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[namjooncentric]

KTH x Reader| The Art of Tenderness

Title: The Art of Tenderness

Rating: Explicit 🔞 MINORS DO NOT INTERACT

Pairing: apprentice!KTH x master’s daughter!reader

Historical AU (handmade mochi / chapssaltteok store)

Genre: Angst, Fluff, Smut

WC: 9.3k

Warnings: patriarchy, gender discrmination, badly researched cooking techniques and historical inaccuracies. PLEASE, suspend your disbelief. 

Smut warnings: unprotected sex, sweet and urgent and you know me, there is a baby somewhere…

Note: chapssaltteok is the Korean version of mochi, a soft rice dough wrapped around some kind of sweet / savory filling. 

Inspired by: The Princess Bride by Wiliam Goldman– the three famous words “As you wish” make a feature appearance here. 

Summary: KTH lands at your doorstep as an apprentice, ready to learn from your father the art of making chapssaltteok–rice flour confectionery wrapped around sweet and savoury filling. Yet, he learns a whole lot more, as do you—about the art of tenderness.

Made possible only by: Julie @thatlongspringnight, Em @miscelunaaa and Ana @xjoonchildx - THANK YOU Jules for giving me the encouragement, Em for looking through with a fine-tooth comb, and Ana for the reassurance that I didn't go too wrong with this. Also special mention to @hamsterclaw who has heard me bitch ad nauseam about my fickle writer's indecision - finally settled on the 4th AU. LOVE YOU ALL SO SO MUCH.

For the very lovely @sugalaritae - I hope you like it!

Happy Possumversary!

—----------------------------

It’s been a long eight months, and he’s learning as much as he can, as fast as he can.

“Pounding the warm rice dough adds–?” your father asks Taehyung, testing him. To help with the large palace order of chapssaltteok as part of the queen’s birthday celebrations coming up next month, Taehyung must prove to your father he has mastered all the fundamentals of pounding chapssaltteok dough. 

“Elasticity,” Taehyung answers the first quickly. “Texture. And…” What was that last one? Taehyung’s mind races frantically. 

“Tenderness,” you say, rolling your eyes. 

Your father shoots you a look. Be respectful. You nod quickly, though you're still unable to hide the disgust on your face. 

“Tenderness is everything,” your father continues, eyes stern on Taehyung. “Chapssaltteok without tenderness is like a bird without wings. No one likes overly chewy dough, do you hear?”

“Yes, Master.”

“Do you remember how to hold the wooden mallet?” your father continues.

“Two hands, overhead, mallet in the middle of the back of the spine. Arc it over the head, bring it down like the curve of the new moon, hit it in the center of the dough, Master.”

“Good man. Now remember, every upswing is a pause for Y/N to reach into the trough to turn the dough. It also gives the dough a second to rest and build elasticity before being pounded again. Do it just like this.” Grasping his favorite wooden mallet, your father proceeds to show Taehyung again how to heave the mallet up just before the downswing. 

Quickly, your hands dart into the warm dough, turning it. 

Within a split second, your father’s mallet comes swishing through the air, pounding on the dough where your fingers had just been. 

“And, that’s how it’s done,” your father says with proud satisfaction. “Of course, a strong man like you can do it on your own, albeit, it’s more arduous, more painstaking. That’s why in our family, we have a saying, ‘Chapssaltteok made by one person tastes bitter, chapssaltteok made by two tastes better’.”

“Yes, Master,” Kim Taehyung says, head bowed.  

“Now, your turn with the wooden mallet,” your father offers Taehyung his prized mallet, passed through five generations of your family’s storied legacy as chapssaltteok makers for the royal family. 

Kim Taehyung is nervous as hell. 

You glare at him, daring him to make a mistake and hurt your precious fingers.

He’d have to time everything right or else, he’ll be out on the streets once more.

“Ready?” he asks you, tentatively.

“Yes. Just hurry up already!”

“As you wish.” 

And so he takes the first stroke, a smooth upward arc which looks promising. You hurry to turn the dough in the trough. But Kim Taehyung takes too long on the downswing, he’s too soft, too gentle.

“Harder,” you tell him. “Go harder!”

He tries again. But again, he’s too afraid to hurt you and decelerates every time he brings the mallet down.

“Remember, you have to make the dough submit to you,” your father says, taking over the wooden mallet. “Like this, Kim Taehyung.”

Your father shows him again how to pound the dough into pliant submission. Immediately, you slip into a rhythm both familiar and comforting, a father-daughter dance you’ve mastered since you were a wee little girl. Pound. Turn. Pound. Turn. 

Now and then, your hands dip into the water bowl to wet the dough so that it remains soft even in the dry air. You’re just about to turn the dough once more when a sharp cry from your father rings out.

“Appa!”

With a loud crash, the heavy wooden mallet slips from your father’s grasp as he tumbles backward onto the ground.

“Don’t just stand there!” you order Taehyung who was looking dumbfounded, “help me get him up!”

Snapped out of shock, Taehyung rushes to your father’s left side while you take father’s right. “Master! Can you feel your legs?” 

“My back!” Your father’s breath comes out in short, painful gasps. “I think I might have sprained it!” 

Your mind races at what this could mean. Appa always had a weak back, but nothing that has made his whole face pale and ashen like this before. Oh no. What about the large order for the queen’s birthday?

Another groan from your father draws you back to the task at hand. Together, you and Taehyung lift your father and carry him gently into his bed, stopping now and then to adjust him to make him as comfortable as possible. 

“My daughter,” your father says with strained effort, “the palace order for the queen’s birthday…” 

“Shh… Appa. Don’t worry. I’ll take care of it.”

“I’ll help her,” Taehyung adds quickly. 

“I’ll take care of it,” you say sharply. 

“ENOUGH!” your father barks, bringing on a fit of coughs. “This is an order that we cannot fail. You have to work together! Is that clear?”

“Yes, master,” Taehyung answers quickly, the two words familiar on his tongue by now. 

“But Appa–” A stern glare from your father forces you to agree. “Yes, Appa,” you reply obediently. 

“Now get back to work!” your father rasps urgently. “The rice dough must have dried out by now! Better throw it out to the pigs. Soak a new batch of rice and start over!”

He dismisses you and Taehyung with a wave of his hand before closing his eyes. 

“But he doesn’t know anything–” you whisper, hoping to get a word in to your father as Taehyung leaves the room. 

“Then teach him,” he breathes out, breath ragged and shallow, before turning his head away.

Sighing, you head back out into the courtyard only to see Taehyung heading to the east gate. 

“Hey! Where are you going!” you call out.

“I’m going to get something!”

“Come back here! Appa said we have to start on a new batch!”

“You can do it on your own!” he answers hurriedly, voice disappearing as the gate slams behind him.

Angrily, you go measure out a new batch of rice. What kind of apprentice is he? Gone at the first sign of his master’s injury? He’s probably going to the village for soju or for gambling or maybe even for-–women. You don't know why, but your face heats up as you think of that last thing: Kim Taehyung. With women. 

After measuring out the rice, you quickly put it in the earthen pot to soak in the water from the mountain spring. Bringing the sticky, doughy mess to the pigs, you wonder if Kim Taehyung will even come back. You tell yourself it doesn’t matter. You can, you will handle this entire order on your own! 

It’s almost dusk before he returns, hands carrying a cloth bundle. Without a word, he goes into the kitchen, starts a cooking fire and grabs a claypot. 

“What are you doing? How dare you just come in like that without a word!” you scold.

Ignoring you, he continues to fill the claypot with water before inserting a smaller pot within. You watch him, incredulous at his audacity to completely disregard you. 

“Need thin linen cloths,” he finally says. “It’s a poultice for your father’s back. Hurry before the swelling worsens!” 

Unwrapping the cloth bundle in his hands, he reveals a bunch of wild ginseng, medicinal pine needles and a mossy green tree bark you’ve not seen before. It must have taken him all day to gather these hard-to-find herbs on the mountain slopes. 

“Where did you–” 

“I watched a medicine woman prepare it for my mother before,” he answers, eyes completely focused on washing and soaking the herbs in the inner pot. “Get the linen cloth. I need to wrap it around the boiled herbs and place it on the master’s back.”

A little awed by his voice of authority, you move quickly, getting the strips of linen cloths from the wooden medicinal chest. Dumbly, you hand the cloths over and watch as Taehyung deftly wraps the boiled herbs into neat rectangles. 

You follow Taehyung into your father’s chambers, anxious to do whatever he says is necessary to ease your father’s pain. “Loosen the master’s robes. We have to get the poultice on his bare skin,” he orders quietly. 

Sound asleep from the exertions of the day, your father hardly stirs as you uncover his back. Thankfully, he likes to sleep on his side which makes it so much easier to undress his torso.

Making sure it’s not too hot, Taehyung begins to press the warm poultices along your father’s spine. 

“The swelling has already started, but this should still help speed up the master’s recovery.” 

The quiet confidence with which he says this brings you comfort. Your father has always been as strong as an ox. But lately, you do realize he tires easily–you can tell by his weakened grip on the wooden mallet that he's getting on in his years. It’s scary to see your father like this—so vulnerable.

“Thank you, Kim Taehyung,” you whisper gratefully. 

“I’m sorry I left you to do all the work,” he says, dark eyes imploring you to believe his sincerity. “Had to make sure I reached the summit of Saraksan to gather the herbs before dusk.”

“It’s fine. I’m glad you can help Appa. But tomorrow–” your words trail off. You’ve never asked for help. You can’t. You won’t.

“Yes. Tomorrow, I will help you,” he pauses. “Let me.”

His gaze on you makes your skin flush with heat and you feel the pores in your skin gasping for breath. 

“Fine,” you say, your words coated in reluctance. “See you first thing, tomorrow.”

“As you wish,” Taehyung seizes the opportunity to take his leave and bows to you.

You’re confused as hell. You want to hate him, but you can’t.

It’s not fair that he’s always so calm and collected. Not fair that his very presence riles you. 

Not fair how his eyes look so serious and solemn and his mouth like it’s always ready to stretch into that devastating smile every time he says as you wish.

It’s not fair at all. 

—----------------------------------

The next few days pass by like a blur for Taehyung. 

Heaven knows he has tried to act honorably in his master’s absence. Tried. How many times has he honorably torn his gaze from you in the day only to be plagued by your image at night? 

Damn you. You infuriate him. You always had to demonstrate how to do everything just right. 

Yesterday, you couldn’t just tell him to correct his handling of the rice dough. No, you went ahead and wrapped your hands around his to push against the dough. 

“Feel that?” you’d asked. “The pressure? You can’t be too gentle. You gotta do it like–” Exasperated, you went ahead to position yourself in front of him, putting yourself between him and the table. 

Without thinking, you grabbed his wrists, wrapped his arms around you, then laced your fingers with his before bringing his hands on the warm rice dough, showing him how to pull a single portion of dough with just the right pressure, and then flattening the dough into a perfect circle on your palm. 

Ask him again about the pressure he should use to flatten chapssaltteok dough on the palm of his hand and Kim Taehyung would be forced to admit he’s forgotten everything you taught him. 

All he remembers is your breath–warm and sweet–-feathering against his neck when you tilted up your lips to ask him Feel that? 

Yes, he feels that, all right. He feels your fingers curled between his own, as if they’ve always belonged there. Feels the hardening of his loins every time you look at him with those fiery eyes of yours.

Every day is torture as he rises again for another day of apprenticeship with you. 

How is he supposed to bear the brush of your body against his when you reach over to adjust the amount of filling he puts in the dough. Or the way your hands are so soft in his as you insist him to feel the dough, the texture, the elasticity.

Closing his eyes to force himself to sleep, he tries to breathe evenly, wishing the hardness in his cock will just go away. You consume his every brain cell—he dreams of your curves. The softness. The silkiness. 

Feel. You always tell him. Feel. Feel. Feel.

It’s not fair. 

—————————————————

“Remember to keep a firm grip on the upswing!” you shout out as you watch Taehyung lift the heavy wooden mallet and take a few practice down-swings. 

As he heaves the mallet up into the air, he lets out a low sound that’s a cross between a growl and a grunt. A strange thrill thrums down your spine and you shiver inwardly–it sounds so…so… primal. 

Willing yourself to concentrate, you watch him until you’re satisfied that he won’t smash your fingers when you turn the dough in between the poundings of the mallet.

“Ready?” he asks, this time, with more confidence than the first. 

“Yeah, hurry up! Remember, don’t go soft. Go hard. Go fast. The chapssaltteok needs it.”

“As you wish.” 

You signal for Taehyung to start. He swings the mallet down perfectly with a loud thwack. He heaves it up again, and just at the right moment, your hand flies into the trough to turn the dough. 

Thwack. 

Turn.

Thwack,

Turn.

Surprisingly, he has gotten it. The strength, the momentum, the cadence. Soon enough, you and Taehyung find an easy rhythm and you feel the familiar elasticity forming on the dough. 

While the pounding takes a longer time than when you are doing it with your father, you’re impressed that Taehyung is never off beat, maintaining a smooth, easy arc on the upswing and downswing. You think he would tire by now, but he keeps going, demonstrating an impressive stamina. 

Finally satisfied with the dough, you stop him. “Feel this?” you ask as you proffer the dough to him. “See how it’s still slightly warm? Feel the bounce?” Taehyung puts down the mallet and tentatively reaches for the dough. Impatiently, you wrap your fingers around his, pushing them deep into the soft, warm dough. “It needs to yield to your touch, like that.” 

He makes a noise in his throat, unable to trust himself to speak. 

You mistake it for a sign that he doesn’t understand. So you pull his hand closer to yours, pressing it more deeply into the dough, your fingers intertwined with his. 

“It’s ready when the slightest touch can make an indentation on the dough’s surface,” you lecture. “Press deeper and you feel some resistance. That’s actually good because we want the dough to be able to contain the filling–whether it’s red bean or sesame or lotus paste–nothing should ever ever leak out.”

Well. He wishes his cock can contain itself. Wordlessly, he nods to you. Better to be silent than to speak words he should not utter. 

“Come on. We have just two more days to go before the palace delivery,” you sigh, worried that your father will not heal in time. “Back to work.”

“As you wish,” he says, in that tender, quiet way of his that makes your insides go all queasy. 

Damn this man and his infuriating as-you-wish-es.

—---------------------------------

Your father’s back is healing nicely, but he fears that the journey to the palace on horseback will trigger another sprain. 

“I’m sorry, child, but it looks like Kim Taehyung has to go with you.”

“But, Appa, I can make the journey on my own! I went with you last time!” 

“It is not safe for a woman to travel alone. What if something happens to the chapssaltteok along the way? What if something happens to you?”

You know he’s right. It’s just that wanting to prove yourself has been your battlecry for so long that it’s almost instinctive to protest anytime he tells you to do something with Kim Taehyung. 

And so it’s settled. Together, you will head to the palace with the prepared chapssaltteok tomorrow. 

Taehyung busies himself by packing the supplies for the fresh chapssaltteok that will be made onsite for the royal family. By order of the palace, preparation of every morsel that will pass through the lips of the royal family must be supervised by royal courtiers in case of an assassination attempt by poisoning. 

The entire journey will take a full three days. You worry how your father will cope without you as you fill stacks of polished wooden boxes with neat rows of chapssaltteok. These ready-made chapssaltteok will be for the guests and palace attendees, not the royal family. Still, they need to look presentable, and so you wrap each box with beautiful colored silk. 

“Did you embroider this?” Kim Taehyung’s voice startles you. Turning to him, you watch as he fingers the singular cherry blossom sewn on each of the silk cloths. 

“The queen’s favorite color is rumored to be pink. So I thought I should add a pink cherry blossom on each piece of silk,” you answer, cheeks warming. “I spent all my summer nights on these.”

“It’s beautiful.” Taehyung looks wistful as he outlines the delicate thread of the cherry blossoms. “My mother embroiders—waves, peaches, flowers. Her eyes are no good now. But still she tries. She does it by feel. I don’t have the heart to tell her that sometimes her peaches look like the Biseondae rocks, all jagged and sharp. Or that her flowers look like chickens!”

You burst out in laughter. It’s a full, rich laugh that bubbles out of you without warning. 

“I don’t believe I’ve ever heard you laugh,” he says, a glint of delight in his eyes. “And you look so pretty when you laugh.”

Kim Taehyung winces inwardly, wondering why the hell he said that.

The shock of the compliment stuns you into complete silence for a moment. There were some suitors here and there but you’ve never really cared for them. No one you’ve met has been so… so forward as Kim Taehyung.

“Your presence here hasn’t been exactly an occasion for me to laugh about,” you confess, “it feels like…”

“Like what?” he asks, curious.

You swallow hard, because the truth sounds so childish. 

“Like you’re trying to take my place,” you say, a little too vulnerable than you’d wish. Damn. Why do you feel compelled to be so honest with him? 

Clearing your throat, you snap yourself back to reality. “And. For your information, I’m actually pretty all the time,” you say evenly. “Too bad, you haven’t noticed.”

Kim Taehyung turns a shade of red at your chastisement. Oh he’s noticed, all right. Noticed too well. Too often. Too much. 

“Go to sleep, Kim Taehyung. We set off early tomorrow,” you wave him off, hoping you looked bored and uninterested. 

And again, Taehyung says those three little words that always seem to mean something else—exactly what, you don’t really know.

“As you wish.”

—-----------------------------

The journey to the palace is long, but thankfully, uneventful, helped by the expert care Taehyung gives to the horses. 

After reaching the palace grounds, you and Taehyung are ushered to the common courtyard, lining up with other artisans and craftsmen bearing gifts for the queen’s birthday celebrations.

“Y/L/N chapssaltteok makers! Please follow me!” shouts out one of the courtiers who struts the courtyard like a peacock—one which has his head stuck firmly up his ass. Together, you follow him to the servants’ wing. “Here’s your room! Kitchens are just round the corner! You’re scheduled to make the chapssaltteok at noon tomorrow! Don’t be late!”

“My apologies,” you say, eyes demurely lowered. “May I enquire if there’s an extra room? You see, my father unfortu—”

“Woman! I have no time for this! All servant quarters are full! You hear? Full!” With a dismissive sneer, he marches out, hurrying out to deal with accommodation for the next in line. 

The room is bare and unfurnished with a pile of straw sleeping mats in the corner. Worriedly, you look at Taehyung, unsure of what to say.

He clears his throat. “I um, I can sleep with the horses. In the stables.”

You snort. 

“Have you even seen that place? You need your rest Taehyung. I can’t let you sleep in the stables! You would hardly be in any condition to do the pounding tomorrow!”

“But wouldn’t people talk? I worry about your reputation–”

“Let them think whatever they want,” you say airily. “For all you know, they think you’re my father. Or husband.” 

Taehyung’s eyes meet yours briefly. Husband. Why on earth does that word sound so loaded with meaning? 

“As long as you don’t get such ideas, I think we will be just fine,” you say firmly. 

Taehyung nods dumbly, wondering what has come over you. How could you even bear to sleep in the same room as him? Didn’t you hate him?

“The chapssaltteok must come first,” you say authoritatively. “We are only here because of the chapssaltteok.”

Your family name is at stake. You will not fail now. You shall not. 

—----------------------------------------------------------

Dusk falls by the time all the food and supplies have been unloaded and deposited safely in the kitchens. 

Small outdoor fires dot the courtyard are tended by servants who take turns to watch over pots and cauldrons of simmering broth and stews that require overnight cooking. 

You meet noodle makers from the north. Fruit merchants from the south. The atmosphere is celebratory but an undercurrent of unease hums within you. You won’t be able to fully relax until the chapssaltteok for the royal family are finished. 

After a meager meal for the guest servants provided by the palace, you and Taehyung proceed to soak the rice grains for tomorrow’s chapssaltteok. Later, he heads off to check on the horses, while you hurry to prepare for bed.

When you return to your room, you find that Taehyung has already laid out the sleeping mats. He gives you the corner furthest away from the door, where the winter draft is least likely to get to you, stacking three mats on each other, while leaving only one for himself. 

“Kim Taehyung, are you sure? We can go two mats each.”

“I'll be fine,” he says quietly. “Have a good night.” Pulling the thick bedding over himself, he turns his back away from you respectfully and faces the door.

You’re grateful that for once, Kim Taehyung didn’t follow your suggestions and say the usual as-you-wish. The winter winds are brutal. Three straw mattresses may not seem like much but it’s better than nothing. 

Snuggling under the thick blankets you’ve brought from home, you fall into an uneasy sleep, dreaming of making the best chapssaltteok tomorrow; chapssaltteok fit for a queen.

—---------------------------------

Kim Taehyung has a hard time sleeping. It’s profoundly cold and the winter draft snakes between the layers of blankets and soaks into his bones. Shivering, he tries to distract himself. Turning so that his back towards the draft, his sensitive nose picks out a familiar scent. 

It’s how your hair smells, like the pine trees near the sea, which Taehyung has only been to once. 

Groaning quietly, he distracts himself from the cold with images of your warm body close to his. He sees you pressed up against him at the work table in the kitchen, your fingers brushing against his as you show him the way to close the seam of each chapssaltteok. 

He shudders when he remembers how you’d leaned over to correct the placement of the sesame filling in the rice dough, your chest brushing sweetly against his arm under layers of cotton and silk.

He wonders how soft and warm you’d feel under him, welcoming him into your slick heat, how you’d take him in so well, legs wrapped tightly around his hips, ankles crossed around his back urging him deeper. You’ll cry out his name, over and over, moaning for more, begging him to go harder.

Kim Taehyung is sure if his master knew his dreams of you, he would be out on the streets in no time. But by the fires of hell, he’s not in the position to dictate his dreams. He’s so hard now, that it fucking hurts to just lie there. 

Opening his eyes, he lets his eyes get accustomed to the dark room illuminated faintly by moonlight. He can just about make out your sleeping form, rising and falling under the layers of blankets. 

But he also hears a quiet chattering. Realizing that your teeth are chattering from the cold, he gets up and gives you his thickest comforter his mother had sewn for him when she could still see. 

The gold silk cover is embroidered with a beautiful peach tree laden with ripe fruit. He lays it gently over your sleeping form and then goes back to his own sparse bedding, willing for sleep to come.

He hopes you’ll be warm.

—----------------------------------

Dawn creeps quietly into your consciousness. You stir, thinking how strangely cozy you feel. As you sit up, you discover an extra thick comforter piled on top of your blankets.

Fingering the embroidery, you realize that this must be Taehyung’s. You glance at the door, expecting to see him still sleeping, but he’s no longer there. 

Today is the day to make the chapssaltteok for the royal family! Last year, some of the young princes and princesses came to watch your father and you pound the rice flour, cheering you on. 

This year, you’ve remembered to pack a clean set of clothes. It’s so cold but you know you’d feel better with fresh underclothes. Disrobing quickly, you are just about to shrug on your base layer when the door bursts open.

“Ahhh!” You scream trying to cover yourself.

“Ahhhh!” Taehyung averts his eyes.

“Why didn’t you lock the door?”

“Why didn’t you knock?”

You accuse each other at the same time.

“Leave! You m-mule!” you sputter.

“I can’t. The royal courtier is right outside the door! He wants us to start! I’ve come to tell you we’re up now!”

“J-just turn around then!” This was not expected. Last year, everything was planned meticulously to the minute but this year seems to be a lot more chaotic. 

Taehyung turns obediently around. 

“D-don’t look!” you warn.

“I wouldn’t dare.”

He turns around, closes his eyes even. But he sees you, sees every curve of your hips and breasts and thigh, sees the slant of your shoulder, sees the dip between your cleavage, the valley between your legs. 

He tries to think about the kindness of his master. Tries to think about honoring his parents. About anything, really, except how he wants to touch you. Right now.

Swallowing hard, he pleads, “We have to hurry. He says the banquet master wants a sample.”

“I’m hurrying!” 

After securing your robes, tie the belt around your jacket, you take a deep breath at the door next to Taehyung. Nervously, you smooth your hair. 

Taehyung turns to look at you. “You look nice,” he says reassuringly. “I heard some of the royal family will come to watch us.”

“Well. Let’s give them a good show then,” you say, determinedly. 

He grins, his smile wide and genuine. 

“As you wish.” 

—----------------------------------------------------

It turns out the royal courtiers are incredibly short-staffed today. After they sort through your ingredients and equipment, and search your sleeves and pockets for possible vials of poison, they leave you and Kim Taehyung alone. 

Not so, the royal family. You’re aware that every eye is on you as you pour the steaming rice dough into the trough. The young royal children are here along with the crown prince with a few of his companions, a tight crowd of rowdy men, laughing among themselves. You can’t really hear what they’re laughing about, but you feel distinctly uncomfortable. 

“Are you all right?” Taehyung asks, concern written on his face. 

“Yes, I’m fine.” You brush off the unease of having the prince and his companions leering at you. 

“Ready?” he asks, heavy mallet high in his arms.

“Ready,” you say. 

And so it starts. Taehyung gets into the rhythm immediately, and you match him at each upswing of his mallet. Somehow, he seems stronger than before, faster, each stroke precise and sure. The children clap and cheer as they watch this lovely display of skill. Inwardly you grin, proud of your heritage, feeling the dough turn pliant under your fingertips at every handling. 

You indicate to Taehyung that the dough is almost ready. “Last one!” you call. With a last, loud satisfying thwack, Taehyung delivers the last blow on the dough. 

You’re about to take the dough to the makeshift table to demonstrate wrapping the chapssaltteok with the red bean paste when a comment from the royal men drifts over to your ears.

“Who would want a chapssaltteok when you can have her instead?”

“Ahh… I guess we should take bets–does she have a salty or sweet filling?”

“Well, we will only find out if we each get a taste!”

“Who goes first?“

“I don’t mind going second, as long as I get seconds!” 

“As the prince, I abstain from all forms of sloppy seconds—”

Your face burns with embarrassment. Fists rigid with anger, you can hardly control yourself. Oh how you want to hit them! Fuming, you saunter up to them and look squarely at them in the eye.

“My apologies, Crown Prince and honored companions. I regret to disappoint your honorable selves, your servant is neither salty nor sweet. My father has always said I was born…spicy. Would you care to try?” The language is reverential, yet your tone is insouciant.

It’s a long moment before the prince and his coterie recover from shock at your words. He lifts a hand to strike your cheek, “You bitch! The audacity! Guards! Why you–”

“---Please forgive my sister! She knows not what she speaks!” Taehyung moves swiftly between you and the crown prince, bowing deeply, almost on his knees. “Father says she’s only good for making chapssaltteok since she was dropped on her head as a baby.” Turning to you, he says smoothly, “Little one, please hurry on the chapssaltteok. Only the best for the Queen and her family.” 

“Yes, brother,” you say, grateful for Taehyung’s intervention. You’re trembling partly out of anger but also out of fear. You could have gotten into very very serious trouble. 

“Well, you better teach her not to speak then! A woman should work quietly! Not speak!” the crown prince spits out. “Train her properly!” 

“Certainly, your highness,” Taehyung continues, bowing multiple times to the crown prince and to each of his companions until they are satisfied and saunter away. 

Your fingers are shaking as you pull the rice dough for wrapping. How dare they?! How dare they!

You struggle to encase the sweet red bean filling with the rice dough. Usually, you can do this with your eyes closed but today each of your fingers are mutinous. There’s no way you can do this well. 

“Kim Taehyung? T-take over. I can’t right now. This order is too important to mess up. For now, your chapssaltteok is  better than mine.”

A range of emotions flit across his face—Fear. Confusion. Panic. “Are you… are you not well? Because I need you—I can’t do this on my own.”

“I think I need a walk. Away from here. Just for a while. You’ll be fine. I won’t be long.”

Taehyung puts his palm over yours. “What if you meet the prince again? I won’t be there to protec—”

“Kim Taehyung, why do you even care? I’ll be fine,” you insist. “J-just start first, please.” Your voice is shaky, but you won’t cry in front of this man. 

He’s worried for you, but he knows it’s best to let you decide what’s best for yourself. 

“My chapssaltteok will never be as good as yours. Ever.” He looks around and sees no one watching, so he reaches out and gives your hand a gentle squeeze. “But… as you wish.” 

---------------------------------

You walk in the servants’ courtyard. 

Each step you take, you imagine yourself walking further and further away from the prince’s leering gaze, further and further away from those despicable words. You imagine yourself putting whole mountain ranges, oceans wider than the earth between you and those terrible moments in the prince’s presence. 

You think of your father and how proud he is of you. How your ancestors, a long line of them before you nodding sagely, deeming you worthy to bear the family name and the family legacy.

You breathe in and out, letting go of the fear, the anger, the dirty feeling of being leered at and toyed with.

And you don’t know why, but then the picture of Kim Taehyung comes to you. You see his gentle eyes, hear his soothing voice, hear the words he likes to say—as you wish.

It dawns on you. It dawns on you that there’s no one else you’d rather make chapssaltteok with.

Chapssaltteok made by one person tastes bitter, chapssaltteok made by two tastes better.  

Gaining strength, you hurry back to your corner. It’s time. You won’t let your family down. Not your father. And not Kim Taehyung.

And you definitely won’t let yourself down.

———--------------------------------

“Kim Taehyung! Kim Taehyung! The queen loves your chapssaltteok!” you shout your happy news as you fling open the wooden door. You heard from the dishwasher who heard from the royal table’s servant girl who heard from the banquet master that the entire royal family wa smitten with the chapssaltteok. 

Hastening to tell Taehyung the news, you stumble over the step into the room, causing you to fly across the room. You would’ve hit the floor face first if not for how Kim Taehyung catches you in his arms. 

Deliriously overjoyed and not caring about the awkward position you find yourself in—his arms right around your waist, your hands clasping his neck—you beam at him. “She loves them! They love them!” The words tumble out with pleasure from your lips.

“Who? What?” he asks, smiling to see you so exuberant. 

“The queen! Everyone! They loved your chapssaltteok! You did it!”

“We did it, Y/N,” he says, humbled and grateful that it has turned out all right.

“We did it. We did it!” In your exuberance, you squeal with delight, arms still looped around him. You accidentally pull on him, causing him to lose his balance and tumble on top of you, your back thankfully landing on the pile of mats and comforters.

Noses bumping, you’re suddenly so very very close.

It’s too much for him. To have you pressed against him so intimately, so softly and warmly. Quickly he averts his eyes and tries to push himself up. Any second longer and he will drown in the deep pull of your gaze.

Heart racing wildly, you reach up to the side of his face, you ask him quietly, “Why can’t you look at me, Kim Taehyung?”

“Because I can’t,” he says, staring resolutely ahead.

“Why not?” 

He would not speak. The words would be an abomination if his master were here. 

“Tell me,” you whisper, breath held tight. “Tell me because I need to know I’m not the only one dreaming that there’s something between us.”

“I can’t look at you.” He lets out a long, low exhale. “Can’t look because then I would want to touch you. And taste you. And then—” he falters, “—then I’d want to feel you.”

“Kim Taehyung, look at me,” you whisper, urgent and needy, “I want you, too. Want you to do all that to me.”

Time stands still as the enormity of your words sinks in. “Really?” he asks, not daring to hope. It can’t be.

You refuse to wait any longer. “Feel me.”

It’s a declaration. It’s a command. It’s a promise. 

“As you wish.”

--------------------------

Kim Taehyung doesn’t know which is better. How you feel. How you sound. Or how you taste.

“Taehyung. Please.” 

You’re pleading for his fingers to stroke you again under your robes—loosened and dragging on the floor.

Skin against skin, his hands roam over you, between, below, everywhere, feeling you tremble and quake under his touch.

“You’re so soft, soft for me in all the best places,” he murmurs as he plants a kiss on your hip. “Soft for me, here,” he whispers against the curve of your breasts. “And here,” he envelopes a nipple in his mouth, his tongue toys with you, swirling the tight bud in his mouth, lapping at the hardening pleasure, teeth gently scraping across the soft skin of your breast. 

It hurts just enough to induce a moan. You clutch at strands of his hair, arching into him, “T-taehyung. Hnnnnnng.” You pull his head to your other breast, desperate for the hot brand of his touch and tongue there, too. 

“Can’t get enough, huh?” he smirks against your skin. Who knew the master’s daughter is so needy under the fiery personality, so deliciously ripe under her layers of cotton and silk. 

“N-no. Not enough,” you warble, as you feel his hand travels downward, parting your robes, fingers sliding under your underclothes, gently exploring the expanse of the silky smooth skin there. Then, lower, and lower he goes, his clever, clever hands rendering you dumb and stupid with every caress. 

Reflexively, you cant your hips into his touch. “F-feel me,” you beg.

“I’ve got you,” he says, mouth close by your ear now, drawling out each word like warm rice wine poured long and slow. He positions his lips behind your earlobe and drags his teeth across your skin slowly, back and forth, back and forth, in the same slow rhythm as how his fingers now dance right at where you need him most at the apex of your thighs. 

“Gods, Taehyung,” You're moaning at how good it feels, nipples peaking with anticipation, clitoris humming with the pleasure he’s working slowly into you, the dizzying dance of his fingers building a crescendo of pleasure. “Don’t stop,” you sob, heat building in your center. 

“Not gonna stop. Not when you’re so warm for me,” he shifts down your body to position his head between your legs. Locking eyes with you, he parts your robes completely, and kisses the inside of your thighs.

“Not when you’re so wet,” he groans, as he tongues his way into your most intimate place. The first lick has his cock straining ever harder against his own robes.

“Not when you’re so messy,” he says, mouth sucking on the soft skin here, teeth gently nipping at the flesh there, smearing his lips wet and glossy with your arousal.

“I need you, there. Right there,” you whimper.

Heavens. The way you sound. Goes straight to his groin. “Here?” he asks, sliding a tentative finger up and down the slit where you’re so wet for him.

“Y-yes.”

“You’re fucking tight,” he breathes against your your mound as he now intrudes a finger, then another, into your wet walls.

“Oh Taehyung,” you whine with pleasure as you feel him rub against the spot inside you. 

He works and works on you, learning the speed and tempo and pressure you like just by looking at the way your face twists tight with need: You feel everything – his fingers inside you, his thumb on your clit—rubbing, fondling, pleasuring you in all the right ways in all the right places, his tongue darting out, curling into you, flicking across and inside you.

“I-I’m cumming,” your voice quivers at the force of the quake you can feel rolling into you. 

“I know,” Taehyung is breathing hard now, his cock harder than ever as he sees you so responsive under his ministrations. “I feel you. You’re soaking wet. Come. Come.”

With limbs suddenly locked in pleasure, toes curled tight, your orgasm grips you, and you come—short, sharp gasps for air punctuating a litany of expletives that spills from your mouth. 

“Hell’s demons, you’re so wild for me,” he says as he drifts a longer finger down to slide up and down where your arousal has gathered in a sticky sticky mess. “So wild–” he says, bringing his finger glossy with your arousal to his lips for another taste, “so sweet. Like a wildflower.” 

You shiver at his words, it’s thrilling. Wildflower. 

“What do you need?” he drawls, as he brings it that same finger right by your lips. You can smell yourself, how desperate your body is for more of him. “I’ll give you anything,” he kisses your eyelids, your cheek, the side of your nose. “Anything.”

“Need you… need your cock,” you say, reaching out to palm his thick girth under his thinnest robe. He lets out a low hiss as you reach for him through his robes, feeling the rigid shaft, relishing its curve, its heat.

“Feel this? Feel how hard I am for you?” he grits out as your fingers trail fire in their wake. “I need you too.”

“Don’t wait anymore, then,” you say, reaching under his robes to cup his balls, stroking his solid length with your palm. Your finger traces the long vein, thumb smearing the drops of pre-cum around the head of his cock, over and across the slit at the tip, back and forth, every swipe drawing a choked moan from him. “Kim Taehyung,” you say as you slide down to your knees, “I want your cock inside me.”

“H-holy hell!” he gasps, as you ease your lips over him, tongue swirling over the liquid pearling at the top, tasting him, then sliding and spiraling down the shaft, slippery now with arousal and saliva; the glide easy because you are so hungry for him; hard because he’s thick and girthy as the weight of his cock sits heavy in your mouth. 

He makes that low, primal sound again—the one that does something to your insides. Encouraged, you take him deeper down your throat. He glances at you, mouth choked full of him, hand caressing your jaw tenderly, “S-stop, wildflower. I can’t go gentle if you keep that up.” 

You feel yourself getting even wetter at his words. In one last grasp of heady euphoria, you pull off agonizingly slowly, relishing every groan of pleasure from him, your lips tightening into a vacuum as you near the tip, reluctant to let go of your position of power while his fingers curl tighter and tighter into your hair as he tries so hard to stop himself from cumming. 

“No more. No more. Please, take off all your clothes. Want you. Want you bare for me.”

“Want you bare, too,” you give an airy desperate whine. 

Quickly disrobing, he looks at you spread beneath him, naked on the layers of mats and blankets. He pauses a little, thinking how he’s imagined this over and over, but nothing prepares him for the real thing. In a tight exhale, he calls you, “Beautiful. Wildflower.”

“Beautiful and cold,” you say, the chilly air causing you to crave his body on you something awful. “Come inside me. Fuck me, please.”

It’s an invitation he cannot resist. Quickly, he positions himself over you, one hand quickly flicking a blanket over both your bare bodies. “Feel better?” he asks.

“Better,” you sigh, as you welcome the delicious heat of his body on top of you. “But not best. Not yet.”

“So impatient,” he chides gently as he slots himself between your legs. “Just get used to me first, all right?” He rubs his cock between at your center, feeling the lingering slick there, rocking his hips slowly into you, drowning in how good it feels because there’s nothing between you.

“I’m ready. I know I am. Please come inside me,” you cry desperately.

He kisses your jaw , then the column of your neck, then the slant of your shoulder, murmuring each word slowly while he sinks his cock tenderly into you:

as

you

wish.

You whine at the stretch, wince as you try to receive his thick girth, a shadow of pain flitting across your face as cunt swallows his length slowly inch by inch. “So big, Taehyung,” breath catching in your throat.

Finally, fully lodged inside you, his balls are flushed against your ass. “I’m inside you, wildflower–” he pants, awestruck, holding back as much as he can to not start thrusting into you and coming right this moment. “–all of me.”

“I feel it,” you pant back, “feel all of you.”

“Yeah? Feel my cock? I feel you too,” he grits out, thinking he might blow his load any moment. “You’re so tight. And wet.” Gods. He’s going crazy with lust. 

“Taehyung, move, I can take it. Want it. Want you.”

He starts thrusting, hitting deep inside you, pelvis rocking against your clitoris, drawing cries of pleasure from you. 

“Want my wildflower,” he says, eyes shut with effort, “you’re so perfect.”

You meet his every stroke, hips rocking against every roll and every thrust of his, crying out at every surge of his cock in and out of you. It starts to get hot under the covers, your skin sliding and slipping against the sweat of his skin until it becomes a little hard to grip on to each other.

“Too hot. Let me get on top,” you murmur. “Let me ride you.”

He nods, eager to slip back into your warmth again, however you want him, he’ll make it work. 

Throwing off the covers, you climb on top of him, skin flushed and heated, shiny and glowing with a sheen of sweat. With your full breasts swaying tantalisingly before him, you slide slowly on his cock, glad that he’s holding the base for you to take him bit by bit.

“This angle–gods, you make me so full.”

“Yeah?” he asks, mesmerized by the way you’re so beautiful sitting on him like that. With one hand on his chest, you start to move your hips against his, finding your own rhythm and position to suck his cock inside your cunt and slide it out, rubbing your clit against his pelvis. He feels you clenching even harder around him. 

It all feels too insanely good. The pitchy cries you make as you rock on him over and over drive him wild; your tight, slick cunt swallowing his cock. He feels his balls tighten, the end of the chase excruciatingly close.

“N-need to cum,” he groans. “Cum with me.”

“Go hard. Go fast. I won’t break,” you cry urgently as he starts thrusting in earnest. “Harder.”

With a low growl, Taehyung thrusts further, deeper into your sweet heat, hands reaching for your breasts, cupping their full weight, thumbing the peaked nipples, lightly pinching them as he feels your walls tightening him. 

When his lips tremble and his breath starts getting ragged, you know he’s close, you feel the cock inside you twitch, filling you impossibly full until his fingers fly to your hips and grip you to anchor you to him. “Take me,” he growls. “Take me.” He thrusts hard and deep into you, shuddering as he cums, pulling you tight into him. 

You cry out his name when you feel the hot spurt of his seed fill you in ropes of cum, clit swollen and tender from how hard you ride him.“Tae. Tae. Tae. Tae.” 

Limp, with exhaustion, you fall onto him, your head resting in the crook of his neck as he holds you, both of you breathing hard, sweaty and sticky with lovemaking.

Tomorrow, you will think about the consequences when you return to your father. 

Tonight, you will just enjoy sleeping in his arms—wrapped in him, and he in you.

—------------------------------------

The wedding celebrations last for three days. 

It comes right after the unveiling of the new wooden sign above the storefront. On the left panel by the door, is Kim Taehyung’s name as the new sole proprietor of the chapssaltteok store your father has sold to him. On the right panel is a beautifully etched carving of a wildflower, the eolleji—rare, beautiful and treasured. 

While Joseon custom dictates that a woman cannot own a business, Taehyung’s decision of having the wildflower take equal pride of place on the storefront is enough. He has pledged his life, his heart, his everything for you.

You finger the elegant lines of the flower along the wood grain, thinking of how they seem to curve in and out and hold the promise of new life, just like the curves of your body. 

Your fingers fly to the gentle bump in your belly at the sudden flutter—a sweet secret you and Taehyung made weeks ago at the palace. The little one seems to crave another wedding chapssaltteok. 

“As you wish,” you murmur quietly, because you now know it also means I love you.

Taehyung hears the words and looks at you, his eyes filled with tenderness. The family saying has been right all along:

Chapssaltteok made by one person tastes bitter, chapssaltteok made by two tastes better.

~ THE END ~

Please do not translate, post or upload this content onto any platform including YouTube without permission. This is a work of fiction.

Posted on July 17, 2022 by @sahmfanficbts. All Rights Reserved © 2022.

My other KTH fic (Chococlate boutique AU) is here

More from my masterlist here

Dear Reader,

Growing up, I was basically left alone and spent so much time watching TV soaps. I guess you can tell a lot of my fics just come from those kinds of storylines.

A TON of artistic licence was taken to write this fic. I was going from bakery AU to Samurai AU, to Dragon Warrior AU before settling on chapssaltteok Joseon dynasty AU. I beg for forgiveness from all my Korean readers. Please let me know if there are gross inaccuracies. I'll try my best to edit them.

Here's a little more about the rare wildflower called the eolleji:

Just outside Seoul, a wildflower heaven

In spring, hundreds of wildflowers bloom across Korea. First comes the pheasant’s-eye, which blooms after the snow melts, followed by liverw

KOREAJOONGANGDAILY.JOINS.COM

Wishing you a great summer, or winter, or whatever season you may be in, all best.

Love,

Sam

[namjooncentric]

Seoul Redemption| knj romance

Pairing: Criminal!KNJ x single mom!reader

WC: 19.5 k (Welp! My longest yet!)

Tag warnings: the smallest mention of drug use, smut, swearing, some mention of parental abuse, some religious references, criminal activity, single mom. Probably some wrong use of legal terms in the Korean context. To my Korean friends, please correct me, I’m here to learn from you. I tried to research as much as I can, and also consulted someone living in SK for this fic. But I’m sure there are mistakes. I ask for your forgiveness.

Smut warnings: oraling, body worship, love-making, fluffy pillow talk. Emotionally intense sex?

Minors, do not interact. If you are under 18, you are under aged. Come back on your 18th birthday. 

Summary: Kim Namjoon has fallen for you. You have fallen for him. What’s the problem? You just want an honest man. And he’s anything but that. 

Many thanks to the following people who have encouraged and beta’ed and supported me so lovingly:

@wwilloww, @hesperantha, @vyduan, @jinfizz @xjoonchildx @miscelunaaa @bangtanmademedoit @hobi-gif @hamsterclaw @codeinebelle

Willow, Max, Bunny, Jie, Madz, Ana, Em, Mina, Hopie, Rei, if not for you, this fic would not be fucking possible. At all. Dedicated to you all. Because you walk with me.

Banner made by the beautiful and stunning Mina @bangtanmademedoit. She's pure genius.

*******************************

Seoul Redemption

Five-year old Kim Namjoon is a talkative kid.

He babbles about the rainbow colours in gimbap, prattles about the pale pink of his favourite summer drink, hwachae. 

At bedtime, he chatters on and on about the colours he might see at sunrise tomorrow.

When his mother, exhausted from overtime at the factory, stumbles through the doors with him one chilly evening, the last thing she wants to hear is about the beautiful crane dancing by the village rice field. 

“Eomma! It had a long beak, and a curvy neck, and a red patch on its head, like a crown! The neck was like this—”

Mrs. Kim sighs. It was hell at the Yang factory today.

“Eomma needs to lie down.” She lays a tattered box of crayons and a piece of scrap paper for him on the table. “Be a good boy, Namjoonie. Let Eomma sleep,” she pleads. Namjoon watches with wide eyes as she passes out on the threadbare couch, her body too numb to feel the hard wooden slats digging into her ribs. 

“Sleep, Eomma. I promise to be good,” he whispers to his mother’s tired form. Carefully, he kneels by the low table pushed next to her, and takes out his beloved crayons.

Grasped in his little fists, the short, flimsy crayons don’t look one bit like the ones the Yang boy brought to school today. Those crayons were fat with colour, each with a beautiful sharpened edge that could make the thinnest, most precise lines on paper. 

Nevermind. 

There is a crane to draw—a surprise gift for his mother when she wakes up. 

Usually a humble surface for the family’s meagre meals, the wobbly table transforms into an altar in worship of the crane. 

The little boy devotee brings the crane to life with his offering of every stroke of colour.

Black, as dark as the winter night for the feathers. For the eyes, yellow, like the shiny gold ring Eomma gave up at the pawn shop last week. And the red crown must be as red as Eomma’s wedding hanbok in the faded photo on the otherwise bare wall. 

Woken by the soft creaks of the table’s worn wood from Namjoon’s strong, sure strokes, Mrs Kim opens an eye, disoriented as to why she’s on the couch. 

Slowly, she turns her head, breath held in astonishment as she watches her young son bite the inside of his jaw, translating his memory of the elegant bird, line by line, curve by curve onto the paper. 

With his steely gaze focused on the drawing, little Namjoon looks so much like his father. 

Yeobo. 

She bites her lips, keeping them from trembling. 

Namjoon glances up, a wide grin spreading across his face. “Here, Eomma,” he says proudly, “durumi.” On his paper, the elegant crane has one leg lifted mid-air, ready to take flight. “Eomma, do you like it?” he asks, eyes wide with innocence.

It’s beautiful. 

She kneels on the hard, linoleum floor next to him and cradles his face in her hands. “I love it.” Sweeping the fine, silky hair from his eyes, she continues, “Do you know that the durumi bring good luck? They can fly very far because their wings are very strong.”

Namjoon smiles. He likes things that are very strong. 

“And what about their heart, Eomma?”

“Their heart?” Mrs Kim falters a bit, remembering the words her late husband whispered to her on their wedding night so many years ago. 

The durumi love for a lifetime. One love. One partner. One life. I will love you as long as I shall live, as sure and steadfast as the wings of the durumi. 

“Their hearts are very, very strong,” she says solemnly.

“How strong?” he asks. Namjoon is enamoured with strength these days. 

“As strong as Appa’s,” replies Mrs. Kim, voice cracking with emotion. 

Gently, Namjoon brings his own hands to cradle his mother’s face. “And as strong as Eomma’s.” His words are soft but sure. “Don’t cry, Eomma.”

Mrs Kim tilts her head back to blink back the tears, hoping that the dim light from the bare bulb on the ceiling will hide her emotions.

She takes a deep breath. Pressing her forehead against his, she holds Namjoon’s gaze and implores him to remember the following. “Appa was strong. Eomma is strong. So, Namjoonie will be strong.”

It’s a familiar chant she has said over and over again to herself on those cold, lonely nights when the baby’s fever won’t come down. 

A chant that kept her company when she braced the bitter wind on the long walk home, carrying a toddler heavy with sleep, in her arms. 

“Me? Strong?” he asks, eyes round with wonder, cheeks puffed with pride.

“Yes, you. Strong,” she says, with all her heart.

Her husband never got to pursue art even though everyone said his sketches on faded newsprint were incredible. There was no time, no money. No training. But perhaps, their little one has potential. Perhaps, Namjoonie will become a great artist and pave their road out of poverty one day. 

It seems like such a foolhardy wish. 

But Mrs Kim never leaves anything to chance when it comes to her son’s future.

The next day, to his great delight, five-year old Kim Namjoon is enrolled in the afterschool art program at the community centre. 

Poor Mrs. Kim. 

How could she know that giving up her daily sweet potato for lunch just to pay for Namjoon’s art lessons would one day pave his way into a life of crime—as one of the top master forgers in the world. 

*******************************

The ninth circle of hell is not in some deep bowel under the earth. It is right here, in the sweltering Seoul summer, in front of a hot vat of oil, frying chicken by a roadside stall. 

“Two drumsticks!” yells out your boss, an elderly man who hired you when his wife sprained her wrist. His lean, wiry figure is the evidence of half a century of back-breaking labour.

“Drumsticks coming up!” you call back.

Goddamn, you feel like one of those pieces of chicken in this heat. With a pair of tongs, you pull out the sizzling meat, the other hand ready with the small grease paper to wrap around the base of each drumstick. The usual cardboard cartons for the fried chicken have all run out. Business has been too good.

“2400 won! Hurry up!” you bark at the fumbling customer in front of you. Why the fuck can’t people just get their money ready while waiting in the goddamn line? 

The drumsticks are dripping hot fat into the wrappers—it’s going to be a tricky exchange.

He gives you the won bills.

You grab them.

You hand out the drumsticks. 

He takes them. 

You get the change. 

He’s reaching out to take it from you when a loud “hurry up!” from your boss startles you. 

The 1000 won note slips through the grease of your fingers, fluttering innocently into the bubbling hot fat as both watch on in silent horror.

Shit. 

“Sir, I’m sor—”

“I’ve always liked nice, crisp bills anyway,” the customer says ruefully. 

That’s when you look up and really notice the man. He has nice eyes, you think. Nice smile. Nicer voice. 

It’s hot out here, but it’s his kindness which warms your insides. You wonder where on earth you’ve seen that smile before.

“Y/N! Hurry up! What’s the matter over there?” yells your boss. Striding over, he spies the won bill in the vat of oil. “What’s this? How dare you drop the money into the oil? We have to throw it all out now!”

You’re about to admit your mistake when the customer cuts in swiftly, “I’m sorry sajangnim! It’s my fault–I dropped the change after she gave it to me! Here, let me pay for it.”  He’s bowing apologetically to your boss, trying to put two drumsticks in one hand while fumbling for his wallet with the other. 

You protest, but the customer shoves a fifty thousand won bill to your boss, bowing deeply again as he speaks. “Please accept my apologies!”

The ornery old man gives a rough harumph, and waves the troublesome customer away with a dismissive hand. To you, he commands like he always does, “Get back to work! Hurry up! Next order!” 

Tearing your gaze from the man’s disappearing form, you spit out, “Next order!” like how your boss expects you to, and swallow your pride, its bitter aftertaste already a familiar friend. 

Nothing tastes sweet anymore.

*******************************

Sixteen-year-old Kim Namjoon is sweating. Profusely.

“Are you Kim Namjoon?” 

The calm, assured tenor could only belong to the Yang boy. Heir to the Yang textile empire, Jihoon hardly speaks, but when he does, it is with a crystal clear accent that the teachers fawn over.

“Depends on why you’re asking,” says Namjoon, trying hard not to let his uneasiness show.

Yesterday, he’d shared a seat on the bus with a girl from another class for the field trip. She was breathtakingly beautiful and Namjoon knew he was lucky to sit next to her.

It was only after he got home when his best friend called to say there were rumours that Yang Jihoon was dating her. Namjoon shivers. These Yangs are a crazy, unpredictable lot. His mom works at the Yang factory for fuck’s sake and he hopes to God that his litle impasse wouldn’t put her job on the line.

“Relax,” Jihoon says drily, “no one’s in trouble here.” He’s cool and calm, oozing a self-assuredness that Namjoon envies. “Well, no one, except me.”  

What would the Yang Jihoon want from him? Namjoon remains silent, but his curiosity is certainly piqued.

“Listen man, I need your help. End-of-year reports are going out in two weeks. I heard you’ve a good eye and a steady hand for this kind of stuff—”

“I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about,” Namjoon says quickly.

Namjoon knows exactly what the hell Jihoon is talking about. This kind of stuff meant fake doctor’s notes and school forms used to dupe parents and teachers alike for whenever his classmates needed a day off to fuck around. Apparently one of them couldn’t keep his big mouth shut.

“Let me show you something, then,” Jihoon gestures towards the back of the bleachers by the athletic field. 

Away from prying eyes, Jihoon unbuttons the top button of his school uniform to reveal the ugly purplish-yellow bruise below his collarbone. “My dad did that because of the maths exam. I lost two fucking points on question 15. Two. Fucking. Points.” 

Damn. Almost everyone in Namjoon’s class had lost two points on the binomial theorem question. Taking a closer look, Namjoon spies a few raised scars near the bruise. 

Burns. 

Looks like those rumours of the elder Yang’s cruel, savage temper aren’t rumours after all. 

“No guarantees. I haven’t tried this level of shit before. For one, the paper with the school’s embossed watermark for report cards is gonna be a problem.” How the hell is he going to pilfer the coveted special paper kept under lock and key in the principal’s office?

“I got the paper.” Jihoon hands over a fat manila envelope.

Staring into the envelope, Namjoon sees several thick wads of ten-thousand won notes that accompany a piece of report card paper embossed with the school’s crest. He doesn’t know which paper is more valuable. 

“It’s yours. Just get it done,” Jihoon says, aiming for the words to come out flat, nonchalant. But the desperation laced in his speech is obvious, even to both of them.

“Jihoon, you know that’s not going to solve anything right?” Even if I get you all straight As with all the teachers’ signatures perfectly copied?” Namjoon swallows hard before continuing, “your dad might still–”

Yang Jihoon spies pity in Namjoon’s eyes, and he would not stand for it.

“Stick to your job, Kim,” he said gruffly. “What my father will do is none of your fucking business.”

Namjoon watches as Jihoon saunters away, a strange limp intruding in his swagger every other step.

Namjoon better get the teachers’ signatures exactly right.

If he fucks this up, Jihoon might not walk again. 

*******************************

“Appa, story please?” you plead. “I want the story of the prince! He finds the princess and they live–”

“Same story, again?” your father chides gently.

“It’s so good, though! I can’t wait to marry a prince one day!” You have a dreamy far-off look as you settle into your father’s lap.

“Sweetheart.” 

You’re five years old and you already know that voice. It’s when your father wants to tell you SOMETHING IMPORTANT.

Sighing, you ask, “Yes, appa?”

“An honest man is better than a rich man.”

“Yes appa, but an honest, rich man is better than an honest, poor man!” you answer without missing a beat.

Your father laughs. It’s deep and comforting, and you love to hear its echo reverberating through his chest as you lean in for a snuggly hug.

“Are you a rich man, appa?” you ask, suddenly curious, pulling away from his chest so you can stare into his eyes. 

At school, you know the other girls whisper about you whenever you take out a new Hello Kitty pencil. Or when you sport a new pretty hair ribbon, cute little earrings or a charm bracelet which appa buys so often on his business trips. 

You have an inkling that this is not normal and you’re a little proud of the fact that you have pretty things. But is your father truly rich?

“No, I’m not a rich man,” he says, steady and serious.

“But I thought—” you protest, a little crestfallen that he doesn’t consider yourselves rich.

“Let's be grateful for what we have, and always remember there are those who go to bed hungry.”

“But we’re not poor?” you ask, wanting to make sure that the dreaded thing—poverty—is not what you have, like some incurable disease.

“No,” he says simply. “Far, far from it.”

“Phew!” A wave of gladness washes over you. I’m not poor! Those stories about poor children and how they have only one matchstick to keep warm, or have to follow trails of breadcrumbs, or spin straw into gold—you don’t have to do any of that because you’re not poor!

Lost in your favourite fable of the prince and princess, you miss the thin film of guilt which clouds your father’s eyes.

That night, after you kiss your father goodnight, then rub the scratchy part of his chin, then tug his fat earlobes; and—

After he tickles your toes, and squishes your cheeks and tucks you into bed and kisses you one more time—

After all of that, he finally settles back in the expansive leather recliner. 

In the quiet of the night, with a glass of whiskey in his hand, he lets out a deep, deep sigh of relief. 

It’s a sigh of relief not because it’s fucking hard to be a single dad to a little girl.

It’s a sigh of relief because he’s glad you asked him if he was a rich man.

And not if he was an honest one.

*******************************

The school field trip to the National Museum of Art took about two hours there in the morning. But the way back will take three hours now with the notorious Seoul traffic at rush hour. 

Namjoon gets a seat in the front of the bus, hoping no one else would sit next to him so he can revise for the biology test tomorrow. 

But his heart stops. 

A feminine smell of something sweet and fresh and floral lures him away from the textbook; it heightens all his senses. The page in his hand trembles a little before he dares to look up. 

“Sorry, Mr. Lee sent me to this bus. Someone isn’t well and needs to lie down across a row of seats on my bus,” you say apologetically. “Is it okay if I sit here?” You’re in the narrow aisle, feeling uncomfortable as fuck with nowhere else to sit in this bus full of students from another class. 

“S-sit here? Sure! Of course!” He’s flustered by your beauty, and forces himself to remember to be a gentleman. “Um, hey, do you prefer the window seat?”

“That would be nice,” you say, blushing a little when your knees bump against his. He’s standing now in the cramped space, shuffling around you so you can scoot in and take your seat by the window.

Namjoon rolls his eyes at the hoots coming from the back of the bus. His classmates love every chance to tease him. Throwing them a warning look, he mouths shut up at the unruly lot before focusing his attention back to you.

Finally settled, you smooth your uniform, taking care that not one inch of your skirt or school blazer is encroaching on his space. You shiver. The air conditioning is at full blast, but you wonder if it’s the warmth of his gaze that electrifies your spine.

“Are you… are you cold?” he asks, his words coming out cracked and uncertain.

“A little,” you admit.

He reaches up to swing the air vent towards him. “Better?”

“Yeah, thanks.” You give him a polite smile, not sure what to do or say anymore.

The bus rumbles off and Namjoon’s mind races against his heart. He’s staring blankly at the biology textbook, wondering why the hell he’s learning about mitochondria. 

What he really wants to study is how to say something suave, something intelligent to a pretty girl when his brain feels like a plate of japchae—a hot, tangled mess.

“You liked the exhibit?” he asks, embarrassed that his voice has suddenly taken an octave higher.

“Yeah. You?”

“Yeah, I get so inspired to paint when I see all these masterpieces.”

“You paint?”

“This and that. Nature and stuff. But there’s so much studying to do these days, and my mom now thinks it’s hard to make money from painting. I just don’t want to disappoint her.”

“I’m sure you’ll make her proud, whatever you do,” you say, not sure what gave you the right to be so certain.

Namjoon gulps a little when his little transgressions wave at him devilishly in the dark recesses of his mind.

“I hope so too.” Clearing his throat in an attempt to rid himself of his guilty conscience, he introduces himself, an outstretched hand ready for your handshake. “I’m Kim Namjoon.”

“Kim Namjoon—so that’s the name I’ll be looking for in the headlines one day!” you tease and then introduce yourself, revelling in the warmth of his hand.

A lop-sided smile emerges, curtained by his cute dimples. “Thanks,” he says simply. “You know what, I especially can’t get over Kim Whanki’s work we saw today. Those blues… I feel like I can stare at them forever.”

“Appa has one of his pieces,” you say, excited now that someone loves art like you do. “It’s beautiful. Every time I look at it, I feel like it’s saying something different to me.”

“No way!” He looks at you, a little awed and a little envious. “Wow, you’re lucky.”

“It–It’s just a small one.” You don’t know why you’re lying. Why you’re downplaying your wealth. Perhaps it’s the longing so clearly etched on his face.

“One day. One day I hope to own an original work by him too,” he says, each word shy, like he’s afraid of ruffling the order of how things are. 

“I’ll keep my fingers crossed for you!” 

The rest of the ride flies by. He sees the dance of your eyes when you tell him about your favourite books. You hear the lilt in his voice when he lets you in on how he writes poetry, rap verses, little scribbles and mixtures of rhythms.

It’s dusk when the bus pulls up to the open gates of the school yard. You both linger longer that you should, letting everyone else get off the bus first.

He stands and tells you to be careful, warns you that the steps of the bus are slippery as he goes first and offers his hand to help you down.

“Thanks,” you say, glad for the short moment of warmth you find in the cradle of his palm.

“No problem,” he says. “Hope to see ya around.” There’s something the way he says it that makes you look up at him. It sounds like longing and regret and hope rolled into one.

On the sidewalk, you try to find the dark, soulful eyes you saw in the dim light of the bus. You’re wondering why you haven’t really known this tall, handsome boy in school until today. 

But from the darkness behind you, someone calls your name. Shyly, you say you have to go; your friend is giving you a ride home.

He waves at you cheerily, voice carefully masking his disappointment. See you around.

And when he looks and looks until your silhouette merges with the darkness, he wonders why hasn’t he gotten the guts earlier to speak to you. 

Ah. He remembers why.

Because people like you—with friends who have cars—don’t usually hang out with people like him—who walk, or bike, or bus.

Not anymore. 

He’s going to own a Kim Whanki one day. 

By hook or by crook.

*******************************

“Open up! Police! Search warrant!”

Bang. Bang. Bang.

Bleary-eyed, you open the door, wondering, what on earth? 

Surely, this must be a joke. Maybe some kind of prank? You’re just about to embark on your junior year. Tomorrow’s breakfast with faculty and student council pizza party were already penciled into your calendar. 

“Sorry? Is there a mistake?”

Too impatient to answer you, the cops burst into your apartment and upend everything. As you follow the chaos in the apartment, you learn with every slam of closet door, and every emptying of drawer that your father is a fraud who ran his small hedge fund like a ponzi scheme, swindling hundreds of private investors.

“Ma’am, this note from your father. When was this written? What does he mean? Did he give you instructions about where to meet him?”

“W-what note?”

The plainclothes policeman holds up a note you haven’t seen before, written in your father’s distinctive quick, rounded script.

I’m sorry you have to clean up the mess. Gonna try to make it up to you. One day.

“Did he leave bank account numbers with you? Did he give you instructions to meet him? Perhaps an air ticket to the Caymans?”

No. NO. NO!

You didn’t know anything then, and you don’t know anything now. 

Faced with an army of reporters outside your apartment building and the crowd of creditors who have come for their money, the next few weeks spiral like a nightmare. Bit by bit, you find out about the gambling debts, the women, the deals from bribery he constantly collected for people in government. When did this all happen? 

He certainly went away for longer periods of time on his business trips ever since you started high school. He’d been drinking more than usual in the last few years. A bit distant, recently. But you’ve been busy too.

Sigh. 

You trail your fingers around the apartment you know so well. It’s a final goodbye to the home you’ve had ever since you were born.

Everything has to be liquidated. Except those photos on the wall. 

You stare at each picture, searching for signs in your father’s expression that could have told you he was a liar, an embezzler, capable of fraud worth trillions of won. But in every picture, he looks attentive. Loving. Doting even, and you—you’re happy.

Were happy.

You feel like retching. The life he has built for you has been destroyed with the lies he has fed you.

You stumble into the bathroom just in time to heave into the toilet.

Stomach churning, you make sure everything is completely gone before you walk with unsteady feet out of the bathroom.

In a box of things labeled, Unsold, you stare at the trinkets, the little curiosities your father got for you when he went on his “business trips,” which you later found were trips to launder money. 

According to the NIS liaison officer who interrogated you, these trips were not to London or Paris, but to places where dodgy money was made clean by dodgy means. 

Bile rises up your throat again. Is your body that disgusted by your father’s betrayal? 

You get to the sink in time and you retch once more, all the while cursing this terrible situation.

As you throw up yet another time, you vow that you’ll never be betrayed like this again.

In this whole wide world, there’s gotta be one honest man who will love you. 

And you hope to God that Yang Jihoon is that man because you think you might be pregnant with his child.

*******************************

The Fairy Bird or Pitta Nympha is native to parts of East Asia. Well-known for is seven-coloured plumage, they can be found on Jeju island during breeding season. 

One, however, must have lost her way and arrived in Seoul.

“Fairy bird! Fairy bird! Come here!” Little Gi calls out, arms outstretched. 

With strong chubby legs, the four-year-old propels himself higher and higher up the climbing frame. If only he could just touch it, just touch those beautiful blue-green wings! 

“Fairy bird!” Little Gi is at the top rung and leaps off to touch the bird taking flight. 

“Gi!” 

Your scream reaches him too late. His tiny body tumbles from the top towards the ground when a blurry figure hurtles across the park. Cradling the little boy in his arms, the tall man looks around for the voice he heard.

Gi wails uncontrollably, the shock of being locked in the arms of a stranger scarier to him than merely falling. 

“Gi! Gi!” You rush to your son, worried sick. “Are you hurt?”

Gi howls now, triggered by the commotion around him and the realisation that the fairy bird flew away. “Fairy bird! Fairy bird! Eomma! I want to touch the fairy bird, it looked just like the one we saw on Jeju!”

“He’s fine. I caught him just in time,” the man says.

That voice. It’s so familiar. Glancing up, you realise he’s the same guy from lunch who liked the crisp bills–and saved your ass.

“Oh my god. It’s you! Thank you for catching Gi!”

“No problem,” he smiles in the dusky dim light. “Hope to see ya around.”

His words trigger a memory for you. Where did you hear the very same voice and those very same words years and years ago? It was an evening, dusk; moon and stars in the wings ready to make themselves known on their night sky-stage, a night just like this with its deep blues and dark blacks. 

“I—I… wait. Wait. Ilsan Science and Tech High. The bus. Field trip to the art museum?” you ask tentatively. The shape of the boy is still somewhat visible in the form of the man before you. He’s taller, bigger, but the kindness in his voice remains the same. 

You reach for his name—stuffed somewhere back in the attic of your mind. It’s hidden in a drawer of favourite memories which are too precious to take out and too beautiful to savour in the bitter bite of the last few years.

When you open that drawer, his name flies out, as if it’s been waiting for this moment. “Kim Namjoon—the name I’ll be looking for in the headlines one day.”

Slowly, the thing he buried, the thing shoved deep down which throbs with hurt and hope on rainy days like an arthritis of his heart bubbles to the surface of his consciousness. 

Namjoon gasps out your name. “Your father. He has a Kim Whanki.”

“Had,” you say wryly. “Things have changed since, and I had to sell it.”

“I’m sorry,” he says. “Truly. I happen to have—”

“Eomma! I’m hungry!” Gi calls out. 

“Shh… okay, Gi, we’ll go home for dinner. Let’s thank Namjoon Ahjussi for catching you.”

“Thank you Namjoon Ahjussi for catching me,” Gi parrots after you. But before you can placate him, he begs, “Eomma, I’m tired. Can’t walk no no more. Carry me please?” His large innocent eyes look pleadingly at you.

Bending down, you lift him up, letting out a small oof at how heavy he is. “Okay Gi, but remember, Eomma gets tired too, so you have to carry me some of the way.” 

Gi giggles and you hear the man behind you laughing a bit. All too often, it’s just you and Gi, getting through the tough days together with silly songs and silly rhymes and silly stories. Now that someone else is laughing along, it feels strangely satisfying that your mothering is appreciated by a stranger.

Namjoon’s still smiling when the sight of you walking away startles him into motion. Scrambling after you, he racks his brain for a way to drag this meeting out. “Hey, I have tons of japchae my mother dropped off today. I don’t live too far from here, just two blocks away. Does Gi like japchae?”

“Japchae! I like japchae!” Quick as lightning, Gi slithers from your grasp and onto the ground, tugging at your fingers. “Please, japchae? Japchae?”

“Are you sure? I don’t want to impose.” God. When was the last time you got invited to dinner?

“Hey, trust me. You’re not imposing," he reassures you. "I could use help to finish the japchae. Mom always sends me tons.”

You finally relent and Gi whoops enthusiastically. “Japchae!”

Still, the two-block walk back is slow with you having to carry Gi who finds himself back in your arms after some whining. 

Remembering how his mother carried him in wind and rain as a child, his heart is moved with compassion as you struggle under Gi’s weight.

“Gi, how about we give Eomma a break? Do you want to ride on my shoulders and pretend you’re Anpanman?”

Gi hesitates. He has never ridden on a man’s shoulders before. It sounds exciting. Anpanman. He looks to you for assurance. 

“Do you want to?” you ask.

Gi nods shyly, his soft eyes peeking beneath those too-long bangs. 

“Go on then,” you smile reassuringly. 

In one smooth motion, Namjoon lifts up Gi and seats him on his shoulders, making sure to still hold Gi’s hands securely with those little arms stretched out. 

“Anpanman! Look Eomma! I’m flying!” Gi grins with pure delight.

“Hello Anpanman!” you call out, glad to see your son so incredibly happy. 

“Yeah! Anpanman! I’m Anpanman!” he chortles gleefully. 

You suddenly wonder if this is what it’s like if Gi had a father. It’s been four years, four years where Gi has missed out on bear hugs from appa, rides on appa’s shoulders, pretend wrestling on the carpet with appa. Appa. Appa. Appa. You wonder if he even knows that word.

Namjoon sees a cloud of sadness float across your face. “You okay?”

“Yeah. It’s nothing. Happy to see Gi happy.”

Namjoon decides to let it go for now. He’s gonna try to coax another laugh from you. Swaying Gi side to side on his shoulders, he speeds up, and then slows down, sometimes even tickling Gi with his hair by rolling his head against Gi’s belly.

When you finally laugh at Gi’s excited squeals, Namjoon feels proud of himself.

Inside the condo’s quiet lobby decorated with muted lighting and expensive wood, Gi climbs down from the man’s shoulders, preferring to walk and hold hands with both of you while he stares up at the soaring ceiling.

It’s strange how holding hands with Gi in the middle of both of you and walking into his apartment building feels so complete and domestic. 

If only—

“Are we there yet?” Gi asks tiredly in the elevator.

“Yup, buddy, we’re here!” Namjoon hurries ahead down the corridor to the corner apartment. He flings it open grandly and bows with a flourish when you and Gi enter. “Welcome to Kim’s japchae restaurant!”

After giggling, you turn serious as you look at all the glass and porcelain that is placed artfully around the living area. “Gi, don’t touch anything and no jumping on the sofa,” you warn quietly as you bend to take off his shoes. 

“He’s funny, Eomma,” Gi replies, mischievously avoiding your imperative.

“Say I promise not to touch anything without permission,” you insist.

“I promise not to touch anything without permission,” Gi says solemnly, putting his little palm over his heart. “Eomma, I need to pee-pee.”

Namjoon’s head pokes out briefly from around the corner. “Bathroom’s down the hall. I'll show you around the apartment once I get the japchae in the microwave.”

His quiet apartment rings with life—Gi splashing around in the sink, his excited cries are matched by your gentle, steady voice.

A thrill zips up his spine at your melodic alto. It’s been so long since a woman’s voice rang within these walls. Telling himself to calm the fuck down, he gets busy with setting the table.

“Eat! Eat! I want to eat!” Gi claps enthusiastically.

“I guess I’ll postpone the grand tour of Kim’s japchae restaurant for young master Gi’s tummy.” 

“Thank you for the food! Thank you for Eomma. Thank you God for everything!”

Namjoon raises an eyebrow but says nothing at the prayer. If that’s what the kid believes, so be it.

Digging into the japchae, your eyes close with pleasure at how good it is. It’s been so long you’ve had home-cooked food from someone’s mother. 

Namjoon and you talk about bits and pieces of who you know from high school. The Choi guy is some hotshot lawyer. There’s Lee Daeun who’s trying to make it as a model. There’s also—

“Look,” Namjoon whispers. 

Gi’s head is resting on the meat of his chubby elbow for a pillow, completely asleep, a little sliver of carrot hanging by the corner of his mouth.

“Let me lay out a futon for him—have it somewhere in the guest room. He can sleep better while we finish eating. And if he wakes up, he’ll see us here and not get scared of being in a strange place.”

Before you can protest, Namjoon comes back with a lightweight futon. He rolls it on the floor. After you lay Gi down, Namjoon grabs a soft, warm throw from the sofa.

“Why are you so good with kids?” you ask. The question should have come out breezy and teasing, but instead there’s a little catch in your throat as you watch him tuck the blanket around Gi like he’s a precious gift.

“I was living at home to save money for a while after high school. Mom was a babysitter to make a little extra. Always had a baby under our feet.” He smiles wryly, “Sometimes, literally. But it sure paid better than overtime at Yang’s factory. Speaking of which—do you know what happened to Yang Jihoon?”

That name belongs to another drawer, one permanently padlocked.

“Not a lot. We dated for a few years and it didn’t work out,” you say, clearing your throat with practised nonchalance, “What about you? Look at you! And this apartment! You have a Kim Whanki now! You must be doing not bad yourself!”

Namjoon heads off to the kitchen to get two wine glasses. He’d do anything to evade your gaze for the moment.

"This place is a rental by the way! So I still have a ways to go!" he laughs good-naturedly. "I deal in art, a bit of this and a bit of that. Relocation, insurance, auctioning, brokerage services, the whole works. It’s pretty boring, actually. Wine?”

“Just half a glass please,” you say as he leads you on the plush sofa.

The wine and heated flooring send a warmth to your cheeks. The conversation eases back into art and it’s as if the both of you never really got off the bus from the field trip.

But the chime of the clock startles you by how quickly time has passed.

“I—I should get going,” you say reluctantly.

“Is—” he hesitates because he’s dying to know, but also unsure how to put it delicately in case he hurts you. “Is there someone waiting at home?”

Someone waiting at home? When was the last time someone waited at home for you?

You take a deep breath because sometimes telling the truth is as difficult as hearing it. “There’s no one waiting.” 

“Then stay. Stay the night. There’s a guest room for you and Gi. Please, it's late. It’s not safe. And I—I would love your company.” 

The boy born poor, born on the wrong side of Ilsan reminds him that he doesn’t deserve you or love or all of this. And so he clears his throat and adds, “But if you need to go, I–I’ll see you home.”

“I’ll stay.”

With a happy beam, Namjoon motions for you to drag the futon with him—Gi still blissfully asleep on it—down the hall in the guest room. It’s a large room by Seoul’s standard. Clean and minimalist with dark wood and soft, warm light, and a large comfortable bed. 

Like a good host Eomma taught him to be, he fusses with pillows and blankets from the linen closet. Arms full, he backs out to pass them to you, not knowing you’re right behind him.

Namjoon hears your muffled cry as you fall backward and reach for him. Instinctively, he reaches out to grab you, hands around your waist, brain too addled to think except oh shit I did it again.

Together you fall in a heap on the bed, pillows and blankets tossed about you. Your back sinks into the plush surface with Namjoon on top of you. Noses bumping, lips a hair’s breadth apart, you feel him everywhere—his hard chest on your breasts, his hard abdomen on the soft of yours, his hard thighs pinning your legs inside his, his hard—

You’re both not breathing. Both not thinking. Both wanting. Wishing. Longing.

There’s a mountain of fear in making the first move. For the second time, Namjoon wishes he was more suave, more cool. Why can’t he get a grip? On his cock, for starters. Damn thing has a mind of its own.

“I’m so sorry. I didn’t ask you to stay the night just so that—” he starts.

“Shh… this is—this is nice. It’s just… it’s just been a while.” You laugh a little as you shift awkwardly beneath him. Oh my god, why is he so hard everywhere? “I finally get to see these dimples up close after all these years…”

He’s so grateful. So grateful that you can laugh about this and not get mad or weird. 

You let him press in more than you should, let his weight linger over you—you can’t resist the smell of him—the sweat of skin, the musk of man. 

“I, uh—I, uh, best get up now,” he says. 

But your arms are still around him.

And his legs are still straddling yours.

Because you’re staring and he’s staring and there’s what ifs and should we and then you raise your lips, and he lowers his, and the saint and the sinner come closer and closer on this side of heaven when—

A soft cough from Gi stops the kiss.

For a split second, you stare at each other, then at Gi, then back at each other before collapsing into silent laughter. He climbs out of the bed, and looks away embarrassed. 

“I’m so awkward,” he sighs ruefully. “Sorry.”

“We’re so awkward,” you assure him. “Next time, we’ll be better at this.”

“I’d like that.” He smiles. “A next time.”

“Goodnight, Namjoon,” you say, soft and shy.

He almost wants to tuck you in like he did for Gi earlier that evening. But he doesn’t. He would be a little too close to you, the act too intimate, too ironic— because what he really wants is to throw caution to the goddamn wind and throw off the fucking covers and kiss you and kiss you and kiss you. 

Instead, he settles for a goodnight and a yell if you need anything. And then he closes the door to let you rest.

In the comfortable guest bed, sandwiched by the smooth silk of expensive linen and a peaceful, sleeping Gi, you finally fall asleep.

Somewhere in Seoul, the lost Fairy Bird, tired of flying by herself, finds a place to rest her wings.

*******************************

Control is a heady thing. Like a drug denied, it creates an unquenchable thirst once it’s in possession of someone who hasn’t had much of a taste of it. 

Mrs. Yang could never control her husband; but her son is another story.

In the beautiful living room decorated with ornate Louis XV rococo furniture, she examines three national newspapers and four international ones.

For her, nothing beats the smell of newsprint, the flipping of each page, the ability to scan across the broadsheets for what might catch her eye. And today, what catches her eye is your father’s name.

His name is splashed all over the headlines. Yours too, is inserted here and there as a salacious detail, dangled like a tempting treat for the public’s vapid hunger for gossip.

She’s sure sooner or later, your relationship with Jihoon will bring negative publicity to the Yang empire.

“You must stop seeing her. At once,” she declares. “She’s bad for you, bad for business. She’s—”

“Pregnant,” Jihoon says matter-of-factly.

“Well,” she pauses only to arch a perfectly drawn eyebrow, “You know what to do. It’s not like this is your first time knocking up some girl.” Mrs. Yang rolls her eyes, annoyed that her son has gotten in such trouble again. 

“Looking at the list of creditors, she would need the money. That slut better keep her mouth shut—but why she keeps her legs open all the time for you, I really don’t know!”

“She’s not like that. Stop it—”

“Oh, raise your voice now, aren’t you? What happened to my obedient little son? You got your trust fund now and you’re all cocky?” Her voice is low and dangerous. 

Jihoon knows—another wrong word—he would lose the penthouse in Gangnam he was promised for his 21st birthday. Losing the penthouse would also mean losing the freedom he would have of finally being free from the oppression at home.

And so he does what he’s been conditioned to do.

Years growing up with two monsters disguised as parents have taught him enough.

“Yes, Eomma.”

*******************************

There’s always a little explosion of hope that blooms in his heart whenever Gi shoots him a smile. 

“Gi, look at this ladybug! It has seven spots! Seven is—” Namjoon says excitedly.

“—my favourite number!” Gi squeals.

Gi’s wide-eyed wonder reminds Namjoon of himself. Plants, bugs, flowers, birds seem to beg for his touch. Gi can’t keep his hands off from feeling the curve of a leaf, or the silk of a petal. Every bird needs naming, every critter, a close examination. 

“Namjoon Ahjussi, what’s that bird called?” Gi asks, pointing to a bird which swooped to a nearby park bench. 

“That’s the collared dove, Gi. See the black line around the dove’s neck? It looks just like a–”

“–a collar!” Gi announces triumphantly. 

“That’s right, Gi!” 

And so on and on it goes. These nature walks are getting quite frequent now. Namjoon goes with you to pick up Gi after school when his schedule allows, always stopping by the park with the swings, always stopping for ants, and butterflies, and birds. 

There’s something about Gi that draws Namjoon like a magnet. It’s how Gi is filled with so much goodness, and sees only good in everything and everyone. It’s the way Gi looks at him. Like Namjoon is his Anpanman, so big, and strong, and smart. 

His heart swells when he thinks of this.

And as much as Kim Namjoon wants to be good and noble like how Gi believes him to be, the memories of his own childhood haunt him constantly. The cold concrete floor in the winter. The meagre meals. The threadbare coats. Eomma’s well-worn hands that sew and sew and sew even at midnight. 

He will do better than his father. Better for his mother. And better for his family he hopes to have one day.

And so, every time a new custom order comes from yet another nameless client for such and such a passport, or such and such an authentication for a piece of art, he tells himself just one more. 

*******************************

Gi’s temperature is not coming down. 

The doctor had prescribed a generic fever-reducer for Gi to feel a little more comfortable. But like Gi’s personality, the fever is proving to be stubborn.

“Eomma, my throat hurts,” he whimpers. 

“I know Gi. Be strong. Drink another sip of soup, sweetheart.” You proffer a spoonful of hot samgyetang you’d just made, blowing it lightly to cool it down. “It’s good for your fever, Gi-gi.”

Suddenly, Gi’s legs begin convulsing, jerking wildly, his flailing arms knock away the spoon with surprising force.

“Gi! Gi!” you cry out, panicking when you see the whites of his eyes. His limbs are thrashing with ferocity, as if clawed by unimaginable pain. “Gi! Look at Eomma!” You’re trying to pull him out of unconsciousness, but it’s no use. His skin deathly pale, only the whites of his eyes are visible.

Quickly, you dial for an ambulance. The operator tells you that the emergency care is full, they’ll try their best to send an ambulance over. But chances are, the seizure is likely to be caused by the fever and it’s not uncommon among young children.

“Just wait it out,” she says. “It should stop in a few minutes.”

You want to scream. Wait it out? Wait it out?

Hanging up, you do as the operator instructs. Turn Gi on his side. Make sure his airway is clear. Loosen any restrictive clothing.

The seizure seems to go on and on. But slowly, his twitching subsides, and Gi seems to regain consciousness as if surfacing from a fevered dream.

“Eomma, I wet my pants,” he sobs. 

“That’s okay, Gi. Let’s get you a dry set of pyjamas.”

After getting him comfortable, a quick google search helpfully lets you know that febrile seizures are usually followed by sleepiness. Let the child have a nap but make sure he doesn’t get too sleepy.

Right. Let him sleep but make sure he isn’t too sleepy. What the fuck is this?

Exhausted, you sit beside your sleeping son. You wish you could nap, but what if Gi goes into another seizure while you’re asleep?

There’s work tomorrow at the chicken shop and the preschool is not going to allow Gi to attend if he just had a fever. 

You never ask for help. You’ve managed so far, coasting on good luck and sunshine. Gi hasn’t had a really sick episode till now. But exhaustion looms on the edges of your consciousness. 

And so with practised ease, your fingertips find their way to his number.

When you tell him what’s happening, he doesn’t hesitate to show up at your door, with food, and a hug, and a promise to stay awake to watch over Gi. 

Because Kim Namjoon cannot say no to those three little words. 

We need you. 

*******************************

“You!” your boss barks, “here again to drop another bill into my hot oil?”

“No, sajangnim. I wouldn’t dare. Just here to get more chicken,” Namjoon bows politely, but he shoots you a wink. 

The old man narrows his sharp, shrewd eyes as he assesses the scene before him. 

He sees how you lift your lashes to look at the young customer who has been coming daily, hanging around until you’re done for the day.

Then there’s the way your hand lingers in the customer’s hand when you give him the change; how the tall suitor doesn’t even care about the chicken, or the fact that it’s raining wretchedly. 

Ah. Lovebirds.

“Be good to her,” he warns Namjoon gruffly. “She’s my best employee.” 

Namjoon’s eyes widen a little at being called out. But he surmises this is the closest thing he’ll get to parental approval to court you.

Blushing, he bows again. “Thank you, sajangnim. I will.”

You’re a little embarrassed but very much moved. Who knew that old man would look out for you like that?

“Ah, what the hell, let’s just close early. No one’ll buy from us when it’s raining like that.” He gives you a stern look before he warns, “I still expect you to be back here opening the stall tomorrow!”

“Yes, sajangnim,” you parrot dutifully. You’re just about to start emptying the hot oil when your boss stops you. 

“I’ll close this time. Not like I have anything else to do today anyway. Go on, you lovebirds! But remember-–”

“Yes, sajangnim. You want me to open the stall tomorrow.”

“Well, that too. But I was going to say–” he pauses, searching for the right word because truth be told, he does care for you, he just doesn’t know how young people say things anymore "-–use protection.” 

Your face heats up with embarrassment. You can’t believe what you are hearing! Namjoon looks embarrassed, suddenly interested in the puddle by his feet.

Under the umbrella, you walk away from the deserted open air market. It’s just two of you against the cold, dark skies. You’re grateful for the warmth of his body next to yours, the heat of his hand on the curve of your waist.

Exposed to the onslaught of rain, Namjoon’s shoulder is getting wet, but he doesn’t give a fuck. To have you so close is electrifying. He marvels at how you fit next to his side so perfectly.

When he was a little boy, his mother had told him the story of how the first woman was created from a bone out of the body of the first man. The bone did not come from the sole of his foot for she was not to be crushed.

No, she was fashioned with a rib from his side because she would be an equal. Someone to fight for. Someone to fight beside. 

And here, with you beside him, is the best feeling in the world.

“Namjoon, where are we going?”

“I don’t know. I’m just kind of happy right now, being next to you.” He flashes his dimples at you and you fight every urge to thumb at them.

“My shoes are getting soaked. Let’s get indoors! Art Museum? Gi doesn’t need to be picked up for a couple more hours.” These free hours without Gi and without work seem like such a gift.

“I have a zoom call in about thirty minutes—sorry a client needs me all of a sudden. Shouldn’t be long.” He has to shout a bit now with the rain coming down hard. “Do you want to wait at my place and then we’ll go?”

With the rain pelting across your shoulders, the umbrella is all but useless at this time. Pressing into his side, breasts brushing against the side of his arm, you lean upwards to speak above the roar of the rain. “Sounds good! Last one back is a soggy gimari!”

And you take off—feet flying across puddles, legs leaping over cracks in the sidewalk as if you’ve been set free by the rain to do something silly and childish after being the solo parent all this while.

Namjoon gives himself a second to admire your supple form, hair lifting in the wake of your fluid strides.

You turn around and shoot him a mischievous grin. Catch me. 

He takes off after you, surprised at how quick you are, loving the sway of your ass and the rounded curve of your hips. For a block and a half, he chases you, happy to go at half speed just to see you dance through the raindrops, so exuberant as you spread your arms out, like a bird, unafraid of rain.

He catches up, catches you. Without thinking, he pulls you into him by the waist, arms tightening around you. Laughing, you loop your arms around his neck, and with the rain between you, and nobody around you, you lean in and–

You kiss him. 

It was meant to be a playful peck. Something fun and frivolous. But the first taste of his lips mingled with the glide of wet skin on wet skin weakens you, melts your resolve to stay strong and untouchable so that no man can let you down again. 

You let him in, let him crowd his body into you, let his touch soak into your skin, and dare you say it—let his love into your heart.

You’re so hungry for touch, and he’s so thirsty for your kisses that he leans in this time, urging your lips to part for him, his nose nuzzling yours, silently pleading. Again.

You hear the call of his body to yours and answer by moulding your limbs around him, like the last sailor clinging on to the mast of the ship come hell or high water. 

This second kiss—of tongues gently exploring, lips meeting and parting and meeting and parting like dancers who can’t touch enough of each other—this second kiss is hope, and lust, and love poured stronger and fuller into each other than all the rain from the dark heavens.

The second kiss becomes third, becomes fourth and fifth and sixth and you lose count. 

All you want is more. 

The long-forgotten umbrella lays upside down on the ground, quietly collecting the drips and drops that didn’t make it between the lips of lovers. 

Namjoon’s fingers cup your face to tilt your eyes, nose, mouth to him. He kisses each feature, tasting the silver metal of rain and sweetness of your skin. The feel of your tightening nipples against the wet of your shirt presses into his chest, igniting hot burning heat under his rain-drenched skin.

He wants you, not just your lips. Every inch. Every way. Every time. 

A loud clap of thunder pulls you apart. 

“Your meeting.” You whisper the words with effort, fingers still entwined around his neck, taking the chance to steal a kiss at the side of his jaw then his chin. 

“My meeting.” There’s regret in his voice.

“Last one back is still a soggy gimari.” And then you run. Because this time, walking back and not kissing him feels too much like temptation.

Temptation to believe that just maybe, life could be sweet after all.

*******************************

Back in his apartment, Namjoon feels flustered. The kiss in the rain disoriented him and his apartment which is home feels strangely unfamiliar with you here. It’s not like you’ve not been here before. But this time, it feels different. He now knows the curve of your lips, and the pull of your mouth, heard the little noise you made when he kissed you back.

He tries not to stare at how your clothes cling to every curve and dip of your body, tries not to imagine his hands cupping you into him. Goddamn. Get a grip. 

And so, busying himself, he tells you there’s a dryer at the back of the kitchen. That there are towels and some old clothes you can find in the guest room’s closet. 

“I better not go and get them for you. Might end up falling all over you…” he laughs, a little ruefully. 

“That might not… might not be a bad thing.” 

“Yeah?” he asks, remembering how soft you felt beneath him.

“Yeah,” you reply, wishing your voice wasn’t so needy, so desperate. 

There’s a moment where you both stare at each other, breaths still, hearts pounding as the memory of what could have been floods back. But your practical instincts kick in and you clear your throat.

“You said something about a meeting?”

Namjoon swallows hard—he’s hungry for another kiss. But his goal. Of making money. Yes. “Right. Meeting.”

Reluctantly, he turns and heads to his study. 

There’s the click of the lock on the door and you think vaguely to yourself it’s strange he felt like he needed to lock the door. 

No time to dwell on these trivialities—you’re cold and wet. Heading to the bathroom, you strip and enter the shower, longing for the hot water to cool your heated nerves. 

You shiver despite the heat, knees weak with the smell of him in the soft glow of the bathroom in black marble. The steam permeates your pores with his cologne—the clean subtle scent of polished wood and whisky and dark leather. 

It drowns you. Confuses you. 

You’ve said before you wouldn’t let your heart trust again. But Namjoon. Namjoon.

Quickly, you turn the shower off. Any longer and you think you might become delirious. Now in a fresh baggy tee and ridiculously loose boardshorts that are probably Namjoon’s, you settle on the living room couch as you wait for your clothes to dry in the tumble dryer.

But before you know it, exhaustion lures you to fall asleep on the couch with a book on Medieval Art open on your lap.

*******************************

The call from Hitman Bang goes on a little too long. 

It’s a little proposition. Audition now for the biggest heist of his life.

The test is a diplomatic passport of a certain Foreign Minister, country of origin to be revealed. All previous nations visited by this minister in the last five years with correct dates must be represented chronologically with corresponding diplomatic stamps. Package due in 12 hours upon receipt of brief. If he accepts.

“Are you in?”

If. 

If. 

If.

He takes a deep breath, “Of course.”

“Perfect. Expect a courier in one hour.”

One more. One more. One more. How many times has he said this to himself? But he’s sure of it now. He doesn’t want to worry if it’s the cops every time the doorbell rings. 

He’ll audition for the team. If he makes it, then this heist would be the last one. The big one. The last one.

Just one more.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

There’s something about seeing you dressed in one of his old shirts, curled up on the couch fast asleep that makes his heart skip a beat.

Damn the call. He made you wait too long.

He leans down to wake you. He knows you need the rest but he’s sure you’ll be mad if you find out you slept the whole afternoon.

“Hey, time to go. Meeting’s over.” He rounds his fists so he doesn’t cup your face, fights for self-control so he doesn’t thread his fingers through your hair.

When you don’t stir, he finally allows himself to give you a soft pat on your shoulder. “Wake up, sleepyhead.”

Instinctively, you loll your head back a little so you can feel his soft warm hand cupping your face. Namjoon almost whimpers.

He lets his hand linger there a little longer, the courage to deny himself ebbs with every warm breath from you feathering across his palm.

Still deep asleep, all you know is you’re in some sort of delicious dream. You smell Namjoon. Feel him even. He’s so close. “Joon,” you sigh. 

The sigh goes straight to his loins. Oh baby.

He clears his throat to say something gentlemanly, something caring. But another sigh escapes your lips.

“Oppa,” you murmur in your sleep.

Shit.

He feels so agonisingly close in your dreams, so close you can touch him, so close you can whisper to him all the little endearments you want.

A shudder of pleasure shoots through Namjoon. You’re so pliant in his hand, so needy.

Forcing himself to remain steadfast, he croaks out again, “Wake up, sleepyhead.”

This time you stir. Blinking your eyes confusedly, Namjoon’s face comes into focus. “Namjoon?”

“You fell asleep. I’m sorry my meeting went over. Wanna head to the museum now?”

“I want—”  In the hazy limerence of your dream and real life you try to string together a coherent sentence. “I want–” you whisper.

Words fail you. 

And so do what you do when Gi cries after scraping his knees and your heart aches so much you just can’t say anything. 

You touch.

Reaching up, you cup his face and draw it to yours, eyes imploring him to do what your lips cannot utter. Inch by inch. Closer. Closer.

Kiss me. 

He leans in, heart pounding, because this time, this time—there’s no rain between you, no excuse that you’re both caught in a moment, no umbrella around to pretend he needs to be closer. 

And when his lips finally connect with yours, you meet his hunger with your own. Because you’re starving. You want all of him, his taste on your lips, his touch on your skin, his tenderness all over you.

And he? He doesn’t know what to think. Just that he wants to be worthy of this kiss, this outpouring of love and vulnerability and hope when you urge his hands under your shirt, when you bring his fingers into the hot wet ache at the apex of your thighs, when you pant over and over in the airy voice I need you, I need you.

Stumbling like desperate lovers down the hall and into his darkened bedroom, you feast on his nakedness and he on yours. There’s licking, and tasting, groans of satisfaction as your lips roam all over to kiss him—shoulders strong enough to carry Gi and the burden of sick nights; that chest which hides a heart so big it welcomes you and the son fathered by another man. Sinewy arms. Thighs that tremble when you kiss him there. And there. And there.

You worship every inch of him, take his cock in your mouth because you want to bring him all the pleasure your body can give, take everything he gives to you because he’s so, so good. 

He’s so hard that it almost hurts when the smooth silk of your lips slide up and then lick lazily down. And when you start teasing the tender curve of his balls, he fights to hold back, terrified to come too quickly in your delicious mouth.

He needs to stop you now. “My turn,” he rasps desperately. 

He guides you on your back, begs you to open up your legs for him, begs you to let him love you and taste you and be good to you. 

Your skin trembles as he puts his tongue on you, muscles and tendons weaken under his fingertips, limbs flailing as he licks at your clit, kisses the secret wetness there. You grow crazy, pull at his hair, moaning louder at each pass of his tongue and his fingers inside you, both working to draw you to the edge.

“Namjoon?” You’re scared, it feels like you’re falling, you’re so close. “Feels too good,” you whimper. “I think I–”

“Feel you clenching so hard. So fucking hard. Gonna cum?” 

You nod desperately, barely able to force out a weak sigh. Yeah.

He keeps at it, keeps using gentle pressure, keeps urging you with everything he has. Your hands fist the sheets, jaw slack as you let him labour over your most intimate parts. 

Oh god.

Toes curling tight in anticipation, you moan as your orgasm quakes from your core and ripples outward. How is it that this man seems to command your every cell?

Namjoon watches, dumbstruck by the way you cry out his name, mesmerised at the way your beautiful breasts sway in the wake of your high as you fight for your very breath, overwhelmed by all the explosions going on inside your body.

Watching you writhe with pleasure on his bed (his bed!), his hand—still glistening with your arousal—reaches instinctively for his cock, the up and down glide now so much more intense with your juices combined with his own pre-cum. 

How long has he imagined this and cummed to this very sight? But you’re here now, and real.

It takes a few seconds for you to realise what he's doing. And it strikes you as profoundly unfair. You want him in your hand, your mouth, your cunt.

“Don’t you want to come inside me?” you ask, puzzled, a little hurt. 

Fuck yeah but– “D-do you want me to?” 

There’s a bit of the high-school Namjoon you hear in his uncertainty. Like he’s not worthy.

You rise on your knees to face him. Slowly, you reach down and wrap your hand around his, fingers intertwining over his cock, gliding over the hard, throbbing flesh. Together.

“Isn’t this so much better?” you whisper. 

With your free hand, you guide his other hand over the tightened peak of one breast and then another breast. “How can you doubt,” you breathe heavily, “how can you doubt when this is what you do to me?” He sucks in a breath, eyes half-lidded with pleasure, almost stir-crazy when you let him palm your tits.

“And this,” you pant, as you guide his hand to your centre where you’re so wet for him, so wet from him, “T–this is all you.”

You nuzzle the side of his cheek, suddenly too shy to meet his eyes. “Make love to me. Kim Namjoon. Make love. To me.”

Every resolve melts now. He comes to you, eyes dark with desire. 

On his bed, he covers you with soft, fleeting touches–his fingerprints become a signature over your body, claiming you; each kiss a declaration—mine he says. Mine. You’re mine.

You beg to feel more of him. 

It’s not enough that his cock slides along your wet folds as he nips along the column of your neck. It’s not enough that his thighs are straddling yours, the coarse smattering of hair on his thighs rubbing and igniting your skin whenever he rocks and rocks against you. 

It’s not enough.

You make a desperate sound, pathetic in how you plead for him. Please, Joon-ah, don’t make me wait.

He finally fucks slowly and deeply into you, goaded by your little gasps of pleasured pain as you take him inch by inch, his mouth murmuring in your ear that the stretch will feel better soon, that he’ll make sure of it, that you’re taking him so well. That’s it. That’s my girl. Take my cock. Take it. 

And it’s true. He’s right. It feels good when he’s completely inside you, anchored. Full. 

Move Joon. You urge him. Wanna feel you. 

The curve of his cock nudges against your g-spot, thick and throbbing as he thrusts into you, each stroke deep and sure. He sighs with pleasure when you whimper choa, choa. So good, Namjoon. 

You’re squeezing him so tight, sheathing him. He feels so safe inside you like this, accepted completely for who he is. He makes a keening noise against your neck, the sensation of thrusting into your warmth, locked by your legs, welcomed in your arms proves too overwhelming. He’s in heaven. You’re heaven. Oh shit. Condom. “Are we safe?” He draws out half-way, hovering over you, eyes drifting to his hard cock, slicked all over with the cream of your arousal and his. Shit. How much of that is yours and how much is his?

“IUD,” you reply in the haze of climbing your own peak. “It’s safe. Please oppa.”

“Fuck. Here we go,” he says, not really sure what he means. His brain is all fuzzy—his cock is back inside the velvet clench of your slick walls. All he knows is he could remain there forever. He mouths at your breast, rolling the peak in his mouth, enjoying the way your voice gets airy and breathy before he pulls out a little and then surges back in. 

Each plunge of his cock is taking you closer and closer to a heady rush. Without thinking, your hand goes to your clit, walls spasming at every tight circling of your fingers right there. 

Namjoon feels the tell-tale tightening of your sweet pussy around his cock. “Don’t come yet,” he slurs with effort as he rolls his hips again and again into you, head thrown back. “Wait for me. Wait.”

You’re so close. Too close. Desperately, you stutter, “C-catch me.”

So he races you for the second time today, forgetting every inhibition, forgoing every vow to be self-controlled around you as he chases you and chases his climax, slamming his hips into yours over and over, breath broken as he can’t get enough of the sweet heat between your thighs.

He feels your release a split second before his own. 

“Fuck. Fuck. Ah—ah, cumming,” he groans into your neck, hips bucking on their own accord.

You clutch him closer, urging him deeper inside you. You’re calling his name as you cum, he’s moaning yours, both of you holding onto each other, holding fast.

As warmth blooms into your cunt, your eyes roll back at how well he fills you. You don’t want him to slip out. You feel so full—full of his cum, full of his cock, full of love for this man. You trail your fingertips all over his big warm body on top of you, his heart beating next to yours, his mouth panting hard and hot in rapid breaths in the slope of your shoulder.

Blissed out at the feel of sweat-soaked skin, bodies still fever-hot with love and lust, it’s a while before the pounding of your hearts slow, and your breathing evens out. Tenderly, he tucks a strand of hair behind your ear. 

“Gonna clean you up. All you just have to do is lie there. Don’t move. Let me take care of you.” 

He disappears into the en-suite bathroom and then comes back with a washcloth, comfortingly warm and soft. Open up. 

You let him clean you from the stickiness of sex, both of you giggling. There’s so much cum. He goes back to rinse off the cloth and to get a towel to lay over the damp sheets. 

A wave of satisfaction pins you into his bed, tempting you to curl up like a lazy cat for the rest of the afternoon. Hazily, you wonder if it’s the doorbell you hear. Wait. It is the doorbell. It rings and rings. The sound of running water in the bathroom tells you that Namjoon is preoccupied. 

Without thinking, you grab Namjoon’s robe you see lying on the armchair by the bed. Who could it be? A client of his? Through the peephole, you see it looks like some sort of a delivery person, a package in his hands.

“Kim Namjoon?” the delivery man asks. 

“He’s in the bathroom. Can you leave it at the door?’’ you call out. 

“No can do. I need a signature.”

Apologetically, you open the door, stick out your hand to retrieve the package. You’re trying to ignore the delivery guy’s leering gaze so you quickly grab the pen he proffers and sign it with a simple Kim before slamming the door shut. 

Outside the warmth of the bed, the chill hurries you back into the bedroom, package long forgotten by the side-table in the foyer. You’re glad to slip between the sheets that still retain the warmth of your love-making.

It’s not long before he climbs back into bed with you to put a soft dry towel over the embarrassingly wet spot on the sheets. You both sigh with pleasure as you cuddle, facing each other.

“What are you thinking about?” Namjoon asks, his low baritone thrilling you to your toes. Why does his voice sound deeper and huskier after sex?

“Mmm… nothing.”

“Must be something to make you smile like that.” Namjoon playfully and lightly pinches your cheek. 

“It’s really silly. But I had the beginnings of a crush on you since the bus ride on that field trip,” you confess.

“Well. I had the biggest crush on you.”

You look incredulous. “I don’t believe it!” 

“I’m being honest!” Namjoon protests.

You giggle. “My dad told me an honest man is better than a rich man.”

“I’m not rich.” He looks away. “Hope to be. One day.”

Drawing his face towards you, you touch his cheek comfortingly. “All I need, Joon-ah, is an honest man. My father wasn’t one.”

Namjoon holds you tighter then, gathering you into his big, warm body. Resting his chin over your head, his heart rate gradually slows. It’s safer to hold you like this—he wouldn’t have to lie to your face.

“Well.” He pauses, fighting against the grip of guilt over his words, “Well. I honestly love you.”

Shyly, you confess, “I love you too.” Sliding a leg between his and wrapping another leg over him, you sigh with pleasure as your fingers gently dance across the muscled expanse of his back. Made for each other. 

Snuggling into him, you suddenly remember something. “Joon? A package arrived for you just now,” you say, too much in love to notice the slight stiffening in his arms around you. “While you were in the bathroom.” 

Oh shit. 

He’d forgotten about that damn phone call with Bang. That promise to audition for the biggest job of his life. The last one. 

“Where’s the package?” he asks, voice tight.

“Side-table, in the foyer. Hey,” you say mischievously, “we have time for another round before we pick up Gi. What say you?”

“Sure,” Namjoon swallows hard. “Just one more.”

As your kisses start to get heated again, and the bed begins rocking again, you forget all about the advice from your boss to use protection.

Too bad he just didn’t have the right words to say what he actually meant.

He was not worried that Namjoon would leave you with a round belly.

He was worried Namjoon would leave you with a broken heart.

*******************************

It’s been a few months of three lives entwining together. Strand by strand, the schedule you’ve woven so tightly to fit you and Gi loosen in warp and weft to welcome Namjoon.

It’s amazing how seamlessly he fits into your lives, how easily Gi takes to him, and he to Gi. You and Namjoon fit each other perfectly too—you’ve found that out over many nights, in many, many ways.

Today, Namjoon has promised to take you guys out to dinner but a business call suddenly intrudes on the plan. He’s still in his home office, and the call has since dragged on for a bit.

There have been many of these calls lately, calls that come suddenly when you’re at dinner together, calls that make his jaw clench and his eyes to grow dark. Calls that go on and on and make you worry. Your father had those calls before and you wonder—-nah. He’s a broker for art. Rich people are going to demand his time whenever they want, for whatever they want. 

Gi’s complaining about being hungry though, so you tell him to wait a bit while you wash some strawberries in Namjoon’s kitchen. 

Strawberries washed, you call for Gi to come and eat them. 

But you’re met with silence.

Lately, hide-and-seek has become a favourite of Gi’s. It scares you to death sometimes when you can’t even find him in your tiny apartment, much less in Namjoons’s spacious condo. Gi can contort his body into every corner, adjust his limbs to lie flat under the covers, or freeze straight as a board behind a door.

He must be here somewhere in Namjoon’s place. Gi has been over often enough to know every nook and cranny.

“Gi, Gi! Where are you? Eomma is looking for you! Ready or not, here I come!”

You check the living room, behind the curtains. The guest room?  Not there. Must be the bathroom then, surely, hiding in the bathtub. Not there.

“Gi! Time to stop playing! Strawberries!” You try to keep the panic out of your voice, but the worry that something has happened unnerves you.

You search and you search, opening the closets in the guest room, resorting to the ridiculous of even pulling out drawers in case he somehow could squeeze himself that flat.

“What are you doing?”

Namjoon’s voice startles you. You freeze, hands stilled in mid-air, the drawer filled with important-looking papers still open. 

“Gi. He’s missing. I searched everywhere.” Your voice is tight, anxious.

“And you think he’s in the drawer?”

“I-I don’t know.” Why do you sound so pathetic? Get a grip. “I’m worried sick Joon. I’m not thinking. If opening a drawer while I look for my son pisses you off, I—”

“I’m not pissed,” he says quietly, hating himself for suspecting you of snooping around. “I just need to know what’s happening. How long has he been missing?”

“Ten, maybe fifteen minutes? He was hungry and tired of waiting, so I said I’ll wash some strawberries that he can eat before going out for dinner. The next thing I knew–”

Namjoon hurries to the foyer. Oh god. “The door's open.”

“No…” You’re unsteady on your feet. Gi!

“Stay here in case he comes back. Don’t call the cops. I’m going to look for him.” 

“What if—” you choke on the sour taste of fear.

“No,” he says, voice firm. “We’re not going to think about that now.”

Namjoon runs out the door, heart pounding, his mind racing at all the possibilities where Gi might be. Was there an unsatisfied client looking for revenge? Can’t be. He usually deals through his handler, no direct clients for that business. Well, except for Hitman Bang.

Could Gi be looking for bugs at the park? 

The park looks empty, dotted only with some elderly folk already done with dinner, strolling along the quiet paths. Namjoon checks behind every bush, glances up at every tree, always calling out Gi! Gi!

Maybe he’s at the playground nearby?

Run. Faster.

In the dusk of twilight, little shadows flit tiredly from swing to slide at the playground, the remaining handful of children running on their last legs of energy before dinner. No Gi in sight.

Think. 

Anpanman.

Shit, he hopes to god Gi isn’t on top of some roof somewhere.

He was hungry and tired of waiting…

The chicken stall! 

Running along the familiar route, Namjoon scolds himself for taking too long on the call with Bang. Bang had liked the passport—it was, in his words, authentic as fuck. The forged passport cleared with flying colours despite coming under heavy scrutiny by diplomatic handlers at Tehran, Addis Ababa, and Pyongyang. 

We need you. You in?

And of course Namjoon said yes. Just one more. The big one. The last one. For Gi and for you—so that there will never be a cause for worry about money again. He’ll retire. Find a quiet place, spend his days painting sunsets, painting Gi playing on the beach. Painting you. 

Your phone call comes just as he rounds the corner to the street market. “Namjoon! Sajangnim has him! Gi went to get chicken!”

“Yep, had the same thought. I’m almost there. I’ll bring him home.”

Home.

It’s really home now. With you there, waiting for him and Gi.

Namjoon sprints to the chicken stall, relief ushering him step after step. From afar, he spies the Gi’s little frame, holding a drumstick, eating contentedly. 

The old boss looks up, consternation lining his face as he pulls Namjoon aside. “Took you long enough. What the hell were you doing? Letting a four-year-old walk through the streets, hungry? For God’s sake, do the right thing! Be a good father!”

“I’m not—”

“Don’t tell me you’re not his father,” the sajangnim says evenly. “Tell the little boy. He ran over and announced to me he thinks he has an appa now. I don’t want him to come to me hungry like that ever again because you lovebirds forgot to feed him!”

Namjoon swallows hard. “Yes, sajangnim.”

“Goddamn. Just get the hell out of here! I have a business to run and not be giving free drumsticks to lost little boys!”

Namjoon bows apologetically multiple times, pissed with himself. If only he didn’t take that call from Bang. Gi is strangely silent, beginning to have an inkling that he messed up big time.

In a quiet corner by the side of the shop, Namjoon kneels on the ground, the rough asphalt scraping against his skin. Eye to eye with Gi, Namjoon takes a deep breath, mind racing to think what his own father would say in such a situation. 

“Gi, did you tell sajangnim I was your appa? Do you want me to be?”

Gi nods slowly. Then shakes his head. Then nods again.

Namjoon tries a different tactic. “Do you want to be an appa when you grow up?”

Gi nods.

“Good appas don’t leave. We don’t run away.” Making sure he still has Gi’s gaze, he continues, “If you want to be a good appa some day, that means you don’t run away either. Do you understand that?”

“Even when I’m hungry?” Gi asks, a little tearful.

“Even when you’re hungry. And about that—I’m sorry I kept you waiting. But running away is still wrong. Because it makes Eomma scared. And—”

“Were you scared too?” he asks softly.

Namjoon stops. Was he scared? 

The truth is right there, staring in his face. Bringing his hand up to cup Gi’s little cheek, he swallows hard before answering, “Yes Gi. I was scared. Very scared.”

He doesn’t know why his arms are now wide open. Or why he welcomes the weight of the little body pressed into him in a hug, driving his knees further into the asphalt. Or why his heart soars as those little hands curl around his neck.

“Let’s go home, buddy,” Namjoon says, choking back the tumult of emotions in his throat. He hopes he made his father proud and sends a prayer to the wind. Thanks, Appa, for staying as long as you could.

With new resolve, he puts Gi on his shoulders and seats him there, the movement fluid and automatic. It’s the only way Gi travels now with him. Gi squeals with delight, flinging his arms out with abandon, pretending he’s Anpanman, flying in the sky. He’s safe now. On Namjoon’s shoulders, nothing can hurt him anymore. 

They are about half-way home when they see you, running towards them. “Be good now,” he warns as he slips Gi down from his shoulders. “Tell Eomma you’re sorry for running away without permission.”

Gi nods solemnly before dashing to you with a cry of Eomma on his lips.

“Gi. Gi! Are you okay?” Your hands go to his face, his shoulders, then his arms and sides, as if you can’t believe he’s still in one piece. Threading your fingers through his silky fine hair, you wonder if mothers, like God, have the power to know if a hair is missing from a child’s head. 

“I’m sorry, Eomma, for running out without per-permission,” says Gi. He looks so remorseful—eyes forlorn and cheeks pale—that you’re unable to scold him. 

“I was so scared Gi. Eomma was so, so scared.” You draw him into a hug. “But I forgive you. Just don’t do that again, okay?”

“I won’t, Eomma,” he sobs into your embrace. “I won’t because I want to be a good appa when I grow up. And good appas don’t leave. They don’t run away.”

You’re stunned. It feels like a slap in the face. “What did you say?”

Gi looks at Namjoon helplessly. I thought I said the right thing?

Namjoon clears his throat. “He said, uh, good appas don’t run away.”

How many nights have you worried about Gi—that he will turn out like his father. Or your father. Men who leave at the first sign of trouble. Men who run away from doing the right thing. 

How many nights have you thought that you were somehow at fault for causing the appas in your life to disappear, one after another. That maybe there was something wrong with you—some defect that repelled them from staying. 

But with sudden clarity, you know now. It’s not your fault. And Gi’s not going to be like them. 

A flood of tears follows your stuttered cry. As you cradle his face in your hands, you utter over and over again That’s right, Gi. That’s right. You’re my good Gi.

The three of you stand there in an embrace, arms twined around each other, tears falling freely.

You don’t know how long you stand there, like a cord of three strands, woven together by tears and love. But it’s Gi who stops crying first. “Can we eat now? I’m hungry.”

Namjoon laughs and you laugh too, eyes crinkled up with joy through the veil of emotion. And for the second time that night, he finds himself saying let’s go home

“Home!” Gi shouts with glee.

Tilting your face up at Namjoon, you smile. “Home.”

His heart does a somersault right there and then. Now he knows you feel the same way too.

At home, after bowls of instant ramen, after your bellies are full and Gi is looking sleepy and content, you wonder if this is what peace feels like. Your son, next to you, safe and sound. Your lover, beside you, looking dark and dangerous with that devastating smile of his. 

This little love nest feels so complete and perfect that you forget to ask Namjoon about the strange thing he’d said when Gi went missing.

The strange thing which had puzzled you earlier. 

Don’t call the cops.

*******************************

“Joon-ah please, I can’t take this,” you whimper, your face buried in the pillows, voice muffled. You wriggle your ass closer to him, a hand snaking backwards to draw him into you, legs trembling already with need and want.

“You’re so sexy,” Namjoon breathes into your skin, lips ghosting the delicate line of your spine, fingers tracing the delicate bones there that have withstood the trials of life with strength and dignity.

He lets both hands trail down the perfect curves of your ass, down the back of your legs and sweeps his fingers up on the inside of your thighs, loving how they lead his fingers to come closer, closer till they are trapped at the apex, a light sheen of your arousal already making a mess there.

Gathering you up to rest your soft ass flush against his hard cock, your neck arched, head propped on the slope of his shoulder, he brings his hands to your front to fondle the soft weight of your breasts, groaning as the peaks of your nipples tighten at his touch. He thumbs at them, shuddering at your low whimpers of oppa. 

“How is it you’re so soft and strong at the same time?” he asks. “So soft here,” he says, lightly playing with your nipples, then teasing the twin curves, lush and full in his hands, “yet so strong here?” he asks, nipping at your shoulders. 

“Me, strong?”

“Yeah. These shoulders. They hold up the whole world for Gi,” he says, dropping kisses across your shoulders, hot mouth licking up the sides of your neck along the way. “These arms, always carrying him when he’s tired,” he murmurs into your ear as he strokes the sides of your arms tenderly. “Yang Jihoon is a stupid ass.”

“Please Joon-ah. I’d rather talk about your perfect ass.” You shudder with pleasure as his hands drift down your front, over your navel and over your clit. Arching into his fingers, you let out a needy cry. “Oppa.”

“Shh… oppa’s here,” Namjoon soothes by your ear, sliding his cock right by your cunt, revelling in the arousal smeared between your thighs. So wet. And not even inside you yet. 

Back and forth, Namjoon rubs his cock between your thighs, enjoying the heat, the glide, the way you try to rock forward so that your clit can catch the friction of his flesh on yours.

Grasping his hard shaft, you massage the head of his cock, drawing sharp gasps from him as pre-cum leaks out of the sensitive slit, staining your fingers. You dare him to come apart, fingers squeezing around him as he thrusts repeatedly inside the tight hold of your thighs.

God, he’s close.

Panting hard, Namjoon bends you down so that you can rest again on your arms, your ass up, ripe and tempting; the flare of your hips, perfect for his hands to grasp and pull into his own. 

He lines himself up with your cunt, cock twitching in anticipation for your sweet heat. No more waiting. “Can you take me in one stroke, baby?”

“You know I can.”

“One stroke like this?” he asks, snapping his hips desperately into you, groaning with relief once his entire cock is sheathed inside your slick, tight warmth.

“Just like that,” you whine. “Like that,” moaning as he pulls out and slams back into you, the angle sharper and harder. Better.

He pumps into you, ramming into your sweet cunt, eyes on the mirrored wall, watching your breasts sway to the rhythm of his thrusts. Love and longing from his loins draw him into you again. Again.

You’re trembling, fingers fisting the sheets, blood feverish, skin afire as he pounds into you. You want to come, want him to come. Weakly, with your last coherent breath, you turn back to look at him. “Oppa.”

Namjoon remembers a word from childhood, a conversation from long, long ago. “Durumi,” he exhales. “My durumi.”

He fucks long and hard into you, cumming inside your walls, his mouth panting desperately against your neck as you clench around him. Namjoon almost blacks out from the sweetness of your warm cunt milking his hard cock. 

But from the edges of his consciousness, he hears you crying out for him; using his last ounce of strength, he curls his fingers around yours as you climb your own peak, wobbly knees finally giving out as you sink face-down into the sheets. 

Oh my god.

You must have died. 

Namjoon’s weight on you feels like heaven. He’s still buried inside you, and you’re grateful to be alive to experience his lovemaking.

“You’re a god, Namjoon,” you sigh, as you turn to face him, not caring his cum and yours have slipped out onto the sheets.

“Just a man,” he smiles, sheepish.

“And I’m your durumi. Gah, that was so hot.”

“I’m glad you found it hot,” he laughs. “My mom told me stories about the durumi all the time as a kid. I loved drawing them,” he says with a hand caressing your face, fingertips tracing the outline of your nose, the curve of your jaw, the slope of your shoulder. One day, he will paint you—the glow that’s dusting your cheeks, the quiet contentment in your eyes. One day. 

Scooting closer into him, you bury your nose right in his sternum, tasting the salt-sweat of skin there with little playful licks of your tongue. You’re a little embarrassed by what you want to say, so you hope his muscled pecs would muffle your little confession. “I love you. I want to be your durumi, every day.”

“Just the day? What about nights?” he asks with feigned uncertainty, kissing your forehead.

“Oppa.”

“I know, I know. I love you, too.”

He wonders if now is a good time to propose. No, not yet. He’ll do it after the last when he’s completely unshackled from that business by then. 

The ring, in his nightstand drawer, will just have to wait a little longer. 

“I’ll be gone for a business trip next month,” he starts off. “Handling some expensive art for a big client. Do you want my mom to help with Gi?”

“No, it’s okay. Gi and I have managed on our own before. Don’t wanna bother her. Where are you going?”

“Europe. The usual. London. Paris. Amsterdam. Just for a couple of weeks.”

“Will you miss me?” you pout.

“Every day.” And every night. Oh baby. You don’t know half of it. 

“Promise you’ll come back, Kim Namjoon.” You’re suddenly afraid. 

“I’m not even going yet!”

“Promise?” you insist.

“I, Kim Namjoon, promise to come back.” He keeps his tone light, fun, carefree even, but the truth that he might not make it back gnaws at him. So he tries to change the subject, and asks you what you’d like to do together when he’s back. 

“Maybe go to the birdwatching tour in Cheorwon? Gi would love it for his birthday. You’d love it too.“

“Cheorwon it is.”

Promise secured, you wrap yourself around him, legs criss-crossing, arms entwined. It’s going to be okay, you tell yourself. He’ll come back soon.

Sighing with pleasure, you drift off to sleep.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

It’s the cold bed which wakes you. Where’s Namjoon?

Perhaps Gi woke him. That must be it.

You wait a while for him to return. But minutes tick by and the bed feels colder. Lonelier. 

Softly, you pad down the hallway to look into Gi’s room. He’s there sleeping soundly by himself. That’s strange, where’s Namjoon?

You see light coming from the opposite end of the hallway—he must be in his private study. The door’s open, allowing the dim light from the room to fall gently on the hardwood floor.

He works so damn hard. You do too, but when work at the chicken stall is over, it’s over. For him, it seems like it’s a never-ending cycle of business calls. Even at three in the morning. 

Perhaps it’s a good time to take out the little silk number you’ve stashed in your bag. A splurge, from your own savings. The sheer black chantilly lace might lure him back to bed with you—-and to a reprieve from all the prep he needs to do for this big work trip coming up. 

Softly, your feet pad back to the bedroom, fighting to tame the heady rush of anticipation. You want to be quiet. Very quiet. Once back in the bedroom, you take off his oversized tee you always wear to bed and pull out the wisp of lace from the fine tissue paper from the corner of your overnight bag. 

The soft airy fabric hugs your body and cleaves to your breasts, the sheer panel of lace painting an intricate floral pattern in a V down your chest. It hugs your waist, flaring at your hips. 

After brushing your hair a bit to give it some gloss and volume and adjusting the fragile hand-tied bow at the back which holds everything together, you steal a look in the mirror. 

You’re a completely different person. Seductive. Alluring. Powerful.

A dark red lipstick would finish the look.

Should you put on a bathrobe and then undress in front of him? Or is it better to just lean sexily at the doorway in just the lingerie, neck arched, thigh exposed with heel against the wall, heart pounding for the moment he’ll notice you?

You go for number two. It will be a surprise. Halfway down the hall and you’re wondering what on earth made you think to go for number two? 

What if—he laughs? It’s the first time he’ll see you on something so—explicit.

You press on, convinced that Namjoon needs this break. Be brave now, old girl. 

Just two more steps and you will put yourself on display for him. Body tingling with excitement, you inch closer and closer, quiet as a mouse. 

“Bang, I have all the passports ready for the team. The fakes will also be waiting for us at Addis Ababa—“

What?

“—I’ve checked them personally myself. The authentication is at 99.99%. Virtually undetectable.”

There’s a short pause before he continues.

“Sir, this is my best guarantee. I’m just being honest with you. There’s no 100% in this business. You chose me because I’m the best. Don’t forget, my life is on the line too. I want to make it back.”

No.

A short, cynical laugh and then Namjoon says, “There’s no just one more after this job. I’m retiring after this. You can find someone else to do the dirty for you. I’m getting out of the game—”

Oh my god.

“—I’m sorry, but it’s final. My days as a forger are over after this. I don’t want to keep looking behind my back for the rest of my life for footsteps in the dark. Yes. Yes. See you next month. Tehran.”

You’ve heard enough.

Quietly, you creep back to the bedroom, and undress quickly. Stupid. Stupid! STUPID! Angry with yourself, you wipe off as much lipstick with a tissue while you ball up the lingerie and chuck it in a corner. 

Rearranging yourself back onto the bed, you angle your face away from his side of the bed and try to even out your breathing.

He comes in soon enough, bed creaking under his weight. You feel a kiss on the top of your head. 

A warm arm snakes over your waist. 

A sigh. 

And then, a quiet murmur, “Durumi.”

Biting down your lip, you choke back the bitter bile of betrayal. You will yourself to remain soft and pliant in his arms, disguising your pounding heart with slow quiet breaths. 

Pretend.

As Kim Namjoon drifts off to sleep, the master forger has no idea about the genuine tears quietly sliding down your face in your feigned slumber.

You cry because even a devoted durumi knows that when the seasons change, it’s time to take flight. 

*******************************

Kim Namjoon wonders if he has been scammed. The irony is not lost on him. 

He went to your apartment and it’s bare. Your clothes. Gi’s clothes. Gi’s favourite stuffed Anpanman. All gone. Sajangnim himself is gone. The fried chicken food cart has been replaced by one selling manduk. Namjoon even waited outside the preschool for you, hoping he’ll catch a glimpse of you and Gi. 

But there is no sign of you.

Of course, he’d also gone through all of his drawers, checked his bank accounts, made sure the 2.5 carat beauty he got custom-made for you is still there. Everything is accounted for. 

As far as Namjoon is concerned, there was no reason for your departure. He’d noticed you looked a little quiet that morning before you had vanished. But he attributed your sadness to the fact that he was leaving soon for his business trip.

You’d mentioned that you needed to run some errands with Gi after school and you’ll grab dinner with Gi on the way back to his place.

When you didn’t come back that night, Namjoon was worried sick when he couldn’t reach your cell phone. 

He has a contact who’s been searching for you. Even that has turned up nothing. 

But a day before he has to fly for the biggest job of his life, the call comes from Min Yoongi. You’re in Daegu.

Namjoon is not sure how he gets to Daegu in under three hours. A romantic might say he flew there on the wings of love. But Namjoon knows better. He speeds there because the hound of fear chases him. It’s the fear of losing you. 

In Daegu, he finds the dilapidated building ignored by the wave of gentrification which has swept through this district. Up the stairs littered with empty beer cans and cardboard and the smell of piss. This place is even worse than your little flat in Seoul. He shudders just thinking how dangerous it is for you and Gi to come home every day. 

In front of your door, Namjoon checks and double checks the address Min passed to him. It’s the right place. He knocks.

“Sajangnim! You’re back ear–” you say, flinging open the door.

“Hey.” 

You’re stunned. After three weeks of hiding, you’ve felt pretty sure Namjoon would no longer be able to find you. 

“How did you–” you ask.

“Why did you–” he questions.

“Sajangnim asked for help. He wanted to bring his business here. Daegu’s cheaper than Seoul.” You give a shrug, like it’s no big deal. “I’m here to help him.”

“Don’t bullshit me,” he says quietly. “Why don’t you tell me the truth?”

“Why don’t you tell me the truth?” you retort back. “Where are you going tomorrow, huh?” 

“Tehran.”

“For what?”

“It’s better that I don’t tell you.” He takes a deep breath, “But it’s the last one. I’m done. I’m done after this.”

“And then what? I heard everything the night that Gi got lost. I wore fucking lingerie to bring you back to bed, the fool that I was. We’ll have a few good years and then one day the cops come and you go to jail for the next how many years? Where does that leave me?” You feel a sob rising. “How can I ever trust you again?”

Kim Namjoon has nothing to say.

“Gi is waking up from his nap soon. I don’t want him to see you.” Choking back tears, you plead with him, “Please, go. Spare him the heartbreak of watching you leave.”

Namjoon hesitates. He wants to see Gi one more time. Ruffle the boy’s hair. Fly him on his shoulders. Just once more. But his time is up. “I’m so, so, sorry,” he says quietly. “So sorry.”

“Goodbye, Namjoon.”

You close the door, hoping it will somehow stop the wave of hurt and anger from overwhelming you. But it doesn’t. Wracked with tears, you slide down onto the floor, sobbing with your face between your knees. 

Inside the cramped little flat, Gi comes out of the tiny bedroom, rubbing his eyes sleepily. “Eomma? Who was here? I heard the door–Eomma! Why are you crying?”

“It was nobody,” you say, brushing away your tears quickly. “It was nobody at all. Eomma just misses Seoul. That’s all. Sometimes, people cry when they miss something.”

“I miss Namjoon App–” he falters. “Namjoon Ahjussi.” 

Your heart breaks at his little confession. “Oh Gi.” You draw him into your embrace, your back still against the door. “Missing someone is just our heart telling us this person was important to us. Every time you miss Namjoon Ahjussi you can just come and tell Eomma alright? We’ll hug each other until you feel better.”

“Eomma? Do you miss Namjoon App–Ahjussi?”

All the time.

“Not really, buddy.” You take a deep breath, hoping Gi will not see through your lie. “Let’s go for a walk and see if we can find sajangnim and help him carry back the groceries, okay?”

From the other side of the door, Namjoon moves swiftly away, tears streaming down his face. 

It’s time to do the right thing. 

*******************************

The three biggest Korean news outlets, the Chosun Ilbo, the Dong-A Ilbo, and the JoongAng Ilbo, have seen their circulation rocket by 15 percent over the course of a month. Traffic on their websites have also doubled. 

Kim Namjoon’s handsome face, his scandalous story of forgery, the mystery as to why he turned himself in have gripped the nation. 

To fuel readership, the newspapers race against each other to piece a narrative of the suave forger. Suddenly, anyone who knew the Kim Namjoon is a person of interest for the gossip-hungry public. There’s an interview with his fifth-grade classmate. His art teacher from kindergarten. Even the lady who owns the jjajangmyeon stall which he used to frequent also got a feature on page eleven. 

But it’s the interview with the mother and the speculated girlfriend that the big three newspapers are dying to scoop. 

Mrs Kim had insisted on staying by his side through it all, but Namjoon put his foot down as the eldest and only son. “Eomma, you must go. The media will tear you apart,” he warned firmly. Pepared by Namjoon in advance, she went away to stay with a trusted friend in Shincheorwon with an ache in her heart that even the ache in her knees cannot compare to.

Nightly, she batters her knees in knelt prayer for the soul of her son. She prays that her errant son would come to know her good Lord. That the prodigal would repent. Make restitution. Learn contentment with food and raiment. Flee from the love of money which is the root of all evil. That the might of man’s justice would be tempered with the mercy of God.

She fasts and prays. She prays and fasts. 

And you? You’re glad you’ve left Seoul and its media circus. But the truth is–-a part of your soul lingers in the capital. You wonder how Namjoon is holding up. If he has enough to pay for his legal fees. If he’s eating. 

Try as you might to ignore the daily stories about him that flood Twitter, the newsprint that litter the streets of the outdoor food market in Daegu are full of updates on him. 

Along with headlines that scream FRAUD, FORGERY, FAKES! are other stories about how he helped the cleaning lady in his building who needed help with her son's college tuition, or accompanied a friend in the middle of the night to a rehab facility, quietly paying the bill for his sobriety treatment.  

The nation, captivated by the story of poor-local-boy-turned-forger-with-a-heart-of-gold–turned-repentant-criminal, is debating about his sentencing. (It reads almost like fanfiction!) Everyone and their mother has an opinion regarding the amount of time he would have to spend in jail. 

You’re handing over fried chicken thighs over to a gossipy regular customer when the question barrels towards you without warning.

“So how long do you think he’s gonna serve time for?” she asks cattily. “My husband says ten years. Minimum.”

“Who?” you ask, trying to avoid thinking about this. About him. 

“The Kim fella. The one with the dimples. Kim Namjoon! You know, that one.”

You steel yourself to give a casual nod, plaster a clueless smile on your face. “I don’t know. I’m sorry. I haven’t really been following.”

“If I were the judge, I would say five years. Fifty percent discount for those dimples of his!” she crows, laughing at how witty she is. 

Your heart sinks. 

“Sentencing’s tomorrow! I made a bet with my husband! We’ll see who wins! If I’m closer to the actual sentence, we will go to Busan to see my parents for chuseok! If he wins—”

Her words stir something deep within. You’re not even listening to her anymore. Mind racing, you figure out a quick plan on how to tell sajangnim to give you a day off tomorrow. 

It’s decided.

You will have to go to Seoul. 

By hook or by crook. 

*******************************

The Seoul Central District Court, with its soaring towers and imposing pillars, is made to look like the unflinching, unbending rule of justice. Every person tried in court, rich or poor, is equal in the eyes of the law.

The pair of tired eyes examining the brief regarding one Kim Namjoon in this case belongs to Judge Lee Dong-woo, 67. His fingers tremble as he reads the brief from Lead Prosecutor Gwan. 

The Supreme Prosecutors’ Office has asked for a lenient sentence, in view that Namjoon has turned himself in and fully cooperated with the special prosecutors. Their recommendation for sentencing is five years, with the option of early release upon good conduct after three.

As the trembling in his hands worsen, Judge Lee forces himself to put down the brief. This case should have been straightforward as all cases of admission of guilt usually go. 

Happily, a complication has arisen.

The complication happens to be sitting beside the brief—a beautifully packaged tea-set wrapped in a ribbon of yellow silk. Gingerly, he takes out the gift, courtesy from someone named Bang whatever. He’s not interested to know the full name. What’s of interest is the pure Colombian coke hidden inside. 

Ah. 

Tremors subsiding, Judge Yang feels the tightened muscles in his body gradually relax as the inhaled drug takes effect and brings a startling clarity of what he must do.

With a contented sigh, the judge rests his eyes before his final court session for the day.

It’s going to be easy.

Everything becomes easier after a hit.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Courtroom 21 is packed.

You are lucky enough to squeeze into a back row by the corner. From here, you catch a glimpse of the elderly Mrs Kim seated right behind Namjoon. Now and then, he turns to her, gives her a reassuring smile or a nod. 

Your heart breaks for this slight woman dressed simply in muted grey. Even as she sits alone, she’s beautiful and dignified. You want so much to go up to her and hold her hand, thank her for all those times she has helped watch Gi so you and Namjoon had a couple of hours to go on a date. You wish you could sit next to her, show her photos of Gi and apologise for leaving abruptly without a word of goodbye. 

But going up to her would mean seeing Namjoon, and you’re not sure what to say to him. 

Would you start by saying Gi misses him and hugs his toy Anpanman to sleep, crying for Namjoon-Appa-no-it’s-Namjoon-Ahjussi? 

Would you tell him you tried lifting Gi onto your shoulders just like how he lets Gi sit on his shoulders—but that you stumbled only after a few steps? 

Would you mention that you dream of his arms wrapped around you, his lips by your ear murmuring welcome home?

Where do you start?

When would you ever end?

The court proceedings go by in a blur as memories of your time with Namjoon flood you. The kiss in the rain. The night he found Gi. The hours and hours spent in his bed, learning every inch of him. 

It is only when the gasps echo throughout that you realise you just missed the sentencing.

“How many years?” you ask the lady next to you above the din.

“Twenty-five!”

You see Namjoon turn around to give his mother a hug as camera flashes blind the courtroom. He’s crying, saying he’s so sorry, bowing and bowing and bowing to her as he’s being led away.

There are reporters now surrounding her, vulgar in the way they demand a soundbite from her. You want to go to her and slap them away like flies but that would mean making yourself vulnerable. And you can’t let that happen ever again.

You turn away from the spectacle and push your way out the door, heart heavy, cheeks wet with grief.

Twenty-five years.

A quarter of a century.

Gi would be almost thirty by then. 

It’s a long, long time. 

You can’t even imagine. 

But the truth untold is—

you would still love him.

*******************************

At night, visible from outer space, a dark, peaceful ribbon of land cuts across the middle of the Korean Peninsula which is otherwise shimmering with city lights. 

It is a swath of land 160 miles long and two-and-a-half-miles wide known as the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ). Established in 1953 by the United Nations, human settlement is forbidden on this no-man’s land meant to buffer the hostilities of two nations united by blood, by history, by culture, by geography. 

Soil once stained with blood is now rich with minerals after decades of quiet fallow.

Forests scarred by bombs and grenades are now dense with vegetation.

Once a place of destruction, the DMZ is teeming with life—wildlife. 

Abutting the south of the DMZ is the Cheorwon Plain, winter home to multiple species of the birds, among them–cranes, shrikes, eagles, and herons. Here, peaceful rice fields and ponds dot the landscape where birds of all feathers, flock together. With limits on civilian presence in this area by the South Korean government, nature’s rhythms dictate the ebb and flow of time and seasons here. 

Today, for his sixth birthday, in the middle of winter, Gi finally gets his birthday wish of going on a migratory bird-watching tour in Cheorwon. 

“Eomma! How many bird species do you think I will get to see today?”

“I hope at least six, because you are six years old today!”

“I hope seven! Seven is my lucky number!”

At the back of the tour group of twenty, a tall man hears the exchange. His heart pounds at the sound of the familiar voices. He found the right group after all. With the collar of his thick coat turned up to shield half his face, Kim Namjoon is unrecognisable, a dark beanie pulled down all the way to his sunglasses—worn to protect him from unwanted attention rather than from the glare of the winter sun.

“Jihoon!” you call. “Let’s take a selfie here, the three of us!” 

Namjoon watches quietly from the back as three familiar faces smile happily at a phone, posing before a beautiful rural landscape.

You look happy. 

Gi looks happy. 

Yang Jihoon looks happy too. 

You guys look like a real family. 

He almost wants to turn around and leave, but courage bids him to stay. As the tour guide prattles on and points out different bird species, Namjoon has only eyes for you. God. You’re beautiful. 

At one point in the tour, the guide allows people in the group to spread out to explore the birdwatching area. Everyone seems to have brought binoculars for this special occasion. 

“Gi, come with me. We’ll go check out the birds on the other end of the bridge,” Jihoon motions to the boy. 

“Be careful!” you call out, “don’t fall off the bridge! Gi, stick with Jihoon-appa!” 

Finally, with Gi occupied, you can truly take in the serenity of the quiet rice fields before you. With your binoculars, the assortment of birds are a blur of greys and whites and browns. 

But it is the cranes that catch your attention with their distinctive red crowns.

Durumi. 

You adjust the focus on your binoculars to get a closer look at the elegant cranes.

“Did you know that the durumi love for a lifetime?”

You still completely at his voice. Hands still holding your binoculars, your fingers tremble at the cadence of his words.

“One love,” he rasps. “One partner. One life.”

Slowly, you lower the binoculars down. 

Slowly, you turn to the voice next to you. 

Slowly, your eyes widen in recognition.

The silhouette is unmistakable. 

Namjoon. 

“It’s you.”

Taking a deep breath, he removes his sunglasses. “It’s me.”

You must be dreaming.

You must be out of your mind. 

“I’m out. For good," he takes a deep breath. "

You cannot speak. 

“I’m a poor man now,” he laughs a little bitterly as he looks away, “so fucking poor. But,” he gazes back at you. “But at least I’m honest. And if you think you can trust me again, if you think we can—”

“Stop.” You’re surprised at how even and steady is your voice. “Stop.” You take a deep breath, repeating the words he whispered to you before. “I love you. Will love you as long as I live. Steadfast. Like the wings of the—”

Tears are leaking out now. 

“Durumi.” 

“Durumi.”

You touch his hands, feel the strength of his grip even with his gloves on. And then you go to him—the man who has all your respect, all your love—you’re starving for the warmth of his arms around you, dying for his touch. He comes to you, envelopes you, the woman he has loved since the day on the bus, burying his nose in your hair, chasing the scent he knows all too well; has dreamed of, all too long.

Durumi. Durumi. Durumi.

There’s a catch in your throat. “Namjoon? Yang Jihoon—”

“Shh. It’s okay. Jihoon arranged everything. He knew someone who knew someone. Seemed like the judge was corrupt as shit. He got me out. Jihoon got me out—”

“There you are. I was wondering when to bring Gi back,” Jihoon says, his tone playful, hand holding a very bewildered Gi.

“Gi—this is. This is—” you choke back tears.

“Anpanman!” he cries, recognising the shoulders he sat on so long ago. He lifts his arms for a ride. Namjoon is surprised how easily it’s all coming back to him. In one swift motion, he hoists Gi on his shoulders.

“Anpanman! Anpanman! I’m flying!” With his own arms securing Gi’s spread out ones, Namjoon soars with Gi’s simple faith in him. You stare at them, wondering why the picture looks so right.

Glancing over at Jihoon, you give him a grateful smile. Thank you, you mouth the words silently. Yang Jihoon knows when it's his turn to exit. He gives a little bow, proud of what he has orchestrated. He’ll come again, next year, on Gi’s birthday, like he promised you and Gi. 

Walking away contentedly, Yang Jihoon knows that he will always be Jihoon-Appa to Gi. The plain title of Appa is a privilege that belongs to someone else. Someone else that only Gi can bestow.

Somewhere in Seoul, Mrs Kim rises from her knees, the text message from Yang Jihoon confirming her beliefs all along.  

The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous woman availeth much.*

Photo credit: https://blogs.cmich.edu/library/2020/12/03/red-crowned-crane-sarurun-kamuy-god-of-the-marshes/

The End

*Biblical reference taken from James 5:16 from the Holy Bible (KJV)

*******************************

End note: 

Dear Reader, 

I’m not sure what kind of losses you’ve experienced in your life. I am going through a big one. For me, this fic carries my loss of a father figure in various seasons of my life, loss of trust, my irrational fear of the law, my religious upbringing.

This fic is also about my love for nature, and also the innocent wonder of children. I am also a nut case about grounding my writing as a fanfic. It’s a reminder not to take myself too seriously, or for my reader to take this fic too seriously. (If you read my stuff, you know I like to remind my readers this is a fanfic, no shit!) 

But anyway, it’s me, writing this in the midst of hoping but losing hope for someone to be redeemed. Hoping for the redemption of my own soul--from what, by whom, with what, I don't know.

Whatever you’re going through, I hope you get a second chance. And I hope too that you’ll give a second chance to someone deserving.

May we have the wisdom to know when to give those second, and third and fourth chances, and when to turn around and say, I’m sorry, it’s not a chance for me to give anymore. 

In this shit with you. 

Love, 

Sam

The Fairy Bird or Pitta Nympha in its glorious colours:

Please do not translate, post or upload this content onto any platform including YouTube without permission. This is a work of fiction.

Posted on April 22, 2022 by @sahmfanficbts. All Rights Reserved © 2022.

More from my masterlist here

[bonvoyagenoona]

Hold the Door | KNJ

Pairings: Namjoon x Reader

Rating: 18+ / Mature / Explicit

Synopsis: Will you ever have a normal elevator ride with Namjoon?

Word Count: 8.3k | read on ao3

Genres, Content Warnings, & Themes: Enemies to lovers, neighbors, angst, arguing / fighting, weed, dirty talk, smut (unprotected sex, oral sex, penetrative sex, semi-public sex)

Author’s Note: Written for this “anon” 😉, who has an incredible recurring dream about Namjoon! (Wish we were all just as lucky!) Thanks for your patience, and I hope you enjoy, dear friend!

Permanent Taglist: @purpleheartsfortae @btseditsworld @greezenini @missbickerbocker @dearbambideer @helenazbmrskai @morti13 @skyys-universe @somewhereofftheglobe @imaginativedreams @dreamamubarak @m-yg93 @elyte @awinkies​

Saturday 4:42 PM

“Great, I was wondering whether this day would get any better.”

The sideways, questioning, but dazed glance that your best friend gives you is as flat as the tone with which your words fall to the, as-of-yet, unreplaced carpet in your apartment building’s lobby. Her lips are obscured by the tall, heavy stack of boxes contained in a brown bag, safely clutched and pinned to her body. And her face is mostly hidden by the massive bunch of pink and yellow balloons that are tied around her shoulder to keep them from floating away. But you know that she’s shooting you a pout of confusion.

You couldn’t lift your arms to press the elevator call button the first time, given that you’re weighed down by all the shopping bags. So you jut your elbow out again to gesture backwards and focus her attention on the nightmare who has just walked into your building.

To the unwitting soul, the navy, knit beanie and matching navy t-shirt and sweatpants shuffling toward you might have been pleasant to look at. Thrilling, even, judging by the look in your best friend’s eye, squinting and appraising, like a jeweller’s eye behind a glass. 

She doesn’t really know what she’s looking at.

“The answer, by the way, is a resounding no,” you say quickly, hoping to head off further questioning.

“But he’s hot,” she raves, the brown paper crinkling at her breath.

The elevator’s friendly ding! can’t come soon enough, and when it does, you quickly step into the back corner.

“Hold the door!” the navy-clad man calls from the entryway. His voice booms throughout the lobby. Even your doorman turns to peek inside.

Your best friend — or, now, ex-best friend — plants herself between the elevator doors. “That giant, steamy slice of beefcake is a no?” she asks, turning to face you.

“You heard me!” you repeat.

You step forward, kicking at her feet to move her out of the way. She kicks back, at a slight advantage with her heels. But then a new set of toes come into view. Toes outlined by navy plastic. 

“Namjoon,” you grumble as politely as you can, as you look up from his toes and into his face.

Keep reading

[yoonia]

slow dancing ● glossary

➬ Title | Slow Dancing: a mini-series

➬ Note | This is a list of helpful information for those who are reading the series. I hope some of the things listed below will be able to help readers understand the story a little bit better. 

⇝ 𝐬𝐥𝐨𝐰 𝐝𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐦𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭 ¸.`❤•¸.`

𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐬𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐦𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐤

“By the time a person turns 18 years old, a moving tattoo in the form of a running timer display would appear on their wrist, counting down to the moment when that person would meet their soulmate for the first time. Once their first encounter happens and the timer counts down to zero, the tattoo will change its form, showing their soulmate’s initials written in place of the missing numbers and the image of a certain type of flower which carries the same meaning as what their bond would represent. 

While they would wear each other’s initials on their wrists, the drawing of the flower on the pair’s wrists would be identical, showing a mirror image of one another down to every detail to differentiate their mark from other soulmate pairings, making it their own.”

Keep reading

[wwilloww]

the art of war | jhs

PAIRING royal Hoseok x reader

GENRE royal au. arranged marriage au. enemies to lovers. friends to enemies to lovers.

RATING 18+. EXPLICIT.

WC 5.1K

SUMMARY The bells are tolling and you've just been married to a man you despise on Christmas Day. On your wedding night, locked alone in a room with him, tensions are rising. And so is the past.

WARNINGS enemies to lovers and banter during and before sex. use of she/her pronouns to refer to reader. multiple orgasms. fingering. praise kink. handjob. unprotected sex. creampie.

AN HAPPY BIRTHDAY @xjoonchildx!!!!!!! while this was supposed to be a drabble, the muse (dearest Hobi) has been singing especially so recently and I couldn't help myself... ANYWAYS. I am wishing you the warmest, most joy-filled birthday and year ahead of you, you deserve the entire world. Sending so much love.

And a special thank you to @dntaewithluv who read this and somehow convinced me adding 1k extra of foreplay would be a good idea.

THE ART OF WAR

The wedding bells have long since stopped their tolling, but you swear that your ears are still ringing. From the choir of twenty, from the glockenspiel that rung out above your heads as you ran from the church, from the far-too-raucous reception.

Far-too-raucous because you couldn’t comprehend how anyone could be celebrating you marrying a man you couldn’t stand in a sham of an arranged marriage. Well, your mother wouldn’t call it a sham. She would call it one of her best business moves. You, on the other hand, had a very different sentiment about it all.

You watch as Hoseok, your now husband—! the word sounds so foreign on your tongue—shuts the door behind him and throws you a small smile. It’s not the first one you’ve received from him tonight, though the others read more like the others are looking, grin and bear it, while this one seems more an accident. More, I’m so tired of this bullshit. I know you are too. But a moment after the soft expression fills his face, he’s quickly rearranging his features to something stoic, cold.

Still. Though the kind gesture shocks you and runs like ice through your veins, you don’t return the smile.

Instead, you turn towards the vanity that sits in the corner of the room.

Before you in the mirror, you hardly recognize the scene: you, in a white poof of a wedding dress, every inch the daughter of a duchess. And Hoseok, behind you, Hoseok, in his wedding regalia, the sword still tucked into his belt, Hoseok, loosening his collar. You watch as his long fingers reach and bend, his touch gentle but commanding.

But there is a small part of you that does recognize this, that remembers this, from some long forgotten daydream. A daydream of you and Hoseok, together.

You and Hoseok hadn’t always been bitter. There was a time when you were children, teens even, when you would have called him your friend. Your best friend.

There was a time when you two would crawl under the bed when your parents came calling that it was time to go, desperate to spend “Five more minutes!” together. There was a time when he used to climb the oak tree in your backyard after scaling the stone wall, and slip in through your window. A time when you would lay, side by side, staring up at the yellow paper stars that you never bothered to take down from the ceiling as you grew older. You’d tell him it was too high to reach. But when the taller boy offered to take them down for you, you’d shake your head and say you’d do it yourself, secretly happy to have avoided the funeral of your favorite decorations.

Those stars still hung above your bed in your parents manor, though these days their gaze felt more like a bad memory than anything twinkling and good. Maybe it was time to take them down after all.

As you and Hoseok had grown out of childhood, things changed. There was never a specific point that you could locate as the beginning of the end. And there were good years too, years teetering on the brink of tension and unspoken words. Years where you had grown so close that the others thought of you as destined. You would ride into the forest together in the middle of the night, stealing horses from the stable, only to go skinny dipping in the moonlight. You would write letters to one another, letters you still kept tucked beneath your bed, too afraid of what you would lose if you threw them out.

But as you neared your eighteenth birthday, Hoseok had grown more withdrawn. He would disappear for long hours into his room. And soon withdrawn became coldness as you found him shutting doors quickly behind him with a hard look in his eyes, like he had something to hide.

And the truth was, you did have something to hide. You’d taken up an interest in the art of war, particularly hand-to-hand combat. As a young woman in this day and age, it was forbidden for someone like you, especially someone of noble birth, to participate in such a craft.

When you had finally mustered up the courage to tell him that you were no longer meeting up for midnight rides because you were training instead, he had said something that had your blood running cold.

“War will never be for women.”

“War ought to be for no one,” you had spat back quickly. “So who’s to say it can’t be for me!”

The conversation had devolved into harsh words and harsher sentiments. That was the last time you both had spoken for years.

Until one morning your mother had waltzed into your room with what she had called “thrilling news.”

Thrilling news that had landed you in a white dress with Hoseok at the end of the aisle, his gaze locked on you as the bells tolled and you walked towards your fate.

At first it’s just a glance. Hoseok looking over his shoulder at you as you tinker with the bow on an unopened wedding gift, left on your vanity. It’s just one glance.

But one glance turns into a second. His gaze skating over you as you begin to undo the intricate updo that you had insisted on earlier but now regret.

“You missed one.”

“I didn’t.”

But before you can really argue with him, before you can really absorb what he’s said as an insult about your personal ability to undo your own hair, he’s gliding across the room and plucking a pin out of the back of your head.

You hold your breath in shock. His fingers linger.

Your eyes catch in the mirror and hold for a second that stretches into eons. And then you come back to yourself. You don’t thank him. You simply snatch it out of his hands with a little huff and go back to what you’re doing.

But to your dismay, he doesn’t move.

“Is that the best excuse you could come up with to get me to touch you?”

You stand up so fast your chair falls down behind you as you whirl around to face him face to face.

But you didn’t expect him to be this close, you didn’t expect him to be chest-to-chest with you. Didn’t expect his lips to be inches away from yours—

“How dare you—”

“Is it that hard to pay attention when all you’re thinking about is kissing me?”

You’re furious, flames roving through your chest like a slow burning wildfire, and he’s so close and his breath is mingling with yours, the smug bastard, his eyes ablaze with the same fire you feel—

And before you know what’s happening, your lips are crashing together. Later on, when you can’t tell up from down, you won’t be sure whether it was you or him that began it all. But in that moment, you’re pretty sure it was you.

He doesn’t hesitate before wrapping his hands swiftly around your waist, tugging you with a little huff of air to his front where you can feel something hard and very large pressing into you.

It happens all at once.

Like two stars colliding, you are hurtling towards one another at the speed of light, missing one another in your pointedness but scathing one another in your proximity.

But you keep circling back. Slower, more curious, each time.

His lips slow against yours, his breath intertwining with your breath, his heartbeat beating at the same pace as yours. He whispers your name against your lips, and for a moment, you taste sweetness. That is, until he bites down on your lower lip.

You gasp, but the inhale is not all pain.

A spark rushes through you, smothering your skin in goosebumps.

“Fuck, Hoseok,” you curse, and he grins against your lips.

You tighten your grip on him and dig your fingernails into the back of his neck, trailing them below the nape of his collar, leaving red streaks in their tracks.

But instead of gasping, just as you had, he sucks in a shaky breath and whispers against your lips, “How did you know I like it a little painful?”

A cold chuckle leaves your lips.

“A good guess.”

He kisses you again, quick, furious, all teeth and tongue and it’s then that you feel him, him grinding against you.

That’s when the reality of the situation hits you.

This is not two mere strangers — or, you have to remind yourself, two mere friends. Both of those ships had sailed a long while ago. You are something else now, something entirely foreign. And something tangled up in one another, flames stoking higher with each breath, each tangled limb and—

Somehow you’re both flustered and furious in the same moment. You pull back from him, and he looks surprised, though he quickly masks the look that darts across his face.

“What—“

“I ought to get ready for bed.”

He watches as you turn from him and make your way to the mirror in the corner, tugging at the many bows and clasps that keep you tied up in this ridiculous excuse of a dress.

“For bed.” He grins.

You glare at him in the floor length mirror, but the implication of his words warms you from within.

You have duties to perform tonight, there’s no doubt about it. And you’re not particularly adverse to the idea either, not when he looks as radiant as he does tonight, not when he kisses the way he kisses. But it’s the principal of it all, all the years of resentment hanging between you like spidersilk.

Your fingers fumble as you try to reach around back and unbutton the intricate dress and you can feel him watching you, can hear the way he chuckles smugly as you struggle.

After several minutes of trying without any luck, finally, you give up with a huff.

There’s no way you’re getting out of this on your own. You grit your teeth with the way you’re about to debase yourself, shame trickling through you like molten iron.

“Can you—” you close your eyes and take a deep breath. “Can you please help me?”

They were supposed to send someone to help you out of this godforsaken dress, but— your face reddens as you realize that there was someone knocking on your door while you were tangled in your husband’s arms. And that you had been far too distracted to realize what the sound was. It pains you to ask for his help.

“Pleading looks so good on you.”

“I’m not pleading,” you scoff. “You try getting yourself out of a cage of a dress.”

He chuckles darkly but approaches you from behind, his gaze challenging yours in the mirror.

“Alright. If you’re going to beg.”

“I’m not begging!”

“If you insist.”

His fingers are cold when they skate across your neck and your gaze shoots up to meet his in the mirror. He stands tall behind you, his hair dark and falling into his face, his eyes even darker, even as they catch the reflection of the hearth in them.

“It does look good on you,” he says, and you’re not sure if he means the dress or the begging. Maybe both. But as you fight the urge to roll your eyes, you watch the way his gaze narrows on the skin of the nape of your neck, as it trails down your back. And as he begins to unbutton your dress, one by one, he takes his sweet time, like he’s unwrapping some kind of precious gift. Your brow furrows in confusion.

He’s not supposed to enjoy this.

You’re not supposed to enjoy this.

And yet you do, the way his fingers grace across your skin, the way your skin warms beneath his touch. You enjoy it. You find your eyes fluttering closed, and lose yourself so entirely that soon he’s saying,

“I’m done.”

He’s still holding your dress up, in some attempt to preserve a semblance of your modesty. Though you’re not sure there’s much of it left after your earlier tryst.

A tryst you have no explanation for.

You finally nod and he lets go of the fabric. The thick winter dress falls in a heap around you, revealing the thin but warm slip they’ve dressed you in beneath. It’s the equivalent of being naked before him. He begins to look away but you’re quick to say:

“Are you so afraid to look at your own wife?”

A sly smile flickers at the corner of his mouth and his gaze darts back to rove over your body. But where they linger are your eyes.

“Are you so eager for my attention you have to ask for it?”

You finally turn towards him and stare at him for a long moment.

This is when it begins. This is when it's supposed to begin, when it's supposed to happen: your wifely duties.

Awkwardly, you reach for him.

“What are you doing?”

“I have a duty.” You say, your chest warming, your hand tracing up his torso. But as your words fall on his ears, his gaze immediately hardens. Before you can reach his chest, where you want to trace over his heart, his hand snatches your wrist.

“No.”

“No?”

“I’m not going to force you to do anything,” Hoseok says sternly, his brow pressing. He gently places your hand at your side and retreats to the other side of the room. “Absolutely not.”

The care with which he says it surprises you—and yet not at all. From beneath the hard exterior, you see the young Hoseok you once knew, once loved, poking through.

“But we should—”

“We should do nothing tonight.”

“But, but they’ll come—in the morning, to check.”

Hoseok’s eyes light with recognition.

“And you care that—? Ahh.”

You frown. “What?”

“I see.” He steps towards you, his shirt fluttering open with each step forward. You can’t help it when your gaze flickers downwards.

“You can just say it,” he says.

“Say what?”

“That you want me.”

“I don’t want you,” you scoff. “I only—”

He raises an eyebrow.

“I only want you in the way a wife wants her husband on their wedding night.”

“Is that so?” Hoseok asks. “And in what way is that?”

You immediately warm at the question. It feels like he has you pinned against the wall, even when he’s half the room away. As he steps closer to you, you find yourself holding your breath.

“Kiss me,” he orders. “If you’re too afraid to put it to words.”

And so you do, and just as before, it is furious.

Lips press, teeth nip, lobes bitten, and you know you will look a mess in the morning. He kisses down your neck, biting and sucking gently at the tender skin there and you cry, “You’ll leave a mark!”

“Then they’ll know you’re my wife.”

The thought brings heat to your abdomen, as the idea of wandering out the next morning looking absolutely ravaged plays in your mind. But was this how tonight was supposed to go? You had no qualms about giving yourself to your husband, but now, now, you were giving yourself willingly, eagerly, even. Your mother had instructed you on how these kinds of marital duties were to be performed, but this, lips locked and hands roving greedily over one another’s bodies: this is no duty.

This is passion.

Even if anger still simmers in your stomach.

He is kissing you, so deeply you think he might consume you whole, kissing you like you are the only person in the world. And right now it feels like it. The world outside quiets as you kiss him back, letting the noise of society, along with all the expectations and obligations fade away until there is nothing but Hoseok. The shape of his hands pressed against your back. The warmth of his thigh between your legs. The movement of his lips, inflamed and… needy?

Hoseok, Hoseok, Hoseok.

His hand glides up your back and tangles with your loosened hair as he presses you to his chest.

He walks you backward, his leg slipping between the heavy, warm fabric of your slip—too warm despite the winter chill—somehow managing to not trip you. The mattress of the bed hits your knees and you find yourself sitting, looking up at the man who is now your husband, towering above you. And right in your face:

“Is someone a little desperate?” You chide, running a finger along the bulge in his pants. “It doesn’t suit you.” Though that’s half a lie, because as you look up at him, your mouth waters, struck by the absolute depravity that he looks down at you with.

“I know what might suit you,” Hoseok cuts back, unerred by your half insult as his hands rove over your body. “My desperation, stuffed in your mouth, shutting you up.”

Your eyes widen at the prospect.

“Try me.”

He grins and bends down to kiss you again, interrupting your hands reaching for his pants. You are eager to unwrap him, but he is eager to take his time with you.

Things begin to devolve in the best way possible. Hoseok loses his shirt, then his pants. “I want to see you,” he murmurs as he kisses you, and soon you have lost your slip too, limbs tangling in the sheets, and soon his cock is in your hand, and you squeeze ever so gently, just to watch his eyes flutter closed.

“Let me—” he begins as his hands trail down your body.

“You don’t know—”

He scoffs. “I think I know you well enough to know exactly how to make you come undone,” Hoseok says, and something switches within you. It’s the first time he’s mentioned anything of your past, of knowing you before your wedding night, of all of the tension strung up around you.

“Don’t presume to know me,” you say. “You don’t. Not any more.”

“Is that a challenge I hear?” Hoseok asks, his brow raised.

You look up at him through your lashes, but before you can roll your eyes, he grips your chin gently, forcing you to look at him.

“Are you challenging me?”

“Maybe I am.”

It becomes some kind of competition, the both of you rushing to make the other one drown in their own pleasure before the other.

And it’s true: it’s hard to stay in control like this, with his fingers dragging through your folds, circling around your clit, his mouth pressed up against your ear, whispering sweet nothings, chiding you, urging you onward. But you cling to any semblance of control you have left, wrapping your hand around his length, running gentle, teasing touches along the soft skin of his cock.

That’s when he says it.

“You’re so good for me.”

And you come a little bit more undone beneath him. Your touch falters, your breath hitches.

“Oh, does she like being praised?”

You grit your teeth to keep from nodding.

“No—”

“I love the way you touch me,” he whispers against your ear, his fingers slowing against you, building into a gradual, unerring rhythm. “It’s like you know exactly what I need, what I want.” He nips at your earlobe. “So good.” He slips a finger within you and you gasp. “So good, just for me.”

On the final emphasis, he thrusts a second finger into you and begins pumping in and out of you. The final emphasis has you clenching around him.

His.

Even as you try to push the idea of him away, his body is wrapped around yours. His body is everywhere, atop, beneath, beside you. And you don’t want the distance, you don’t want any space between you at all.

As he draws one orgasm from you, then a second, you cling to him, hands tangling in his hair, pushing it out of his eyes, and threading around his limbs and his back, pulling him closer. And after you’ve come a second time, the two of you lay there, staring silently at the ceiling—starless, blatantly starless—as you catch your breath. The only sounds in the room are the crackling fire and the sound of your in-synch panting.

“I don’t think you could make me come again,” you challenge, and that’s enough for him.

He rolls on top of you with a cheeky grin and nips at your ear.

“As you wish,” he murmurs, and it’s not the fight you want, it’s not the fire you were asking for, but it’s good enough, because he’s sliding his hand down your torso again. As you buck your hips up to meet the touch of his hand, his cock aligns with your center, pushes in just enough.

The both of you freeze.

Eyes lock.

“We don’t have to—”

“No, please—”

The desperation in your voice surprises you, and you swallow hard as he looks down at you.

“‘Please?’” he repeats back to you, a genuine question in his voice. “You want this?”

You nod quickly.

“Then tell me.”

You repeat your previous sentiment with a sly smile. “I bet you can’t make me come on your cock.”

“I can,” he says, capturing your lips in a kiss. “And you know that. Tell me what it is you want.”

“Fuck me, Hoseok.”

He takes his time, teasing your opening with the head of his cock, sliding it through your come and the arousal already spilling again from you as your core aches with need.

“Please, Hoseok,” you beg.

“You’re so pretty when you beg for me,” he smiles. “So messy when you’re needy.”

He lowers his weight atop you as he glides his cock to your opening and pushes in an inch. You gasp, and before your eyes flutter shut at the wide stretch, you can see the pleasure that washes across his face. It’s divine. The mixture of concentration and pure desire that dances in his eyes, the way his gaze bores into yours before he bends down and presses his lips to the concha of your ear.

As he pushes into you all the way, you think you hear:

“Forgive me,” whispered in your ear.

“No,” you whisper back.

But he’s already moving, his face pressed in concentration, that look you know too well. So serious, so firm, you think, How am I going to live with this every day? Not because you don’t want to, but because in that moment you’re filled with so much need for him that you’re not sure what it will be like to want him when your marital duties have been filled and completed and you’re stuck in a house with a man who despises you as much as you despise him.

Though, when you think about it, this hardly feels like spite.

Not with his cock moving like this, not with his hips thrusting like that, rolling so smoothly into you.

It’s so surprising, how goddamn good it feels and all you feel is anger bubbling to the surface. “Fuck you,” you groan, your fingers tightening around whatever parts of him you can reach, nails digging into his skin.

“Darling, you already are,” he spits back through gritted teeth. “And so many would just kill to be in your place.”

When he flips you over, pulls your hips towards you, and begins rolling into you again, it’s entirely different. Something about the angle, your face pushed into the soft material of the mattress, your ass jiggling with each slap of his balls against your clit, it has you tumbling forwards towards delight so quickly you can’t breathe—

“This isn’t right,” you gasp and he stills, looking down at you in concern.

“What’s wrong?”

“How good it feels.”

You can hear the grin spread across his face as he begins again, his hips rolling slowly into you.

“Darling, this is exactly how it’s supposed to feel.”

“How—?”

He repositions you then, so he can look in your face, pulling you on top of his lap, before slippiing into you again.

“You’re supposed to feel good,” he says, as he begins pumping up into you. “And whoever told you you shouldn’t was lying.”

His tongue pokes out between his lips as you begin to move too, chasing your own pleasure now. He nods encouragingly as you drag your hips up his cock. Your breath hitches as he reaches up and slides his thumb across your lower lip before slipping it into your mouth.

“Tomorrow, this will be my cock on your tongue,” he whispers, and you swallow around his digit as he presses down on your tongue, your eyes wide as you bounce on his cock. “Fuck, you look so good,” Hoseok curses.

He removes his hand to kiss you, growling against your lips. His fingers dig into your ass as you fuck him. Once, he brings his hand up and slaps your ass and the sound that leaves your lips is ravished.

“Ah,” he coos. “I think I know exactly what it is you like.”

You ride him, bouncing up and down on his thick cock until you wrap your hands around his shoulders and press your chests together.

“That’s it. Fuck yourself on my cock,” he says.

He’s so close. There’s something even more intimate about this, as your breath mingles and comes in pants, both of you relishing in the pleasure of the other’s body.

“Shit, shit, shit,” you curse as he hits a particularly soft spot within you, and you cling to him even tighter.

Your pace slows, and rather than hurtling towards desire, the both of you are relishing in it.

Slowly, Hoseok lowers you to your back, leaning over you.

Hoseok is determined to—what, you’re not sure at this point, but determined he is, knowing by the set of his jaw and the way his eyes won’t leave yours. Perhaps he is simply determined to draw as much pleasure as possible from your body, because with a quick movement he tilts your pelvis upwards, and the new angle, oh. You can now feel the ridge of the head of his cock pushing into you, and as it does, it catches on a bundle of nerves within you that makes you cry out. The second thing this does is that the base of his cock now presses against your clit every time he slams into you.

There is pleasure everywhere, like swimming in some deep well of warmth.

“You’re close,” he murmurs, rolling his hips into you. “Come for me, will you?”

And it’s a request, not a command.

“Come for me,” he hums against your lips. “I want to feel you around me.”

His voice is like a deep melody and as it resonates through you, you find yourself hurtling towards the edge of your own pleasure, warmth radiating from your abdomen, and the most delicious tension strung between your limbs.

“Please,” he whispers, and that’s enough for you to break into pieces, your orgasm crashing like the far waves of the kingdom through your entire body.

He’s not far behind you, and through your pleasure you can feel his cock twitch within you. He hisses, and holds himself back from you, his eyes fluttering shut. And suddenly you realize, you want his pleasure. You want his pleasure, not for the sake of winning some competition, but simply for him.

But without thinking, you reach up for him, wrap your arms around his back, and press him to your chest. He comes with you, body trembling, words spilling from his mouth that have no meaning, no rhyme or reason. But you catch it again.

“Forgive me—”

And you realize that the anger within you has been entirely replaced with the lingering numbness of absolute pleasure.

You’re sure it will return in good time, yout think.

So instead, you let your nails drag softly up the back of his neck before tangling in his hair, pressing his face into your neck. He peppers the skin there with the softest of kisses, his body still intertwined with yours.

And you lay there for what feels like eons, his weight pressing down reassuringly, the chill of the window finally seeping into your consciousness.

And suddenly, he is standing, slipping from you, his warmth removed.

“You’re leaving,” you say, your voice flat, monotone. Not stay, not, please. A simple statement of fact.

Hoseok freezes. He turns on his heel to face you.

“There is a winter storm raging right outside that window. And while you might be sweaty and hot and all worked up right now,” You flush at the implication, “I promise you that the cold will creep in. I was merely about to warm the fire.”

“Ah,” you say, turning on your side, away from him.

But a touch and a gentle tug brings you rolling back towards him. He looks upset, and before you can stop yourself, you’re reaching out to press at the frown lines that decorate his brow.

“You’re angry.”

“I’m not angry that you’d think the absolute worst of me,” he says slowly. “I’m only concerned that you’d think, and think so readily, that I’d be this quick to abandon you.”

He rolls into bed, pulling you on top of him.

“I’m hardly finished with you, how could I go?”

He kisses you then, and it’s not like the other kisses. The others were fire, burning towards something larger. This, however, is different. He kisses you to kiss you, for the pleasure of it all, for the feeling of your body warming against his skin, for the knowledge that you, you want to kiss him.

And what you found, at the end of it all, is that the anger in you is a dying anger. One like a star, burnt out and blackened, striving for the life that it one was, but ultimately hurtling towards a darkened coolness. And in the place of this old, stupid, anger, is rising something new. Attraction. Respect, even.

It frightens you.

©wwilloww Do not repost, translate, or use my stories without my permission.

THANK YOU FOR READING!

🔆 if you enjoyed this, please consider telling me what you think by leaving a comment, sending an ask, or reblogging! i love chatting with you all!

🔆 want to read more ?

[augustbutwinter]

no skipping | jhs

pairing: hoseok x reader

genre: f2l, fluff/ minimal angst, sfw (a little cursing)

summary: he used to love this song before. before he put it on your mixtape. now every single note reminds him of you. (based on BEKA & HONNE: more than friends)

wc: 850 words

a/n: early last year i posted this, and ana’s comment made me put my thoughts into a document that has been marinating a while. It’s only fitting it sees the light of day today. happy birthday lovely Ana! @xjoonchildx​

masterlist // AO3

You close the car door, you press play and as the familiar tunes fill the space, it hits you like a fucking brick in the face. What you’re feeling is definitely not friendship. You fucked up. Big time.

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[kpopfanfictrash]

A Holiday Snowdown (M)

Author: @kpopfanfictrash as part of the Happy Ho-lidays collab with @floralseokjin , @suga-kookiemonster , @sugaurora , @underthejoon, @winetae​ and @btssavedmylifeblr​

Pairing: Jungkook / Reader (female)

Genre:  Enemies to Lovers / Ski Resort!AU / Snowboarder!AU

Word Count: 36,333

Rating/Warnings: 18+ for sexual content. Fingering, oral (female receiving), hand job, mutual masturbation, breast play, some face riding, dirty talk, orgasm denial, clit smacking (is there a non plural form of this?), cum shot on chest

Mentions of past death (does not occur during story). Ankle injury (non-graphic). Min Yoongi is an enthusiastic MC. Bam is adorable. Jungkook has both lip and eyebrow piercing

Summary:  The Inn on the Hill is in trouble. Or that’s what your boss, Namjoon, says during the last-minute All Staff holiday meeting he calls. You need money, and you need money fast, or his parents are planning to sell the resort. When no one can think of an easy solution, Namjoon proposes his parents’ idea: a weeklong social media blitz with a celebrity guest. The celebrity? None other than Jeon Jungkook himself: two-time Olympic gold medalist, world-class snowboarder and the nation’s sweetheart. What’s the problem? You happen to have met Jeon Jungkook before, and sincerely hoped you’d never see him again.

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[kithtaehyung]

three tangerines (m) | myg

title: three tangerines pairing: yoongi x reader rating/genre: m ; smut ; brother’s best friend au, implied age gap au summary: throughout high school, you sometimes caught glimpses of your brother’s older friends: some of them were sweet, some of them were smart. but the one closest to him? that guy was a total f*ckboy from day one. after a foray of horrid relationships spanning years - ending with one that broke up with you for an alarming reason - you needed advice on what the hell you were doing wrong… and this wasn’t a conversation for anyone sweet or smart. (loosely based off one part of “the window” by silvershine) warnings: pov switch (just one), age gap implied, cursing, dirty talk, choking, hair pulling, thigh riding, oral (m/f rec), sl*t/wh*re mentions, spanking, size kink, hand kink, pussy slapping, penetration, protected sex, rough sex, fingering, breast play, slight ass play, daechwita yoongi should be a warning in itself.. i think that’s it? he keeps the chains on so there’s that, too lmao note: this is a super late birthday present for the wonderful @sketchguk​ <3 ily, teresa and i hope you have fun with this one lololol. and thank you endlessly to @taesinferno​ @chateautae​ and @lavienjin for being angel betas! you all mean the world to me and you know i got you if you need anything in return. note 2: ALSO.. thank you all so much for the level of interest bc that taglist was popping. i did not expect that turnout (or to laugh so much at all of your answers and screams LOL) so you gave me incredible motivation to keep writing. i’m also trying something new which you will see if you get to the end. seriously, ty ty!  total word count: 12k drop date: november 16th, 2021, 7:17pm est 20/11/2021 update: also posted on ao3

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When Yoongi told you he would be there if you needed anything, this isn’t what he had in mind.

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[hobidreams]

march 9, 1872.

may you always trust in the strength of your own heart. may all your trials end in fullest bloom.

pairing: joseon king!yoongi x reader genre: smut, romance, fluff words: 3k a/n: we’re finally here.

moonlit throne index. this is the final drabble. start from the beginning?

Tonight, the quiet, constant moon is the sole witness to your eager steps as you and the king of Joseon hurry down the corridor towards your chambers, your faces alight with mischievous grins. The sleeves of your favorite hanbok billow in the balmy wind of a coming spring, the pink fabric edges worn soft with time. In Yoongi’s arms, he cradles a tray, trying his best not to spill the contents of the covered bowls it supports.

Keep reading

[suga-kookiemonster]

Happy Ho-lidays!

Ho ho ho, could this be true? @floralseokjin @suga-kookiemonster @sugaurora @underthejoon @winetae @btssavedmylifeblr and @kpopfanfictrash with presents for you! Take some time to unwind, and sneak a peek at what's stuffing your stocking 😉

Winter Solace by @floralseokjin

Pairing⇢ Kim Seokjin x Reader

Summary⇢ After a difficult few months (and years), a fresh start in a new city is both equal parts thrilling and terrifying, but you’re determined to make it work. It’s just you and your dog-sized cat Nox, ready to take on the world. Of course along the way there are ups, and there are downs. The main down being you’re short on cash after the big move, unable to spend Christmas with your family. The main up is your kind and thoughtful neighbour who offers to celebrate the holiday with you, despite not being a fan of it himself…

This Christmas by @suga-kookiemonster

Pairing⇢ Min Yoongi x Reader

Summary⇢ it's been a while since you've been home for the holidays, but this year, you finally plan on rectifying that. things are going well for you—great job, great friends, and a new boyfriend who you have a pretty great feeling about—and it seems everything in your life is finally slotting into place. but, of course, the past is a relentless specter and the universe always has a way of humbling you. in a ridiculous twist of fate, you soon find yourself stuck in a car with the very reason you have avoided coming back in the first place.

A Porn Star's Guide to the Holidays by @sugaurora

Pairing⇢ Jung Hoseok x Reader

Summary⇢ Jung Hoseok was your first love, a relationship that ended only because your post-high school dreams led you down two very different paths. Yours brought you to Jeon Jungkook, talent agent for some of the most well-loved adult entertainment actors of the era. And that’s how you became an industry darling, doing just about everything from outdoor gangbangs to golden showers and a long list of kinks in between.

Six years later and you’re ready to find a new path, celebrating your exit from the business with a massive holiday party at your home. Only your new neighbor gets an accidental invite and when he arrives you find yourself standing face-to-face with your high school sweetheart. Suddenly, you’re forced to confront where the years have taken you and feelings that may have never quite gone away.

What’s a former porn star to do?

All Wrapped Up by @underthejoon

Pairing⇢ Kim Namjoon x Reader

Summary⇢ All is currently Merry and Bright in your very secret, very sexy little bubble with Namjoon. But with the holidays on the horizon and the annual friends trip to his family’s cabin fast approaching, the pressure to DTR is at an all time high. Will you meet Namjoon under the mistletoe and finally out your fling to your friends? Or will your case of cold feet ruin the good thing you’ve got going?

ANTIFREEZE by @winetae

Pairing⇢ Park Jimin x Reader

Summary⇢ ‘Don’t sleep with your dance partners.’

For three years, Jimin has followed the above rule religiously. Who knew it would take a vengeful ex, a Christmas fundraiser, and a pair of torn tights for his resolve to crumble?

alternatively, Jimin participates in the school’s adaption of The Nutcracker for extra credit but doesn’t expect his new dance partner to a) be this bad at dancing and b) be this fucking cute

A Christmas Carol in Itaewon by @btssavedmylifeblr

Pairing⇢ Kim Taehyung x Reader

Summary⇢ Finding yourself alone and far from home on Christmas Eve, you are haunted by three spirits. But the real ghost from your past is your childhood sweetheart turned famous actor, Kim Taehyung.

(Ft. Yoongi, Hoseok, and Namjoon as the ghosts of christmas past, present, and future)

A Holiday Snowdown by @kpopfanfictrash

Pairing⇢ Jeon Jungkook x Reader

Summary⇢ The Inn on the Hill is in trouble. Or that's what your boss, Namjoon, says during the last-minute All Staff holiday meeting he calls. You need money, and you need money fast, or his parents are planning to sell the resort. When no one can think of an easy solution, Namjoon proposes his parents' idea: a weeklong social media blitz with a celebrity guest. The celebrity? None other than Jeon Jungkook himself: two-time Olympic gold medalist, world-class snowboarder and the nation's sweetheart. What's the problem? You happen to have met Jeon Jungkook before, and sincerely hoped you'd never see him again.

[sugaurora]

The Wedding Arrangement

You are in love with your best friend, the only man who matters, Kim Seokjin.

Unfortunately, he’s just gotten engaged to someone who isn’t you. Even more unfortunately, he expects you to help plan the wedding alongside Kim Namjoon, his other best friend and, based on your first meeting, just another judgmental jerk.

Putting aside your distaste for the sake of your friend’s happiness, you both set about giving Seokjin the wedding of his dreams. Following a rough and satisfying affair at the caterer’s, you strike an unusual deal: you and Namjoon will be enemies with benefits until the wedding is over. And after six months of wedding planning, you both just might learn that weddings aren’t usually the end, but a brand new beginning.

Pairing: Construction Contractor Namjoon x Physician’s Associate Female Reader

Genre: Romance; Enemies(?) with Benefits; Enemies(?) to Friends to Lovers; Smut

Word Count: 44,200+

Warnings: Profanity; Alcohol; Depiction of giving birth; Psychological distress caused by a strained parental relationship; They literally aren’t even enemies ya’ll, just kinda pissy for a minute; Explicit sexual content; soft dom Joon if you squint, biting, scratching, fingering, oral (male and female), protected sex, stupid amounts of kissing cause ya’ll know my brand

Note: This story features a black reader-character

Commissioned by namaslaylife on Twitter. You watched the entire insanity of my writing process and I can’t thank you enough for your patience and trusting me to tell your story 💜

Music: Zayn - TiO, Giveon - For Tonight, James Arthur - Can I Be Him, Ella Mai - Naked, Why Don’t We - 8 Letters, Kiana Lede - I Choose You

If you enjoy my writing, please consider buying me a ko-fi or purchasing a fic commission.

Read on AO3

[jungkxook]

—suck it up! (m)

⟶ pairing: jeon jungkook x fem!reader

⟶ genre: vampire!jungkook / college au / friends-to-lovers + fluff / smut

⟶ words: 9,784

⟶ rating: 18+

⟶ summary: being jungkook’s best friend means you’re used to his strange and chaotic ways but lately he’s been acting a little too strange, like thinking he’s turned into a vampire kind of strange.

⟶ warnings: pretty much a crack fic!!!, dumbass new world vampire jungkook who is completely incompetent as a vampire, general dumbass-to-lovers shenanigans, twilight references, sweet love making, dry humping, jungkook comes in his pants, riding, marking, biting, a brief mention of blood (so blood play?), breast play, fondling, possession kink??, oral sex (f receiving), cum eating, clit play, fingering, missionary, multiple orgasms, unprotected sex, creampie

⟶ note: happy halloween!!!👻 to celebrate, here is my fic for the nightmare on tumblr.com collab with the lovelies @underthejoon @bratkook @junghelioseok​ @hobidreams @kpopfanfictrash @suga-kookiemonster !!! pls keep an eye out for their fics when they drop bc it’s going to be fangtastic! this fic was inspired by an old tumblr post i’ve seen but i’ve since lost the link to it! also dedicating this fic to the loml @rockwithwoo​ !! <3

Jungkook’s been acting strange lately.

Then again, Jungkook’s always been strange ━ like the text-you-at-all-hours-of-the day strange, drop by your house unannounced when it’s two in the morning and he’s craving burgers from the diner down the street strange; or send you one of his many unsolicited memes (yes, like quoting dead Vines and dumb Tiktoks and forwarding you horrendous selfies you’ve sent him and snapshots he’s taken of you when you’re least expecting it) from his repertoire at any given moment strange (because he seems to have a meme for every occasion. No, seriously. Like, every occasion).

Keep reading

[bratkook]

the dark. (m) myg.

‘So don’t swear to God, he’s never asked you’

pairing. demon!yoongi x reader genre. smut  word count. 18k summary. your small town thrives on the occult, luring tourists in with endless themed festivities, but the only place you’re determined to see is the mysterious club that comes to life the week before Halloween. what makes The Dark so exclusive, and what secrets are they hiding behind closed doors? warnings. some mentions of religion/demonic stuff, smut, oral sex, fingering, unprotected sex, multiple orgasms, stomach bulging, cum stuffing, slight praise, crying lol author’s note. this is part of the Nightmare On Tumblr.com collab with @underthejoon​ @hobidreams  @junghelioseok​ @jungkxook​ @kpopfanfictrash​ @suga-kookiemonster​ ! please go check out everyone’s story and give this fic some love. i loved picturing yoongi as a cheeky and flirty demon, don’t worry it’s not meant to be dark and spooky (just a little) it’s pretty light hearted imo. i hope you enjoy it as much as i enjoyed writing it. (this wasn’t meant to be this fking long so considering i wanted it to be a pwp….oops) I also made a playlist for the club here! HAPPY EARLY HALLOWEEN MONSTER FUCKERS🖤

If there was one thing your town did right, it was Fall, more specifically Halloween and all things spooky. The second the weather dropped, the foggy mornings lingering longer as the first touch of fall fell over, all of the decorations came pouring out of shops and onto porches. The typical pumpkins littered the sidewalks, scarecrows picketed up on front lawns, cornucopias painted on windows, every inch of your small town was covered in hues of orange and red to welcome the festivities. 

Beyond the cutesy decorations were your favorite parts of it all. The origin of it was a little unsure, not exactly certain where the stories sprouted from, how they were twisted around to make the array of urban legends that allowed your town to thrive, but you loved it. You never fully believed them, bought into the idea of vampires, werewolves, and demons walking among you, but it was exciting to play along. 

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[hobidreams]

Nox | KTH {M}

It has been centuries since the noble vampire Taehyung has allowed himself to want another. He had thought his emotions under control, his chilled heart far from susceptible to such human fallacies. Really–How many times has he borne witness to the lethal consequences of desire for a warm body, a soft kiss? But when he happens upon you, injured on the side of the road, bathed in the darkness of a long-settled evening… He finds himself unable to move on without at least ensuring your safety, all the while denying the fervent need budding in his damned soul.

pairing: taehyung x reader genre: romance, smut words: 10.5k contains: bram stoker dracula/vampire au, historical au, graphic sexual content, blood, violence, animal death, minor character death, taehyung is in a cravat, a fic from HIS pov!, did someone say sexual tension? a/n: this fic is part of a halloween collab with lovelies @underthejoon @kpopfanfictrash @suga-kookiemonster @jungkxook @junghelioseok @bratkook! i’ve been thinking about this concept for a long time & i’m grateful for the opportunity to see it come to life! additional shoutout to @propinqxity​, who is always saving me when i need it most 🌹

Count Taehyung despised extended journeys.

He found all aspects about them nauseating. The endless shifts of the carriage’s large wheels on uneven ground that jostled the seats. The dashes of bright, scalding light that somehow always slipped their way through the dark curtains, even when he drew them firmly shut. Most of all, he hated being away from his manor. A place where everything was to be expected. Expected, familiar, and safe.

Keep reading

[kpopfanfictrash]

Lovely Demons (M)

Author: @kpopfanfictrash as part of the Nightmare on Tumblr.com collab with @underthejoon , @bratkook​ , @hobidreams​ , @junghelioseok​ , @jungkxook​ and @suga-kookiemonster​ 

Creative Contributor: @baebae-goodnight FOR THIS MOODBOARD LIKE. look at it. 

Pairing: Jimin / Reader (female)

Genre:  Fantasy / Enemies to Lovers / Princes of Hell!AU / Witch!AU

Word Count: 41,774

Rating/Warnings: 18+ for sexual content. Fingering, dirty talk, oral (female), condom-less sex (with mention of other protection), breast play. 

Somewhat graphic injuries occur to main characters throughout the story. Death of a side character.

Summary:   As penance for a crime committed long, long ago, the Witch Council banished you to the feared Tholoss forest. Your sentence was one hundred thousand days of solitude – or death, whichever came first. Your only hope of salvation comes from the demon names routinely sent your way; creatures who escape the inner circles of Hell and pose a threat to the mortal realms. For each demon you kill, days are removed from your sentence. For years you’ve existed, biding your time, until one morning you receive a name which throws your entire world into chaos: the name of Park Jimin, High Prince of Hell himself.

[[ Lovely Demons Glossary ]] 

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[wwilloww]

collab announcement: IN THE SPOOP

Welcome to the threshold, where worlds collide.

For the 31st of October, seven authors have joined forces to bring you stories of rituals gone awry and worlds meeting. Join @augustbutwinter @xjoonchildx @kkulfm @hobisuniverse @sahmfanficbts @madseok and @wwilloww for an out-of-this world ride.

GOODNIGHT NABI by @sahmfanficbts

Pairing Namjoon x reader Rating Explicit Genre DILF mechanic AU, ghost AU, school AU Summary It’s been years since his Nabi (Butterfly) flew away with angel wings. Kim Namjoon meets you, a librarian at his daughter’s school, who reminds him of life’s beauty and love he's sure he doesn’t deserve. It will take a strange convincing from the other world to help him let go of the past and embrace... you. The question remains: Is he ready?

OCTOBER 28

GOD OF MISCHIEF by @wwilloww

Pairing trickstergod!Jin x reader Rating Explicit Genre fantasy, smut, supernatural au Summary You've dedicated your life to the temple of Lugh, the golden sun god. But when your world crumbles, your ticket to escape is not what you imagined it'd be, especially when it comes as a handsome, mischievous figure waltzing through the flames.

OCTOBER 29

WHAT THE WATER GAVE US by @madseok

Pairing ghost!Yoongi x reader (f) Title What the water gave us Rating explicit (18+) Genre ghost AU, strangers to lovers Summary What was supposed to be a quiet Friday night after a hectic week at work is ruined by the sudden arrival of a strange man. The worst part? He doesn’t want to leave your bathtub.

OCTOBER 30

SEE YOU AGAIN by @hobisuniverse

Pairing ghost brother!Hoseok x human-turned-ghost!reader Rating PG-13 (death) Genre angst, h/c, smidgen of fluff at the end Summary You lost your older brother when you were 25. Every subsequent year, at the stroke of midnight on All Hallows Eve, he appears in front of you with a dazzling smile to spend twenty-four hours with you. But this year, when you turn 100, things are different when you realize everything as you knew it has changed.

OCTOBER 31

ALL WE SEE OR SEEM by @kkulfm

Pairing bird shapeshifter!Jimin x neutral!reader Rating PG-13 Genre dream AU, shapeshifter AU, angst & fluff Summary Trapped in a dream you can't wake up from, you find yourself on a strange journey home. On the way you meet Jimin; a young man but also a magpie who wants to help. But not all is what it seems, and something is chasing you that cannot be outrun.

NOVEMBER 1

STRANDS by @xjoonchildx

Pairing soldier!tae x reader (f) Rating explicit (18+) Genre creepy shit, spooky smut Summary taehyung can’t figure out how he ended up separated from his men, lost in these woods. or how he got hurt. he only knows he has no choice but to rely on the beautiful, secretive stranger who found him.

NOVEMBER 2

SEASONS DON'T FEAR THE REAPER by @augustbutwinter

Pairing reaper!jk x reader Rating mature (for themes) Genre reaper!AU, strangers to something Summary life is short, they say. one day everyone meets their death, they say. how often can you meet yours before he takes you with him?

NOVEMBER 3