One More Time
Summary: Your touch was addictive, your scent intoxicating. He wants that back so badly, but he needs another chance. Just one more time.
pairing: Seokjin x female reader
rating: GA
genre: angst, mild fluff
warnings: pining, heartbreak, only mentions of sex, but everything very sfw
wc: 3k
member: Rid || @taegularities
a/n: Hello! Back with the second fic in the Bouquet Collab series. Each one of us chose a flower and wrote a fanfic around the meaning of it! These were just 2 out of 6, so please look forward to many more awesome stories! I also want to thank my amazing betas @biaswreckme and @missgeniality, and further @birbdae for this wonderful banner!!!! 💕 And now let’s dive into the angst!
A single ray of sunshine illuminates the room.
Conveniently, it shines directly onto that one particular plant that stands in this whole apartment, still healthy and green as it refuses to die. Seokjin is fond of it, given the fact that it was you who had gifted him it many weeks ago.
You always used to say that his place is gloomy, grey, in urgent need of redecoration, so he could actually invite someone over and make them feel somewhat homely. After he’d declined all your offers due to laziness, you’d given up - except for the little present that you’d brought him that one significant day.
He remembers it so vividly, the memory still so painfully clear.
At that time, spring was just approaching, birds returning and beautiful flowers blooming. You were a sucker for nature and all its aspects - which was probably the exact reason for the distaste that you felt whenever you entered your friend’s apartment. His way of handling his place was dull, tasteless.
So, when you decided to surprise him with the odd choice of giving him an aloe plant as decoration and present, you weren’t expecting more than a pleasant evening that you’d spend together.
What you didn’t know was that he’d been a nervous wreck for days now, ripping out several strands of his hair before he’d finally decided to tell you the truth about what he caged in his mind. But when he saw you that day, wearing this beautiful sunflower dress, your hair in a bun with only two strands framing your angelic face, words failed him immediately.
Instead, he froze, eyebrows furrowing in fear of what you’d say or do if he confessed to you. And it didn’t take a lot from your side, no - one brush of your finger along his arm, an intense and loving gaze addressing only him, and a beautiful, mesmerizing smile were enough for him to snap before he pulled you in.
When you first felt his full lips on yours, you stared at the way his eyes closed, relishing in and welcoming the moment right away. You needed a second to comprehend what was happening, but once you understood, you felt yourself give in fast, the world becoming blurred and silent.
All you heard were the sweet words he uttered, all you saw was his glistening skin, and all you knew was that you wanted to bathe in this euphoria forever without ever having to let go.
But when you both found yourselves in each other’s arms, covered by nothing but his blanket, you still hadn’t addressed why this had happened and what it meant for you now.
Seokjin didn’t regret this - how could he, if it was with you? But the same old insecurity that plagued his heart and made his chest burn had eventually come back now. Despite having no real evidence or reason, he assumed that you didn’t want what he wanted - you’d never see him as more than a friend that you’d slept with in the heat of the moment.
In that sense, you’d woken up to a pressing awkwardness, him offering breakfast and coffee, but portraying distant nonchalance otherwise. And when you felt like none of this was going to go anywhere, you told him you had to go, finding some kind of excuse to leave.
Since then, an uncomfortable radio silence had found its way between you, and the only thing he had these days to remember you was the pink-orange flower that slowly bloomed on top of his desk.
Lying across the bed, Seokjin opens his eyes with a smile on his face, remembering how he’d looked at you in confusion when he’d first seen you standing at the threshold of his entry, smiling wide with Ally in your hands. Yes, you’d named the plant Ally - always one to give non-living things names.
Wrong.
Ally is very much alive. You’d made that clear that day. Plants take in carbon dioxide and release oxygen - yes, that’s what you’d lectured him with when he’d joked around. His apartment needs some freshness, you’d told him.
Now that he’s inhaling the air around him, it almost feels like he can smell Ally, which is total nonsense of course. He has honestly grown to love this small, spiky thing, especially after finding out the meaning behind it.
Affection.
Something he has felt for a long time now. Affection for the way you scrunch up your nose when you’re annoyed. Affection for the concentrated gaze you adopt when you’re reading a good book. Affection for your words, for the sound of your voice; he loves the sweet, honey-coated, soft tone that he swims in every time you speak.
Seokjin gets up, stretching his limbs and getting dressed when he looks at the clock, noticing that it’s time to go. There’s this boring gathering this evening, organized by some of your colleagues who thought it might be a good idea to come together and strengthen your bond as a student body or whatever.
The only reason he’s going is because he knows you’ll be there. He doesn’t care about getting himself drunk or talking about philosophical theories today - all he wants is to make right what he ruined back then. He just needs to tell you what words float inside his heart, hoping for you to reciprocate his feelings the way you’d responded to his kiss that night.
Gathering all this ardor for you, with only your name on his tongue, he closes his door behind him, summoning all the energy his body can deliver.
You’re easy to find in the small crowd. The room isn’t too filled, the atmosphere peaceful and pleasant when he steps in, running his hand through his soft, brown hair when he sees you. Breathing in and out in a steady rhythm, he approaches you, trying to mask his eagerness, hands pocketed to exude a relaxed demeanor.
When you finally notice the tall figure come closer, recognizing him as none other than the man you’re so in love with, your heart beats just a little faster and you tilt your head in wonder. After barely sparing you a glance in your classes, he has apparently finally decided to give you some attention.
Memories come crashing back; images of your last encounter flooding your mind as you press your tinted lips together, still feeling the phantom touch of his mouth on yours. He still looks the same, but his hair has gotten a little longer, almost covering his eyes entirely before he brushes the bangs away.
“Hey,” he greets, breathing in deep as he sits down in front of you, “long time no talk.”
You nearly counter with a sarcastic remark, but then contain yourself, only shooting him a breathtaking smile. “You’re right. Busy lives. How have you been doing, Jin?”
“Good!” he answers way too fast, clearing his voice before he continues. “I’m doing good. And you?”
“All good. Been writing some more lately.”
Seokjin nods as his eyes widen and his mouth forms an ‘O’, glad to hear that you’ve picked up your hobby of creating beautiful poetry again. He’s even read some of your poems, and you’re truly talented, working around words so easily as if they were his own heart.
“Oh, wow! I- um… I took care of Ally. Do you remember her?” he stumbles over his words, ears growing increasingly red. He’s such a dork and you can’t help but smile a little.
“That’s nice to hear. I bought one of these myself a few days ago. Reminded me of you.”
“That’s great! T-that’s…” What is he trying to say? There must be something that he had prepared, but for the life of his, he can’t remember anymore. All he knows at the sight of you is that he wants to grab you by your waist again, pull you in to press you against him. He wants to feel your lips, move against them in soft, then needy motions.
He just wants you as a whole, if not forever, then once.
Just one more time.
And when he sees you wait for him to speak, fumbling with your fingers with your eyes far away from his, he whispers the word “courage” to himself once before his hand reaches out to grab yours and settle on your palm.
Your gaze shifts to him immediately, his abrupt action causing confusion in you as your heart rate spikes up. But when you see the expression on his face, you feel like you know.
“Y/N, I- we… we need to talk,” he finally declares, his thumb gently ghosting over the skin of your hand, such a simple gesture sending shivers down your spine.
Yes, he doesn’t have to say much. You know what he wants to talk about; after all, there aren’t that many possibilities of what he could want at your first encounter after being somewhat estranged all this time.
“I’m not sure I want-”
“No, please,” he interrupts, squeezing your hand tighter in his. A few weeks ago, his warmth would’ve felt like a safe haven for you, pulling you out from the dark grounds of an ocean if it needed to - but right now, you feel like you’re drowning, like you’re sinking instead of swimming up. “There’s so much I’ve been wanting to tell you and there were so little opportunities to do so.”
Half-fearing, half-anticipating what he’s going to say, you search for the walls you’ve managed to pull up, accepting that Seokjin will never want you in that way. You think you’ve moved on, but now that he’s so close, on the brink of either confessing or rejecting you, you feel tense - and both options aren’t ideal for you right now.
You wait until he’s ready to talk, watch his chest rise and then fall, his eyes meeting yours, but looking like they’d rather not before-
“I’m in love with you,” he finally breathes - and as he mutters his last word, the air around you becomes suffocating, the sounds muffled and his touch heavy.
Is that better than being rejected? You don’t know. You really do not know; and the shake of your head and furrow of your eyebrows show him that something is plaguing you that he might not want to hear.
“Y/N.” His tone is calm, steady, different from your hazardous heart that’s breaking right in front of him, and he doesn’t even see it.
“Why did you not tell me that back then, Jin?” you inquire, pulling your hand away and settling it on your lap. “We slept together. Why did you let me go?”
This… this is awkward. It’s ridiculous. Seokjin shouldn’t have decided to talk about this in a crowd, surrounded by people who know nothing about what’s going on between you two. But now that he did, his heart sinks, his mind in a painful fog, and he puffs out some air, calming himself.
“Let’s leave,” he suddenly suggests, and you think you can see the faintest glint of panic in his dark eyes, “clear it out somewhere else. At my place?”
Again, you shake your head, chuckling lightly but not decently. “I can’t. I’m sorry, I can’t. There’s someone…”
Jin is quick to cut you once again, his breathing suddenly erratic. He’s been in love with you for years - no, he can’t take the thought of you having a boyfriend now, choosing someone over him. “Someone else? This fast? Y/N, why did I never-”
He stops mid-sentence, and it happens just timely as you were going to hold out a hand to silence him anyway.
“Jin. Listen,” you start, leaning in closer, “there’s someone who offered to guide me through a scholarship. Not here - in a different city. And as much as I’ve always wanted you, I can’t do long-distance relationships.”
Your words ease the pain inside him, his mind suddenly relaxing as he takes in your confession. You want him. You’ve always wanted him. Is all of this real?
“Where- where are you going?”
“It’s too far away. I wouldn’t see you more than a handful of times a year. I can’t do this,” you admit, your eyes stinging as you swallow the lump in your throat.
You see him tilt his head with a sigh, and you’re on the verge of breaking when you see his mouth twitch, that familiar movement that mostly means despair. This always happens when his grades are worse than he expects. It happens when he talks to his little brother who lives miles away. Mostly, you see it when you watch - or used to watch - movies together, especially Pixar and Ghibli ones tearing him up in no time.
And now, it’s happening because of you.
“Is there no way for you to stay?”
You bite your lip, chewing on it until you taste your lipstick. “I don’t think so. And it’s… a big chance for me.”
Seokjin’s jaw clenches and he nods, relief turning into sorrow as his expression shows understanding on the surface while his blood is boiling with pain on the inside. He’s angry with himself - he truly is. But he’s also sad about the fact that you never approached him.
And while waiting for the other in silence, phones in your hands, but the courage to message each other so far away, you missed it. You both missed it and he hates it.
“Then I hope you’ll get everything you want, Y/N,” he finally says, standing up as he grabs his thin jacket. It’s probably not that fresh outside yet, he can carry it - maybe hide his fumbling hands that clearly show his nervosity and distaste to this whole situation.
All he can think of is to get away before he breaks.
Yet, he comes closer to you, hovering above you before he leans down. Not caring about your surroundings, only seeing you, his heart only beating for you, he presses his lips onto your forehead first, wanders to your nose, both your cheeks and your earlobes as he says in between each kiss, “whenever… you decide… to come back… I’ll be here…”
Then, he cups your face, looking at your beautiful, full lips, missing how they feel on his before he kisses you gently. His mouth moves delicately, sweetly against yours, bittersweet memories and feelings streaming back as you internally forbid yourself to cry.
“Waiting for you,” he finally whispers, lips brushing yours, and every fiber in you tries hard to hold back. To not pull him into another room, kiss him more fiercely and bring back the fervent heat that you’d indulged in the last time.
His thumb brushes your cheeks softly, his eyes registering you gulping hard as he says his goodbyes, so he can leave. There’s just no way he can stay here any longer. “Don’t cry. I’ll be here, sweetheart.”
And then, his warmth is gone.
Fighting the urge to follow him, you watch him walk away, mind going crazy as you see him face the ground. You can’t falter. You need to focus on your studies before anything else - you don’t want to regret your choices; and if what he says holds true, you might just be able to wrap him into you forever when you come back in a year or two.
Maybe it’s not over yet.
The sun has set by the time Seokjin arrives home. All the sunshine from today morning has vanished, warming someone else, somewhere else now, leaving him in the dark as he lets himself fall on his bed.
An absolute disaster, all of this. And what an idiot he is. Why did he not insist on inviting you over? Ask you if there was any way you’d spend this one last night with him? The lingering feelings of your soft lips strengthen his despair tenfold, and he hates himself for not fighting for a night or a day with you. After all, you’re not going away just yet.
But deep down he knows why he did what he did: being together again would just hurt you both further, the small flame that both of your pain is becoming a searing wildfire. At least he knows for sure that this is what would happen to him. He knows it’d be near impossible to let you go if he woke up beside you.
What if Seokjin searches for scholarships, too? Your grades are similar - if you can get one, why not him? The picture of having you around, falling asleep next to you, studying together and bantering over food and movies - it’s so intriguing that he knows what he’ll search up tomorrow.
Then again, you have your people; he doesn’t know anyone who can guide him through this, give him a fast opportunity to study somewhere else, be near you.
He doesn’t know. Not how to get you back, not how to feel you again; his brain comes up with nothing helpful, no plan he can actually execute successfully.
Slipping out of his pants, he lingers at the corner of the bed, his arms leaning on his thighs as his fingers tangle between them. Seokjin shakes his head as he physically feels his heart break, each broken piece fighting the other and torturing him, no matter how much he tells them to calm down.
And despite not knowing what to do, what to feel, how to erase the image of you and your face from his mind for the time being, he remembers something else.
When he’d looked for the meaning of the aloe plant, he had found many sources, some beautiful descriptions, and some poetic definitions that connected it to an emotional feeling. While the flower holds the meaning of affection, the memory of another word comes flooding in, ironic to the fact that aloe is supposed to heal, used to mend injuries and pain.
And thinking of this particular word, all he does know at this agonizing moment is that he identifies with your plant’s meaning.
He knows that all he feels is grief.
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