✩‧₊˚༺☆༻ੈ -blessed-cursed- ੈ✩‧₊˚༺☆༻
“We were desperate in our desire to transform. We believed that there lay dreams unknown. We keep our fists fiercely clenched, not knowing it to be a blessing or a curse, lest we lose what we hold in our hands.”
⊱ ۫ ׅ ✧
enhypen ot7 vampire x reader fic in which 7 depraved 'young' men are forced to accept a human girl while trying not to kill her from desire
word count: 10k
part 1
part 2
part 3
part 4
part 5
part 6
part 7
part 8
part 9
part 10
part 11
part 12
part 13
part 14
part 15
part 16
part 17
part 18
part 19
part 20
⊱ ۫ ׅ ✧
-21-
scream
Heeseung traced circles into my legs as the sun splattered orange across his room.
The curated mural of old magazine cut-outs and pages torn from books peeled from under the warm glow of his walls, the decades worth of compiled material finally revealing itself to my naked eye.
I’d noticed the gutted piles of sleeves and tattered covers scattered all over the room. It gave the same impression as a teenager’s experimental art project executed with the passion of a conspiracy theorist.
Slumped against his shoulder, I faced a particularly dense section of the collage, and at the squint of my eyes I made out the enjambment of scribbled words on white pages. They were song lyrics?
“Do you write everything you sing?” I asked, adjusting my head against the sharp curve of Heeseung’s neck.
“Do you think I’m a fraud?” He joked back, his cold chest rumbling beneath my nuzzled ears.
Air left my nostrils and a smile teetered my lips.
“No!” I said, sitting upright to face him. “I just had no idea.”
The weight of the room shifted from the bubble of space outside of us, to the isolated bed where we both lied, our bodies barer than our souls. Everything else was shut out.
“Ever write a song about me?” I asked, falling back into his chest.
Immediately I regretted how self-possessed I sounded. But it was Heeseung, he was perhaps the one person who wouldn't guilt me for it. Instead, he made me feel as though I’d asked exactly the right question at exactly the right time.
“They’re all about you,” he laughed lightly.
“Heeseung…there's like hundreds of sheets of paper,” I laughed with him, a vague nervousness straining the lilt of my voice.
His chest stopped rising with feigned breath. He sat up suddenly, and buried himself between my legs, his jaw resting atop one of my knees.
“Sometimes it starts with just a sound and then it comes to me all at once, words I want to say but can’t form into anything other than melodies. What’s written on those pages is truly meaningless compared to what I actually feel inside.”
My legs went stiff beneath his fluid body.
“Let me read them,” I said, already pushing to get up off the comforter.
Thoughts pulled directly from Heeseung’s head and put onto a page, thoughts once circulating in his consciousness about me. There was no way around it—I had to know.
But before I could even set foot on the ground a thin hand gently clasped at the still sensitive skin of my wrists and tugged me back onto the mattress.
“Please don’t,” he said, eyes like black marbles.
“Fine,” I quickly conceded, not sure I could stand that look on his face for much longer.
It looked as though his anguish would come leaking right out from the depths of his wobbling pupils and overflow them with emotion.
He softened slightly, and a part of my interest smoothed over, but beneath the surface an aching desire gnawed at my core. I wanted to know everything the vampires kept hidden about themselves, I wanted to uncover it all.
Thankfully our focus was captured by a sound I’d almost forgotten about, a sound that no longer sounded familiar to me at all
The chime of a cellphone.
The noise pricked my ears with a conditioned bodily response of scanning the room for the device of its origins, but no greater desire to check further possessed me. I only felt the overwhelming urge to ignore it and move on.
But Heeseung seemed genuinely caught off guard.
Especially as the chiming continued to alert again and again.
In a second he held a large smartphone in the palm of his long hands, the juxtaposing sight of a vampire using modern technology giving me full body chills.
At least Jay’s outdated phone fit with my image of him, but this made Heeseung look remarkably normal, and for some reason I didn’t enjoy the view at all.
“Who texted you?” I asked, maliciousness stealing its way into my words.
Heeseung slid as close as possible against my side and offered up the screen for me to look at. The white light was semi-blinding.
It took my eyes a second to adjust to the rapid pace in which text bubbles appeared ahead of me.
Jongseong: So, are we doing this or what?
Jaeyun: yeahhh tns not really a good night for me
Jongseong: Are you serious? This is the one tradition we actually keep up with.
Sunoo: something’s come up for me too.
Jungwon: Guys, make the time. I don’t care how. But I expect you all home.
Riki: moms pissed off lol
Jaeyun: lololol
Sunghoon: I will be there, Jungwon.
Sunghoon: I’m guessing she’s still with Heeseung?
Sunoo: no surprises there
Jungwon: She is. She is also reading our texts right now.
“Shit,” I gasped, nearly dropping the wide screen with my clammy hands.
Riki: shouldve said something sooner
Jaeyun: there’s always someone who lurks but doesn’t say anything
Jongseong: I feel sorry she has to witness this trainwreck.
I turned to hand the phone back to Heeseung but he smiled at me and nodded towards the ongoing thread of conversation, as if encouraging me to jump off of a cliff.
“Why don’t you say something?”
My fingers stiffly crawled across the keyboard.
Heeseung: um hi everyone
Sunoo: omfg adorable…
Jeongsong: Hello.
Riki: sup
Jungwon: Sorry for putting you on the spot like that.
Jaeyun: no way its actually her
Sunghoon: Please give Heeseung his phone back.
I typed again, my fingers fumbling across the screen.
Heeseung: okay
Overwhelmed by the swarm of text bubbles filling in one after the other, I motioned to hand Heeseung back control over the phone but he wouldn’t take it no matter how much I forced the dumb slab of metal in his face.
Riki: nah let her stay this is fun
Jongseong: Did something happen to Heeseung?
Sunoo: hes probably reading everything over her shoulder genius
Jaeyun: yo, hee you down for tn?
“Tell them, ‘yeah I’m down,’” he chuckled against my ear.
What was I? His receptionist?
Nevertheless my fingers moved in accordance with his request.
Heeseung: yeah im down
Jongseong: Good.
Jungwon: We might not get the opportunity to do this again for a while, so I want us to let loose and try to have fun together. Just like old times, yeah?
Sunghoon: I agree. I think that would be for the best.
Riki: yeah whatever same here
Jaeyun: lezz get it
Sunoo: cant wait
The messages stopped appearing abruptly and I got the gist that the conversation was over, but so much of it had flown over my head.
“What was that even about?”
Heeseung finally took the small weight from my hands and concealed it in the pile of his blankets.
“Believe it or not, but we partake in our fair share of activities together,” He began, trailing a pale hand down the back of his neck. “It doesn’t happen very often, but every few months we hit the town and put our differences aside.”
He got up from the squeaky bed and paced towards a window that poured dying sunlight directly onto his face. The spotlight allowed me to see the true nature of his features, to see the underbelly of emotion that reprimanded his smile.
“Sounds like a rare thing right?” He asked, voice hollow.
“Is it really that hard to get along?" I said, shifting up in order to project myself clearer.
“Would you be happy if your dreams were intertwined with 6 other vampires?”
It was hard to bear the tone of his distraught voice. Heeseung’s sincerity bled out of him like a thready pulse coloring him red.
“I am happy,” I said, standing up at last.
My feet kissed the cold hardwood floor, and once again I was reminded of the impunity of life. At the sight of me, Heeseung snapped out of his sinking daydream and replaced his frown with a wild grin.
“Then tonight you’re going to have a blast.”
My chest raptured in one thud of my heart. Excitement had been lost on me, and the old feeling of looking forward to something was as foreign as the thought of the vampires getting along for the night.
“I’m coming too?” I asked, not letting my hopes skyrocket just yet.
“There is nowhere you can go on this Earth where we are not likely to follow,” he began, a proud smile glossing his lips. “So yes, you are coming, and you’re going to have as much fun as humanly possible.”
I only had one question. One thought barreling down the course of my mind.
“When?”
Heeseung snapped from his mesmerised daze into a flow of calculated contemplation. His eyebrows tensed together almost comically so.
“Soon,” he said decidedly.
“I hate vague answers,” I fired back, uncertain of where the sudden frustration originated from.
“You saw the texts,” Heeseung said, raising his hands in self-defense, the innocent gesture almost fooling me away from the delighted glint in his eye. “Maybe in one hour?”
“One hour?” I gaped numbly, too stunned to fix the horrified slacking of my jaw. “I have one hour to get ready?”
“Why would you change anything about how you look right now?” Heeseung deadpanned, the completely candid tone of his voice seizing me in place.
His band tee draped across my body like it was holding on for dear life, my hair tangled into a ratted mess from wrestling around in the pillows. Had it been so long since he was human that he forgot about the mortal obligation of self-care?
“You must be joking,” I said, attempting to smooth out a bump at the back of my head.
Heeseung flattened his palm over the area I was fussing with, holding my skull in his outstretched palm like he were Prince Hamlet himself.
“I can’t believe you don’t know how beautiful you are,” he breathed just as poetically.
Now it made sense why he was a lyricist, because only a songwriter could produce such heavenly words.
“Stop it,” I said, half-heartedly pushing at his broad chest.
“I will never stop telling you the intense longing I feel for you,” he whispered, lips brushing against the skin of my temple.
“Then let me read what you’ve written.”
His grip on me loosened in an instant. The irked sensation that took hold in its absence genuinely unnerved me.
Of course Heeseung was entitled to his privacy, and I would never want to breach his trust, but the more he rejected the idea, the greater its importance became on the benign checklist in my head.
If his songs contained an ounce of the same fatally stunning awe as the confessions he was able to deliver without so much as a knock on his composure, then I needed to know. They were mine by right.
“Go,” he asserted, before my focus could fully spiral. “You have 58 minutes now. Better hurry, baby.”
I spun on my heel, not wanting to waste another fleeting second. But then I remembered that time around Heeseung always seemed to stop. Maybe that's why I allowed myself to turn back for one last kiss with the vampire.
Before I could even press into him, Heeseung pulled me nearer into his orbit.
Our lips collided like two shooting stars, and I inhaled the scent of his effortlessly decadent aroma. He tasted like obsession, like I couldn’t get enough of him no matter how hard I tried.
Once returned to the ground and given back a semblance of control over my body, I blinked rapidly. Now I only had 56 minutes left.
“I promise I won’t make you wait for me!” I yelled, already darting out of the room. “Never again!”
Heeseung didn’t have to say anything—I would show him the full scope of my sincerity.
The hallway kept hidden an overwhelming vacuum of darkness.
From the way the sun set over the house, the windows allowed no sunlight to filter through and illuminate a path. Still, I paced quickly through with just my hand against the wall guiding me by muscle memory. When I reached the edge of the very first step on the first set of stairs, my toes hugged the hardwood and my movement permanently halted.
One step, and then another, and then, a gust of wind flew right by and slapped me in the face. The jarring sensation caused my knees to quake and my palm to clutch the handrail for dear life.
I hadn’t even heard so much as the echo of footsteps pattering through the empty hall, but there was undoubtedly a presence pricking at the back of my neck.
“Who’s there?” I asked, fulfilling my role as the protagonist of a horror film.
“Don’t you remember?” the voice rumbled, so deep I was certain I’d never heard it before.
What usually happens at this part of the movie? Witty banter?
“You know, I’m much better with faces,” I said, gripping the splintering wood in my hot hand.
“That’s too bad,” the raspy voice hummed, his voice flowing into one ear and funneling out the other.
My brain flickered through each vampire’s distinct cadence but none of them matched the lowered register of the one currently concealing himself away. Perhaps mimicry was another one of the many tricks up the vampire’s sleeves.
“I didn’t know I was still meant to fear monsters hiding in the dark,” I said, not too proud to admit there could be a new type of monster stealing its way into my life.
But then a whisper coaxed right against my ear.
“Have you learned nothing, bunny?”
My spine went rigid beneath my skin. Now I was certain. This had to be one of the vampires, no other entity could come up with such nauseating pet names.
But, bunny.
That was new.
Jake had used every nick name imaginable, but never bunny. Ni-ki teased me almost exclusively with little deer (save for the one instance of derogatory name calling), Heeseung stuck mainly with baby.
So that left Sunoo, Jungwon, Jay, and Sunghoon. But the thought of guessing wrong was perhaps worse than the thought of not knowing at all.
“Need some help?”
Hands gripped my waist.
Cold hands.
But every vampire except for Jake had an affinity for frosty skin. At this point I was convinced the mystery man only existed as a figment of my imagination.
That was until we started moving. Down the stairs.
Perhaps the grim reaper had come for me after all and was on his way to dragging me to the depths of hell.
But hell took the strange form of my bedroom, which happened to be immaculately organized and staggeringly bright.
“You're welcome,” the voice chuckled from behind, hands ghosting my waist.
When I dared to whip back around, there was no vampire laughing in my ear, no hands holding me securely.
It was just me. Alone. Again.
The clothes that once scattered across my velvet comforter were gone, the shelves realigned, my shoes tucked neatly away. No cobwebs clung to the neglected walls.
Oddness struck me, but not in discontent. The neatness filled me with an overpowering sense of serenity.
In fact, I was so at ease that my time crunch no longer peddled at my anxiety.
I showered with nothing on my mind except for discerning which color would flatter me best. I dressed with no self-doubt clouding my judgment and trampling my ego. I combed through my hair while humming a joyful tune. Each step further along in the process of getting ready only brought me a greater peace of mind.
That was until I glanced at the analog clock by my bedside and realized my time was nearly up.
One last rustle with my hair, one last glance in the mirror, and then I allowed myself to climb up the steps to the basement.
For some reason though, my hand wouldn’t reach for the shiny gold door knob that locked me away.
Why did fear have its chokehold on me now of all times?
Maybe it was the heels, or the low cut of my dress, or the jazzing of my hair, but I had the sudden urge to laugh at myself, to gaze at my own reflection in the mirror until I was so small and insignificant that I could never be seen by anyone again. But at the same time I wanted to just pull the door open and run out without any barriers holding me back.
After all, this was my night as much as it was theirs.
That thought alone allowed me to make up my mind and to step forward, for the first time of my short, renewed life, with a smile so bright it could melt the sun.
What I was not expecting in my millions of racing thoughts, was to find the band of vampires seated and conversing amongst each other. They laughed, and talked, and joked, keeping their voices miraculously low.
And when I strutted over with my 1,000 watt grin, they all turned to face me like I was Jesus Christ walking on fucking water.
“You guys look…nice,” I said, attempting to diffuse whatever atomic bomb had decimated their composure.
In the impact I took in their outfits.
Each wore some variation of heavy black clothing coordinated in a way that couldn’t have possibly been planned but that was still perfectly executed. Mentally I cursed them for how good they all looked.
“Don’t you think that dress is a little short?” Sunghoon laughed darkly, the surreptitious looks of every other vampire now fixated on where the skin-tight fabric met my thigh.
My smile dropped. I think I understood now. There was no external force causing them to shatter into tiny pieces. I was the bomb.
“Let her wear it,” Jake jumped in from across the couch, his fist balling into the leather armrest beside him. “She has the freedom of choice, right?”
“He’s right, Hoon,” Heeseung said from his spot on one of the armchairs, eyelids unable to lift from the ground.
I don’t know if I wanted to laugh or to cry. My smile rose and fell like a wavering seesaw.
“There’s a breeze outside.” Jay shot to his feet, his stone cold face appearing as serious as ever. “Should I bring a coat for you?”
Finally unsticking from the glue that trapped me in place, I nodded and walked over to meet him where he was already sifting through the jacket closet, my tongue unable to untwist itself from paralyzing embarrassment.
I felt the vampires’ eyes on me like they were a pack of starving wolves surveying a fresh cut of meat—one wrong move and they would pounce just as savagely.
Incidentally, I caught the sight of a jaw clenching from afar. The musculature made serrated edges look dull.
Your ass is hanging out, Ni-ki’s low voice rumbled all the way over from the farthest end of the couch.
At the echo of his words, I forced myself to stand impossibly upright. My spine perked up and my back flattened against the wall.
“You do look kind of uncomfortable,” Sunoo said lazily from the adjoining chair that hovered separate from the rest.
“I’m fine,” I said, my tone too sharp for my own good. “Thanks for all the concern everyone.”
I stared at the floor until I caught a glimpse of the vampire seated in the middle of the couch, wide eyes hidden away amidst all other piercing stares. These eyes were what grounded me in my capsizing.
Large, measured, and entirely open to the world around him.
“That color is striking on you,” Jungwon said with a smile that resembled the discovery of a rare artifact.
His shining eyes traveled my body and a jolt of validation sunk through my skin.
“Thank you….” I said, vulnerability finally untangling its way from my tongue.
His spotlight of acknowledgement reminded me of why I originally wanted to turn away and hide—because praise was all I really wanted to hear. Not arguments over decisions made entirely above my head. I just wanted appreciation for the effort I’d put in to please them.
Jay shut the closet door, a brown trenchcoat folded over his arm.
“Are we ready?” He asked the room.
The six others rose in unison and marched uncannily towards the exit as if they had picked up some sort of signal shared only amongst each other. Jay and I stood by as they neared.
“Who’s riding with who?” Jake asked, already spinning a pair of car keys on his index finger.
“We can do two cars,” Jay said evenly, dangling his own silver key in hand.
“Dibs on Jake’s car,” Ni-ki called, his mocking tone contrasting too well with his baritone voice.
My eyes shot between them as the vampires naturally rounded into a circle.
“I guess I’ll ride with you guys too,” Heeseung spoke softly.
“What’s so great about Jake’s car? We’re all going to the same place,” Jay began to stir, his words thick with irritation.
Perhaps his restraint was as flimsy as my own desires.
“His car has a sunroof,” Sunghoon said, his flat, uninterested tone nearly pulling a chuckle from my stomach.
“My car is a convertible!” Jay’s voice cracked like soft chalk, his free hand running tracks through his black spiky hair.
The solid timbre of his voice resounded through my body like stones placed against my chest. His undoing was devastatingly alluring.
But like pulling the wool over our clouded eyes, our leader soothed a hand against Jay’s shoulder and disrupted the circle’s open forum.
“I’ll go with you,” Jungwon said, hand firm on the vampire’s chest.
I tried to keep focus on the plan as it was unfolding before me, but I couldn’t really think of much besides the veiny skin of Jungwon’s palm.
He looked immeasurably strong.
“I’ll go with you guys too,” Sunoo intruded with a sigh. “I’m not in the mood for any collisions right now.”
“Fine by me,” Jay said with an air of finality.
His fingers gripped my forearm with a delicacy I knew must’ve taken him a lot of strength to muster in his current state as he guided me towards the front door.
But before we could make our escape, Jake blocked our way, a sweet, stupid smirk tugging at the corners of his wide mouth.
“Where do you think you’re going?”
“She’s riding with us,” Jay barked, his fingers clutching into me imperceptively tighter.
“And how are you going to protect her, huh? Multiple airbags? Reinforced frames? Automatic emergency braking?”
Jake leaned against the doorframe, mouth open, eyes completely focused on Jay. Clearly he was prepared to win this war—he had the one key element that he exploited to his advantage, something you couldn’t even cheat with mind-reading—he knew his enemy, inside and out.
“Bite me,” the elder vampire choked from beside me, freeing his fingers from my wrist.
Jay shot off like a rocket, and within seconds I heard the noise of his old engine sputtering to life through the garage door.
“She will be riding home with us,” Jungwon intervened from behind me, stepping up to face Jake head on. “I personally will ensure her safety.”
I couldn’t see Jungwon’s face, but I was privy to Jake’s, and through his expressions I caught a flash of the oddest darkness, like fear had hijacked him momentarily and dredged him through the annals of time.
Then Jungwon left, and Sunoo right along with him. It wasn’t long before we heard the screeching of tires against the pavement echoing off into the distance.
“Don’t worry,” Jake softened, a charming laugh falling from his lips. “I’ll get us where we need to go.”
“In one piece?” I asked, suddenly recalling Sunoo’s comment about collisions.
“You think so poorly of us,” Sunghoon said, leading the group into the garage. I couldn’t make out his features but I was sure his eyebrows were knitted and lips were pouty as always. “We are your safety.”
“Then why does it matter whose car I'm crammed into the backseat of?” I asked, following diligently in his footsteps.
“It doesn’t,” Jake’s voice echoed as his vehicle chirped alive. “But Jay is a neurotic, and that comes with its perks.”
He found me with his eyes and I took in the momentary warmth of Jake’s smile before he vanished into the driver’s seat.
When I turned around, the car door was already propped open for me, Heeseung waiting patiently at its side. I crawled into the vehicle without a word. The car smelled of fresh leather and fragrant wealth.
Once inside, I felt a pair of long legs trap me in the middle. Ni-ki was hunched over into himself, his lengthy proportions making him appear terribly displaced in the back of the car. Heeseung filed in against my other side, and the two tallest vampires sandwiched me in between their showcase of limbs.
Heeseung reached across my lap to fasten my buckle but I grasped the strap before he had the chance. I’d dealt with enough seatbelt shenanigans when Jay had secured it criminally tight on our day out.
Jake wasted little time in taking off, nobody else bothering to buckle in even as he began speeding down the vacant roads. The pull of gravity had no effect on the vampires. My body was the only one to propel harshly against the seat.
“Hold on tight,” Heeseung breathed into my ear.
His leg jutted against my bare thigh, his hand twitching atop his knee in contemplation, but Ni-ki beat him to the punch as he let his large arm drape across both of my legs. Their dual contact was almost enough to make me forget of their lack of affection, but still somewhere deep in my gut I held onto my grudge against the vampires.
I wished to be in Jay’s car.
At least the three vampires who rode together were able to sidestep their pride and see me, really see me as I was. But this unlucky bunch were too twisted within their own complexities to reach me in the way I wanted.
All I had was their physical intentions, and for now I decided that would be enough.
“Can you hold my hand?” I whispered to Heeseung, extending my palm out as a humble offering.
He wasted no time in squeezing his fleshy palm into my own. He found the centimeter of space left between us and narrowed it by pressing in closer to my side.
What about me? Ni-ki coaxed inside my head, his deep voice rumbling its way through my entire body.
I have two hands, I replied, as I faced his profile that refused to meet my gaze.
His large hand enveloped my own, his long fingers swallowing up my balled fist. It was a strange way to hold a hand, but what surprised me the most was how lightly he wrapped around me.
When his eyes finally revealed themselves, all I saw were galaxies of black.
“Are we going tunnel, guys?” Jake called as he rapidly tapped through different radio stations.
“Tunnel?” I asked, my question shared in both Ni-ki and Heeseung’s directions.
“What’s Jay doing?” Sunghoon said from the passenger’s seat, staring straight ahead at the oncoming road. “I don't know!” Jake yelled, finally a song coming on and causing him to speak an octave higher.
“I think we go tunnel,” Ni-ki said, his deep voice cutting through the music blasting through every speaker in the car.
“What tunnel?” I asked again, my questions useless at receiving answers.
“Its better to find out for yourself,” Sunghoon said, tilting his head ever so slightly in acknowledgement.
It was only when I saw the mechanic opening of the sunroof did I begin to understand the meaning of the word ‘tunnel.’
The windows showed images of street lights illuminating the dark road ahead, our sudden descent into the sectioned off part of the highway causing a tearing of nostalgia in my heart.
Sunghoon gripped the headrests between him and Jake and carefully lifted himself until his shoulders peeked through the top of the roof. He balanced himself sturdily in the moving vehicle, like he would never suffer another fall in his life again.
I looked on in awe as he stood ahead of me, his hair whipping wildly behind him, his skin glowing like he was carved directly from a shooting star. He laughed into the open night, for once his face alive and alight with pure childlike wonder.
I had never seen Sunghoon look so handsome before.
Through the pardoned gap in the sunroof where noise and air filtered in, a distant howl reverberated off of the curved walls of the tunnel. It was a yappy sort of call, one that reminded me of a fox yelling in rebellion.
The vampires laughed amongst themselves, a group jubilation taking hold of the car and making it feel lighter. Clearly, there was an inside joke I happened to be on the outs of.
Sunghoon raised his muscular arms and cupped his hands around his mouth. He let out a yell himself. Chesty, grating, and raw. The fangy smile that appeared soon after made my heart swell in admiration.
Swinging down and turning to face me as he stood atop the black vinyl seats, Sunghoon extended his white hands and raised his eyebrows to indicate his question. The gesture was useless, I was ready to give into anything he asked.
As I took his hands, I let go of the ones I was already occupied with, and instead felt the supportive guidance of Heeseung and Ni-ki passing me to Sunghoon. He helped me stand on Jake’s armrest and positioned his body behind mine, in the safest place I could currently be.
Wind slashed me across the face. Even as Jake adjusted to a more bearable speed, the oncoming gusts of air were all-encompassing. But the flow brought only a smile to my face—the sensation was unlike anything I’d felt before.
It felt like the world was giving me a hug, wrapping its arms around me in order for me to know just how much I was loved and meant to exist. I laughed, and gasped, and smiled, and felt nothing but the great urge to scream.
That was when I saw the tail lights of the car ahead of us, and the reflection of the bodies that were seated in the lowered top of the vehicle. Standing up, arms outstretched, and chest emptied, was Sunoo. It wasn’t a fox I’d heard, it was just the vampire’s giddy, riotous screams.
That made my desire to unravel ignite even stronger.
Clutching the top of the car and inhaling a revitalizing breath, I emptied my lungs into the night. Sunghoon’s broad chest tremored with laughter behind me, his hands holding on dutifully even as I shook from screaming.
The feeling was fully freeing. My eyes rocked closed, my neck released its tension, my trust softened into Sunghoon’s icy hold.
I laughed again, and I wanted only to tell Jake to go faster.
But before I knew it, my body fell back into the interior of the car, the sunroof closing above me.
“Hey, I was having fun,” I said as I eased into Heeseung and Ni-ki’s arms.
What I barely noticed was that we were back on the main highway, and that we had exited through the other side of the tunnel.
“Don’t get ahead of yourself,” Jake said, his hands maneuvering dexterously along the steering wheel. “The night is young, new blood.”
I rolled my eyes and watched as we neared the city now. Buildings, and bars, and cobbled roads all leading to the center of it all.
When I looked out at the young people of the night, I observed them as humans separate from myself. I wasn’t a vampire, but I was practically one by association, like I had adapted their traits just by living in their shells.
Jay’s car sped ahead of us and parked in an empty gap on the road. Jake quickly swerved into the vacant spot behind him, and for a second I thought he would ram straight into Jay’s bumper, but the engine was killed and the keys yanked from the ignition.
Before I knew it the vampires had all exited the car.
I fussed with which side to leave out of, but Ni-ki decided for me as he grasped my arm and pulled me across the seat cushions.
Ahead of us was a small building crammed in between a department store and a classic American diner. The broken windows were blacked out with cardboard, the roof tilted, the front steps caved in. It looked as if it were some elaborate set piece used specifically in haunted spatial design.
I thought we looked terribly overdressed.
“Wrong address?” I asked, turning to face both Jay and Jake, who stood casually in each other’s orbit.
“What do you see?” Jay asked, staring straight ahead with unyielding conviction, his arms crossed over his chest.
“A very scary looking place,” I sighed, not in the mood to get philosophical, or rather, metaphysical right now. “Are you not creeped out?”
“Look,” Jake said, joining Jay's nonsensical hysteria. “Really look.”
He nodded in the direction of the decrepit building, and I stared at the drooping exterior, at the dormant decay that was no doubt consuming its walls from the outside in. But my fuzzy eyes adjusted to a wider picture, focusing instead on those passing us by in the street, who looked just as dark and glamorous as we currently were.
All of these notable figures disappeared into the very dark, very narrow alleyway hidden beside the entrance. I noticed an empty bottle littered on the sidewalk vibrating with life as it shook on the ground. Only then did the thunder from the Earth hit me like I was on a delayed end of a receiver.
Music was distant, but not too far to escape my pin-pricked ears.
When I found the duo’s contemplative pairs of eyes looming in the night, they were both twinkling with tiny red stars that sent waves of astonishment straight to my retinas.
“Some of the best things are hidden right before your eyes,” Jake said, taking the leap into the darkness.
Behind him followed Ni-ki, then Sunghoon, Sunoo, and Jungwon, Heeseung next, and as I stood stuck in place, Jay waited with me until my sweltering heart soothed.
“Show me everything you know,” I said, latching onto his sculptural forearm.
Jay’s gaze softened as he undid his posture. His loosened arm snaked around my waist and held onto me securely.
“I want you to take it all in slowly,” he said, guiding us through the eerie alleyway. “This might not be your thing, and I just want you to feel comfortable no matter what.”
“I always feel comfortable around you, Jay,” I said, staring into his pupils obscured in pure black.
“Then stay close,” he smirked, tugging my waist nearer into him until I was pressed directly in front of his rigid body.
Our proximity made my heart leap. Jay’s stature didn’t scream about its obvious advantages, but his frame still suggested its dominance in the way he operated. He was so steady, so certain of himself that I couldn’t help but be drawn to him, like he was the cornerstone of safety and trust.
We descended a set of stairs that led to a red door propped open, just a single wooden block keeping it from colliding with the wall. Jay pulled on the door’s handle like it was the entrance to his own private palace, and waited as I flooded through.
Immediately my senses were overwhelmed.
My teeth buzzed in my skull from the thumping of the music, my eyes adjusted rapidly to the strobing of white light in the dim atmosphere. A vague suggestion of smoke filled the air.
Jay weaved through bodies on top of bodies, a single hand attached to mine acting as a lifeline between us. He tugged, and I followed adeptly behind, never once parting from his stoic presence.
Once he loosened his hold, I was affixed safely atop a bar stool.
“Would you like something to drink?” Jay shouted in my ear, his heavy voice more energizing than the bass reverberating off of the walls.
“Get the girl some shots,” another voice replied, nearly sounding offended on my behalf.
I spun in my seat and watched as Sunoo and Ni-ki approached the counter, breaking up my direct connection with Jay and occupying both of my sides. Sunoo rested his elbows on the marbled surface and caught the attention of one of the workers dressed in all black.
“How is it that you can contain yourselves right now? There’s hundreds of people here,” I asked, not sure who to face with my question.
It’s not easy, Ni-ki answered only to me. I really could use a drink.
I expected to find his tiger eyes surveying the gallery of bodies that suffocated us, all with loosened inhibitions, but instead he stared me down, squinted eyes suggesting a need for much more than just a sip of blood.
My nerves kickstarted in an instant.
Sunoo presented me with a round of tiny glasses all filled to the brim with a clear liquid, and I thought that it was a bit of a Catch-22. If I took the shots, they would act as a solution to the unrest of my stomach and rigidness of my speech, but at the same time I knew there would be no going back to a state of normalcy after indulging in whatever hard liquor was bound to ruin my composure.
My fingers clenched tight around one of the small glasses.
When I looked up to find the three other vampires, they all had their own glasses in hand, except theirs were curved and filled to the brim with a viscous red liquid.
I turned back to Ni-ki and watched as he sipped slowly from the rim, swallowing without once breaking away his gaze. When he lowered the cup, he gave me a wide smile, and all of his teeth were coated the same shade of crimson red.
“Wine?” I asked, my voice hardly a whisper over the music.
“That’s what the bottle says,” he spoke to me finally, nodding behind the counter towards the endless shelves decorated with unique silhouettes. My eyes landed on one specific bottle that had written in delicate script across the aged paper, ‘Park’s Winery.’
I leered at Jay from over Sunoo’s body, but the vampire was lost to the crowd. A tinge of disappointment and anger stirred inside of me. So much for staying close to his side.
I wasted no more time and swallowed the shot I cradled in my thumb and index finger. It went down miraculously easily. Tequila, I presumed. Then, I took another.
“Pace yourself,” Sunoo said with a laugh, his crinkling smile smoothing over a fraction of my anxieties.
But I was a girl on a mission, and not even God could stop me.
“Not tonight,” I said, knocking back one more glass.
Alcohol burned my esophagus and I shivered at the need to cleanse my palate. But there was no cure for me here, what I really needed was to rid my mind of everything physical and forget the rest.
I dropped down from the stool and headed for the crowd.
“You better be careful,” Ni-ki demanded, his voice like a distinct frequency only I could pick up on, only I was certain everyone else could hear him this time.
I merged with the wave of young Frankensteins, all galvanized with love, and drugs, and music; taken too soon from their own lives and thrown into the midst of action. Pretending to be one of them, I was reinvigorating after aging a hundred years alongside the vampires.
The sinking feeling inside of me manifested as an impatience, I’d identified, as I parted onto the dance floor. When would the time come where I felt just as capable as they were? When would I make my move?
The ground shook a melody through my legs, and my train of thought derailed at the sensation. My hair whipped from side to side, my arms twirled in the air. This was the release I needed. No thoughts, just movement, just sound.
Another presence joined in my rhapsody, the friction of warmth engulfing me like a flame from behind. A palm steadied itself against my hips, slowing my movements just to speed them up again. A breath met my neck, and I relaxed into the feeling.
“You are sensational,” the voice gasped from against my ear.
My eyes slid closed as I smiled. My movements grew faster, less refined, more raw and vulnerable. One of my hands trailed up the neck of the familiar stranger behind me, his skin like a cauldron of lava.
Ahead of me, a cool air parted from the sea of bodies. My eyes shot open in surprise as the shadow of a figure brought himself as close as humanely possible to my chest. I breathed in the thick decadent scent that adorned his clothes and suffocated me in luxury.
His cold hands caressed me where warm ones once grabbed—the feeling was intoxicating.
“May I have this dance?” Jungwon asked, his voice lower and darker than I remembered it sounding.
“Mhm,” I hummed as I moved my weight all the way forward into his strong arms. Pressed against his stiff figure, his muscles were honed, his body like a sharpened arrow ready to pierce right through me.
I turned in his grasp, and finally met the face of the molten man that I had melted into.
Jake.
Of course it was Jake. And of course he had the most devilish smile stretching his mouth, his lips bitten to oblivion. He managed to squeeze even closer to me.
I couldn’t move forward without smushing further into Jungwon’s abs and I couldn’t move backwards without pressing right up against Jake’s waist. For some reason I was stupidly happy with the position I found myself in.
“I want both of you,” I said, my lips loose and my walls slowly crumbling.
A twitch where Jake stood, and then I felt the weight of his head fall into the crook of my neck. Jungwon rocked me softly, his fingers molding into my body like he couldn’t keep his hands from balling fistfuls of my skin and clothes.
“Jake, should we?” Jungwon’s low voice rumbled against my ear, each syllable from his mouth like a shot of whiskey.
“Yes, you should,” I answered for him, wrapping one arm around Jake’s back, while using the other to rub Jungwon’s thighs through his clothes.
“She’s tipsy, it’s not right,” Jake answered, sounding himself like he was hardly convinced.
His words made me scrunch up my eyebrows. If I was tipsy, then I would love to see what a sober person acted like.
“I know, but…” Jungwon inhaled harshly, the sound sending a shiver down my spine. “Damn it.”
“You guys are no fun.”
I let my hands slide free, and pulled away from the situation at hand. I would find my fun elsewhere.
As I stumbled through the crowd, the swirling vortex of sounds around me and the attack of lights on my eyes caused my face to overheat and my stomach to spiral into a pit of unease.
I turned back to try and find Jungwon and Jake amidst the crowd, but everyone around me seemed to multiply and the two figures that could stand out as anomalies in any crowd were gone with the wind.
The sinking feeling worsened.
I searched the sky for an answer, instinctually trying to catch a glimpse of the Sun, or for wisdom to impart upon me, but there were only propellers of strobing light and dozens of more bodies lining the mezzanine of the second story.
I didn’t even realize the place was that big.
Like winning the lottery, like being guided by fate, like prevailing through slim odds, I recognized the face of one strikingly beautiful vampire, illuminated by artificial light like a divine statue on permanent display.
He was staring down at me, eyes like two anchors chaining me to the ground.
His silver hair made him appear so unique, so timeless around all other bland faces, I wondered if angels actually were real.
“Heeseung,” I said, suddenly overcome with a coil of anxiety. “Where are your wings?”
His eyebrows contorted together daintily, his parted lips formed a ‘what?’
I guess even with his supernatural senses, there was no hearing over the all-consuming music, especially since the upper level was its own ways away.
Without really thinking I continued on in my pursuit, now desperate to find him so I could ask again, if he was a real angel, then why was he rid of his ability to fly?
I just had to find some stairs. Or a seat, actually that would be much better than stairs.
I settled on going back to the bar. The bar was a safe space. The bar was what I knew best, and when I planted myself back on the sticky vinyl I was met with yet another surprise.
Jay leaned over the counter, smiling and laughing with a bartender clad in black and dampened with sweat. In his hand he clutched a full glass of blood-wine, the liquid not so much as stirring as he jostled around the worker.
“Where the hell have you been?” I asked, my hot face pressed flat against the cool counter top.
Jay’s eyes widened, but quickly he composed himself before the human man and dismissed him with a nod.
“Don’t rest on that, it's filthy,” he said, wiping off the imperceivable grime he spoke about.
“You left me,” I said, words coming up like vomit. “I hate being left. Don’t tell me to stay close by if you don’t mean it.”
“Ni-ki and Sunoo were there,” he said, raising his arms defensively.
“I wanted to be with you.”
For a moment Jay was speechless.
I was speechless.
A childish ire yanked at the reasoning in my brain. Why was it, when I expressed what I wanted, almost always it was denied?
“Finally, you want me?” Jay darkened, lips pressed into his glass. “Now you’ve decided this is what you want?”
“Don’t do that,” I said, head shooting up of my own free will. "Don't make me feel bad.”
“I can do whatever I want,” he said, lowering his glass before he could sip from it. “Can you?”
And with that, Jay trailed off. This time, my eyes didn’t leave his figure once. I watched as he walked slowly into a room pardoned by a curtain in the back of the club.
I can do this, I thought, spinning in my seat.
“Excuse me,” I said, to the young man Jay had spoken with. “I’ll have another round, please. Put it on Mr. Park’s tab.”
“Sure thing,” the man replied simply, as he poured me another line of shots.
These went down much easier than the last.
Liquored up and newly renewed in my anger, I staggered my way to the sectioned off rooms, where smoke and laughter clung to the air. The memory of which curtain Jay had disappeared behind almost evaded me, but miraculously I tugged at the right banner.
Jay and Sunghoon were seated around a poker table, cigars hanging from their lips, smiles plastered on their unaged, handsome faces. Other men also littered around in the private room, human men that were too loud and too imperfect it almost wasn’t fair.
All eyes darted to me, and I wondered if there was something on my face.
“Who’s she?” One of the insignificant faces asked, the room too filled with smoke for me to make out his features.
I did, however, notice the clenching of Jay’s jaw, and the way his gaze fought to focus back on the cards in his hand.
“That’s my girl.”
Sunghoon’s voice startled me like a slap of cold water to the face. Never in my life did I think those words would fall from his lips—his attentively carved lips, which no longer smiled in jest, but buried lines of seriousness into his plastic skin.
So much came over me at that moment.
What I mainly felt was regret. Regret for not uplifting the vampires the same way they uplifted me. I could never repay that debt, even as they continued to turn my existence into a ride of constant love, constant passion and growth.
But it occurred to me that I at least had to try, no matter the outcome, to amaze them back, because it was how they deserved to be loved.
“I missed you, babe,” I said as I approached the back of Sunghoon’s chair.
My arms slinked over his shoulders as I hugged him from behind.
His thick build was unexpectedly tender, his soft skin as pillowy as flaky snow. I had the urge to dive right into him and bury myself beneath his structured existence, but instead I stood in place and watched as he cracked beneath me.
“You reek of alcohol,” he whispered under his breath.
“You smell like smoke,” I fired back, hand coasting along his protruding musculature.
Fuck, his arms were big.
My fingers trembled at the thought of his size in a way I’d never pondered about before. All he ever did was draw confusion from my brain like a neverending stream of ‘why’s’ and ‘how’s.’ Knowing Sunghoon was like knowing a formula that changed each day.
But not once did I doubt the divinity of his features. No, his sharp beauty pained me irreparably.
“Come sit,” he hummed, tapping his hand on his thigh.
I swallowed, dryly.
Jay was long forgotten at this moment, in this attempt to ruin him. All I thought about was Sunghoon, and how if I didn’t lessen our proximity I might never get another chance. I strode over in long measured steps.
Luckily the room had carried on. Cigar trails continued, conversations resumed, cards were dealt again. The subordinate human men had entirely accepted the fact that I was Sunghoon’s lap dog returning home, ready to satisfy my owner.
And in some ways, they were horribly right.
I sat atop my throne tempered straight from marbled glass, my legs stinging with pleasure against Sunghoon’s broad lap. His posture pronounced itself through his spine, through the dense fabric of his clothes. Just being near him cooled my blazing skin to a chilling touch.
One of his large hands held me still while he continued to bet in the ongoing round. The pressure of his fingers felt akin to the weight of a thousand sinking ships flooding my body with electric heat.
My face was especially vulnerable as I felt the involuntary squeeze of my thighs around Sunghoon’s glorious legs. I couldn’t help myself from the intense bodily craving that occurred just by perching on his knee. The contact was exactly what I’d been searching for, and it was perhaps unfolding in the most mortifying way imaginable.
I wondered if anyone could notice the extreme pleasure I was taking in my own discomfort. But very quickly I realized there was one person who would notice anything I did.
I dared a glance at Jay, and it took everything in me not to gasp.
The vampire had his head buried in his hands, a single eye peeking out and destroying me in an instant.
At the same time Sunghoon’s fingers curled into me deeper, as he himself began to coax my body back and forth. It took everything in me not to moan while looking at Jay.
“Having fun, bunny?” Sunghoon asked against my earlobe.
My blood went cold while my body boiled into a spell-binding lust.
Bunny, I thought, lazily, eyes sliding closed.
“Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten that easily,” he said, his tone aggravatingly flat.
Then it hit me. In the stairwell, his hands had held me the exact same way they did just now.
“Sunghoon…” I said, head whirring with pressure, smoke suffocating my lungs. “Think I’m gonna…be sick.”
Using every ounce of reason and self-control I had over my buzzing body, I forced myself to my feet and left the private room in dire search of a bathroom.
By the grace of God, I spotted an alcove beneath a single hanging light, my vision becoming progressively choppier as the alcohol climbed up the walls of my stomach. A swinging door, a jangling lock, and then the bottom of a toilet as I retched up bile.
Immediately I felt a sense of relief. But my skin still tingled with a stain of drunkenness. When I checked myself in the mirror my image danced like a glitching hologram.
There was no coming back from this.
I ran cool water over my palms, and counted the sound of the droplets falling into the sink, flinching as the creaking door accepted in more people. Chatty people. Human women.
“He was so fucking hot.”
“Did you see the tall one though?”
“I wouldn’t mind sharing a bed with all of them. How many guys is that, like seven?”
The traveling gossip moved as the group of women checked their appearances in the mirror, their nasally voices reverberating off of the dimly lit walls.
“You saw them staring at me right?” One particularly loud looking girl spoke, smudging a lipstick on her bloated lips.
My hand curled against the porcelain of the sink, fingers dripping wet onto the dark tile.
“Please, they were looking at me,” another answered from behind a stall, a toilet flushing cutting her off.
“You wish,” the last one rattled, typing away at her phone. “Should I ask for their numbers?”
“Leave the silver haired one for me, he’s too damn sexy.”
I wanted to speak, to laugh, to say something, but a dormant feeling kept me silent. An ugly beast awakened in the pit of my heart, and I hated the way it changed everything for me. My attempts to play it cool were meaningless in the monster’s wake. Nothing could sate its hunger but equally measured revenge.
They were after what was mine.
And under no circumstances was I willing to let that happen.
I ran from the bathroom, but my travel was cut short, because waiting before me in an inconspicuous gathering, straight out of a police line-up of heartthrobs, were the seven vampires themselves.
“We’re leaving,” I said, my throat sore and raw from my dry heaving.
“How much have you had to drink?” Heeseung asked, stepping forward with a scowl scrounging his face.
He used his fingers to tilt my chin in the light as if to observe my condition for himself.
“I…don’t know,” I wobbled, using a hand to support me against the wall.
“Why would you be so reckless?”
His red eyes begged the question, their deep impact bludgeoning me in the heart.
“Heeseung, chill out,” Jake cut in, once again the voice of reason. “She was just having fun.”
The tall vampire’s hand fell sharply from my face, his palm instead running through his ash-toned scalp.
“What if you blacked out and hurt yourself? That’s not fun for me to worry about, you know? It’s…agonizing, really.”
“Why were you staring at those girls?” I asked, as I rested my throbbing skull against the cold drywall.
A spine-chilling silence overcame the group, even with a continuous stream of music raging around us. I closed my eyes, half in shame, half in genuine need of a second of peace. I’d never sounded more childish in my life.
“What?” Heeseung whimpered, his distraught voice sounding as though I had accused him of murder.
The alarming sound made my eyes flicker open immediately. Each vampire wore the same surprised look on their mannequin faces, their eyebrows creased upwards, their pupils constricted. Heeseung’s silver hair flickered back and forth between the grouping of bodies behind him and my lone frame ahead of him.
“What girls are you talking about?” He said, his throat a quivering mess.
I thought for a second more red tears would spring from his doe eyes. But right on cue, the bathroom door creaked open, and out squeezed the gaggle of talkative women. Except this time they were entirely silent. If the vampires didn’t stare at them before, they certainly stared at them now. But I did, too. The situation was too miraculously awful to avoid egging on.
“Oh, um, sorry,” the loudest one squeaked as they quickly rushed by, all ducking their faces from view.
I didn’t feel justified anymore, I felt rotten inside.
“What did they say to you?” Jay stepped in as he appeared next to Heeseung.
The vibration of his palm slapping against the wall resounded through my jaw.
“Just that—”
“Leave it,” Jungwon intercepted as he appeared in a moment by my side. His strong hands guided my head to rest on his shoulder. I sank into him like a sack of bones falling through quicksand.
“I’ll kill them,” Sunoo said with a smile, his joke not sounding very lighthearted.
Ni-ki laughed along, however, and that was perhaps more frightening than his overwhelming quiet.
“No!” I said very clearly, so they would know how serious I meant it. “I’m sorry. I’m…really sorry. I shouldn’t have said anything, okay?”
Jungwon patted a soothing motion into my scalp.
The vampires looked deflated with their interest in the matter and gratitude overcame me in mounds. What a dumb situation we had found ourselves in. I almost wanted to laugh.
“Were you…jealous?” Jake asked, as he expertly cut the tension, after so often being the one to manufacture it himself.
The laugh I’d wanted to hold in finally escaped, and I buried my face into Jungwon’s neck.
“I will never complain about you guys not getting along ever again,” I said, exhaling a string of exasperated sighs.
“Actually, all things considered this was one of our better nights,” Jungwon asserted to the group, arm wrapped confidently around my shoulders. He leaned in low so that only I could hear him as he continued, “Thank you for reminding us what it's like to be together again. You made the night one we’ll never forget.”
I smiled and nuzzled nearer into him, words escaping me at the moment.
The night could’ve gone a million different ways, but one factor would always remain in my heart—that being with them was the gift. It was the ultimate joy of being alive.
“Shall we?” Jungwon threw back to the group, already starting to lead me away.
I presumed that they were all in agreement because it wasn’t long before we were out the red door and back onto the street. At this point in the night, I couldn't tell if things were just moving at the vampires’ vigilant speed or if my memory was lapsing in splices, but the next thing I knew I found myself in the backseat of a car that registered as vaguely familiar. The scent told me all that I needed to know. Nothing else was comparable to Jay’s unique fragrance.
“Please, watch over her,” I heard from the very distant passenger’s seat.
The engine rumbled alive and reminded me I had to breathe.
When my heavy head stirred I realized I rested horizontally in a lap I could only describe as the pinnacle of comfort. Thighs like butter, pants like silk, I got lost in the sensation, and entrusted the closing of my eyes to the one who held me like I would always be wanted, always be loved.
Finally, I found myself in Sunoo’s arms.
⊱ ۫ ׅ ✧
a/n:
Wow! So sorry for the wait on this chapter, it is my longest one yet! I really wanted to see it through from beginning to end and I really hope it was an enjoyable one :,)
Thank you so much for continuing to show an interest in my story. I hope that your interest only grows as things progress and develop further. Big things are coming so stay tuned dear readers!!
Thank you once again for all of the support <3 Be well everyone
tl: @firstclassjaylee, @b3tt7boop, @ebitsujun ,@enhypenmanager, @wonnieswife,@rue-jenni, @countluciosspouse, @wilonevys, @periwinkleandtwilight, @tinybof, @naykki, @kpopishgirlie, @neralondon, @holacsh, @kyunluv, @cinnamonrei, @buttersoob, @sisakoekiee
