#ianshin

[ryanlandi]

Reflections on Chapters 19 + 20

Ian is stunned by the kiss, hardly able to believe Jo’s lips are pressed against his. In that fleeting moment, he notices Jo’s eyes are closed—as if to let his mind fully absorb the intensity and every sensation that sharpen into a very visceral experience. This is Jo’s first time kissing a guy. A guy Ian’s quietly longed for and keeps his feelings simmering beneath the surface until now.

In the heat of the moment, Ian’s thoughts spiral. He leans in, kissing Jo back with a hunger that surprises even himself. His thoughts now are a mix of everything: this is the one he’d laid eyes on for a while, first fell for his beauty and then won over by his mind; the one who’d rested his head on Ian’s shoulder as a shooting star tore through the night sky; the one who’d just claimed him as a boyfriend in front of the world. This kiss brings him more happiness than he could ever know. Yet guilt crashes over him. How could he have said those cruel things earlier? What kind of fool lashes out at someone this radiant, this fiercely kind? Desperation takes over. The kiss deepens, his tongue brushes against Jo’s in a reckless, maddening impulse he can’t restrain. He’s rushing, he knows it, but the taste of Jo is dizzying. Too much, too fast. Jo stiffens, grabbing Ian’s arm to halt him. This is his first time with a guy, after all—Ian reads the hesitation in his touch, the unspoken fear.

Ian teases him: Is this not what you always want? Your face gives you away, Jo. He knows exactly how to turn Jo on — how that hesitant, almost innocent resistance only fuels him. Every touch, every kiss, burns through Ian’s self-control. He can’t stop himself from claiming every inch of Jo, as if marking territory. Mine. Jo doesn’t pull away, not truly, even if he never meant for things to go this far. The beauty mark under Jo’s lips is really something to Ian, and he does not mind tells Jo that the mark is so attractive, before tracing it with his tongue. And later, when he discovers another mark lower down—a secret only Ian gets to map—it feels like uncovering a buried treasure. As revealed in later chapters, Ian always finds having s*x with Ian like the first time no matter how many times they do it. The way their bodies click into place like a language only they speak. This, this collision of hunger and tenderness, all these feelings, all these chemistry, are what he’d meant all along.

And then… hot s*x… It’s all about basic instincts, and their/our taste in these intimate moments. I might find it hot, but there might be something a real turn off to others. The first time with a guy of Jo, who Ian promised to be gentle, surprises Ian, because Jo eventually takes the lead. The shyness melts away, now replaced by a ferocity that leaves Ian breathless. Now Jo’s recurring dreams have become a reality, and for Ian, the guy he has been wishing to have this moment with, has been finally his. The night spirals, a relentless rhythm of skin and sweat, pants and whispered angst. Ian loses track of time, until the last piece of latex was used, and Ian can’t go anymore. The peaks are reached, and the night deepens with their waves of carnal desires. Exhausted, Jo pulls him close, murmuring how adorable Ian had been that first time. They sleep next to each other until dawn breaks with rain pattering against the windows.

Jo woke up and fumbles for his phone. Instead, his fingers close around Ian’s phone when it buzzes with an incoming call. The screen flashes TJ, a name that prickles the back of Jo’s neck. The same TJ who called during their first date. Before he can dwell, the bathroom door clicks open and Ian steps out. Jo freezes, the phone slipping from his grip. There’s something about the way Ian’s hair falls, damp and tousled, over his forehead, free from its usual slicked-back restraint that Jo finds so fresh and young. Without thinking, he crosses the room and wraps his arms around Ian’s waist from behind, chin resting on his shoulder. “Did you sleep well last night?” he asks, voice rough with hope. Ian removed Jo’s hands around his waist, leaving Jo stand rooted. Some feeling deepens inside Jo, he feels it then: the cruel twist. He is afraid that everything between them is just a one-night stand, and he’ll soon become the guy he fought yesterday. That very idea starts to grow bigger in him, and reaches climax when Ian touches him and says “Last night was fun”, then snaps the door shut behind him.

[ryanlandi]

Reflections on Chapters 21 + 22

Ian had planned to pick up his fabricated ID the day before, but between some unspecified trouble and his entire first night with Jo, he’d gotten sidelined. It was Jo, really, who made him delay getting the fake ID. The name on it? David Kim - about as generic as it gets for a Korean American guy. Like, it’s practically the first name that comes to mind when thinking about a Korean American male . What I don’t get is why he even needs a fake ID if he’s planning to disappear but still stay in the country. In the States, you can ghost pretty easily without one: take buses, trains, or just drive safely enough. Avoid bars, skip the places that require an ID, and nobody’s going to hassle you for it. But Ian doesn’t have a clear exit plan yet. Then there’s his ass — it’s still throbbing from last night. Yeah, he definitely overdid it. And Jo… It’s not like Ian didn’t catch the look on Jo’s face when he left. He saw it all, expected that stunned reaction, really. He knows how “good guys” like Jo react. That’s why he had to be cold, to cut things off cleanly. Better this way, he knows he’s let guard down too much around Jo already.

Ji Woon pulls over beside him moments later, relaying that TJ wants to meet. Right on cue. How’d he time this so perfectly? Did TJ have someone tail Ian last night? Does he already know about Ian and Jo’s first night together? But Ji Woon shrugs it off, claiming he just came to check on Ian after his phone went unanswered. Sure, okay. Then there’s the girl. When Ian arrives at TJ’s place, a beautiful girl in a short skirt slips out of TJ’s room, drenched in his signature cologne—the same bottle Ian spotted by the bathroom sink later. Subtle, TJ. So here’s the whole scenario last night: Ian was reeling from a night with Jo, while TJ’s clearly been… busy with this girl. And let’s not dance around it — TJ is bisexual. I mentioned this the second time, because, let’s be real, I’ve scrolled enough Reddit threads to know how often gay guys get burned by bi dudes. More options, less stakes. Love’s not always enough, right? They take the path of least resistance. Classic. But TJ—really? You hook up with some random girl reeking of your cologne, then pivot to summoning Ian like nothing happened? Do you ever think about how he’d feel walking into that? The perfume, the girl, the whole messy tableau? Or is this your twisted way of balancing the scales? Ian’s not having it today. He’s drained, his body still humming with last night’s… exertions. But they eat burgers anyway.

TJ’s game is played well, isn’t it? I bought those burgers we used to eat when we were younger — figured nostalgia might chain you to the past. To me.

- You haven’t changed a bit.

- You changed a lot

Of course TJ knows everything. The burger stunt? Timed right after he catches wind of Ian’s escape plan. And then he drops California — the same dream TJ shattered years ago when he threw Ian off that second-floor balcony. Broke his legs. Crushed his future. And now, how dare you dredge up California again? Too late for redemption arcs, buddy. But here we are: TJ’s pivoting to his “good guy” act, all staged remorse and reheated memories. Classic manipulator’s playbook. First, the guilt trip. Next? The inevitable rebellion.

The memory hits like a gut punch: Red Lady’s Burger, their eating ritual during the old days. Jason always saw through TJ — the raw ambition to claw his way to the top, yes, but also the quiet, inconvenient ache TJ carried for Ian. Back then, Jason played mentor, laying out the hierarchy without flinching: Money first. Power. Honor. And girls. Cold, but practical. “The heart changes,” he warned. “Let it flare up, and everything you’ve built burns with it. Think with your head.” Stay close enough to the fire to feel its heat, he said, but never get scorched. And honestly? I get it. Jason’s the kind of villain you almost root for — a man who knows you can’t have it all. Sacrifice isn’t noble; it’s arithmetic. Want the crown? Cut the weight dragging you down. For TJ, that weight was Ian. But that was the old TJ. Not the man he is now. And like Ian said—TJ’s changed. A lot.

As expected, Jo replays the night on a loop — the glances, the touches, the unspoken something — so much so that he seems haunted, almost depressed. He senses something was off the day before and knows he needs to talk to Ian about it. Unable to contain his turmoil any longer, Jo arrives at Ian’s apartment, sitting at the foot of the stairs to wait. When Ian finally returns home, another tense conversation unfolds. Jo grabs Ian’s wrist, his voice trembling as he asks whether everything between them the night before had been wrong. Ian brushes it off, insisting nothing was wrong—until he delivers the cutting question: “Are you sure you’re not misreading things?” Still trapped in Jo’s grip, Ian dismisses the previous night as a spur-of-the-moment lapse, nothing more than two people indulging a fleeting desire. The words freeze Jo in place. Deep down, he’d known he might end up like this—someone who clings too tightly after a single night—but he’d let himself hope anyway. After all, it had felt mutual in the moment. Yet now, the truth crashes over him: he’s the one who fell harder, while Ian walks away unscathed. What Jo had dared to imagine as a beginning was, for Ian, merely an ending.

Ian held Jo’s gaze—those eyes that never failed to soften his defenses—but he steeled himself and let the cruelty spill out anyway. Jo released Ian’s hand, nodding slowly as the truth carved into him: he’d misunderstood. He never should’ve started this. He’d been so sure their feelings had aligned last night, so certain of a shared thread of longing. Jo, I’m with you. I know how you feel. I resonate deeply with you. Jo didn’t beg. Didn’t cry. He simply let the delusion dissolve—the fantasies he’d spun of them, of a future Ian had never once named. Quietly, he turned his back, footsteps heavy yet steady as he walked away, returning to the restaurant and the life that existed before Ian blurred its edges.

[ryanlandi]

Reflections on Chapter 14

A flashback drenched in shadows opens Chapter 14. TJ negotiated with attorneys over Ian’s murder charge - a crime so ruthlessly precise that even he couldn’t spin it as self-defense. He pushed for a two-year prison sentence, coldly pragmatic. But the real tragedy here? Ian’s hollow aftermath. He kept asking himself if there was something he should feel - guilt, remorse, anything. But there was nothing. Just… numbness. He knew cold-blooded violence wasn’t right, wasn’t human. Yet Ian - oh, Ian - when suffering cracks a person’s soul, sometimes all that’s left is emptiness.

The scene shifts: Ian kneeled before Jason and TJ, still wearing that bloodstained white tee, pleading that he couldn’t do it anymore. Let me go. Even Jason, with his usual steel, admitted Ian’s heart was never in this work—he’d been a square peg in a bloody round hole from the start. Jason was ready to cut him loose, but TJ? TJ didn’t want to. He needed Ian anchored to the gang, to him. Then there’s the prison sentence. Was it truly the lightest sentence possible… or was TJ scheming to trap him? Jason’s furrowed brows and clipped silence speak skepticism. Reading between the lines: that two-year stint? A calculated play. Ian’s stacking debts: protection fees, compound interest - until Ian’s drowning in obligations even Jason calls suicidal. “He’ll kill himself trying to pay it back.”

So answer me, TJ: Is this how you prove love - by chaining someone to you with debt and guilt? Crushing their freedom under “protection” and moral duty? If you’re so confident he’d choose you, why the desperation? Why the Machiavellian strings? You’re such a monster, TJ. 

TJ lingers over the photo Jo took of him during their fleeting balcony encounter - but wait. How did a shot from Jo’s phone end up in his possession? The answer comes with implication, especially since TJ’s quietly hoarded a photo of Jo in return. Does he sense the low-key connection pulling Jo and Ian together? He knows Ian’s track record of casual flings for sure, yet it’s Jo who catches his attention. Even Yangji admires Jo’s handsome looks, that he takes a picture of Jo on his phone, which, as revealed in next chapter, cast a shadow on Jo and his resentment to TJ. 

The unspoken truth? TJ isn’t just watching. He’s curating. Every glance, every stolen image, a thread in the web he’s spinning. And when that photo resurfaces in the next chapter, it won’t just cast a shadow, it’ll ignite the war.

Jo’s meticulously planned stargazing trip collapses sadly when his beloved white SUV - the college-era clunker he’s clung to for five loyal years at least - gets stolen in broad daylight outside the camera shop. (Wait, is this New York or San Francisco? Since when do daylight car heists happen in New York?). ‘Cuz he is so upset, he vents to Ian, mourning the loss like it’s crybaby ((Jo’s deer mode materializes at this), while Ian bites back a smirk. Let’s be real: the car’s a rustbucket. But that’s the point. Jo doesn’t love things; he loves stories. Sentimental to a fault. That could hint something about Jo’s personality: he’s loyal to his beloved. The car must be so special to him, that when he is able to get a new one, it is still the same car.

Ian managed to make them a spot to do stargazing by dragging them to the rooftop of some crumbling building. He also prepared for the night so he can’t miss it again to have some privacy with Jo. Just the two of them. Just enough beer to blur the line between “friends” and… well, you know what I mean. When Ian suggested this is also a good place to have a beer, Jo is looking at him, and his heart starts to race, and you know this initiates the feeling of love in him. Probably the moment he knows he’s fallen for someone. 

“Should I take some photos of you?” Jo blurts, face burning. I want to remember this. I want to remember you when you’re here with me.