.” Whether Jake means it or it's just horny rambling, it makes your heart race anyway, because you think the same, think it so deeply, so entirely, you feel yourself clenching around nothing.
And when he comes for the second time it's with his tip at the back of your throat and your name on the tip of his tongue. Muttered curses spill out of him as you keep sucking anyway, paying no mind to the hot drops of his release slipping onto your chest and thighs. All the while, you tongue at his slit so he whines, whimpers, and throws his head back, until he can't take it any longer, pulling out. Falling to his knees. You can't resist him, wiping his cum from your skin and sucking your fingers clean. Sucking on his thumb when he strokes your cheek. Leaning in and taking his bottom lip between yours to suck on that too.
“So good, baby,” he mumbles, breathless. “Way too good.”
The heat in your stomach doesn't subside, if anything, it spreads. Especially with the way he looks down at you, his eyes boring into yours, warm pools of deep brown and all the love in the world. “I love you, Jake“ you say, and it feels like the first time. Fresh and exciting and giggle inducing. It is the first time, technically, saying it in this way, for him to hear and understand exactly how you mean it. “I really love you so much.”
“I love you so much too,” Jake says, and it's so much better to hear it from him. He pecks your lips, smiling when you lick into his mouth. “And I'm sorry about earlier, didn't mean to push you like that, yeah?”
A chance for both of you to catch your breath, to calm down, only comes when he gets into the shower. You brush your teeth, liking the dull ache in your jaw and the raw feeling in your throat, skin glowy and radiant after you wash your face. On cloud nine, you sit on the end of the bed to wait for Jake, but you can't sit still. Leg bouncing frantically while you drum your hands against your bare thighs. Restless, you get up and once again, pace the length of the room, this time with a grin you can't control playing on your lips. This surplus energy comes in handy though, because when Jake joins you in the bedroom, he wastes no time getting his head between your thighs and evening the score.
Now that you and Jake have kissed once, a few times — a hundred — it’s impossible to stop. And each time is better than the last. First thing in the morning, you share giddy kisses in bed. And again right after brushing your teeth. Alone in the kitchen, you kiss against the countertop. And again by the pool after he swims four laps to impress you.
His arms flex to show his muscles as he lifts himself out of the water, droplets running down his skin, racing through the dip in his chest, his abs. He’s already starting to tan, a clean line around his hips where the golden skin turns lighter under his shorts. Just the sight of it, the memory of it and everything else you saw last night, heats your skin, tugs your lips up at the corners. Jake straightens his waistband before extending a huge hand to help you up from the concrete, pulling you into him and pressing his lips to yours again and again. He giggles into your mouth, palms holding your hips to his. It’s hard to kiss like this, with both of you grinning against each other’s lips, but you don’t stop trying.
“I. Love. You,” he says between pecks. “So. So. Much.”
You will never tire of hearing him say that, even though it’s the other thing you can’t stop doing now that you’ve done it once. It comes out at every opportunity, for Jake at least, you’ve been having fun teasing him, verbally opposing the flush in your cheeks and the grin on your face. “I. Know. You. Do.”
Unimpressed, he pulls away to look down at you, and seeming to notice your squinting eyes, he turns you around so the sun heats your back and his chest instead of your face. Now that you can see him properly, you can see that his smiling lips are covered in lip gloss. Most of his face is covered in it, shiny pink on his chin and cheeks, the tip of his nose. “Say it back,” he mumbles into your palm while you clean him up, though it’s no use, because you press your lips right back to his.
“It. Back.”
“Not. Funny.”
You pull away, playing with the wet hair at the nape of his neck, twirling the longer tufts of it around your fingers. “Why are we laughing then?” you ask, struggling to stop.
Jake’s eyes and nose are scrunched, happy creases all over his face. “Because it’s funny watching you play hard to get after last night,” he whispers, and the uneven slant of his lips undoes you. “You’re a very bad actor, Yongie.”
Unfortunately, he’s got you there. It was like he’d hypnotised you, cast a spell so that the only things you could say were his name, and I love you. Every single time he touched you made it worse, each stroke of his tongue or brush of his fingers had you reeling, his name hardly more than a desperate cry or a sob—never mind the sight of him kneeling between your legs breathing heavily, his lips and chin covered in you.
Completely defenceless, shameless maybe, you pull the only card you can. “Yeah, well, you’re hard.”
“Your. Fault.” He pushes your hips back so you can’t feel him pressed against you. “Love. You. Too. Much.”
The smile that curves your lips is reflexive, a knee-jerk reaction just like the butterflies in your stomach. “I. Love. You. More.” Flustered and giddy and giggling, you run away from him and all the way up to Minjeong’s room, flinging the door open.
She’s laying on her beautiful four-poster bed, scribbling into her diary, but she abandons it at the sight of you. “Holy shit!” she says, covering her mouth. “You had sex last night.”
You let the door swing shut behind you, biting your lip to stifle a smile. “I wish.”
“Those words don’t match your afterglow.”
“It’s thirty degrees, MJ. I’m sweating.” You roll your eyes, climbing into the bed next to her. “And there’s no such thing as an afterglow when you kiss someone—we would’ve heard about that by now. Although he did finish in his shorts, so I guess we did hook up.”
Minjeong’s eyes are like saucers. “Jake what? Just from kissing?”
“Kissing?” Yizhuo asks from the doorway. “You kissed Jake?”
“They’ve been kissing all morning, I could see them from my window,” Aeri supplies, slipping past Yizhuo and into the room. It’s just like yesterday in the kitchen, except the telephone is working perfectly. “It was gross, in a cute way, I guess.”
“And he came in his shorts!” Minjeong squeals, kicking her feet.
This development, revelation, has Aeri and Yizhuo’s jaws on the floor, gasping as they rush over to the bed and leap onto the duvet in front of you. Having had your first and last sexual experiences during the summer before university, you’ve never had a story to share during debriefs, always in the listener’s shoes eager to hear more.
Spurred on by the thrill of evoking this reaction, you can’t help but say, “Then he came in my mouth!”
Clearly as delighted as you, the girls break out into giggles and applause, nudging each other and hugging you, smiling from ear to ear. Your heart is racing in your chest, the smile on your face aching your cheeks, as they set off in a chorus of oh my gods and finallys. Maybe in the grand scheme of things — at least in your group — a blowjob was hardly anything to write home about, hardly anything to warrant more than a hum or a nod or a what else, but your having given one, and having given one to Jake, made the very admission seem like some kind of generational disclosure, some unique foray into sexual exploration. Made you something of a pioneer, an innovator even.
Like air from a popped balloon, the story launches out of you, from picking your coverup and eating on the couch, to Sunoo’s slip-up and watching Jake pee, absolutely no detail is spared. Especially not when it comes to the feeling of Jake’s head between your legs. The whole time, your cheeks burn furiously and all of your words come out a mile a minute so you have to take a deep breath at the end, the girls watching you with varying levels of shock painted on their faces.
It’s Minjeong who speaks first, tilting her head. “So he’s just as pathetic as he looks? That’s really hot, like, I’m sorry but he’s extremely hot.”
“Right?” Aeri nods.
“I wouldn’t have thought to use that word…” You trail off. In theory, it seems a harsh thing to say, pathetic, but the more you think about it, the more objectively true it becomes. His little moans and whimpers, how easily he got hard in his shorts, how easily he finished. Pathetic. Maybe he is a little, but you like it, love it, feel a shiver down your spine at the thought. “It was sweet in the moment, how I said his name and he just fell apart, but yeah, I guess you’re right.”
Yizhuo sighs, shaking her head. Her cheeks and neck are flushed red. “I’ve never looked at him like that, but… I understand you so much better now, YN. You guys are freaky as fuck, I have to respect it. And I’m a thousand percent sure Sunoo did that on purpose.”
You hadn’t considered that, but it was the exact sort of thing he would do, losing his patience faster than the rest of you and taking matters into his own hands. After all, you and Jake had waited years, and it only took Sunoo a handful of minutes to confess on his behalf. There was no reason to wonder though, it was just as likely he’d gotten the same idea as everyone else had in the kitchen, and sharing your thinking, Aeri says, “I think he just saw the locket and thought the same as we all did.”
“Uh uh.” Minjeong shakes her head, lifting her phone to show you the screen. It’s her text thread with him.
Minjeong: Jake gave her the necklace and didn’t say anything, he’s so fucking stupid. They’re just gonna be friends forever atp all bc he thinks he’ll scare her off
Sunoo: LMAOOOOO poor guy has rocks for brains BUT not completely doomed he just needs our help
Sunoo: *MY help
“That’s a little mean,” you mumble half-heartedly. “It was me being stupid.”
Yizhuo pinches the bridge of her nose. “If you and Jake kissing means we have to be nice to him all the time, I’m voting against this relationship.”
“Yizh—”
“All in favour of JakeYN breaking up right now, say, aye.”
Right in front of you, all of the girls raise their hands and from the doorway, Jimin gawks at you. “JakeYN doing what?”
“Well, we’re not even really…” You trail off, only realising now that you didn’t exactly put a word on what the two of you are. “Together in the official sense.”
Yizhuo sighs. “Oh, Lord.”
For Jimin’s sake — and yours — you tell the story again from top to bottom, while Aeri, Minjeong, and Yizhuo listen again, just as eager and nosey as the first time, oohing and ahhing at all the same parts. Jimin has a lot more questions than they did though—is he big? Yes, Jimin. Thick? Yes, Jimin. He looks like he’d whimper, does he whimper? Yes, Jimin.
With everyone caught up to speed, you rush to your room — relieved to find it empty — and bring your suitcase into Minjeong’s so the girls can help you pick out something to wear to the beach. Luckily, it’s perfectly organised, with all of your swimming costumes neatly rolled up next to your underwear so you don’t have to take everything out to find all of them. At the end of the bed, you stand in a row appraising the spread of your swimwear.
“I think you need to wear the world’s tiniest bikini, so these are out,” Jimin says first, taking all of your one pieces and rolling them back up the way you had them packed. Whether or not she receives the mental thanks you extend her way is anyone’s guess.
“Your ass looks best in this one.” Yizhuo lifts the blue bikini you wore on Saturday night.
Aeri rebuts with a strappy black bikini in her hand. “Your boobs look better in this one though.”
“No, that’s your Instagram bikini,” Minjeong says, shaking her head. “You can’t do anything if you wear that.”
“I guess I could take pictures for Instagram,” you point out, not really caring which bikini they pick, obviously you like them all or you wouldn’t have brought them. The main reason you’re even letting this decision spiral into such a big thing is that you’re having fun with the girls, having fun feeling fully like you’re part of them, one of them. Mostly, your attachment to Jake is harmless, but it comes at the expense of this sometimes.
With her arms around your waist and her chin on your shoulder, Jimin speaks right into your ear, making you squirm. “Or Jake could take pictures,” she sing-songs, and you can picture the waggle of her eyebrows. “Wear the black one, YN, he’ll like it. And I’ll like it if he doesn’t.”
Heeding her advice, you take the black two piece from Aeri. “He’ll definitely like it, he’s a boob guy for sure.”
“I think he’s a you guy,” Minjeong says, gathering up your swimming costumes and packing them away. “What do you mean for sure?”
A pang of heat burns your skin, flooding your cheeks. You can’t even look at her — or any of the girls — eyes darting to the pastel pink painted wall on the other side of the room. The white trim and sheer white curtains. Fanning your face, you finally say, “He was all over them basically, like, in bed.”
From Minjeong’s vanity, Aeri scoffs, spinning around in the fluffy desk chair to glare at you. “For a story you told in grave detail, it seems like you missed out a lot of details.”
“You know what they say.” You shrug, feigning nonchalant like you’re not grinning from ear to ear. “A true gentleman doesn’t kiss and tell, ladies.”
“Okay, so you’re obviously not a true gentleman considering you described the exact movement of his tongue on your cl—” You cut Jimin off with your hand over her mouth.
“Jesus,” you mumble. “I was there, alright? I get it.”
As you’d expect for two p.m. in the dead of July, the beach is heaving. Families dot the sand with bright parasols and screaming children, while lines of vendors sell ice cream and hot dogs and chilled water for more than what’s reasonable. In the middle of it all, on a mass of beach towels, you and the girls drink cider and beat the same long-dead, stupid, stupid Jungwoo–shaped horses as always.
“You could ditch the first two movies and still make sense of the story, Revenge of the Sith is clearly the best.” Aeri huffs, putting her book down to defend her favourite of the prequels. “The Phantom Menace was boring as fuck, you only like it for Padmé’s dresses.”
Even though you’re not part of the conversation, at this accusation, you have to speak up. “No one’s watching Phantom Menace for the dresses, Aeri. Everyone knows Padmé’s best dress is at the Naboo picnic in Attack of the Clones.”
“Thank you!” Jimin pats you on the back, pleased that you’ve come to her defence. “I never even said Phantom Menace was the best, I just like it. Obviously Revenge is better, I mean, isn’t Anakin such a big, strong boy in that one?”
Aeri doesn’t even dignify that with a response, at least not with words anyway. Instead, she puts her head down, face in the towel and lets out a scream louder than your laughter, causing families and couples to look around in terror.
Regardless of the crowd, and oblivious to Aeri’s mounting irritation, the boys do keepy ups in a tight circle with varying degrees of skill. Jake doesn’t drop the ball once, neither does Heeseung. Sunoo does well enough to keep Jake happy. Jay’s very good at kicking the ball, but not so much at the aiming of the ball, which leaves poor Sunghoon sprinting off to the shore before he has a proper chance to play.
It doesn’t take long before Jay gets kicked out and a visibly irritated Jake calls time out. “Yongie,” he yells, waving with both of his arms, lips spreading into a stomach-fluttering grin. “Hey, darling! Sub in?”
You shake your head, pointing over at them. “Jay’s right there!”
Jake actually laughs at that, his head falling back. “We need someone good, Yongie, please?”
“No, thank you.”
His lips curl downwards, pushing out into a pouty frown, but you remain strong, unswayed no matter how cute he is, no matter how much every last fibre of your body cries out to be near him. You’re already tired from the heat, and — having opted for the picture bikini in the end — not actually dressed to run around the beach anyway. Seeming stumped, Jake stands there with his hands on his hips, watching you, perhaps trying to communicate that he’d really like to be spending time with you at the minute. At least, that’s the message you’re trying to send him, willing him to ditch the game altogether and join you on the blanket, though he does no such thing.
It’s Sunghoon who calls Aeri over to play instead, and with a grumble, she swaps with Sunoo so the game can continue. They even work up a rally, now that Jay’s been relegated to ball boy, and before long, Yizhuo runs over to join in too. You and Jimin and Sunoo stay safe on the blanket, watching over napping Minjeong and taking turns to wake her up so she can turn over.
“One more question.” Jimin lifts her head from her book, looking out at the group for a beat before she looks at you. “Was he good?”
“At what?”
“In bed.”
A smile tugs at your lips before you can help it, destined forever to giggle and blush at the memory by the looks of things. “I’d say so, I don’t have much to compare him to, but…” You trail off, looking over your shoulders before leaning in and whispering the rest. “He made me finish twice.”
“Twice?” Sunoo repeats, eyebrows shooting up.
“With his mouth, yeah.”
“So that’s the kissing he was talking about,” he says with a slow nod.
Jimin nudges him, muttering his name, unimpressed. He nudges her right back, rolling his eyes. “What? He’s the one who said a true gentleman doesn’t kiss and tell.”
“Jeez.” She sighs. “You two really are perfect for each other.”
Fighting your smile is futile, so you don’t bother. You’d have to agree with her, eternally thankful that she sees it too, even if she’s told you in a ridiculous context. Pushing your sunglasses up into your hair, your eyes find Jake right away, latching onto the sight. The flex of his back as he stretches this way and that, muscles accentuated by the slick sheen of sweat. The bob of his glistening Adam’s apple in his throat. The tipping back of his head whenever someone drops the ball, how he groans in frustration.
“Hoon, you totally had that, are you fucking kidding?” Jake’s red in the face and pinching the bridge of his nose, but Sunghoon only shrugs, laughing as Jay runs off towards the shore to collect the ball.
This side of him amuses all of you, the loveliest, most patient person any of you know losing his cool over the slighting thing if sports are involved. His hyper-competivity is probably the reason he’s always been so good at football, that he takes it seriously, more meticulous on the pitch than with anything else.
For you though, Jake in this state, all riled up and irritated, is a guilty pleasure. The clench of his jaw, the way he rakes his hand through his wet hair, how he cuts his eyes at Sunghoon, seeming more annoyed by the way he only laughs harder. These tics, and them existing on Jake, force your heart to race, skipping beat after beat against your ribs to no end.
“Sunoo,” you say, leaning forward to get a good look at him. “Tell Jake if he ever feels like being ungentlemanly, he doesn’t have to hold back.”
His ears burn red and he hums in response, giving you a thumbs-up.
“You’re disgusting, YN.” Jimin gives you a discerning look from top to bottom as if she’s relearning you, reassessing, and, clearly liking what she sees, she grins. “I love it.”
You can only smile because you love it too, love this side that he brings out of you, this side that you don’t have to keep to yourself anymore, this side that Jake loves as well—Jake who still stands irritated amongst the group. You’re drawn in completely by the pinch of his eyebrows, by the way his frustration melts away as soon as he catches your eye. The crease of his brows smooths over, and his lips curl up when you blow him a kiss.
Apparently deciding he’s had enough of the game, he comes bounding over the way Layla normally does, further committing to the bit by laying down on top of you, his front to your back, like a hot and gangly weighted blanket. Burying his face into the crook of your neck, he presses tickly kisses to your skin, pecking a trail up to your cheek where he stops and mumbles, “D’you see me play, Yongie? Was I good?”
“Yes, Jake, very,” you say through a smile that aches your cheeks.
Instead of thanking you, his response is to roll over so he’s lying on his back and pulling you close. Everywhere he touches, your skin is on fire, soft fingertips hotter than the shining sun against you. Giddy giggles trickle out of you like water from a tap, endless as the ocean, even while he kisses you—a messy liplock that you can hardly focus on for the thudding of your heart in your ears, for the way your friends cheer and applaud behind you.
He pulls away and it’s an affront, though he’s still smiling, the pointy corners of his lips quirked up and beautiful as he looks at you, breathless. “Why didn’t you wanna play with us? You know you’re my favourite teammate.”
“This isn’t really a sports bikini,” you explain, liking the way his hand falls from your back to your hip, twirling the string. “One deep breath and I’m flashing everyone.”
Jake nods, patting your thigh and letting his eyes fall to your chest. “I can tell,” he says, laughing on an exhale as his hand comes up between you, pulling the black cup more securely over your left breast. “Instagram bikini.”
“Mhm.” You give him a peck, but he holds you against him, his hand slipping into your hair to keep you right where he wants you, which apparently is as close as humanly possible just to kiss you.
It’s never just kissing with Jake though, that’s the thing, and you’re not sure it ever could be. More than lips on lips and tongue on tongue, it’s a full body experience. It’s your knee slipping between his, your foot stroking his calf, it’s his dick hard against you, his hands slipping over your body. The lick of heat in the pit of your stomach, the lightness in your head and in your body like none of it is real, like you don’t really exist. But you could never complain, not when his soft lips move so savouringly over yours. Not when his tongue licks into your mouth with such care, drawing hushed whines out of you, out of him, deep and slow like he wants to feel every single part of your mouth, like he wants to fall into you, to become one.
Unconcerned about anyone else, Jake lets his hand slip over your ass, cupping it gently. And as much as you like it, you lift his hand to a decent height on your waist, making him chuckle. “Couldn’t. Help. It,” he tells you between kisses and breaths. “Not. Sorry.”
“You’re a disaster, Jake,” you whisper, even though you’re smiling, even though the only thing keeping your hands out of the front of his shorts is that they’re too busy tugging his hair. “No decorum at all.”
“I’m saying this in the most respectful way possible, but it’s kinda impossible for me to have decorum when you look like that. I mean, now that I’m allowed to touch you after all these years of wanting to, Yongie, it’s all pent up.” His gentle voice doesn’t match his words or the hungry look in his blown eyes.
You gulp, and the only thing you can think to say is, “Yeah?”
“Yeah.” He nods. “Look so good in black, in everything.”
“Thank you.” Holding eye contact is a feat, but there’s nowhere you’d rather look than at your sweet Jake, no matter how much your cheeks burn.
“Such a perfect girl, YN, even look good in nothing,” he says, and you can hear in his raspy voice, see in his lidded eyes, feel on your stomach that he wants you in a way he can’t have you on the beach, but it just sounds earnest. Sweet.
The smile on your face and the cold sweat on the back of your neck answer for you. At once, it’s affirming and terrifying to hear these things from him, these things that only ever existed in the deepest, darkest recesses of your mind, nestled away behind the wholesome stuff. Cuddles and held hands. Forehead kisses, wearing his hoodie. These things you’ve only ever let out late at night by yourself. All you can do is hide your face in his chest and feel the rumble of his laughter on your nose.
“Don’t need to be shy, Yongie, not with me,” he mumbles, kissing the top of your head.
Leaning back, you face him again, liking the freckles forming in the middle of his face, scattered over the broad bridge of his nose, the red pimples on his forehead and chin, this face you’ve come to know better than your own. As if it’s your own. How could you ever be shy with him? Your bestest friend, your… whatever he is now. Dread casts a cool shadow over you at the mere thought. You press a soft kiss to his lips, but it doesn’t help.
“I’m not shy, this is just weird,” you admit. “No offence."
“What’s weird?”
Motioning into the space between you, you cringe at the way Jake’s face falls, though briefly. He clears his throat before he speaks. “You don’t like… us?”
“I do, Jake. I love it, I just…” You press your lips together and wait, either for Jake to supply the rest of your sentence or the world to come to its fiery end, saving you from the duty of salvaging what you’ve so quickly torn apart. Neither happens, so you push on, ignoring the ache in your chest. “I pictured this for so long that having it, having you, is a bit weird. Not in a bad way, it’s just… as if it’s not real or something, like I’m dreaming.”
Jake pinches your waist, making you cry out and you hear your friends cheering behind you. “See, Yongie? Not a dream. Dreams aren’t nearly as good as this,” he says.
He’s right, but just like he said they wouldn’t, things have changed a lot. Good change — amazing, even — but that doesn’t make this any less surreal. Doesn’t tamp the fuzzy feeling when he kisses you or tells you that he loves you, nor the way he seems to glow whenever you look at him. After all, the sun can’t rise if it doesn’t set, and dream or not, you’ll have to wake up eventually.
Seeming to realise he hasn’t quite soothed you, he changes his tack, stroking your hair and pecking your lips. “Does all of it feel like that or just right now, Yongie?”
You take a moment before responding, trying to feel more in the moment than in your head. Over your shoulder, your friends chat and bicker and laugh, the same as everyone else around you. By Jake’s head, the coarse sand is hot on your palm, slipping easily through your fingers. Against you, Jake is solid, he is warm and waiting. Patient. Yours. On his collarbone, there is a purple bloom in the shape of your mouth. It’s enough to ease the tightness in your throat so you can say, “Just right now.”
Jake doesn’t speak right away, only eyeing you instead, slowly like he’s taking you in. He gulps before he speaks. “I think that’s alright then, Yongie. Because even if this is a dream, I’ll be sleeping right next to you when you wake up, won’t I?” he asks, waiting for your response. You nod, so he continues. “And I’ll love you just as much as I do right now.”
You have no idea how you got so lucky, how someone could possibly love you this much—how that someone could be the one person you’ve wanted so badly all this time. His heart and yours beating in tandem, towards and for each other, bound by a single thread of gold or something greater, and you had no idea.
“Okay,” you mumble, hiding your face in the crook of his neck. “Now I’m shy.”
Holding you tight, he presses his lips to your ear. “So am I,” he admits. “I love you.”
“I love you,” you say back, and it feels more honest than before, better somehow. Better to hear the spread of his lips into a smile, to feel it and his heart racing against his chest. Against you.
Being this close to him is addictive, to deeply inhale his citrus and sunscreen scent, and taste the salt of the ocean on his skin, is maddening. A hot, shaky breath hits your shoulder when you lick his neck, fingertips sinking deeper into your flesh.
The promise of food wasn’t enough to separate the two of you, but the smell of food wrenches you apart, forcing you to join the circle of your friends eating burgers and hot dogs and chips.
And even as you sit cross-legged, laughing and talking with everyone else, Jake’s hand rests on your thigh, and your hand rests on top of his. At least until it’s actually time to eat, and he splits his burger in two while you do the same with your hot dog, giving each other the bigger half—you don’t even have to check to know he’s taken the pickles out. With your thumb, you wipe ketchup from the side of his mouth and he adjusts the cup of your bikini and both of you giggle at the fuss your friends make about it.
Once everyone’s done eating, Jake volunteers the two of you to take away all the rubbish, stuffing carrier bags with styrofoam containers and wooden cutlery and empty cans. He carries everything over to the bins and you do all the sorting before rejoining your friends hand in hand. By the time you reach them, they’re all scattered, split off by activity—napping, drinking, and reading. With you two back, another activity starts: planning. “Are you free tomorrow, darling?” Jake asks, his arm heavy around your shoulders.
“Yes, Jakey.”
A smile plays at the corner of his lips and he nods his head, but he keeps his gaze locked on the shore no matter how long you stare at him. “Same,” he says.
“Cool,” you say, grinning.
Red scatters slowly over his ears and neck, nipping his cheeks as they lift with his smile and finally, he looks at you. Eyes wide and golden in the sun, brown hair blackened and slicked back with seawater save for one stubborn strand over his forehead. He looks like a prince and your heart stutters in your chest at the thought.
“Well… since we’re both free tomorrow, how about I take you out, Yongie?”
“Like, on a date?” you ask, covering your mouth with your hand for fear of screaming at the top of your lungs.
Jake chuckles, taking your wrist in his hand and tugging it down. “Yeah, gorgeous, exactly like a date. Just you and me.”
Heat overtakes you, flooding your cheeks and your neck and swirling in your stomach, an endless stir all throughout your body like a shaken can of fizzy juice. “Yes, please,” you say, but it’s more of a squeak.
“You’re so cute,” Jake says under his breath, pulling you close to kiss your temple. “I’ll pick you up at eight, alright?”
And even though you’re staying in the same house, you nod and tell him, “I’ll be ready at seven. I’m ready now.”
As he said he would, at eight p.m. sharp, Jake knocks on the door of the bedroom you share to pick you up. And as you said you would be, you were ready at seven.
In the external sense at least, because you’ve spent an hour admiring your reflection and taking pictures in the short white linen dress that the girls picked out for you. On the inside, you feel about as relaxed as a fish out of water, your stomach and its contents flipping and flopping. It’s just a shame he arrived before you thought to repack your suitcase or alphabetise your bodycare on the sink. But none of that matters in the end, because when you open the door and see Jake standing behind it, smiling, you can’t even remember what you were so worked up about.
“H—” His eyes widen, looking you up and down and down and up before he clears his throat and he tries again. “You look so beautiful, Yongie.”
“So do you.”
The giggle that he lets out is contagious, passed between your mouths in a kiss that lasts too long. Taking your hand, he leads you through the suspiciously quiet house, hardly a trace of your friends at all as you step out into the garden, going all the way to the back behind the shed. Jake climbs the stile in the fence first, then helps you over with his hands on your waist. On steady ground, you don’t pass up the opportunity to press a kiss to his soft lips.
“I love this dress,” he tells you. “My. Beautiful. Girl.”
Despite the grin on your face, still you keep your mouth on his. “Always. All. Yours.”
“Lucky, lucky me,” Jake says through a smile, giving you a peck and then another before pulling you through the clearing and out to the beach.
Generous perhaps, to call it a beach, this little private strip that’s more giant slabs of glittering rock than sand along the shore where you all used to skinny dip until a rogue jellyfish stung Jay’s ass. A smile splits your lips at the memories, a happy warmth in your chest that only heightens and spreads at the nod of Jake’s head towards something behind you. On the rock furthest from the water, is a cosy-looking nest of blankets and cushions, lined at the outer edge with fairy lights, and a wicker basket in the middle of it all.
“You like it, Yongie?” he asks, a sheepish look in his curious eyes.
“Jake…” You trail off, unable to find the words to express how much you love it. How much you love him.
Behind him, the tide rushes against the rocks, a constant crash that rivals the thud of your heart, darkening the slabs and making them glossy. In your silence, he shifts his weight from one foot to the other, scrunching his nose. “I know it’s not much, but I didn’t want to wait until we got home to treat you.” His voice is but a murmur over the ocean, and still your stomach sinks.
“Are you joking? Jake, no one’s ever do—” Realising how wrong you are, you have to stop mid-sentence, because someone has done something like this for you before, because Jake is always doing things like this for you. Always going out of his way to show you he cares, to make you happy. “It’s perfect,” you say. “It’s absolutely perfect.”
Together on the blanket, Jake lets you open up the basket, beaming as you fawn over the crisps and dip he picked out, the nice cocktail cans and yogurt-covered pretzels, the banana chips. And a delighted laugh comes out of him when you lose your mind at the sight of a clear container with honeydew feta salad inside, chili crisp tickling your nose as soon as you take the lid off. “Look how thin you sliced the cucumbers!” you all but squeal.
Jake, who only ever slices his cucumbers in thick strips, is blushing, beautiful red breaking through his smiling cheeks. “Jay helped a little bit with that, but it was mostly me once I got the hang of it.”
Fuelled by love and hunger and a quick kiss, you continue through the basket. Japchae, tinfoil wrapped ham & cheese toasties, and perfectly pinched dumplings. Raspberries dipped in dark chocolate, and a foggy tub of pork belly. It’s more food than you’re sure you can eat, but you’re happy to try. Apart from what he’d obviously picked up, it’s clear he made it all himself — with maybe some help — and all for you.
Your giggles are instantaneous, light and giddy, as Jake joins in. “So this is why I wasn’t allowed in the kitchen all afternoon?”
He nods. “Worth it?”
“More than,” you whisper, liking the pleased smile on his lips. Looking into the basket once more, you find a heap of shiny gold foil beaming up at you. “Holy shit,” you manage through a laugh.
“What, baby?”
Like a magic trick, when you grab the first condom, an endless string of them follows from the depths of the basket and you can’t stop laughing, genuinely having to fight for breath. “I was wondering what we were gonna have for dessert.”
Jake doesn’t share in your amusement though, his face falling as he snatches them like they might hurt you, and says, “I didn’t put those in there!”
“Are you sure?”
“I swear.”
Even though you believe him, you can sense the evening taking a turn towards how-to-kiss-gate and nip it in the bud immediately, giving him a big hug and assuring him that you know he wouldn’t do that, all while stifling your laughter and stroking his hair.
With Jake’s mood all taken care of, it’s time to tuck in and the food he prepared is just as good as it looks. The japchae light and the pork belly tender, sweet salad with a perfect kick. You can’t help but moan around each bite, around his fingers when he feeds you raspberries, constantly losing track of the conversation as it goes. Patient as ever, Jake only repeats himself or reminds you gently, accepting your apologies with a smile, seeming happy just to be here. Just to be with you. As the heat of the sunshine wanes, so too does your hunger. Having tried everything, you at least feel satisfied when you tap out, pushing your plate towards him. He’s not faring much better than you are, though he does finish off your pork belly. The more time you spend out here, the more you notice how lost he gets in the quiet, frozen in place, staring into the distance.
All it takes to steal his attention from the glimmering shoreline is you squeezing his knee, gaze finding yours, lips curling into a dizzying smile. A lingering peck pressed to your lips, your cheek, and then, “Can we talk about something?”
“Mhm.”
Looking down at his lap, Jake clears his throat and says, “I know a lot has changed between us since your birthday, but in my opinion it’s all been good. What do you think?” It’s only when he’s finished speaking that he looks at you.
“It’s different, but it feels right,” you admit, mirroring the grin that spreads on his lips. “I’m happy, Jake. You make me happy.”
Seeming a bit more sure of himself, he nods, locking his fingers with yours, thumb rubbing the back of your hand. “I’m the same, I mean you’re exactly what I want, Yongie. You’re who I want. You always have been, and you make me so… I just get so excited when it comes to you, even if I read your name somewhere or I hear it, my heart beats out of my chest.”
As he says the words, your heart does exactly that, beating so fast and so hard you can hear it in your ears, feel it in your throat. You can’t believe this is happening, that any of this has happened over the past few days, that tomorrow, when you wake up in the morning, it’ll be to pack your bags and go home.
“And I feel really sorry that you had to hear it from someone else first, but I love you, YN. I love you so much. I wanna do everything with you, and more than anything, I’d like to be your boyfriend,” Jake admits, only taking a beat to breathe at the end. “Is that… would you like that as well?”
Fuzzy warmth finds a home in your chest, blooming and spreading and forcing giggles out of you. Nodding your head, it’s all you can do to hope he can read your mind like he always has. More than anything, Jake, you think. You’re all I want. Like a penny to a magnet, your lips find his, drawn in over and over and over again. You can’t even help it. Can’t help but hold his face in your hands. Can’t help but say, “I. Love. You.” Hardly noticing you’ve been kissing for so long until your knees start to ache against the blanket.
You pull away and don’t wipe your lip gloss from his smiling face.
Once the two of you manage to stop giggling and kissing and lingering and kissing again, packing up the picnic is an easy task. You hand empty containers to Jake who places them neatly in the basket, same with your cutlery and cans and wrappers.
It really doesn’t take long at all and with pursed lips, he latches the basket shut, patting the top and staring out at the shore before saying in a quiet voice, “I really am sorry about the condoms, Yongie. I’m sure it was just one of the guys trying to be funny or something.”
“I know, I know, and I thought it was funny, baby, it is funny. We’ll just take them back to our room and see how many we can use tonight,” you suggest, already looking forward to later, hoping that he’s looking forward to it too, though his expression betrays nothing.
Jake’s eyes flick over your face and he finally smiles, a slow, lopsided, butterfly inducing curve of his lips as he takes your locket in his hand, pulling you closer for a quick kiss. “Lower your expectations, my love. Promise you’ll be happy even if we only use two?”
Your stomach does a swoop at that, my love. “I’d be happy even if we didn’t use any,” you tell him, breathless.
“That would kill me, YN, alright? I’m serious,” he says, with a great big grin on his face.
“Well, we’re dying on the same day, remember? Might not be too bad.”
Even though he chuckles, he rolls his eyes, seeming to give in. “Whatever then, have it your way.”
You hum, shaking your head as you push Jake’s hair from his face to get a good look at him. At his freckled nose and lopsided smile. “Obviously if you want to use a condom we’ll use one, Jakey. Or two just like you said.”
“I don’t,” he admits, shaking his head. “Let’s go.”
A smile curls your lips and a flutter stirs your stomach. “Not before the sun goes down, I want to see it.”
“Sounds good, love. Later then.” And with the matter settled, he kisses your forehead. Then the tip of your nose, then your lips. Unlike the first two though, this kiss is lingering. This kiss is the press of bodies against one another, thighs and hips and chests and lips. It’s Jake’s soft hair between your fingers, his big hands slipping to your waist, holding you as tightly as possible. Like this, you kiss and you kiss and you kiss, separating only for the time it takes to tug his T-shirt up and over his head—all plans of watching the sunset long forgotten.
Still attached at the mouths, Jake lays you down on the blanket, his palm clutching your hip through your dress as he settles between your thighs. A lick of molten need consumes you at the weight of his body on yours, at the closeness of his lean frame. How you’re connected everywhere it matters. Damp press of sweat-slick skin on linen. Grind of rough denim on soft lace. Tug of hair between fingers and warmth of whimpers passed from his mouth to yours and right back.
Wet kiss after wet kiss from neck to collarbone, shallow breaths warm your skin from collarbone to heaving chest, tearing a desperate sound out of you. Teeth on linen, tugging at the neckline of your dress, trembling hands coming up to help, to pull it down and hook it underneath your bare breasts.
Jake pulls away and it’s like seeing God, your breath hitching at the sight of him, at how the setting sun filters through his hair, catching him at the edges so that he glows. His chest rises and falls heavily as he looks down at you, his eyes blown and latching onto your breasts, inching slowly upwards along the shiny saliva path he’s left behind. From his swollen lips, the word, God, falls, a gravelly sound, ragged like it came from the depths of him, enough to make you shiver. He lets his palm roam the length of your body, over your stomach and up between your breasts until his long fingers slip over your shoulder to straighten your locket on its chain.
“Oh my fucking God,” he says, eyes tracking the same path before they flick up to meet yours. “You’re so…” He shakes his head. “So, so beautiful.”
Causing this reaction, being the one to get to him this much, and seeing it, is a rush unlike anything else you’ve ever experienced. In this state, this stupor, you could probably ask him to do anything, tell him, and he would, and only on the basis that it came from you. Inexplicable heat pools between your legs at the mere thought.
“Thanks.”
An unbearable beat passes, scored by the whisper of the breeze and the kiss of tide against rock, before Jake wets his lips and says, “What’d you say, gorgeous?”
“You want them in your mouth, don’t you?” Your wavering voice betrays your nerves, but if he notices, he doesn’t seem to care.
His pretty mouth falls ajar, wordless lips closing and opening again until he gulps, nods his head.
Spurred on by his level of engagement, his willingness and pliancy, there’s nothing you can do to stop your mind from running wild, alight with possibility, the future suddenly an exciting thing for as long as Jake is with you. It’s this, your certainty, your desire, that levels your voice when you speak. “Are you gonna be good and hurry up then?”
“Fuck,” he whispers before clearing his throat and speaking softer than you’ve ever heard. “Yes, love. Gonna be good for you, gonna be so good.” He’s already leaning in.
Taking your nipple between his teeth, Jake has you gasping, has your back arching up towards him as his tongue flicks out over the sensitive skin to soothe it. A cry of his name, a huffed breath, a shudder at every tug, at every lick, at every moan he lets out around you. Caught up in the feel of it all — of his sweet mouth and muffled whines, of the knot tying itself in your stomach — you don’t even notice that his hand has left your other breast until his thick fingers press on the lace between your thighs.
Chasing it, the pressure, your hips buck, grinding until Jake curses under his breath and pulls away. To the chill of the air on your wet chest, you sigh, opening your eyes to the sight of your beautiful boyfriend kneeling between your spread thighs. Straight teeth dent plush bottom lip. Heavy eyelids blink slowly. Pink flush on his cheeks, his neck, spreading to his chest that heaves with his breath. Your toes curl against the blanket. He looks about as good as you feel—looks better. Unsticking the damp cotton, Jake pushes your underwear to the side so the breeze rushes against you, cool and overwhelming and drawing a gasp from your parted lips.
His eyes fall as he spreads your wetness from your slit up to your clit and groans. “Love how wet you get for me, YN, always feel so good.”
Every last inch of your body responds to his touch, to him and the low sound of his voice, to the slow push of two thick fingers into you. Clamping together, your knees knock with a smack, thighs trapping Jake’s wrist where it is. The tension in your stomach is immediate, hot and heavy as he curls his fingers where they are, just brushing right where you need him to.
"Good, baby,” you manage, breathless. “Like that.”
Parting your knees, he pushes further and the sweet pressure sends a burst of blinding pleasure throughout your writhing body. A twist of the knot in your stomach, a moan torn out of you, stars behind your closed eyes at the sound of the smile in his voice. “Such a pretty girl, aren’t you? Don’t know how I got so lucky.”
As always, seeing Jake smile far surpasses hearing it, that broad curve, lips red and puffy around his perfect teeth. It takes your breath away to see him like this, to hear those words from him when it’s exactly how you feel—Jake, Jaeyun, your pretty boy, and you, Yongie, the luckiest girl in the world. Especially when you notice the way his other hand is tucked into his shorts, moving slowly under the denim.
“I wanna see, Jake,” you say. “Take them off.”
Not a second goes by before he undoes his belt and button and fly with one hand to push his shorts down. On the front of his white briefs is a dark patch where his dick strains against the cotton, precum seeping through it. A pang of hunger strikes you, tongue wetting your lips as he thumbs at the damp spot and mutters, fuck, tugging the fabric out of the way. His leaking tip is shiny and red, same as his lips. Veins curve around the rest of him, leading your eyes down his twitching length to where his fingers are wrapped around the base, unmoving.
“Should I…” Jake trails off.
“Please.” You nod and without missing a beat, he spits into his palm and starts stroking.
Save for the pretty way he whines and shudders, how his nose scrunches up and his muscles tense, there’s nothing particularly special about the way he jerks off. What’s mesmerising though, what really winds you up, is the fact that it’s Jake’s big hand on Jake’s big dick. That and the fact that he’s timing his strokes with the pump of his fingers into you. The fact that the wet sound between your legs is only getting louder and lewder. Feverish heat laps at your bucking hips, ravaging your body from the inside out.
“Don’t wanna—” you blurt out, taking a moment to catch your breath, to figure out what you’re trying to say. “I don’t wanna finish like this. Need it now. You.”
“Thank fuck.” He takes his fingers straight from inside of you to his mouth, humming around them. “So good,” he mumbles, shaking his head while your cheeks burn. “You’re so perfect, YN.”
Butterflies fill your stomach, tugging your lips up at the corners. If it were up to you, this moment would never end. Jake, apparently, has other ideas though, asking, “So are we using a condom or am I dying today?”
His question takes a second to process, to make sense of over the pounding rush of blood in your ears. “The second one,” you whisper with a smile. “And I will miss you so, so much.”
A glorious smile curls his lips, a sweet chuckle coming out of him. “Not for too long, love.” He leans down and presses a kiss to the top of your knee. “You sure though? Sounds silly, but you’re allowed to change your mind, YN.”
“I know.” You can’t resist reaching for him, unsure if you can stomach another second without. Against your palm, his hair is soft between your fingers. Behind him, the sun’s last rays cling to the violet sky, streaking it orange. Something twists in your chest at the sight, at the sight of Jake’s brown eyes, shining like brilliant pools of amber. There’s nothing you’d change about any of this, let alone your mind. “I’m sure about this though,” you say, swallowing around the lump in your throat. “About you.”
Jake leans into your touch, lifting his head and kissing your palm when you cup his cheek. “Me too, Yongie. I’m certain.” That certainty is warm against your skin, muffled and earnest. “Forever,” he says and this is the moment you don’t want to end.
You can’t help but take his forever to heart, because it’s a promise he’s always kept. There isn’t much for you before Jake, your memories few and far between up until he moved to your school. “Yeah, Jaeyun. Forever,” you say, and when the words come out, you are absolutely certain that there won’t be much after him either.
The moment it finally happens, you’re kissing. That slow nudge of Jake into you, the complete shrinking of the world to that burning point of your connection, the melting of two bodies into one. His shallow thrusts deepen with each push and pull of his hips until he’s filling you all the way up over and over, further than you thought possible. Pressed to your chest, his heart races just as fast as yours, beating in perfect sync. Hungrily, Jake’s lips move over yours, but his hips still against you, buried to the hilt and staying completely flush—as if the kissing, the brushing of tongues and taste of you, is the point of it all.
I love you, he says, and you say, I love you, too. On a desperate, whiny loop, those three words spill from one mouth into another, back and forth for ages until you can’t tell if it’s him saying it or you.
Until he finishes with a cry of your name, arms giving out so his full weight presses you down. Until you finish right after, shuddering and full and so in love.
As is tradition, you all spend this last morning together. Bright and early, the kitchen is alive at eight a.m., all ten of you moving sleepily around each other while Sunghoon’s lock in playlist blares through the house. After four summers of this, you’ve gotten it down to a science, so that no one is in anyone else’s way and nothing needs to be reheated. It takes forty-five minutes, but with all of the dishes on the garden table, everyone sits around it, ready to eat the breakfast you all helped to make.
Your plate is about as full as can be, with Jay’s gamjajeon, Jimin’s buttered toast, Sunoo’s fried eggs, and Heeseung’s pork belly all warring for space on its surface. Exactly where he wants to be, Jake sits in your lap and his plate has your overflow—his Buldak carbonara, Yizhuo’s stir-fry, and your bacon.
Nosey as ever, your friends barely allow you to have a bite before grilling you and Jake, desperate to know what happened at the beach to make you guys come back so…
“…Weird,” Yizhuo says. “If you hadn’t been holding hands I’d have thought you called it off.”
Around gulps of Aeri’s coffee and spoonfuls of Sunghoon’s assorted cereal, everyone nods and mumbles their agreement. Now that everyone knows about your reciprocated feelings — now that you and Jake know — it seems your friends would prefer one big debrief rather than you with the girls and him with boys. Most of the time, the morning after begins with a group FaceTime call, or a detailed rundown in the chat to catch each other up, so it’s not totally unusual to share everything with everyone at once, and of course, now that two members of the group have hooked up, the next natural step would be to tell the group together. This fact, and your knowledge of said fact, don’t make it any easier for you to find words that accurately convey the genuinely life-changing sex you had last night. How afterwards, you undressed each other reverently to fuck like animals in the shower.
Seeming not to share your reservations, Jake has no trouble speaking. "We weren’t being weird,” he says through a yawn, even though you definitely were. “We were being in love, Yizhuo, you should try it.”
“Yes, but you’ve been in love for as long as we’ve known you, and we’ve never seen you like that.” Minjeong squints over the top of her sunglasses, pointing an accusatory spoon. “Obviously you fucked out there, but — and no offence — was it bad?”
Before you can leap to the defence of your and Jake’s sexual prowess or show them the video you took last night and ask, does it look bad? Aeri sighs, shaking her head. “They didn’t, I counted and all ninety condoms were in the basket, they didn’t even tear one from the strip.”
“Ninety? Aeri, we gave them eighty, you bought the boxes,” Sunoo says, smacking his forehead twice and going, “Stupid, stupid Jungwoo.”
Around the table, laughter is immediate and as you wrap your arms around Jake’s waist to hold him closer, you can’t help but wish you had even one more night to spend together. Can’t help but wish you’d been even a tiny bit less in your head about him all weekend so you could’ve gotten the fullest out of this time with everyone. Only one person isn’t fighting for breath through their cackles, and it’s Aeri who only rolls her eyes.
“Yeah, yeah, because none of you have ever been with someone questionable.” Crossing her arms over her chest, she scoffs and points in your direction. “YN is literally dating Jake,” she says and everyone laughs again, even Jake, who you know is only pretending not to be irritated.
After breakfast, it’s a heated game of rock, paper, scissors that leaves Aeri, Heeseung, Jimin, and Sunghoon on kitchen clean up duty while the rest of you are left to your own devices. Thankfully, you had the foresight to pack your suitcase, and then Jake’s, before breakfast, so all that’s left is kissing and triple-checking that you have everything you came with.
It’s an hour before Minjeong calls up the stairs that it’s time to leave and you’re standing alone in the en-suite, staring at your reflection. Only five days have passed since you left home with the girls, but already you look so different, feel so different. A healthy glow kisses your tanned skin and the semi-permanent bikini straps on your shoulders. Your lips rest in a curve you can’t straighten out. And your locket sits under the star pendant on your chest. Jake’s locket, maybe, if the years he’s held onto it mean more than the days you’ve spent wearing it. Running your thumb over the tiny dragon, the metal is warm in your palm. Changed by the love of those you love — Jake, your friends, and the sun — you can only look forward to what might change next, knowing no matter what, you won’t have to go through it alone.
From the doorway, with his baseball cap backwards and glasses low on the bridge of his nose, Jake is already watching you. His small smile turns into a broad grin, showing all of his teeth as he lets out a happy sigh. Crossing the room to be in his arms is the absolute least you can do, sinking into his chest as he pulls you close. You tip your head back to press a kiss to the base of his neck, making him giggle.
“You ready to go, darling?”
You’re not ready to go, not really—you never are. Already, you want to relive the last few days, see them again with those same fresh eyes. See them with your knowing eyes and make the same decisions a million times over, because all of them have led you here, lead you to this. To Jake’s lips on yours. Regardless, you nod and say, “I am.”
In the middle of the driveway, warmed by the blazing sun, you hug all of your friends as though you’ll never see them again, as if you don’t share a flat with Minjeong, or won’t see everyone at Heeseung’s on Friday for movie night. For what it’s worth though, they all hug you the same way, with tight squeezes and mumbled I’ll miss yous and get home safes.
Once you’ve hugged your way around the circle, you end up in Jake’s arms again, squealing when he lifts you up off your feet. His fingers grip your sides as tight as he can, warmth in your chest at the feeling and a smile on your face even as you try to wriggle free. But over your shoulder you hear the girls burst into laughter, hear Jimin cry out, no way! And there’s something to it, the disbelief in her voice, the sheer joy, that stands out to you, that tugs your heart in her direction, in theirs. You can’t ignore it, can’t ignore how much you hate the thought of having to hear about it from Minjeong at home later.
“Would you mind if I went home with the girls instead?” you blurt out as soon as Jake sets you down on your feet.
The smile on his face doesn’t falter at all, it widens, his eyes searching yours. “That sounds like fun, Yongie. I guess I’ll see you later then.”
“Yeah, Jake, see you later,” you say, and for the first time, the thought of being away from him doesn’t make you feel sick.
𑣲. SYNOPSIS!: After ignoring your boyfriend for three days over a petty argument, he decides to use his pent up frustration for the greater good
.✦ ݁˖ CW!: 18+, porn, raw sex, finger sucking, doggy (?), bit of degradation, praise, dom!hoon, kinda mean hoon, aftercare, cream-pie, crying, lmk if i missed any
⋆˚࿔ WC!: 6.9k
It’d been three days of you and Sunghoon not talking; well, it would’ve been three days if you had managed to keep your mouth shut.
Sunghoon, in his agitating, loose, white shirt that managed to highlight each and every muscle—whether it was tense or not—he stood there, minding his business.
You let out a quiet sigh, passing by him. His bubblegum fingertips were wrapped around his designated beige bowl, already preparing to pour the steaming hot ramen from the strainer.
He looked too unbothered. Too careless. Too much like his usual demeanor, before you had met him and made him fall in love with you.
Being in a relationship for almost two years now, it was normal for couples to argue. It was normal for couples to ignore each other for a few hours—but three days?
This was new.
Like a flake in the sky, he always knew how to land straight on your nose, gentle and chilly, the type of chilly that made you feel bubbly inside, the type of chilly that made you warm—that made you want to stay trapped between his arms as if he himself was a shield.
Which he was.
He’d always been the one to approach and apologize first, sometimes with a teddy bear, sometimes with things you’ve had in your cart for months, sometimes with a hug, and sometimes just with his words alone.
And each time, your knees would wobble, your pride would shrink, and you’d be in his lap, styling your fingers in with his black strands. He’d occasionally rock his hips upwards, a stupid attempt to distract you; you’d scold him as if his hair actually mattered, although you never actually wanted him to stop.
And now, here you were, standing in your white, silk pajama set, staring at the love of your life barely acknowledging your very existence.
It sent a thrill of rage down your spine.
“Hello?” You raised your eyebrows, tilting your head at him as if that’d suddenly release all your irritation.
He wasn’t quick about it.
He took his sweet time placing the now-full ramen bowl onto the counter before turning to look at you.
You sighed dramatically.
He blinked once.
“Yeah?”
“What do you mean, “yeah?!”” You scoffed, throwing your hands on your hips.
His lips pressed together. Monotone. Bored.
Not even sparing you another look, his hands moved towards a nearby fork.
As your jaw dropped in disbelief, his loaded with the wheat noodles.
“Are you serious?” You muttered, taking half a step as if to emphasize your true “seriousness.”
He looked up at you through his thick eyebrows, almost raising them while he slurped a hanging piece.
“Hm?”
Your hands fell to your sides. “It doesn’t bother you that we’re not… I don’t know.. talking?”
He placed the bowl back onto the counter, right before taking a deep breath and wiping off any remaining juice on his lips.
“It does.”
“It doesn’t look like it.”
“I’m not sure what you want me to say.” He muttered, walking over to the fridge.
Unbelievable.
While you planted your feet like weeds of a dead RedWood tree, too upset to even fathom the amount of carbs he’d inhaled today, he couldn’t have cared less.
Clearly.
He moved with ignorance, he grabbed a bottle of water with ease, and he couldn’t even look at you for more than 10 seconds—you felt something deep in your intestine sting.
“Park Sunghoon.”
Your voice was stern. It left no room for nonchalant shrugs or short, half-assed responses, it meant business, and the grit in your teeth told him more than ever.
He paused, turning fully towards you. The cap in his palm wasn’t a cap any longer; it became a tool. A fidget. Something he could mess with, without you hissing at him.
He leaned halfway against the counter.
“Yeah?”
There it was.
The same lifeless tone he’d been forcibly feeding you on a dry, splintered, wooden spoon instead of his usual ribbon-wrapped voice that sent sweet glaze down your back.
“What’s wrong with you?” You took a deep breath, maintaining whatever maturity you had left. “It’s been three days and we haven’t talked; if you want to break up, then just say it to my face!—”
“I don’t want to break up with you, Y/N.” He exhaled through his nose before looking away.
You paused for a second.
“Then what? Because this is ridiculous.”
He stared at nothing for a couple of seconds. His jaw was sharp, stiff, almost as if he had been holding back.
That made your mouth arid.
“Y/N,” he swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing in a way that almost made you forget why you guys were arguing.
“What?”
He turned to look at you. “Every time I try talking to you, you snap at me.”
“I do not!”
He pressed his lips together, sighing.
You shriveled, feeling a gush of wind hit your neck.
“That doesn’t count!” You rolled your eyes, stomping a couple steps up to him.
“Stop acting innocent! The whole reason we’re in this mess is because you couldn’t get your hands off that woman.”
His eyebrows furrowed about immediately. Leaning off the counter, his height became apparent; towering over you like you were a mere squirrel in the hands of a dragon.
That didn’t stop you, you were never one to say no to a challenge, no matter how intimidating or sexy it was.
“What woman?”
Your heart thumped through your ribcage, echoing nothing but rattles. “We—”
“The woman at the station?” He cut you off, taking another step towards you.
You took a step back as he pointed behind you, emphasizing his radiating frustration. “The woman, the one that was trying to sell me flowers?”
All your muscles tightened. “Yeah, okay Sunghoon; because a woman with a full-face, hair done, and number eighty-five lash clusters was going to sell you roses out of everyone else.”
He stuttered briefly, lips parting.
“Exactly!”
“I didn’t look at her enough to notice all of that—and lashes have sizes??”
“Don’t change the topic.”
He ran a hand over his face, inhaling the biggest breath he’d sworn he’d ever taken since asking you to be his girlfriend.
You stared at him, determined to get an apology out of him.
“The only reason I touched her was because she kept pushing her flowers against my chest—Y/N, we’ve been over this.”
You crossed your arms over your chest. “Actually, no, we haven’t been over this—”
“Yes we have. You just weren’t listening to me, you never do, and that’s your problem.”
You felt your lips involuntarily part.
Say something.
Say anything.
You could argue how he was wrong, how last year on April 24th, you’d remembered his moms birthday—which proved you were listening,
Yet you could only stare as he took the final step towards you.
The next thing you knew, your lower back was fully pressed against the cold counter, your hands were gripping the marble edges, and your chest popped out just enough to make it clear that you wanted space.
He continued.
“I told you multiple times while you were yelling in the car,”
~~~
“That’s fucking crazy.” You laughed dryly, kicking one leg over the other before purposely facing the window.
Sunghoon’s eyes widened, a bit of confusion in them. “What’s wrong baby?”
“Don’t fucking baby me.”
His small, default grin instantly dropped. “What?”
“Your girlfriend’s in the car, waiting for you, and you’re out there flirting with that woman with flowers. Did you think I wasn’t going to see?!”
You whipped around to face him, stomping both feet onto his car mats.
“Baby, what—”
“Didn’t I say don’t call me baby? Go call her baby, clearly you fucking want to!”
He shook his head. “What are you talking about?”
“Sunghoon!” You stuck your hand out at his window. “You touched her—basically hugged her, and I’m right here! What? What’d she need? A new flower ambassador?!”
He grabbed your arm, slowly dragging it down into his lap. “Don’t be immature Y/N. All she wanted was for someone to buy her flowers, I told her no and moved on.”
You yanked your arm back. “Showing all thirty-two for someone who told her no! God, you’re easy.”
“I was trying to be nice, Y/N.”
“By grabbing her hips?”
“I gently placed my hands on her shoulder to push her aside.”
“You touched her! Why’d you touch her? Weirdo.”
“She got too close, I didn’t have a choice.”
“Oh, shut the hell up, cheater!”
~~~
You were always one with a temper, to be fair.
“I didn’t mean to touch her, I’ve been trying to tell you that all week, but you keep getting upset with me before I can even explain myself.”
“Well—”
“There is no “well.”” He silenced you before you could even put up another argument.
Your pride deflated.
Just a bit.
Especially seeing him up close in your personal space after being deprived of his everything.
His scent, his bone structure, his features, his killer state—maybe it was because of the pure aroma of dissatisfaction floating off of him, but it made your legs weak.
He nudged his eyebrows up, as if he was waiting for you to say something.
Anything.
You smacked your lips open, feigning confidence. “You could’ve just said that in the first place.”
“Y/N.”
Your body, yes, entire body, froze then erupted. You could feel the peach fuzz on your neck straighten into coarseness.
“I’m sorry.”
That was it. It was hard feigning confidence, but even harder feigning innocence in front of your boyfriend; the one man who could read you like a drenched piece of lined paper.
And it was even worse when you’d figured out that he was right. Something that barely happened because, according to his logic, “Whatever makes you happy baby.”
Even if it meant dealing with your stupid arguments that usually led nowhere and ended with him apologizing (you’re usually in the wrong).
Even if it meant listening to you yell about meaningless coworker drama for hours on end.
Even if it meant sitting through every single curse word aimed at whatever had decided to pull your strings that day.
The guilt felt like glaciers in your lungs.
Maybe you should’ve listened.
Maybe you shouldn’t have cursed him out.
Maybe you shouldn’t have called him a cheater.
“You’re sorry?”
Your eyes fell to the ground, where his legs were enveloping yours.
You barely nodded. Too ashamed. Too shy.
The silence made you want to drown in your own tears. To say it was uncomfortable would be undermining it.
He stood there, capturing every bend and curve your face had morphed into over the years. His eyes didn’t leave your face once,
Until you felt him slowly slither.
It was one gradual movement; his hands locked onto the marble counter, right above yours.
He leaned in beside your ear, his breath like a ghost.
“Speak up.”
The strength in your grip weakened, just like your mental state.
“I’m sorry.” You tried again, this time a bit louder.
The tip of his nose nudged your temple, as if he was guiding your head to the side.
You obliged. Instantly.
You could feel the way his eyes sunk into your profile; mercy was only a dream at this point.
For some reason, it filled you with nervousness, but at this point, you weren’t sure if it was excitement or anxiety.
“One more time.” He whispered.
You gulped, closing your eyes. “I’m sorry—”
You were cut off as his hand moved, harshly gripping your chin to face him.
“No. Keep your eyes open.”
You attempted to swallow whatever your dry mouth had produced in that split second before opening your eyes slowly.
“Now, try again.” His other hand gripped the counter behind you, causing him to lean down just to match your height.
Your eyes met his.
Dark, black, olives and maple buttons, you could skinny dip in them if you wanted to.
Just not right now.
“I’m sorry Sunghoon.”
“For?”
“For hurting your feelings.”
His hand slid off your chin, down to your throat, squeezing gently rather than choking you, yet.
“No,” he murmured, sending another squeeze. “Try again.”
The counter embedded crevices into your lower back from the amount of strength it was taking you to stand up to him.
“For calling you a cheater.”
“And?”
“I…I don’t know,” you winced, attempting to look down but Sunghoon was quicker. His gentle squeeze turned into a capture, forcing you to look at him.
“I said try again.”
Your eyes met his, again, this time involuntarily. You could feel your heart begin to claw its way up your throat, it wasn’t working—the words you wanted to say refused to come out.
“I’m sorry Hoon, I didn’t- I didn’t mean it,”
“Don’t call me Hoon.” He muttered dryly, lifting his other hand off the counter and onto your bicep.
Without warning, he engulfed it within his tight grip right before shoving you out the kitchen, using both his grip and the side of his body.
“What—”
“Walk.”
His words were firm, left no room for argument or disobedience, and that scared you.
The further you walked, the more you realized he was leading you towards the bedroom.
Your head inflated, your eyes transformed into dizzying swirls, and your heart couldn’t have been beating faster, yet your abdomen grew a hyperfixation on one thing and one thing only: Sunghoon.
“Hold on-”
You pathetically tried as the door swung open. Your hands reached for his body, for his grip, even for the air surrounding him, but he was faster, stronger, and bigger.
In one shove, you were on the bed, flat on your back, knees curled up to the sky, propping yourself up with your elbows.
He wasted no time taking what’s his.
He sank over you, his legs over yours, and in no time, his hands felt like burning iron on your knees, tearing them open.
“Hoon-”
“Shut up.” He hissed, shoving one of his massive thighs in between your legs.
Your lower back arched at the slight graze, already wanting more of his touch; even if it meant humping his thigh like a pathetic piglet.
He had other plans.
Quickly, he completely palmed your stomach, deepening you into the mattress.
He exhaled, crawling up on his forearms towards you before locking them beside your head.
His face nestled into your soft neck, embracing the frictionless scent of vanilla and sugar; his tongue flexed, aiming it directly at the one spot he knew would send you squirming.
And so you did.
Your hands darted up to his shoulders, latching onto them like he was the hook on the rod keeping you afloat.
“Ah..”
Your eyes fluttered shut, already feeling your new Victoria panties start to moisten against your clit.
Just one swipe, that’s all it took for you to be under his mercy.
He moved one hand teasingly slow, as if you weren’t worth the trouble of hustling. It explored like it had a mind of its own—across your neck, down past your collarbone, caressing your sternum up and down, until finally landing on top of your already hardened nipple.
It didn’t take much for your hardened nipple to turn to stone under his touch. His hands were large and rough, caging every part of your body like they were branded his.
“Mm..” You whined, squeezing your thighs together. “Hoon.. come on…”
You were aware it was absolutely beyond pathetic to be begging for him after being the sole reason you guys weren’t talking, but you didn’t care.
He flattened his tongue against your neck, making sure you felt every tastebud and saliva bubble popping.
His head tilted to the side, focusing on a certain spot rather than sprinkling random sucks, kisses, and pecks all over.
That killed you.
Your grip on his shoulder faltered. One hand moved down to his bicep, squeezing gently at the relaxed muscle.
“Are you still mad at me?” You muttered, slightly turning your head to catch a glimpse of him working on your neck.
He pulled back almost immediately, but stayed close.
His eyes snapped to yours as he hovered over you. A couple strands from his hair fell over his face and you could’ve sworn an angel had just been reincarnated in front of you.
God, you were pathetic for this man.
“Yes.” He answered shortly. “Stop talking.”
You felt a lump in your throat at his tone. It wasn’t playful, it wasn’t gentle, and it wasn’t how he usually spoke to you whenever you guys had sex.
It scared you, it worried you, and it endeared you.
The second he saw the submission on your face, an unwilling grin broke out on his face.
His hand on your breast moved—too quickly for you to even realize he’d just pinched your nipple. Hard.
A gasp escaped from your mouth. “Ah! Hoon!-”
“Shut up.”
He moved his other hand off the mattress, onto your hip bone, angling it just right against his growth.
His eyes stayed on yours, with each blink of his thick lashes, his breath hit center against your cupid’s bow.
“Does it feel good?” He gripped your hip, forcibly using you against his length.
It dragged, inch by inch, you felt it through your silk pajamas. You knew he was big, sometimes you questioned how you’ve taken it before, but this was different.
Your hips shook with each drag he stole from you, your legs felt like they were about to give up and you were laying down, your clit began to swell.
Another gasp.
“F-fuck,”
He pinched your nipple again. “Does it?”
“Yeah.” You winced, digging your nails into his muscular biceps.
He exhaled, watching your eyebrows pitiably touch every time he moved your hips for you.
“Good,” he removed his hand off your breast then slid it down into your waistband.
One tug. “Take them off.” He tugged the band back, just enough to earn a loud snapping sound against your flesh.
You flinched up, your entire body curled in at the stinging sensation already blemishing a scarlett line of red.
He didn’t even budge, eyes locked with yours. His hand fell over the waistband again.
“I said take them off.”
Then again, he pulled them back enough to release another loud snap.
“Sunghoon-”
Before you could finish your complaint, his hand slid under your waistband, cupping you through your panties.
He tensed his palm against your swollen clit, gradually moving it up and down in a way that made you see stars.
The pain morphed into pleasure almost immediately. You fell back onto the mattress, lolling your eyes all the way back, lips parted.
“You don’t listen,” he whispered, bringing his lips up to your ear. “I need you to listen baby, or it’ll be hard on you.”
His breath sent a shiver up your shoulders, but the continuous friction from his palm made you go numb.
“Uh-huh…” You slurred, hips moving with his palm.
He halted his palm. Your eyes zapped open at the lack of warmth, but once you saw him staring down at you, you gulped.
“Take them off.”
You wasted no time. In just a couple of seconds, your expensive silk pajama pants were randomly tossed across the floor.
Despite your cooperation, he looked the same. No validating expression, no soft smile, not even a look away.
Instead, he leaned back on his knees, cradling your hips. His large hands roamed across your stomach, up and down, too gentle yet so thick with skin.
You moved under his touch, copying his rhythm; the only thing protecting you were your Victoria panties that’d already had a stain from your previous arousal.
And in a snap, those were off.
Using both hands, he ripped them in half, leaving you exposed and a little cold.
Your initial reaction was to close your legs—sure, he’s seen you naked plenty of times, but it never stopped your self-consciousness.
“Don’t,” he grabbed your calves, opening up what was rightfully his.
His eyes stayed locked onto your plushy center, already glistening under the not so bright lights.
“Hoon!” You whined.
It didn’t register to him.
He leaned in, grabbing both of your thighs, forcing them around the sides of his face. Instead of going in directly like the hungry beast he was, he planted kisses across your bikini line, occasionally gliding his tongue over your flaps.
Your breath caught with every glide. Each one felt like pure bliss on the edge. It was so delightful, you swore each time you’d cum all over his tongue, yet it never came.
It was bordering torturous.
It was bordering purposeful.
“H-Hoon,” you managed to utter through parted lips and bucking hips.
He swept his tongue over your clit this time, making sure to let it roll in its own wetness. “Hm?”
“Can’t.” You hissed, tangling your hand in his hair.
He pulled back just barely, releasing a dry chuckle. His hand moved, gripping yours before yanking it down towards the mattress.
“You can.”
You squeezed your eyes shut. “I can’t, I really- I can’t,”
“What’d I say about listening?”
He released your wrist and climbed up to hover over you.
Once your eyes opened, all you could see was his lips covered in your liquid.
It made your abdomen greedy.
“You never listen,” he grabbed your jaw with one hand, using his forearm to balance beside you. “I said you can, what’s that mean?”
Your eyes glinted. Your tongue felt heavy.
His grip tightened, almost painfully, before shaking your face lightly. “What’s that mean? Speak up.”
“…means I can.” You mumbled under your breath.
Another shake, this time your hair shook along, landing on your face.
“Louder.”
“I can.”
“One more time.”
You winced, squeezing your thighs. “Hoon, please, I said I’m sorry.”
“Are you going to make me repeat myself?”
He abruptly let go of your face, now planting both of his hands beside your head.
His forehead tickled yours, awaiting your response.
The corners of your lips shivered. “I can.”
He grinned. “Good girl.”
His hands found your shoulders, jerking you up in one swift movement. Before you could even gasp, he spread his legs, forcing you to sit in a way where your entire pussy was floating between his thighs.
Your inner thighs hung off his, your knees barely touched the mattress—he loved it.
Having you open like this, him being the only one that could see you this pathetic, whining, begging and on show—just for him.
He was practically leaking already.
Your hands found his shoulders, yet his eyes stayed glued onto your pussy.
His tongue flashed out, wetting his lower lip, like a madman craving his experiments.
He slid one hand down your stomach until his thumb reached your hooded clit. Slowly, he rubbed a tender circle right above it, making sure to not apply the pressure you so desperately needed.
“Fuck,” you clenched, feeling your entrance tense at the sudden pleasure inflating your abdomen.
Your hands tightened on his shoulders, silently pleading for more.
He noticed.
Of course he did.
“Feel good, baby?”
“Uh-huh,” you nodded, wriggling your hips against his agonizing thumb. “Faster…”
His other hand landed on your thigh, just resting. A barely visible smirk appeared on his face, cocky and content.
“So easy.”
Your heart thumped at his words. Something in you snarled, suddenly feeling exposed and wretched, you swallowed dryly.
He pulled his thumb off your clit, sensing your sudden shift of energy, yet his other hand gripped your thigh tighter.
“The hell?” You rasped. “Since when-”
“Baby,” He cooed, patting your thigh a few times. “It’s okay. Just be quiet and look pretty.”
A dagger flared up in your throat. It twisted and stabbed; no matter how much you swallowed, it kept getting bigger.
His hand on your thigh moved.
Before you could respond, you felt his middle and ring finger rub the slit of your entrance methodically. It was easy, the way he was rubbing.
Light, like a feather, and once he reached your clit, he’d apply flexen his finger and directly rub for a couple seconds, just to make sure you wouldn’t slide off his lap.
He knew what to do to make you stay under his grip.
“Fuck,” your hand jumped on his, unsure of whether you want more or want him to stop.
“Shh,” he grabbed your hand with his free hand, tugging it up onto his shoulder before dropping it back down. “You know what to say to get me to stop.”
Your eyes shrunk in humiliation, that dagger in your throat felt like a sea urchin now.
“Fuck you.”
“Mm.” Was all he responded with, that is until you felt two fingers slide into you without any warning.
He spread his thighs wider, spreading yours out even further than before. As if you didn’t already feel exposed enough, you could feel your wetness dripping onto the comforters.
You leaned your head frontwards, letting a raspy moan fall from your lips. Refusing to look at the mess you were creating, Sunghoon’s free hand landed on your hip, pulling you even closer.
“Fuck me?” He repeated, watching his own fingers pump in and out of you, each disgusting thrust sent a splatter of your juices against the comforters, some even landing against his gray sweatpants.
You couldn’t even utter half a syllable.
“Mm, yeah?” He teased, looking up at you for a brief second.
Quicker.
He moved his hand off your hip and onto your lower back, making sure to fuck you on his fingers himself.
You pulsated on his fingers, squeezing them as if they were his actual cock buried deep inside you.
Your forehead landed against his shoulder, gasping, moaning, and cursing quiet insensitives—uncertain if they were directed at him or not, he shifted his leg, practically putting you in a split above his legs.
“Hoon,” you hissed, burying your face into his shoulder. “Gonna-”
“Don’t do that,” he furrowed, slightly moving his head past your torso. “Can’t see your pussy when you do that.”
His fingers pushed deeper past the groovy skin inside of you. He pressed up in a specific rhythm that made your legs shake.
You moaned in response, gripping the fabric of his shirt, tugging in despair.
“F-fuck—gonna-” you cut yourself off with a whine.
“Be quiet.”
He moved your hip in a way that was purposeful, in a way that made your g-spot bounce against his fingers, as he’s pushing them up into you.
You saw galaxies.
Your lips fell open, releasing absolutely nothing but a soft, paused wince. Your body shuddered on itself—your pussy, having a mind of its own, squeezed around his fingers causing a major explosion over his hands.
You rolled your eyes back, covering your face using the fabric of his shirt while your body shook.
“Fuck…” he continued pumping you, but the movement on your hip stopped. Now it was just him, enjoying the view in front of and on him.
Your wetness felt like a faucet, dripping without any stop in sight.
With a satisfied groan, he slid his fingers out of you. His other hand moved first, up to your face, pushing you off of his shoulder.
You blinked open, eyebrows slightly furrowed at the light. Your body still shook, it felt like someone had physically rearranged your organs, and that was only his fingers.
“Came pretty hard?” He mumbled, pushing your forehead to his.
A ray of effortless blush spread on your cheeks.
“So wet baby,” his other hand slid under you again, feeling up your neverending wetness.
“Ah-” you winced, shrinking your thighs together.
He let out a small chuckle before patting your thigh a couple times.
“Come on baby,” his voice went low, almost soothing as he brought his fingers, the same ones that were just in you, up to your mouth. “Come on.”
Your eyes snapped to his hovering fingers. For a moment, you paused.
Catching this, he took it upon himself. His other hand gripped the back of your neck, fisting a handful of your hair before tilting your head back.
“We’re going to start listening, okay?”
His voice was delicate but the way his fingers moved made you think otherwise.
He brought them up to your lower lip at first, gentle, petting, then slowly he inserted his middle finger.
Just one for now.
He let out a low groan at the pure sight of you. In his lap, legs spread, pussy dripping between his legs and onto the comforter, all fucked out from the same fingers in your mouth.
His bulge grew bigger, twitching.
“Suck, baby, suck.” His voice sounded like a lullaby, and you did.
Your cheeks sunk in around his finger, salvia began to lather around his skin. You tasted yourself on him, salty but bitter.
“More.” He whispered, shoving his finger further down your throat.
You complied.
And soon, it was his middle and ring finger. His hands were large, it was no mistake his fingers were just as big.
“Fuck, you’re such a slut for me.”
He rubbed his fingertips across your tongue, then under your tongue, making sure to scatter your juices all over, without a doubt.
You choked a couple of times, naturally. Each time he hit uvula on accident, you pulled back, attempting a cough, but he was always a step ahead, grabbing the back of your neck and shoving his fingers back to where they belonged.
It almost made you choke. Your breath kept getting cut short, but Sunghoon was persistent. Especially after you’d unreasonably upset him, this was his payback.
“Keep sucking,” his eyes narrowed in on your lips, watching how his fingers disappeared halfway then revealed themselves.
His other hand dropped from your neck and onto his bulge.
“Use your hands.”
You moved, reaching out for his throbbing cock, but he stopped you instantly.
“No,” he placed your hand on his wrist. “Suck like you fucking mean it. Like it’s me in your mouth.”
Once that was clear, he let go of your wrist and went back to his bulge. Feeling himself through his sweats, he watched you.
He watched how you grabbed his wrist with both hands, how you adjusted yourself so that your knees touched the mattress instead of your dripping pussy, how your eyes rolled back each time he helped you by pulling in and out.
“Fuck.” He hissed, squeezing his thick length.
His eyebrows furrowed—a small gray stain began to form right near his tip.
The more he felt himself up, the more he imagined being in you.
And that was it.
In a quick motion, he yanked his fingers out of your mouth and shoved you head first into the mattress.
You let out a caught off guard sound, landing on your stomach, but he didn’t care.
He wasn’t bothered. Couldn’t be when he still had so much anger pent up, because of you.
You lifted your head, propping your upper half up using your elbows. Right as you got a bit of leverage, his strong hands shoved your head right back into the mattress.
“Shh,” he eased, planting his veiny forearm next to your head.
You let out an inaudible sound, gripping the comforters beneath you.
He smirked, ripping his shirt off in one motion. It was a shame you weren’t facing him, but you knew each carving of his muscles would’ve made you cum on the spot.
In another motion, his pants and boxers slid off.
Sluggishly, he crawled above you, pressing his entire weight onto you. You let out a mixture of moan and a gasp for air.
“Heavy?”
“Ah..”
He laughed.
Using one hand, he moved the hair off your face before turning you to face him.
Expecting him to kiss you, he just stared at you in silence, then dropped your head back onto the mattress.
Your heart sank even further.
He was never this mean during sex.
Shifting, he slightly leaned back, just the slightest, giving you the right amount of room to inhale and exhale, but not enough to yawn or shift.
He kept his gaze locked on the back of your head, admiring how stupid you’d gone, how you’d become a ragdoll in his hands—just for him.
It made him hard. So hard. Too hard.
He groaned, rubbing his tip tenderly against his palm. His precum spread, there was too much, some landed on your lower back.
“Fuck baby.”
Using the precum on your back, he rubbed it over as if he were giving you a massage, except he dragged it down, over your ass—making sure it’d drip into your entrance.
Your back reflexively arched toward the mattress, feeling it glide like an edge.
That was it.
Eyeing the way your swollen pussy sucked up his precum, even on accident. You were painfully unaware of the effect you had on him.
He pushed himself over you, hovering slightly before yanking you up on your knees. He gave your ass a loud slap that made you flinch and wince, yet he showed no mercy.
“Yeah..” he muttered to himself, spreading your folds open. “All this for me.”
You felt your face grow hot. In retaliation, you couldn’t help but hide your face in the covers.
His hand stayed on your ass as a sense of stability, while he began rubbing his tip between your folds.
It was pornagraphic.
The way his tip disappeared into your plumpy folds—he wasn’t even in and he felt his balls tightening.
Your thighs clenched, spreading wider as your back arched even deeper.
That’s when he lost control.
His hands slid down to your hips, and in one, unforgiving thrust, his length inflated you, inch by inch.
You felt the air in your lungs go stale. The numbness in your toes and the stretch of your hole only made it feel better and worse at the same time.
“H-Hoon,” you whimpered into the sheets, voice cracking.
He groaned, pulling out just the slightest before shoving right back in.
Your eyes rolled back.
“Fuck, baby,” he groaned, scrunching his face together. “You’re this tight after three days?”
You gripped the sheets tighter, feeling your face flare up.
“Maybe I should stop talking to you after every argument?” He grunted, digging his nails into your skin.
His cock flexed inside your tacky walls, each clench you mistakenly admitted to him made him more feral.
Another grunt. “Should I?”
You didn’t respond. Too fucked out, too embarrassed, too ashamed to even fathom was he was saying.
His tip scratched at that specific hidden gooey spot deep past your walls. Every graze felt like you were about to cum yourself right then and there; it was breezy, barely catchable, yet mixed with the way he was thrusting into you like a reusable sexdolll—you were close.
“Come on, say something.”
He yanked your hips back against his, burying himself in you to the brim.
You were overflowing.
“Fuck!” You moaned, but he didn’t care.
“Always have something to say,” he grunted, grabbing your thigh to spread you even more open.
Your head felt heavy—so did your stomach.
“Hoon- Hoon- gonna cum—”
“I don’t care.”
He abruptly grabbed a fistful of your hand and jerked your head up.
You yelped, staring at the wall in pain. Too many things were going on at once, you couldn’t help it; but it felt so good.
“Sunghoon, hurting- hurting me—”
“Shh..” his grip tightened.
His thrusts became erratic, messy, uncontrollable. He wrapped his other hand under your stomach, holding it tightly.
You felt your opening begin to burn at his pace, in contrast to your g-spot repeatedly getting grazed, it felt like heaven on earth.
You didn’t know whether or not to cry or to cum—it felt that good.
“You’d like it, huh?” He spoke through gritted teeth, staring at his fistful of your hair.
He yanked back once, ensuring you were listening.
You replied with a small, pained sound.
“Yeah?” He tightened his fist even harder. “You’d like being treated like this, huh?”
You flung your hand behind you to grab onto something, failing, you dropped your hand down with another pained sound.
“Hoon—fuck,”
“So fucking easy for me baby.”
“Fuck, Hoon, hold on,”
“Can’t,” his voice went down an octave, almost as an attempt to control himself, but failing miserably to do so.
Your neck began to hurt, evidently; his grip was unwavering and his cock was too big, too wide, too thick—you were being impaled.
You gasped, raising a hand up to his grip. Then you felt it.
A slow tear rolling down your cheek, a choked gasp, then a sob.
You winced, squeezing your eyes shut. “F-fuck… Hoon, please..”
He groaned. Telling by your voice, you were sobbing.
Sobbing because of him, because of his cock.
His ego inflated.
“Please what?” He hissed, spanking your ass with all his might before throwing your hand off his.
You yelped, letting out another sob. You planted your hands, instantly re-gripping the sheets.
“Hurts, ‘s hurts, can’t—”
“What’d we say about can’t?”
You sobbed, feeling your abdomen tighten impeccably. “Hoon, can’t,”
He ignored you, going back to focusing on what’s important: filling you up.
He plunged his cock further into you, then right back out completely, leaving the tip dangling off your opening.
Each thrust made your back ache, each thrust made you sob louder and louder, and each sob felt like your body was pleasurably on fire.
“Come on baby,” he finally let go of your hair, and your head immediately fell on its own. “You can take it, come on.”
Your legs shook, your knees wobbled—it was sharp. It was fast. It was incomprehensible to anyone that wasn’t you.
The orgasm soared from your toes that had gone numb, through your arching back and up to your dazed head.
It kept going, your body twitched and spasmed, it felt like the quickest rush of adrenaline you’d ever experienced.
Painful, pleasurable, dirty—all of it.
And the best part? Sunghoon continued.
He stared at your fucked out state, elbows above your head, side of your face planted against the sheets, no longer moving besides a few spasms here and there.
He bit his lower lip, grunting as he shoved his tip all the way inside of you, and in one more, small, thrust, he let out a sharp groan, filling you to the brim with his savory cream.
You felt full, like you had to use the bathroom; there was too much of his liquid in you.
But it felt unimaginably good.
He stayed there for a few minutes, resting over you. Part of him wanting to keep the warmth, the other part wanting to make sure you had sucked him completely dry.
Even a drop would be wasteful.
Eventually, he pulled back. Using a hand to stabilize himself on your back, his cock stretched from you, almost as if refusing to leave, before plopping out.
He grunted at the sight of his milky cum trickling past your opening and collecting on your clit.
“Mmh,” he breathed, rubbing a small circle above your ass, before pushing you completely down.
You closed your eyes, covering your face completely from him. You’d never cried during sex, and this certainly shouldn’t be a first.
Not after you’d caused chaos.
His hand slid up to your hand, still maintaining the same rhythmic rubs.
His lower abdomen muscles tightened at the sight of you; his cock was already hardening but he knew this wasn’t the time for that.
Once he reached your side, he patted your shoulder a few times.
“Y/N, baby, you okay?”
Sunghoon’s voice had a complete shift. From aggressive and assertive to drenched in brown sugar and Valentine’s Day arrows.
You hummed once, still keeping your face covered.
He gently smiled, patting your head. “Look at me, come on, be a good girl.”
Despite your embarrassment, you gradually lifted your head.
Revealing bloodshot eyes, furrowed eyebrows, and what looked like a scared mammal, Sunghoon’s heart clenched.
“Did I hurt you?” He muttered, pushing back a section of hair using his hand.
You shook your head no, swallowing a wet lump. “No.”
“What’s wrong baby?”
His other hand slid under you, gently propping you up into his lap.
Your head rested against his head while your arms wrapped around his torso.
He placed his chin on top of your head right before grabbing a nearby blanket and drenching it on top of the both of you, creating a layer of humidity and sweat under.
“Nothing,” you sniffled, wiping your nose. “You were just..different.”
He squeezed you closer to him, lips forming into a kind smile. “Did I scare you baby?”
You shook your head no again.
“You did good, don’t cry.” He hushed, wiping your tears with his thumb. “I got a little bit carried away.”
You let out a small huff mimicking a laugh. “You did.”
He frowned before pressing a calm kiss against your nose. “Sorry baby.”
“It’s okay.” You smiled, finally looking up at him.
Returning the smile, he took that as the green light to fully press his lips onto yours.
You quietly moaned into his mouth, but before you could go further he pulled back.
“What—”
“You’re perfect.”
You blinked a few times, unsure of what to say.
“I was a little… angry, I didn’t mean to hurt you.” His voice went quieter, sharing something vulnerable, something bare and honest.
You stared at him as he looked down, then back at you.
“You’re my favorite good girl baby, promise.”
“I believe you.” You muttered, shifting in his lap.
Your hand flew into his hair, tucking a sweating Strang behind his ear. He smiled, easily leaning into your touch.
“And Hoon?” He raised his eyebrows. “I kinda liked it.”
( 박성훈 ) In which - (Part 3) You and Sunghoon were childhood best friends who drifted apart over the years. Now, struggling to find a job, Sunghoon steps in and offers you one at HYBE. But after a few drinks to celebrate, the line between childhood best friends and something more starts to blur.
~2.9K
Warnings / Tags: smut, mature content, dirty talk, emotional tension, childhood friends to strangers, slow burn romance, heavy sexual tension, rough sex, fingering, multiple orgasms, aftercare, drinking/alcohol, K-pop idol AU
After two straight days of snowfall, the snow had finally begun to ease. Seoul looked almost normal again, streets cleared, sidewalks salted, the city breathing easier. I was breathing easier too, or at least I told myself I was.
Two days of living with Sunghoon had done something strange to my chest. The apartment still felt too big, too expensive, too much like it belonged to someone I used to know and not the quiet, broad-shouldered idol who now shared his space with me without complaint.
He was still the same old Sunghoon in a lot of ways; short answers, long silences, that cool stare that made strangers step aside. But every now and then the ice cracked. A soft laugh when I burned toast. The way he left an extra blanket folded at the foot of my bed. Little things. Enough to make my stomach twist whenever I caught myself smiling at him like we were seventeen again.
We were back at HYBE today because he had meetings and I had nowhere else to be. I tagged along, badge clipped to my coat, pretending I belonged in the sleek hallways. He didn’t seem to mind. We’d gotten comfortable enough that he’d let me sit in on a quick vocal lesson, and I’d watched him from the corner, hoodie pulled low, voice smooth and controlled. Every time our eyes met across the room something warm flickered between us. It felt dangerous. It felt good.
My phone buzzed in my pocket while he was mid-conversation with a manager. I slipped out into the hallway, heart already sinking because I recognized the number. Another interview.
“Oh, okay. Well, thank you nonetheless.” I said, voice steady even though my throat burned. I hung up and stared at the blank screen. Four companies. Four no's. A full bachelor’s degree and still nothing. I pressed the heel of my hand against my forehead and tried not to cry in the middle of a freaking K-pop company.
By the time Sunghoon finished, the sky outside the tinted windows had gone soft gray. We rode the elevator down in comfortable silence, shoulders brushing. In the car he glanced over once, like he wanted to ask what was wrong, but he didn’t push. I appreciated that about him... always had.
Back at the apartment he headed straight for the kitchen, sleeves rolled to his elbows, pulling ingredients from the fridge like he’d done it a hundred times. I perched on the island stool, chin in my hand, watching the muscles in his forearms flex while he chopped vegetables.
“So what are we having?” I asked.
“Kimchi jjigae. Easy. Warm.” He didn’t look up, but the corner of his mouth lifted. “You look like you need it.”
I opened my mouth to answer when my phone rang again. The screen lit up with another unknown number. My stomach dropped.
“Ah, fuck, I have to take this.” I muttered, sliding off the stool and hurrying into the living room. The call lasted less than two minutes. Another rejection. Another soft, professional 'we’ll keep your résumé on file.' I hung up with my fingers knotted in my hair.
Fuck. This was really happening. I was going to have to call my parents, Ask them to finally come pick me up so I can stay there while I continue looking for a job in Seoul. The thought of leaving Sunghoon’s apartment; Leaving him… made my stomach hurt for some reason. I was already trying to figure out how to tell him I’d be gone by the end of the week when I heard his footsteps behind me.
“You good?” His voice was low, careful.
I turned, blinking fast. “Uh, yeah... No. That was my last job call for Seoul. Another turn-down. You’d think a full English degree would open doors in a country where English isn’t the first language, but apparently not. And now I literally have to go home because I don’t have anything and I can’t exactly afford rent without a paycheck, so it’s just… a lot.” My voice cracked on the last word. I hated how small I sounded.
Sunghoon stayed quiet for a few seconds, studying me. Then, almost casually, he said, “What if you work at HYBE? They’re kinda used to your face by now. And English speakers are always useful with international fans.”
I stared at him. “What?”
“No, I’m serious. It’s perfect.” He stepped closer, eyes bright with the idea. “Sunghoon, even if that was an option, rent here is fucking expensive. I can’t pay for that.”
“You can stay here.”
My heart stuttered. “Oh no, I can’t—”
“You’re already doing it? And I really don’t mind. It’s perfect.”
“That’s a big ask.”
“It’s nothing. I don’t mind. I’ll arrange something for you tomorrow at work. For now, let’s eat.” He turned back toward the kitchen like the conversation was settled, like offering me a home was the easiest thing in the world.
I stood there in the middle of his living room, throat tight, watching his broad back as he stirred the stew. Life wasn’t that bad right now after all?
-
Three days later I walked out of the HYBE conference room with a signed contract in my hand and my pulse hammering. Sunghoon and the rest of the members were waiting in the hallway like they’d been holding their breath the entire interview. The second the door opened, six pairs of eyes snapped to me.
“Well?!” Sunghoon asked, voice tight.
“I got the job!”
“Really?!” He grabbed my waist and spun me around before I could answer, laughing into my hair while the others whooped. Jay pulled me into a quick side hug. Jake ruffled my hair. I was dizzy with relief and the solid warmth of Sunghoon’s arms around me.
“They said they were impressed by my résumé and they want me to start Monday so they can decide which group I’ll support. International fan relations, probably.”
“That’s good!” “I’m so proud of you.” “We should go out for drinks to celebrate!” The suggestions tumbled over each other as we headed for the elevators.
Drinks turned into dancing. Dancing turned into the club where the lights strobed and the floor felt like it was breathing. After some time at the bar, Sunghoon and I realized we had completely lost the group. We ended up in a far corner, away from the crush of bodies, just talking.
Sunghoon smiled at me, eyes bright even in the dim light. "I'm so happy you're back."
I laughed, a little breathless. "You don't mean that. I'm literally inviting myself into your life."
"No, really, I… missed you. Missed us." His fingers reached out, gently tucking a loose strand of hair behind my ear. Then his hand slid to the back of my neck, firm and sure, and he pulled me in.
His mouth met mine in a kiss that stole the air from my lungs. The pressure of his hand tightened just a little, and an unexpected moan slipped out of me. The sound shocked me back to reality; that I was here, in a club, making out with my former best friend.
Sunghoon’s eyes were dark, lips wet. “Don’t be sorry. I was the one who—”
“I—um—”
“We should leave?” he asked, voice rough.
“Yeah. Yeah.”
We didn’t speak in the car. The city lights blurred past the windows while my heart tried to beat its way out of my chest. By the time we reached the apartment I was shaking. I went straight to the guest bathroom... my bathroom, stripped, and stood under the hottest water I could stand, trying to scrub the taste of him off my lips. It didn’t work.
When I finally stepped out, hair damp, wearing nothing but an oversized sweater and soft cotton shorts, the apartment was quiet. I padded into the kitchen for water. The glass was halfway full when I felt him behind me; heat, presence, the faint scent of his body wash. I didn’t turn around.
“Listen,” Sunghoon said slowly, “we need to talk.”
“Do we Sunghoon?” I kept my back to him, fingers tight around the glass.
“Yes. I think we do, Ariana.” His voice was colder than usual, but underneath it something raw trembled.
I set the glass down. “Listen, I’m sorry about what happened. It shouldn’t have—I think we should just forget it after tonight. We’re going to be living together and stuff—”
“What do you mean by ‘after tonight’?” I asked, turning.
He was closer than I expected. Close enough that I had to tilt my chin to meet his eyes. A faint smirk tugged at his mouth.
“Because after that kiss…” His gaze dropped to my lips. “I think I just have to try you once.”
He kissed me again before I could answer.
This time there was no hesitation. His hands slid under my sweater, palms hot against my waist, dragging me flush against him. I felt the hard line of his cock through his sweats and my stomach flipped. My back hit the edge of the kitchen island. He lifted me onto it like I weighed nothing, spreading my thighs so he could step between them. The marble was cold under my bare ass; the contrast with his body heat made me gasp.
“Fuck,” he muttered against my mouth. “You have any idea how long I’ve wanted to do this.”
“Hoon—”
“Tell me to stop and I will.” His fingers traced the edge of my shorts, dipping under the fabric. “But I don’t think you want me to? Do you?”
I didn’t. I really didn’t.
He hooked his thumbs into the waistband and yanked the shorts down my legs, tossing them somewhere behind him. Cool air hit my bare pussy and I shivered. Sunghoon’s eyes darkened as he looked down at me spread open on his kitchen counter.
“Already wet?” he said, almost to himself. Two fingers dragged through my folds, gathering slick. “Is this from the club or from me putting you on the counter like a fucking meal?”
“Both.” I whispered.
He pushed two fingers inside me without warning. The stretch punched a moan out of my throat. He curled them immediately, finding that spot that made my thighs jerk. His thumb circled my clit in tight, relentless strokes.
“Fuck, this shouldn’t feel this good.” I gasped. “We’re supposed to be friends.”
“Well yeah; friends don’t finger each other on kitchen counters.” he agreed, voice low and filthy. “But I’ve been hard since you moaned into my mouth at the club. Since you let me grab your throat like you wanted me to own you.” He pumped his fingers faster, the wet sound obscene in the quiet kitchen. “You gonna come for me right here, Choi? Gonna soak my hand before I even get my cock in you?”
My head fell back. The pressure built too fast, too sharp. I came with a broken cry, walls fluttering around his fingers, thighs shaking against the marble. Sunghoon didn’t stop until I was whimpering, oversensitive, pushing at his wrist.
He pulled his fingers free and sucked them clean, eyes locked on mine. Then he lifted me off the counter like I was nothing and carried me to the living room. My sweater rode up; cool air kissed my soaked pussy again.
He dropped onto the couch and settled me straddling his lap. I could feel every inch of his cock straining against his sweats, thick and hot. I ground down instinctively and he groaned, head tipping back against the cushions.
“Take it out.” he ordered.
My hands shook as I shoved his waistband down. His cock sprang free, flushed dark, tip already leaking. I wrapped my fingers around him and stroked once, twice, just to feel the weight of it. Sunghoon’s hips jerked.
He grabbed my hips and lifted me, lining himself up. I sank down slowly, inch by inch, until he was buried to the hilt. The stretch burned in the best way. I’d never felt so full.
“Fuck—” Sunghoon hissed. “Your pussy’s gripping me like it doesn’t want to let go.”
I rolled my hips experimentally. The drag of his cock against my walls made both of us moan. His hands slid under my sweater, cupping my breasts, thumbs flicking over my nipples until they ached.
“Ride me.” he said. “Show me how bad you want it.”
I braced my hands on his shoulders and started to move; slow at first, then faster, chasing the angle that made stars burst behind my eyelids. Every time I dropped down he met me with a thrust, the slap of skin loud in the quiet apartment. I could feel myself getting wetter, slick dripping down his cock and onto his balls.
“God, look at you.” he growled. “Bouncing on my cock like you were made for it. Pussy taking every inch like a fucking slut.”
The dirty talk made me clench around him. He felt it and smirked.
“You like that? Like hearing how wet you are for me?” He thrust up hard enough to jolt me. “Bet you’ve thought about this. Bet you touched yourself in my guest room thinking about me bending you over the kitchen counter.”
I couldn’t answer. I was too busy chasing the orgasm building low in my belly. Sunghoon’s hand slid between us, thumb finding my clit again, rubbing tight circles while I rode him.
“Come on my cock.” he ordered. “Come for me and then I’m flipping you over.”
The command pushed me over the edge. I came with a choked sob, walls pulsing, thighs shaking. Sunghoon fucked me through it, holding me steady while I trembled.
Before the aftershocks even faded he lifted me off his cock, spun me around, and bent me over the back of the couch. My sweater rode up to my ribs. He kicked my feet apart and slammed back inside in one smooth thrust. The new angle punched the air from my lungs.
“Fuck—Sunghoon—”
“Shh. Just take it.” His hand pressed between my shoulder blades, keeping me pinned while he fucked me hard and deep. The couch creaked with every thrust.
The filthy squelch of his cock driving into me filled the room. I moaned into the cushions, drooling, eyes rolling back. “Gonna come again.” I warned, voice wrecked.
He groaned like I’d punched him and slammed in one last time, cock pulsing as he came. I felt every throb, felt his hips stutter, felt him collapse over me, breathing hard against my neck.
We stayed like that for a long minute, hearts hammering in sync. Eventually he pulled out carefully, and disappeared to the bathroom. He came back with a warm cloth and cleaned me up with surprising gentleness, pressing soft kisses to my inner thighs.
When he was done he pulled me into his arms on the couch, my head on his chest. His fingers traced lazy patterns on my bare hip.
“So.” he said quietly, “still want to pretend that kiss didn’t happen?”
I laughed, breathless. “Pretty sure we’re past pretending.”
He kissed the top of my head. “Good. Because I’m not letting you go anywhere. Not after that.”
summary: jake had a tough day at work — everyone has their ways of winding down, but jake’s preferred way of relaxing is… interesting. (see request here)
word count: 5,779
content warnings: smutty smut smut, sub!jake, dom!reader, reader is afab with she/her pronouns, excuse me there’s plot in your porn, begging (a LOT of it), mama pet name (reader!receiving), handjob, crying (from excess pleasure), overstimulation, praise, a smidge of mirror sex (blink and you’ll miss it tbh), cum eating, hand around neck (not choking), cowgirl, jake’s souls leaves his body, aftercare (jake!receiving, reader!receiving)
author’s note: ngl i don’t think i like this?????????? this isn’t a work of art or wtv so my bad yall
taglist: none yet! please fill out request form to be added :)
It was the slam of the door that startled you.
You had recently taken to winding down for the day by taking up a book to read. It wasn’t like you didn’t enjoy reading, but the common distractions in life often had you neglecting your hobby more than you would like to admit. So, naturally, you had to go out of your way to etch it into your schedule. Every evening, like clockwork, there was the click of the kettle. The light squeak of the kitchen cabinet protesting as you removed your mug of choice. The quiet ruffling of cardboard boxes holding all the tea bags you loved. the thick trickle of the boiling water filling the porcelain cup to capacity. The quiet thud of your hot mug dropped on your bedside table. It was a ritual that you commonly practiced, one that always preceded Jake’s arrival from work.
It was normal for you and Jake to text or call quite sporadically throughout his work day, him slipping away for a quick few minutes phone call or a short text prior to engagements. He didn’t have to, you made it clear to him numerously, but something didn’t quite sit right in his spirit if he didn’t make the effort to reach out to you in the midst of his hectic schedules. That day was no different — a brief text message conversation and a two minute phone call. However, it was different. His texts were shorter, more spaced out and disjointed than usual. His tone in the phone call was short and almost carried some air of irritability that you couldn’t pin point. Your boyfriend had mentioned in passing that it was one of those days, but you had no way of preparing yourself for just how tough his day was.
Jake usually made a habit of announcing himself as he let himself through the door; he had familiarised your reading habit and knew you were holed up in your shared bedroom — it was his attempt to not frighten you and let you know that he was not a burglar who happened to somehow have the key to your house. However, nothing more could be heard beyond the front door slamming shut. A frustrated huff that could be heard afterwards informed you that the door slam was not intentional. There was the shuffle of him slipping out of his outdoor shoes into the house slippers located at the front door, followed by heavy footsteps which grew closer and closer. Soon, your boyfriend’s body crossed the threshold of the doorway of your shared bedroom. “Hi baby,” you chirped, folding down the top folder of the page you were scanning and placing it on your bedside table. “Oh, hey love,” he murmured in response, offering you a smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes. You eyed him carefully as he shrugged his bag off his shoulders and slung it to the corner of the room, as he actively endeavoured to forget about it for eternity. Your eyes squinted inquisitively, now knowing that your mind wasn’t running amok with thoughts of Jake’s inexplicable negativity. As he shrugged his jacket off his shoulders, you decided to go straight for it. “What’s wrong?”
As soon as you spoke, his movements paused for a brief second, as if he thought he was doing a better job at hiding his emotions than he truly was. Jake continued to shed his outer layer without saying a word, the silence so stretched and thick that you thought he had ignored you completely. He finally responded after what felt like an eternity of no response. “Work was… a lot,” he started carefully. He didn’t turn to hold your gaze like he usually did and instead turned towards the vanity that sat across from the bed, slowly removing the few rings that adorned his long, slender fingers. Spying his face through the reflection in the mirror, his eyebrows were furrowed in clear agitation, jaw working through whatever unspoken carnality he held in his chest. “It’s not even like something happened in particular, I just feel… tense. Like I haven’t been able to really rest. It’s getting to me now.” His voice was gentle, despite all the physical attributes to his subdued anger. When he realised he could no longer stall himself by undressing himself from his outdoor accessories, he finally turned to meet your eyes. His eyes were soft, always were, but tiredness flickered within his orbs. He raised a hand to run through his hair, revealing the dark grey underlayer of his locks. Your eyebrows knitted together with concern. This side to Jake was not foreign to you, but it wasn’t common either. You hated to see him so bothered, so stressed, and not being able to take it away instantaneously. You opened your mouth, ready to spew a slew of ways for him to get his well deserved rest, until he spoke those faithful words.
“I need to relax.”
His voice suddenly sounded so small, so vulnerable and his facial expression suddenly loosened. Your heart pounded in your ears and heat raised to your face as you allowed your body to slowly settle. Relax didn’t mean what it meant to most people between you and Jake; it was a code word. Relax meant that he wanted to relinquish control for a few hours, forget about his responsibilities temporarily and, most importantly, submit. You thought you were mistaken, analysing any clues to inform you of such, but Jake remained determined. He stood very still at the foot of the bed, forcing himself to maintain eye contact despite every nerve in his body demanding to reject it. With a slow swallow, you took a deep breath through your nose and offered a slow blink. As arousal pooled in your most private place, what it took to position yourself where Jake needed you most took no effort at all. “You know what to do, don’t make me say it,” you drawled. Jake sharply took in a breath, as if to not have expected you to agree, but complied without a thought of hesitation.
As you slowly maneuvered your legs to hang off the side of the bed, the young man made his way in front of you. Your eyes never left his own as he sunk down, lower and lower, until his knees made contact with the floor below him. He fixed his eyes on you earnestly, eyes glossy with need for you. His lips glistened under the soft glow of the bedroom light in a dull manner from him licking his lips mere seconds ago. His venous hands remained on his clothed thighs, ever so trained and obedient. Your legs widened to accommodate his bigger frame while you leaned forward to caress your finger over his cheek. His internal battle was a quick and lost one — his eyes fluttered shut as he leaned into your warm touch, as if to be the one thing he had been searching for all his life. Your heart softened, wanting nothing more than to scoop him in your arms and cuddle the night away, but you knew you didn’t truly want that. You knew he didn’t need that the way you knew he needed you. “Sweet boy,” you whispered, taking him in from his delicate lashes, the dusty pink which colored his cheeks, the the similar pink of his lips. At the affectionate title, his eyes opened up once again, not unlike a dog being called to its owner. Despite the pang of arousal it sent straight to your core, your carefully placed expression meant that it was something that Jake would fail to read.
“Yes?” He whispered. In the state he was in, he was like a sponge, so ready to soak up any and all words that tumbled from your lips. The hand caressing his cheek quickly moved to grip his jaw, ensuring there was no opportunity to escape your gaze despite how tempted he was to. The grip on his jaw allowed you to feel his veins move under his skin as he gulped. “What do you want me to do to you?” you quipped. Asking him a question when he was far gone was always a treat — you could almost see his mind searching for the words to string together if you looked deep enough into his eyes. He gulped once again, before his lips parted. “Please, I want you to touch me,” his voice said weakly. It was then that one of the hands raised to smooth over your thigh, his touch still grounding despite your sweats that covered your legs. While you could earnestly say that it was a trick that worked on you, it didn’t mean that you weren’t displeased with his behavior. Your eyes dropped towards his veiny hands wrapped around your thigh, then slowly back up to his own. Paired with your expression of indifference, it was an unspoken interaction that held a dictionary’s worth of words. Almost immediately. Jake’s hand retracted and fell on his lap once again, eye contact finally broken as he stared down at his lap in clear shame. “I-I’m sorry, please baby, please,” Jake whimpered. Tongue in cheek, you were swayed. A single gesture for him to get up was all that he required.
He rose to his feet almost immediately, large hands clumsily curling around the hem of his t-shirt and pulling it over his head, exposing his lean figure. His torso exposed the efforts of his high intensity career, chest and stomach wound tight with toned outcome. Your eyes followed a particularly thick vein which protruded from his bicep as his shirt slid down his arm down to the floor by your feet. Your fingers made quick work of his belt which kept his dark slacks clung to his slim waist and soon it fell limply at his feet, prompting him to obediently step out of them. The sight of his boxers were not lost on you and you didn’t even think to pretend not to look. While he wasn't fully hard, the weight of the bulge was evidence of a man who was at least partially erect. If that didn’t inform you enough, a small, dark spot developing around the end of his bulge was evidence enough. Above you, Jake sucked in a sharp, shaky breath as his hands dutifully clasped behind his back. With a single finger, you curled your digit around the waistband of his boxers and pulled it down to his feet in one fell swoop. Jake, ever expressive but obediently silent, just barely stopped a tiny, strangled whine from escaping his throat. Though partially erect, the heaviness of his thick girth meant that his cock still somewhat hung between his thighs when released from its clothed cage. Saliva accumulated in your mouth immediately, but ever stoic, you remained appearing unaffected.
Then, you swung your feet back onto the mattress you were previously laying on and positioned your legs wide and far apart. The young man followed suit; carefully climbing on the bed and situating himself carefully between your legs and his bare, wide back pressed against your chest. From your position, you could see how his eyelashes fluttered, his pink mouth falling slightly ajar as if he failed to take in sufficient breath by breathing through his nose alone. You witnessed the moment that the hairs of his arms stood to attention the second your hand wrapped around his bicep, running your fingers over his skin while your other reached over to your bedside table to retrieve a bottle of lube. you had no doubt in your mind that the precum that Jake was producing and would go on to produce would be more than enough lubrication, however you were particular addicted to how much you could fuck Jake’s brains out with your hands alone — the slick provided by the lube never failed to make his brain dysfunctional. As his cock, still ever hardening, drooled onto his thigh with effort, you squeezed a generous amount of lube onto your palm before smoothing the substance over his girth. Though he tried to maintain the same resolve you held effortlessly, you could easily hear the way his breath hitched and his body immediately stilled.
Your hand wrapped around the base of his cock while your other hand took a firm hold of the rest of him, delicately spreading the lube over his length. “Tell me about your day,” you murmured. The hesitation from Jake informed you that it was the last thing he expected to hear out of your mouth given the context, but he would be stupid to not listen to you, not when your hand was so soft, so warm, gripping him just right. “U-Um,” he gulped, gathering all the words he could generate in that moment. “We had training for the choreography for the new - fuck - comeback, t-the snippet I played for you the other night,” he explained steadily yet breathily. His cock adequately slick, your fist started at a steady pace, stroking him with ease. His head lulled back against your shoulder as he released a small whimper, his length twitching and his tip still leaking into the crevices of your lithe knuckles. “Oh yeah, that sounded cool. I was thinking about what the choreography would look like in the shower this morning actually,” you hummed, tone level and passive as if they were sharing a conversation over coffee, not while you were effectively taking his soul with just the palm of your hand. As you responded, Jake let himself get lost in the sensation. You could tell he wasn’t truly connected to the chatter, and so you let him for some stretched seconds until you continued to speak. “What was the choreography like then?” you cooed, twisting your wrist expertly as your hand moved up and down. Jake whined lowly, his hands holding onto your knees. “It’s really fast and uh…” he trailed off as your pace quickened. The slickness of your fingers massaging his shaft filled the room with the lead sound, whir your eyes moved from his pulsating length to the man’s distant expression. He wasn’t far off drooling, you could tell. “Was it hard baby?” you urged him softly. “Yes! Yes,” he moaned.
Your pace slowed ever so slightly so the hand that gripped the base of his cock moved to his weeping tip instead. Your thumb pressed against the wet slit and moved the pad of your thumb back and forth, stimulating his most sensitive spot. Jake cried out and pathetically rutted against your hand, chasing a level of pleasure that you knew too well he would struggle to handle. Beads of sweat rolled in on themselves and ran down his face and onto his neck, where you carelessly flattened your tongue to lick it up and attach your lips. You started to suck and nip at the crook of his neck while humming in satisfaction. Jake was helpless at this point, heady and whimpering your name. “Please baby, please, please, pl-ease - oh my God,” he whined. His voice was beginning to crack with effort, and if you flicked your eyes up, the tears welling up in his eyes seemingly glittered under the room’s light. “Oh darling boy,” your voice softened after you detached from his neck. The spot bloomed a brilliant red, sure to bruise adequately as the evening grew. “What’re you begging for?”
The hand stimulating his tip dropped down to his balls and you took them in your hands, gently massaging them between your fingers while you set an unforgiving pace with your hand stroking his cock. He was rock hard at this point, tip wet and angry. Jake’s hand moved to the sheets underneath your bodies instead of your legs to grip them in between his fingers, knuckles whitened from the sheer strength behind his hands. Only further moans tumbled from his lips, your words clearly just passing through his ear canal uselessly. With a soft sigh, you immediately stopped your strokes in favor of simply gripping the base of his cock, the hand on his testicles favoring just simply laying on his twitching thighs. Jake’s eyes immediately snapped open in shock, a short gasp leaving his lips. “W-wait, why?” he mumbled in shock, his chest still heaving. “I said, what are you begging for?” you enunciated once again. The lightness in your tone was gone, replaced by the aloofness you had adopted prior. His eyes looked around wildly, as if to still be coming to terms with the sudden loss of stimulation. “‘S just a lot… just for you to keep going,” he explained with a quiet voice. You sighed silently and pressed a soft kiss against his rouge cheeks as your hand built up another pace. The hand on his thigh moved to similarly grip his angry dick, both hands now moving up and down. Almost immediately, his head lulled back against your shoulder as a deep groan left his throat.
Your eyes flicked upwards towards the vanity mirror across from the bed and you carefully spied Jake’s features. The sounds falling from him were devastating, but the sight was even better. His adam’s apple bobbed in his throat as he attempted to swallow down saliva into his throat that was rapidly drying. Your bruising on his neck was apparent, tying the image of positive sin up nicely. “Oh, you’re so good for me Jakey,” you cooed. Your praise was sufficient enough to draw a broken whine from him, as if to be agreeing without saying such. Jake was shaking now, all over, while the little pathetic shreds of composure he had remaining was actively being destroyed. You could tell he was growing close. “S-so-so good, I’m so close- so close, I can’t hold it,” he whimpered loudly. Sure enough, his cock was beginning to twitch against your knuckles. On any other day, you wouldn’t have had a problem with asking him to hold it on account of the fact that he told you he couldn’t, but you weren’t that cruel — especially when he had such a tough day. “You wanna cum baby?” your voice softened. The only thing that could be heard in the room were the damn near disgusting slicks of your hands massaging his cock, his whines which were dangerously near to sobs and the shuffling of the bed covers beneath the two of you as his hips twitched and moved up to fuck himself more into your hands. “So bad, I-I’ll be so good, I pro-omise, please mama,” Jake moaned. As much as you’d like to say the unexpected pet name left you unaffected, the throb in your sopping core informed otherwise. However, you put up a good front; simply humming in response to his words and continuing your pace despite your wrists beginning to ache in a dull manner. You took a long minute to respond, despite the pitiable pleases and fucks that tumbled from his lips. You enjoyed when he was this far gone, at the mercy of your words and your fingers. While his cock twitched angrily in your grip, you leaned close to his ear while fixing your eyes on the mirror across from the bed belonging to the vanity table. “You better look at how pretty you look in the mirror while you cum for me,” you instructed gently. Ever obedient, Jake forced his watery eyes open and fixated on the mirror to the best of his ability, pink lips still uttering your name and other slurring profanities. “Thank you - oh fuck.”
Just as the words fell from his mouth, his hips thrusted into your fists one last time, urging his girth to spill hot, white seed on your knuckles in strong spurts. Your speed slowed but never ceased, your eyes spying the way his face flushed a deep red. A strangled cry ripped from his throat just as his orgasm wracked his body like a tidal wave. While he took prolonged blinks, his heavy lidded eyes remained trained on the mirror. You peppered small kisses underneath his ear while his orgasm rode its course, until his devastating whimpers reduced to heavy breaths, until his quaking thighs reduced in intensity. His head lulled back against your shoulder as he continued to catch his breath. You allowed him to catch his breath for a short minute before speaking. “You know better than to not clean yourself up,” you remarked flatly. Jake blinked blearily, lost but willing to be instructed. Carefully, you let go of his softening length with one of your hands and brought it to his mouth. Picking up his head, his shaky hands held your wrist carefully, as if scared to break fine china, and slowly licked up his own cum, humming while doing so.The hand left on his length began to stroke him again slowly, causing his rhythm to temporarily halt but overall fail to disrupt his flow. He dutifully flattened his tongue and clean the back of your hand, your knuckles, the crevices between your lithe fingers. Your breath hitched just for a moment, a crack in your armour, and you were sure that Jake didn’t miss it. It didn’t take long until your hand was completely free of his spilled cum and his focus was fixated on your hand moving on his cock once again, sending sparks of overstimulation through his spine. “‘S too much, please give me a s-second,” Jake protested quietly, as if he truly did not want to complain but his hand had been forced. Without missing a beat, your hand sped up and you cut him a look from the side. “Are you complaining?” you spoke simply. Immediately, he shook his head, but followed it up with a soft no upon realising you would not be satisfied with a non verbal answer. With that, you continued to stroke his cock mercilessly, ignoring his soft cries. Tears prickled the corners of his eyes once again, but he willed them to not overflow. Soon, his length stiffened once again and you freed him from his torture just as his cries reduced to moans once again.
Once he was rock hard once again, you gently tapped his shoulder. That was enough instruction to cause him to shakily get to his feet, breath still uneven. You got up behind him and began to strip down, pulling your top over your head and undoing your bra. Jake almost immediately settled back down on the mattress as soon as you got up. His eyes were still absent yet still remained trained on your body which you readily exposed. Soon, you were bare. Normally there was some healthy yet small level of self consciousness you felt being exposed, but you were so wet that it didn’t even cross your mind. “Oh fuck,” Jake cursed silently. He watched you climb over his body carefully, large hands gripping your hips to steady you and make sure you perform the maneuver safely. “Baby, you’re so pretty,” he murmured once you had settled down. His eyes raked over your neck, your breasts, your bare torso, your core slickened with your arousal caused by Jake’s unwavering obedience. You felt his cock twitch angrily yet pitifully against your thigh, the remnants of lube smearing against your skin in a memorable touch of your past activities. “You’re so pretty too, love,” you spoke softly. Your hand traveled up to his neck and wrapped your fingers around it, not quite applying pressure but simply fixing his head to position itself in a manner where he could not escape your gaze. Although he usually had no issue with maintaining eye contact when prompted, the effect of your action is not lost on him; a soft, stifled whimper could be heard from his throat.
“How bad do you want it?” you quipped with a small mischievous grin. Just as Jake parted his lips to speak, you adjusted yourself so you sat directly on him, your wettened folds sitting snug against his hardened girth. Almost immediately you moved your hips against him, a sigh falling from your lips as your swollen bud became stimulated from the friction created with his veins. You could almost see the moment you stole the breath from his lungs simply from staring into his eyes before. The man who once knew exactly what to say was rendered effectively speechless. Still, he wouldn’t disobey you. “So, so, so bad. I need you please — you’re so soft ‘nd tight ‘nd… warm…” he groaned lowly in response. Your cunt shamelessly drooled on his cock to the extent that strings of arousal dropped between you and him when you raised yourself slightly. You gripped the base of his cock firmly and tapped the head of his dick against your clit with enough force to make you jolt. The grip Jake had on your hips tightened as he swallowed down a moan dryly. “Please, I-I need you so bad,” he urged once again. All strength had been stripped from his tone and exposed the true desperation hiding behind it. If that wasn’t enough of an indicator in isolation, the tears that sprang to his eyes almost immediately informed you of such. Finally succumbing to his soft, devastating pleas, you lined his throbbing girth up with your entrance and slowly slid down, working your way through the brutish burn of the stretch. A soft hiss left your mouth, but the burn was addictive and meddled messily with the pleasure of the fullness. Thus, you didn’t hesitate for a second. Jake, on the other hand, was trying his dear hardest to not cum straight away. The iron grip on your hip which foretold of a nasty bruise told you enough, but his quivering lip and the few tears he had been painfully holding finally falling down the redness of his cheek attested to it further. It was only when your hips fell plush against his own that you let out a breath that you weren’t even actively aware you were holding.
You took a long few seconds to allow your walls to scramble around his cock, rushing to align itself and stretch around him. You simply breathed deeply through your nose while your hand dropped from his neck to one of his hands on your hip, picking it up in your grip and intertwining your fingers together. That was enough to ground the both of you, where the sensation of simply existing in that moment was euphoric. “S-So… hah, tight,” he moaned wantonly. Almost immediately. you slowly began to rock your hips back and forth on him. A soft moan fell from your lips, your head rocking back. Jake leaned forward and raised his other hand from your hip and moved to cup your breast in his veiny hand. His tongue darted out and laid against the underside of your nipple while his lips wrapped around it, sucking earnestly while whining against you. The sensitivity in your peaks shot straight to your core, coaxing more sounds of pleasure from you. “You’re such a good boy,” you cooed between soft pants. You began to bounce up and down, placing both your hands on his chest. The burn of the stretch was still lingering, but the pleasure crawling through your veins made you not mind it entirely. Jake’s mouth fell open, guttural groans escaping his throat. The few tears that had rolled down his face dissipated onto the pink of his lips, the wet trail being the only testimony to their presence. You could feel the slight tremble of the young man’s thighs beneath your own every time you descended on his length, but that wasn’t enough for you.
You adjusted yourself to get up on your toes, moving your hands to grip the headboard behind Jake’s head. His eyes suddenly went wide, able to participate in what was to come, but the only thing that left his mouth was raggedy breathing. While your own thighs were quaking slightly simply from the previous stretch of his dick, your newly found strength enabled you to begin raising your hips and slamming them down on his own with reckless abandon. Your hips raised until just the tip of his cock remained nestled in you, but brought yourself down with a force which knocked the length out of both your lungs. You were punishing yourself in the best way. The new angle meant that the head of his cock jabbed your sweet spot with perfect precision, making you whimper. “Ho-holy shiiiit,” Jake moaned shamelessly. The way his cock massages your walls perfectly was mind numbing, but it was something you couldn’t fully succumb to at the time; not when your status quo was making Jake jelly. It seemed you were succeeding; his arms fell limply at his sides and he looked up blearily at you, his mouth ajar and only mere whimpers of your name falling from him occasionally. It was as if he was between worlds of being unable to bear your punishing hips, what with his lingering oversensitivity, and also not being able to get enough of the way your cunt weeped around him and squeezed his cock, threatening to milk him of all the cum he could possibly spill for a week. Despite how far gone he was, he found enough strength to raise a hand to plant on your bouncing ass, helping you as the burn of your position crept along your knees and thighs. You were barrelling closer and closer to the finish, quicker than you previously anticipated. Maybe it was the way the slick of your pussy coated him more and more, making his girth glisten under the low light of the room each time you raised your hips, or even your sounds becoming higher as you became a slave of your own making, but Jake took notice of it immediately.
With an unexplainable bound of energy, his other limp hand snaked around your thigh to press his thumb against your clit in tightly-wound circles. Your gasp was noticeable, loud, uncontrollable. “D-does that fe-eel good mama?” he groaned lowly. “It feels so p-perfect Jakey,” you cried out. Your pace began to stutter, failing to carry the same depth as before. Ever observant, Jake’s grip tightened on your hip as he adjusted himself to be able to thrust up into you, meeting your weakened hip movements. Despite taking on physical control, you knew he was still under your thumb at your beck and call. “Make me cum baby, I’m so cl-close,” you panted, one of your hands on the headboard falling to his chest once again, but this time rolling his nipple between your fingers. His whimpers remained loud, his voice even beginning to crack from effort, but his fingers and hips never stopped even as his own orgasm loomed. “Yes baby,” he responded quickly. You began to move your hips once again to meet his own, resuming the deep strokes you were subjected to before.
It didn’t take long.
Burying your face into the crook of his neck, your eyes rolled back as your orgasm fell in waves over your body. “Jaaaake,” you moaned in a voice that did not belong to you. Your body shook like a leaf in the wind above him, the hand on his chest slowly becoming your nails dragging across his skin. Similarly, Jake’s voice cried out shortly after you as his length began to twitch within your walls unloading rope after rope of cum deep against your cervix. He too completely slumped under you, spent and more than satisfied. Your hips rocked slowly and gently as he filled you up, causing you to shakily moan. The both of you said and did nothing for a while, still and throbbing, warm and glowing. The hand in your hip drew idle nondescript shapes into your lower back, your breath radiating pure heat against his pulse.
You soon moved slowly, body still shaky, and reached for a small clean towel which laid close to the vanity table. You crawled over to your boyfriend and gently cleaned his softening length which caused him to whimper. “You’re a good worker, Jake,” you murmured as you gently cleaned between his thighs. Your eyes flicked upwards to meet his eyes. The same eyes met you, so ready to listen but this time, a little more worn down. His hair was mussed in his face, slightly covering his eyes and some stray strands stuck to his forehead by sweat. His face remained flushed but was gradually lessening in its rouge. His lips were swollen from repeated licking and biting. His breathing still somewhat uneasy, he reached for a water bottle on the bedside table and flicked it open, taking several deep gulps. You grinned softly, knowing he was already anticipating your instruction to hydrate. “You don’t need to be so hard on yourself, you know that.” He listened earnestly while you peppered kisses trailing upwards to his mouth: his thigh, his hip, his lower stomach, his abs, his chest, his neck, his jawline. You finally let your lips touch, soft and grounding. His hand raised to cup the side of the neck as his lips moved carefully against yours with care of a person that did not want to break you. He broke the kiss to take the towel from your grip and motioned for you to lay down beside him, which you did. Mirroring your past movements, he wiped in between your legs so gently that it felt like he was ghosting over you. It made you shudder. “I know, I think I just got… really overwhelmed today,” he mumbled. Tossing the towel aside, he took the water bottle he had just drank from and handed it to you. Just like him, you tipped it back and drank its contents, feeling refreshed. “At least I only have a radio appearance tomorrow… but… thank you,” he smiled gratefully. You were mindful in returning the smile as you handed him back the water bottle. “Anytime baby.”
As Jake sank down on the pillow beside you, the heaviness of his eyes were telling. You carefully untucked the sheets from underneath your bodies and threw it over the two of you. He immediately snuggled into the new environment, pulling you into an embrace. Your hand raised to his head to massage his scalp. His eyes immediately fluttered shut in response. As he drifted off, you paid attention to his body slowly falling slack around you, yet his grip on your waist remained firm. It was the gentle rhythm of his heavy breathing that brought you under finally.
The dorm party has finally wound down to a hush. A heavy kind of quiet settles over the living room after hours of loud music, shouting, and too much laughter. Empty plastic cups litter the coffee table and side tables. Some are half full with flat beer or diluted soju. Others tipped over, leaving faint sticky rings on the wood. Discarded jackets and hoodies drape over every available surface. Armrests, the back of the sofa, even piled in a heap on the floor near the entryway. The air still smells faintly of fried snacks, citrus soda, and sharp sweet alcohol. It feels thick and warm inside the enclosed space.
It is well past midnight. The rest of the members have all dropped off or retreated to their rooms one by one. They are worn thin from the week’s schedules and the late night celebration. Sunoo curls up in the far armchair. A throw blanket pulled halfway up his chest. His breathing is slow and even. His head tilts to the side against the cushion. Jungwon is passed out on the rug in front of the TV. He props himself awkwardly against the base of the stand. Eyes shut tight. One arm tucked under his head like a makeshift pillow. Jay and Jake stumbled off to their bedrooms nearly an hour ago. They murmured goodnights that nobody really caught. Doors clicking shut softly behind them. Riki crashed early on the smaller sofa in the corner. Limbs sprawled out. Completely out cold.
That leaves only you and Heeseung awake.
You sit on the large main couch, shoulder to shoulder. Legs stretched out toward the messy table. You met Heeseung and the rest of ENHYPEN through mutual friends. You have spent enough time around the dorm to feel comfortable. Even when things get chaotic. Tonight you fit right in. Drinking and dancing and yelling along to the music like you belonged. But now the energy has shifted entirely. There is no one else to perform for. No one to distract from the quiet tension that hummed between you all evening. Small glances that linger too long. Accidental touches that do not get pulled away quickly. The way he always seemed to end up standing or sitting near you no matter where you moved in the crowded room.
You are both buzzed. A warm loose haze settles over everything. It makes your movements slower and your thoughts feel lighter. Less guarded. Your head feels clear enough but your body is relaxed. Skin warm. Edges soft. Heeseung leans back against the cushions. One arm draped along the back of the sofa just behind your shoulders. Legs spread wide in the casual way only someone completely at ease in their own space can manage. His dark hair is messy. Falling over his forehead. Cheeks flushed faintly pink from alcohol and heat. The collar of his loose black t-shirt slightly stretched. His eyes are darker than usual. Heavy lidded but sharp. Watching you with a lazy unbroken focus that makes heat curl low in your stomach.
“Total chaos tonight,” you murmur. Breaking the silence. Picking at the label of the half empty drink in your hand. Your voice is lower than normal. Careful not to cut through the quiet and wake anyone sleeping nearby. “Everyone crashed so fast.”
Heeseung huffs a quiet laugh. The sound deep and rough in his throat. He shifts slightly. The couch dipping under his weight. Bringing him closer to you. Your knees brushing together with the movement. “They burn out easy,” he says. His tone low and smooth. His gaze never wavering from your face. “Too much work lately then this. I am surprised they lasted as long as they did.” He tilts his head. Studying you. “You are still up though. Not tired.”
“Not really,” you reply. Looking back at him. Matching his gaze. “The quiet is nice. Better than the noise.”
“Way better,” he agrees. His voice drops a little more. He glances around the empty room then back to you. A faint smirk playing on his lips. “We could do something to kill time. Keep from falling asleep like the rest of them.”
“Like what,” you ask. Tilting your head. Amused and curious.
“Truth or dare,” he says simply. Leaning his elbow on his knee. Leaning in closer to you. The space between you shrinking noticeably. “Old school. No stupid rules. No holding back just because it is late or we are alone.”
You raise an eyebrow. A small smile tugging at the corner of your mouth. You know how this game goes. Especially with alcohol in your system and nobody else around to see what happens. “You think you can handle whatever comes out of this,” you tease. “I am not going to go easy on you.”
Heeseung’s grin widens. Confident and sharp. “Do not hold back for a second. I can take anything you throw at me. You go first.”
You lean back. Mirroring his relaxed posture. Though your heart is beating a little faster than before. “Fine. Truth.”
He thinks for a moment. Eyes roaming over your face slowly. Like he is mapping out every detail. “Alright. If you had to pick anyone in this dorm to sleep with right now. No consequences. No drama. Nobody finding out. Who would it be.”
The question lands heavy in the quiet air. Your breath catching slightly. You knew it would not take long for things to get personal. But you do not look away or pretend to be shocked. You hold his gaze steadily. Letting the silence hang for a few seconds before answering honestly. No games. No beating around the bush. “Probably you,” you say evenly. Watching his reaction closely. “Or Jake. Depends.”
For a split second you think you see his eyes darken further. A flicker of something sharp and hungry flash across his face. Gone almost as quickly as it appeared. He does not look surprised or offended. Just pleased. The smirk settling deeper. “Fair enough,” he says. Nodding slowly. “Good answer. Honest. My turn. Truth or dare.”
“Dare,” you say immediately. Wanting to keep the momentum going. To see how far he is willing to take this.
He considers it. Tapping his fingers against his thigh. Looking thoughtful. “Easy one first,” he decides. “Take two shots. Straight. No pulling faces. No stopping until both are gone.”
You laugh quietly but do not hesitate. Reaching for the nearest small shot glass on the table and filling it then another. You tip the first back in one go. The strong liquid burning as it goes down. Then the second. Setting the glasses down with a soft clink. “Done,” you say. Wiping your mouth with the back of your hand. “Your turn. Truth or dare.”
He does not even pause. “Dare.”
“Alright,” you say. Thinking fast. Looking for something that will get under his skin a little. Keep him on edge. “Tell me the last lie you told anyone. And do not skip over it. Be specific.”
Heeseung chuckles. Low in his chest. “Simple enough,” he says. “I told Jay earlier I was heading to bed right after the party ended. Said I was dead on my feet.” He leans closer. His voice dropping to a rough whisper. “Total lie. Had zero intention of sleeping anytime soon.”
Heat rushes to your cheeks but you keep your composure. Raising an eyebrow. “Not bad,” you say. “Truth or dare again.”
“Dare,” he repeats. Without a beat of hesitation. He is enjoying this just as much as you are. The thrill of pushing boundaries. The risk of being caught. The obvious pull between you two getting stronger every minute.
“Okay,” you say. Leaning in a little closer too. Your voice dropping to match his. “Show me the last photo you saved in your phone. No skipping. No deleting first.”
He smirks. Pulling his phone from his pocket. Unlocking it easily and handing it over. It is just a blurry picture of the group from earlier in the night. Everyone laughing and piled together. “See. Boring,” he says. Taking the phone back and tossing it onto the cushion beside him. “My turn. Truth or dare.”
“Truth,” you choose this time.
“Where is the most risky place you have ever hooked up with someone,” he asks. His eyes scanning your face. Waiting for your answer.
“Backstage hallway at a concert venue,” you reply without flinching. “Someone walked past right in the middle of it.”
Heeseung’s jaw tightens slightly. His tongue darting out to wet his lips. “Fuck,” he mutters. Quiet enough it is almost to himself. “Impressive. Okay. My turn. Dare.”
You grin. Feeling bold. “Let me look through your search history from today.”
He laughs. Shaking his head but complying. Turning the screen toward you. It is all innocent stuff. Lyrics. Practice times. Schedule changes. “Told you I play fair,” he says. “Now. My turn. And this one is not going to be so harmless. Truth or dare.”
“Dare,” you say. Your pulse picking up speed. Knowing exactly where this is heading.
He leans in close. His face inches from yours. His breath warm against your cheek. His voice drops low and rough. Leaving no room for doubt about what he wants. “Take your shirt off,” he commands. Slow and clear. “Slowly. And do not cover up. I want to see every bit of it.”
You pull your shirt up slow and toss it aside. You sit there in just your bra. You do not cross your arms or try to hide. Heeseung leans forward resting his elbows on his knees. His eyes move over your shoulders your chest your waist slow and unhurried. His pupils are blown wide dark and hungry. His lips part a little. A sharp smirk pulls at his mouth.
“Wow,” he says plain and low. That is all. But it feels heavy in the quiet air.
It is your turn. Your heart beats fast but you keep your voice steady. “Truth or dare.”
He does not even think for a second. “Dare.”
You look him over from head to toe. You want to touch him everywhere. You want to feel what is under his clothes. “I dare you to let me touch your body wherever I want,” you say clear and firm. “No stopping me.”
He nods right away. He sits up straighter and opens his arms a little. “Go ahead,” he says. “Do whatever you like.”
You move closer on the couch. Your hands go first to his shoulders broad and solid under his t shirt. You slide them down over his chest feeling the hard muscle through the fabric. You keep going running down the center of his torso over his stomach tight and firm. You trace lower right above his pants then slide one hand over the front. He is already semi hard. You can feel the shape thick and clear against your palm. You drag your hand back and forth slow. His breath catches sharp. His jaw tightens. He watches you the whole time eyes dark and burning. When you are done you sit back down properly.
“Good,” you say. “My turn to choose. Truth.”
He leans back against the cushions. He licks his lips slow. “Alright,” he says. “What is your body count. How many people have you slept with.”
You do not shy away. You answer straight. “Two,” you say plainly.
He huffs a short laugh. A teasing look comes into his eyes. He tilts his head. “Oh,” he says. “So you are pretty innocent then.”
You raise an eyebrow. You flip the question right back. “And what about you,” you ask. “What is your number.”
He smirks all knowing. He leans in a little closer voice dropping lower. “Me,” he says slow. “I am experienced. I know all the good places you know. Exactly how to do things right.”
His words send a hot shiver right through you. Heat pools thick and heavy between your legs just thinking about it. But you stay on track. It is still your turn.
“My turn again,” you say. “Truth or dare.”
“Dare,” he says instantly.
You look at his neck pale and open. You want to mark him. You want to leave something only you put there. “I dare you to let me give you a hickey,” you say. “Right on your neck. No covering up.”
He tilts his head to the side giving you full access. “Take it,” he says rough.
You lean in close. You press your mouth to his warm skin. You kiss light at first then suck hard and steady right under his jaw. He makes a low sound deep in his throat. His hands grip the couch tight. You work it until you know it will stay dark and visible for days. When you pull back there is a bright purple mark clear against his skin. He touches it lightly with his fingers and smirks.
“Nice,” he says. “My turn. Truth or dare.”
“Dare,” you answer.
He nods toward your chest. “Take your bra off,” he commands. “No hiding. Keep it off.”
You reach behind your back undo the clasp and slide it off. You toss it away. Now you are fully bare from the waist up. He looks every inch pupils huge and dark. He breathes out slow like he is holding himself back.
“Your turn,” he says. “Truth or dare.”
“Dare,” you say.
“I dare you to make me take everything off but my boxers,” you say clear.
He stands up fast. He grabs his t shirt and pulls it over his head showing his broad chest and hard stomach. Then he shoves his sweatpants down and kicks them aside. He is left in only black boxers. The fabric pulls tight showing clearly how hard he is now. He sits back down on the couch slow and spreads his legs to make space. His eyes lock straight on yours.
“Done,” he says. “My turn. Truth or dare.”
“Dare,” you reply.
He pats his lap right in front of him. “I dare you to come sit here. Right on top of me.”
Your breath catches hard. You look around the room quick. Everyone else is asleep. Sunoo curled up in the chair. Jungwon out cold on the floor. Doors shut down the hall. It is only you two awake. You look back at Heeseung. For a quiet moment you just stare at each other. You realize the silly little game you started has led you straight here. There is no turning back now. You feel suddenly nervous. Your hands twist by your sides. You shift on your feet.
“I… I do not know what to ask next,” you say softly. Your voice shakes a little.
He does not let you pull away. He reaches out and rests his hands light on your hips to steady you. His touch is warm and sure. “That is fine,” he says low. “I will dare you then. I dare you to kiss me. Properly. No quick pecks.”
You lean in slow. When your lips touch it is heavy and real. He meets you with hunger no holding back. His mouth moves firm and demanding against yours. You sink into it. You step forward and lower yourself down to sit on his lap just like he said. Your legs go on either side of his hips. Your chest presses tight to his bare chest. He wraps his arms all the way around you holding you flush against him. His hands roam your back your sides then grip your waist hard. You kiss him deeper opening up for him. You taste the alcohol and the heat on his tongue.
Without thinking you start to move your hips. A slow drag back and forth right over where he is hard for you. Through your thin underwear and his boxers you feel every thick line of him. He hisses sharp into your mouth and tips his head back. His grip on your hips tightens more. He guides your movement making you grind harder against him. The friction sends heat straight to your core. It builds fast making your head spin and your body ache for more. You can feel how hard he is how much he wants this just as bad as you do.
He pulls back just enough to speak. His voice is thick and rough. “That is it,” he breathes against your neck. “Just like that. Keep going.”
You move faster chasing the feeling. His hands slide down your back lower and lower until they grab your ass tight. He pulls you harder against him and grinds up to meet every roll of your hips. The thin fabric between you does nothing to hide the heat. You can feel yourself getting wetter by the second soaking through onto his skin. He notices too and groans deep in his throat.
“So ready,” he whispers against your skin. “Already dripping all for me.”
He slides one hand down past the waistband of your pants and underwear. His fingers are hot and rough as they slip between your legs. He runs one finger through your folds slow and teasing before pressing firm circles right on your sensitive spot. You jerk forward and a loud moan almost escapes you. You bury your face in his neck to keep quiet enough not to wake anyone. He does not let up. He keeps rubbing you there steady and hard while you keep grinding on his lap. He knows exactly what he is doing hitting all the right spots every time just like he said he would.
“Tell me how good it feels,” he orders in a low growl.
“So good,” you gasp out. Your hips move wild against his hand. “Heeseung please.”
“Please what,” he teases and slows his fingers a little. “Tell me exactly what you want.”
“More,” you beg. “Want you inside me. Now.”
He wastes no time. He lifts you up easy his strong arms holding your weight. He shoves your pants and underwear down in one go pulling them off your legs and tossing them aside. Now you are completely naked on top of him while he still sits there in his boxers. He pulls his own underwear down just enough to free his cock. It springs out hard and heavy tip flushed and leaking clear fluid. He guides it straight to your entrance with one hand and holds your hip with the other.
“Ride me slow at first,” he commands. “Take every inch.”
You sink down slowly. The stretch burns in the best way possible making you gasp and cling to his shoulders. He is thick and long filling you completely. You pause for a second once you are all the way down adjusting to his size. He rests his forehead against yours breathing heavy and fast. Then you start to move. You lift yourself up almost all the way then drop back down hard onto him. He meets you every time thrusting up deep and strong. The sound of skin slapping skin fills the quiet room. You do not care. You are too lost in the heat and pleasure.
He watches your breasts bounce with every move your face scrunch up the place where you are joined wet and shiny. He talks dirty the whole time telling you how tight you are how good you feel how you were made for this. He leans forward and kisses your neck your jaw your lips all while you ride him hard. He holds your waist steady so he can control the pace making it faster and harder with every minute. The couch creaks loud under the movement but neither of you pays it any mind.
He slips one hand between your bodies to rub your clit again while you move. It pushes you higher faster. You feel the pressure building tight in your stomach ready to snap. He sees it and pushes harder. “Come on,” he grunts. “Come for me. Let me feel you.”
You crash hard. Your walls clamp down around him tight. Your back arches and you cry out his name. He keeps thrusting through your release pushing you into overstimulation before he follows right behind you. He thrusts deep one last time and holds it spilling himself inside you with a long rough groan. His body shakes against yours his arms locking tight around you to keep you close.
You stay there on his lap for a long time after. Both of you breathing heavy sweating skin sticking together. He does not pull away or rush you. He just holds you quiet against his chest while the room settles around you.
Got it—Part 3, picks up right after, simple plain language, no fancy words, pure raw smut, no fluff/feelings, keeps the tension high, risk of being caught still there.
📖 Lights Out, Games Over
Part 3: Unrestrained
You stay curled against him for a minute. Your skin is still hot and damp, legs shaky, heartbeat loud in your ears. Heeseung does not pull out or move away. He keeps you seated heavy on his lap, still connected deep inside. His hands slide slow up and down your bare back, rough and sure. He rests his chin on your shoulder, breathing steady against your neck. The dorm is quiet, everyone else passed out cold. It feels like nothing exists outside this couch and the mess you have made together.
Eventually he pulls back just enough to look at your face. His eyes are still dark and heavy, pupils blown wide. He brushes a strand of hair off your forehead, his thumb dragging light over your cheek.
“Not done yet,” he says low and rough. “Far from it.”
You nod slow, your body still thrumming. You shift a little on top of him and both of you suck in a sharp breath. The friction is still intense, sensitive, every move makes your head spin.
“Truth or dare,” he asks again, voice thick.
“Dare,” you whisper.
He smirks, glancing down at where you are joined, then back to your eyes. “Let me be in control,” he commands. “Lie back against the cushions and let me do all the work.”
You obey immediately. You lean back against the armrest and pillows, spreading your legs wider for him, letting him have full access. He holds your hips steady, keeping you seated exactly where he wants you. Then he starts to thrust up from below—slow, deep, deliberate at first, hitting that same perfect spot inside every time. You moan loud, head falling back against the couch. He picks up speed fast, hard and relentless, the sound of skin meeting skin filling the quiet room.
He leans forward and takes one breast into his mouth, sucking hard, biting gently at the nipple before moving to the other. His hand slides down to rub your clit fast and rough, matching the rhythm of his thrusts. You twist under him, hands gripping his arms, shoulders, anything you can hold onto.
“Look at me,” he orders, pulling back to watch your face. “See how good I make you feel.”
You lift your gaze, breathless and hazy. He looks wild, hair messy, chest flushed, the mark you left dark on his neck. His expression is pure lust, no softness, just total possession.
“So tight,” he grunts, thrusting harder. “Still squeezing me like you want every drop. You love this don’t you. Being completely open for me.”
“Yes,” you gasp out, hips bucking against his hand. “Only you Heeseung.”
He pulls out suddenly, making you whimper at the loss. Before you can say anything he stands up with you still in his arms. He lays you flat on the couch, back against the cushions, legs hanging off the edge. He stands over you for a second, looking down at your whole body bare and open for him. His cock hard and heavy, tip leaking and red. He pulls his underwear down all the way and kicks them aside. Now he is fully naked too, no barriers left at all.
He leans over you, bracing one arm by your head, the other guiding himself back to your entrance. He pushes in slow and deep, making you stretch all over again, a new wave of heat rushing through your veins. He starts to pound into you right there, deep, hard, unforgiving. The couch creaks and slides slightly on the floor but neither of you care.
He grabs your legs and throws them over his shoulders, hitting deeper than before. You cry out his name, hands scrabbling at his back, leaving faint marks on his skin. He leans down to kiss you hard, swallowing your sounds, tongue pushing into your mouth. He grunts against your lips, telling you dirty things—how he has thought about this, how you were dripping wet for him from the start, how he is going to make you come again and again.
He reaches down to rub your clit fast while he keeps thrusting deep. The pressure builds tight and hot in your stomach, faster than before. You can feel it coming, stronger than the first time.
“Come on,” he growls, pounding harder. “Come apart for me again. Let me feel you shake.”
You break instantly. Your back lifts off the couch, your whole body tenses, a loud broken moan tearing from your throat. Your walls clamp around him tight, pulsing and shaking. He does not stop. He keeps driving into you through the whole thing, pushing you right to the edge of overstimulation. His breath comes in short sharp bursts against your neck.
“Fuck,” he groans, his rhythm getting messy and wild. “Taking it so well. Gonna fill you up again.”
He slams in one final time, holds it deep, and spills himself inside you with a long rough shout. His body shudders hard against yours, arms trembling as he holds himself up. He stays buried there for a long moment, breathing heavy, letting the feeling settle.
Then he pulls out slow and sits back on the couch beside you. He pulls a blanket from the side and tosses it over your legs and body, not rushing you. He runs a hand through his messy hair, chest still heaving, skin shiny with sweat. He looks around the room quickly to make sure no one woke up, everyone is still out cold, just like before. He looks back at you with that same dark satisfied smirk.
“Game over,” he says quiet and sure. “I won.”
A/N: HII SEND REQUESTS ON MY PAGE also comment to be added to a tag list!!
WHEREIN twelve hours of wanting you but not being able to have you leads heeseung to fucking you in a restaurant bathroom while the enhypen members can hear everything he does to you.
(𝐧𝐚𝐯𝐢). MDNI. wc: 3.2k. idol!heeseung x reader. smut. brat tamer!hee. p in v. semi-public sex. risky sex. oral (m receiving). slight degradation. teasing. hee is desperate.
──── ୨୧ ──── #31 🪽
elle’s thoughts ❀ hi! this is the second story for my “echoes of you” writing event! it was based off of prompt 14 and requested by anon, so i hope you enjoy! this is the first smut i’ve written since may, which is kinda crazy to think about lol. love you guys!!
“Heeseung, you can’t be serious!”
“Please, baby. I need it.”
Heeseung looked, for lack of a better word, desperate. As his girlfriend, you had been invited to attend ENHYPEN’s group dinner at their favorite Korean Barbecue spot after dance practice, which you happily agreed to. However, what you didn’t expect was just how needy Heeseung was going to be for you the second you stepped foot in the crowded restaurant. His hands hadn’t left you for a second, and the way he kept leaning over and whispering sweet nothings into your ear in front of everyone made you feel as if every nerve in your body had been set ablaze.
ᝰ.ᐟ read more
“Everything okay over there?” Jay’s teasing voice came from across the table, accompanied by the sizzling of meat as he used a pair of tongs to flip the short ribs.
“Shut up, Jay,” Jake chuckled. “Can’t you see they’re having a moment? You’re ruining it per usual.”
“I am not!”
“Yes, you are.”
“God, can you guys stop fighting for five minutes?” Sunghoon scolded, glancing at how closely Heeseung was sitting next to you. He looked away as he fought the smile trying to spread across his face. “Not their fault you’re single and jealous.”
“I am not!”
“Liar!”
As the debate continued to rage around you, Heeseung’s hand slowly traveled up your bare thigh under the table until he was dangerously close to your most sensitive area. You let out a shaky breath before lifting your gaze to your boyfriend, who gave you a pleading look you had never seen before. At that moment, you knew that if you stayed there for a moment longer, being teased by Heeseung in front of everyone, you were going to burst into flames.
“I’m going to the bathroom,” you announced abruptly, interrupting the playful yet heated argument sounding around the table. “Be back in a sec.”
Unfortunately, the bathroom was only mere meters away from the table where your boyfriend and all his groupmates sat, and you could still hear every word they were saying. However, that didn’t matter to you—you just needed to get away from their bickering and Heeseung’s needy glances and touches for a bit. It was all too much, and you could barely think when he was acting that way around you. You couldn’t want him—not here, not now.
The inside of the dimly lit family-style bathroom was sweltering, which you knew wouldn’t help how turned on you felt. As soon as the door shut behind you, you pressed your back to the cool tile adorning the wall and pressed a hand to your chest, feeling just how rapidly your heart beat in your chest. After all this time, the effect Heeseung had on you was still embarrassing. A few heated glances and soft touches was enough to make your head spin.
After a few moments of working to steady your breathing, you heard Heeseung’s voice from the table. “She’s been gone for a bit, so I’m gonna go check on her. Leave some pork belly for me.”
Footsteps. A quiet knock. The lock clicking open beneath your slender fingers before Heeseung stepped into the small space.
“You okay?” Heeseung murmured, lifting a hand to caress your flushed cheek. “You look… bothered.”
“How can I not be when you’re teasing me like that in front of your group?” you hissed, acutely aware that the other six boys would probably be able to hear every word you were saying if they listened closely enough. “The way you’re touching me, and looking at me, and talking to me… what the hell am I supposed to do?”
A coy smile found its way to Heeseung’s face, and he slowly stepped forward to force you back against the wall. You swallowed thickly as you took in the animalistic way in which he was staring at you. “That’s a great question. What are you supposed to do?”
“I don’t know!” you exclaimed, averting your gaze. “What got into you today during practice? You’ve never acted like this in front of the others before.”
“Dunno,” he murmured, absentmindedly playing a strand of your hair. “What else am I supposed to do when you look this good? I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you all day—not after what you did to me this morning.”
“Oh.”
That.
Somehow, you had forgotten about that.
Earlier that morning, you had woken up nude in Heeseung’s bed after a night spent together. He had wanted to take you right then and there, but Jungwon was practically threatening to bang down the door if Heeseung didn’t get his ass moving to get ready for the dance practice they were already very late for. Heeseung begged you for a quickie, but you knew exactly how upset Jungwon would be if Heeseung delayed any further, so you told him no before sending him to dance practice hard as a rock.
“You’re still upset about that?”
Heeseung cocked his head slightly, narrowing his eyes at you as he tilted your chin upwards. “Not upset. But I am going to make you pay for doing that to me.”
“And how are you going to do that? You can’t do anything in a restaurant bathroom—the boys will hear everything.”
Faster than you could blink, Heeseung spun you around and pressed his hips against your back. You gasped as your chest flattened against the wall, and you felt Heeseung’s hands slowly tracing over the curve of your hips and waist. He leaned down, nipping your ear before immediately soothing the spot with a featherlight kiss. “Guess you’ll just have to be quiet.”
“Heeseung, we can’t—” you began, but your words quickly shifted into a moan as Heeseung gathered your hair in one hand and tugged, forcing you to expose your neck. He immediately began to suck on the soft spot just beneath your ear that he knew would have you seeing stars, and it was all you could do to stop yourself from crying out at his sudden dominance.
“We can, and we’re going to,” he growled against your skin. As he continued to suck on your neck, you became acutely aware of every other place Heeseung was touching you—one hand still holding your hair, the other reaching around to grab your breast, and the hardness pressing into your back that was quickly becoming impossible to ignore.
“Heeseung-ah,” you moaned softly, arching your back as he dipped his hand into the front of your shirt and grasped your nipple. He rolled the delicate bud between his fingers, whispering praises in your ear as he teased you. Heeseung knew exactly what to do to drive you wild, and of course he would do everything in his power to make you moan precisely at the time when you weren’t able to.
“What do you want, baby?” he whispered after a moment, his hand still working against your breast. “Tell me what you want.”
“I—I want you to touch me,” you forced out.
Heeseung huffed a quiet laugh in your ear. “So desperate, aren’t you? It’s almost like you forget that you’re the one who left me this morning and not the other way around.” At these words, Heeseung pulled back from you, leaving you feeling utterly exposed at the lack of his body pressed against yours. “I’ll touch you, but you have to do something for me first.”
You turned around slowly, and you had barely made eye contact with Heeseung before he placed his hands on your shoulders and pushed you down to the floor. You were eye-level with his groin, and you couldn’t ignore the outline of his cock that was now directly in front of you.
“Suck, and then I’ll touch you.”
You nodded slightly, making quick work of Heeseung’s belt and zipper before you pulled his pants and boxers down in one swift motion. He hissed as the warm air of the bathroom hit his exposed dick, already flushed and red. You could tell he had been turned on all day, and you weren’t entirely sure how it hadn’t killed him yet.
You lifted your eyes to Heeseung’s, staring up at him through your lashes as you licked the underside of his shaft slowly. His eyelids fluttered slightly, and from the way his hips jutted forward ever so slightly, you could see just how desperate he was despite him making it seem as if he were in control. With a small smirk, you decided that the only natural course of action was to tease him until you drove him crazy.
As you continued staring up at Heeseung, you continued to lick him, your tongue swirling around the tip and focusing on the one spot you knew would normally have him chanting your name. However, now? There was nothing he could do but bite his lip and stare as you teased him. And you loved every second of it.
After a moment of this, you could tell Heeseung was barely holding himself back. Your action had had its desired effect, and he now looked even more frustrated than he had moments ago.
Finally, he snapped. He grasped your chin and growled lowly, “You’re such a fucking brat. Open your mouth.”
You finally complied, opening your mouth slowly before sticking your tongue out as you continued to gaze up at him. Heeseung groaned at the image in front of him, and he rested his forearm against the wall above you as he leaned forward. He tapped your tongue a few times with his cock before pushing it into your mouth.
Immediately, you closed your lips around his length and began to bob your head slowly, enjoying just how tense he was. As you moved around him, you lifted your hand and squeezed his hip, which led to him bucking his hips into your mouth. When his tip hit the back of your throat, you gagged around him, and he swore fiercely.
“Fuck, feels s’ good,” he murmured, allowing his eyes to flutter closed as he leaned his head back. You continued to work him in your mouth, all the sweet noises he made only making the dampness between your legs increase.
After a moment, you hollowed your cheeks to create even more suction, and Heeseung let out a moan that you knew his friends heard. However, he didn’t seem to notice. He was so lost in his pleasure, in the feeling of your mouth around him, that he hadn’t even realized just how much noise he was making.
So much for being quiet.
It wasn’t long before you could tell Heeseung was about to find his release. His breathing became more labored, and you could see the way his abs tensed with every bob of your head. You were fully determined to send him over the edge, but just as he was about to let go, he pulled back suddenly.
“Jesus,” he panted, squeezing his eyes shut for a moment before tugging you upward. “That felt so fucking good.”
“I’m glad,” you whispered, smirking at him. “You do realize how loud you were moaning, right? The guys definitely heard you.”
The only embarrassment he showed was the slight reddening of hie cheeks. He leaned down and kissed you slowly, sensually, before his hand slowly trailed down your front and into your shorts. “They’re going to forget all about it when they hear how loud you are while I’m fucking you.”
As soon as Heeseung’s cool fingers found the slick between your thighs, you clamped a hand over your mouth to stifle the noises he drew from your swollen lips. Unfortunately for you, Heeseung had spent many hours studying you and everything that made you scream, and he would be remiss to not utilize those things exactly when you needed to stay quiet.
“You’re so pathetic, being this wet for me,” Heeseung tutted, his fingers working slow circles over your clit. “I thought you didn’t want to do this here, but your body is begging for it.”
You could only moan softly in response, tears welling up in your eyes from just how badly you burned for Heeseung. It had been fun to tease him, and you loved being a brat, so it was unfortunate how quickly you melted beneath Heeseung’s careful touch.
“So needy,” he chuckled, increasing the speed of his thumb slightly as he slipped a finger inside you. You pressed your eyes closed, allowing a tear to spill onto your cheek. “It’s funny how fast I have you moaning and crying just from my fingers. Can you even handle my dick?”
You opened your eyes, nodding avidly as you felt a familiar burning sensation bubbling up within you. “Heeseung, I—I’m gonna—”
“Gonna cum for me, baby?” Heeseung murmured, capturing your lips in a kiss as he continued rubbing you. “I want you to cum for me where everyone can hear exactly what I’m doing to you.”
That was all it took. You finally reached your peak, a deliciously overwhelming wave of pleasure spreading from your core to the rest of your body. You trembled violently, Heeseung holding you steady in his strong arms as you worked through the waves of your orgasm.
However, he barely gave you any time to recover before he tugged your panties down just enough to allow him to access the spot he so desired. He cupped your ass with his large hands, squeezing the soft flesh as he kissed you deeply. He stayed there for just a moment before lifting you up and pinning you to the wall with his hips. “‘m gonna fuck you now. Stay still, princess.”
It only took a second for Heeseung to line himself up with you before pushing inside your entrance, and you knew that everyone could hear the moans that left both of you as he buried himself to the hilt inside you. The forbidden nature of what you were doing somehow only heightened the immense pleasure you felt, and when he started rolling his hips into you, it took everything in you not to cry out.
“So tight, fuck,” Heeseung groaned, still grasping your ass tightly as he fucked into you. With every thrust, your back hit the tiled wall behind you, but you didn’t care. The only thing you could focus on was the sensation of Heeseung’s cock rubbing along every inch of your walls.
“Heeseung-ah, oh my g-god,” you whimpered, squeezing your eyes shut as he increased his pace. His quiet, breathy moans filled the bathroom, echoing off the tiles and mingling with the sounds leaving your own lips.
“How’s it feel, baby?” he breathed. He slowed his movements for a second, ensuring his hips had you pinned against the wall before he lifted a hand and brushed a strand of hair out of your eyes.
“Amazing.” You wrapped your arms around his neck as he shifted your weight back into both hands, and he stepped backwards until he reached the sink. He placed you on the edge of the sink, leaving you at the perfect height for him to keep driving into you. He grasped your hips in his sweaty hands to steady you before resuming his previous pace.
“Oh–oh–my God, remind me to tease you more often,” you stuttered, your words punctuated by each thrust of Heeseung’s hips. The temperature of the bathroom seemed to have gotten even hotter than it had been moments ago, and you felt sweat dripping down your back, but you couldn’t find it in you to care.
“You better not,” he growled, his half-lidded eyes finding yours as he continued moving in you. “I thought I was gonna die all day. I wanted you so b–bad I couldn’t focus.”
“Poor baby,” you breathed. “Tough day.”
At these words, Heeseung’s pace became punishing. Yet again, you clapped a hand over your mouth, desperately trying to stop the cries leaving your lips. However, there was nothing you could do about the lewd sound of skin on skin filling the air.
A few moments later, you could tell Heeseung was close again from the way he began to breathe raggedly in your ear. Beads of sweat were dripping down his neck and face face and onto his hoodie, and there was no longer a rhythm to the way he was fucking you.
“God, I’m so close,” he gasped.
“I need you to cum in me, Hee. Please.”
At your words, Heeseung thrusted forcefully a few more times before his climax crashed into him. He let out a series of low groans as his hips stilled, his cock pulsing as he filled you.
“Thank you,” Heeseung sighed, leaning forward and resting his forehead on your shoulder. “That was incredible.”
You pressed a kiss to Heeseung’s sweat-dampened hair, willing your breathing to return to normal. You both stayed there for a moment, neither speaking, as you came down from the high of your intimacy with each other.
“You know we’re gonna have to go out there and face the boys, right?” you said after a moment.
“Fuck, I forgot about that,” Heeseung sighed before letting out a laugh. “How the hell are we going to explain this?”
“We? Sorry, babe, but that’s all you. I’m not the one who initiated. And that isn’t my group sitting out there listening to me fuck.”
Heeseung sighed, rubbing his face with his hand. “Alright, fine. But we at least have to make ourselves presentable first. Try to conceal some of the evidence.”
Five minutes later, you had to force Heeseung from the bathroom with a push. He glanced over his shoulder at you sheepishly before stepping back into the restaurant, his eyes dancing across the crowded space. When the other six boys caught sight of him, they all went silent.
“Uh, hey,” Heeseung said, shuffling awkwardly towards his seat at the table. You scanned the faces of the six boys, noticing that they were all trying to repress their smiles. “Did you save me any pork belly?”
“I thought you just had all the meat you could ever want, so I ate it,” Ni-ki shrugged, a glass of soju grasped in his hand. “Sorry.”
“Ni-ki!” Sunoo exclaimed, but everyone else burst into laughter at the youngest’s comment.
“The bathroom, hyung? Really?” Jake chortled, placing a hand on Heeseung’s arm. “You couldn’t think of a better place to fuck than the bathroom at a restaurant?”
“How the hell am I supposed to use that bathroom now knowing what you’ve done to it?” Sunghoon groaned. “Freak.”
“Guess we need a new favorite restaurant,” Jay chimed in, giving Heeseung a pat on the back. Luckily for you, the boys didn’t seem to want to tease you. They had always been respectful to you, and you knew they wouldn’t give you a hard time about what had just happened. Heeseung, though? They would never let him live it down.
“Alright, alright, calm down guys,” Jungwon said, though a smile played on his lips. “As fun as it is to make fun of Heeseung’s questionable choices for sex locations, can we order more short ribs? I’m starving.”
And as the topic of conversation moved on and more food and drink flowed, you couldn’t help but smile. Even though your bathroom rendezvous had been a questionable decision, you knew you wouldn’t have your life any other way as you listened to Heeseung and his bandmates banter for hours to come.
in which, after a few regretful moments of letting your older brother, jake’s, best friends in your pants, you end up crying in lee heeseung’s arms from guilt—and unfortunately having to deal with the consequences.
wc 5.6k ִֶָ🪽་༘
kiki’s note: a lil surprise for 1000 followers!! i’m so grateful to all of you and i can’t believe a thousand people enjoy my work! i only started writing on tumblr in april so this is literally crazy guys wtf… mwah mwah! i hope u guys love this too!
warnings: lots of angst, reader becomes disgusted with herself, not even a single bit aftercare, unprotected sex, creampie, belly bulge, knee grinding, oral (f. and m. receiving), fingering, lots of crying, degrading, dacryphilia, dumbification, a lil comfort if u squint, praise kink, mean dom hoon, soft dom hee, sappy ending, leaving a few warnings out as to not spoil the ending okay . . . enjoy!
you don’t even know how you got here.
one second, you and heeseung were having an intense argument—something about one of your assigned group projects.
the next second, he has you pinned against the dirty wall of the cramped janitor's closet.
continue 𑣲⋆
“mmh . . .”
that’s it, that’s all that you could gather the energy to say.
with heeseung’s knee placing just the perfect amount of pressure between your legs, and with your throat being flooded with spit that definitely doesn’t belong to you, your brain risks self-destruction at any moment.
heeseung pulls off you, a string of mixed saliva still linking you two. he presses his thumb against your chin. dragging it down, he gestures for you to stick your tongue out.
he guides your hips to grind harder against his knee, pulling a delicate moan out of you — which is swallowed quickly by his mouth. the sight of your soft muscle disappearing inch by inch into heeseung’s mouth, gliding in and out was enough for the heavy dam in your lower stomach to dangerously overflow.
your brain was turning into mush, all your senses becoming overwhelmed. “heeseung . . . i can’t-“
you don’t even try to finish your sentence.
if it wasn’t for heeseung holding your whole body up with his knee, you’re guaranteed that you would’ve just fallen straight onto the floor.
heeseung removes his knee from you, a complaining whine escaping your throat. he quickly slides his palm down your bare stomach—grateful to your shirt that only covers your chest—he unbuttons your shorts, pulling the zip down.
heeseung immediately slips his hand inside your panties, replacing his knee with his unfairly long fingers. they wasted no time into finding your aching entrance; already leaking and slippery for him.
he eases two fingers inside of you, savoring the way your mouth starts to spill uncontrollable moans. heeseung continues to lap at your mouth, his fingers now abusing your sweet spot.
“so pretty when you’re so dumb for me, my baby.”
he continues to curl his fingers harder, making the pathetic sounds coming from you even louder.
“hee- fuck! i’m gonna . . .”
a sudden vibration comes from heeseung’s back pocket, he tries to ignore it — but he just can’t.
“fuck.” he reaches for his stuffed phone.
he looks up at you, “jake’s calling me.”
your chest begins to heat up, mind endlessly spinning. “well don’t fucking- fuck! don’t answer it!”
huh, even in a time like this, heeseung continues to thrust his fingers in and out—and faster.
an irritating smile spreads across his face,
he answers the call.
“hello?” he breathes.
at this point, you’re practically praying that jake doesn’t hear the lewd squelching sounds coming from heeseung’s side.
you hear jake’s muffled voice through the speakers, “where the fuck are you? we’ve been waiting for you for like 15 minutes, the movies gonna start soon. get your ass here now!”
heeseung lets out a silent groan, breaking eye contact with you for a minute to roll his eyes to the side.
all of a sudden, a dirty thought enters his head.
heeseung rams his fingers deeper, harder, into you. constantly toying with the spongy spot that makes your eyes squeeze shut.
a small but undoubtedly an obvious moan accidentally leaks out of you. your eyes immediately snap open, and glare at heeseung’s phone—which is still on call with jake.
“yo, what the fuck? where are you hee?”
your heart hammers against your ribs, but heeseung doesn’t even stop there.
you’re dangerously close, and unfortunately for you; you’re super loud. cumming silently sounds like a nightmare for you! and so, you quickly motion for heeseung to just end the fucking call.
“i’m on my way, just give me a sec.”
the last thing you hear from jake is a distorted groan before heeseung cuts him off, finally letting you air out all the moans you desperately tried to suppress.
the heavy knot finally snaps, creaming heeseung’s fingers. he pulls them out of your shorts, a long rope of your release following them before breaking shortly after.
heeseung lays you a small kiss, not directly onto your lips, but near them. “see you later, y/n”
the soft click of the door makes your heart sink to your stomach. watching heeseung leave you in this dark room, with the fabric between your legs wet and sticky, caused a large, gut wrenching pit form in your heart.
you immediately fall onto the floor, back sliding against the wall. your legs are absolutely finished, your chest still rising and falling rapidly.
your lips sunk into a gentle frown, your vision becoming slightly blurred — you weren’t crying. not yet, atleast.
your body is trembling, the fact that you’re all alone makes your heart burn even more. it’s okay, who cares! it happens to every girl, right?
you quickly wipe your tears, hints of flaked mascara blurring into a dark stain under your eyes. it takes you a minute to help your body up, your palms digging into the ground to push yourself up.
you eventually find your balance, head spinning and vision blacking out. the disgusting feeling of stickiness still lingering in your panties — you’ll just deal with that at home.
you clear your throat, zipping up your shorts and buttoning up. you probably look like a fucking mess, there’s not even a single mirror in here to help you. so, with a lessened confidence, you reluctantly reach for the door handle.
your room smells of toasted vanilla and warm chocolate.
after hundred sprays of vanilla scented perfume, makeup products spread all over your vanity, a million failed outfits and dresses thrown onto the floor,
you are finally ready for riki’s annual house party — also known as: the party where sluts unite!
you take one last look in the mirror, pleased with what you see.
a cute, neat half up half down hairstyle with two mini pigtails, a mini strapless dress with black and white polka dots; featuring a ruffle neckline with black lace trim and a flattering drop waist silhouette paired with just-under-the-knee level black boots.
huh . . .
so pretty.
after a quick touch up on your lip gloss, you finally make your way to the living room — where you are met with none other than your older brother, jake.
soft chestnut hair sleeked with mousse, black baggy jeans dragging onto the floor, and an oversized red hoodie. is he some fucking middle schooler?
jake shakes his head dismissively, “do you always have to dress like that?”
“who would i be if i didn’t dress like this, jake?”
he shrugs his shoulders, letting out a weak sigh. “whatever. come on let’s go, we’re getting late.”
the comfortable silence your car is shattered by jake,
“do you think heeseung’s seeing someone?”
your heart immediately throbs faster, eyes discreetly widening. you clear your throat, “why would i know? I don't care about him.”
jake’s hand on the wheel tightens, only resulting in your chest overheating even more. toying with the hem of your dress, you begin to mumble,
“but why? do you think he is?”
you just hope, hope that jake doesn’t utter a word about that fucking phone call from yesterday.
he inhales deeply before answering, “well, he’s just acting weird, and when i called him, it sounded like he was with a girl . . . but whatever, it’s not like you’d know who anyway, so just leave it.”
you eyes close in gratitude, thankfully he dismisses you as a suspect. god knows what jake would do to you—and heeseung, if he found his own best friend got into his younger sister’s pants.
at last, you finally reach riki’s airbnb for the night.
and woah, is it fucking massive.
“how did riki even afford this,. what the fuck?” jake questions, shutting his car door with a loud slam.
the smile trickling across your face was enough for jake to know you were up to something, he just didn’t know what.
jake knew you knew something he didn’t, especially since the girl on the phone yesterday had a voice suspiciously similar to yours.
but that’s where he gets stuck,
why would— you . . . even let heeseung near you?
you were always vocal about your hatred for heeseung. late nights where jake would listen to you endlessly complain about his inactivity in biology, his disheveled hair, his constant lack of respect towards you — you literally hated him.
or atleast that’s what he thought.
the colorful lights were sweets for your vision, the loud bass of music blasted through the speakers. you cheerfully walk with a subtle skip through the gathering.
you’ll admit, even though you were super social, you never really had an actual set of friends in your time at university.
so after separating yourself from jake, you find yourself . . . alone.
alone in the sea of people who all have someone to gossip with, someone to listen to,
just somebody.
hm, whatever.
you don’t need friends, you don’t need anyone.
all you need is a good fucking drink that will make you forget everything and anything. so you examine the room till you find a bar.
fortunately, since jake forgot to refill the car's fuel last night, you two came late — meaning the bar is already empty.
it’s all familiar to you; the feeling of pouring your liquor by yourself, sipping by yourself. it’s normal to you, sadly.
the alcohol fills your lungs, a choked cough leaving your throat from the accidental rapid pace of swallowing.
“what’s up, y/n?”
you bottoms up one last shot before turning around to the mysterious voice summoning you, the effects of alcohol already influencing you.
to your surprise, you are met with park sunghoon — towering right behind you. a smile leaks across your face.
“hi sunghoon! nothing much, what about you?”
his dark eyes drop from your lips, “well, this dress looks beautiful on you . . .” his delicate hands play with the ruffles on your neckline, thumb brushing over your collarbone ever so slightly.
you let out a smooth, breathy laugh, unsure of what to say.
fuck it, you can’t be alone forever.
you wrap you arms around his neck, pulling sunghoon into a deep, slow kiss. his hand slides down your dress, touching all parts of you.
he pushes himself off you, gasping barely. “let’s go upstairs, yeah?”
with a burning heart, you accept his proposal.
disgusting, that’s it.
the room was absolutely disgusting.
used condoms thrown onto the floor, stains of who knows what on the messed-up bed, strands of hair scattered across the tiles — it took you everything not to throw up right then and there.
as soon as the door clicked shut, sunghoon’s hands were all over you. his tongue pushing its way past your lips, pulling a reflexive gasp out of you.
he continued to shove his tongue down your throat, pushing your head down harshly till your knees hit the cold, hard ground.
“i want to see your mouth so fucking full of me. come on, do the honors.”
you swallow hardly before reaching for his belt, the metallic clink making your heart race.
you know jake would kill you if he saw you like this.
having heeseung’s fingers inside of you was one thing, but sucking sunghoon off just twenty four hours after? he would lose his mind.
to make matters worse, jake was present both times.
first on the call, and now downstairs—fucking clueless on what his ‘innocent’ little sister is doing with his whore friends.
but the arousal leaking between your legs had taken over you, with a heavy heart you finally take sunghoon into your mouth. soft hand stroking what you can’t take.
his hand immediately intertwines with your hair, pulling each strand so harshly that a quiet whine escapes you.
you suck harder at his severe tugs, the damp fabric underneath becoming increasingly uncomfortable.
sunghoon pulls you off, your saliva still connected to his tip. tears already pricking your eyes, you look up at him.
fuck, sunghoon could cum just like this. your pretty, round eyes looking up at him with so much innocence, and with your soft lips slick with the same spit dripping off of his dick.
a low groan comes from him, he quickly signals for you to get on the bed.
holding back your nausea staring at the dirty bed, you crawl until the plush hits your chest.
“so trained, huh? already having your ass up to show for me? such a nice slut for me.”
he lays a harsh smack at your flesh, pulling a whimper filled with a mix of pain and pleasure out of you. he pushes your panties aside, using two of his fingers to spread your wetness behind.
he aligns himself at your entrance, and with one brutal thrust, he buries himself deep inside of you.
his tip kisses your cervix, a faint bulge forming in your stomach. he quickens his thrusts, a ring of white appearing at the base of his dick.
you are so so grateful at the loud hum of music for muffling your borderline pornographic cries. “fuck- hoon . . . i’m close!”
his finger slips under, drawing tight circles onto your clit. you instantly come undone at the overwhelming sensation, heavily puffing.
sunghoon’s thrusts become erratic, overstimulating you in the best way possible. “gonna- fill you- fuck, so much.”
the thought of sunghoon not wearing a condom made the gut-wrenching pit in your heart bloom immensely, your face becoming warm at the realization.
“no! wait- fuck! don’t cum inside hoon!”
sunghoon’s eyes are pressed shut, “fuck.”
he quickly pulls out of you, leaving you empty and aching. he strokes himself with precision, long flows of cum landing straight onto your back — and on your dress.
his delicate breaths fill the air, slowly pushing himself off the bed, he drags his pants up.
confusion takes over you, why isn’t sunghoon . . . doing anything for you?
“jay and riki are probably waiting for me downstairs, i have to go, okay?”
you try to bend your lips into a subtle smile, “okay.”
sunghoon has the courtesy to close the door, at least. leaving you, once again, by yourself.
you sit in the nasty bed in stillness, cum dripping down your back, your thigh, your ass — even your fucking dress. tears swell your vision, your sobs coming to be progressively louder.
you just feel fucking pathetic, sunghoon’s words duplicating inside of your brain.
‘slut, slut, slut.’
you arnet a slut, are you?
you sob harder at your thoughts, mascara running down your washed, flushed cheeks.
you came to this stupid party looking so pretty, now your pigtails are all messed up, your dress is stained, your makeup is smudged and you just . . . dont feel pretty anymore.
the door swings open,
“where the fuck is the bathroom- oh”
you already know who it is, not even having the life to look up anymore — just soaking yourself in the filthy bed.
“what’s wrong? are you okay?”
the sounds of your sniffles and stifled breathing were enough of an answer for him.
he unhurriedly makes his way over to bed, noticing how messed up you look — and the leaks of fluids running down your thigh.
he takes a seat next to you, cradling you into his arms.
you quickly make yourself comfortable, the warmth radiating from him causing an unfamiliar feeling of comfort to drape over you.
you let out a few more faint sobs, tears smearing his shirt — but he doesn’t care, he lets you do whatever you need to do.
you pull yourself away from his chest, cheeks a gentle hue of pink. you don’t dare to look at him, a humiliating sense taking over you.
“let me take you home, please.”
you wipe your tears with your palm before responding, taking your time locating the words.
“no, i don’t want to go home. i want to stay.”
heeseung emits a sigh, clearly not believing you.
“stay here and do what? cry?”
the frown on your face was unmanageable, you couldn’t even try to fight it.
you know he’s right. if you stay, all you’ll do is cry,
cry because you’re alone, cry because you feel awful, and cry because you don’t even know what to do anymore.
“cmon, let’s go home.” he caresses your head with his feather-light hand, playing with your hair.
you hesitantly nod, making heeseung’s heart soften.
you don’t know what to say,
the silence in the car was sufficient.
but there was one thing bothering you, “what if jake saw us? or if he finds out you’re taking me home? he’ll literally end us.”
heeseung’s eyes blink slowly, “he won’t know.”
“you don’t know that.” you gently laugh, “jake knows everything.”
heeseung smiles at your sudden softness, his own heart illuminated at the picture.
“even if he finds out, it’s fine. i’ll talk to him.”
you just nod at his words, feeling comfortable knowing he’ll deal with everything.
the rest of the ride was peaceful, only a few more small talks took place between you two. after almost twenty minutes, you two reach your — and jake’s — apartment.
the air was cold, the chilly air burned your skin. heeseung helps you shut the car door, his shoulder brushing yours.
“i think you should go, heeseung.”
you look up at him, mascara still muddied under your eyes.
“are you sure? i can stay.”
“no it’s fine, you can go.” a giggle escapes you.
heeseung inhales for a second, his own brain spewing nonsense. he looks down, leaning forward to kiss your forehead — the delicate plush of his lips pressing against your skin.
“okay. rest well . . . bye.”
to say you were anxious was an understatement.
it took you thirty minutes to get out of your bed today, desperately trying to come up with an excuse for why you went home — or rather, how you went home.
nonetheless, you couldn’t stay in bed all day. so, you stood right up and headed outside.
you are met with the one and only; sim jaeyun, sitting down on the couch with a piece of french toast hanging from his mouth.
you let out a small cough, just to let jake know you’re ready to eat. he immediately turns around, “good morning, took you long enough.”
he turns back to the tv, focusing on his breakfast.
okay, so far so good. he isn’t questioning you on anything, yet.
you make your own bowl of cereal, pouring milk over the sugary frosties — mouthwatering at the sight.
you feel a lot better today, you took a shower, spread body butter and body oil all over your body, air-straightened your hair, and now you are wearing the white, fluffy pajamas jake gifted you last year because he was ‘tired of you wearing all of his clothes as sleepwear when they clearly aren't’
you take a seat right next to jake on the couch, the bowl of cereal cooling your thighs.
“why’d you leave so early last night hm? you're always unnecessarily excited for ‘the best party of the year!’ or whatever the fuck you call it.” he mocks your tone, causing you to punch his shoulder in response.
it’s okay, this is a question you can answer — let’s just hope he doesn’t ask further . . .
“i don’t know- i just, i felt really sick and wanted to go home.”
jake nods at your reply,
“but how did you get home, uber?”
fuck.
you aren’t a liar, you hate lying.
but you might just have become what you hate today, “i got dr-“
rapid, loud bangs get fired at your door before you can finish, jake groans and leans back.
jake’s throws his head into his hands, “sorry y/n, i forgot i have to help sunghoon with something. you can go in your room till he leaves, if you want.”
your heart suddenly weighs heavier, slightly searing at the thought of having to face sunghoon.
what happened last night wasn’t sunghoon’s fault, it was yours. a wave of guilt had passed through you, intense emotions that you had bottled up fully shattered when he left you in that room.
so when jake opens the door, you compose yourself to act as if everything is normal. as if he, jake’s best fucking friend, didn’t fuck his sister the night before.
sunghoon eyes immediately light on you,
“hey . . . ”
you take a moment to swallow, trying to clear your throat, “hi! it’s nice to see you.” you smile gently.
“okay that’s enough, go to your room.” jake says with a serious tone.
and you do.
sunghoon and jake had left around ten minutes ago, meaning you were home alone, again.
so here you sit, slumped on the couch, letting it swallow you whole. a freezing redbull chilling your right hand, and the tv remote in your left.
you are so fucking bored. even your phone has become worthless to you, it’s not like anybody even tries to message you anyway.
thankfully, before you could kill yourself out of boredom — a faded and surprisingly respectful knock comes from your front door.
you desperately try and gather the power you need to push yourself up from the cozy couch, letting out a lengthy stretch — a soft, breathy moan coming from you.
you gradually walk towards the door, legs practically dead from the lack of blood flow.
you let your hand rest at the doorknob for a few seconds, trying to work out who the hell is standing behind this door, and at this time?
you don’t open the door fully, only a slight crack just to see who it is.
your heart drops,
heeseung?
“hi . . .”
“what the fuck are you doing here hee? you know you can’t be here if jake isn’t home,” you whisper,
“i need to talk to you, please.”
your eyes roll to the back of your head, you just aren’t in the mood to be reprimanded by jake today.
“talk to me at uni, not here. go home.”
you try to close the door, but heeseung extends his hand till you can’t.
“please, i’ll only stay for a minute.”
you take a deep breath, “fine, just for a minute.”
“do you want something to drink? water? juice?” you say with a low, dull voice.
“i’m alright, come sit here.” heeseung pats his hand onto the couch, giving a sign for you to sit next to him.
you plop down near him, your knee brushing his.
the atmosphere feels unusually tense, the weak buzz of the ac fills the silence in the air. you brush your hair out of your face, glimpsing towards heeseung.
“why . . . are you here?”
“i just wanted to say, i’m sorry.”
you let out a scoff, “you’re- you’re sorry? for what?”
“for everything, i can tell your upset- i don’t know why but i am sorry.”
you look away, rolling your eyes once more. “be serious heeseung, you don’t even know what you’re apologizing for.”
heeseung rests his hand on your knee, causing your body to instantly heat up. “well, tell me why you want me to apologize, what did i do?”
your throat aches, your eyes become glossy. “i don’t want you to apologize, you didn’t do anything.”
“is it because i left you in the closet that day?”
your lips sink into the familiar position of a frown, vision blurring immensely till faint drops tarnish your pants. you don’t respond to him — you don’t have the heart to.
you nod so subtly you’re not even sure he saw it.
heeseung immediately wraps you into his arms, holding you close. you push him away, part of you still infuriated at him. you’re strong, you arnet going to let him see you cry for the second time in two days.
“i’m sorry, i should’ve stayed with you, i wasn’t thinking properly. i get why you’re mad, you should be.”
you grumble with a sniffle, “shut up! just- shut up.”
heeseung rubs your head, stroking your hair — letting you cry as much as you need. you finally face towards him.
aren’t you just fucking adorable.
your red, glossy eyes look like gems to heeseung, the pink flush on your cheeks perfectly shaping your face, the whine in your voice making his dick twitch even harder,
fuck.
heeseung lets his eyes rest on your lips, his hand gradually making its way to your jaw. he gives you a chance to push him away, but you don’t.
he gently applies his lips on yours, waiting for you to open your mouth. you squeeze your eyes shut,
and let him into your mouth.
the tip of your tongues dance together, the usual feeling of his lips wrapping around yours making you increasingly stimulated.
the soft sounds of your wet kisses fill the room, occasional warm moans fleeing you both.
the kiss is soft, slow and gentle — extremely different from what you’re used to.
heeseung pushes your body calmy till your back hits the plush couch. he pushes your shirt up, cold hand discovering your warm body.
thankfully for heeseung, you don’t wear bras at home. meaning he could freely envelop your aching nipple with his warm mouth, hardening it almost instantly. bolts of electricity going straight down to your clit.
the soft muscle of his tongue scraping over the tip was enough for your hips to buck, trying pathetically to grind against his growing hardness.
his hand slips in between your bodies, holding your stomach down till you can’t even try to move. he turns to the other nipple, conveying the same amount of attention and pleasure.
you tug at his hair, desperately trying to get him to just get his tongue on you already. “please, hee . . .”
the melodic moans leaving your mouth only made him more feral. he lays wet, open-mouthed kisses down your body till he reaches your waistline, looking up at you while hooking his fingers into your pants.
as soon as you nod at him, he immediately yanks them down, along with your panties.
he groans at the sight of your glistening pussy, this is so much better than staring at your fucking shorts. he uses his fingers to spread your folds, putting his mouth on the swollen bud.
the sharp whimper leaving you was absolutely beautiful.
it took everything for heeseung to stop humping the fabric of the couch — a wet patch appearing on his boxers.
his tongue explored everything. it didn’t take long for his fingers to join too. easily slipping inside of you while his nose brushes against your clit, your leg instantly twitching at the overwhelming sensation.
you exhale a shaky moan, face burning — his tongue intertwining with your folds, his fingers abusing your sweet spot, and his nose bumping your on your sensitive bundle of nerves was enough for you to cum— and hard.
he watches in awe how fluids run down your thigh, how beautiful and glimmering you are for him — how your body already knows how to prepare itself to have him inside.
he lets his fingers run through your arousal, coating them in your dampness. “you are so pretty.”
your heart flutters at his words, it feels nice to hear ‘pretty’ being used to describe you in a situation like this,
and it’s definitely much better than ‘slut’.
your brain starts to liquify, letting heeseung have the full power to take over you — how cute, your body trusts him.
heeseung takes his time undressing himself, beaming at you’re fucked out state. he aligns himself at your entrance, pushing in so slowly it’s essentially torture.
he gives you time to adjust to his size, your walls violently clamping on him. he squeezes his eyes shut, hiking your leg up till he’s so deep you feel him in your lungs.
a few choked moans exit from you, fuck, you never knew heeseung could be this big. a prominent bulge constantly reappearing in your lower stomach, heeseung could cum at the sight.
but, your moans become quieter, smaller.
obviously heeseung notices, he slows his thrusts, reaching up to wipe your tear with his thumb. “it’s okay, what’s wrong?” he breaths softly.
you let out a few soft hiccups, sniffing violently.
you look up at him, his doe eyes sparkling with lust. “i need you closer, closer to me.”
heeseung delicately kisses your wet cheek, a hint of saltiness spreading across his lip. “i’m here, i’m inside of you.” he chuckles lightly, thumb brushing your forehead.
he lets you rest like this for a while, him still deep inside of you — sobbing straight into his neck. the cool, light tears running down his chest.
he rolls his hips slightly, letting you feel him inside of you, pulling a faded moan from you. his rolls become harder, deeper, more soothing sounds leaving your open mouth.
it just all feels so intimate, the feeling of heeseung being so deep makes your heart warm instantly.
“cum for me, please baby.”
you practically cream his dick, your release triggering his.
long, warm ropes of cum shoot inside of you, filling you up so deeply you’re sure you’ll feel him for days.
In fact, both of you are so drunk on each other you don’t hear the quiet click coming from the front door.
“what. the. actual. fuck.”
your eyelids immediately shoot open, your heartbeat becoming dangerously high.
heeseung closes his eyes in frustration, suppressing a groan. you frantically push him off, covering yourself with a nearby blanket.
fortunately, heeseung hadn’t took his pants all the way off, he had just pushed them down till his ankles — grateful to his impatience, he swiftly pulls them back up.
“what the fuck- what- oh you’ve got me fucking kidding me . . . “ jake trails off mid-sentence, veins bubbling with rage.
he can’t even believe it, all of his suspicions are confirming themselves right in front of him — no. this can’t be happening.
jake swallows hardly, “do you have nothing to say for yourself? huh? what the fuck!”
“jake- relax, i’m sorry, okay? just please hear me out.”
“no, the fuck! i leave for barely 20 fucking minutes and you’re here fucking my- my little sister . . . on my couch?” he scoffs, his voice progressively becoming louder.
jake looks at you, noticing your stupid glossy eyes. “what the fuck y/n? . . . don’t cry, don't fucking cry after you let my best friend fuck you.”
“jake . . . just listen to me, let’s talk inside your room-“
“no! i don’t want to talk to you. get the fuck out of my house before i beat your fucking ass!”
heeseung faces towards you, you subtly nod at him, gesturing for him to leave.
jake let you shower, letting you clean his best friend’s cum off of you, letting you wash yourself after getting his best friend’s spit all over you, letting you dry your body after fucking his best friend.
now here you are, sat next to jake, on the same couch heeseung put himself on you.
the delicate droplets of rain crashing against the glass of your apartment window filled the silence in the air, both of you struggling to find the words.
“just tell me, why? why did you let him do this? why didn’t you just tell me from the start?”
you put your head down, face becoming warm; a warning from your tear ducts are about to be put in overdrive.
“that day, when i called heeseung, you were there, right? that was your voice, right?.”
jake doesn’t even look at you directly, instead staring at the black screen of the TV in front of him; scanning your reflection.
“yeah. it was me.”
jake exhales softly, trying hard to trap the fury inside of him. his eyes fluttering shut and open.
“but so fucking what, jake? i’m not sixteen, i can date or fuck whoever i want. why do i need your approval?”
“you don’t, but you need to tell me. especially if it’s my best friend. you don’t know anything about heeseung, he doesn’t know anything about you either.”
the air becomes cold between you two, tension becoming heavy and uncomfortable.
“i’m sorry, okay?”
“i just- don’t want to find out who my sister is dating by coming home and watching them fuck on our couch.”
“okay, i already told you i’m sorry. i wont do it again.”
jake pushes his back off the couch, balancing himself on his arms resting on his legs. “and i don’t want you seeing heeseung anymore.”
you’re pretty sure your eyes had become bloody from how fast they widened, your chest heating up in frustration.
“you don’t get to decide that. don’t do this jake, please.”
he finally looks at you, meeting your eyes.
that’s when you knew jake would never let you stay with heeseung. his eyes stay glowing with rage, and not even a single indication of mercy.
it’s been almost four weeks since you’ve conversed with heeseung, or anyone related to jake for that matter.
after a long session of crying and screaming in your brothers arms, you finally came to terms with jake’s feelings — and accepted his decision for you to never, ever talk to heeseung again.
you don’t even recognize yourself anymore.
you used to doll up everyday — you loved lace sheer tops, baby doll tops, mini shorts, wearing oversized tank tops as dresses,
but here you stand, staring at your reflection in the mirror; wearing some random hoodie that probably belonged to jake three years ago, flared jeans from last year, and to make it worse, you’re wearing your hair . . . up.
you loved doing your hair, you’ve probably done every single hairstyle in history by now— but today? you didn’t even try, and it doesn’t even look good, your breakage practically the star of the show.
also, weirdly, you’ve been feeling increasingly more nauseous lately.
your heart sinks to your stomach, an empty void forming.
“it can’t be, it just can’t.”
oh but yes it can,
tears prickle your eyes, your back crashes against the bathroom wall. you rest your hand onto your stomach, staring at the two lines.
“ . . . positive?”
kiki thoughts: alright chill this my first time writing a bit of a lengthier fic so forgive me if it’s a bit half assed… but i tried hard for reader to give that addison rae, ariana grande hyperfeminine vibe but uhh it’s not very well executed ok. okay love u all ty for one thousand!
the sweetest fruits are always forbidden, and in this case, it's your two new stepbrothers ❤︎
PAIRING⟢ lee heeseung x sim jaeyun x f!reader
TAGS ──── ⚠️ MDNI, porn with plot ( 8.3k ) ft. nerd bsf! sunghoon, stepcest, morally gray characters, finger sucking, food play, dry humping, wet dream, oral (f!receiving), clit play, threesome, virginity loss, piv, unprotected (wrap it before you tap it!), double penetration, choking, spanking, praise kink, degradation, use of word slut, creampie, orgasm denial, belly bulge, they're SO freaked out, nasty smut, heejake are seniors y/n & hoon are juniors (all characters are 18+)
NOTE based on this ask!
WHEN YOUR MOM showed you the ring on her finger the size of an actual rock, you were happy.
she’d finally met someone. a good man, who always smiled at you, asked how your classes were going, and reminded you to eat on time with a faint frown. one who surprisingly didn’t look at you like you were some extra baggage, unlike her past flings, who considered you the annoying fee they paid to be with your hot young mother. “a total milf,” they would comment. sure, they were all passionate and steamy—but then they fizzled out just as quickly.
so, when she packed your entire life up into neat cardboard boxes at the speed of light—not that it would take so long, given the humble shoebox apartment you lived in—you were so happy for her. you’d never seen her smile so much and go so long without complaining about the broken AC. it was like nothing could faze her.
so, why is it that now that you’re all settled into your new house, with its marble floor and spiraling staircase and a walk-in bedroom closet the size of your old living room, you just feel so…
…unhappy?
all the spaciousness and grandeur of it all wasn’t lost on you. but it just felt unfamiliar, and that’s what made it all the more scary. it’s not like you missed your old life. you just felt like you didn’t fit into your new one.
take, for example, the prep school your stepfather had enrolled you in. full of prissy teenagers with ruffled skirts and fresh blowouts and faces that looked as if they were carved by angels—not really, just the work of their family’s plastic surgeon.
but none of it hid their rotten interiors.
you felt their vulture eyes on you every time you passed by, whispering in hushed tones about how your mom had apparently swindled her new husband. how they couldn’t fathom the likes of you breathing the same air as them.
it all probably would’ve completely broken you—if it weren’t for your stepbrothers. honestly, they were absolute lifesavers.
heeseung and jake always accompanied you to every one of your classes, heeseung’s hand on your lower back was a warm, steady presence that held your edges together as you tried to tune out the noise of all the stares and snickers. and jake would take your hand in his, murmuring, “don’t worry about them, just focus on this,” rubbing the insides of your wrist to ground you.
what you didn’t notice was the very next second after you’d walked into class, they would turn around and shoot the most venomous glare at those girls, a silent threat that didn’t go unnoticed as they quieted down instantly.
it was all very surprising. the way people at school seemed to be almost worship them.
of course, you noticed how the crowd parted whenever they appeared in the hallway. how the table you three sat was somehow always left empty, as if specially reserved, even in a cafeteria where people would fight just for a seat.
once, a freshman tripped over his unlaced seakers, spilling a can of orange pop soda near you guys. heeseung had just looked at him blankly. it’s not like he was even aggressive or anything. you’d actually never seen him lose his temper. he was such a calm person. but the guy blabbered hundreds of apologies and scurried to wipe it up as if he was being chased.
you didn’t see what all the fuss was about. they were so painstakingly ordinary. you often wondered what people would say if they saw the way they acted at home. just two rowdy high school boys making a mess in the kitchen when they were supposed to be doing chores, yelling over each other so loudly when playing video games that your stepdad had to cut off the WiFi so he could holler at them and get them to finally stop.
but you really didn’t know what you would do without them—and your best friend, sunghoon.
SUNGHOON HAD a skittish temperament. he was six feet tall, but he always slouched. he didn’t speak unless spoken to. so, when he approached you to pair up in chemistry lab, it was safe to say you were intrigued.
he had quickly explained, a slight tremor to his voice and black locks falling into his face, that it was because he had overheard from the advisor that you were joining the science olympiad, so he trusted that you “won’t mess everything up like these idiots.”
after that, it was basically history. with you, and your shared nonexistent popularity, you guessed he just felt comfortable to be himself. he could relate to being on the lowest rung of the hierarchy.
in the past, he’d struggle to choke up a full sentence and function as a member of civil society. but funnily enough, these days, it seemed like you couldn’t get him stop talking. he would ramble on and on about the unique properties of alkalines or another one of his current hyperfixations. in response, you would bump his shoulder and roll your eyes jokingly, telling him, “we get itt,” and he would flush a deep red, going mute and absentmindedly rubbing that same spot on his shoulder the rest of the day. had you actually hurt him or something? you were getting concerned.
but today, he looked even more skittish than usual. in a way that had nothing to do with this temperament. you didn’t think it was possible, but here he was, completely avoiding eye contact with you, murmuring a quick, “hey,” as he brushed past you and sat all the way in the back of class.
weird.
you wanted to ask him what was wrong, but then the teacher had started the lecture, so you had to sit down.
after class, he practically ran out the door. you caught up to him, grabbing his wrist. “sunghoon, wait!”
he stilled, shrugging out of your grasp as if your touch had burned him. it made bile rise in your throat.
why was he being so weird? like, did you smell or something?
he turned to you, looking down at the floor, and that’s when you noticed the sickly green color of his skin. you catalogued each observation as if it could help you piece together what he wasn’t telling you. his gaunt dark circles, sunken cheekbones, mussed uniform, and split lip. sunghoon was one of the most meticulous people you knew. he even ironed his bed sheets, something he’d told you in confidence. so the fact he looked so unkempt only confirmed to you that he wasn’t well.
“are you ok? you look sick. is something wrong?”
“it’s nothing,” he mumbled under his breath, all too quick that you knew to press further.
“don’t lie to me, hoonie. what is it? why are you avoiding me?”
he sighed so deeply that it sounded like he was carrying something heavier than he let on, and finally looked up at you. and the look in his wide, glassy eyes made your blood run cold. he looked fucking scared. yes, he was scared of a lot of things. the dark. the yellow teletubby. his mother’s voicemails. but not you. never you.
“i don’t think we should really be friends anymore.”
your stomach dropped. each word cut into your heart like daggers.
“w-what? why are you saying this? did i do something wrong?”
“no, i just don’t think it’s a good idea. i’ve realized that we’re too different. you’re not on my level.”
what the fuck.
the tears brimmed hot and ready to fall. your chest caved in and your voice felt all too weak when you whispered, “you don’t mean that.”
“no, i do. you’re a nobody. i don’t want to be associated with you.”
and that’s what did it, the tears streaming down your face. you wanted to scream. you wanted to demand an explanation, because this was just ridiculous. you wanted to shake him until the sick monster wearing sunghoon’s face with sunghoon’s voice disappeared and you got your sunghoon back.
but the words died in your throat.
you’d never expected this. from sunghoon, of all people? sure, people hated you and your guts. sure, most of them never acknowledged your presence and when they did, it was only to giggle at you behind your back, but sunghoon? he was your best friend.
your only friend.
he turned away before he could see you crumple to the ground.
WHEN YOU ARRIVED at home, you didn’t say a word to anyone. usually, you would at least smile and ask martha, the housekeeper, how her grandchildren were doing.
but today, you didn’t have it in you to care. in fact, you could barely feel your limbs as you sprawled on your bed like a starfish. the tears had stopped long ago because you’d bled your body dry. your throat was achy, and your clothes felt sticky, and you really wanted to take a shower, but you couldn’t even move.
a small knock on your door resounded.
you hiccuped, mumbling, “come in.”
heeseung and jake stood in the corridor, eyes wide at your state of complete disarray. god, you probably looked like such a mess right now. you didn’t want them to see you like this. you didn’t want to make them think you were always some weak helpless thing they had to protect all the time. a burden. you quickly wiped your face, getting up already, when jake stopped you, a hand on your shoulder, propping up the pillows behind you and tucking the blanket over you.
“you should take it easy. we could hear you crying for hours, it felt like it was never gonna stop. your body needs the rest.”
heeseung nodded along, handing you a bottle of water and gently tipping it up so you could take small sips as he asked, “do you want to talk about it? it’s okay if you don’t want to.”
“no, i think i’ll feel better telling you guys. i feel like i’m going crazy and i don’t know if i’m being dramatic.”
you took a deep breath. “so, you know sunghoon?”
“the kid that’s always following you around like a lost puppy?” jake snickered. heeseung bumped him with this elbow, “sorry, sorry,” he chuckled. “what about him?”
“he told me today that he doesn’t want to be friends anymore. he cut off our friendship. like, we almost, broke up? i don’t know what to even call it. can you even break up as friends?” you rambled, the words spilling out of you, because you needed the sound of your voice to drone out your thoughts, the way the moment replayed in your head like a broken CD. “i don’t even know what i did wrong. and when i asked him, he said, i’m not on h-his l-level. can you believe it? since when did that kind of stuff even matter to him? he just seems like a completely different person.”
jake cut in, “because he is. he’s just showing his true colors.”
heeseung added on, “jake’s right, y/nnie. you don’t need anyone who doesn’t appreciate you in their life. your feelings are valid. he was being an asshole, but he doesn’t deserve your tears. this is just who he is, and today you finally found out.”
“w-what do you mean?” sunghoon was harsh today, but he wasn’t a bad person. he spent his free time volunteering at the bunny shelter, for god’s sake.
jake’s voice was sweet, but it didn’t do anything to land the blow of his words, “haven’t you heard? sunghoon’s been talking a big game about you. during P.E. in the locker room, he was bragging about how he became friends with you and how you guys are so close, all so that he could finally hit it.”
“what.”
heeseung explained, “he only became your friend, because he thought you would eventually sleep with him. and i guess, well, since you haven’t, he dropped you,” he shrugged.
“no, i know what that means, i’m just in shock.”
heeseung rubbed slow circles on your back, “i know it’s a lot to take in. we overheard from some of the guys earlier. we were going to tell you, but then all this went down. i’m sorry, y/n.”
you nodded along, his touch a slight respite to your heavy heart. it made sense. sunghoon was only being nice to you for this digustingly selfish reason and now he’d come clean because he didn’t feel the need to keep up the act any longer. after all, who in the world could truly switch up that fast?
“thank you, guys,” your voice was broken and raspy, but you still hoped they heard the gratefulness in it. “i don’t know what i’d do without you.”
THE NEXT FEW DAYS passed by in a blur. eat (barely). coffee (way too much). study. repeat. (note: the lack of the word sleep). you’d spent every waking moment camping out in the library, under the guise of preparing for exams, but really, it was to keep yourself so buried in your work that you didn’t feel anything else—just numb—not even the hurt or heartbreak of anything tied to a particularly pale and lanky ex-friend of yours.
now, finished with all your exams, you were planning to spend the rest of the night cooped up in your room, like always, re-reading some stupid romance novel for the hundredth time until your eyes got bleary and sleep took over, because otherwise, it was too hard to fall asleep these days.
but then, jake barged into your room and announced to nobody in particular, “this is so not it.”
“who cares. just leave me alone, jake,” you muttered, rolling your eyes and turning over in bed so your back was facing him.
he turned you back, taking the book from your hands quicker than you could say no. “hey, i care. hell, you’ve been completely isolated from society the last 2 fucking weeks. you need to get out of this goddamn room. i swear it’s making you depressed.”
“okay, fine, whatever,” you relented, too tired to argue, as he dragged you out of bed and into the gaming room. yes, they had a whole separate room just for their antics (funded by daddy dearest, of course).
the walls were a dark gray, and there were thick blackout curtains prepared to make it the most comfortable viewing experience. red LED lights washed the room in a soft glow and two leather gaming chairs sat in front of the flatscreen smart TV. trinkets and figurines, from limited edition legos to toy story, were displayed on the wall shelves.
“hey y/n,” heeseung nodded over at you with a small smile, still practically glued to the screen.
“there’s no space for me to sit, see? i’ll just go back,” you swiftly turned, already trying to escape—but jake caught your wrist in time, “no biggie. you can share with one of us.”
“yeah, come on, you can sit with me,” heeseung patted at the space next to him on the chair, although it looked nowhere near big enough for anyone, really.
regardless, you swallowed any hesitation you had because of how nice they were being to you. so, you cleared your throat and plopped down, desperately trying to squeeze in, huffing when it became clear it was impossible. literally only a toddler could fit here. “it’s not enough space,” you mumbled, already getting up—but heeseung pulled you back down.
on his lap, this time.
your cheeks went hot as you squirmed around, still trying to get up, but he held the controller in one hand and placed the other on your thigh, stilling you in an attempt to calm your nerves. instinctively, you looked down and something about the sight of his tan, large, callused hand against your soft thighs, the firmness of his grip, how easily he’d commanded your focus, it all made your stomach flip for reasons you couldn’t exactly name.
heeseung broke you out of your thoughts. “just stop moving around and enjoy the game, y/n. come on, you’ve been holed up in your room for god knows how long. so, just take your mind off things and have a good time, yeah?”
you turned around to look at him, his soft gaze and huge brown eyes that held only care and concern for you. you think if heeseung looked at anyone like that and asked anything, they could do nothing else but agree. so you found yourself nodding along, you were truly grateful, but inside, you just felt incredibly guilty. you couldn’t stop replaying sunghoon’s harsh words and somehow they’d absorbed into you. a new insecurity that you’d internalized fully. that you were somebody that was difficult to be around. that it was hard for people to like you. that you weren’t on their level.
your eyes flit to the floor. “i know, hee, but i feel bad, i’m disturbing you guys and making you literally carry me right now,” you mumbled, only voicing half of what was swimming inside your head.
he tucked a misplaced strand of hair behind your ear, his hand lingering at your jaw, tilting your downcast head up again. “hey, look at me. it’s okay, i really don’t mind. you’re fun to be around and we want you here. with us.” he looked at jake for a moment, who nodded in solidarity and agreement. “not inside of that crazy head of yours. and if i really minded, y/n, i would tell you, i promise.”
you’re fun to be around.
we want you here.
with just two sentences, heeseung had singlehandedly addressed the gnarly things you’d try to run away from these past few weeks. how was he so good at this? were you really that transparent? still, every single one of those words acted like a balm to the wounds that were yet to heal. it didn’t completely fix everything, of course. a small part of you, a faint voice ringing in your ears, refused to believe that he really meant it. that you deserved such kind words. but you droned it out. instead, you allowed yourself to soak in the warmth of his words. immediately, your mood was brighter, a small smile twitching at your mouth.
with that, you felt less embarrassed or like you were overstepping. so you finally relaxed into heeseung, practically using him like a pillow, as he brought his arms back around you, holding the controller. everyone went back to focusing on the game. it was quite entertaining actually, especially when jake would yell at the screen like a madman every time heeseung beat him. it had been a while since you’d had this much fun. things were going well.
yeah, for a grand total of five minutes.
because right then, you felt an unmistakable hardness against your lower back. at first, it didn’t even register, because you refused to acknowledge it. maybe if you pretended it didn’t exist, it wouldn’t. totally solid logic, y/n. you told yourself it was just a natural reaction. heeseung was a young man, so of course, he had these fundamental biological reactions. he couldn’t help it. it was completely normal and nothing to fuss about. you felt guilty for even putting him in this position in the first place, he was being so nice and accommodating, just to get you out of your head, so you didn’t want to make him feel all weird about it and humiliate him.
but then, you felt it nudge against your core, down there, catching at the spongy entrance of your pussy covered only by a flimsy pair of panties and the silk nightdress that you were wearing.
you practically flew out of your seat.
“what is it? is something wrong?” heeseung peered up at you with wide eyes, a small frown tugging at his mouth.
jake removed his headset and looked at you both curiously, his brows furrowed in confusion.
whatever excuse you were going to say to get back to your room evaporated instantly in the back of your throat. they were being so sweet and trying to include you so you didn’t feel so alone. you didn’t want to ruin everything or seem difficult or rude. you didn’t want to prove sunghoon right. that no one would want to be friends with you. spend time with you.
so, you decided you should just suck it up.
you stuttered, “n-nothing’s wrong. just my foot fell asleep, so i got up to stretch. that’s all,” you let out a nervous chuckle, dropping into an unceremonious lunge right there, sweat beading down your forehead. “see? all gone!”
heeseung looked mildly confused, glancing at jake for a beat, but just sighed and nodded. you sat back down, hoping and praying that thing would go away.
but it didn’t.
so then you took it upon yourself to create some distance between you two, because maybe if you weren’t stuck to his back as much it would help make it go away. it was the least you could do. you scooted a bit forward, but then heeseung lunged forward too, shouting at something on the screen, firing the joystick forward forcefully to attack his opponent as he was completely enraptured in the game.
the friction of the roll of his hips against yours sent a tingle down your spine, and heat pooled in between your thighs. you squirmed again, trying to reposition yourself better, but every rub and drag and grind of him beneath you became only more and more pronounced until you felt the dampness starting to coat your panties. nononoNO. this cannot be happening.
and then, heeseung lowered his arms around the controller, bringing it down so it was resting on your lap. the feeling of the solid weight of his hands right there, where you were craving something you couldn’t even tell the shape of, just knowing this was not nearly enough to quench that ache, it was all too much. you let out a small, broken whimper before you could stop it.
that’s it. you launched yourself out of the seat and mumbled a quick, “sorry, i have to go,” running out the door and hoping he or jake didn’t hear it.
fuck, that was so embarrasssing.
YOU THOUGHT you could just block out that whole incident from your memory. where was the eternal sunshine clinic when you needed it? it was all going according to plan, kind of…
now, you were in the kitchen, baking red velvet cupcakes to relax and take your mind off things. you’d already finished with the base cake part, and now you were making the buttercream frosting. hey, maybe, you could share some with heeseung and it would make things less weird, because—well, you’d been kind of avoiding him.
but then, you felt a warm solid presence hovering behind you. heeseung. your body thrummed, adrenaline rushing as you shivered, from fear or from something else, you didn’t know. had your mental state deteriorated so much that you were having fucking hallucinations, now? oh, lord.
suddenly, hands gripped your sides. “BOO!” a voice boomed over your shoulder.
a shrill, blood-curdling scream ripped from your lungs. you hadn’t considering that there could actually be someone there, since you were so convinced you were imagining things. you felt a low, gravelly chuckle grazing your ear, a warm breath fanning across your neck that made you shiver again.
“please, you’re so easy to scare,” jake chuckled.
before you could whack him with the whisk, he promptly swiped it from your hand, and shot you that lazy dimpled grin you’d come to recognize as a sign that he’s up to absolutely no good. “so, can i get a taste?” he asked, a twinkle in his eyes you didn’t trust one bit.
“with what, dumbass, you stole my utensil,” you grumbled. he’d completely pissed you off with his little prank. otherwise, you might’ve been more agreeable to give him some. in fact, you’d already been planning on sharing anyway.
“well, you still have your hands,” he pointed down at them.
“wow, great observation. no shit, sherlock,” you rolled your eyes.
“please, pretty please, just a little bite. or else, i’m telling your mom that you’re hogging all the food and bullying me.”
“oh okay, because you’re literally starving or something.”
“well, i am now,” he singsonged.
“ugh, fine,” you muttered, dipping your finger in gingerly to pick up some of the white frosting, ready to place it in his hand, but right then, he abruptly took your wrist and pulled you closer until your chest collided with his.
your heart dropped straight into the ground. you couldn’t breathe.
he was so close you could see the small golden flecks in his eyes as he held your gaze intensely. your face started getting hot. suddenly, he closed his lips around your index finger, enveloping it in the heat of his mouth, still holding eye contact with you. your mind went completely blank like a whiteboard. his lashes fluttered once, and all you could do was watch like it was happening in slow-motion, the way he hollowed his mouth, looking up at you with a hooded sultry gaze. all you could do was feel the sensation of his tongue lapping and sucking and swirling around your finger, getting every last bit of frosting. and all you could hear were the wet smacks of his tongue and the faint buzz of the kitchen fan, and the increasingly louder thump, thump, thump of your own heartbeat.
“mmm,” he moaned around it, a vibration that resounded low and sent a tremor through your body. he let your finger go with a loud pop, plump lips glistening with the remaining wetness, “tastes real good.”
you couldn’t even respond properly. your brain was still catching up to what just happened. you were definitely annoyed. furious at him for first pranking you, then this, whatever this was. but you were also really, really fucking turned on. good thing jake didn’t leave you struggling for too long, saying, “now, your turn.”
he scooped up a bit of frosting onto his index finger, holding it up to your mouth expectantly, tapping your lips with his thumb, “open up,” and you complied on autopilot, brain long since gone into overdrive.
you cautiously licked just the tip, but then he thrust his finger in deeper, and added another finger, causing you to gag. “c’mon, you gotta clean all of it off to really get the taste,” he cooed.
you slackened your jaw, letting your lips cover your teeth so as not to graze his fingers and began sucking of all the creamy frosting until the sugary sweetness of it melted and mixed with the warm, slightly salty flavor of his skin. and all that was left was the aftertaste of him on your tongue.
slowly, he dragged his finger out, mechanically washing his hands in the kitchen sink as you gawked at him the whole time.
and then he left without another word.
so, what the actual fuck.
YOU DIDN’T REALLY do this type of thing often. touching yourself. even thinking it out loud, even if it was just in your head, made you feel weird and self-conscious. probably, because of your lack of experience in the sector, being a virgin and all that. not like you were embarassed about it. you just never felt ready yet. honestly, maybe, it was the effect of the purity culture surrounding you. or maybe, it was because even though your mother had never had a shortage of sexual encounters and one night stands (ones that you had to unfortunately block out with noise-cancelling headphones on the other side of the wall), she’d never really sat you down and had the talk. you’re thankful, though, it would have been way too awkward. but still.
sometimes, you wish you knew more about this kind of stuff.
like now, because you had no idea what you were supposed to be doing with your fingers shoved down there.
you started by swirling your finger across your clit, poking and prodding and hoping it would get you over the edge. occasionally, you would dip your finger actually inside, spreading the wetness up and all over, but it all felt too mechanical. the knot in your stomach grew tighter and tighter, but you just couldn’t…
come.
you huffed, retreating your hand, frustrated. maybe, thinking of something specific would help. of someone.
your mind drifted to a hazy image of tan veiny hands, brown locks, and eyes that looked like melted pools of butter. the vivid memory of his heart-shaped lips around your fingers. how it would feel to kiss him, how you knew he would be good at it, his skilled tongue tangling with yours as his hands roamed your waist and hip, and dipped lower. lower. lower. how he would curl his fingers into the wetness pooling inside your thighs, sucking and licking and fucking you with his tongue until your toes curled.
oh my god, you were so close.
so so close.
in your reverie, another pair of hands caressed your waist, landing on your ass until you felt him, strong and solid pressing into you. every roll of his hips against yours sent you further into the jake’s mouth, the high bridge of his nose bumping your clit in the most perfect way. meanwhile, heeseung squeezed and smacked your ass, “god, you love this don’t you. love being such a good little slut for us,” he groaned, grinding his cock against you in slow, torturous circles.
“she tastes so sweet,” jake moaned, licking a long stripe down your clit until you trembled and whined.
jake started thrusting his fingers in and out at a rapid pace, rubbing your clit with his thumb at the same time and kissing and tonguing your pussy. simultaneously, heeseung roughly moved you back against him, rolling his hips frantically to chase the impending high. the dual sensation of heeseung’s cock rubbing back against you and jake’s mouth and fingers—it was all too much. and you felt your muscles lock up as pleasure washed over you and left you shaking.
your head felt hazy. your clothes were all sticky. and it wasn’t until you were inside the shower, letting the steady hot drizzle of the water burn into your skin, that the thought fully materialized.
you’d orgasmed thinking about heeseung and jake.
your fucking stepbrothers.
you’d never felt worse.
THE GUILT WAS eating at you slowly but surely. a secret that tasted like bile in your throat. here they were, being so nice and caring. sure, jake would mess around with you. but it was only because he was cracking a joke just to make you smile, it’s not like he knew how crazy you were and how your body would react to it. and heeseung? he would sit and listen to you for hours as you vented out all your frustrations—and all you could think about was this. disgusting.
you felt like a horny crazy sex demon had possessed you.
so, you skirted around them whenever you could, eyes flitting to the ground, always mumbling a quick, “sorry, gotta go.”
but, now, there was no way around it. your parents had left on a business trip, and they’d left the house in the care of you three.
leaving you in the middle of it all, quite literally. because, right now, heeseung sat on your left and jake on your right, caging you in with everything you’d been trying not to confront, as some old rom-com played on the tv. you weren’t paying attention at all. you were only here, because they’d cornered you and insisted you never hang out with them anymore (this was true), and your parents weren’t even there to act as a buffer, so you really had no escape route.
plus, when heeseung had asked why you’d been so busy recently (the flimsy excuse you’d come up with on the spot), just seeing him so dejected and hurt made you feel even more guilty. you didn’t want to keep making them think that they did something wrong to push you away, when the whole problem was you and your dirty mind!
the three of you were wrapped in a thick off-white cashmere couch blanket that your mother had picked out for the decor. as the movie droned on, heeseung’s hand came to rest on your thigh like an afterthought, a phantom touch that reminded you of one too many nights ago. and jake was practically glued to your side, muttering something about how cold it was, shoulders bumping against yours every other second.
heeseung traced slow patterns on your thigh, still facing the TV, and you wrote it off as some absentminded fidgeting thing. you didn’t mind, really. it wasn’t anything inappropriate, of course.
but you swore you could feel his hand slowly inching up until it brushed the hem your cotton pajama shorts. but honestly, you were probably just imagining that. your horny sex-crazed brain was playing tricks on you.
and that’s when you felt jake’s breath grazing the tip of your ear, his lips brushing against your neck, as he whispered, low and gravelly, “hey, can you hand me the remote?”
you froze, a whimper slipping from you before you could stop it.
oh my god, you fucking whimpered instead of handing him the remote like a normal person.
and it didn’t go unnoticed, because heeseung whipped his head away from the TV, eyes solely latched onto you, “hm? what was that?”
“n-nothing,” you mumbled, voice still breathy and high-pitched.
“didn’t sound like nothing. y/n, is something wrong?” jake’s honey-sweet voice dripped with concern.
“well, uhm. there is one thing.”
“go on, what is it? you know you can tell us anything, right?” heeseung smiled warmly, a half-moon-shaped crinkle appearing next to his eyes that made you think he looked like an absolute teddy bear or something. NO, STOP Y/N. stop romanticizing him. HE’S YOUR STEPBROTHER.
still, his calm demeanor set your nerves somewhat at ease, so you just thought you’d get it all out and worry later.
“i can’t stop thinking about IT.”
“like the clown?” jake snickered. “come on, it’s not even that scary.”
“no,” you groaned with frustration, “like ITT. you know?” you gestured with your hands in some wavy motion that only left them more confounded than before.
“what the hell is that supposed to be?” heeseung let out a small chuckle, genuinely lost.
“like s-e-x. ugh, i don’t know what’s wrong with me, and i-i can’t stop, and it’s really gross, and oh my goodness, there’s something totally wrong with me, right? i think i need to see someone, this is so bad, ugh, i hate myself, sorry i’m being so weird,” the words tumbled out before you could stop and think. all of what’s been plaguing your mind now out in the open. tears brimmed in your eyes, threatening to spill.
jake wrapped his hand around yours, “hey, no, look at me. you know we care about you, right?”
you nodded, unable to speak. everything felt like it was closing on you, caught in your throat.
heeseung added on, “and you know we’d do anything for you, righ—”
jake cut him off, “so let us help you out.”
“what do you mean?” you mumbled, vision starting to go blurry with unshed tears. you blinked it away.
“you know, with that. trust me, you just need to experience it, so you don’t keep thinking about it. it’ll feel good, and then you never have to worry about it again.”
“o-okay, j-just get rid of it. please.” you didn’t care how wrong this was. you would do anything to stop feeling this way. it was the only way to fix this once and for all, so you could stop fantasizing about your goddamn stepbrothers.
“just let us take care of you, okay? heeseung rubbed slow, comforting circles on your knee. “you trust us, right?”
you nodded, beyond thankful and ready to get this over with.
heeseung brought his hand up to cup your face, your lashes fluttering shut as he tilted your head up and kissed you, swallowing your gasp. his pillowy lips melted against yours, it was soft, slow, and he took his time with small pecks that made you lose your balance. he coaxed your mouth further open with his tongue, hands growing braver as he wrapped them around your waist, pressing you to him as he exhaled into you with a small moan. he pulled back, and it took some time for your eyes to adjust to the light and the delicate, sweet bliss clouding your head to dissipate.
then, jake turned you to him without wasting a second, pressing a wet kiss just underneath your jaw that made you moan and tilt your head further to give him more access. he sucked at the same spot, pads of his fingertips pressing into your collarbones with a grip that felt like he needed to feel you, needed to be impossibly closer to you to anchor himself. it cut off your circulation slightly, but something about that loss only made you feel every inch of his lips against your skin more intensely. you gasped, his teeth grazing your skin slightly as he soothed over it with his tongue, the pain blurred by the instant pleasure. jake trailed kisses on your collarbone, your upper chest, dragging the straps of your tank down to kiss your shoulder, until finally, he latched his lips onto yours.
unlike heeseung, he instantly crushed his lips to yours, biting into your bottom lip and tearing a small gasp out of you that was soon muffled. his tongue tangled with yours, a clear show of dominance. you pulled back for air.
your chest heaved as your eyes flitted from heeseung to jake, unsure of what to do next.
heeseung sensed your hesitation. “just sit back and relax, ok?” he laid you flat horizontally against the couch. his hands came up to your tank. “can i take this off?”
“yeah,” you rasped, until he tugged it over your head, and there you were left in your bra and tiny pajama shorts.
“you’re so beautiful, y/n,” heeseung said, caressing your waist, your stomach, admiring the small marks adorning you that had started to bloom along your collarbone and shoulders that were jake’s handiwork. he pressed a small kiss to the underside of your throat that had you arching up into his touch, while palming your breasts over the lacy white fabric.
at the same time, jake pulled your shorts down, revealing the wet spot already dampening your panties. “you’re so wet already,” he murmured, “cute.” his thumb barely brushed over your clit, circling it with a light, teasing touch. he pinched the nub unexpectedly, causing you to whimper and yelp, sending a heady rush of pain and pleasure through your core.
“oh? you liked that?” he teased, “didn’t take you for a painslut,” he hummed, amused. he didn’t even give you a second of respite before he suddenly slapped your pussy. you mewled, and jake observed the fabric grow so soaked your pussy was basically see-through now. “fuck,” he muttered under his breath, “you’re so goddamn wet.” he wasn’t complaining. he loved it. actually it made it all the easier for him to tease you, scrunching the panty together into a thin sticky strap, gliding it across your clit. side to side. unraveling it and smoothing it out back again to finger you through the fabric. you moaned, the friction between the fabric and your sensitive folds making you furrow your brows, eyes closing shut.
heeseung made quick work of unclasping your bra, his hot tongue on your nipples a contrast to the cool air that had you moaning, “h-heee.”
“that feel good, angel?” heeseung continued his ministrations, taking your nipple fully into his mouth now, sucking it as he tugged and pinched your other nipple in between his thumb and forefinger. he switched and switched again, until you thought you could come just from this—and the way jake was still working you from below.
suddenly, he pulled back, leaving you dazed and confused as you opened your eyes.
“can’t have you come just yet, pretty,” he explained, pulling his gray sweatpants down to reveal his flushed cock, hard and leaking with precum.
you’d never really had any, but you’d be surprised if he didn’t win for most picturesque or something. he was long, thick, and slightly arched to the side, and as you were practically drooling, you failed to notice it might be a bit of a problem to have that fit inside you.
“won’t fit,” you mumbled your observation absentmindedly.
“oh, what’s that? don’t worry, princess, i’ll make it fit,” he smirked.
you bit your lip in anticipation, as heeseung positioned himself at your entrance, knees holding your thighs apart as jake moved away to give him space.
and then, even though your face was already probably the color of a tomato, you needed to come clean with this. it just wouldn’t be right otherwise. so, you just shut your eyes and said it really really fast. “i’mavirginbytheway.”
heeseung laughed. your eyes flew wide open in surprise.
what? why did he laugh?
jake and him glanced at each other for a second, something moving across their faces, but it was gone before you could comprehend it.
“don’t worry, we already had an idea,” he explained, clearing your doubts. “i’ll go slow,” he promised, pulling your panties to the side. he inched in with a groan, your walls fluttering around him. you gasped, feeling his mushroomy tip nudge against your gummy walls. the sticky wetness coating your folds made it easy for him to slip in about—well, only a quarter of the way.
you were getting worried, and your muscles tensed up, which heeseung noticed. “relax for me, pretty,” he whispered, his thumb massaging your clit to help ease you up. he sunk all the way in with a groan that sounded almost painful. you let out a small gasp, feeling utterly stuffed to the brim.
he gripped your hips for balance, his large hands digging into your waist as he slowly lowered himself out, and in again, true to his promise. he drove into you impossibly deeper every time, bullying your cervix. he brought his hand to rest on your stomach, feeling the way the skin bulged. “open your eyes, baby, want you to see how deep i am,” he murmured. you looked down, gasping at the clearly visible evidence of him moving under your skin. it was an almost poetic testament to the way your body desperately held onto him, and just as desperate, how heeseung had buried himself into you without a lick of space. you felt every single vein and ridge of him sliding against your sticky walls, only making you moan louder.
“that’s right, baby, your pussy’s sucking me in so fucking deep. so greedy. it’s like it wants to keep me inside forever,” he groaned. with the way you clenched around him, heeseung became utterly pussy drunk, cursing under his breath, “f-fuck, so tight.”
you were so lost in the feeling of him you didn’t particularly notice how jake was watching everything with his jaw dropped open, eyes glassed over. a small gasp escaped his mouth. he was fisting himself, pants pooled at his ankles. every time heeseung drove back out, you could do nothing but try and arch your back and push back against him to feel him again, which had jake imagining how you would feel around him. would you be just as needy? “god, so fucking needy,” he moaned, moving his palm faster and faster.
he could feel the edge looming over, just out of reach. he couldn’t take it anymore. he moved next to heeseung, stilling him with a hand on his shoulder. “bro, you’re going so slow, come on, i can’t wait any longer. it’s my turn,” he huffed.
heeseung reluctantly pulled out, and it left you whining, instantly craving something to fill the ache again.
“don’t worry, baby, i got you,” jake cupped your face, thumb brushing your cheek gingerly in complete contrast to the smirk on his face. suddenly, he thrusted in, burying himself all the way to the hilt easily with the wet mixture of your wetness and heeseung’s precum.
he set a brutal pace, plowing into you. your eyes rolled back. jake was girthier than heeseung, not as long, but the way he stretched you out had you seeing stars. and he wasn’t far off. he was completely absorbed in the feel of you pulsing and clenching around him. “fuck, she’s so tight, bro. best fucking pussy ever.”
his hands squished your cheeks together, making your face form a pout, drool trailing down the side as tears began to pool in your eyes from the pure ecstasy of it all. “so. fucking. cute,” he punctuated each word with a sharp thrust. “i knew one cock wasn’t enough for a slut like you.” he drove into you so hard the entire couch shook from the force of it. “come on. say it.”
“say that you're ours. our slut. our fucktoy. ” he dropped his hand from your face, only to bring it around your throat.
“y-yes,” you rasped, too fucked out and needy to even say otherwise.
he clicked his tongue, “nono. say it right. say you love being our slut.”
you blurted it out, “yes, i’m yours. i love it. i love being your slut.” you babbled as all you could feel was the hazy keening pleasure about to overtake you. you couldn’t hold back any longer.
jake groaned, satisfied, harshly rolling his hips into you again, making you moan, squelching around him loudly.
“p-please,” you begged, though your mind was too scrambled to even realize what.
“please, what?” jake teased. “wanna come, is that it?” his hand pinched your nipple making you whimper and flail around and bite your lip harshly so hard you thought you tasted blood, “yes, fuck, please, i need it so bad, jakey,” you whined desperately.
“don’t worry, angel,” heeseung chimed in. “i know exactly what you need.”
and with that, heeseung pushed in right next to jake, taking you both by shock. jake faltered, but only for a minute, then the next, the two of them alternated strokes. jake pulling out as heeseung pushed in, scissoring you open until the two of them pushed in together.
you mewled. the tight fit of them sliding against each other in unison was insane. you felt beyond full and stretched, the two of them together managing to hit every spot deep within you until all you could do was moan wantonly.
“please, can i come?” you whined, feeling the wave starting to build in your core that you couldn’t control any longer.
“go on, be a good girl and come for us,” heeseung whispered, him and jake both hit a frantic relentless rhythm that had you splitting with the fullness of it all. jake was girthier and heeseung was slightly longer and the dual sensation of them both was maddening, every single crevice within you feeling stuffed. the pressure built in no time and your body locked up around them, gushing them both in your wetness.
the vibration of you shaking and fluttering around them caused heeseung to stutter and spill inside you, with jake following right after. they pulled out, your overstimulated pussy twitching still. the cool air hit your gaping hole, clenching around nothing.
jake pulled your folds apart gently with his thumbs, causing their white, mixed cum to drip from you, glistening pearls that he thought made for one of the most beautiful sights in the world: you, laid out like a painting, all used up, leaking with their cum, skin flushed and glistening with that afterglow. “so beautiful,” he remarked.
heeseung pulled his pants back up, going to fetch something and coming back with a warm washcloth to carefully clean you up. you jerked when the fabric hit your sensitive skin, but jake’s warm hand caressing your sides helped steady you. “sorry if i was a little rough, got carried away,” he admitted, biting his lip. you nodded, voice still too gone to answer properly.
“there, all cleaned up,” heeseung said, coming up to press a gentle kiss to your forehead. “you did so good for us, princess.”
“that’s right. so proud of you, baby,” jake tucked a strand of hair behind your ear, gently patting down your hair that had become all mussed.
in that moment, in their arms, you felt completely, wholly safe. your eyes began to flutter shut, your body exhausted and sleep overtaking you. all the earlier tension and stress and underlying pain you’d felt since sunghoon had evaporated. a part of you knew that everything would be different between you three from now on, that this was all wrong in the weirdest ways, but you weren’t bothered. in your gut, it felt right. you knew you could trust them to take care of you, always, just like now.
and with that thought, you drifted off.
JAKE: IMG_3158.MOV
JAKE: here’s a little smth smth for ya
HEESEUNG: kept your mouth shut and stayed away from her like a good boy haha
JAKE: aww poor hooniee. are the bruises better? did we go too hard?
SUNGHOON: wtf.
ᯓᡣ𐭩 After moving to Los Angeles for a fresh start, a talented orthopedic surgeon finds herself constantly clashing with the hospital's charming neurosurgeon, Jake Sim. Their rivalry quickly turns into a no strings attached arrangement, but as their connection deepens through long shifts and life or death cases, they realize keeping feelings out of the equation may be impossible.
𝙣𝙚𝙪𝙧𝙤𝙨𝙪𝙧𝙜𝙚𝙤𝙣! 𝙟𝙖𝙠𝙚 𝙭 𝙤𝙧𝙩𝙝𝙤𝙨𝙪𝙧𝙜𝙚𝙤𝙣 𝙛𝙚𝙢! 𝙧𝙚𝙖𝙙𝙚𝙧
forced proximity, fuck buddies, fwb, slow burn, mutual pining, fake indifference, workplace secret relationship, breakup and reconciliation, angst, SLOW BURN happy ending
WARNINGS: A LOT OF Explicit sexual content, graphic sex scenes, friends with benefits, semi-public sex, rough sex, surgery descriptions, minor character death (patient), emotional angst, temporary breakup, jealousy, pregnancy, size and hand kink, praise kink, swearing
wc: 37,151
🎧: Lost in the Fire- The Weeknd, Him & I- G-Eazy & Halsey, Love Me Like You Do- Ellie Goulding, Often- The Weeknd, Dangerous Women- Ariana Grande, Earned It- The Weeknd, Falling- Harry Styles, Perfect- Ed Sheeran, Say You Won't Let Go- James Arthur
CHAPTER 1: THE MOVE
The moving truck pulled away from my old apartment at 6:14 a.m., and I stood on the curb in Chicago in the close end of a Midwestern spring, watching my entire life shrink down to a truck's worth of boxes and a single overstuffed suitcase riding shotgun in my car, and thought, not for the first time that week, what have I done.
The offer from XO Medical Center had come out of nowhere, three months earlier… an orthopedic attending position in Los Angeles, better pay, a genuinely excellent surgical program, and, if I was being honest with myself, an ocean and two time zones of distance from a residency program that had chewed me up for six straight years and a breakup I still wasn't sure I'd fully recovered from. When the recruiter had called, I'd said yes before I let myself think too hard about it, which was, in looking back at it, either the bravest or the most reckless decision I'd made in a decade. Possibly both.
The drive took three days. I'd mapped it out with the kind of manic precision I usually reserved for surgical planning… Chicago to St. Louis, St. Louis to Amarillo, Amarillo through the desert and into California, watching the landscape change through the windshield. Flat cornfields gave way to red rock and endless highway, and somewhere around the Arizona border the temperature climbed high enough that I had to keep the AC running full blast just to think straight.
I cried exactly once, outside a gas station, for no reason I could fully articulate… not sad, exactly, just overwhelmed, the specific dizziness of realizing that nobody in the next state over knew my name, that I was about to become the "new attending" for the second time in six years, and that this time there was no attending physician to hide behind, no more training wheels. I was the one signing off on charts now. I was the one whose name would be on the surgery.
Los Angeles announced itself the way it always seemed to in movies… traffic first, a slow crawl of brake lights stretching for miles before the skyline even came into view, palm trees lining the freeway looking strangely delicate against a sky so blindingly clear it almost hurt to look at. My new apartment was a one bedroom in a beige stucco building fifteen minutes from the hospital, small enough that half my boxes were still stacked against the living room wall a week after I moved in, but it had a balcony that caught the sunset every evening, and some stubborn, hopeful part of me decided to take that as a sign.
"You're insane," my sister told me over the phone, the night before my first shift, while I sat on my bare mattress surrounded by unopened boxes labeled KITCHEN and BEDROOM in my own frantic handwriting. "You don't know a single person out there."
"I know that."
"You hate change."
"I'm aware."
"So why'd you do it?"
I thought about that for a long moment, staring out at the strange, warm dark outside my window, streetlights and palm fronds and the distant hush of a freeway that never really went quiet. "Because I needed to find out who I am when nobody already has an opinion about it," I said finally. "Does that make sense?"
"No," she said, "but I love you anyway. Go kill it tomorrow."
I didn't sleep well that night… too hot, too unfamiliar, the ceiling fan clicking in a rhythm I hadn't learned yet… and I lay awake running through everything I knew about XO Medical Center, a Level 1 trauma center, a surgical program with a strong reputation, a chief of orthopedics named Dr. Kim who'd sounded brisk and no nonsense on our one phone interview. I didn't know anyone there. I didn't know the freeways, the good coffee shops, which grocery store had decent produce, or exactly where downtown ended and the hospital's neighborhood began.
I definitely didn't know that in less than twelve hours I'd be standing in a surgeons' lounge, staring at a stranger's hands like they'd personally done something to offend me.
But that was still twelve hours away. For now, there was just the dark, and the unfamiliar hum of a city I'd chosen sight unseen, and the quiet, stubborn hope that three thousand miles could actually be enough distance to become someone new.
I got up before my alarm, made coffee in a kitchen that still smelled like fresh paint, and drove to XO Medical Center with the windows down and the radio on, telling myself, the entire way there, that I had absolutely nothing to be nervous about.
I was, it turned out, spectacularly wrong about that. Just not for any of the reasons I'd expected.
CHAPTER 2: NEW BLOOD
The hospital rose up out of the LA skyline like something built specifically to be photographed… glass and pale stone, a sweep of palm trees along the circular drive, valet attendants directing a steady stream of cars even at seven in the morning. I parked in the employee garage, badge freshly laminated and still smelling faintly of plastic, and made my way up to the surgical floor with my heart going a little too fast for someone who had, in theory, done this exact kind of first day once already in her life.
The first thing I learned about XO Medical Center was that the coffee in the surgeons' lounge was criminal and nobody had done a single thing about it in what looked like a decade, despite being located in a city that apparently had four handcrafted coffee shops on every block.
The second thing I learned was Jake Sim, and I learned it before I even had a face to put to the name.
"Did Dr. Sim say good morning to you yet?" a nurse was saying, somewhere just around the corner from the lounge, her voice pitched low but nowhere near low enough. "I nearly dropped a chart."
"Please. I heard he smiled at Deb in radiology and she had to sit down."
"I would also have to sit down."
I rolled my eyes internally, badge still crooked, orientation packet tucked under one arm. Six years of residency had taught me exactly what this sounded like… some overconfident, sharp jawed attending who'd learned early that charm got him out of things competence should have to earn, coasting on cheekbones while everyone around him rearranged their whole morning for a smile. I'd met the type a dozen times over. I did not need to meet it again on day one.
I hadn't even made it to the vending machine before I heard him… not saw him, heard him, that low, easy laugh carrying down the hall like he owned the acoustics of the entire building. I turned the corner into the lounge with my badge still crooked on my scrub top, ORTHOPEDIC SURGERY printed under a photo that made me look like I'd been startled awake, and there he was, leaning against the counter like it had been built specifically to hold him up, dark hair falling messily over his forehead, sleeves of his scrub top rolled to show forearms that had clearly never met a day of doubt in their life. Outside the window behind him, the sun was already blinding off the parking structure, and somehow he looked like he belonged in it… tan, unhurried, entirely too comfortable for seven in the morning.
Three nurses were laughing at something he'd said. He wasn't even trying that hard. That was somehow worse.
"New meat," he said, when he spotted me. Not unkindly. Just… observational, like he was registering something for later.
"Excuse me?"
"You've got that look. First day. Trying to figure out if the coffee machine hates you personally." He nodded toward it. "It does. Don't trust it. This is LA, there's a decent espresso cart on the ground floor if you can survive the walk down."
"Thanks for the warning," I said, and went to pour myself a cup anyway, mostly out of spite, and possibly because I wasn't ready to walk back out of a room he was standing in.
He watched me do it, arms crossed, amusement written all over his face like he already knew how this was going to go. Up close I could see he had this way of tilting his head, registiring me, like every conversation was a diagnosis he hadn't finished making yet.
"Orthopedics," he said, reading my badge without asking permission. "Bone doctor. You're the new attending everyone's been talking about. Transferred in from Chicago, right?"
"News travels fast."
"This hospital runs on gossip. You'll learn." He held out his hand. "Jake. Neuro. Brain doctor, if we're doing the nickname thing."
The slight Australian lilt in his voice caught me off guard… broader vowels, softened at the edges. I shook it, and that was the first time I noticed them… his hands. Slim, long fingered, the kind of hands you'd expect on someone who played piano or did something delicate for a living, which I supposed he did, technically, if you counted people's brains as delicate. Veins ran visible along the backs of them, up under his rolled sleeves, and I found myself looking a half second too long before I caught myself and looked back up at his face instead.
He'd noticed. Of course he'd noticed. His mouth curved, and he bit down briefly on his lower lip in a way that felt entirely too deliberate for a first meeting.
"Something wrong with my hand?" he asked.
"No," I said, too fast. "Just didn't expect a surgeon to have such… dramatic veins."
"Dramatic veins," he repeated, delighted, like I'd handed him a gift. "I'm going to remember you said that."
"Please don't."
"Too late." He pushed off the counter, and as he passed me he reached up and dragged a hand back through his hair… that same gesture I'd apparently be seeing a lot of, I'd learn later, an absent tell, something he did when he was thinking or stalling or just existing… and said over his shoulder, "Welcome to XO Medical. Welcome to LA, technically, if this is your first week. Try not to fall in love with anyone in the first month. Statistically it happens more here than anywhere else… something about the sunshine making everyone reckless."
"I'll take my chances," I called after him.
One of the nurses… Jasmine, I'd learn her name was later that day… caught my eye with an expression that was somewhere between pity and amusement. "That's Dr. Sim," she said, like it explained everything.
"Got that impression."
"He's not usually that friendly on a first meeting. You must have impressed him."
"I insulted his coffee opinions and stared at his hands," I said. "Not exactly a strategy."
"With Jake," she said, already walking away, "that basically is one."
I didn't think much more about it, not then. I had a full afternoon of chart reviews and an orientation packet the size of a phone book and exactly zero interest in whatever reputation apparently trailed Jake Sim through these halls like cologne. I'd moved three thousand miles for this job, left behind everything familiar for a fresh start in a city that still felt like a movie set half the time. I had one goal, and it wasn't him.
Still. Walking to my new office, sunlight slanting gold through the windows in a way Chicago's never quite managed, I caught myself flexing my own hand once, like I was trying to remember what his had felt like against mine.
I told myself it meant nothing. First days made people weird. That was all.
CHAPTER 3: FORCED PROXIMITY
I made it exactly four days before fate, or more accurately the surgical scheduling algorithm, decided to test me.
Those four days had, at least, given me time to find my footing… a decent grocery store two blocks from my apartment, a running route along a stretch of sidewalk shaded by jacaranda trees that dropped purple blossoms across the pavement every morning like the city was putting on a show just for me, a coffee shop near the hospital with a barista who'd already learned my order. LA was starting, in small and unexpected ways, to feel less like a place I was visiting and more like a place I might actually live.
"You're on the Romano case," Dr. Kim told me, sliding a chart across her desk like it was a routine thing and not a small disaster. "T12 fracture with cord involvement, complicated by a mass we need imaged and possibly resected before you can even get near the vertebra. You'll be working with neuro."
"Which neuro?"
"Sim."
Of course. Of course it was Sim.
"Problem?" she asked, when I didn't say anything right away.
"No," I said. "No problem."
There wasn't, really. I was an adult. I was a professional. I had done six years of training around plenty of overconfident men in scrubs and survived every single one of them. Jake Sim was just going to be another name on another chart, another set of hands I had to coordinate with in an OR for six, maybe seven hours… or more.
Hands. I really needed to stop thinking about his hands.
He was already in the scrub room when I got there the morning of the surgery, elbow deep in suds, sleeves pushed up past his elbows, humming something under his breath that I didn't recognize… something with a beat, the kind of song that belonged on a car radio with the windows down. He glanced sideways when I came in and did a visible double take.
"New Blood," he said. "You're on my case."
"It's not your case. It's our patient."
"Sure, sure." He was smiling in that lazy way again, water running down his forearms. "You nervous?"
"About a T12 fracture? No."
"About working with me."
"Should I be?"
He considered that like it was a genuinely interesting question, head tilting, and then said, "Depends how easily you get distracted." The Australian flow a little more noticeable when he was amused.
"I don't."
"We'll see."
I scrubbed in next to him, elbow to elbow, both of us going through the same practiced motions… the brushes, the iodine, the careful choreography every surgeon learns before they're allowed to touch a human body for a living. It should have been nothing. It should have been exactly as clinical as it always was.
Except his hand brushed mine, reaching for the same faucet at the same moment, and something about the accidental contact… skin on wet skin, brief and meaningless… made my whole arm go warm in a way that had absolutely nothing to do with the water temperature.
"Sorry," he said, not sounding sorry at all.
"It's fine."
"You went red."
"I did not."
"You did. It's cute."
"Do you flirt with everyone you operate with, or am I special?"
"Bit of both," he said cheerfully, and shouldered the door to the OR open before I could figure out how to respond to that.
The surgery itself, to my genuine surprise, was where Jake Sim stopped being infuriating and started being… good. Actually good. He worked with a precision that didn't match the loose, lazy way he carried himself outside an OR, his hands, the ones I kept catching myself watching, moved with total certainty around the mass pressing on Mrs. Romano's spinal cord, careful and economical and startlingly gentle for someone built like he was.
"Talk to me," he said at one point, not looking up from the microscope, and I realized he meant it generally… an old habit, probably, of narrating a case out loud to keep the room calibrated to him.
"Go ahead."
"Clean margins. I think we can close here and let you do your thing." He glanced up, eyes bright behind his loupes. "Your turn, Dr. New Blood."
"I have a name, you know."
"I know. I like the nickname better."
I rolled my eyes and stepped in as he stepped back, and for the next three hours it was just the fracture and the hardware and the long, focused silence surgeries demand, and somewhere in there I stopped being aware of him as Jake Sim, hospital fuckboy and started being aware of him as someone who was simply very good at his job and standing close enough that I could feel the heat off his arm when he leaned over to check my alignment on the imaging.
"Nice work," he said, when we finally closed. It didn't sound like flattery. It sounded like he meant it.
"You too," I admitted.
"See? We make a good team." He stripped his gloves off with a snap, and… there it was again…dragged a hand back through his hair, damp now with sweat, dark strands falling right back into place like they always did. "You should let me buy you a coffee. A better one than the lounge poison. I know a place near the beach, it's a bit of a drive but it's worth it."
"I think I'll pass."
"Your loss," he said, entirely unbothered, and left me standing there trying very hard not to watch him go.
It didn't work.
CHAPTER 4: REPUTATION
By the end of my second week, I had heard approximately four different, elaborate, and only partially overlapping stories of Jake Sim's love life.
I hadn't asked for any of them.
"He dated an ER attending for like three months last year," said Jasmine, over a truly awful cafeteria salad, the kind that made me miss the Midwest's total lack of claim about vegetables. "Then a rep from the surgical device company. Then I think there was a producer he met at some industry party… this is LA, everyone's dating someone in entertainment eventually… but that one might be a rumor."
"He's not a bad guy," added Sunoo, one of the residents, around a mouthful of fries. "He's just… allergic to anything that looks like it's going somewhere. The second it gets serious he's gone. Very charming about it, though. Nobody even hates him for it. It's honestly kind of impressive."
"Charming exit strategy," I said. "Great. Very reassuring information for a coworker to have."
"Why, you interested?" Jasmine asked, entirely too delighted by the idea.
"Absolutely not."
"You're blushing."
"I am not blushing, I am mildly annoyed that this is apparently the primary topic of conversation in this hospital."
Which was true. It was also true that I spent that entire evening's chart review with my mind drifting, unhelpfully, back to the feel of his hand brushing mine at the sink, the particular way his forearm had flexed as he'd angled the retractor, the veins running down the back of his hand into long fingers that had held a human spinal cord's covering with more gentleness than I'd expected from someone with that reputation.
I told myself it was clinical curiosity. Surgeons noticed hands. It was an occupational hazard.
I did not believe myself even a little.
I ran into him… actually ran into him, physically, my shoulder catching his chest as I came around a corner too fast with an armful of charts… outside the radiology suite around eleven that night.
"Whoa." He caught my elbow to steady me, and let go a half second slower than strictly necessary. "Somebody's in a hurry."
"Post op check. Sorry."
"You're here late."
"So are you."
"I like the quiet. Best time to be in this building, honestly… no admin, no noise, just the hum of the bright lights and whatever left of the day." He leaned against the wall, arms crossed, studying me in that unhurried way he had, like he had nowhere else to be and no interest in being anywhere else. "Heard you're settling in. People like you already. Sunoo says you're terrifyingly skilled."
"High praise from Sunoo."
"He doesn't say it about many people." A pause, and then, almost no reason, "Heard you've heard about me too."
I didn't pretend not to know what he meant. "The reputation, you mean."
"The reputation," he agreed, unbothered, like we were discussing the weather. "What'd they tell you? The ER attending? The device rep? The producer? I feel like there's a rotating cast at this point."
"Something like that."
"It's mostly true," he said, with a shrug that was almost disarming in its honesty. "I'm not going to pretend it isn't. I like people. I like dating. I don't like the part where it stops being fun and starts being… " he made a vague gesture, "… a project. So I leave before that happens. Saves everyone the trouble."
"That's a very tidy way of avoiding commitment."
"It's efficient," he said, and something flickered behind his eyes, quick and gone, that made me think maybe it wasn't quite as tidy for him as he made it sound. "Anyway. You didn't ask, I just figured you'd rather hear it from me than the fourth hand version."
"Thanks for the transparency."
"I'm a very transparent guy." He pushed off the wall, close enough now that I had to tip my head back slightly to keep looking at him, and I was abruptly, uncomfortably aware of how good he smelled, some mix of antiseptic and something warmer underneath it… sun warmed skin, maybe, or the particular smell LA seemed to leave on everyone eventually.
"Confidence is a requirement in this job, I've noticed," I said, mostly to have something to say that wasn't about how close he was standing.
"Definitely a requirement," he agreed. "Helps in other areas too, if the rumors are to be believed."
"I wouldn't know. I don't listen to rumors."
"Sure you don't." His mouth curved. "You've got ink on your hand, by the way."
I looked down. I did, a streak of blue pen along the side of my palm from filling out charts too fast. When I looked back up he was watching my hand instead of my face, and for one long, strange second neither of us said anything.
"Goodnight, Jake," I said, finally, and made myself walk past him toward the elevator.
"Night, New Blood," he called after me, and I could hear the smile in it without even turning around.
Outside, the parking structure was warm even at that hour, the sky over the city that strange, orange tinted dark that never quite went fully black, and I sat in my car for a full minute before starting the engine, hand pressed briefly against the wheel, trying to talk myself down from something I didn't have a name for yet.
I did not think about his hands again that night.
I thought about them extensively.
CHAPTER 5: FIRST IMPRESSIONS, RECONSIDERED
I'd made a habit, in that first month, of keeping a running mental list titled, more or less, Reasons Jake Sim Is Not My Problem, and by week three the list had started developing some inconvenient holes in it.
The first hole appeared during a Monday morning trauma conference, of all places… a dry, hour long meeting where attendings reviewed complications from the previous week, usually the least romantic setting imaginable for anything resembling a report. Jake was presenting a case that had gone sideways, a bleed that had been harder to control than expected, and instead of doing what I'd half expected… deflecting, minimizing, charming his way past the hard questions the way he seemed to charm his way past everything else… he stood at the front of the room and walked the entire department through exactly what had gone wrong, what he'd do differently, and where he thought the system itself had failed the patient before he'd even gotten involved.
"I should have called for backup twenty minutes earlier than I did," he said, plainly, in front of people whose respect he clearly cared about. "That's on me. I got tunnel vision on managing it solo instead of recognizing I needed another set of hands."
Dr. Kim, notoriously hard to impress, actually nodded along, murmured something to the surgeon next to her that looked approving. I sat there in the back row revising my mental list downward by one significant point, watching a man who apparently had no trouble at all being honest about his mistakes in front of a room full of colleagues, even as everyone in that same hospital seemed convinced he couldn't be honest about anything that mattered to him personally.
The second hole appeared two days later, in the hospital's tiny meditation room… a space I hadn't even known existed until a nurse pointed it out to me after a particularly brutal shift, tucked behind the chapel, meant for exactly the kind of five minute mental reset healthcare workers rarely gave themselves permission to take. I ducked in there hoping for solitude and found Jake already sitting cross legged on the floor, eyes closed, phone face down beside him, looking nothing at all like the easy, performative version of himself that held court in the surgeons' lounge every morning.
"Sorry," I said, already backing out. "Didn't mean to interrupt."
"You're not interrupting." He cracked one eye open. "This room's not exactly hard to share. Come sit, if you want. Or don't. No pressure either way."
I sat, mostly out of curiosity, and we didn't talk for several minutes, just breathed in the small, quiet room together, and it was, unexpectedly, one of the more peaceful five minutes I'd had since arriving in the city.
"I come here after hard cases," he admitted, eventually, still not quite looking at me. "Nobody knows that. Well. Now you know that."
"Why tell me?"
He considered the question like it deserved an actual answer, rather than a deflection. "I don't know. You don't seem like the type to use it against me."
"I'm not."
"I figured," he said, and something in the way he said it… simple, undefended, nothing at all like his usual exterior… made the third and largest hole in my mental list open up all at once, and I found myself, walking out of that meditation room ten minutes later, reluctantly admitting that Jake Sim might, in fact, already be my problem, whether either of us was ready to admit it yet or not.
CHAPTER 6: SETTLING IN
By my sixth week, Los Angeles had stopped feeling like a place I was borrowing and started, in small, unglamorous increments, to feel like mine.
I'd found a farmers market two blocks from my apartment that ran every Sunday morning, tables of stone fruit and strange citrus varieties I'd never seen back in Chicago, and I'd taken to walking there before my shifts on the days I was lucky enough to have a slow morning, coffee in hand, sun already warm by eight a.m. in a way that still felt like a small miracle every single time. Jasmine had started dragging me to a taco truck near her apartment on Fridays, insisting my culinary education was "criminally incomplete," and Sunoo had, with great attention, added me to the group chat the residents used to complain about attendings, which I understood to be some kind of honor even though half the complaints, lately, were apparently about me.
"You're strict," he told me, entirely without spite, over lunch one Thursday. "In a good way. But strict."
"I had a chief resident who used to make us re-suture things at two in the morning if the spacing was off by a millimeter. I'm basically a saint by comparison."
"That explains a lot," Jasmine said, and passed me a napkin, because apparently I still hadn't mastered eating a taco with any dignity.
Work, too, had started to settle into something like rhythm. I knew the good scrub techs from the ones who cut corners, knew which resident to trust with a complicated closure and which one needed extra supervision, knew, with the particular unspoken fluency that only comes from repetition, the exact rhythm of Jake Sim's voice across an OR when a case was going well versus when it wasn't.
That was the part I hadn't expected… how quickly he'd become a fixed point in my new life, not because I'd chosen it, exactly, but because the hospital kept putting us together, complex case after complex case, until working alongside him had simply become one more thing I knew how to do without thinking too hard about it. Or that was the story I told myself, anyway, on the days it was easier to believe.
We had a good case together that week… a motorcycle accident, complicated but survivable, the kind of surgery that left both of us satisfied rather than dried out… and afterward, in the elevator, he leaned against the wall with his eyes closed for a second, exhaustion written plain across his face in a way the hallway swagger usually hid.
"Long week," I said.
"Long month," he corrected, cracking one eye open. "You get used to it. Eventually. Mostly."
"Is that supposed to be reassuring?"
"Not really, no." A tired half smile. "How's the apartment? You settling in okay? Chicago girl surviving the culture shock?"
"Better than I expected. There's a farmers market near me. And a taco truck Jasmine's very committed to. I think I might actually stay."
"Good," he said, and something in the way he said it… simple, direct, none of the usual performance… caught me off guard enough that I didn't have a response ready by the time the elevator doors opened.
He was easy to talk to, I was slowly, reluctantly discovering, when neither of us was actively bickering about a case or dancing around whatever this tension between us actually was. Easy in a way that had nothing to do with the reputation trailing him through every hallway, and everything to do with the fact that underneath all of it, he was simply good company… quick, a little self deprecating, genuinely curious about the answers when he asked me a question instead of just waiting for his turn to talk.
I noticed that, and filed it away carefully, next to all the other things about Jake Sim I was doing my best not to notice.
CHAPTER 7: THE LONG CASE
The Kombu case was, by every objective measure, the hardest thing either of us had worked on since I'd started at XO Medical… a sixteen year old competitive swimmer with a spinal injury from a diving accident, a family in the waiting room too frightened to eat or sleep, and a surgical plan that required Jake and me to essentially co-lead for the better part of two weeks, coordinating imaging, staging two separate procedures, and checking in on the same patient morning and night like she was the only thing either of us had to think about.
It should have been exhausting, and in a way it was, but there was something about being trusted with something that mattered that much, together, that changed the shape of whatever was happening between us in a way neither of us fully acknowledged out loud yet.
"She's scared," I told him, the night before the first procedure, both of us reviewing imaging in his office long after everyone else had gone home, the desk lamp the only light in the room, the city outside the window gone dark except for a scatter of lit windows in the buildings across the street. "She keeps asking if she'll swim again. I don't know how to answer that honestly without taking away the only thing keeping her going right now."
"You don't have to have the perfect answer," Jake said, not looking up from the scan he was studying, one hand absently rubbing the back of his neck, the other tracing a line along the images with a finger, veins standing out along the back of his hand in the low light in a way I noticed and, for once, didn't bother pretending I hadn't. "You just have to be honest that you're going to fight for the best possible outcome, and let her hold onto hope in whatever shape she needs it to be. Kids are more resilient than we usually give them credit for. So are their parents, most of the time."
"You're good at this. The people part. Not just the surgery part."
"Don't tell anyone," he said, with a tired half smile. "Ruins the reputation."
We worked side by side for the better part of two weeks after that, and something about the ongoing proximity… long nights, shared exhaustion, the particular intimacy of trusting someone completely with a case that mattered this much… did more to weaken the careful professional distance between us than any single dramatic moment could have. By the time Sana Kombu came out of her second surgery with full sensation intact and a genuinely excellent prognosis, both of us standing in the scrub room afterward too tired out to do anything but lean against opposite counters and grin at each other like idiots, something fundamental had shifted between us that neither of us had a name for yet.
"We did that," Jake said, quietly, disbelief and pride tangled together in his voice.
"We did," I agreed, and for a moment, just a moment, neither of us bothered pretending the space between us was purely professional.
Her mother cried in the hallway afterward, thanked us both with a hug that neither of us was quite prepared for, and it was Jake who teared up first, quickly wiping it away and blaming allergies in a way that fooled absolutely no one, and I filed that away too, next to everything else about him I was failing spectacularly to keep at arm's length.
CHAPTER 8: ALMOST
The call came in at 2 a.m. on a Thursday, multi vehicle collision on the 10, one patient with a compound femur fracture and a subdural hematoma that meant neuro and ortho were both getting paged at the same ungodly hour, both of us summoned into the same trauma bay like the hospital had personally decided to keep testing whatever this was.
There was no time to think about anything except the patient. That was the thing about trauma… it burned away everything irrelevant, left only the essential, sharp focus of keeping someone alive. Jake worked fast and clean, calling out numbers to his resident, and I worked fast and clean beside him, and for two hours we didn't so much as make eye contact, too busy being surgeons to be anything else.
It was after… once the patient was stable, wheeled up to the ICU with a neurosurgical hold and an ortho consult scheduled for the morning… that the adrenaline caught up with both of us at once, in the empty hallway outside the trauma bay, three in the morning, the whole floor gone quiet and strange around us, the city lights visible through the window at the end of the corridor, spread out and glittering like something out of a postcard nobody in that hallway had the capacity to appreciate.
"That was close," Jake said, dragging his mask down, hand going automatically back through his hair, which was damp with sweat and standing up in places. "Another twenty minutes and we lose that bleed control."
"You did good work in there."
"So did you." He was leaning against the wall across from me, chest still rising fast, eyes bright with the particular high that came after a save like that. "You always this calm during a code?"
"I don't really have another setting."
"I noticed." He was looking at me the way he had that first day… registering, except this time it didn't feel clinical at all. "You're kind of terrifying, you know that? In a good way."
"I'll take it."
He pushed off the wall, and crossed the distance between us before I fully registered it, close enough now that I had to look up, close enough that I could see the fine lines of exhaustion under his eyes and the way his jaw was still tight with leftover adrenaline. My back found the wall behind me without me quite deciding to move there.
"Jake—"
"I know," he said, low, and he braced one hand on the wall beside my head… that hand, I couldn't help but notice, veins standing out along the back of it under the bright light, fingers spread against the paint an inch from my hair… and didn't move any closer, like he was waiting for permission he wasn't sure he wanted to ask for out loud. "I know what this looks like." He said, low, the Australian in his voice thickening slightly with the leftover adrenaline.
"What does it look like?"
"Like a bad idea," he said, and there was something almost regretful in it, self aware in a way I hadn't expected from him. His other hand came up, not quite touching my jaw, hovering there like he hadn't decided yet. "You've heard the reputation. You'd be smart to stay far away from me."
"Probably," I agreed. My heart was doing something ridiculous, fast and stupid, entirely disproportionate to the fact that he still hadn't touched me.
"Probably," he repeated, and huffed something that was almost a laugh, almost pained. His thumb finally grazed my jaw, feather light, and I felt it everywhere. "You should tell me to back off."
"Back off, Jake."
"Right." He didn't move. Neither did I. For one long, suspended second the whole hallway seemed to narrow down to the space between us, his breath and mine, the low hum of the overhead lights, the specific, electric awareness of exactly how close his mouth was to mine.
Then a door banged open somewhere down the corridor, a nurse's voice calling for someone, ordinary hospital noise crashing back in, and he stepped back like he'd been burned, hand dropping from the wall, that easy, careless smile sliding back into place like a mask clicking shut.
"Get some sleep, New Blood," he said, already walking backward toward the elevators, and if his voice was rougher than usual, neither of us mentioned it. "Big day tomorrow."
I stood there in the empty hallway for a long moment after he'd gone, hand pressed briefly to my own jaw where his thumb had been, trying to remember how to breathe like a normal person, the city lights still glittering, indifferent, through the window at the end of the hall.
It didn't work particularly well.
CHAPTER 9: CROSSING THE LINE
It caught up with us three nights later, over something that shouldn't have mattered nearly as much as it did.
The Romano post-op notes had come back with a delayed recovery timeline, and Jake insisted the surgical plan had been sound, that the setback was unrelated, and I insisted he'd rushed a consult he should have slowed down for, and the argument followed us out of the conference room and down two flights of stairs and into his office, door swinging shut behind us harder than either of us intended, voices too sharp for the hour, for the empty hallway outside, for anything except each other. Both of us were running on too little sleep and too much espresso from the cart downstairs, thinned out from a week of overlapping night shifts, the kind of exhaustion that strips away whatever polite distance usually keeps two people from saying exactly what they mean.
"You don't get to talk to me like that," I said, and the words came out sharper than I meant, more heat behind them than the actual disagreement warranted.
"Like what? Like I'm allowed to have an opinion about my own consult?"
"Like I don't know what I'm doing."
"That's not what I said."
"It's what you meant."
He crossed the small office in two steps, close enough that I had to tip my chin up, close enough that the argument seemed to run out of air between one breath and the next, replaced by something with far more heat behind it than either of us had planned on that particular Tuesday.
His eyes were dark, searching, jaw tight under the bright light that somehow made everything feel sharper, more exposed. The desk lamp was still on from earlier chart review, casting a warm pool across the scattered papers and the half empty coffee cups neither of us had bothered to throw away.
For a second neither of us moved. Then his hand came up… those long, veined fingers I had been trying not to notice for days, for weeks, since that first morning in the lounge… and curled around the side of my neck. Thumb pressing just under my jaw like he was checking a pulse that was already racing. The contact was deliberate. Claimed. His palm was warm, slightly hard at the base of the fingers from the way he held tools for hours, and the veins stood out along the back of his hand in the low light like something drawn there on purpose.
“Tell me to stop,” he said, voice low and rough, the Australian accent slipping through more than usual. Not quite a question. Almost a dare.
I didn’t.
I grabbed the front of his scrub top instead and pulled him down.
The kiss was messy from the start… teeth, heat, no finesse, the kind of collision that felt less like wanting and more like finally giving in to something that had been clawing at both of us since the scrub room a week ago. He made a low sound against my mouth, something halfway between a groan and a curse, and backed me into the edge of his desk hard enough that papers slid and a pen clattered to the floor. His hands were everywhere at once, one still at my throat, the other sliding under the hem of my scrub top, palm hot against bare skin. I felt the drag of those veins, the strength in his fingers as they spread out over my ribs, and something low in my stomach clenched so hard I had to bite back a sound.
“Jesus,” he muttered against my mouth, already shoving the fabric higher. “You’ve been driving me crazy. Every single day. Looking at me like that across the table in conference. Across the OR. Like you’re daring me to do something about it.”
“Good,” I managed, breathless, and yanked at the drawstring of his scrub pants with zero patience. The knot gave. My hand slipped inside before either of us could think better of it.
He was already hard, hot against my palm, and the way his hips jerked forward told me he was just as wound tight as I was. His forehead dropped to mine for half a second, breath ragged, the tip of his nose brushing mine. Then he kissed me again like he was trying to prove a point, or maybe trying to erase the last week of careful, professional distance that had only made everything worse.
Scrub tops came off in a tangle of fabric and impatience. Mine first… yanked over my head and discarded somewhere near the chair. His followed a second later, and I got my first real look at him without the loose blue fabric in the way, lean muscle, a faint scar near his collarbone, the same veins running up the insides of his forearms and disappearing under the skin of his shoulders. His mouth dragged down my throat, teeth scraping, while those hands… God, those hands… pushed my sports bra up and out of the way so he could cup my breasts, thumbs sweeping over my nipples until I arched into him with a sharp inhale. He looked almost dazed when he pulled back just enough to look at me, pupils blown, dark hair falling into his eyes, lips already reddened from the kiss.
“Still want me to stop?” he asked, voice wrecked.
“If you stop I will actually kill you.”
That was all the permission he needed.
He spun me around, bent me over the desk with one firm hand between my shoulder blades, the other already shoving my scrub pants and underwear down just far enough. The edge of the wood bit into my hips. Cool air hit the backs of my thighs. I heard the soft sound of him spitting into his palm, felt the slick press of his fingers between my legs… two of them, no hesitation, pushing into me deep and curling while the pad of his thumb found my clit like he’d mapped it in advance. I bit down on my own forearm to keep from making noise that would carry into the hallway.
“Fuck,” he breathed, almost reverent, working his fingers in and out with a precision that felt entirely unfair given how frantic the rest of this was. “You’re soaked. How long have you been like this?”
“Since the scrub room,” I admitted, voice muffled against my arm. “Since your hand brushed mine and you looked at me like… like you already knew.”
He pulled his fingers free and replaced them with the blunt head of his cock before I could finish the sentence. One hard thrust and he was buried to the hilt, both of us freezing for a second at the sudden, overwhelming stretch of it. His forehead dropped between my shoulder blades. One of those veined hands braced against the desk beside my hip, the other gripping my waist hard enough that I knew I’d find faint marks later. The contrast of the cool wood under my palms and the heat of him inside me made my head spin.
“Okay?” he asked, voice strained, like it was costing him something not to move.
“Move,” I ordered.
He did.
It was frantic… almost angry at first, the way we’d been arguing only minutes earlier bleeding straight into the way he fucked me. Hard, deep strokes that shoved me forward against the desk with every snap of his hips. The only sounds were the wet slide of skin, the soft thud of the desk against the wall, and the broken, bitten off noises neither of us could fully keep quiet. His free hand slid around to the front of me, two long fingers finding my clit and rubbing in tight, precise circles that made my thighs shake. I could feel every ridge of those veins against my skin when he gripped harder, could feel the flex of tendon in his wrist as he held me steady.
“Look at you,” he muttered against the back of my neck, voice low and almost amazed even through the roughness. “Taking me like this. In my office. Like you were made for it. Like you’ve been thinking about this every time I walked past you in the hallway.”
I reached back blindly, found his wrist… felt the tendons and veins under my fingertips… and held on. He groaned like the contact alone was too much and drove into me harder, the rhythm turning punishing, perfect. The tension that had been coiling between us for days finally snapped. I came with a choked sound against my forearm, walls clenching around him, vision going white at the edges. He didn’t stop. He fucked me through it, relentless, until the oversensitivity edged into something almost too much, and then he pulled out, spun me around, and lifted me onto the edge of the desk like I weighed nothing.
My scrub pants were still tangled around one ankle. His were shoved down just far enough. He stepped between my thighs, guided himself back in with one hand… those fingers wrapping around the base of his cock, veins standing out, the sight of it enough to make another pulse of heat roll through me… and thrust home again. This angle was deeper. Different. I locked my legs around his waist and pulled him closer, one hand fisted in his hair, the other braced behind me on the desk for leverage. He kissed me again, messy and open mouthed, while his hips snapped forward in a rhythm that felt less like anger now and more like need, pure and unfiltered.
“Been thinking about this,” he admitted against my mouth, the words coming out between thrusts. “Your hands. The way you look at mine. The way you went red that first day. Drove me fucking crazy.”
“Shut up,” I breathed, but there was no heat left in it, only the sound of someone who had stopped pretending.
He laughed once… short, breathless… and then his hand slid between us again, those long fingers finding my clit with the same precision he used under a microscope. The double stimulation was too much. I came a second time with my face pressed into the side of his neck, tasting skin and the faint remaining antiseptic that never fully left either of us after a long shift. He followed a handful of thrusts later, burying himself deep and spilling into me with a broken curse against my shoulder, hips stuttering through it, one hand still braced on the desk like he didn’t quite trust his legs to hold him up.
For a long moment the only sound in the office was both of us trying to remember how to breathe.
He pulled out carefully. Neither of us moved right away. My legs were still loosely around him. His forehead was still resting against my temple. The desk was a disaster of scattered charts and coffee rings and the faint scent of sex mixing with the usual hospital smell of antiseptic and old coffee. Somewhere down the hall a cart rattled past, ordinary and distant, a reminder that the rest of the world was still turning while the two of us sat half naked and wrecked in a locked office that suddenly felt too small for what had just happened.
Eventually he stepped back, pulled his scrub pants up with a wince, and helped me down from the desk. We dressed in silence that wasn’t quite awkward and wasn’t quite comfortable either… just full. My sports bra was twisted. His scrub top was inside out until he noticed and fixed it with a quiet, self conscious huff of laughter. I found my scrub top under the chair and pulled it on, the fabric still warm from where it had been discarded. Neither of us looked fully presentable. His hair was a complete disaster. My lips felt swollen. There was a faint red mark on the side of my neck where his mouth had been.
We ended up on the floor somehow… backs against the front of the desk, shoulders almost touching, both of us staring up at the ceiling like it owed us an explanation. The city glittered through the window beyond the blinds, indifferent. My heart was still going too fast. So was his, if the rise and fall of his chest was any indication.
“Well,” Jake said finally, breaking the silence, voice rough in a way I’d never heard it before. “That happened.”
“That happened,” I agreed. My own voice sounded unfamiliar. Used.
“For the record,” he said, turning his head to look at me, hair a disaster, that half smile back but softer somehow, less shield to it than usual, “I regret nothing.”
“Me neither.” I meant it, and that was the terrifying part. The part I wasn’t ready to look at directly. The way my body still hummed with the aftershocks. The way I could still feel the shape of his hands on my hips, the press of those veins against my skin. The way the argument felt like it had happened a lifetime ago instead of twenty minutes.
“So.” He propped himself up a little higher against the desk, and even now I caught myself glancing at his hand where it was braced against the floor, veins standing out along the back of it, and hated myself a little for it. “What do we call this?”
“A mistake?”
“A really good mistake.”
I huffed something that was almost a laugh. The sound felt strange in the quiet office. “We work together. Every day. In surgeries, Jake. Complicated ones. Cases that matter.”
“I’m aware.”
“So this can’t…” I gestured between us, the motion vague and a little helpless, “… become a thing. A real thing. We can’t afford that. Not here. Not with everything else.”
“Obviously not,” he agreed, too quickly, and there was something in his eyes I didn’t examine too closely. Something that flickered and then smoothed over. “I don’t do real things. You know that. Everybody knows that.”
“Right.”
“So.” He said it carefully, like he was building the sentence one brick at a time, testing the weight of each word before he set it down. “This is just… this. No expectations. No feelings. Just two adults blowing off a truly absurd amount of professional tension whenever we both feel like it. Whenever the week gets too long and the coffee is too bad and we need somewhere to put all of it that isn’t another argument in a conference room.”
“Friends with benefits,” I said. The phrase felt both ridiculous and necessary. A clean box to put this in. Something with edges.
“Friends with benefits,” he agreed, and held out his hand like we were sealing a business deal, which… absurdly, giddily… made me laugh for real. The sound cracked something open in the quiet, made the whole thing feel almost manageable for half a second.
I shook it. His hand was warm, and larger than mine, and I held on maybe a beat too long before I let go. The veins under my fingers. The remaining heat. The way his thumb brushed once across my knuckles like an accident that wasn’t.
“No feelings,” I said again, mostly for my own benefit. A reminder. A boundary drawn in the air between us while both of us were still half dressed and glowing and entirely too aware of each other’s bodies.
“No feelings,” he echoed, and if his voice caught slightly on the second word, neither of us was willing to admit we noticed. Neither of us looked at the other when we said it. We both kept our eyes on the ceiling, or the window, or the mess of papers still scattered across the floor. Anywhere else.
Outside his office window, the city went on glittering, indifferent, all the way to the dark line of the ocean neither of us could see from here but both of us knew was out there somewhere, wide and patient and entirely unconcerned with whatever two exhausted surgeons had just agreed to at one in the morning. The agreement hung in the air between us… half joking, half a little too serious… while the desk lamp hummed and the distant sound of the night shift carried faintly through the closed door.
Neither of us moved to leave right away.
CHAPTER 10: FALLOUT AND RULES
I woke up the next morning with the distinct, sinking sensation of having done something I couldn't take back.
Not that I wanted to take it back, exactly. That was the problem.
I saw him at morning rounds, and for one horrible second neither of us knew how to look at the other… and then he just grinned, easy as anything, like nothing at all had happened, and said, "Morning, Dr. New Blood. Sleep well?"
"Fine," I said, too fast, and Jasmine shot me a look that suggested my poker face needed serious work.
"You're doing that blushing thing again," she murmured, once Jake had moved further down the hall.
"I am not."
"Your ears are red."
"It's cold in here."
"It's July. In LA. It is never cold in here."
I ignored her, mostly because I didn't have a good answer, and buried myself in charts for the rest of the morning, determined to be a completely normal, professional colleague to Jake Sim for the rest of my life.
It lasted until lunch, when I found him in the stairwell between floors three and four… a spot, I'd learn, that nobody used, tucked away from the main traffic, with a narrow window at the top that let in a slice of hard California light… clearly waiting for me.
"So," he said. "We should probably talk logistics."
"Logistics."
"Rules. Ground rules. If we're doing this." He leaned against the railing, arms crossed, and there was something almost businesslike about the way he said it, like he'd had this conversation before and knew exactly how to structure it. "Rule one, nobody at work finds out. This stays between us."
"Obviously."
"Rule two, it doesn't interfere with the job. If we're in an OR together, we're colleagues. Full stop."
"Agreed."
"Rule three…" he paused, and for just a second the easy confidence flickered, something more careful underneath it, "… no feelings. If either of us starts catching feelings, we call it off. No hard feelings, no drama. Just… done."
"That seems fair," I said, even though something in my chest twisted slightly at the phrase no hard feelings, like it was already anticipating a version of this that ended badly.
"Good." He held out his hand again, that same absurd business deal gesture from the night before, and I took it, and this time neither of us pretended the handshake wasn't lasting a beat too long. "Partners in crime."
"Don't say it like that, it sounds unpleasant."
"Everything sounds unpleasant in a hospital stairwell at one in the afternoon," he said, and let go of my hand slowly, fingers trailing against my palm in a way that felt entirely too deliberate for someone who'd just laid out three careful rules about keeping this simple.
I went back to rounds that afternoon with my hand still faintly warm from his, and caught myself, twice, staring at the backs of his hands across the nurses' station while he charted… the veins, the long fingers, the absent way he tapped his pen against the counter while he read… before I forced myself to look away both times.
Rule three, I reminded myself. No feelings.
It felt, even then, like a promise I wasn't entirely sure I could keep, and that night, driving home with the windows down and the last of the sunset burning orange over the hills, I found myself thinking that three thousand miles hadn't done nearly as much to change me as I'd hoped it would. I was still, apparently, exactly the kind of person who made things complicated the second she told herself she wouldn't.
CHAPTER 11: LEARNING HIS RHYTHM
The rules held, more or less, for the first week and a half… a fact I found almost funny, in hindsight, given how quickly they'd unravel after that. We were careful. We were professional. We were, in the particular way of two people trying very hard to prove something to themselves, almost aggressively normal with each other in front of anyone who might be watching.
Off the clock, though… in the narrow, unmonitored hours after a shift, in the handful of times our schedules happened to line up for a coffee that was seemingly just two colleagues being friendly… I started learning things about him I hadn't expected to want to know.
He drove a car far too nice for someone who claimed not to care about appearances, a fact he was defensive about in a way that made it clear he cared quite a bit. He ran most mornings before his shift, along the same stretch of beach path, rain or shine, an old habit from college he said he'd never managed to break even when residency made it borderline impossible. He was, despite the reputation, a genuinely terrible cook… I discovered this on an evening he'd insisted on making dinner at his place, purely as friends, he'd said, both of us apparently choosing to believe that fiction for the length of one meal, and watched him nearly set off the smoke alarm attempting something that was supposed to be risotto.
He also, I learned that same week, texted like a man with no punctuation budget whatsoever.
"rough one today," he sent, around midnight, no capital letters, no context.
"you good?" I typed back.
"better now that you're texting me back instead of ignoring me at the nurses station like earlier"
"I was charting. Not ignoring you."
"sure. anyway. thinking about that risotto disaster. still owe you a dinner that doesnt set off an alarm"
"Low bar. I'm free Thursday."
"its a date," he sent, and then, a beat later, "not a date date. friends date. whatever we're calling this"
"Sure, Jake."
"dont sure Jake me. go to sleep dr new blood"
I put the phone down smiling in a way I had no good excuse for, and told myself, not for the first time, that texting like a functioning adult with proper capitalization was clearly too much to ask of a neurosurgeon.
"In my defense," he said, waving a dish towel at the ceiling to clear the smoke, "the recipe lied to me."
"The recipe did not lie to you. You forgot to stir it for twenty minutes."
"Details."
We ended up ordering Thai food instead, sitting on his kitchen floor because it was somehow funnier than moving to the actual table, and it was easy… dangerously, comfortably easy… in a way that made the careful rules we'd built feel increasingly beside the point.
"Can I ask you something?" he said, halfway through a container of pad see ew, in a tone that made me put my chopsticks down.
"Sure."
"Why'd you really leave Chicago? Everyone assumes it's just the job offer, better pay, whatever, and maybe that's true. But you get this look sometimes. Like you're running from something."
I considered lying, or deflecting, the way I usually did when the question came up. Something about the low light in his kitchen, the ease of the evening, made me tell the truth instead. "There was someone. In Chicago. We were together most of residency. It ended badly… not dramatically, just… badly, in that quiet way where you both know it's over long before anyone says it out loud. I think I took this job partly because it let me leave before I had to watch it die any slower than it already was."
"Leaving first," he said, quietly, something unreadable crossing his face. "I get that."
"Yeah," I said. "I figured you might."
Neither of us said anything else about it, but something had shifted, some careful boundary redrawn without either of us announcing it, and by the time I left that night… later than I'd meant to, both of us lingering at his door in a way that had nothing to do with the food… the rules felt considerably less sturdy than they had eleven days earlier.
CHAPTER 12: THE CLOSET
The supply closet on the fourth floor smelled like antiseptic and cardboard, and it was, statistically, the worst possible place two attendings could be caught doing anything other than counting inventory. Which was exactly why it worked.
It had been eleven days since the rules. Eleven days of charged glances across nurses' stations, of his hand "accidentally" grazing mine at the coffee machine, of a tension that had started to feel less like professional friction and more like something wound so tight it was bound to snap. It snapped on a Tuesday, after a case that ran four hours long and left both of us tired and irritable and entirely too aware of each other across the scrub sink, the afternoon sun slanting hard and gold through the hallway windows the way it only did in this city, turning the whole floor faintly amber.
"You've got that look," he murmured, catching my wrist as I passed him in the hallway outside radiology, tugging me half a step sideways into the shadow of the supply closet door before either of us had said a single word about it.
"What look?"
"The one that means you're thinking about the stairwell." His voice had dropped, low and rough, and when I didn't argue he pushed the door open and pulled me in after him.
The door clicked shut behind us. The space was narrow… metal shelves stacked with gauze, saline bags, sterile trays, the faint chemical bite of cleaning solution under everything. One flickering bright panel overhead. Barely enough room for two people who weren’t trying very hard to keep their distance. Jake’s back hit the shelves with a soft rattle of boxes. His hand…those long, veined fingers I had spent eleven days trying not to watch… was still wrapped around my wrist, thumb pressing into the inside of it like he needed the contact more than the restraint.
For half a second we just looked at each other, breathing hard, the four hour case still humming under both our skins. Then the last of the careful professional distance shredded.
I shoved him harder into the shelves. He laughed once, sharp and low, and dragged me in by the front of my scrub top. The kiss was nothing like the frantic, almost angry collision in his office. This one was hungrier. Familiar. The kind that said we already knew how this ended and were still choosing it anyway. His mouth was hot, open, tasting faintly of the terrible lounge coffee he’d been nursing between cases. One of those veined hands slid up into my hair, gripping just tight enough to tip my head back, the other found my hip and hauled me flush against him so I could feel exactly how little eleven days of rules had done to calm either of us down.
“Clothes stay on,” I muttered against his mouth, already yanking at the drawstring of his scrub pants with zero patience. “We have rounds in twenty minutes.”
“Then you’d better be quiet,” he said, voice wrecked, and bit the side of my throat hard enough that I had to muffle the sound against his shoulder.
His hands were everywhere at once… yanking my scrub bottoms down just far enough, bracing one palm against the metal shelf beside my head so the whole unit rattled, gripping my hip hard enough that I knew I’d feel the shape of those fingers later. The veins stood out along the backs of them under the bad bright light, tendons flexing as he shoved the fabric down my thighs. I got his pants open the same way, impatient, messy, the elastic catching for a second before I shoved it out of the way. Neither of us bothered with underwear any further than necessary. The whole point was speed. The whole point was that we couldn’t wait until the end of the shift, until some private place with a lock that actually meant something.
He spun us so my back hit the shelves this time. Boxes shifted. Something plastic clattered to the floor. His hand… God, that hand… slid between my legs without warning, two long fingers pushing into me like he already knew I’d be ready for him. I was. The week of charged looks and accidental brushes and carefully not looking had left me wound so tight that the first curl of those fingers made my knees threaten to give out. He made a low, satisfied sound against my mouth and worked them deeper, the heel of his palm grinding against my clit in short, precise circles while his other hand stayed braced on the shelf above my head, veins standing out in sharp relief under the skin.
“Eleven days,” he muttered, almost accusatory. “You’ve been walking around looking at me like that for eleven days and then pretending you’re not.”
“You’re one to talk,” I managed, breathless, hips rolling into his hand. “You nearly broke the coffee machine this morning just to stand next to me.”
He laughed again… short, dark… and pulled his fingers free. A second later he was pushing into me in one hard thrust, the stretch sudden and perfect and almost too much in the cramped space. My head tipped back against a box of sterile gloves. His forehead dropped to mine. Both of us froze for a beat, adjusting, the only sound our breathing and the distant overhead page for some consult three floors down.
Then he started moving.
It was rushed and a little rough, almost angry energy under the hunger… short, sharp snaps of his hips that shoved me back into the shelves with every thrust. The metal creaked. My scrub top was shoved up under my arms; his was still mostly on, just rucked up enough that I could feel the heat of his stomach against mine. Clothes barely off. The addiction phase in real time. The first clear proof that the “whenever we both feel like it” clause was going to get both of us into serious trouble if we kept letting it win during working hours.
His hand braced harder against the shelf beside my head. I watched it… couldn’t help it… the flex of tendon, the prominent veins running down the back of it and disappearing under the edge of his rolled sleeve, the way his fingers tightened every time I clenched around him. His other hand gripped my hip, thumb digging in, holding me steady while he fucked me like we had three minutes instead of twenty before someone needed something from this closet. The friction was perfect and imperfect at the same time, too dry at first, then slick, the angle just short of ideal until he hitched my thigh higher against his hip and the next thrust punched a sound out of me that I had to bite down on his shoulder to contain.
“Quiet,” he reminded me, voice strained, but he was grinning against my neck like the risk was half the point. “You want the whole floor knowing what Dr. New Blood sounds like when she’s getting—”
I clapped a hand over his mouth. He licked my palm. I nearly came right there.
The pace stayed frantic. No slow build. No time for it. Just the wet sound of him moving inside me, the rattle of shelves, the occasional soft thud of a box shifting overhead. Sweat prickled at the small of my back. His hair was already a disaster from where my hands kept sliding into it. Every time those veined fingers flexed against the metal or dug harder into my hip I felt another pulse of heat roll through me, ridiculous and specific and entirely his fault. I had spent eleven days telling myself the office had been a one time pressure valve. Standing here with my pants around my thighs and his cock buried in me while a code blue was probably being called somewhere downstairs proved how badly I’d been lying.
He shifted the hand on my hip lower, thumb finding my clit, rubbing in tight, mean little circles timed to the snap of his hips. That was all it took. The orgasm hit hard and fast, almost mean in its intensity, forcing me to bury my face in the side of his neck so the sound wouldn’t carry. He followed half a dozen thrusts later, burying himself deep and coming with a bitten off curse against my temple, hips stuttering, the hand braced on the shelf going white-knuckled for a second before the tension bled out of him.
For a few long seconds neither of us moved. Just breathing. The bright light flickered. Somewhere outside the door a cart rattled past and kept going. My legs felt unreliable. His forehead was still pressed to mine, eyes closed, lashes dark against his cheeks.
Then the absurdity of it caught up with both of us at once.
I started laughing first… quiet, breathless, slightly hysterical. He followed a second later, the sound muffled against my shoulder, shoulders shaking. We stayed like that for another few seconds, half dressed and wrecked and trying not to make enough noise to get ourselves permanently banned from the fourth floor, until the laughter faded into something softer and more dangerous, the quiet awareness that this had not felt like a one off. That eleven days had been too long. That the rules were already developing cracks neither of us was ready to look at directly.
Afterward, we stood there for a second, both of us struggling to look remotely presentable. My scrub top was inside out. His hair was an absolute disaster from where my hands had been in it. I yanked my pants back up, wincing at the residual slickness between my thighs, and tried to smooth my hair into something that didn’t scream “just had sex in a supply closet.” Jake was doing the same thing with less success, dragging one of those veined hands back through his hair in an unsuccessful attempt to fix it, which only made it worse. The veins stood out along the back of his hand under the bad light. I looked away before I could get caught staring again.
“We are going to get fired,” I said, straightening my badge with hands that weren’t quite steady.
“Worth it,” he said, entirely too pleased with himself. The grin was lazy and satisfied and entirely too charming for a man who had just fucked an orthopedic attending against a shelf of sterile saline. “You’ve got…” he gestured vaguely at my neck, “…a mark. You might want to deal with that before rounds.”
I clapped a hand over the side of my throat and felt the tender spot where his mouth had been. “You’re the worst.”
“You didn’t seem to mind five minutes ago.”
I shoved his shoulder. He caught my hand before I could pull it back… brief and easy, thumb brushing over my knuckles once, the contact lingering half a second longer than strictly necessary… before he let go and slipped out the door first, whistling something under his breath like a man who had not just had sex in a supply closet on a Tuesday afternoon. The door swung shut behind him. I gave it ninety seconds, heart still going too fast, trying to get my breathing back under control and my expression into something that wouldn’t make Jasmine take one look at me and know exactly what I’d been doing.
When I finally stepped out into the hallway the light felt too bright. The floor was still the same floor. The afternoon sun was still gold through the windows. A nurse walked past with a chart and didn’t give me a second glance. I adjusted my badge again, ignored the faint ache between my legs, and told myself this was exactly what we’d agreed on.
No feelings. Just this.
I almost believed it.
CHAPTER 13: CREEPING SOFTNESS
It was a Thursday, quiet by hospital standards, when I first noticed the crack.
We'd been assigned a joint case… an elderly patient with a spinal tumor pressing on nerve roots that also needed a hip revision, complicated enough to require both of us and simple enough that neither of us was under the kind of stress that usually meant we ended up somewhere private within the hour. Just a normal case. Just work.
Mrs. Sloane was seventy eight, sharp as anything despite the pain that had brought her in, and scared in the particular, dignified way older patients sometimes were… trying very hard not to show it, hands twisting in her lap while she waited for us to explain what came next. She'd lived in the same house in Boyle Heights for fifty years, she told us, raised four kids there, and she wasn't about to let a tumor take away her ability to walk to church on Sundays.
Jake crouched down next to her wheelchair instead of standing over her, which I noticed, and took her hand… that hand, I couldn't help but notice, the veins on the back of it standing out as he wrapped his fingers gently around her much smaller, more fragile ones… and talked her through the surgery in plain, unhurried language, no slang, no rush, answering every single one of her questions like he had nowhere else in the world to be.
"You're going to be just fine," he told her, at the end. "I promise you that."
"You surgeons always say that."
"I mean it, though." And the thing was, he did. I could hear it.
Later, in the elevator, I caught myself watching him again… not the reputation, not the easy charm he wore in the halls like a shield, but this, the quiet, unshowy kindness he didn't seem to think anyone was watching for.
"What?" he asked, catching me looking.
"Nothing. You were good with her."
He shrugged, suddenly a little self conscious in a way I hadn't seen from him before. "She reminds me of my grandmother. Different neighborhood, same stubbornness. She used to threaten to walk out of physical therapy if the nurses didn't let her keep her rosary in her lap during sessions."
"You have a grandmother?"
"Everyone has a grandmother, that's generally how it works."
"I mean… I didn't picture you as someone with, like, a family. Sentimental attachments. A childhood."
"I'm full of surprises," he said, but there was something almost soft in it, and when the elevator doors opened he let his hand brush against mine on the way out, just barely, just enough that I noticed.
I noticed too much, lately. That was becoming the whole problem.
That night I found myself lying awake, annoyed at myself in a way I couldn't quite name, replaying the particular gentleness of his hand around Mrs. Sloane's, the unguarded way he'd said I mean it, though. I told myself it didn't mean anything. People could be good at their jobs and still be exactly as uncomplicated as they claimed to be.
I almost believed that too.
CHAPTER 14: OFF THE CLOCK
Days off had always felt, back in Chicago, like something to survive rather than enjoy… a brief gap between shifts I usually spent asleep or dreading the next stretch of call. In LA, somewhere around month three, I started noticing they'd quietly become something else entirely.
Jake had a rare Saturday off that lined up with one of mine, an alignment of schedules rare enough that Jasmine had actually gasped audibly when she saw it on the shared calendar, and he showed up at my apartment at nine in the morning with sunglasses, two coffees, and an expression that suggested he had Plans, capital P.
"Where are we going?"
"Hiking."
"You want to take a neurosurgeon and an orthopedic surgeon hiking. On our one shared day off. Have you met either of us?"
"I've met exactly one of us intimately," he said, entirely too pleased with the joke, "and I think she could use a day that doesn't involve a hospital. Trust me."
The trail he picked wound up into the hills above the city, dry bushes and the occasional lizard skittering off the path, the whole valley spreading out below us as we climbed… hazy and vast and, from that height, almost impossibly beautiful, the ocean a thin silver line at the far edge of everything.
"Okay," I admitted, somewhere near the top, breathing hard, sweat soaked and entirely unglamorous in a way that felt oddly freeing after months of curated hospital composure. "This was a good idea."
"I have those occasionally."
"Rarely."
"Wound me," he said, dropping down onto a flat rock at the overlook, patting the space beside him. I sat, close enough that our shoulders touched, and we stayed there for a long while, not talking much, just looking out over the city that had become, without my quite noticing the transition, something closer to home than anywhere I'd lived in years.
"Can I tell you something," he said, eventually, not quite looking at me, "that I haven't told anyone else here?"
"Always."
"I almost didn't take the job at XO Medical. Had an offer in Seattle too, better research opportunities, honestly a smarter career move on paper. I picked LA because the program was stronger, and my dad’s health scare a few years earlier had already made me realise I couldn’t keep putting everything off until later." He glanced sideways at me, something careful and unguarded in his expression. "Lately I've stopped wondering that quite so much."
I didn't say anything clever back. I just leaned my head against his shoulder, watched a hawk circle lazily over the ridge below us, and let the moment sit there, unhurried, uncomplicated by anything except two people who had somehow found their way to the same overlook, on the same rare day off, in a city neither of us had originally expected to call home.
We hiked back down as the light started going gold in the late afternoon, tired and sunburnt and easy with each other in a way that had nothing to do with the rules we'd built and everything to do with whatever we were quietly, carefully becoming instead, one ordinary Saturday at a time.
CHAPTER 15: QUIET UNDERSTANDING
There was a rhythm to the weeks that followed Mrs. Sloane's surgery, one I hadn't noticed forming until I was already deep inside it… a private language of glances across the nurses' station, of coffee orders remembered without being asked, of a text late at night that was nothing more than "you up?" and somehow meant everything.
We'd started spending time together that had nothing to do with the arrangement, technically, though the line between "just hanging out" and "definitely still sleeping together" had gotten blurry enough that neither of us bothered pretending there was a meaningful distinction anymore. He took me to a hole in the wall noodle place in Koreatown he swore was better than anywhere with a Michelin star, and it was, and we spent two hours arguing about whether that was a controversial opinion or just obviously true. I dragged him to a Sunday farmers market, and he bought an embarrassing quantity of fruit and then complained, with a straight face, that I'd corrupted him.
"You're supposed to be the fun one," I told him. "The player. The reputation. And instead you're standing here debating peach varietals with a farmer named Gerald."
"Gerald's opinions are extremely well informed," Jake said, entirely serious, and paid Gerald for four more peaches he clearly did not need.
It was on one of those ordinary, unremarkable Sundays, walking back to his car with our arms full of produce, that he told me about his father… carefully, like it cost him something, the way people talk about things they've decided are safe to say but haven't quite finished deciding.
"He had a stroke when I was fourteen," he said, not quite looking at me. "Back home in Australia. Bad one… he's fine now, mostly… some lingering weakness on his left side, nothing that stops him doing much of anything, but I remember the waiting room. I remember watching my mom fall apart in slow motion for about a year afterward, and thinking, even at fourteen, that I never wanted to feel that helpless. That's part of why I went into medicine. And probably part of why I do… the other thing. The leaving first thing. You get good at spotting the moment before it gets bad enough to actually hurt."
I didn't say anything clever. I just reached over and took his hand, the one with the veins, laced my fingers through his, and let the silence sit there instead of trying to fill it with something that would only cheapen what he'd just handed me.
"Thank you for telling me that," I said, eventually.
"Yeah, well." He cleared his throat, some of the old, easy performance sliding back over his face, though not quite all the way. "Don't get used to it. I don't usually do the sharing thing."
"I noticed."
"You're a bad influence."
"You bought four extra peaches from a man named Gerald. I think the damage is already done."
He laughed at that, real and unguarded, and squeezed my hand once before letting go to unlock the car, and I stood there for a second in the parking lot, sun warm on my shoulders, feeling something settle into place in my chest that I wasn't ready to examine too closely yet… something that had very little to do with the careful, tidy arrangement we'd agreed to in a hospital stairwell months ago, and everything to do with the particular, terrifying comfort of being let in.
CHAPTER 16: SLOW HANDS
The on call lounge, this time… a stretch of empty overnight hours between a discharge and a consult, the kind of silence that happens maybe once a week if you're lucky, when the whole floor goes quiet and the only sound is the hum of vending machines down the hall and, faintly, through the window, the endless white noise of the 10 freeway running toward the coast.
"You've been staring at me for twenty minutes," Jake said, not looking up from the chart he was pretending to read, sprawled across one of the ratty couches like he owned it.
"I have not."
"You have. I can feel it." He glanced up then, and whatever expression was on my face made his own shift… that lazy, knowing smile sliding into something a little more focused. "Come here, then, if you're just going to stare."
I stayed where I was for another second, mostly out of principle. Then I crossed the small room and stopped in front of the couch. He didn’t sit up. He just looked at me, head tipped back against the cushion, eyes dark in the low light, and waited.
“This is a terrible idea,” I said, already knowing it wouldn’t change anything.
“Most of our best ideas are.” He reached out with one of those hands… slow, deliberate, the veins standing out as his fingers curled around the back of my thigh and tugged me forward until I had to brace a knee on the cushion beside his hip. “Door’s locked. Hall’s empty. We’ve got at least forty minutes before anyone pages. Unless you’re suddenly feeling virtuous.”
“I’m feeling like we’re going to get caught and I will blame you.”
“I’ll take the heat.” His other hand came up, equally slow, and traced the edge of my scrub top where it had ridden up slightly at my waist. The touch was light. Teasing. Nothing like the frantic yanking in the supply closet or the almost angry urgency of the office. This was different. Measured. Like he had decided to take his time simply because he could. “You’re thinking too loud. Sit down before someone walks past and sees you hovering like you’re about to commit a crime.”
I swung my other leg over and settled into his lap, knees bracketing his hips. The couch protested with a tired creak. His hands immediately settled on my thighs, thumbs stroking idle arcs over the fabric of my scrubs, and I felt the heat of his palms even through the material. He was already half hard under me. I rolled my hips once, experimental, and watched his mouth part on a quiet inhale.
“Playful tonight,” he murmured, eyes dropping to where my hands rested against his chest. “That’s new.”
“Maybe I’m learning.”
“Maybe I like it.”
He sat up enough to kiss me, and this kiss was different too… slower, deeper, with a thread of laughter under it when I nipped his lower lip and he made a soft, surprised sound. One of his hands slid up my back under the scrub top, palm flat and warm against my spine. The other stayed on my thigh, fingers flexing, the veins along the back of it catching the dim light every time he shifted. I reached down and caught that wrist, turning it so I could watch the play of tendon and vein under the skin while I kissed him again. He went still for a second. Then he smiled against my mouth.
“You’re doing it again,” he said, voice low.
“Doing what?”
“Looking at my hands like they’re the main event.” He didn’t pull away. Instead he opened his fingers slowly under my grip, almost showing off, letting me see the way the veins stood out when he flexed. “I could be offended. Or I could use it.”
“You’re insufferable.”
“And yet.”
He used it.
His hands moved with deliberate care after that… sliding under my top, mapping the line of my ribs, thumbs brushing the undersides of my breasts through the sports bra until I made a soft, impatient sound. He took his time pushing the fabric up, watching my face the whole while, like he was registering every reaction. When he finally got the bra out of the way and closed his mouth over one nipple, the hand not supporting my back came up and cupped the other breast, fingers slow and intentional, the pad of his thumb circling in lazy patterns that had nothing to do with urgency and everything to do with the fact that he knew exactly what the sight of those hands did to me.
I threaded my fingers into his hair and held on. The lounge was quiet except for our breathing and the distant freeway hum. Every so often a soft laugh slipped out of one of us… when I got the drawstring of his scrub pants undone on the first try and he raised an eyebrow like I’d been practicing, when he tried to shove my pants down and they caught on my shoe and we both had to stop and wrestle with the fabric, breathless and grinning, when I finally got a hand around him and he dropped his forehead to my shoulder with a muttered, “Christ, give a man a warning.”
It stayed playful even as it deepened. Less frantic than the closet. More deliberate than the office. We were learning each other in small increments… the way he liked a firmer grip, the way I shivered when he dragged his teeth lightly over the hinge of my jaw, the way both of us went quiet and focused when he finally guided himself into me and the stretch pulled a soft, shared sound out of both our throats.
He didn’t rush. He held my hips steady with both hands… those veined, elegant hands splayed wide over my skin, thumbs pressing into the crease of my thighs… and let me set the pace at first. Slow rolls of my hips. The quiet creak of the couch. His eyes half lidded, watching me like he had all the time in the world and no intention of wasting any of it looking anywhere else. When I leaned forward to brace my hands on the back of the couch, he took the opportunity to drag one palm slowly up my side, over my breast, along my collarbone, until his fingers rested lightly against the side of my throat. The touch was possessive without being rough. Intimate in a way that made the “no feelings” rule feel thinner than usual.
“You’re staring again,” he said, voice rough but threaded with amusement.
“Your hands are right there. It’s hard not to.”
“Mm.” He flexed his fingers against my throat on purpose, slow, the veins standing out as he did it, and watched my reaction with open satisfaction. “Interesting.”
“Shut up.”
“Make me.”
I kissed him to shut him up. He smiled into it. Then he took over the rhythm, lifting into me in deeper, steadier strokes that made the couch shift under us. One hand stayed at my throat, light and deliberate; the other slid between us so his fingers could find my clit and work it in the same unhurried circles he’d been using all night. The double sensation built slower than before but hit harder when it finally hit my peak… a long, rolling orgasm that left me trembling against him, face pressed into the side of his neck, breathing hard. He followed a minute later, hips stuttering, a low sound punched out of him that he muffled against my shoulder. His hands never stopped touching me through it… stroking down my back, gripping my hip, fingers threading briefly through mine like he needed the contact even after.
We stayed like that for a while afterward, still joined, still breathing each other in. The lounge felt even quieter than before. My scrub top was shoved up under my arms. His was halfway off one shoulder. Neither of us moved to fix it right away.
Eventually I shifted. He helped me ease off him with careful hands, both of us wincing at the sensitivity, and we ended up side by side on the narrow couch, legs tangled, clothes still mostly askew. He reached over and dragged his fingers idly along my arm… slow, tracing the line of muscle and tendon the same way I always stared at his. The satisfaction on his face was impossible to miss.
“You’re doing it on purpose,” I accused him, still catching my breath, watching those fingers move.
“Doing what?”
“The hands thing. You know exactly what you’re doing.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he said, entirely too pleased with himself, lacing his fingers loosely through mine and holding my hand up to inspect it like it was the most fascinating thing in the room. The veins along the back of his hand stood out under the low light. He turned our joined hands slightly so I could see them better. “I just have naturally elegant hands. Can’t help it.”
“You’re insufferable.”
“You like it.”
“I tolerate it.”
“Sure,” he said, grinning, and pressed a kiss to my knuckles that was far too soft for something that was supposed to be strictly physical, strictly no feelings, strictly just this… and I let him, because some small, stubborn part of me had stopped pretending, at least to myself, that I minded.
Outside the window the freeway kept up its distant white noise. The vending machine hummed. Somewhere down the hall a door closed and footsteps faded. Neither of us moved to unlock the lounge door just yet. His thumb kept moving slowly over the back of my hand, absent and familiar, and for a few more minutes we sat there in the quiet, half dressed and still catching our breath, letting the comfort of it settle around us like something we hadn’t planned on and weren’t ready to name.
CHAPTER 17: CRACKS
The hospital gala was, by united agreement, the worst night of the year… black tie, forced small talk, a silent auction nobody actually wanted to bid on, held this year in a hotel ballroom downtown with a wall of windows overlooking the lit up grid of the city… but attendance was mandatory for attendings, so there I was, in a dress I'd bought specifically for this and would probably never wear again, nursing a glass of mediocre wine and watching Jake Sim get cornered by a cardiology fellow named Giselle who had, according to hospital legend, been trying to get his attention since her first week.
It shouldn't have bothered me. We weren't anything. We'd agreed on that very specifically, with a handshake, like idiots.
It bothered me anyway.
She had her hand on his arm, laughing at something he'd said, and he was doing that thing he did… the easy smile, the head tilt, the full, undivided attention that made whoever he was talking to feel like the only person in the room… and I found myself gripping my wine glass hard enough that I had to consciously loosen my fingers before I broke the stem.
"You okay?" Jasmine asked, following my line of sight, and then, slowly, a grin spreading across her face. "Oh my god."
"What?"
"You're jealous."
"I am not jealous. I don't care what Jake Sim does at a party."
"Your face says otherwise."
"My face is doing nothing."
"Your face," Jasmine said, delighted, "is doing quite a lot."
I made myself look away, made myself focus on the auction table, on anything else, and it was almost ten minutes later, standing near the terrace doors trying to cool off in every sense of the word… the night air outside warm and dry, smelling faintly of flowers from somewhere down the block… that Jake found me.
"You disappeared," he said.
"I'm right here."
"You know what I mean." He was watching me with an expression I couldn't quite place, something searching underneath the usual easy charm. "You looked like you wanted to throw your drink at Giselle."
"I did not."
"You absolutely did. For the record, nothing happened. She's nice. Not my type."
"You don't have to explain yourself to me. We're not… this isn't that kind of thing." The words came out sharper than I meant them to, and I watched something flicker across his face, quick and complicated, before he smoothed it back into neutral.
"Right," he said. "No feelings. I remember the rules."
"Good."
"Good," he agreed, and there was a beat of silence between us that felt heavier than it should have, both of us looking anywhere but at each other, the city spread out gold and endless below the terrace, and I hated… genuinely hated… how much it had cost me to say something so obviously untrue.
CHAPTER 18: AFTER THE GALA
I didn't sleep well the night of the gala, replaying the terrace conversation on a loop until it wore a groove into my thoughts… this isn't that kind of thing, my own voice, sharp and defensive and, worst of all, obviously untrue even to me as I'd said it.
Jake texted the next morning, earlier than usual, "you okay? you left kind of fast last night."
I stared at the message for a long time before answering. "Fine. Just tired."
"liar," he sent back, and then, a minute later, "want to talk about it? no pressure. just offering."
I didn't answer right away. I sat on my balcony instead, coffee going cold, watching the marine layer burn off over the hills the way it did most mornings that time of year, grey giving way slowly to a hard, bright blue, and thought about what I actually wanted to say versus what was safe to say, and how those two things had stopped lining up somewhere in the last several weeks without my permission.
"Can we get coffee before my shift," I typed, finally. "Actual talking. Not the parking lot kind."
He was waiting for me at the little place near the hospital when I got there, two coffees already ordered, mine exactly the way I liked it, which he'd apparently learned without me ever telling him directly.
"So," he said, once we were sitting. "Talk to me."
"I don't actually know what I want to say. That's the honest answer." I turned my cup slowly on the table, not quite looking at him. "Last night, watching you with Giselle… I know it's not fair, I know we agreed this isn't that kind of thing, but it bothered me. A lot. More than it should have, if we're really just… what we said we were."
He was quiet for a moment, turning his own cup, and I watched his jaw work like he was choosing his next words carefully. "It bothered me too. Watching you decide you weren't allowed to be bothered by it, I mean. I could see you doing the math, trying to talk yourself out of caring."
"Yeah."
"I don't know what to do with that either," he admitted. "The rules made sense, back in that stairwell. Clean. Simple. No one gets hurt. But I don't think either of us actually believes it's staying that simple anymore, and I don't know if saying that out loud makes it better or considerably worse."
"Probably worse," I said, with a small, unsteady laugh. "But maybe also true."
"Maybe also true," he agreed, and reached across the table, not quite taking my hand, just resting his fingers lightly over mine, testing the waters. I let him. Neither of us said anything else about it… not yet, not fully, both of us clearly still circling something neither of us was ready to name outright… but something had shifted in that quiet coffee shop that morning, some careful boundary redrawn a second time, closer now than it had been even after the noodle place, even after the peaches, and I drove to work that day with his fingerprints still warm against the back of my hand, wondering how much longer either of us could keep pretending the rules were holding.
CHAPTER 19: HIS PENTHOUSE
He texted me two days later, "case files at my place, need a second opinion before tomorrow's consult. bring wine, I have terrible taste in it and need judgment."
It was, apparently, work. That was the story we were both telling ourselves when I typed his address into my phone and found myself driving up into the hills above the city, turning higher and higher until the lights of LA spread out below in every direction, a carpet of gold stretching all the way to a dark seam on the horizon that I'd learn, later, was the ocean.
"Nice place," I said, when he let me in… a sleek high rise penthouse, floor to ceiling windows on three sides, the kind of view that made my breath catch a little despite myself.
"Don't sound so surprised."
"I pictured you living somewhere with, like, one couch and a lot of takeout containers."
"I'm full of surprises," he said again, the same line from weeks ago, and poured us both a glass of the wine I'd brought while spreading the case files across his kitchen island like this really was just work.
It was, for about forty five minutes. We went through the imaging, argued about approach angles, actually got something useful done… his balcony door cracked open enough to let in the sound of the city below, distant and constant, sirens and traffic and somewhere, faintly, music from a rooftop party a few buildings over… and then somewhere between his second glass of wine and the particular way the city lights caught the side of his face, the work fell away entirely, and neither of us reached for the files again.
He was leaning against the island, hip cocked, one of those long fingered hands wrapped loosely around the stem of his glass. The veins stood out along the back of it under the warm overhead light. I had been watching them more than the scans for the last ten minutes and we both knew it.
“You’re not looking at the imaging anymore,” he said, quiet.
“Neither are you.”
He set the glass down. The sound was soft against the marble. Then he crossed the small distance between us, slow enough that I could have stepped back if I wanted to. I didn’t. His hand came up and brushed a loose strand of hair behind my ear, fingers lingering at the side of my neck, and the touch was nothing like the hurried grabs in the supply closet or the frantic urgency of the office. This was unhurried. Exploratory. Like he had decided the rest of the night belonged to whatever this was turning into and he intended to take his time mapping it.
“Stay,” he said. Not a question. Not quite a command either. Just the word, low, while his thumb traced the line of my jaw.
I answered by reaching for the front of his shirt and pulling him down into a kiss that started soft and deepened the second his mouth opened under mine. He made a quiet sound… surprised, pleased… and walked me backward until my hips met the edge of the island. The case files scattered. Neither of us cared. His hands settled at my waist, then slid up under the hem of my sweater, palms warm against bare skin, fingers spreading wide like he wanted to feel as much of me as possible at once. I felt every ridge of those veins, every flex of tendon, and something in my chest tightened in a way that had nothing to do with lust alone.
We undressed each other slowly. No frantic yanking. No race against a locked door or a ticking clock. He peeled my sweater off and dropped it somewhere near the stools. I worked the buttons of his shirt one by one, watching the way the fabric parted to reveal the lean lines of his chest, the faint scar near his collarbone I’d noticed before but never had time to touch properly. When the shirt was gone I traced the path of a vein from the inside of his wrist up the underside of his forearm with one fingertip, slow, deliberate, and felt him shiver under the contact.
“You’re staring again,” he murmured, but there was no tease in it this time. Just something softer. Almost wondering.
“I know.”
He kissed me deeper for that, hands sliding around to the small of my back, then lower, lifting me easily onto the island so he could step between my thighs. The marble was cool under me. His mouth was hot. He took his time with my bra, unhooking it with a patience that felt almost submissive, then bent to map the newly exposed skin with lips and tongue while those hands held my hips steady. Every so often he would lift one hand and rest it against my sternum or the side of my throat, fingers spread out, veins standing out, and leave it there just long enough for me to look down and get caught in the sight of it before he moved again.
By the time we made it to the bedroom the city lights had fully claimed the windows, turning the room into a soft gold and shadow box. He laid me down on the bed like he had all night and intended to use every minute of it. Sheets cool against my back. His weight settling over me, careful, deliberate. We kissed for a long time like that… slow, deep, learning the exact angle that made the other person make those quiet, involuntary sounds. His hands never stopped moving. Tracing the line of my collarbone. Sliding down my arms until our fingers laced. Pressing my wrists gently into the mattress for a moment just so I could feel the strength in them, the heat, the steady pulse under the thin skin where the veins ran closest to the surface.
When he finally pushed into me it was with the same unhurried care. One long, slow thrust that left both of us breathing hard against each other’s mouths. He stayed still for a second, forehead pressed to mine, giving us both time to adjust to the fullness, the intimacy of it. Then he started to move… deep, steady strokes that had nothing in common with the rushed, half clothed collisions of the hospital. This was thorough. Exploratory. Tender in a way that caught me off guard every time his hips rolled just right or his hand slid between us to touch me with those precise, elegant fingers.
I couldn’t stop watching his hands. One braced beside my head, veins standing out as he held his weight. The other roaming… cupping my breast, sliding down to grip my thigh and hitch it higher around his hip, fingers spreading over the curve of my ass to pull me into each thrust. At one point he lifted that hand and turned it so the back of it faced me, flexing slowly, deliberately, while he kept moving inside me, and the private, unspoken joke of it… the way he was showing off because he knew exactly what it did to me… made something warm and dangerous bloom behind my ribs.
“You’re doing it on purpose,” I whispered, breathless.
“Maybe.” His mouth curved. He brought the hand to my lips and let me press a kiss to the inside of his wrist, right over the strongest vein, while he watched. “Maybe I just like the way you look at them.”
The night stretched. We changed positions without urgency… me on top for a while so I could brace my hands on his chest and watch the way his fingers dug into my thighs, him behind me later, one arm wrapped around my waist, the other spread out over my lower stomach so I could look down and see those veins against my skin while he moved. There was laughter when we nearly rolled off the edge of the bed. There were long stretches of quiet where the only sounds were breathing and the soft shift of sheets and the distant city. At one point he pulled out just to kiss his way down my body and take his time with his mouth, those hands holding my thighs open, thumbs stroking slow arcs over the sensitive skin while I came apart under him for the second time. When he finally pushed back into me after that I was oversensitive and shaking and he went even slower, almost gentle, until the third orgasm pulled a broken sound out of me and he followed with a low groan against my throat, hips stuttering, hands gripping me like he needed the anchor.
Afterward we didn’t move. Not right away. Not the way we usually did… the quick untangling, the half joking reminders about rules, the careful putting back together of clothes and distance. We stayed tangled in his sheets, limbs heavy, skin cooling in the air from the cracked balcony door. His head rested on my shoulder. One of his hands lay open on my stomach, fingers relaxed, the veins soft and unguarded in the low light. I covered it with my own without thinking, tracing the line of one vein with my fingertip the way I had earlier, slower now, almost meditative.
Neither of us made a move to get up or get dressed even after it was clearly over. That was new. The quiet acknowledgment of it sat between us heavier than any of the orgasms had.
I must have dozed. When I woke the early morning light was just starting to come through the windows, the whole city hazy gold below like it was still deciding whether to wake up too. I lay there for a long moment just watching him sleep… which was, itself, a problem, because I hadn’t meant to stay long enough to watch him sleep, hadn’t meant for any of this to feel like something you stayed for.
His hand was resting on the pillow between us, slack and unguarded in sleep, and I found myself reaching out before I’d really decided to, tracing one finger lightly along the vein running down the back of it, over his knuckles, memorizing the shape of it like it mattered.
“You’re doing the hand thing again,” he mumbled, without opening his eyes, voice rough with sleep, and I snatched my hand back like I’d been caught doing something far worse than I had.
“I wasn’t—”
“It’s fine.” He cracked one eye open, mouth curving into something soft and unguarded, nothing like his usual performance of easy charm. “I like it.”
“This is the part where you tell me I have to leave before your maid comes or whatever rich people say.”
“I don’t have a maid,” he said, and reached for my hand himself this time, lacing his fingers through mine, thumb moving slowly over my knuckles. “And you don’t have to leave. If you don’t want to.”
Neither of us said anything else for a long moment. It felt, lying there in the quiet morning light with his hand wrapped around mine, less like the beginning of a rule being broken and more like the very last chance either of us had to notice it happening at all… and choose, right then, to look away instead.
I looked away.
“I should get to rounds,” I said, and made myself get up.
He didn’t argue. But when I glanced back at the door, he was watching me with an expression I didn’t have a name for yet, and wouldn’t, for a while longer still.
CHAPTER 20: AFTERGLOW DENIAL
I spent the entire next day pretending that morning hadn't happened, which was, in hindsight, a spectacularly stupid strategy, given that I worked in the same building as the person it hadn't happened with, and had to see him at rounds, at the nurses' station, in the cafeteria line, approximately every forty minutes.
"You're avoiding me," Jake said, catching up to me outside the elevator, hands in his pockets, that easy smile a half degree less certain than usual.
"I'm not avoiding you. I'm busy."
"You've walked past me three times without making eye contact."
"I've had a lot of charts."
"Right," he said, and didn't push it, which was somehow worse than if he had.
That night, at home, I sat on my balcony with a cup of tea going cold in my hands, the city lights just starting to come on below, a plane crossing low overhead on its way into LAX, and made myself actually think about it… really think about it, instead of the frantic, registering not thinking I'd been doing all day.
I liked his hands. That part I'd known for weeks, could laugh about, could file under harmless observation. But it wasn't just his hands anymore, and I could admit that now, alone, where no one could see my face do whatever it was doing.
I liked the way he crouched down to Mrs. Sloane's wheelchair instead of standing over her. I liked the surprised, unguarded way he laughed when I actually landed a joke instead of just being polite about it. I liked the quiet, focused version of him in an OR that nobody outside the surgical staff ever saw, and I liked, far too much, the soft, sleep rough voice that had told me I don't have a maid, and you don't have to leave like it was the easiest thing in the world to say.
This was not what friends with benefits was supposed to feel like.
"You are being an idiot," I told myself, out loud, to my empty apartment, and the apartment did not disagree, and somewhere below, faint and constant, the freeway hummed on, indifferent to the fact that I had apparently moved three thousand miles just to make exactly the same mistakes I could have made at home.
The problem… the real problem, the one I didn't want to look at directly… was that Jake Sim did not do feelings. Everyone had told me that, repeatedly, since my very first day. He left before things got serious. He had a rotating cast of almosts and near misses and nobody who'd made it past three months. Whatever this was between us, it was a countdown clock, and I had apparently, somehow, forgotten to keep track of the time.
Better, I told myself, to end this on my own terms, before it ended on his. Better to protect myself now than to find out later exactly how efficient his exit really was.
I just didn't do anything about it yet. Not yet.
CHAPTER 21: QUIET
It was almost 3 a.m., a long, brutal shift behind both of us, when I found him in the on-call bedroom on the third floor… not looking for anything in particular, just too dried out to sleep and too tired to go home, and he was already there, sitting on the edge of the narrow bed with his head in his hands, looking more worn down than I'd ever seen him.
"Rough one?" I asked, from the doorway.
"Lost a patient." He didn't look up. "Kid. Nineteen. Nothing anybody could've done, the bleed was too far gone before he even got to us, but…" he exhaled, hard, "… still sucks. His mom was in the waiting room. I had to be the one to tell her."
I didn't say anything clever. I just crossed the room and sat down next to him, close enough that our shoulders touched, and after a moment he leaned into it, into me, in a way that felt different from anything we'd done before… quieter, heavier, less about heat and more about needing to not be alone with it.
The on-call bedroom was small and dim, the single overhead light left off, only the thin strip of hallway glow leaking under the door and the faint blue of the exit sign outside the window. The bed was narrow, the mattress thin enough that I could feel the metal frame under it when I shifted. The air smelled like laundry detergent and the faint residual antiseptic that clung to both of us no matter how many times we scrubbed. Somewhere down the corridor a monitor beeped once and then went quiet again. The whole floor felt suspended, the kind of late night hospital quiet that only exists between disasters.
Jake’s shoulder was warm against mine. He didn’t speak for a long time. I didn’t either. I just sat there and let the weight of him settle, the slow rise and fall of his breathing eventually matching mine. When he finally moved it was only to turn his head, forehead resting briefly against the side of my neck, breath warm through the fabric of my scrub top.
“You don’t have to stay,” he said, voice rough.
“I know.”
He didn’t pull away. After another stretch of silence his hand found mine on the mattress between us. Those long fingers, the ones I had spent months trying not to stare at, closed around mine carefully, like he was afraid of asking for too much. The veins along the back of his hand stood out in the low light. I traced one of them with my thumb without thinking, slow, and felt him shudder once, almost imperceptibly.
That was all it took. Not heat. Not the usual sharp pull that had driven us into supply closets and locked offices. Just the quiet, mutual recognition that neither of us wanted to be alone with the shape of the night we had just survived.
I turned toward him. He met me halfway. The first kiss was soft, almost tentative, nothing like the ones that had come before. His mouth opened under mine with a quiet sound that was more relief than desire. One of those veined hands came up to the side of my face, palm warm, thumb brushing the hinge of my jaw like he was checking that I was still real. I felt every ridge of tendon and vein against my skin and something in my chest tightened hard enough that I had to breathe carefully around it.
We undressed each other slowly. No yanking. No race against time. He peeled my scrub top over my head and set it aside like it mattered where it landed. I worked the hem of his shirt up, careful of the way his shoulders tensed and then eased when my palms settled against bare skin. The faint scar near his collarbone caught the dim light. I pressed my mouth to it without thinking and felt him exhale, long and shaky, into my hair.
When we were down to nothing he pulled me with him as he lay back on the narrow bed, shifting until I was straddling his hips, the mattress dipping under our combined weight. His hands settled on my thighs, thumbs stroking slow arcs over the skin, and I could feel how hard he already was beneath me, but there was no urgency in the way he held me. Just presence. Just the steady pressure of his palms saying stay.
I guided him into me myself, sinking down carefully, both of us going still for a long moment once he was fully seated. The stretch was familiar and still somehow new in this light, in this silence. His hands slid up my sides, settling at my waist, fingers spreading wide so I could feel every vein, every careful flex of tendon as he held me. I braced my palms on his chest and began to move, slow rolls of my hips that had nothing frantic in them. The bed creaked softly. Somewhere outside a cart rattled past and kept going.
He watched me the whole time. Not the usual half lidded, hungry look. Something quieter. His eyes tracked the way my breath hitched when he shifted the angle slightly, the way my fingers curled against his skin when his thumb found the crease of my thigh and pressed. One of those elegant hands left my hip and traveled up, palm flat over my sternum, resting there like he was feeling the beat of my heart through bone and muscle. The veins stood out along the back of it under the thin light. I covered that hand with my own and held it there.
“You’re shaking,” he murmured.
“So are you.”
He didn’t deny it. He just lifted his head enough to kiss me again, slower this time, deeper, while his other hand stayed firm at my hip, guiding the rhythm without forcing it. Every thrust was measured. Every withdrawal left a space that felt almost unbearable until he filled it again. The desperation was still there, but it was inverted… less about needing to come and more about needing to stay connected, to keep the other person close enough that the grief and the exhaustion and the particular loneliness.
I leaned forward, bracing my forearms on either side of his head, and the change in angle made both of us inhale sharply. His hands slid up my back, one settling between my shoulder blades, the other lower, fingers splayed over the curve of my ass, pulling me into each slow roll of his hips. I could feel the flex of every tendon in his wrist when he held me tighter. I could feel the heat of his palm and the slight tremor that hadn’t left him since I’d found him on the edge of the bed.
Time stretched. The only sounds were our breathing, the soft creak of the mattress, the distant white noise of the hospital at three in the morning. When he finally slid one hand between us it was with the same careful precision he used under a microscope, two long fingers finding my clit and working it in unhurried circles timed to the deep, steady thrusts of his hips. The orgasm built slowly, almost reluctantly, like my body wasn’t sure it was allowed to feel something this close to good after the night we’d had. When it finally broke it was quiet… just a long, shuddering exhale against his neck, my body clenching around him in waves that left me trembling. He followed a handful of thrusts later, burying himself deep and coming with a low, broken sound that he muffled against my shoulder, both hands gripping me like anchors.
We stayed like that for a long time afterward, still joined, still breathing each other in. The narrow bed left almost no room for anything except the two of us tangled together. His head rested against my collarbone. My fingers moved slowly through his hair, damp at the temples from the long shift and whatever had just passed between us. One of his hands lay open on my hip, fingers relaxed, the veins soft and unguarded in the low light. I traced one of them with a fingertip, the same mindless gesture I’d been doing for months, and felt him go very still under me.
“Hey,” he said, quietly, after a long silence, voice muffled against my skin. “Thank you. For… this. Staying.”
“Of course.”
“I mean it. I don’t usually…” he stopped, and I felt him go very still against me, like he’d caught himself right at the edge of something. “I don’t usually let people see me like that.”
“Jake—”
“I—” he started, and then stopped again, sharp, like he’d bitten the word back before it could finish leaving his mouth, and when he pulled back to look at me his easy smile was already sliding back into place, a shield going back up brick by brick right in front of me. “I mean, obviously, you’re a great listener. Very professional bedside manner.”
“Very funny.”
“I try.” He rolled onto his back, putting a few careful inches of distance between us that hadn’t been there a minute ago, staring up at the ceiling instead of at me. “We should get some sleep. Big surgery tomorrow.”
“Yeah,” I said, and told myself I hadn’t heard anything, hadn’t felt the shape of an unfinished sentence hanging in the air between us, heavy as anything either of us had said out loud.
Neither of us slept much, in the end.
CHAPTER 22: THE SPIRAL
I started pulling back after that night, in small ways at first… declining a coffee, finding reasons to leave a room a few minutes before he did, keeping our interactions strictly, carefully professional whenever we were somewhere other people could see us.
It wasn't that I didn't want him. That was almost the whole problem… I wanted him in ways that had stopped being simple weeks ago, and every small withdrawal cost me something I didn't want to examine too closely.
Jake noticed. Of course he noticed.
"You've been weird," he said, catching me alone in the supply room… the same one, though neither of us mentioned that… arms crossed, watching me with an intensity that felt entirely too perceptive for comfort.
"I haven't been weird."
"You have. You've been avoiding me for like a week and a half."
"I've been busy."
"That's the same excuse from before." He stepped closer, and I made myself hold my ground even though every instinct told me to put more distance between us, not less. "Talk to me. What's going on?"
"Nothing's going on. This is exactly what we agreed on. No feelings, remember? I'm just…being careful. Making sure it stays that way."
Something shifted in his expression, quick and sharp, there and gone. "Careful," he repeated.
"Yes."
"Right." He didn't sound like he believed me, and honestly, neither did I, but he didn't push it further, just studied me for one more long moment before he said, quieter, "You know you can talk to me. About anything. Not just…" he gestured vaguely, "…this."
"I know."
I didn't talk to him. I kept pulling back instead, and the strange thing was, the more I pulled back, the more intense he got in return… showing up at my office with coffee I hadn't asked for, finding excuses to walk with me to my car after a late shift through a parking structure that still felt too big and too unfamiliar most nights, watching me across the OR with an unreadable focus that had nothing to do with the patient on the table.
I called my sister that week, sat out on the balcony with the phone pressed to my ear while the sun went down over the hills, and almost told her everything before I lost my nerve halfway through and just said the job was going well, the city was starting to feel like home, everything was fine.
"You sound tired," she said.
"I am tired."
"That's not what I meant."
It never was, with her. But I let her think it was, because the alternative meant saying out loud what I still wasn't ready to admit… that pulling back from Jake felt less like protecting myself and more like slowly starving something that had, somewhere along the way, become necessary.
It felt, increasingly, like two people circling the same drain from opposite directions, both too scared to say the thing that would either save them or pull them under for good.
CHAPTER 23: THE FIGHT
The fight, when it finally came, wasn't about us at all… not directly, anyway… which somehow made it worse.
It started over a patient, a young mother with a difficult presentation that fell into the gray area between our two specialties, and it escalated the way things had started escalating between us lately, every professional disagreement carrying twice the weight it should have because neither of us could quite separate the argument from everything else we weren't saying.
"You're being reckless," I told him, in the hallway outside the OR, loud enough that a passing nurse actually flinched. "You want to push for surgery today, and her numbers don't support that timeline."
"Her numbers support exactly what I'm saying, if you'd actually look at the full picture instead of just the ortho half of it."
"I am looking at the full picture. That's the job."
"Is it?" Something sharp came into his voice, something that had nothing to do with the patient chart between us. "Because it feels like lately you're only willing to look at the parts of things that are easy to look at. The parts that don't require actually committing to anything."
The words landed harder than either of us expected, and I watched something flicker across his face… regret, maybe, or surprise at himself for saying it… but it was too late to take back.
"That's not fair," I said, quieter now, and angrier for it.
"Maybe not. But you asked me to stop pretending I don't have an opinion, and that's my opinion. You keep one foot out the door with everything. The job, this thing between us, all of it. Like you're still waiting for the moment it's smart to leave."
"Says the man with an entire reputation built around exactly that."
It was a low blow, and I knew it the second it left my mouth, watched it land somewhere real, watched his jaw go tight and his eyes go carefully, deliberately blank in a way that told me I'd hurt him more than the argument technically deserved.
"Right," he said, after a beat, voice gone flat. "Good talk."
He walked away before I could take it back, and I stood there in the hallway feeling sick with myself, the patient's chart still in my hands, the actual medical disagreement… which, on reflection, we'd both had valid points about… completely swallowed by the much larger, much scarier thing neither of us had managed to say honestly yet.
We didn't speak again that shift, moved through the rest of the day in careful, professional silence, and it was that silence, more than the argument itself, that finally cracked something open in both of us later that night, once the adrenaline had worn off and all that was left was the plain, unbearable fact of how much the fight had actually cost.
CHAPTER 24: NOT LEAVING
He showed up at my apartment just after midnight, three days after a surgery that had gone about as badly as a surgery could go without losing the patient… a young mother, complications nobody had predicted, hours in the OR that had left both of us hollowed out in different ways… and one truly brutal argument in the hallway outside recovery that had ended with me saying something sharp about his reputation, about how easy it must be to leave before things got hard, and him going pale and silent in a way that told me I'd hit somewhere real.
I hadn't expected him to come. I'd gone home that night furious with myself for saying it, furious with him for making me care enough to want to hurt him, and I'd been sitting on my couch in the dark for almost an hour, still in my scrubs, when the buzzer went off downstairs.
I opened the door and he was just standing there, hair a mess, jacket still half on, having clearly driven straight from the hospital without stopping anywhere in between, looking at me like he'd run the whole way over even though I knew for a fact he'd driven a very nice car.
"You were right," he said, before I could say anything at all. "About the leaving thing. I do it because it's easier. Because if I leave first, it never gets the chance to actually hurt."
"Jake—"
"I don't want to leave," he said, quieter now, and something in his voice cracked right down the middle. "I don't know what to do with that, but I don't want to leave. Not this time. Not you."
The words hung in the dark entryway between us. My apartment was quiet except for the low hum of the refrigerator and the distant freeway. He looked wrecked… eyes red rimmed, jaw tight, the collar of his scrub top still damp at the edges from the long shift neither of us had properly ended. I should have told him to go home. I should have reminded him of the rules, of the stairwell handshake, of every careful boundary we had built to keep this from becoming exactly what it was becoming.
Instead I stepped forward, grabbed the front of his jacket, and pulled him inside.
The door shut hard behind him. For a second we just stood there in the near dark, breathing the same air, the argument and the near miss and the three days of silence still raw between us. Then his hands came up… those long, veined, impossibly familiar hands… and framed my face like he was afraid I might disappear if he didn’t hold on. His thumbs brushed the hinges of my jaw. The veins stood out along the backs of his hands under the thin spill of streetlight coming through the blinds. I covered one of them with my own, pressing his palm harder against my cheek, and felt the fine tremble running through his fingers.
“I’m still mad at you,” I whispered.
“I know.”
“I’m still mad at myself.”
“I know that too.”
He kissed me like the admission had unlocked something. Not careful. Not teasing. Desperate and possessive and edged with the same fear that had been living under both our ribs since the hallway fight. I kissed him back the same way, fingers fisting in his jacket, then shoving it off his shoulders so it hit the floor with a soft thud. His scrub top followed. Mine after that. We left a trail of clothes between the door and the bedroom that neither of us would care about until morning… shoes kicked off, pants shoved down and abandoned, the quiet urgency of two people who had spent three days trying not to need this and failing completely.
By the time we reached the bed he had me backed against the edge of it, mouth at my throat, one hand already sliding between my legs like he needed proof I still wanted him as badly as he wanted me. I was already wet. The discovery pulled a rough sound out of him that vibrated against my skin. He pushed two fingers into me without warning, deep and sure, the heel of his palm grinding against my clit while his other hand gripped my hip hard enough to bruise. I watched those fingers work… the flex of tendon, the prominent veins, the way his wrist rotated with every curl… and the sight of it alone nearly undid me.
“Look at me,” he said, voice low and rough. When I did, his eyes were almost black in the dark. “I meant it. I’m not leaving. Not tonight. Not…”
I cut him off with another kiss because the rest of that sentence was too dangerous, too close to the thing neither of us had said out loud yet. He groaned into my mouth and walked me backward until we both went down onto the mattress in a tangle of limbs. The sheets were cool. His skin was hot. He settled between my thighs and pushed into me in one long, relentless thrust that punched the air out of both our lungs.
It was nothing like the playful lounge or the unhurried penthouse. This was raw. Intense. The kind of sex that felt like an argument and an apology and a confession all at once. He fucked me hard and deep, one hand braced beside my head so I could see every vein standing out along the back of it, the other gripping my thigh and hitching it higher around his hip so he could get deeper still. Every thrust felt possessive. Every roll of his hips felt like he was trying to write something permanent into my body. I met him stroke for stroke, nails digging into his shoulders, heels locked at the small of his back, chasing the same desperate edge.
“You don’t get to say shit like that and then walk away,” I managed between broken breaths. “You don’t get to make me care and then…”
“I’m not walking away.” His forehead dropped to mine. His rhythm stuttered, then drove harder. “Feel that? I’m right here. I’m not going anywhere.”
The words and the angle and the relentless pressure of his body against mine pushed me over. The orgasm hit hard and sudden, ripping a sound out of me that I muffled against his shoulder. He didn’t stop. He fucked me through it, relentless, until the oversensitivity edged into something almost too much, and then he pulled out just long enough to flip me onto my stomach, drag my hips up, and push back into me from behind. One of those veined hands splayed between my shoulder blades, holding me down. The other reached around to work my clit in tight, mean circles while he took me even deeper.
I came again with my face pressed into the pillow, vision sparking white. He followed almost immediately, burying himself to the hilt and spilling into me with a broken, wrecked sound that sounded dangerously close to my name. His whole body shuddered through it. His hand on my back trembled.
For a long time afterward neither of us moved. He stayed draped over me, chest heaving against my spine, face buried in the curve of my neck. Eventually he shifted just enough to pull out and roll us onto our sides, still tangled together, one of his legs hooked over both of mine like he was afraid I might try to leave the bed. His hand found its way to my chest and settled there, palm flat over my heart, thumb moving slowly back and forth in a gesture that felt less like the confident, deliberate touches from earlier and more like something involuntary… something he wasn’t doing on purpose at all.
The apartment was quiet except for the distant hush of the freeway and, somewhere further off, a siren fading in and out on its way toward downtown. City light filtered pale and grey through the blinds. I could feel every place he had touched me… the bruises already forming on my hips, the residual ache between my legs, the ghostly press of those fingers against my skin. More than that, I could feel the shape of the thing we still hadn’t named sitting heavy and electric in the dark between us.
He didn’t leave. He stayed curled around me for a long time, breathing slowly evening out, that hand never moving from over my heart. Every so often his thumb would stroke once, absent, like he was checking the beat was still steady. I covered his hand with mine and felt the veins under my fingertips, soft and unguarded now. Neither of us spoke for what felt like hours.
“I should go,” he murmured eventually, not moving.
“You should,” I agreed, and neither of us moved either.
It was almost four in the morning by the time he finally sat up, and even then he lingered at the edge of the bed for a long moment, watching me in the near dark like he was trying to memorize something before he’d let himself leave. His hair was a disaster. There was a faint red mark on his shoulder where my teeth had been. He looked younger in the grey light. Scared, maybe. Or just tired of pretending he wasn’t.
“Hey,” he said, quiet.
“Yeah?”
“Nothing.” He shook his head, and pressed a kiss to my forehead that felt entirely too soft for two people who had agreed, months ago, on nothing beyond this. His lips lingered. When he pulled back his hand came up one last time, fingers brushing my cheek, the veins standing out faintly as he tucked a strand of hair behind my ear. “Get some sleep.”
I didn’t sleep, not really, not after the door clicked shut behind him. I lay there instead, staring at the ceiling, one hand pressed flat over the same spot on my chest his had been resting on, and thought, with a clarity that scared me more than anything else had that whole night:
I’m in love with him.
It did not feel like good news.
CHAPTER 25: THE BREAK
I ended it on a Tuesday, in the same stairwell where he'd laid out the rules months before, because some part of me thought there was a kind of symmetry in that, even if it didn't make the conversation hurt any less. Outside the narrow window at the top of the stairs, the sky was doing the thing it did most evenings in that city, going pink and orange and gold all at once, entirely too beautiful for what I was about to do.
"We need to talk," I said, and watched something in his face brace itself before I'd even gotten any further.
"Okay."
"I think we should stop. This… whatever we've been doing." My voice came out steadier than I felt, which was the only mercy I could manage to give myself in that moment. "It's getting complicated."
"Complicated," he repeated, carefully.
"I don't want to catch feelings, Jake. That was the rule. I think we're getting close to breaking it, and I'd rather stop now, cleanly, than let it turn into something that actually hurts."
It wasn't a lie, exactly. It just wasn't the whole truth, either… the whole truth being that I already had feelings, deep and inconvenient and entirely too real, and I was terrified, genuinely terrified, of being the only one standing there holding them when this inevitably ended the way everyone had warned me it would.
Better to jump first. Better than being left.
Jake was quiet for a long moment, studying me with an expression I couldn't read, and when he finally spoke his voice was carefully, deliberately even. "If that's what you want."
"It's not about what I want. It's about being smart."
"Right." He nodded, once, like he was filing the conversation away somewhere he didn't intend to look at again anytime soon. "No hard feelings. Like we said."
"No hard feelings," I agreed, and it was the second time in this entire relationship… if you could even call it that… that I'd said something so obviously, painfully untrue.
"Okay," he said, and that was it. That was the whole thing. No argument, no protest, nothing but that same quick, efficient exit everyone had warned me about from my very first week at XO Medical, and somehow, even having braced myself for exactly this, it still managed to blindside me completely.
He walked back through the stairwell door without looking back, and I stood there alone for a long time afterward, hand pressed to my own sternum, waiting for the relief that was supposed to come with finally being the one who left first.
It never came.
CHAPTER 26: FIRST DAYS WITHOUT
The first week after the stairwell was, in a strange way, almost bearable… a kind of numb, functional autopilot that got me through shifts and charts and grocery runs without too much active thought, the way I imagined shock probably worked for other kinds of loss.
It was the second week that broke something open.
I came home on a Wednesday to find I'd bought two coffees out of habit, the second one sitting cold and untouched in my cupholder before I even registered what I'd done, and sat in my car in the parking garage for a full ten minutes, staring at it, before I could make myself go inside. I caught myself, twice that same week, reaching for my phone to text him something… a stupid meme, a complaint about a difficult patient's family, the small, reflexive impulse to share my day with someone who'd become, without my fully noticing, the person I most wanted to share it with… before remembering, sharp and fresh every single time, that I wasn't supposed to do that anymore.
I threw out the leftover peaches from Gerald's stand, the ones still sitting in my fridge from a Sunday that felt like it belonged to an entirely different version of my life, and cried about that too, which felt, even in the moment, faintly ridiculous… grieving produce… but grief didn't seem particularly interested in being reasonable about what it attached itself to.
Jasmine showed up unannounced on the ninth day, letting herself in with the spare key I'd given her for emergencies, and found me on the couch in yesterday's scrubs, surrounded by the specific, unglamorous waste of someone who had stopped bothering to pretend she was fine even to herself.
"Okay," she said, taking in the scene with a practiced, unshockable calm that told me this wasn't her first time doing this for a heartbroken friend. "We're doing a thing. Shower. I'll order food. You're going to tell me everything, and then, at some point in the next hour, you're going to feel slightly more like a person again. That's the plan."
It didn't fix anything, not really, but it helped, in the specific way that having someone simply refuse to let you disappear into a bad week always helps. She didn't tell me I was right to end it, and she didn't tell me I was wrong, either… just listened, mostly, occasionally interjecting with an observation sharp enough to make me wince, and by the time she left that night I felt, if not better, at least less entirely alone in the particular mess I'd made.
"For what it's worth," she said, at the door, "I don't think this is over. I've watched that man watch you for five months. That kind of thing doesn't just evaporate because you both got scared at the same time."
"Maybe."
"Not maybe. I'm right about this. I'm annoyingly right about most things, you'll learn." She squeezed my hand once, entirely serious under the joke. "Give it time. Not forever. Just time."
I didn't believe her, not fully, not yet. But I held onto it anyway, the way you hold onto anything when you don't have much else to hold onto, and went back to work the next morning marginally more capable of getting through the day than I had been the week before… which, given everything, felt like the only kind of progress available to me at the time.
CHAPTER 27: ABSENCE
The hospital, it turned out, was a genuinely terrible place to nurse a broken heart, mostly because it required me to see the person who'd broken it approximately every single day, often across an operating table, often with someone's life literally in both our hands.
We were professional about it. Unfailingly, exhaustingly professional. Jake was polite, competent, distant in a way that felt worse than if he'd been cold… like whatever door had briefly opened between us in his penthouse, in my apartment at four in the morning, had been quietly and thoroughly bricked back up.
"You okay?" Jasmine asked me, more than once, watching me watch him across a nurses' station with an expression I clearly wasn't hiding as well as I thought I was.
"I'm fine."
"You don't look fine."
"I'm professionally fine," I said, which wasn't really an answer, and she let it go, mostly because there wasn't much else to say.
I threw myself into work instead, the way I always had, back in Chicago, back in residency, back through every hard thing I'd ever survived… took extra call shifts, volunteered for the complicated consults nobody else wanted, told myself that if I filled every hour of the day there wouldn't be any room left over for missing him. It worked, sometimes, for an hour or two at a stretch. Mostly it didn't.
I kept catching myself doing it anyway… watching his hands during a shared case, the same veins, the same precise, careful movements, and feeling the loss of them somewhere underneath my ribs in a way that had nothing to do with professional respect and everything to do with the very specific, very personal grief of missing someone you saw every day and couldn't have anymore.
He'd started wearing his sleeves down more, I noticed. Rolled less often. I told myself it didn't mean anything. I told myself a lot of things, that month, most of which weren't particularly true.
There was a night, about two weeks in, when I finally let myself drive down to the beach after a shift, just to sit in my car in an empty parking lot and watch the waves come in under a sky gone the colour of a healing bruise, purple and orange and finally black. I'd moved out here for a fresh start, I reminded myself. For a version of my life that wasn't defined by the last thing that had gone wrong. And instead, somehow, spectacularly, I'd managed to build an entirely new version of the exact same wound, three thousand miles from where the old one had happened, like grief had simply followed me across the country and was waiting there when I unpacked the last box.
"You did this to yourself," I told the ocean, which, predictably, did not respond, and I sat there until the parking lot lights flickered on before I made myself drive home.
We were assigned another joint case, three weeks after the stairwell, and it was, without question, the worst surgery of my career… not because anything went wrong medically, but because I spent all six hours extremely, painfully aware of exactly how close his hand came to mine at the sink and exactly how carefully, deliberately, he made sure it never actually touched.
"Good work today," he said afterward, stripping off his gloves without looking at me.
"You too," I said, and that was the whole conversation, and I went home that night and cried in a way I hadn't let myself do since the stairwell, out of sheer, exhausted grief for something I'd ended myself and still somehow felt entitled to mourn.
Jasmine found me at my lowest that week, showed up at my apartment with a bottle of wine and a genuine willingness to sit through however much crying it took, and it was somewhere around the second glass, both of us curled up on my couch with the balcony door open to let in the warm night air, that she finally said the thing I think she'd been holding back for weeks.
"You know he's miserable too, right?"
"He doesn't look miserable."
"He looks exactly like you look. Professionally fine. Terribly, obviously not fine underneath it." She refilled my glass without asking. "Sunoo said he's been picking up extra shifts too. Nobody does that unless they're trying to outrun something."
"That doesn't mean anything."
"Maybe not," she said, gently, in a way that told me she didn't believe that any more than I did. "But it's worth thinking about, don't you think? Before you decide the story's already over."
I didn't answer her. I didn't know how to, not yet. But I thought about it for a long time after she left, staring out at the city lights scattered across the hills like something spilled and never cleaned up, and some small, stubborn part of me that I hadn't managed to talk myself out of yet refused to stop hoping.
CHAPTER 28: WHAT EVERYONE ELSE SAW
It wasn't just Jasmine who noticed. By the third week of the silence between us, it seemed like the entire hospital had quietly, collectively decided that something had gone wrong, in the particular way hospitals always know these things before anyone involved has said a single word out loud.
"You two used to argue in the elevator all the time," Sunoo said, relevant to nothing, while we waited on lab results for a shared patient. "Now you just stand on opposite sides and look at your phones. It's honestly less entertaining."
"We're being professional."
"You're being sad," he said, with the bluntness only a twenty eight year old resident who hasn't learned sensitivity yet could manage. "Sorry. Just an observation."
Even Dr. Kim, who I would have sworn had no interest whatsoever in staff gossip, caught me alone in her office one afternoon under the pretense of discussing a case and, at the end of the conversation, said, almost offhandedly, "You've seemed distracted lately. Everything all right?"
"Everything's fine."
"Mm," she said, in a tone that made it clear she didn't believe me, and didn't push it, which somehow felt worse than if she had.
I ran into Giselle, of all people, in the cafeteria line one day… the cardiology fellow from the gala, the one I'd been so unreasonably jealous of months earlier… and braced myself for something awkward, only for her to surprise me entirely.
"You should talk to him," she said, without warning, sliding her tray along the rail. "Jake. I don't know what happened between you two, it's honestly none of my business, but for what it's worth… nothing ever happened with us. I liked him for about five minutes at that gala, and it became extremely clear extremely fast that his whole attention was on you the entire night, even while he was technically talking to me. I've genuinely never seen him look at anyone else the way he looked at you across that room."
"Oh," I said, entirely unprepared for that. "I… thank you. For telling me."
"You looked like you needed to hear it," she said, with a small, knowing smile, and walked off toward the cardiology table before I could ask her anything else.
I carried that conversation with me for days, turning it over during quiet moments between patients, during the drive home each night through streets that had started, somewhere in the last several months, to feel entirely, unmistakably like mine. It didn't change anything, not immediately… I still didn't know how to close the distance I'd created, still didn't trust myself not to be the one who got hurt if I tried… but it planted something, a small, stubborn seed of possibility that refused to fully die no matter how hard the rational part of my brain tried to talk it down.
Maybe, I let myself think, just once, walking to my car under a sky gone that particular, impossible shade of orange that only seemed to happen here… maybe I hadn't imagined the whole thing after all.
CHAPTER 29: A REASON TO CALL
The excuse, when it finally came, wasn't one either of us planned out… which was, in its own strange way, exactly why it mattered.
Mrs. Sloane was readmitted on a Thursday night, complications from the hip revision unrelated to anything either of us had done wrong, but serious enough that both her original surgeons were paged in, together, for the first time since the stairwell. I got the call first, was already halfway into my scrubs when I saw Jake's name pop up on the shared consult, and felt my stomach drop with a complicated mix of worry for her and something else entirely for the idea of working beside him again after weeks of careful, wordless distance.
He was already at her bedside when I arrived, sitting in the chair beside her, holding her hand… that same gesture from all those months ago, the one that had first cracked something open in me… and something in his face when he looked up and saw me told me he was as unsettled by the timing as I was.
"She's stable," he said, all business, though his eyes lingered on me a beat too long before returning to the chart. "But we need to move fast if we want to avoid a second surgery."
We worked together for six hours that night, falling back into the old, wordless rhythm without either of us having to think about it… the particular fluency of two people who knew exactly how the other worked, even now, even with everything unresolved and raw between us. It should have been unbearable. Instead it felt, unexpectedly, like coming up for air after weeks of holding my breath.
Mrs. Sloane stabilized by morning, out of danger, cranky and demanding her rosary back from a nurse who'd tucked it away for safekeeping, and Jake and I stood in the hallway afterward in the pale, early light, both of us too exhausted to keep up the careful performance of professional distance we'd been maintaining for weeks.
"She's going to be fine," he said.
"Yeah."
"You did good work in there."
"So did you," I said, and for a second, just a second, it felt like the easiest thing in the world to close the distance between us… before both of us, almost simultaneously, stepped back instead, neither ready yet, not quite, though something had shifted, some old wall worn thinner by six hours of trusting each other completely with someone else's life.
"I'm glad you were there tonight," he said, quietly, before he turned to leave. "For what it's worth."
"Me too," I said, and meant it more than I'd meant to let myself.
I sat in my car in the parking garage afterward for a long time, watching the sun come up properly over the hills, thinking about how strange it was that the two of us, who couldn't manage to say a true thing to each other outside a hospital, had never once lost the ability to work together inside one… how some part of us had kept choosing each other all along, in the one language neither of us had figured out how to distrust.
It wasn't a resolution. Not yet. But it was, unmistakably, a crack in the wall wide enough to let some light back through.
CHAPTER 30: NEAR MISS
It happened on a night neither of us had planned for, the way these things always seemed to.
A case ran late… a twelve year old with a spinal deformity that needed both of us in the OR until well past midnight, delicate enough that neither of us had room to think about anything except the work in front of us, which was, in its own way, a small mercy. It was only after, in the empty scrub room, stripping off gloves and gowns in the particular silence that came after a long, difficult surgery had gone right, that the mercy ran out.
"Good save," Jake said, and it was the most words he'd said to me outside of strict clinical necessity in almost a month.
"You too."
He didn't leave right away. He stood there at the sink, hands under the water, not quite looking at me, and something about the set of his shoulders made me stay too, even though every instinct told me to go, to not let this become one more thing I'd have to carefully unfeel later.
"Can I ask you something?" he said finally, still not looking up.
"Sure."
"Was any of it real? For you? Or was I just…" he stopped, jaw tight, "… was I just what everyone always said I'd be. A distraction. Something to pass the time until it got complicated."
The question landed somewhere under my ribs, sharp and unexpected. "Jake—"
"Because I keep telling myself it was just physical. That's what we agreed on. That's the whole deal. But I don't…" he shut the water off, turned to actually look at me for the first time in weeks, and his eyes were doing something I hadn't let myself hope for, something raw and unguarded, "… I don't think I believe that anymore. And I don't know what to do with not believing it."
I didn't answer right away, because the honest answer was standing right there in my chest, three words heavy and terrified and desperate to get out, and I was so close… so close… to just saying them, right there in the empty scrub room at one in the morning, consequences be damned.
"It doesn't matter," I made myself say instead, voice not quite steady. "We agreed. No feelings. I meant that."
Something in his face closed, slow and deliberate, like watching a door swing shut in real time. "Right," he said. "Of course."
We stood there for one more unbearable moment, close enough that I could have reached out, close enough that I could see the exact second he decided not to push it either, and then he nodded once, grabbed his jacket, and left without another word.
I stood alone in the scrub room for a long time afterward, hand braced against the cold edge of the sink, furious with myself in a way that had nowhere useful to go. I had wanted, more than almost anything, to close that distance. I hadn't. The tension between us, unresolved, unspoken, followed me home that night heavier than it had ever been when we were still sleeping together, which felt, somehow, like the cruelest joke of the entire situation.
I didn't sleep. I sat out on my balcony instead, wrapped in a blanket even though it wasn't cold, watching the sky lighten slowly over the hills, and replayed his question over and over… was any of it real… until I couldn't tell anymore whether the ache in my chest was regret for what I'd said or grief for what I hadn't.
CHAPTER 31: THE WEIGHT OF ALMOST
I didn't go straight home after the scrub room. I drove instead, no direction at first, and then found my direction, until I found myself parked outside the old Italian place near the water… the one we'd never actually gone to together, the one he'd mentioned once in passing months ago, back when we were still pretending this was simple. I don't know what I expected, sitting there in my car at two in the morning, except maybe some kind of proof that the life I'd imagined with him had ever been real to begin with.
It hadn't been, not yet. Not really. That was the whole problem.
I called my sister the next morning, earlier than either of us usually surfaced on a weekend, and she picked up on the second ring, groggy and immediately alert the way only family manages to be.
"Okay," she said, after I'd gotten about halfway through an explanation that kept looping back on itself, unable to land on a single clear thought. "Slow down. Start over. You like him."
"I love him. I think. Which is worse."
"Why is that worse?"
"Because loving someone means actually risking something. Liking someone, you can walk away from. Loving someone…" I stopped, throat tight, staring out at my own dark apartment like it might have an answer I didn't. "Loving someone means if it goes wrong, it actually wrecks you. And everyone told me exactly how this ends with him. I had all the information. I chose it anyway."
"You know," she said, gently, "you did the exact same thing with James. Saw all the warning signs, told yourself you were being smart about it, and then acted shocked when it hurt exactly as much as everyone predicted."
"That's not helpful."
"It's not supposed to be helpful, it's supposed to be true." A pause, softer now. "Look. I can't tell you whether this is going to work out. Nobody can, that's not how any of this works, ever, with anyone. But you didn't move three thousand miles to keep playing it safe. You moved out there to find out who you are when you actually let yourself want something. So which is it? Do you want him, or do you want to be safe?"
I didn't answer her right away. I sat with the question for the rest of that day, turning it over during a slow shift, during the drive home, during a lonely dinner I barely tasted, and it followed me into a restless, half formed sleep that night, tangled up with the memory of his voice in the scrub room… was any of it real for you… and the answer I'd given him instead of the one that had actually been sitting in my chest.
By morning, something in me had settled, quiet and certain in a way it hadn't been in weeks. I didn't know exactly how I was going to say it, or when, or whether he'd still want to hear it after everything. But I knew, finally, which answer I was choosing.
Not safe. Him.
CHAPTER 32: REALIZATION… CONFESSION
It was Jasmine, in the end, who forced the issue, cornering me in the on-call lounge on a slow Wednesday afternoon with the particular expression of someone who had run out of patience.
"I can't watch this anymore," she announced, sitting down across from me with her arms crossed. "You look like someone died. He looks like someone died. You're both so obviously miserable that Sunoo started a bet on when one of you would crack, and honestly, at this point, I just want my ten dollars back."
"There's nothing to bet about."
"You're in love with him," she said, flatly, not a question. "I've watched you stare at his hands for five months, and I watched you stop doing it three weeks ago, which is somehow worse, because now you just stare at the space where his hands would be and look like you're grieving something."
I opened my mouth to argue and found, for the first time in weeks, that I didn't have the energy to lie about it, not even to myself. "It doesn't matter," I said instead, quietly. "He doesn't do feelings. Everyone told me that from day one. I ended it because I didn't want to be the one left holding this by myself."
"Have you actually asked him?"
"I don't need to ask him. It's practically hospital lore at this point."
"Hospital lore," Jasmine repeated, unimpressed, "also said he'd never crouch down to talk to a scared seventy eight year old patient like she was the only person in the room, and he did that too. Hospital lore also said he'd never drive across the city at midnight after a bad fight to show up on someone's doorstep, and I heard from three different nurses that a certain neurosurgeon looked like absolute hell the entire week after you two stopped talking. Maybe hospital lore doesn't actually know Jake Sim as well as it thinks it does."
I didn't have a good answer for that. I sat with it for the rest of the day, turning it over between patients, between charts, between the long stretches of driving I did now just to have somewhere to think that wasn't my apartment or the hospital… up into the hills sometimes, past the overlook where you could see the whole valley spread out gold and hazy in the late afternoon light, and it was still sitting there, unresolved, when I finally decided to just say something to him instead of running the math on it one more time.
I found him at the end of a shift, in the parking garage, and I almost lost my nerve twice on the walk over before I made myself keep going.
He was already leaning against my car when I got there… waiting, it turned out, for exactly this, though neither of us knew that about the other yet.
"We need to talk," he said, echoing the exact words I'd used in the stairwell, and something about the deliberate symmetry of it made my chest ache before he'd even said anything else.
"Okay."
"I let you walk away," he said, before I could say anything else, "because you said it's what you wanted, and because I've spent my entire life making sure I'm the one who leaves first, so it felt almost… familiar, letting you go instead. Like I already knew how this story was supposed to end." He dragged a hand back through his hair, the old, familiar gesture, except his hand wasn't steady doing it. "But I haven't slept right in five weeks. I keep reaching for my phone to text you something stupid before I remember I'm not supposed to anymore. And today Jasmine cornered me in the hallway and told me I was, and I quote, 'an idiot with very nice hands and terrible communication skills,' and honestly, I couldn't really argue with either part."
"She got to you too."
"She's very thorough." A flicker of that old smile, gone almost as fast as it came. "But she's not wrong. About any of it."
"Jake—"
"I caught feelings," he said, plainly, like it cost him something to say it out loud and he was doing it anyway. "Somewhere around the penthouse, maybe before that, if I'm honest… maybe as early as you insulting my coffee opinions on your first day, I genuinely don't know. I broke the rule. I broke it a long time ago and I was too scared to say anything, because every single time in my life that I've let this happen, I've been the one to leave before it could hurt. And I didn't want to find out what happens when I don't."
My eyes were stinging, and I didn't bother fighting it. "You could have said something."
"So could you," he said, gently, not an accusation, just true. "You ended it because you thought I wouldn't feel the same. I could see it in your face in that stairwell. You weren't protecting the rule. You were protecting yourself."
"Yeah," I admitted, quietly. "I was. I moved three thousand miles to stop doing exactly this… falling for someone and then bracing for the part where they leave first, because it always feels safer to see it coming. And then I got here and did it again anyway. With you. In record time, honestly."
"For the record," he said, closing the last of the distance between us, reaching up to brush his knuckles… those hands, I'd know them anywhere, veins and all… very gently against my jaw, "you didn't have to. Protect yourself from me, I mean. I know that's not exactly the reputation, but—"
"I don't care about the reputation."
"I know," he said, and something in his voice cracked open, soft and unguarded in a way I'd only heard from him twice before… once in an on-call bedroom after losing a patient, once at four in the morning with his hand resting over my heart. "I care about you. That's the whole confession. That's it. That's all I've got."
"That's plenty," I said, and let him kiss me, right there in the parking garage, slow and certain in a way that felt nothing at all like the frantic, desperate collisions that had started this whole thing, and everything like a beginning instead of an ending.
Somewhere behind us, a car alarm chirped twice as someone unlocked it, entirely unglamorous, entirely ordinary, and neither of us so much as flinched, too busy finally, finally getting this part right.
CHAPTER 33: LIGHTS ON
He drove us back to his place without either of us really discussing it… just a quiet, certain understanding that the parking garage wasn’t where this was going to end, not tonight.
Neither of us said much on the way up in the elevator. There wasn’t anything left that needed saying, not after everything that had already been said down in that garage… no rules to lay out, no careful arrangement to negotiate, nothing to protect ourselves from anymore. Just the quiet, charged kind of quiet that comes after two people finally stop pretending.
He unlocked the door and flipped the light on without thinking about it, and I remember noticing that… the light, on, neither of us reaching to turn it off, neither of us needing the dark to hide in this time.
“Hey,” he said, catching my hand before I could take another step further into the apartment, turning me gently back to face him. “I just want to say it again. Out loud. In case it didn’t land the first time.”
“Jake—”
“I love you,” he said, plain and unguarded, nothing performed about it at all. “Like I said I’ve probably loved you since you called my coffee opinions dramatic on your first day, if I’m honest, and I spent way too long being an idiot about admitting it. But I’m done being an idiot about it. I just needed you to hear it again, somewhere that isn’t a parking garage.”
“I love you too,” I said, and watched something in his whole body ease at hearing it, like he’d been braced for it not to be true even after everything.
He kissed me then, slow and certain, the kind of kiss that had nothing left to prove and everything left to feel. The lights stayed on. I noticed that, too… the warm spill of the entryway fixture catching the side of his face, the way I could see every shift of expression instead of guessing at it in the dark. No supply closet shadows. No on-call room dimness. No frantic race against discovery or against the rules we had both already broken a hundred times over. Just the two of us, standing in the middle of his living room with the city glittering beyond the windows and the light fully on, neither of us reaching for a switch.
“Come here,” he murmured against my mouth, and walked me backward toward the bedroom without ever breaking the kiss for longer than a breath. We left a trail of clothes that felt almost routine in its slowness… my jacket, his, the soft sound of fabric hitting the floor one piece at a time. He took off my shirt off like he was unwrapping something he intended to keep. I did the same with his, palms sliding over the warm skin of his chest, feeling the steady beat of his heart under my hands. When I reached for the button of his jeans he caught my wrists gently, thumbs stroking the insides of them, and waited until I looked up.
“Lights stay on,” he said, quiet. Not a question. A promise. “I want to see you. All of it. No hiding.”
“I know.” My voice came out softer than I expected. “I want that too.”
He finished undressing me with the same deliberate care, kneeling to help me step out of the rest of my clothes, pressing an open mouthed kiss to the inside of my knee, the soft skin of my thigh, the jut of my hipbone. Every touch was unhurried. Every glance was full and open. When he stood again I could see the faint flush across his cheekbones, the way his pupils had gone dark, the small, almost disbelieving smile that kept threatening the corners of his mouth like he still couldn’t quite believe we had made it here.
We made it to the bed without rushing. He laid me down against the sheets and followed, bracing himself over me on those long, veined forearms so he could look at me properly. The lamp on the nightstand was already on, neither of us moved to turn it off. Golden light pooled across the mattress, across his shoulders, across the back of the hand he lifted to brush hair away from my face. I watched the veins shift under his skin as his fingers moved. I always watched. The difference was that this time I didn’t pretend I wasn’t, and he didn’t pretend he didn’t notice.
“I love the way you look at my hands,” he said, almost conversational, while his thumb traced the line of my lower lip. “You’ve been doing it since day one. I used to think it was just a weird surgeon thing. Then I realized it was a you thing. And I started doing it on purpose because I liked watching you react.”
“I know you did.” I turned my head enough to press a kiss to the center of his palm, then to the inside of his wrist where the strongest vein ran closest to the surface. “I always knew. I just didn’t know how to say that I liked it out loud.”
“Say it now.”
“I love your hands,” I said, holding his gaze. “I love how careful they are in an OR and how greedy they get with me. I love the veins. I love that you know I love them and you use it against me on purpose. I love that I don’t have to hide any of that anymore.”
Something soft and almost pained moved across his face. He leaned down and kissed me again, deeper this time, while one of those hands slid down my body with well patience… over my collarbone, the curve of my breast, the soft plane of my stomach, until his fingers slipped between my legs and found me already wet. He made a low, appreciative sound against my mouth and worked me open slowly, two fingers curling, the heel of his palm pressing in steady circles while he watched every flicker of expression that crossed my face. Full eye contact. No looking away. No burying my face in a pillow or his shoulder to hide how much it affected me.
“I love you,” he said again, quiet, while his fingers moved. “I love how stubborn you are. I love that you moved three thousand miles and still somehow ended up exactly where I needed you. I love that you called me on my bullshit in a stairwell and then let me back in anyway.”
I came like that… slow and rolling, eyes open, his name a soft, broken sound between us while he watched and murmured soft praise against my cheek. When the tremors eased he withdrew his fingers, brought them to his mouth, and tasted me without looking away. The sight of it, lit fully by the lamp, made heat pool low in my belly all over again.
He settled between my thighs and pushed into me in one long, controlled thrust, both of us exhaling hard at the stretch and the heat and the simple rightness of it. He stayed still for a moment once he was fully seated, forehead pressed to mine, giving us both time to feel it. The lights stayed on. I could see the exact shade of his eyes. I could see the way his lashes lowered when the sensation threatened to overwhelm him. I could see the small, helpless smile that appeared when I wrapped my legs around his waist and pulled him even deeper.
“Stay with me,” I whispered. “Eyes open. I want to see you.”
“I’m not going anywhere.” He started to move… deep, steady strokes that had nothing in common with the frantic supply closet urgency or the almost angry office collision or even the tender but still slightly careful penthouse night. This was slower. Fuller. Every thrust deliberate. Every withdrawal a chance to look at each other again. His hands framed my face for a while, thumbs stroking my cheekbones. Then one slid down to lace our fingers together against the pillow, veins standing out along the back of his hand where it pressed against mine. I watched them flex with every movement of his body. He watched me watch them and smiled, soft and open, no performance left in it at all.
“I love you,” I said, because I could. Because the lights were on and there was nowhere left to hide the words and I didn’t want to hide them anymore. “I love how you crouch down to talk to scared patients. I love that you cry at allergies that aren’t allergies. I love that you tried so hard not to need anyone and then needed me anyway.”
His rhythm faltered. He dropped his forehead to mine again, breathing hard, eyes still open and locked on mine.
“Say it again.”
“I love you.”
He kissed me like the words had rewritten something fundamental inside him. The pace stayed slow but the intensity built… deeper rolls of his hips, the wet sound of our bodies moving together, the quiet creak of the bed, the distant city noise filtering through the open balcony door. Sweat gathered at his temples. I reached up and brushed it away with my fingers, then traced the line of one of the veins running down his forearm while he moved inside me. He shivered under the touch and drove into me a little harder, a little deeper, still never looking away.
When I came the second time it was with my eyes open and his name on my lips and his hand still laced tightly with mine. The orgasm rolled through me in long, shuddering waves that left me trembling. He followed almost immediately, burying himself deep and spilling into me with a broken, reverent sound that was half my name and half something that might have been another I love you. His whole body shook with it. He stayed braced over me afterward, chest heaving, forehead still pressed to mine, neither of us closing our eyes.
For a long time the only sound was our breathing and the faint hum of the city beyond the glass.
Eventually he shifted just enough to ease out of me and roll onto his side, pulling me with him so we ended up face to face, legs tangled, the lamp still glowing warmly across the sheets. Neither of us reached for the switch. Neither of us moved to cover up or put distance between our bodies. His hand settled on my waist, thumb stroking absently over my skin. I traced the veins on the back of that hand with one fingertip, slow and open and completely unashamed of the habit this time.
Afterward, we lay there tangled together, the lamp on his nightstand still lit, neither of us in any hurry to reach over and turn it off.
“So that’s new,” he said, eventually, voice lazy and warm against my hair.
“What’s new?”
“Not immediately panicking and finding an excuse to leave the second it’s over.” A small laugh, self aware in the way I’d come to love about him. “Or turning the lights off. I always used to turn the lights off.”
“Why?”
“Easier to leave, I think. Harder to actually see someone, in the dark. Harder for them to see you.” He pressed a kiss to my temple, unhurried. “Didn’t want to do that tonight.”
“I noticed.”
“Good,” he said. “I wanted you to.”
I traced one finger along the back of his hand where it rested on my stomach, over the vein running down into his knuckles, the same gesture I’d been doing since that very first week, except there was nothing furtive about it anymore, nothing I was pretending not to do.
“For the record,” I said, “I liked the lights on.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. Turns out I didn’t actually want to hide any of this either. I just didn’t know how to say that out loud yet.”
“Well,” he said, pulling me closer, the city glittering wide and unbothered beyond the window, neither of us reaching for the switch, “you don’t have to hide it anymore. Not from me. Not ever again, if I have anything to say about it.”
CHAPTER 34: LEARNING IT SLOW
We took it slow, after that… which was, admittedly, a strange concept for two people who'd started out with a supply closet, but there was something almost funny about working backward into the parts we'd skipped the first time, actual dates, actual conversations that weren't just between surgeries or in the five stolen minutes of an on-call shift.
"This is weird," I told him, on our first real date, both of us sitting across from each other at a small Italian place near the water he swore had the best pasta in the city, both of us dressed in something other than scrubs for once, which somehow felt more intimate than half the things we'd already done together. "We've had sex in a supply closet and now we're doing, like, appetizers. It feels backwards."
"I like backwards," he said, reaching across the table to lace his fingers through mine, thumb moving slowly over my knuckles in that same absent, familiar gesture. "Backwards got us here. I'm not complaining."
He told me things, over the following weeks, that he'd never once mentioned in five months of whatever we'd been calling ourselves before… that he’d grown up in Australia, in a house on the outskirts of Brisbane where the summers were so hot the sidewalks shimmered, that his grandmother, the one Mrs. Sloane reminded him of, had died his second year of residency and he still hadn't fully figured out how to talk about it, that he'd chosen neurosurgery specifically because his father had suffered a stroke when Jake was fourteen and he'd spent three days in a hospital waiting room learning exactly how much a good doctor's steady hands could mean to a terrified family.
"That's why the leaving thing," he admitted, one night, both of us lying tangled together on his couch with the city lit up gold beyond the windows. "I watched my mom fall apart for a year after my dad's stroke… not because he died, he didn't, but because she'd built her whole life around him and then almost lost it overnight, and I decided, somewhere around sixteen, that I was never going to let anyone matter enough to do that to me. Leave first. Simple math."
"Bad math," I said, quietly.
"Yeah," he agreed, pressing a kiss to my temple. "Turns out. Took me thirty four years and one very stubborn orthopedic surgeon to figure that out."
I told him things too… about the residency program that had worn me down to nothing before I finally recognized it for what it was, about the breakup that had sent me looking at cross country job listings in the first place, about standing on my old curb in Chicago watching the moving truck pull away and wondering, for one genuinely terrifying second, if I'd made the biggest mistake of my life.
"You didn't," he said, when I told him that part. "For the record."
"No," I agreed, looking at him… really looking, the way I had that very first morning in the surgeons' lounge, except everything about the way I saw him now had changed. "I really didn't."
Hospital gossip, predictably, caught on within a week of us stopping the pretending… Sunoo won his bet, loudly, in the cafeteria, to a chorus of groans from everyone who'd bet against him, Jasmine declared herself personally responsible for our entire relationship and demanded to be a bridesmaid at a wedding that did not yet exist, even Dr. Kim, usually entirely unbothered by staff gossip, gave me a knowing look over a chart one morning that I chose not to examine too closely. Jake, to his credit, stopped pretending to be embarrassed about any of it almost immediately, walking me to my car after every shift like it was the easiest, most obvious thing in the world, no longer bothering to check who might be watching.
CHAPTER 35: OLD GROUND, NEW RULES
There was a moment, a few weeks into actually dating, where the old habits nearly tripped us both up… a reminder that just because we'd said the true thing out loud didn't mean five months of careful self protection simply evaporated overnight.
It happened over something small, Jake picked up an extra weekend shift without mentioning it until the morning of, an old holdover from a life built around never letting anyone plan too far ahead with him, and I found out from the schedule board instead of from him, which stung more than the actual inconvenience deserved.
"You could have told me," I said, that evening, more hurt than angry, though it came out sounding like both.
"I know. I'm sorry. It's just…" he dragged a hand back through his hair, frustrated with himself. "Old habit. I used to pick up shifts specifically so I'd have a built in excuse not to make plans with anyone. I didn't even think about it, I just did the thing I've always done, and then I remembered halfway through the day that I actually had someone to check in with now, and I didn't know how to walk it back without making it a whole thing."
"It doesn't have to be a whole thing. It just has to be a conversation. That's kind of the point of doing this for real."
"Yeah," he said, quietly. "I'm still learning that part. Bear with me."
"I'm not going anywhere," I said, and meant it, and watched something in his shoulders ease at hearing it, like some old, tired part of him hadn't quite believed I'd stay for anything less than a formal announcement.
We talked, properly, that night… not a fight exactly, more like two people renegotiating the terms of something neither of us had ever actually done before, not like this, not with any real intention of it lasting. He told me more about the string of almosts before me, not the gossip version but his own accounting of it… how each one had ended the same way, him pulling back the second things asked anything real of him, and how exhausting it had become, underneath the charm, to keep proving the reputation right.
"I don't want to keep doing that," he said. "With you. I want to actually be bad at this the normal way people are bad at relationships, not bail out before it gets the chance to be anything."
"I can work with bad at this," I told him. "I'm not exactly an expert either."
"No," he agreed, pulling me closer, "but you stuck around for the worst of it already. Feels like a decent sign."
It wasn't a dramatic turning point, not really… just an ordinary, unglamorous conversation about calendars and communication, the kind neither of us would have thought to mention if anyone asked us to describe the moment things got real. But it mattered, in its own quiet way, more than either of the big, cinematic scenes that came before it, because it was the first time either of us chose, deliberately, to do the hard, undramatic work of staying instead of just surviving one more dramatic moment of almost losing each other.
CHAPTER 36: MEETING THE FAMILY
"My mom wants to meet you," Jake said, one evening, with the particular tone of someone bracing for a reaction he wasn't sure he'd get. "Fair warning, she's going to ask you a hundred questions and probably show you baby photos. She's been waiting for this for a while."
"A while how long?"
"Since I mentioned you exist, if I'm being honest. Which was about two weeks after your first day, for the record, though I will deny that under oath if you ever bring it up in front of her."
"Two weeks," I repeated, delighted. "You were talking about me to your mother two weeks after I insulted your coffee opinions?"
"I said you had 'dramatic opinions about vending machines and terrifying competence in an OR.' It wasn't romantic. I want that on record."
"Sure it wasn't."
His parents lived in a house forty minutes east of the city… the place they’d moved to after leaving Australia when Jake was in his twenties..., a modest single story with a lemon tree in the front yard and a driveway crowded with a decade of accumulated family life… bikes that clearly belonged to nieces or nephews, a faded chalk hopscotch grid on the walkway, wind chimes that never quite stopped moving even on a still day. His mother, hugged me before I'd even gotten both feet through the door, already talking, already pulling out a photo album from somewhere suspiciously close at hand.
"He was a very serious baby," she informed me, flipping to a picture of an unmistakably grumpy infant Jake scowling at the camera. "Very serious. Didn't smile until he was almost one. The doctor said it was normal, but I worried."
"Mom," Jake said, with the particular long suffering patience of a grown man who had clearly had this exact conversation many times before.
"What? She should know these things. It's relevant information."
His father, quieter, more reserved, watched the whole exchange from an armchair with the faint, permanent weakness on his left side that Jake had told me about, and caught my eye at one point with a small, knowing smile. "He talks about you," he said, simply, once his mom had wandered off to check on dinner. "More than he's talked about anyone. Just so you know."
"Good talk or concerning talk?"
"Good talk," he said. "Very good talk."
Dinner ran long, loud, warm… his mom insisting I take home three separate containers of leftovers, Jake's younger sister video calling in from Portland halfway through dessert specifically to interrogate me about my intentions, which she did with a bluntness that made Jake put his head in his hands and made me laugh until my sides hurt… and it was well past ten by the time we finally left, both of us quiet in the car on the drive back, the radio low, streetlights sliding past the windows.
"That went well," I said, eventually.
"They loved you. Obviously. I told you they would." He reached over, found my hand in the dark, laced his fingers through mine. "For what it's worth, my dad doesn't say things like that lightly. The good talk thing."
"I could tell."
"Good," he said, quietly, and brought my hand up to press a kiss against my knuckles at a red light, unhurried, certain, and I thought, watching the city lights blur gold and warm through the windshield, that I had never in my life felt so completely, unexpectedly at home.
CHAPTER 37: NOT YET
The invitation arrived in early spring… not Jasmine's wedding, not yet, but a save the date for a hospital fundraiser gala that had become, in the months since Jake and I had gone public, something both of us actually looked forward to instead of dreading, if only because it meant an entire evening of watching Sunoo try and fail to act casual about having won a bet off our relationship.
"You clean up nice," Jake said, adjusting his tie in the mirror of our shared bedroom… a phrase that still gave me a small, private thrill every time I thought it, our bedroom, ours, not his, not mine, a fact that had happened so gradually I couldn't pinpoint the exact day the boxes labeled BEDROOM had simply stopped being separate from his things.
"You say that like it's a surprise."
"It's not a surprise. It's an observation. I'm allowed to make observations about my girlfriend."
"Girlfriend," I repeated, the word still faintly new enough to catch, pleasantly, in my chest every time either of us said it out loud. "Feels like a very flat word for everything we've been through to get here."
"We could go bigger," he said, mock thoughtful, catching my eye in the mirror. "Life partner. Significant other. Woman who insulted my coffee opinions on day one and never let up."
"That last one's a mouthful."
"Accurate, though."
The gala itself was, this time, an entirely different experience than the one that had ended in me white knuckling a wine glass on a terrace, watching him get cornered by a cardiology fellow I'd been unreasonably jealous of. This time he kept a hand at the small of my back all evening, introduced me to colleagues from departments I'd never worked with, and when Giselle caught my eye across the room at one point, she raised her glass in a small, knowing toast that made me laugh out loud, drawing a curious look from Jake that I didn't bother explaining.
Jasmine cornered me near the dessert table, considerably less subtle than Giselle had been. "So," she said, "when's the wedding."
"We've been together five months, Jasmine."
"I've had shorter engagements than your entire situationship took to resolve. I feel like I'm owed an speed up timeline out of principle."
"You're owed nothing," I told her, laughing, though later that night, dancing slow with Jake near the edge of the floor, the city lights spread out gold beyond the ballroom windows exactly the way they had been that first terrible gala, I let myself think about it anyway… some future version of this same room, or one like it, with considerably higher stakes than a silent auction nobody wanted to bid on.
"What are you thinking about?" Jake asked, catching the look on my face.
"Nothing," I said, and then, because I'd promised myself somewhere along the way to stop hiding the true things, "Actually. Everything. This. Us. Where it's all going."
"Yeah?" Something careful and hopeful crossed his face. "Good things, I hope."
"Very good things," I said, and let him pull me closer, both of us moving slow and easy to music neither of us was really paying attention to, thinking, for the first time in longer than I could remember, that the future wasn't something to brace against anymore… just something to look forward to, one ordinary, extraordinary day at a time.
CHAPTER 38: RESOLUTION
Nine months after I first stood in that surgeons' lounge insulting his coffee opinions, I stood on Jake's balcony… our balcony, really, since I'd given up the lease on my apartment two months earlier and moved most of my boxes labeled KITCHEN and BEDROOM into a spare room he'd cleared out without me even having to ask… watching the sun go down gold and pink over hills that had, somewhere along the way, stopped feeling foreign and started feeling like mine.
"You know," he said, coming up behind me with two glasses of wine, considerably better than the bottle I'd shown up with that first night, setting one down beside me on the railing, "I used to think leaving first was the smart move. Saved everyone the trouble."
"And now?"
"Now I think I just hadn't found the person worth staying for." He lifted my hand, pressed a kiss to my knuckles, unhurried, unguarded, nothing at all like the performance he used to wear so easily in hospital hallways. "Also, for the record, I noticed you staring at my hands on your very first day. Took you long enough to admit it."
"I wasn't staring."
"You were absolutely staring. Jasmine told me, weeks ago. Said you called them dramatic."
"I stand by that judgment."
"I'll allow it," he said, grinning, and pulled me closer, one arm settling easy around my waist like it had always belonged there.
Mrs. Sloane sent a card that spring, addressed to both of us… she'd heard, apparently, through some hospital grapevine neither of us had ever managed to identify the source of, and wanted us to know, in careful cursive, that she'd never once doubted it, watching the two of us in her hospital room all those months ago, and that she expected an invitation to whatever came next. Jake taped it to the refrigerator, right next to a photo from the gala neither of us had ever admitted to keeping, the two of us caught mid argument by someone's phone camera, months before either of us had said a single true thing to the other out loud.
We didn't rush anything, in the end… no dramatic proposal, no grand gesture, nothing that would have looked good as a hospital rumor. Just a slow, steady build up of Tuesday dinners and lazy Sunday mornings and the particular, acquired comfort of two people who had both spent a long time convinced that leaving first was safer than staying, learning, one ordinary day at a time, that it wasn't.
"You know," I told him, one evening months later, both of us tangled together on the couch, his thumb tracing slow, absent circles against the back of my hand, "when I moved out here, I told myself I needed to find out who I was when nobody already had an opinion about it. Find myself. Fresh start. All of it."
"Did you?"
"I think so," I said, considering it. "Turns out I'm someone who falls for insufferable neurosurgeons with very dramatic veins in his hands. Wasn't exactly the plan, but I'll take it."
"High praise," he said, laughing, and pulled me closer, and outside the window the city went on being loud and ordinary and entirely unaware of the fact that somewhere in it, two surgeons who'd spent five months insisting they didn't do feelings had finally, quietly, completely stopped pretending otherwise.
Lights on, this time. No more hiding in supply closets and on-call rooms and rules built to keep either of us safe from the other.
Just this. Just us. Just the whole wide, golden, unfamiliar city that had somehow, without either of us noticing exactly when, become home.
CHAPTER 39: ONE YEAR LATER
A year to the day after I'd stood on a curb in Chicago watching a moving truck pull away, I stood on a different curb entirely… outside XO Medical Center, at the end of a shift, waiting for Jake to finish signing off on a consult so we could drive to the beach for the sunset picnic he'd been suspiciously insistent about all week.
Jasmine had, predictably, been right about everything, a fact she reminded me of at least once a week with an insufferable amount of satisfaction. Sunoo had collected his winnings from the bet months ago and had, somehow, transformed the story into minor legend status among the incoming residents, who now regarded the two of us with a kind of admiring curiosity usually reserved for attendings who'd survived something genuinely dramatic. Mrs. Sloane still sent a card every few months, walking to church every Sunday exactly as promised, and had recently taken to including updates about a great grandchild she was very transparently hoping we'd take an interest in as a parenting preview.
The beach that evening was quiet, the tourist crowds thinned out by the hour, the sky doing its usual, impossible show of color as the sun dropped toward the water… pink bleeding into orange, orange into a deep, bruised purple, the whole horizon on fire in a way that had stopped surprising me and never once stopped taking my breath away.
"You're doing the thing," Jake said, spreading out a blanket, watching me watch the sky.
"What thing?"
"The thing where you look at this view like you still can't quite believe you live here."
"I can't," I admitted. "Some mornings I still wake up and I'm surprised there are palm trees outside my window instead of a parking lot in Chicago. I don't think that surprise is ever fully going to wear off."
"Good," he said, sitting down beside me, close enough that our shoulders touched, his hand finding mine automatically, fingers lacing through mine in the gesture that had become so familiar I barely registered it as a gesture anymore, just as a fact of how his hand fit against mine. "I like that you still notice it. Most people who grow up here stop seeing it after a while. Takes an outsider to remember how strange and beautiful the whole thing actually is."
"Is that what I am? An outsider?"
"You were," he said, "on day one, staring at my hands like you'd never seen a neurosurgeon's veins before in your life." A pause, his thumb moving slow and absent over my knuckles, the same gesture from that very first almost kiss in a hospital hallway a lifetime ago. "You're not anymore. Not to me. Not for a long time now."
I turned to look at him then, the last of the light catching the side of his face exactly the way it had that first night in his penthouse, and felt the same catch in my chest I'd felt every single time since… a small, private wonder that this, of all things, was where three thousand miles and one deeply unwise hospital rule had eventually led.
"For the record," I said, "I still think about that first day. The coffee. The hands. All of it."
"For the record," he said, lifting my hand to press a slow kiss against my knuckles, unhurried, certain, the ocean going dark and gold behind him, "so do I. Best mistake I ever made, letting you insult my coffee opinions and stick around anyway."
"Second best," I corrected.
"What's the first?"
"Not leaving first," I said, quietly, "even when it would have been so much easier."
He didn't say anything to that… just pulled me closer, pressed a kiss to my temple, and we sat there together as the sun finally dropped below the water and the sky went fully, softly dark, lights coming on one by one along the coast behind us, the whole wide, glittering city we'd both, somehow, separately and then together, learned to call home.
We stayed at the beach long after the color had drained fully out of the sky, long after the last of the tourists had packed up their towels and headed back toward the boardwalk, until it was just us and the sound of the waves and the distant hum of the pier lights flickering on further down the shore. Jake pulled a second, smaller blanket from his bag… the same bag, I realized, that had held the first one, which meant he'd planned this far more carefully than his usual breezy just a picnichad let on… and wrapped it around both our shoulders, and I let myself lean fully into him, listening to his heartbeat under my ear, steady and unhurried, nothing at all like the frantic, uncertain thing it had felt like in an on-call bedroom over a year ago.
"You know what I keep thinking about," I said, quietly, into the dark.
"What's that?"
"That first week, when I was so sure I'd made a mistake moving out here. Sitting in my apartment surrounded by boxes, calling my sister, telling her I didn't know a single person in this entire city." I tilted my head back to look up at him. "I had no idea I was about to meet the person who'd make it feel like home. I was so busy being terrified of starting over that I almost missed it happening right in front of me."
"For what it's worth," he said, pressing his lips to my hair, "I think that's usually how the good things sneak in. Not with an announcement. Just quietly, while you're busy being scared of something else entirely."
"That's annoyingly wise for someone who spent five months insisting he didn't do feelings."
"I'm full of surprises, remember," he said, for what had to be the hundredth time since that very first day in his kitchen, and I laughed, the sound carrying out over the dark water, easy and unguarded in a way I don't think I'd ever quite managed to be with anyone before him.
We didn't talk about the future in any specific terms that night… no ring, no formal declaration, nothing that would have made a tidy ending to the story other people at the hospital liked to tell about us. Just two people who had both spent a long time convinced that leaving first was the safer bet, sitting together on a dark beach in a city neither of us had originally planned to call home, in absolutely no hurry to be anywhere else.
That would come later. Both of us, it turned out, still had a little more waiting left in us… just the good kind, this time.
CHAPTER 40: THE PROPOSAL
He asked me eight months after that night on the beach, and true to form, he did not do it the way anyone at XO Medical would have predicted.
There was no elaborate scheme, no orchestrated flash mob, no hiring out the entire farmers market to be in on it… I'd braced myself for something ridiculous, honestly, given how much he'd been disappearing on "errands" for the two weeks prior, texting, "don't ask, it's a surprise" in his usual lowercase whenever I got suspicious. What I got instead was a Tuesday.
An entirely ordinary Tuesday, in fact… both of us off, which was rare enough on its own, spent exactly the way we spent most of our rare shared days off by then, the farmers market first, Gerald pressing an extra bag of peaches on us "for the road" with a wink that, in hindsight, should have tipped me off immediately, and then the trail above the city, the same overlook where he'd told me, more than a year earlier, that he'd stopped wondering what would've happened if he'd taken the Seattle job instead.
"You're being weird," I told him, near the top, watching him check his pocket for the third time in ten minutes.
"I'm not being weird."
"You've patted your jacket pocket like it's about to catch fire since we left the car."
"Allergies," he said, entirely unconvincingly, and I let it go mostly because the view had opened up in front of us, the whole valley spread out hazy gold in the late afternoon light, the ocean a thin silver seam at the edge of everything, exactly the way it had looked that very first time.
"This spot again," I said, smiling. "You really do love this rock."
"I love a lot of things about this spot," he said, and there was something different in his voice, something that made me actually look at him instead of the view. "This is where I told you I'd stopped wondering about Seattle. Where I figured out, sitting right here, that I didn't want to be anywhere I couldn't picture you being too."
"Jake—"
"Let me finish, I've been rehearsing this for two weeks and Gerald made me practice it on him three separate times." He was smiling, but his hands weren't quite steady, and when he reached into his jacket pocket this time it wasn't for a ghostly allergy tissue. "I spent most of my life leaving before things got real, because it felt safer than finding out what happens if you let something matter and it falls apart anyway. You're the first person who ever made staying feel like the safer bet instead. And I don't want to keep proving that to myself one ordinary Tuesday at a time. I want to prove it for the rest of however many ordinary Tuesdays we get."
He dropped to one knee right there on the dusty overlook trail, a small velvet box open in his hand, catching the same gold light that had caught the side of his face in his penthouse kitchen a year and a half earlier, back when neither of us had a single true thing figured out yet.
"Marry me," he said, simply, the Australian lilt a little stronger with nerves. "Lights on, this time. No hiding any of it."
I said yes before he'd even finished getting the box all the way open, which he complained about for weeks afterward… you didn't even let me finish the sentence properly… and a passing hiker, a total stranger, whooped loud enough that a pair of birds startled up out of the chaparral below us, and neither of us cared even a little that our engagement had an audience of one very enthusiastic jogger in running shorts.
"For the record," I told him, once he'd gotten the ring onto my shaking hand and pulled me into a kiss that tasted faintly of Gerald's peaches, "I would have said yes on day one too. If you'd asked me while I was insulting your coffee opinions."
"Don't tell me that," he said, laughing against my mouth. "I spent way too long being an idiot about this. I don't need to know I could've skipped several months of it."
"Worth the wait, though?"
"Every second," he said, and kissed me again, the whole city glittering awake below us as the sun finally dropped behind the hills.
CHAPTER 41: THE WEDDING
We got married the following spring, on the beach… the same stretch of coast where he'd proposed to me a second time, technically, in his own head at least, the night of the beach picnic that neither of us had called an engagement yet but both of us, looking back, agreed had basically been one.
It was small, by design… closer to fifty people than the sprawling, catered affair Jake's mom had gently lobbied for during at least four separate dinners. Jasmine was my maid of honor, exactly as she'd been threatening to be since the very first week she found out about us, and she cried through the entire ceremony despite loudly insisting beforehand that she absolutely would not. Sunoo gave a toast at the reception that opened with "I won forty dollars off this relationship, and honestly, it was worth every cent," which got the loudest laugh of the night and made Dr. Kim, seated at the head table in a rare moment of unguarded warmth, actually snort into her champagne.
Mrs. Sloane came, cane and all, refusing every offer of a wheelchair with the same stubbornness that had gotten her through her own surgery years earlier, and pulled me aside before the ceremony to press a small, worn rosary into my hand… "for luck," she said, "and because I told you both, from the very first day I watched you in my hospital room, that I already knew." I kept it tucked into my bouquet the whole ceremony, and gave it back to her, tearfully, at the end of the night.
Jake's father walked him partway down the aisle on Jake's mom's arm.. slower than either of them wanted, the lingering weakness on his left side more pronounced by then, but steady, determined, refusing every offer to sit down before the job was done… and Jake cried before I even reached him, which surprised absolutely no one who'd watched him wipe away tears in a hospital hallway after Sana Kombu's surgery and blame it, unconvincingly, on allergies.
"You're doing the crying thing," I whispered, once I reached him, taking both his hands… the same hands, veins and all, that I'd been quietly obsessed with since day one, a fact the entire wedding party had been informed of at length by Jasmine during her toast.
"I'm allowed. It's my wedding."
"Our wedding."
"Our wedding," he agreed, and something about hearing him say it, out loud, in front of everyone who'd watched this entire ridiculous, five months of denial story unfold from the very beginning, undid something in my chest that I hadn't realized was still holding on to any last bit of disbelief that this was actually happening.
The vows were simple… we'd written our own, both of us stubbornly refusing to let the other one see a draft beforehand… and Jake's, when it came to it, circled right back to the beginning, the way I should have known it would.
"I used to think leaving first was the safest thing I could do for anyone I cared about," he said, voice rough, not bothering to hide it. "You taught me that staying is actually the brave part. Lights on, no more hiding… that's the only promise I really need to make you today, because it's the one that covers everything else. I'm not going anywhere. Not this time. Not ever."
My own vows were shorter, mostly because I'd rewritten them four separate times trying to say everything I wanted to and kept coming back to the same simple truth underneath all of it. "I moved three thousand miles to find out who I was without anyone else's opinion weighing on it," I told him, "and it turns out the answer was someone who falls hard for insufferable neurosurgeons with dramatic veins in their hands. I wouldn't change a single detour it took to get here… not the rules, not the mess, not any of it. Just you. Always, from here on out, just you."
We danced our first dance to something slow and a little too sentimental for either of our tastes on any other night, and somewhere around the second chorus Jasmine cut in, loudly informing Jake that she required "at least one dance as compensation for five months of secondhand emotional labor," and he laughed and handed me off without a fight, watching from the edge of the floor with an expression I'd come to know very well by then… the one that meant he still, after everything, couldn't quite believe his own luck.
CHAPTER 42: TWO LINES
We found out on an entirely unremarkable Sunday morning, almost two years into the marriage, in the small, cluttered bathroom of the house we'd bought together the previous spring… a modest place not far from the beach, close enough that Jake still ran the same coastal path most mornings, closer still to his parents' house than either of us had originally planned, though neither of us minded that particular accident of real estate.
I sat on the edge of the tub with the test face down on the counter, both of us staring at it like it might do something unexpected if we looked away too soon.
"You're allowed to look," Jake said, crouched down in front of me, hands braced on my knees, his own hands… still the same hands, still doing that thing to my chest they'd been doing since day one… not quite steady.
"You look. I can't."
He reached over, turned it faceup, and went very, very quiet.
"Jake."
"Two lines," he said, voice cracking clean down the middle, and when he looked up at me his eyes were already wet, the same unguarded, undefended look he'd worn at the altar, at Sana Kombu's bedside all those years ago, every single time he stopped bothering to perform anything at all. "Two lines. We're—"
"We're having a baby," I finished for him, because he genuinely could not get the words out, and then neither of us could say anything else for a long moment, both of us laughing and crying at the same time on the bathroom floor of the house we'd built together out of one very unwise hospital rule and every single thing that came after it.
We told his mom first, over dinner two weeks later, and she burst into tears so immediately and so loudly that Jake's father had to explain, laughing, that yes, these were the happy kind, before she'd even managed to get a single word out. Jasmine found out at work, trapped me in the on-call lounge the moment she noticed I'd turned down coffee twice in one week, and screamed loud enough that half the floor came to check if there was an emergency. Mrs. Sloane, informed by card exactly as she'd once predicted the whole relationship into existence, sent back a tiny, hand knitted baby blanket within the week, along with a note that said, simply, I told you both. I always know.
The pregnancy wasn't without its complications… a scare at eighteen weeks that sent both of us, doctors as we were, into a version of panic neither of our medical training had adequately prepared us for, an entire night spent in an ultrasound room holding hands so tightly Jake's knuckles went white, waiting for a heartbeat that, thankfully, steady and strong, eventually appeared on the screen. Jake cried again that night too, unashamed, forehead pressed to mine in the dim light of the ultrasound room, whispering something too quiet for even me to catch, though I had a fairly good guess what it was.
She arrived in the spring, seven days past her due date and in no particular hurry even then, in the same hospital where both her parents had built an entire life around each other without either of them meaning to. Jake held her first, in the quiet, exhausted hour just after, tears streaking silently down his face, that same absent gesture… thumb tracing slow, careful circles, this time against the impossibly small back of a hand that already, unmistakably, had his same long fingers.
"Hey," he murmured to her, voice wrecked and soft, "you've got dramatic hands too. Runs in the family, apparently."
"Don't start," I said, laughing, exhausted, watching the two of them with a fullness in my chest I hadn't known was possible before that exact moment.
"I'm just saying. Someone's going to stare at these hands one day and fall hopelessly, catastrophically in love, same as her mother did." He looked up at me, that same easy, unguarded smile from a hospital lounge years earlier, except everything underneath it had changed completely. "Best mistake I ever made. All of it. Every single step."
"Second best," I corrected, softly, looking down at our daughter, at the whole wide, unexpected life we'd built out of one insulted cup of coffee and a set of dramatic veins.
"What's the first?"
"This," I said. "All of this. Right here."
He didn't argue. He just leaned in, pressed a kiss to my temple, then to our daughter's tiny, sleeping head, and outside the hospital window the city went on glittering, wide and golden and entirely, finally, unmistakably home.
Lights on. No more hiding. Just this… just all of this… for as long as we get to have it.
THE END
Hope you guys enjoyed it! I think I might try to do more fics inspired by shows! I love Grey's Anatomy, so I thought it was good inspiration! Please let me know if you guys have any requests!
warnings : smut -mdni, implied unprotected sex, swearing, hee is a virgin, semi!public sex, bathroom sex, implied big!dick hee, cumming inside, oral (m.rec), if theres anything else lmk !!
# : first fic ever, kinda nervy, i love hee so muchhh, i hope you enjoy, likes and reblogs appreciated.
The bass from the speakers was vibrating through the floorboards. The frat house smelled of cheap vodka and swwat, a blur of neon lights and grinding bodies.
Heeseung felt entirely out of place, his fingers gripping a red plastic cup as if it were a lifeline. Beside him, (Y/n) looked like she owned the room. She leaned back against the wall, her body highlighted by a skin-tight outfit that left little to the imagination, her eyes tracking him with a predatory glint.
"You're awfully quiet tonight, Hee," she purred, her voice cutting through the noise, "Something on your mind?"
Heeseung swallowed hard, his throat dry. He looked at her—really looked at her—and the sheer confidence radiating off her made his stomach flip. He didn't want to be the only one in their circle who was clueless. "Just... everyone here seems so experienced..."
(Y/n)’s eyebrows shot up, and a slow smirk spread across her lips. She didn't laugh; instead, she stepped closer, the scent of her perfume mixing with the heat of her skin. She reached out, her fingers sliding across the waistband of his jeans, "Experienced... and youre a virgin?"
Heeseung nodded, his chewks turned a dark shade of red, "I- I.... yes.."
"You poor baby, do you want some help?" her hand slid down, barely grazing his growing hard on, "I can help you. Come this way."
He followed her like a moth to a flame, his heart hammering against his ribs. She led him down a hallway, dodging a group of drunken freshmen, and pushed open the door to the bathroom.
The click of the lock echoing in the small space. Suddenly, the noise of the party was muffled, replaced by the sound of Heeseung's heavy breathing.
(Y/n) didn't waste a second. She turned around and pushed him back against the cold tile wall, her hands immediately diving for his belt. "First lesson," she murmured, her eyes locking onto his. "You don't have to worry about a thing. Just feel."
Heeseung gasped as she pulled his jeans down, his hard, aching cock springing free. He had never been seen like this, and the vulnerability made him tremble.
(Y/n) let out a low hum of approval, her gaze roaming over his lenghth before she dropped to her knees, "Youre pretty big for a virgin, arent you sweet?"
Heeseung's breath hitched as she spoke and wrapped her fingers around the base of his shaft, her grip firm.
Then, she leaned in and swiped her tongue from the base to the tip, tasting the pre-cum that had already leaked out.
"Shit..." Heeseung moaned, his head hitting the wall behind him.
She didn't stop to let him breathe. She took him deep into her mouth, her cheeks hollowing as she sucked with a quickening pace.
Heeseung felt his knees buckle; the sensation was overwhelming, a thousand electric needles firing through his nerves. He looked down, watching her dark hair as she worked on him, her tongue swirling around the head of his dick. He felt a desperate need to please her, to do whatever she wanted.
(Y/n) pulled back, a string of saliva connecting her lips to his glistening tip. She stood up, her eyes dark with lust, and unbuttoned Heeseungs shirt, pulling it of entirely.
She let her hands roam across the hard planes of his chest, "Strong little thing, arent you?" she teased before quickly stripping off her own clothes, revealing a body that made Heeseung’s head spin.
She guided him toward the bathtub- sitting him down on the edge and hoisting her legs up to wrapping them around his waist, pulling him flush against her soaking wet pussy.
"Now," she whispered, hand alipping between them to pump his length a few times before guiding him to her entrance. "Slowly. Just push."
Heeseung trembled, his breath coming in ragged gasps as he felt the heat of her. He pushed his hips forward, the tight friction of her walls gripping him.
He let out a choked cry, the sensation of being surrounded by her gummy walls so intense it almost felt like pain, but it was quickly replaced by a strong pleasure.
"That's it, baby," (Y/n) encouraged, her voice a low hum as she began lift her hips up and down. "Just like that. Give it all to me."
Heeseung lost all control. He began to thrust, his movements clumsy at first but quickly becoming urgent as he followed her lead. He was drowning in her, the smell of sex and the sound of their skin slapping together filling the small room. He felt her muscles clench around him, milking him, driving him toward a cliff he had never seen before.
"I'm... I'm gonna..." Heeseung sobbed, his body tightening.
"Do it," she commanded, digging her nails into his shoulders. "Cum for me, Hee. Fill me up."
With a guttural scream, Heeseung's hips buckled, his entire body shuddering as he allowed his liquid to gush inside her.
He felt the hot, pulsing jets of his cum filling her, a release so violent it left him breathless and shaking. He collapsed against her, his forehead resting on her shoulder, his heart racing as the aftershocks of his first orgasm rippled through his lean frame. (Y/n) slowed eased off him, grabbing a rowel off the sink and gently wiping him down.
Dazed, Heeseung spoke up, "Did i do well?"
(Y/n) giggled, brushing his hair off his face, "You did amazing, baby."
this is all fiction- nothing in this story depicts any of the characters in real life. this work belongs to me do not steal.
✦ SYNOPSIS ⎯⎯⎯⎯ For years, Heeseung has lived by a single rule: complete the mission, no matter the cost. As one of the most skilled agents in his unit, he's spent his life chasing criminals, uncovering conspiracies, and surviving battles few ever walk away from. But everything begins to change the moment one assignment ties his fate to the woman he's willing to risk everything for.
With dangerous enemies closing in and the truth buried beneath layers of deception, Heeseung is forced to make an impossible choice between the duty that defined him and the future he's always dreamed of. Because some wars don't end on the battlefield. And sometimes, the most dangerous mission is protecting the person you love.
୨ৎ ֹ 𝐡𝐞𝐞𝐬𝐧𝐠𝐢𝐫𝐥 ۟⎯⎯ "This is a story that was originally published on Wattpad. It’s a 'One Shot' with a word count of exactly 54,738 words. It was originally split into two parts, but... for the sake of my own convenience and functionality, I decided to break it down into 4 parts here on Tumblr. Updates won't take too long, and you won't have to wait ages between posts since the story is already finished. I hope it gets a warm reception ~"
Oh, by the way, if anyone would like to be added to the taglist for this post, just let me know in the comments.
— PAIRING: frat president!Lee Heeseung x fem!nerd!reader
— SUMMARY: You still won't talk to him, so everyone tries to get through to both of you, one way or another.
— WORD COUNT: 8.7k (i tried :/)
— WARNINGS: ANGST, cursing (this might be the cursing chapter), violence, character nerfing, mentions of past cheating, depictions of normal boy stinkiness, riki locks in, mentions of drunk driving and car crashes, i think i went crazy here too (you let me know), when i say everyone i mean everyone, taking the grump a little too seriously in this chapter, monster high is mentioned, still on my downbad!hee agenda
Heeseung freshman year probably would have scared the panties off of you. He was even still frightful looking back on his adolescent time. He was only 18, fresh out of high school without a clue in the fucking world.
He'd never tell anyone because they'd clown him for it but that's why he was so thankful for Gamma.
Those boys were more his family than he thought.
If it wasn't for his previous president, he wouldn't have never made it out of his introvert ways, he would have never let himself come out of the shell he had been building since high school.
Yeonjun was more than his president, he was a mentor, a friend. They did grow up together after all.
All freshman year, they dreamed of getting in. Yeonjun first and Heeseung after he made it up the ladder.
He's the reason he tried so hard to be good for the boys, because he had such a good example and he wanted so badly to follow it.
Now he was on his ass and he couldn't help but feel like this was the place he belonged.
He chose to lie to you, to keep things from you when it would have been so easy to explain. Even Riki saw it as the proper decision. That's how he knew he was wrong.
He just wished he had a chance to clear his name.
He may have lied to you but he didn't want to go down wrongfully as a cheater. Not again.
୨ৎ
You felt it buzzing in your nightstand, you just refused to touch it, not when you already knew who it was.
heeseung
baby, please let me explain
i'm not that type of guy, i swear
even if we weren't together, i didn't want to be any other girls anyway
It was just noise at this point, you had to block him, you just didn't have the energy to. Keeho had to do it for you.
Yunjin didn't have the heart either.
Not when she was as close to him as she was to you. It was like picking a favorite trainwreck.
She was at a crossroads.
On one hand, this didn't sound like the Heeseung she grew up with but on the other hand, he was kind of seeming like a repeat offender and it was hard to defend that.
So you kind of just avoided the topic for a bit. And each other it seemed. It was the elephant that was taking all the air out of the room. You had to stay away.
It was weird but she knew how much you enjoyed your space as well when you were feeling bad, it was the best thing she could do for you from afar.
It was better than meeting the eye of the storm.
Although Riki didn't seem to get the message.
It had been a few days since the Gamma party and since you finally made the decision to cut off communication fully (or more like was made to).
He was on his way to class when he saw you doing a little sad little slump across the grass.
"Y/n!"
You knew what the depth of Riki's voice sounded like, you knew it very personally but you weren't turning around for it.
He didn't wrong you, you just didn't feel like it.
Due to having the world's longest legs, he catches up to you in no time, cutting you off by standing in front of you, blocking the sun.
"I need to talk to you." He huffed, catching his breath as it was still so early in the morning.
"I told you you're not getting stupider and you don't need my help anymore. I showed you enough and anything else you might need, you could find in the library where Keeho or Jiung could help you out."
"I don't want some book. I want you. I was learning best when a real person was explaining it to me and you are the only one I trust. Life was easier when you were helping me."
"Well, you're a grown man, Riki. If you're still slipping up over math this late in life, I don't know what you want me to tell you." Your venom spat him like a weird rainstorm.
He's not unfamiliar, it was the version of you he knew best, it just wasn't the version he had grown to care about in that older sister way.
"You're both no fun when you're apart."
The mention reignited your anger, even if it wasn't for him, it was his now for bringing it up.
"Who's fault is that?"
"Oh, it's his. Everyone's already dug into him for it; your girl, Yunjin included. But I don't think it's fair to not at least have one conversation with him about it."
"You're right about one thing: you don't think." You snickered at your own joke before making your escape.
But it was must be a rule that you're not allowed to let people leave conversations in their house because he's on your tail quick, following in pace with you.
"I mean the story doesn't seem a little iffy to you? Of him cheating?"
You shrugged. "I know what I saw, Riki."
"No, him and Chae. He never told you?"
That earned a head shake on your part. You don't stop walking so he continued, right by your side.
"According to Jake, Hee got drunk at a pledge party and someone caught him making out with some girl so they took a picture. Chaewon saw it, broke up with him that night. That doesn't sound like him."
You quirked a brow at the tall boy. "How not?"
His shoulders slumped, disappointed.
"Heeseung doesn't drink."
That gets you to stop.
Your feet paused and you turned, putting your hand on his chest to keep him with you.
"Hold on. Back up. What do you mean Gamma's all-star president doesn't drink?"
Now he was the one who didn't know what you were talking about, rubbing his neck all boyish.
"In the two-and-a-half years I've know him, I have never so much as seen him touch a beer unless he was cleaning up the night after. When he buys kegs, it's for everyone else. He says he doesn't drink because he doesn't feel as though we would be safe with him incapacitated." And then he jerked his shoulders, like that was some unknown word.
You'd hit him in the face if you weren't so tired.
"So there was no way he was drunk when he supposedly cheated on you and Chaewon."
The eye roll you were holding was detrimental, it was louder than anything you could have said to either of them. Because at this point, you just wanted to be left alone, you didn't care anymore.
You saw this film before and the ending wasn't pretty then either.
"Can you please stop saying he cheated on me? We were not together, therefore it's not possible for him to cheat on me."
Even Riki wasn't buying that shit. His expression went flat.
"You can lie to anybody else but there's no one who notices small things more than the stupid guy. You can't tell me you two weren't genuinely into each other. I have never heard him giggle more high-pitched in my life."
He did have a weird laugh that deployed whenever you'd make a joke. You often told him he sounded like a girl but in actuality, it was one of your favorite noises.
"That doesn't matter, Riki. That house is haunted and I refuse to step foot. We all got what wanted: your grades are better and Mr. C's off my back. We don't have to be in each other's lives anymore."
And that was it, you walked off after that.
He didn't run after you, all he could do was hope that his words got through.
But knowing how stubborn you could be, he was better off getting comfortable with the librarians.
Heeseung felt like the shell of a man.
He made his stinky bed and now he refused to leave it. Which incidentally was causing the stink.
He still was there to help the boys with the big stuff but other than that, unless someone was dead, dying, or bleeding, do not enter the funk zone. Not unless you were willing to sacrifice your nose.
Plus his bathroom in there, all of it was just..mixing together into something awful.
He figured this was his punishment, since he hurt you so bad, he didn't deserve luxuries like soap or the sometimes titillating excitement of enjoying someone's presence.
And this was the worst time to be down for the count because it was a special weekend; pledge weekend.
All of the boys were putting together beautiful torturous things together to do poor saps who had the gall to walk through those doors.
But no one seemed to be having any fun since you could practically feel the sadness dripping out of Heeseung's cracked door.
He even had the nerve to open it and let the smell season the hallway.
Even Beomgyu was complaining about it, and he hadn't seen his floor since he moved into the house.
With the president out, his second-in-command was left to figure things out. The role was appointed to Jake but he was off bothering some girl and not answering his phone so it was left up to the next heir to the throne: Riki.
He was never left in charge, he never knew what to do with it.
Usually he probably do something incredibly stupid like fill the kitchen with bubbles or get a stripper with Heeseung's card.
But he couldn't, because now he cared about Heeseung's wellbeing more than his own. That was his older brother, the man who stuck around for his bullshit even when he super didn't deserve anyone.
If he didn't help, he wouldn't be able to live with himself.
Or Heeseung anymore, frankly — not with the stench.
He knew this situation was out of his wheelhouse, he barely knew how to take care of his room, let alone someone older like his president.
So he called in reinforcements, someone who knew how to get him out of this funk. Emphasis on funk.
"Hee, you have to get up. This is getting sad." Riki pestered, hitting his feet, hoping it was enough to get him to move.
He still laid dead, head buried in his pillows.
"I don't care, Rik. I don't want to socialize. I don't care about the pledges. I don't even care about Gamma. I just want her." His words come out hoarse and muffled, he hadn't talked in bit and he had been crying a little.
"Don't care about Gamma? That's not my Hee."
The sound of his voice made Heeseung shoot right up, it was like the police were at the door. Suddenly he felt like a measly little freshman again, getting hazed.
His eyes shot to the door, just in case he could be imagining things once again but then Riki moved to the side to reveal the previous Gamma president, Yeonjun, all smiley and looking new.
Heeseung almost didn't recognize him, that's how shiny he was now.
That's enough to get him to leave the bed, and wash up since your best friend would be the only one to tell you smell obscene and need to fix it. Everyone was telling him all week, Yeonjun was just the only one he decided to listen to.
If only Riki knew that earlier in his quest.
୨ৎ
After finally washing up and fixing his room up, then he was free to meet his friend in the kitchen for the catching up he had been waiting for.
He could hug him without getting pushed away because he was ripe.
He offered him a beer as he would normally and of course, he doesn't pass it up.
"Still on that sober adult bullshit?" Yeonjun snickered to himself, popping open his drink and taking a swig like he had done so many times before. "I told you you seem insane."
"And I told you I am not planning on wrapping a car around a tree again," he rounded the island, coming to sit with his friend, coffee in hand since he basically just woke up.
"Bro, that was in high school! You have to get over it." Yeonjun stressed, rolling his eyes.
But it wasn't just 'something that happened in high school' for Heeseung, it was the day him and Yeonjun had officially become best friends.
They say you are bonded once you got through an unexpected trauma together.
Yeonjun and Heeseung's was their junior year.
First party of the year, both of them got a little excited being surrounded by their peers and they got more than they bargained for. They didn't bring another friend so Heeseung thought it was a good idea to get behind the wheel.
He had less drinks than his friend so he thought maybe he was more sober.
Wrong — half of 'a lot' is still lot.
And it's ten times worse in the rain.
They were just a few short blocks of Heeseung's house before he full sended it into a tree in front of their English teacher's house.
They were lucky he was home because it didn't look good when they got to the hospital.
Heeseung got off easy with the air bags, just a broken arm and he had a broken nose for a bit. Both were cool, girls dug it. However, he didn't get to bask in his pity flirting because Yeonjun was in the hospital for the first half of the semester.
The tree hit his side so he got more of the blow.
Heeseung never forgave himself for it, so he's been sober since.
It wasn't something he took lightly but he knew how unserious boys were, he let it slide since they're best friends.
"I never get over anything. You know this, bro."
"That I do, buddy. That I do."
They both take sips of their drinks in unison.
"So tell me why Riki called me late last night and told me you haven't had a shower in days. You stopped bathing?" Yeonjun made a stank face, waving at his nose.
"What?"
"Are you on that stuff?" He grimaced.
"No! Why would I be on drugs?!" Heeseung's eyes widened, all you could see was white.
"I seem to recall you being the one to say you wouldn't be able to get addicted to crack." Yeonjun squinted.
"I think I'm too strong!"
That melted any ice that might've have frosted over their friendship, the divide felt so large while apart but once together, everything was already back to how he remembered it.
His brother.
They laughed together and suddenly it's like old times.
"Not but seriously, what's this about? Is it a girl?"
He goes silent, that's enough answer.
"Same ol' Hee."
He just smiled back at his disappointed bestie.
"So who is it? It's not still Chaewon?"
He shook his head with quick pace.
"Ok, anyone I know?"
"Probably not. She's an angel. She only comes into people's lives to brighten them and all they do is ruin it by being lying assholes."
That made a laugh roar out of Yeonjun.
"You never change!"
Heeseung hit him in the shoulder but it has no real fire since he's still guffawing at his friend's misfortune.
"Isn't this the same shit Chaewon broke up with for?"
"Yes! But you know that wasn't me. I don't drink. I would remember cheating on my girlfriend. That guy just looked like me."
Heeseung could remember that party front to back, he was supposed to be on since he wanted Yeonjun to have fun and feel safe. Heeseung was his number two.
He hadn't even talked to many girls, he was too busy putting fires out and making sure everyone else was having fun.
Kind of like practice for when he did finally get president.
He zapped out of his mind when he noticed the expression on Yeonjun's face. It's not caught or anything, but it does look like he's weighing his options.
"What?" He doesn't usually like what follows that look.
"I mean, it's been long enough, I can tell you. That was me, in the picture."
The record in his head stopped.
"Yeah, remember when we dyed our hair the same color that one year for the twin party? Everyone wouldn't stop thinking you looked like me from behind and vice versa? That pic was supposed to go in that slideshow that I abandoned for obvious reasons."
"And you let her break up with me for something YOU did?"
"In my defense, I didn't think she was good enough for you anyway. She was harshing the brand."
His mouth falls open as he gets to his feet to look down on this guy he thought was his friend.
"What brand?"
"The one we've been building since high school, Hee!" He jumped up too, meeting him almost exactly. "We were supposed to be athletes together, traveling the world and getting with dozens of girls. A girlfriend would have made that exceptionally hard."
And just like that, his fingers found the grounding grip of his own hair. He was due for one anyway, like cracking knuckles.
"I guess I'm not the only one who hasn't changed in the time we've been apart. Because it wouldn't be you without your narcissism. Not everyone wants to follow in your footsteps all the time!"
"You did." Yeonjun smirked. "In fact, you wanted to be me so bad you stole my girl. I told you how much I liked Chaewon first."
His face just fell. "No, you didn't. You told me how badly you wanted to hook up, you never said anything about wanting to date her."
"I couldn't, I already had a girlfriend."
And then the conversation was flipped on its side again, because now Heeseung was genuinely confused. "Since when did you have a girlfriend?" He sat back down, Yeonjun following after.
"I had a girlfriend for a while. You just didn't know about her because parties were never her thing. I also was a little ashamed by how much I liked her. She was one of the only girls who made me feel like that." He looked up, lost in the memory.
It was a different vibe for him, Heeseung didn't mind it.
"I can't believe this. You had an entire girlfriend and I never knew about it? You told me everything, even when you lost your virginity."
"I kept her hush, just for me."
"What was her name?"
"Y/n."
It was like a roller coaster, one second, he was on the ground, having a catch-up with his friend, and suddenly he was at the top of the track, putting things together way too easily and about to throw up.
Your story of getting cheated on at a party, his about his drunken escapades. Your hate for frat boys. He was childhood friends with the reason. He was literally sharing a drink with the enemy.
Parties were never your thing.
For the first time in his entire life, he was actually sickened by Yeonjun.
This was a guy who shat his pants on a school trip and had to borrow Heeseung's, and yet, what he did to you was so much more embarrassing.
"Hee, you okay?" He snapped in front of his shocked face. "Did I lose you?"
"Yeah, you did. For a while. Maybe forever." He trained on the ground, it almost like he's having the discussion with himself with Yeonjun here.
"What?"
"You didn't like her at all." He looked up, piercing into him with those normally soft brown eyes.
Yeonjun leaned back, offended. "How do you know that?"
"Because you cheated on her! If you actually liked her, you would have had a talk about whatever fucking avoidant issues you seem to have but instead you decided to break her heart and run away unscathed! You should be shamed, on the street real talk."
Yeonjun goes to laugh at the crazy Heeseung humor, but it wasn't even a joke, he didn't even move once.
"Ok firstly, ouch. Second, why are you riding so hard for her? It's not like you knew her dweeb-y ass." He rolled his eyes.
"I do know her dweeb-y ass! I love it. It's probably my favorite thing about her."
"Wait, is she the girl who has you pussy-whipped? You're so fucking stupid! I dated her for a year and a half and barely got any." Yeonjun scoffed.
"Maybe you just didn't know what you were doing. Maybe you cheated on her because you knew no matter what, any girl that had been with you would prefer being with me instead."
Heeseung doesn't get to say much after that, since Yeonjun jolted forward, catching his fist right in his mouth. He's not unfamiliar with fighting with him, they were boys together, they had gotten into their fair share of play fights.
This was just the first time they were actually trying to draw blood.
The rest of the boys find them in no time, they're being rather loud.
They find them wrestling around on the ground and they have to pull them apart. They don't walk away with nothing more than some bruised knuckles, bloody nose, and a black eye.
"You have completely flipped, man!" Yeonjun shook a little, getting to his feet with the help of Riki.
"I showed you that movie, motherfucker!" Heeseung pushed everyone else off, not needing it. "You know what? You want to 'movie quote' me, bitch? Don't call me. Don't come by this house. We're done."
"So that's it? We just end our years-long friendship over a girl?"
"No. It's not just her. You brought this upon yourself a long time ago, Yeonjun. I just finally woke up and realized that I outgrew you. It's another thing Y/n taught me."
"She should have taught you how to use your fucking brain! At least, she has one." He shrugged everyone off, doing his little kid stomp off out of the house.
No one chased him down, they had chose a side a long time ago.
Your sad walk had gotten a little better over the days. You stopped wearing clothes bigger than the average person, you were almost back to normal, Keeho and them hadn't even seen you for a bit, since you were kind of avoiding work.
No one could gauge what you were feeling because you weren't telling anyone. You were hoping it would simmer out and eventually, Heeseung could be that other bad decision you made in college that you could you tell your grandkids about.
But then you saw him, another one of your past mistakes, wandering campus like he still was the man.
You stood stock-still.
It was almost as if nothing had changed.
His eyes met yours and you were immediately turning around, going back home and not giving the day any chance to get worse.
"Y/n, is that you?"
Those Gamma legs put him in step with you in an instance.
You were immediately reminded of when he used to come over in the middle of the night just to chase you around your apartment, giggling and showering you in presents to make up for the fact that he hadn't talked to you in weeks.
It was sweet at the time, now you can see the wizard with all of his lies. No cute little curtain.
He grabbed your wrist for some familiarity but you snatched it away as soon as he touched you.
"There's my favorite girl," he reached out to grab your face like he had done so many times before but this time, you smacked it down with great force.
He winced like you burned him.
"I am not your favorite anything. I'm surprised you even remember what I look like. You rarely looked at my face when you were around, dick."
He smiled. "Still my Y/n, you never did let up, did you?"
"No, and I'm not yours. I never was."
"But you were. You know you were my special pudding." He tried once more, lifting his hand up to grasp the apple of your cheek but you were serious about keeping your distance, you gripped it mid-air.
"I told you I hated that nickname." You squeezed tighter, making him whimper in pain. But it wasn't normal pain you noticed. It wasn't something you were inflicting. That's when you moved and noticed the dried blood.
Past you kicked in for a second, rubbing your fingers over top with that delicateness you always gave him when you helped him clean blood off his hands.
"You been fighting again?"
His mouth stretched thin in the way you remembered it in your dreams sometimes.
It haunted you in the darkness.
"Why don't you do us all a favor and go back overseas?"
You throw his hand off to the side before you continued on. You were tired of these boys stalking you around the grass. If they were going to keep bombarding you, you might has well have just stayed home.
"Why?" He called after you. "So you can keep screwing my best friend behind my back?"
You stopped and turned back around. You could say whatever you want about the guy, but he always did keep you captive.
"It's not behind your back because I don't have to explain shit to you, Yeonjun. We dated years ago, that's dead now. Who I sleep with is quite frankly none of your fucking business. Speaking of sleep, I'm going home. You remember where that is, right?"
Which is what you did.
If they were going to keep kicking you, you were going to stay down.
You were adopting Heeseung's lifestyle without knowing.
Yunjin knew, she was the only person who could see what was happening from both sides.
However, it was only Heeseung she smacked upside the head.
"Ow!" He rubbed the spot, as if it was the part of him that was bleeding right now.
"Stop moving, dumbass. I'm trying to help you here."
Heeseung's secondary emergency contact is Yunjin. It's who Riki decided to text after he saw him trying to put ice cream on bleeding wounds.
She came in responsible with the gauze for his face.
"And hurt me at the same time."
"Well, that's what you get. You've been on a mean streak: you've cheated on two of my best friends and now I hear you're fighting with Jjunnie. That's not the Heeseung I know."
He rolled his hurt eye with a groan. "I wish people would stop saying that. How am I acting different? Different than what? And he had it coming. I found out today that he not only cheated on Y/n but Chaewon too."
Yunjin paused her wiping to hum confused.
"Yeah, this entire time, everyone's been spreading around that I cheated on her but today, he tells me the picture that she dumped me because of was him. So that fucker destroyed two relationships in one night, didn't care and I'm NOT supposed to punch him back? Right."
She slumped.
"Damn, you actually did the kind of right thing for once. Hitting is bad but..."
"Bro, he hit me first!" He squeaked, his voice breaking from the stress.
"It's still not the lesson you should be teaching these boys, Hee. They look up to you. You're like Mufasa, and they're your Simbas." She grinned, satisfied with her wording.
"Why can't I be Scar?"
"You're going to have a scar if you don't stop talking and let me check your nose."
Now he was one raising brows. "I mean not really since my injury is internal. I'm just bleeding. There's not gonna be a scar."
She just smacked him across the face.
"Sometimes I feel the need to hurt you. Like I understand Yeonjun a little bit." She turned, grabbing the alcohol like what she said wasn't completely mad.
"Hurtful! What happened to hitting being bad?"
"You deserve it! You hurt my friend. She's really upset."
He softened at the mention of you. He knew he technically was talking about you earlier but now he was finally hearing about the aftermath and that was all he was waiting for.
"Is she still tutoring? Or writing? Riki never knows when I ask."
Yunjin shrugged. "I wouldn't know. I haven't seen her yet. I'm kind of scared to." Dread filled her pupils. "When I go over there normally, it's never the best. I don't want to see her worse. Especially when I can't help. Not when she's just gonna see me as a extension of you."
"She won't. You're her best friend. I'm just the guy who fucked up. I'm not special."
You cocked her head at him, putting the band-aid on his nose.
"You think you aren't special? That picture of you at that bridge was her background until Kee made her change it."
He doesn't even notice the smile that peeked out.
You didn't want him to take a picture because you thought you looked crazy in your pajamas. But he took it anyway because he wanted to get your reaction. As revenge, you pushed him against a tree and got a bad one of him.
He never knew what you did with it, until now.
"She wouldn't be this upset if she didn't really like you. You were more special than you realize."
୨ৎ
After leaving Heeseung, Yunjin was on the rest of her rejuvenation journey which happened to end in your apartment.
She was grateful for her keys at times like this. She planned on doing the same as before — sneak in while you were away off doing your normal routine and just wait for you to arrive to talk.
But then she heard the rustle from your room.
You were supposed to be on your way to class right now, not napping in your bed. She knew your schedule because she knew you.
This wasn't where you were supposed to be.
She bursted in your door, partially open to find your half-dead body hanging off of the top of your comforter, snoring.
"Y/n!" She flicked your lights on.
You fall down like it's a tv show, screaming from the sudden racket. "What the fuck? I was sleeping."
"Yeah, that's the problem. Why aren't you in class?"
"You know I joke about you acting like a overbearing mother but this?" You gestured between the two of you. "This is fucking weird. Get off my junk."
Her eyes blew wide open, as grumpy as you could be, you never bit her this hard.
"Seriously? You're breaking out your old high school vernacular? You're at this part of your freak-out? Should I come back?"
"No," you got up, slipping back onto your bed. "You and everyone else needs to leave me alone. I am tired of getting drive-by therapy sessions because everyone fucking loves Heeseung so much. I don't care. I want nothing to do with him."
You pushed past her, going right into the kitchen to get some water for your dry mouth.
"You don't even want to talk to him? I know how much you liked him." She followed behind.
That seemed to be a main theme of your life recently.
"That doesn't matter anymore. I didn't know he was lying to me, therefore whatever feelings I might've been feeling are now null and void. Fuck him."
"I mean, I think you already have." She snorted, hoping to ease some of the tension in you but you're too sour. Normal you has clocked out and has been replaced with heartbreak.
"Well then, never again. I'm serious. And I understand you two are friends so you're on his side but—"
She put a hand out.
"When did I say I was on his side?"
Your eyes lulled into the back of your head, clearly too tired and annoyed for this conversation.
"All of you have been on his side! Aren't you the same girl who told me not to let men play in my face? I guess that doesn't matter when you grew up together? People change, men cheat!"
"I'm sorry, Y/n, I love you both equally and I don't think Heeseung did it. He even admitted to me that he didn't even cheat on Chaewon in the first place."
You were chuckling next, all madly like a girl who had truly lost her mind. "And you believed him? He's been lying to me for months and you suddenly think he's got it out of his system? You funny."
"I'm just saying you should hear him out, that's all. He at least deserves that, right?" She crossed the boundary, coming into your space by your kitchen counter.
"It doesn't matter at all to me what he deserves. To be fair, both of you are getting on my nerves with this situation. I kind of wish you both would just fuck off."
Her mouth fell open in shock.
This wasn't like you at all. Sure, you were known for being a little sarcastic from time to time but she knew there was never any actual hatred in your words. This was the first time you had spoken to her this way.
"Babe, I'm just trying to make sure you're okay. I care about you." She reached out, hoping to make some kind of contact with you to bring you down but you shoved her off.
You were in the groove of doing it now.
"Well, I wished you'd stop. I'm not your fucking charity case, Yunjin. You can't just treat me like Delta's Make-A-Wish kid. Like, leave me alone please."
Your tone is exasperated, you're done and she can tell. She wanted to blame it on the sleep deprivation. You were never this mean.
"Ok." She nodded, contained. She could have fought back but she wasn't going to, she refused when it was with you. "I'll leave you alone. Just let me know when you're ready to talk."
You don't meet her gaze as she made her way to the front door and left.
You knew you wouldn't be able to let her leave if you did.
You didn't want her to see you this way either.
The next few days were downright numbing to both of you.
The funk disappears and Heeseung reappeared to his duties as president, being more involved in pledge weekend like he said he would be. But there was still a stink on his vibe. He wasn't joking or making fun of them when they said stupid things anymore, he just let it slide.
It somehow wasn't any less terrifying than the smell prior.
Now there was just a ghost who was pretending to be Heeseung and he was haunting their living space.
He could have been a skinwalker.
He checked back in with all of his teachers, letting them know he was still alive and was prepared for whatever punishment they had for him. He was lucky he was such a good student that they had more leniency.
He wished you were more like his teachers, then maybe you'd hop off his neck.
He continued to see you around campus, slumping across the grass like you were in the middle of a movie montage.
He tried to approach you every time, screaming your name and running after you as he had done so many times before but every time, you curved him, either running in the other direction or disappearing in crowds of people.
It was odd but it genuinely kept happening and it was freaking him out.
At some point, he just thought he was imagining you.
It made the most sense out of everything right now.
Yeonjun did try to come back and apologize after died down. He didn't want to check out again on his friend when he knew he was in the habit of doing so.
He didn't think their friendship was going to go back to normal but there wasn't too much ill will between them.
You on the other hand didn't have people surrounding you worrying about you, you drove all of them away.
The only reason you left your apartment now was to attend your classes and then go back to bed. You were already at rock bottom, you didn't want to be down with bad grades also.
Yunjin told you to stop self-sabotaging.
Too bad, you only listened when it came to schoolwork.
୨ৎ
Another writing class and you got through it without jumping down Mr. Calderon's throat.
He was confused, it was unlike you to not try to put him into the dirt every class period.
He watched as all the students filed out, bags in hands and books falling out from how quickly they were trying to flee from him. Usually that was you. But not today.
Today, you were taking longer.
You were moving at the speed of smell right now. Your arms slumped with each book you picked up like it was heavy for you. You moved like someone who didn't want to leave.
That was also unusual.
"So, am I ever going to learn the reason for the quietness? Is there someone I should be thanking for the sudden change?" He tried to joke, but he wasn't rather good at it.
"To be honest, I don't think it really concerns you, Mr. C." You sniffled.
And yet, you continued this very obvious sad dance that he could see on display.
"I'm going to say it does because you being quiet is one of the most scariest things in the world," He takes the long trek up the stairs, up to where your seat is. "So tell me."
You grabbed your bag but then he sat on the desk, so you definitely couldn't leave.
"If anything, I'm blaming it on you. It's your fault."
"Everything else is. Why is this one me?"
You figured if Heeseung was as right as you thought he was in the past, you could just ask him point blank period.
"What lesson are you trying to teach me? Someone told me that maybe your entire point was that you were trying to teach me something important. So what is it? Because right about now, a life lesson would be great instead of what's been happening to me. I'm feeling things and they scare me." Another sniffle plagued you, this one weighty.
That last part wasn't even for him, you were just admitting it to yourself.
Maybe if he had a better answer everything would be good again.
But alas he didn't. Not one you wanted anyway.
For a second, he just looked at you. He wasn't stunned by anything, he wasn't even giving you any type of notion that you had found a treasure, he was just simmering.
"You know you remind me a lot of my daughter. She's just as mean to me as you are. Maybe worse since she's my flesh and blood." He chuckled to himself as you wiped a stray tear. "She doesn't like listening to me either. The only way I met her where she stood was by speaking her language."
Your frown crumpled into something confudled.
"Is that what you've been doing to me?"
"You're not very good at getting out of your own way. You talk all this smack because you're scared and it's your only defense. You figure if you're loud enough people won't notice how you're retreating into the shadows."
It's a blow to the chest, so much harsh than any of the other ones because you knew this one to be definite. You just didn't want to say it out loud.
"What does that mean?"
"Your piece on the bridge," he snapped to emphasize his point. "The one about the guy with the 'Bambi' eyes? Inspired. I'm guessing by your mood, shit's not sweet no more?"
You don't answer but you do avoid him. That's enough.
"Right. But do you see what you produce when you let the world in? It's so much more emotional and beautiful. Stop kicking it out when you know you enjoy it."
Your rope is so taut, there's no more trying to hold onto it. You don't stop the tears from falling anymore, they just have their own path now, trailing down your face silently.
"And what if I end up getting hurt? What then?"
"You write about that too and you turn it into something wonderful."
Dressing it up in sparkle sounded so easy. It was what you did in the first place but that was a happy emotion: love. Now it was gone and all you were left with was a dark cavern.
But just then, in the middle of your very sad rewatch of Monster High: Boo York (and your cry sesh), you got a stroke of inspiration.
You were right at the part where Deuce and Cleo broke up and you feel your head tilt like a dog who was trying to get it. You're relating to the kids movie and before you know it, your laptop was perched on your knees.
You couldn't even sense fully where the wave was coming from, you just had all these thoughts and you needed to write them down.
Even if they weren't coherent.
In the end, you didn't think you were happier, not yet, but you did feel lighter. Maybe he wasn't such a bad teacher.
୨ৎ
Being an adult meant cleaning your room, even when you didn't want to. The smell was sickening and it was not a way for anyone to live. Especially not a president.
He's in the middle of sweeping under his bed when he feels it pulling back. He wants to look but he knows it's going to slow him down so he just continued with more force.
He couldn't believe he let it get this bad.
On his second trip outside, he heard Jungwon smack his teeth at him, like he couldn't bare to let him have his walk of shame without any derogatory sounds.
He deserved it — it was a dreadful stench.
It might have taken six bags but his room was changing form right before his eyes.
The form that it was in before he knew you.
His sheets still had a faint whiff of your scent. It was the only thing that didn't clean. If it was going to be as easy to access anymore, he was going to hold onto his last piece for as long as he could.
They weren't dirty anyway.
Not in a way that mattered.
He thought about one of the last times you had graced his blankets.
It was around the time you were still writing your bridge piece. You weren't sleeping that time so he was all over you. Only problem was you were trying to shield your screen from him.
He didn't like that.
He loved being in your business, it was one of his favorite things. He couldn't help but lean over closer and closer to get a glimpse of your secrets.
"Come on," he was practically in your lap and still you were hanging off his bed, hoping he couldn't see what you were doing. "What is so bad that I can't see what you're doing?"
"Because it's none of your business."
He didn't like that either.
He wanted to be close to you and here you were, pushing him away, in his own bed. He would have bit you if you hadn't told him to stop doing that.
He sat back up, pouting all sad.
He could still feel the pain in his shoulder from when you shoved him. And the contact on his neck from when you were finally done and gave him what he was asking for.
He could still kind of hear your voice if he tried hard enough.
It actually sounded like you were downstairs.
Fully formed, your laugh squeaked out into the front doorway. He knew it well, it was the sound that taunted him in his dreams with the thought of you returning.
He'd recognize it anywhere.
He muttered your name under his breath as his legs absentmindedly bring him to the sound.
It was small but he caught a glimpse of your hair before Riki shut the door.
"Was Y/n here?" He tried not to sound so forlorn but he was failing at everything lately.
"She was. She told me to give these back to you." He stepped closer, dropping Heeseung's hoodie and ring. Both of the pieces of him he gifted to you after you spent your first night together.
He gave them to you in hopes that the only time he'd see them would be on you. Not folded like you were returning his belongings after his sentence.
"She said she doesn't need them anymore."
"Of course she doesn't." He just nodded. Not because he was okay with it, but because he was getting used to rolling with the punches.
Especially to the head.
So he retired to the pool.
Not to swim, not to drown himself like it sounded like Sunoo and Sunghoon were whispering about when they saw him grab his towel.
He kind of just sat there, legs planted in the water and eyes locked on the trees that seemed to decorate the Gamma backyard. The sun was basically gone. He noticed the sun on its descent when he was cleaning. He just didn't expect it to be so melancholy.
Or for the boys to decide it was a group hang and cannonball right with Heeseung in the splash zone.
He couldn't be mad, that was another Gamma rule: don't hang by the pool if you're not prepared for getting wetter than you thought. These boys had dunking problems.
"Guys, what the fuck? Can't I just enjoy some part of this place without you lurking?" He complained, shaking the water out of his hair.
They didn't care, they just paused like confused babies before splashing him again until he was laughing.
"You're the one who made the rule! We're just following our leader." Jake smacked him on the foot that was underwater.
He'd be crazy to not submit to their silliness, it's hard not to laugh watching Riki challenging Jungwon to a 'holding your breath' contest and then just watching as he almost drowned.
The boys were the reason he had his place now, they voted for him in the first place.
Actually, he never specifically asked them why they did that.
"Yo, nasties," he kicked water on the group, getting their attention. "Why did you guys want me to be your leader? I mean, I've been doing this for a semester and I never asked why you guys wanted me in this spot after Yeonjun. I figured you would have picked Jungwon, or something."
They all looked around at each other, like they were using their shared braincell to figure out an answer to his very easy question. Jay broke off, coming closer.
"You're trustworthy. Even if it doesn't seem like you are a lot of time. These fuckers have me at the end of my rope a lot but they dogpile on you. And you never choke them out like they need to be."
They earned a chuckle out of Heeseung and a smack from Jake.
"As stupid as he is ALSO," Jake glared a little too hard before returning to the task at hand, "Jay proves to be right this time. You're great. Some homo intended."
Everyone squinted at him.
"Can you say that?" Heeseung inquired.
"I'm bi, it's cool."
No confusion was dropped.
"Is that confirmed?"
Everyone just kind of shrugged, Jake was too much of a weirdo to know when he was being serious or not. It was better to just leave in the air than to ask more.
"Regardless of gay rumors, they're right and whatever Y/n broke up with you for was not cool. She's stupid anyway." Sunoo came to his defense.
He splashed him with that notion.
"Don't talk about my future wife like that. We're just in a rough patch. I'm getting her back. She's just a little mad at me right now and I understand why. What she saw did look incriminating. I just wish she would let me clear my name." He grumbled to himself.
Now the same question is on everyone's mind.
He hadn't told anyone what the fuck happened for it to get like this. So it begs the thought.
"Yo, what happened, like point blank?" Luckily Riki was brave enough to approach the confusing cage for his brother who feared the answer.
And he was lucky he held no secrets from his brothers.
"It was stupid! Oh my gosh, get this."
୨ৎ
After taking Mr. C's advice of not leaving it inside anymore, you found the joy of journaling. It felt a little stupid having a diary as an adult but once you figured out no one was trying to read your inner thoughts, it felt freeing.
You felt weird keeping Heeseung's jacket if nothing was going on between you anymore. Plus, you felt the need to apologize to Riki for going off on him in your depressed state.
You told him he didn't have to be a complete stranger, you weren't sure if you were ready to go back to tutoring just yet but you didn't want to disparage any friendship you might have garnered.
Next on the apology tour was Keeho.
You hadn't specifically said anything to him and that was kind of the problem. You were avoiding work and them all together. Luckily he could never hold a grudge against you, he really liked you like that.
They told you you could keep your job as long as you were actually going to show up. You promised to not disappear and you meant it.
Not anymore.
Last up was Yunjin.
She was the hardest to text, you had gone off on her like no other. In fact, a lot of the beginning pages of your new notebook were just about the guilt you felt for practically destroying one of the only relationships that stuck around.
You texted her, asking if you could come by Delta to apologize and her being so chill, she said she'd come to you.
It sounded perfect.
As you were fluffing your pillows and making sure it wasn't too messy, you heard a flurry of frantic knocks gracing your front door.
"Coming!"
"I'm so glad you cam—" You swung the door open only expecting one body but was instead met with three. Yunjin barreled past you to your living room, two hands gripped in her own.
One belonging to Riki, who looked like he really didn't care and the other to Chaewon, who seemed anxious.
"I was kind of only expecting you but I guess the more the merrier. Look I just wanted to tell you how sorry I am—"
She shushed you fast, leaving them two to meet you by the door and pull you over. She dragged you like she did them, plopping you right down on your couch.
"We'll get to that, sweetheart, in a second, I promise. We're on something else right now. I'm going to need you both to tell her what you just told me." She snapped to the victims standing in front of your coffee table.
You whipped your head around to look at them.
If you were to have categorized their vibe, it would felt like three really sweaty salesmen trying to sell you something in five minutes. Everyone was jittery, staring at each other and not saying anything after basically pushing their way into your house.
"I'm going to need someone to tell me something because I'm the only one not in on the joke. I want to laugh."
Yunjin snorted.
"You're not gonna. I sure didn't."
With Chaewon biting her nails out of fear and Yunjin being the last one to hear about it, Riki had to wake up his responsibility to the group. He rounded your table and sat in front of you.
"Hey, girl." He tried to chuckle but it came out weak.
"Hi, Riki. Can you please tell me what's going on?"
"Right. Ok, do you remember the Gamma party? Yeah, you missed a lot of that party. Like all of it." Then he rubbed his neck again and suddenly you were teenage boy nervous.
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A/N: fun fact, the fight between the boys is inspired by something that happened to me in real life (minus the fists though), so do with that what you will.
ﾉ*.✧ symposis : sunghoon has been consumed by work for weeks, leaving you with barely scraps of his time. But the project is finally done. Now, he's coming home with only one thing on his mind: making up for every second he lost. He's going to give you every part of him until you have no doubt left that you are, and always will be, his priority.
warnings (explicit content) : unprotected n rough sex,breeding,bulge kink,and???
◕ᴗ◕✿
The bedroom was thick with heat, the air heavy with the scent of sex and sweat as sunghoon maintained a relentless, punishing rhythm. your head throbbed with every heavy thrust, your fingers clutching uselessly at the tangled bedsheets beneath you.
“a-hh, fuck, h-hoon...i can’t anymore” you cried out, your voice breaking into a breathless sob as he refused to slow down. His pace showed no mercy,driving you further over the edge than you thought you could survive.
hearing your distress,sunghoon paused his upper body’s motion just long enough to lean over you. his dark eyes locked onto yours with intense,unwavering devotion. gently, tenderly,he brought a thumb up to stroke your cheek,wiping away a stray tear. the soft, reverent warmth of his touch stood in stark, intoxicating contrast to the ruthless, deep friction he was still inflicting down below.
“Shh, it’s okay, baby…just a lil’ bit more,yeah?” he coaxed, his voice dropping into a low, velvety whisper that vibrated against your collarbone. He leaned down, pressing a soft kiss to your temple before looking back down into your eyes with a smirk. “my pretty wife can give me that, right?”
before you could even process his words, he shifted his hips and slammed back in, hitting your g-spot with deliberate, brutal precision. Your eyes rolled back into your head as a sharp gasp ripped from your throat, your entire body trembling violently around him.
“Look down for me,baby” sunghoon murmured darkly,his hand sliding down from your face to rest flat against your lower abdomen.
driven by his command, you forced your heavy eyelids open and looked down. the sight made your breath hitch in your throat. because of how deeply he was buried inside you and how tight your body was wrapped around him, every time he drove forward, a clear, visible bulge stretched against the skin of your lower belly. you could literally see the outline of his cock pushing up against your stomach wall, a mesmerizing, stretch of skin that proved just how completely he filled you.
sunghoon tracked your gaze, his eyes darkening with primal satisfaction as he watched his own shape moving beneath your flesh. He pressed his broad palm directly over the distinct bulge, pushing down slightly as he thrust back into you, causing the stretch to feel impossibly deeper,wider, and more overwhelming.
“Fuck, look at you taking all of me” he growled, his voice stripped of its previous softness, replaced by an intoxicating, raw need. He leaned down, his mouth brushing against your ear as his hips maintained that agonizingly deep pace. “you feel that?you’re so tight,so full... i’m going to fill you up so fucking good”
the heat pooling in your gut flared out of control at his words. the physical sensation of the bulge stretching you from the inside out combined with the heavy pressure of his hand on your stomach sent a wave of electric shocks through your nerve endings.
“hoon... please” you whimpered, your heels digging into the upper back as another wave of pleasure crashed over you.
“im going to breed you so full, baby” he whispered huskily, his thumb tracing the stretched skin of your stomach right where he hit deepest. “I’m going to spill every single drop inside my wife, right where it belongs. i want you carrying my baby...i want to leave my mark so deep inside you that you feel me in your stomach for days.”
his words tore down your last remaining thread of control. The thought of him filling you completely, of taking every drop of his seed deep inside your core while you watched the physical proof of his size stretching your belly,was too much.
“pls-- pls pls!” you sobbed out,your hands flying up to grip his broad shoulders, scratching him as your walls began to pulse uncontrollably around him.
sunghoon saw you fall apart. He gritted his teeth. His jaw tightened. He slammed into you one last time, pushing as deep as he could. The bulge on your lower belly peaked. He held himself there, hips locked against yours. With a deep, rough groan, he poured himself into you. His whole body shook as he filled you completely.
roxy speaking • first fic ever and ut wont let me add the photos #crashout, but ive been working on this for a while and i love jake so....
You could feel his eyes on you before you even looked up. Jake was sitting on the edge of the bed, his posture slumped and tired. Though, his eyes were staring so intensely it felt like you were veing burnt through.
He wasn't looking at your face; his pupils were blown wide, fixated entirely on the thin fabric of your bra. He licked his lips, a nervous habit, his breath hitching every time you shifted your weight.
"Still staring, Jake?" you teased, a playful smirk on your lips. You knew how much he loved them, how he treated your chest like it was the most divine thing he'd ever seen. To him, they weren't small; they were perfect, concentrated gems of pleasure that he couldn't get enough of.
Jake swallowed hard, his voice a shaky whisper. "I can't help it. They're just... so beautiful. Please, can I?"
You chuckled, the sound vibrating in your chest, and slowly reached for your bra strap. You pulled it off in one fluid motion, exposing your pale skin to the cool air and his gaze. You watched as his chest heaved, his hands trembling at his sides, desperate to reach out but waiting for your permission. "Come here, then."
He didn't need to be told twice. Jake practically scrambled toward you, sinking to his knees on the floor. He approached your breasts with a reverence that bordered on religious, his fingers barely grazing the sides before his tongue darted out.
He started with a soft, wet lick from the base of your breast up to the top, making your breath catch. He began to kiss your nipples softly, his lips fluttering against the sensitive tips, teasing them into hard, aching points.
God, she smells like heaven, Jake thought, his mind swirling with a singular, obsessive focus.
He felt a surge of desperate need, a craving that went beyond simple lust. He wanted to worship her, to prove how much he adored every inch of her chest. He opened his mouth wider, taking one nipple fully inside, sucking with a rhythmic intensity that sent jolts of electricity straight to your core.
You groaned, threading your fingers through his hair and pushing him closer, forcing him to take more of you. "You're so obsessed, Jake. It's almost pathetic," you whispered, though your voice was thick with arousal.
The word 'pathetic' seemed to trigger something in him. He moaned against your skin, his tongue swirling around your peak, licking you clean with a frantic, devoted energy. He was panting now, his face flushed, looking up at you with wide, pleading eyes that begged for more.
"I am," he whimpered, his voice breaking. "I'm pathetic for you. Please, let me. I'll do anything."
A spark of dominance flared in your chest. You liked the way he looked up at you—small, needy, and entirely yours. "If you want them that badly, we're going to do this my way."
You guided him to the bed, pushing him down and whispering, "Closd your eyes."
He could hear the rustle of your clothes, the soft sound of your breathing, and the scent of your skin filling his nostrils. He was floating in a void of anticipation, his entire existence narrowing down to the hope of feeling you again.
You leaned down, your breasts brushing against his cheeks, the feeling making him moan loudly. You didn't let him move; you simply teased him, dragging your nipples across his lips, then his chin, then the tip of his nose.
You laughed softly, the sound echoing in his ears, and then you pressed both of your breasts firmly against his mouth, smothering his cries with your soft flesh. He let out a muffled groan of delight, his tongue working frantically, tasting you, sucking at you with a desperation that was almost violent. He was blind, bound, and completely at your mercy, his world reduced to the taste and feel of the breasts he obsessed over.
Aa he sucked, he reached between you both, palming himself theough his boxers, "Shit, you taate so good," he whimpered, getting embarrassingly close already. "Fuck, fuck, fuck, mommy."
"Aww, my poor baby," you whispered, atroking his hair as he finished in his pants, "Are you done?"
Jake looked up at you, eyes bright and hairline beaded with sweat, "Youre so perfect," he lifted his hand up, caressing your chest once more before rolling the both of you over so he was laid on top of you.
"Jake, youre such a tit-freak," you muttered as he burried his face in the valley of your boobs.
"Mm, love you too," he responded words muffled by your skin.
You rolled your eyes, reaching iver and turning the lamp beside your bed off, "This is going to be a long night.
in which you get to ride your vampire boyfriend… yay!
content warning: blood, unprotected sex, soft dom hee, degrading from both sides, vampire hee chilllll…
“i am so fucking thirsty.”
you roll your eyes, skimming past your love-struck brain. “not my problem. feed off some other girl, whore”
“i’m- i’m a whore? for helping some random stranger with… directions?” heeseung scoffs in disbelief, mouth hung open.
you don’t even respond, continuing to brush through your hair, repeatedly making sure heeseung has a direct view of your bare neck in the clear reflection that mirrors your actions — you can’t see him in it, but you can feel his gaze burning holes into the cold, sharp glass.
heeseung pushes his head back further into the plush of the pillows, throwing his hands over his head, desperately trying to ground himself. you are just so fucking infuriating.
you finally turn around, gazing at your hopeless, starving boyfriend while he brushes his own hair out of his pale face. he meets your eyes, the atmosphere chilling your skin.
“just… just come here, please.” he gestures toward his lap, bambi eyes filled with oh-so-adorable sparkles.
you reluctantly make your way towards him, the dim light shapes his face into the most beautiful sculpture you’ve ever seen.
no, no yn, do not get fooled.
you adjust your thighs till you’re in the familiar position of straddling heeseung’s lap. his cold hands reach up to your hair, slowly wrapping around it. he shifts it all to one side; leaving him a clear, tasty picture for him to treasure — your neck!
your blood boils at the sight, his mouth is practically watering. you push his chest pathetically, “no! don’t even try it.”
heeseung’s lips sink into a gentle frown when you cover your neck with your hair, the glimmer in his eye immediately being destroyed.
his thumb finds your chin, slowly dragging it down till your lips hesitantly part. your tongue instinctively sticks out, but not for long.
heeseung wraps his mouth around your tongue, savoring the flavor of you to try and solve his craving. his own tongue starts to push past your lips, trails of spit leaking across both of your chins.
you fucking hate heeseung.
it’s like he knows exactly how to make your brain melt till you can’t even try to think. your mind instantly fills with an intense fog of pleasure, eyelids heavy and chest impossibly overheating.
heeseung uses your lightheaded state to his advantage; moving your hair once again till the nostalgic chill air crashes into your bare neck. his hand instantly reaches up to cover it, fingers digging into the soft skin.
you pull off him, heavily gasping and desperately attempting to inhale as much air as you can. the damp fabric between your legs rubs against the rough texture of his jeans, making your body liquify even more.
you look into his lustful eyes, “ugh. fuck you!” you quickly exclaim before reaching for his belt. the metallic clink making your heart race.
heeseung lets out a soft laugh while lifting his hips to help you take off his pants, his cold palm caressing against your warm neck. “whore.”
you furrow your brows at him, glaring into his eyes while rage leaks through your veins—but you are way too worked up to argue. your sole focus is on getting his stupid dick right inside of you.
and finally, finally your fingers get to lightly skim over his hardened member, thumb spreading leaking precum all over the tip. you look up at him one more time before aligning him to your entrance, “okay! okay, just- just bite me when your inside okay?”
heeseung irritatingly smiles while nodding, licking his lips at the view of your prepared neck.
once you eventually start to sink down onto him, you feel heeseungs fangs placing immense pressure onto your neck—piercing a deep, narrow hole causing blood to leak out.
the overwhelming sensation of him filling you up entirely while he sucks the literal blood out of you is enough to make you start fluttering already.
he doesn’t stop though, no he doesn’t.
he guides your hips till you start riding him, sinking his teeth in even deeper when he abuses your sweet spot; occasionally letting out small, delicate moans himself.
the heavy dam in your lower stomach threatens to break at any moment, the mess produced where you two connect is enough to push you over the edge.
you immediately come undone once heeseung licks a long, broad streak over his bite — the two deep, slim holes now healed. he chases his own high, bordering you into overstimulation.
ignoring your half hearted protests, he continues to ram into you till he can’t hold it back anymore. hot, thick ropes of cum filling you so deeply you feel him all up in your organs.
your body doesn’t waste time to crash into his chest, both of you heavily breathing — muscles relaxing.
his chilled hands rub softly up and down onto your back, “thank you, baby.” he kisses your forehead gently.
