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CLOSED MOUTHS

they say sharing secrets keeps friends close, but you and jake would beg to differ. it’s because you have secrets, or... one big secret anyway, that you’ve stayed so close. closed mouths don’t get fed though, do they?

pairing ✩ jake sim x fem!reader

genres: summer au, friends to lovers, angst, fluff, smut, idiot in love | warnings: minors dni, #ControlFreakGirlSummer, only one bed but they know, down bad af jakeyn, they're kinda weird tbh, yn is soooo effing scared, jake is lowkey the only person in yn's world, so much kissing, author loves jake so jake mustn't suffer (too much) | word count: 32,154

playlist: same la by tiffany day ✩ tongue tied by grouplove ✩ the moment by tame impala ✩ champagne coast by blood orange ✩ ribs by lorde ✩ the bridge by kelala ft. pinkpantheress ✩ crush by solange ✩ 23:42 by rachel chinouriri ✩ lost island by enhypen ✩ tonight by girlsweetvoiced

from zo: haiiiii everyone hehe back sooner than i thought... thank u @asahicore for beta-reading as always love u so much and im literally the happiest girl on earth bc i get to see u so soon and for so long !!! uhm... for everyone else i hope u have fun w my silly summer couple and let me know what u think no matter what! (also can u believe i started writing this thinking there'd be no angst lmao) :D

There are any number of things to love about summer, but for you, the drive to Minjeong's beach house will always snag a spot in the top three. Of that, you are certain. Mainly it's because it's the only time of year none of your friends volunteer you to drive them somewhere.

Admittedly, without riding shotgun in Jake's car, the drive up isn't quite the same.

Nothing about this summer feels the same. After handing in your final assignment, last month you crossed the stage to receive your diploma, with all of your friends and family cheering competitively in the audience. In two months, you will start your first ever adult job, kissing your girlhood goodbye. In two days, you will turn twenty-two, and for the first time since you met, you won't be spending your birthday with Jake.

But of course, riding with the girls is fun too.

Your focus can be a bit singular when Jake is around, so it's nice catching up properly. Together, you yell along to PinkPantheress with all the windows down, while Minjeong keeps her eyes on the road ahead. Slower songs in the group playlist give you chances to debrief, and laugh to the point of tears remembering some of the shit Aeri puts up with from some of the world's most questionable men.

jaeyunie: How's the drive?

you: it's really good actually i'm having a lot of fun rn, you're genuinely so jealous of all the fun i'm having i can't even talk rn i'm just so busy having fun without you.

jaeyunie: Wrong. You're so wrong I'm actually laughing at you, Yongie.

jaeyunie: I'm jealous of Minjeong getting to drive you around :(

Jake is always… saying things. Things that give you butterflies, and then give your butterflies butterflies too.

you: that could've been you.

jaeyunie: I KNOWWW I KNOW IT COULD HAVE I PROMISE YOU I KNOW

jaeyunie: Quit making me feel bad at work.

you: soz.

jaeyunie: Found out why Jaehyun and Yunjin broke up btw, more of an in person story though so remind me when I see you

you: YAYYYYYY can't believe they even dated genuinely how do they know each other.

jaeyunie: Discord !!!

you: i have more questions

“What you have, YN, is five seconds to put that phone down before I throw it out the window,” Yizhuo says, leaning over the centre console to scowl at you. “And if I hear a word about Jake Sim at any point in the next two hours, I'll throw you out the car too.

“I'm allowed to text my best friend,” you mumble, but you put your phone down anyway, tucking it under your thigh.

At the exact same time, in the exact same tone, all four girls say, “Ouch.”

“Best friend…“ Minjeong trails off, running a hand through her silky blonde hair. “I think you might have it worse than Aeri did with Jungwoo.”

Jungwoo was Aeri's ancient ex-boyfriend who used to smack himself on the head and call himself stupid whenever he made a mistake. Maybe if the thought wasn't so funny, you might have taken offence, might have stepped up to your or Jake's defence. In unison, Jimin and Yizhuo smack their foreheads and say, “Stupid, stupid Jungwoo.”

While you and Minjeong erupt into a fit of cackles, Aeri groans, slumping in her seat. “Don't remind me.”

“Wasn't he, like, forty or something?” you ask.

“He was thirty,” she corrects, defensive. “And that was two years ago, guys. I've done better.”

“I'd consider any guy who doesn't send shirtless selfies with the message, aren't I a big strong boy, to be better,” Jimin points out. “Even Donghyuck was better, at least he didn't send you any messages.”

“Jesus, I get it.” Aeri groans. “Can we go back to bullying YN for her made up problems?”

For a moment, no one says anything, and eyes dart around the car while trees and stretches of motorway blur by through the window. This thing with Jake — your friendship — has become a source of mild irritation with the girls, a bit of a touchy subject. Something you complain often about though make no effort to change. Attempt to change. Relationships, of all kinds, take two unfortunately, no matter how desperately you wish you could take control of Jake's brain and rewire him to like you back. For fear, perhaps, that Aeri's comment might have hurt you, it seems the silence is yours to break.

“You're on your own, Aeri. Yizhuo said we're not allowed to talk about him,” you say, turning the radio up so loud that SZA's new single makes the speakers rattle.

“No, she said you can't talk about him.” Minjeong turns the volume right back down.

“Yizhuo?” you ask, desperate for her to agree with you.

“I'll allow it.”

“You like him, he likes you—your problems only exist in your weird, YN brain,” Jimin says, speaking for Minjeong. And apparently for Aeri and Yizhuo too if their disjointed chorus of, exactly, is anything to go by.

There's no restraining the pit in your stomach. You've seen Jake like someone before, seen it a million times. How he turns to mush when a pretty girl so much as smiles at him, goes out of his way to be wherever she is. You know they're wrong, and that only makes your stomach feel worse.

Jake tells you absolutely everything, whether it concerns you or not, anything he finds out is something you're going to find out as well. The guy's an open book, with you at least, and can't lie to save his life—by omission or otherwise. If he fancied you, you would know. In fact, he would have told you as soon as it occurred to him, blurted it out.

“Only one of those things is true and I don't want to talk about it,” you say, unlocking your phone to text him again.

At your request, they drop the subject. Minjeong goes on a rant about how the dress she ordered for graduation arrived yesterday, one whole month after the ceremony.

you: are you really not coming at all……..

you: you used to be so fun dude i miss you

“YN!” Yizhuo yells, reaching for your phone.

“Done! I'm turning it off, see?” It does not help that you have a picture of Jake as your lock screen, which shows as you hold the power button. For the sake of your phone, and your life, you make a show of opening your bag and shoving it to the bottom before pulling the zipper shut. “Happy?”

In the rear view mirror, Yizhuo grins, leaning back and closing her eyes. “Very.”

At the rest stop, all of you get out to stretch your legs and pee, grabbing enough snacks to feed a small country before piling back into the car where Jimin takes over for the rest of the drive. You fall asleep as soon as you rest your head on the window, bass buzzing against your skull as your eyelids get heavier and heavier.

It's only one long blink until Jimin parks in the driveway.

The Kim family holiday home is a sight to behold. A sprawling wood-clad fortress by the beach that has seen you at your best and your absolute worst. You and your friends have spent summer after summer visiting this large slice of heaven on earth, hoping its original pine floors and floor-to-ceiling kitchen windows will keep all of your secrets. So much has happened here, changed here, it's hard to believe you only stay for one week at a time. That so many of your life's keystone moments could be boiled down to twenty-eight sweaty days over the last four years.

On the couch in the den, Aeri gave you first and only tattoo, a shaky five-pointed star right between your shoulder blades that your mother still hasn't seen even after three years. That was the summer before you and Jake spent two rounds of sardines hidden in the wine cellar. Pressed chest to chest between cool rows of sauvignon blanc, it's the closest to kissing you two have ever gotten, and you're certain if his phone hadn't started ringing, your lips would have bridged the centimetres-wide gap. And maybe then, you would have had something to talk about before bed beyond, that was… and, yeah, it was.

When you get to your room at the very end of the hall, you dump your bag by the door and throw yourself onto the bed, spreading out like a starfish. It feels huge without Jake here to share it. Whether or not there's any real need for you to share a room on this trip is up for debate, but for as long as Jake doesn't make a complaint, you won't either. That first summer, you won rock, paper, scissors and got first pick of a room all to yourself, Jake lost and got stuck sharing with Jay. Before bed that night, he came to check on you and fell asleep at your side. It happened the next night too and by night three, with your heart pounding against your ribs, you suggested you might as well share the room. He agreed.

On the pillow by your head, your phone vibrates. It's him.

jaeyunie: I have a job, dude. You gotta try it !!!

jaeyunie: I miss you more though :(

you: i have a job too you know. i work at the very beautiful woman factory

jaeyunie: Ohhh I get it now…that explains a lot

jaeyunie: You're employee of the month then, yeah?

The great big grin stretching your mouth is humiliating, even in a room by yourself.

you: i've heard this before jaeyun thank you

you: wyd

He replies with a selfie, he's lying in bed frowning, the sweetest thing you've ever seen. On the wall behind him, you see his steadily growing collection of Polaroids. You're in almost all of them.

jaeyunie: Tired af rn I'm gonna slump very soon wbu send a piccc

jaeyunie: Texting w one eye open wanna see you before the end

you: and you look very cute doing it

At his request, you take a selfie right where you are — after tilting your head a little to show your bare neck and tugging the neckline of your tank top down just enough to show the top of your lacy bra and adjusting your boobs in said lacy bra to make them look a bit bigger — sending it without thinking too hard about it.

you: our bed feels so empty bruh what are you doinggggggg

Jake types and deletes for a while before his message finally comes through.

jaeyunie: Noooo darling I'm sorryyyyyyy

jaeyunie: My pretty Yongie holy shit look at you

jaeyunie: Yk if I could be there I would bruh. I'm requesting PTO for next summer as we speak

jaeyunie: Fuck I really miss you :(

The squeal that comes out of you is wretched. Worse than the grinning from earlier, the grinning you haven't quite stopped doing as you writhe around on the bed. Maybe it's for the best that he's not coming this summer, he'll miss you more. And text you all about it.

A throat clearing in the doorway snaps you out of whatever chokehold Jake seems to have on you from the other end of the country. It's Yizhuo and she's not pleased.

you: yizhuo has a Water Gun so i have to go but sleep tight ok ily + imysm

jaeyunie: Ilymmmmmmm

“I'm up, okay? No more Jake, I promise. Just put the gun down,” you plead, getting up from the bed and leaving your phone face down on the sheets. In the doorway, she doesn't budge, only closing one of her eyes and aiming the bright orange nozzle with one arm. “I'm coming, Yizhuo. It's alright.” In a very brave display, you don't even jump to check your phone when it vibrates.

You make it out unscathed, joining the rest of the girls in the kitchen. Open cans of beer litter the worktop, and Jimin's speaker plays at full blast. You can hear Travis Scott so clearly you're not convinced he's not yelling in your head. Locating the blender is a five-woman task, and you celebrate by making a heavy handed cocktail while waiting for the takeaway Minjeong ordered in advance to arrive.

Tonight is girls’ night, the first of the summer so far. Tomorrow, the guys will arrive and your group will be mostly complete. On Sunday, your birthday, Sunoo finally gets back from Erasmus, and everyone else will be here for the rager you throw every summer.

Everyone but Jake anyway.

Minjeong's garden — her mum's garden — is beautiful, always more so than you remember during the gloomy remainders of the year, when you're lying in bed at night, replaying your summer memories and trying to fall asleep. Tipsy lengths swam across the pool; falling asleep on the linen couch, just out of sight behind Ms. Kim's pink cosmos; crawling through the gap in the fence to get their teeny private strip of rocky beach to skinny dip in the ocean—when it's quiet enough, you can hear the tide kissing the shore. An otherworldly saturation permeates the entire yard and even photos don't do it justice. Brilliant turquoise swimming pool and lush green grass. If your friends notice it too, how brightly everything shines out here, they don't mention it. Nothing bad could happen to you out here, you're certain you could weather any storm on earth if it was happening in this garden.

With the long table and sliding glass doors at your backs, the five of you sit on the warm concrete by the pool, an excess of takeaway bags and boxes strewn between you. It's not so much a sharing platter as it is a, this is my dinner for tonight and tomorrow until we eat out on Sunday, situation. As nice as the quiet is, just you and the girls and no threat of being thrown into the pool by Heeseung and Sunghoon, it's a little strange without the boys. Jimin pushes her container away, every last morsel of jalfrezi eaten up, while your dinner still hasn't arrived. You watch as she sighs into the night sky, leaning back on her palms and envy her full stomach while yours rumbles quietly.

“I don't know why you insist on ordering from Ayaz every summer when you know how long they take,” she says when she catches your eye.

You toy with a loose thread on the hem of your nightdress. “It's my favourite.”

“Favourite? They're not even the best Greek place on the high street,” Minjeong points out.

And she's right, unfortunately. Last summer, you and Jake took a trip to Gyros Heaven after the club and well… went to actual heaven on the first bite. However, though apparently none of your friends care, tradition is tradition, and when you first came here, you and Jake ordered from Ayaz and what followed was the best summer ever. Too much is changing this summer, too much already has changed. Graduation, job offers across the continent. In other continents. This could be the last summer you all get together like this and no one seems to care. Jake isn't even coming, and the other boys are skipping the first night. You've already checked the Nessfest website five times since you came outside, just to make sure something hasn't happened to cancel the whole thing.

Call it superstition or batshit crazy, you will have your chicken and lamb gyros with a bucketload of tzatziki to dip it into no matter how obnoxiously late it arrives. It's reliable, as close to something you can control as possible, their constant latecoming a complete non-variable—maybe the only one you have left.

You check the Nessfest site again. Refresh your emails. Reread the ticket confirmation. Text Jake.

you: do you ever feel like everything is changing in a way that none of us have any hold over haha

“It'd be kinda funny if they arrived early for once though,” Aeri says. “Like symbolic, you know? We've finished uni, we're starting our careers — our lives — maybe Ayaz could do with some change too.”

“I think I would shoot myself in the face if that happened,” you say, but it doesn't come out as light-hearted as you'd like for it to.

Yizhuo lets out a surprised chuckle behind her cup, lips swollen and red from her extra hot tteokbokki. “Are you okay?” she asks, seeming truly concerned.

You nod, smiling, even though you wish desperately for Jake to show up somehow. Materialise out of thin air or something, lift himself out of the pool and say, surprise! That was really funny, Yongie! HAHAHA that was just so silly! Isn't she so silly? He'd know you meant what you said, but he'd be able to swing it well, to add to it with his universal charm and help you land. Laugh first, properly, so you and everyone else could join in.

“Well if they came early I wouldn't have gotten to sample your dinners, check for poison and all that,” you point out.

To this, they laugh, genuinely. Thank fuck. It's easy to laugh now that they are.

Now that Aeri's laughing even harder as she turns her phone for you all to see. It's a picture of Jay leaning against one of the walls in the student union, posted to Sunghoon's Instagram story. He's dead asleep with his eyes and mouth half-open. To his credit, Jay's a good drinker. Never too rowdy or too emotional. Nor too argumentative or romantic. He's sleepy though, more so than usual. This photo is just one more in a folder of near-identical photos. Jay sleeping at the dinner table, Jay sleeping on the driveway of his childhood home. If you can think it, he's slept there. In the queue for Thirsty Thursday after pres. And, though not photographed, once during sex.

“Well, it's nice to know he's enjoying the Pickle Club party they absolutely couldn't miss.” Yizhuo rolls her eyes, taking an irritated bite of her last chip. “Come on, it's gonna be our last time seeing some of those guys.” Her Jay impersonation is scarily accurate. “Suck my dick, Jongseong.”

You and Jimin can't stifle your laughter, exploding into cackles when your eyes meet.

“At least Jaeyun has an actual excuse, if he can't get off work it can't be helped, but the rest of them… I swear to fucking God—” Minjeong cuts herself off with a sip of her drink. “Whatever.”

“It's not like he works weekends,” Yizhuo points out.

The desire to leap to Jake's defence is overwhelming, second nature even, but you bite your tongue. You had the same thought when he told you he wasn't coming. Asked if he couldn't even make it just for the weekend. I don't know if it's worth driving so far just for a night or two, Yongie, he said, while you tried not to burst into tears or punch him in the face.

“How about no boy talk?” Aeri suggests, taking a screenshot and sending the picture to the groupchat. All of your phones light up at the same time, buzzing against the concrete. “Not until they get here anyway, can't really avoid it then.”

As soon as she says it, a message from Sunoo lights up your phones once more. It's a screenshot of the folder in his phone with all of the Jay sleeping pictures in it and the total is at 400.

“If they get here,” Yizhuo mutters, raising her glass. “Cheers, then.”

All of you raise your drinks and clink them overhead, as a chorus of cheers! rings out loud enough to settle the unease in the back of your mind, even if only for a moment. You take a slow sip of your sun-warmed beer and the doorbell goes behind you.

Your dinner is here, right on time.

The night slips away before your eyes, and it doesn't feel like long until you find yourself brushing your teeth after a cool shower in the en-suite. It's weird not seeing Jake's things with yours on the countertop. His cologne in the light blue bottle, his watch next to yours between the sinks. The bedroom is worse though, by far, one suitcase and one pair of house shoes. One body in the bed.

As much as you love this house, you hate this bedroom. All of its large windows are on the right side, giving you a beautiful view of the beach, the water. At night, the moonlight kisses the ripples, making it glitter. Having this ocean view however, means the lighthouse at the end of the dock casts its blinding beam into the room with a startling frequency. Even with your eyes screwed shut, you can see the shifting light behind your eyelids.

Your phone lights up as soon as you get comfortable, Jake's name on your screen, stinging your eyes.

“You alright, Yongie?” he asks, calls out more like, as if he wants you to hear him over the distance and not just through the phone.

Holding it an arm's length, you ask, “How drunk are you?”

“I just saw your text,” he says, ignoring the question you asked, but his softer vowels and higher pitch answer for you. He's tipsy. “Thought you were excited to spend time with the girls tonight, darling.”

“Oh,” you say, feeling your cheeks burn. “I was just being stupid that's all.”

Jake says nothing and over his silence you hear the boys laughing. Hear the opening and closing of a door muffle the laughter.

“That was actually your chance to tell me I could never be stupid.” To this, you hear his smile so clearly it's like he's here with you now and despite the ache in your chest, you can't help but smile too.

“I was thinking, Yongie,” he says. “I get it freaks you out, and that's valid, but I don't think everything's changing.”

“Ever heard of hyperbole?”

“Ha ha. That was really funny, Yongie. Aren't you just so silly?” There's some rustling on his end before he speaks again. You can picture him quite clearly, lying down on the end of his bed, his hair covering his forehead, long enough to graze his eyelids by now surely. “How about we try and think of something that's never going to change so you can focus on that instead?”

If you'd been having this conversation last summer, you would have said this trip with no hesitation, but even this, your teenaged promise with — at the time — Jake's friends, feels less and less secure with each passing minute. Slipping like sand through your fingers. This summer, here, right now, you've got nothing.

“How about I come up with something?” he suggests after a while.

“Please.”

Jake doesn't seem as stumped as you, continuing right away. “You love me, right?”

“Sure.” You chew on your lip, concerned like you've made some grand admission, bared some precious part of yourself for him to look at. To hold up to the light and inspect.

Another audible smile takes over his voice. “And you know I love you too, Yongie. That's not going to change.”

Heat lashes your cheeks, coats you from head to toe as your heart thumps away in your chest. That Jake can speak so definitively, with such conviction always scares you. He might be the most sincere person you know, completely earnest for earnestness’ sake no matter what. Everything he cares about he gives the utmost attention to, and you're no exception. He's proven that time and time again, he's proving it now. And yet, that nagging voice in the back of your mind won't quiet.

“But—”

“No, YN,” he says, interrupting you. “But nothing, I always will and you can count on that.” There's a certainty in his voice that forces a flutter in your stomach, a smile on your face. A certainty that makes you desperate to believe him. It feels like a necessity. “Change can be a good thing, you know. I think most of the time it's a great thing,” he adds.

“Why is it so scary then?”

“I'm not sure, darling,” he says quietly, like he really wishes he could give you an answer, like he's disappointed that he can't.

You sigh and he yawns, though he vehemently denies sleepiness when you accuse him. “Good night,” you say anyway.

“Good morning,” he says, and it's the start of an endless back and forth.

The sound of the smile in Jake's voice only makes you smile too, heats you up from the inside out and reminds you just how lucky you are to have him at all, whether he's right next to you or on the other side of the country. “I'm really glad we're friends, Jake.”

A moment passes before he speaks, you can't even hear him breathing down the line. “Yeah, Yongie, I know,” he says before clearing his throat, sounding more awake than earlier. “I'd better get back to the guys. See you when you're back, yeah? I miss you already.”

Jake doesn't even wait for your response before he cuts the phone and you can't keep your eyes open for long enough to think much about it as you fall asleep.

Nessfest is a geographically confusing Loch Ness-themed carnival hosted on the east coast of Scotland. As is tradition, you attend every summer and spend the whole day catching sun and eating pastries. And like every year, you are staunchly against getting on any ride that can just be thrown up and taken back down again at a moment's notice, so you're stuck holding bags while everyone else straps themselves into swinging lawsuits waiting to happen. Without Jake, who's scared too, you have to do it all on your own, taking your job of live-texting him updates very seriously.

you: aeri threw up after the tilt-a-whirl

you: again

The sun is relentless, baking the concrete and your skin. Your feet are already tanning around the crisscrossed straps of your sandals, paler bands of skin on your shoulders where your tank top straps rest. Alone under a parasol next to a ride with five loop-de-loops in a row, you're on high alert, craning your neck and trying to spot the guys in the growing crowd. They were meant to meet you at the house this morning, but last night's drinking rendered them horizontal until noon.

And that is okay. Change is okay.

Inhaling slowly, holding the breath, and exhaling slowly is easier in the shade, but there's nothing you can do to stop the sweat beading along your hairline, no matter how many times you pat it away with the back of your clammy hand.

you: what are you even doing rn

you: please tell me if you're sleeping it's in the car next to hee otw here :/

“There she is!” Jay calls out in a hoarse voice, waving with his whole arm when you turn around. At the sight of him, and Heeseung and Sunghoon trailing behind, your stomach drops. Jake really isn't coming. It's strange seeing everyone without him. Seeing the boys without him. He was your first friend, your only good friend until you went to uni together. And even then, all the friends you have now were his friends first.

If it weren't for all the handbags you were wearing, you'd have jogged over to meet them halfway, but alas. They're gracious enough to do the jogging on your behalf, all three of them pulling you into the middle of a group hug and jumping around you. There are more long, sweaty limbs than you'd like to be embraced by at any one time, but you've missed them so much you can't find it in yourself to complain. Not properly anyway.

“Any chance you left someone in the car?” you ask, squinting up against the sun at them.

Heeseung pulls air through his teeth and shakes his head. “Sorry, princess.”

“No worries though, birthday girl. You won't even notice he's not here!” Sunghoon grins for a split second before pressing his lips in a flat line, saluting and standing at attention like he's ready to serve his country through the fulfillment of Jake duties. “Can't share the bed though, bossman said no way,” he says, taking the girls' bags from your shoulders, so he can carry them. You don't stop him when he takes yours as well. To his credit, he looks kind of wonderful, a buff, compression-shirt-wearing ten out of ten with five handbags slung over him.

“Give me some of those,” Heeseung mutters, taking Jimin's and Minjeong's bags for himself. “Making me look bad.”

Sunghoon rolls his eyes. “You do that on your own. Look after your fucking hair, man.”

It's hard not to laugh at that, at least until Heeseung cuts his eyes at you anyway—that shuts you up quite quickly. Now that the guys are here, there are more targets for the line of fire, and you're not about to do the noble thing and take the fall for Heeseung. You wouldn't even do that for Jake.

you: stupid stupid jungwoo son or heeseung's fried hair daughter?

Unconcerned with how he looks, Jay cranes his neck to watch as the Loch & Key hurls your friends through the air. “Are—uh… are you guys mad at us? For missing last night?”

“Not any more than usual.”

He hums, resting his hands on his hips. “That's good then. A relief, I guess.”

Ice cream wielding children rush by you, glittery green butterflies and purple thistles painted on their smiling faces. Their soft laughter makes you grin as their exhausted parents, miniature backpacks slung over their shoulders, trail after them, weaving through you and the boys while mumbling their apologies. Jake would think it adorable if he were here, clutch his heart and coo over their tiny giggles and hurried waddles. He's always been good with kids, relating and playing with your little cousins better than you ever have, braiding hair and coaching football. He'll be a great father and his children will be very lucky. His partner. It's easy to imagine him running after his own kids like that, keeping up though, and happy to do it. Just the thought of it, future Jake, father Jake, warms your skin, your cheeks.

Meanwhile, present Jake, childless Jake, is ignoring your texts. Missing your birthday. You turn to Heeseung who's scrolling on his phone. “How was Jake before you guys left? He's airing me.”

He lifts his head at once, affronted by the very notion apparently. “Nah, no way. He drank the most last night, for sure. Didn't even wake up to say bye, dude's gonna be hungover 'til at least Christmas.”

A grin splits your face at the revelation that he's suffering for his crimes against you and your date of birth. The universe is fair and just after all. “Was it worth it at least? Your Pickle Party?”

“Pickleball, YN, ball,” Heeseung corrects, though Pickleball Party is not as fun to say. “I was fucked, man, can't really remember it if I'm honest. How about you though, how was your night?”

“I figured as much, we saw the photos, but my night was so good.” You're not even exaggerating, you hadn't realised how much you needed time with just the girls until you got it. “And I have all of my memories.”

“I remember enough to know Jake was with me and not you so…“ He shrugs with a shit-eating grin on his face, and he's very lucky you love him because if not, you would have pushed him to the ground instead of nodding nod with your jaw clenched, and muttering, yeah, well.

Free from Loch & Key's deep blue clutches, the girls stumble down the stairs and into the waiting arms of the boys. Anyone watching might think it had been years since they'd seen each other, rather than a handful of days. It wells your eyes to see them all like this, overjoyed already just by the promise of the next few days spent together. Meanwhile, you struggle to adjust to the sight of them without Jake, feeling the void already. At least you've had time to get used to missing Sunoo, seeing as he left a year ago now, but even he'll be here tomorrow. As Jimin reaches out to pull you into the group hug, you think of Jake. Miss him.

you: what time do you get in tmrw?

suntori: like 9 pm ish at the airport and then ten thousand hours in the car to get to the house

suntori: pls get me a nessfest '26 shirt !!!!!!

“To the bar!” Aeri calls out, pointing in the direction of the margarita truck you frequent.

Heeseung actually shudders. “Sober weekend for me I think, sorry guys.”

Even though he mumbles his agreement, Sunghoon is the first to follow Aeri, Jimin, and Yizhuo through the crowd. Around Heeseung and Jay's waists, Minjeong snakes her arms. “Hair of the dog, boys,” she says, pulling them. “Hair of the dog.”

Under an air conditioned gazebo, you crowd around a picnic table and Jay buys you an Irn Bru margarita in a pitcher. Sitting across from you, Sunghoon tries the first sip of it and hums, his eyebrows knitting together. “It's good, you know. Surprisingly.” He slides the pitcher back over to you, but you slide it back.

“We can share it.”

As if terrified by your offer, his eyes widen and he shakes his head so hard his sunglasses slip from his hair down onto his nose. “No way, YN, I actually can't. Because you'll want me to drink again tonight and tomorrow and for the rest of the week. What do you know about moderation?”

“Not much.” You shrug, taking the drink in your hands and moving the straw to take a big gulp. It is good. Surprisingly.

you: having a pitcher of irn bru marg u are so jealous rn

To sober Sunghoon's credit, he does a pretty good job as a Jake stand-in. Holding all the bags and phones while you sit in the shade, even standing if there's only one seat free so you can take it. The two of you eat candy floss and caramel coated popcorn while he gives you a play by play on last night's jaunt and follow the group from ride to ride, passing a yard glass of melting blue raspberry slushy back and forth. He even tries — and fails — to win you a stuffed animal to add to your collection. As the sun inches lower and lower, the crowd only gets denser, the lines longer. You and Aeri wait twenty minutes to use the toilet, shuffling into the same stall because the attendant is too busy scrolling through short-form videos with her volume on full blast to stop you. You pee first then Aeri goes.

“I feel like a grandma, dude. I'm tired already.” Laughter and squeals and techno music muffle her voice as she shimmies her jean shorts back up over her hips.

Only when you've fully processed what she said does a groan rumble in your throat, agreeing wholeheartedly. There are still nine hours until midnight, never mind whatever godforsaken time it'll be when you crawl into bed and sleep. Alone. “Call me Jay the way I'm gonna nap at any opportunity.” You lean against the stall door with your mouth open and your eyes half-shut to make her laugh.

“Him and Heeseung are kinda opposites like that, don't you think?” she asks, following you to the sinks. “Heeseung only has to close his eyes to fall asleep and that's before a drink.”

“Was that last year or the year before when we lost him because he was sleeping behind the marg truck?”

Aeri cackles, shaking her wet hands out in front of her. “Could Heeseung Lee report to guest services?” she says in a flat tone, just like the tannoy that had blared through the entire festival that day. “That's Heeseung Lee to guest services, please.”

You leave the toilets with your sweaty arms linked together, only to find everyone laying out in the grass. Sure enough, when you reach him, sober Heeseung is dead asleep on his stomach with his head on his arms.

you: was i annoying on call last night or smth… my bad my bad

To this, finally, Jake replies and right away.

jaeyunie: Neverrrrr ❤️

jaeyunie: I miss you sooooooooo much

jaeyunie: Can call before bed if you're free? Facetime and we can watch Bee Movie if you want

you: ok. i miss you an adequate amount. i always want.

Next on Yizhuo's tight schedule, is the least intimidating, but by far most popular ride at the whole festival. The Rock Ness Monster—a Viking ride with peeling green paint where the boat curves towards the bottom. She bumps your hip with hers. “Are you two coming with?”

“Who's gonna hold your bags if we do?”

“Ugh.” Sunghoon's head falls back, clearly sick of standing around while all the slightly terrifying, so-called good stuff happens on these insane portable roller coasters. “Don't be such a baby, YN. Even Jake can ride a viking boat.”

“Wow, Hoon,” you say, nudging his ribs with your elbow. “It's almost like we're two different people.”

At his side, Minjeong actually laughs out loud. “Could've fooled me.”

The burn in your cheeks is immediate, the sting behind your eyes. That no one leaps to your defence, that you feel like someone else should in the first place, is unsettling. Embarrassing, more like, to stand there, sandalled feet glued in place, body heavy with alcohol stirring in your sinking stomach, sweat laden and overheating. Saying nothing while your friends look around at one another and Jay mutters, “God damn.”

“Whatever,” you say, rolling your eyes. You're not in the mood to argue, not sure if you even have much of a case, so you leave everyone's bags at your feet and take the first step towards the Rock Ness queue. “Let's go then, since you all want to so badly.”

You walk quickly and blink even quicker, the only thing that could possibly worse would be to cry and bring the mood down. It's not even really that serious. Not at all. Your friends follow in silence while you pull out your phone to text Jake. Do you think I'm too dependent on yo—sense and shame wash over you, pulling your thumb down to the backspace key and clearing the message. Who cares what your friends think? Even Jake can ride a Viking boat, well so can you! It's not even about him anyway. You like roller coasters, it's just that these particular rides, with their semi-permanent nature, freak you out a little.

At your place in line, a rush of peach hits you and two long arms wrap themselves around your middle. Minjeong. “My sweet lady,” she mumbles. “I'm sorry for saying that.”

Worse than everyone thinking you follow Jake around like a lovesick puppy, is them feeling bad for you, feeling bad about bringing it up. And here you are, with no Jake to follow, ruining everyone's mood. “It's fine,” you say, picking at the fraying hem of your jean shorts. “It's true anyway, I guess.” That's probably what annoys you about it, that she wasn't wrong.

Minjeong kisses the top of your shoulder, her lip gloss sticky on your skin. “We're all a bit too attached to be fair.”

As if to prove her point, the two of you stay clinging to each other, a sweaty waddling mass as the queue grows shorter and shorter until it's your turn to get on. You press your palm to the side of Nessie's carriage for good luck, safe travels maybe, like boarding an aeroplane, and end up sandwiched between Heeseung and Jay, bare thighs sticking to each other and the hot seat. It's a bit of a tight fit, squeezing all of you into the same row, against some kind of safety regulation surely, but the teenaged ride attendant barely looks up from her phone except to push the bar down over your laps. It's fun though, even you can admit that. Fun to laugh and squeal with your friends while Nessie's hinges do the same, rocking you back and forth and back and forth again.

Heeseung's hair is dry as straw and the heat does nothing to help, so that when you get off the ride, wobbly-legged, it sticks up at all angles like he's been electrocuted. Yizhuo can't stop laughing, reaching up to ruffle the strands. A few of them break off when he does, flitting towards the ground, dusting his shoulders.

“Jesus, Heeseung. Do you want a hair mask or something? A buzzcut, maybe?” Minjeong asks, her own bleached hair silky and long, a testament to her twelve step haircare routine.

He rolls his eyes with a smile on his face. “It's not that bad.”

“It's literally breaking off in her hands,” you remind him, taking a tuft from his shoulder so he can see it.

“Good thing it's my hair then,” he says, yanking the cap from Jimin's head and putting it on his own to hide what's left of his hair.

Yizhuo wipes her palms together and Aeri scowls. “Sure, buddy—not for much longer though.”

Sunghoon's film camera goes everywhere with him, but he doesn't trust anyone else but Jay to use it—and even that took proof of him studying up on film and passing a twenty-question quiz. With it — now that you've all reconvened after a much needed, well-timed nap — the two of them capture every single moment, a flash going off in some part of the garden no matter what. Jay standing at the grill in his Meat Master apron. Aeri pouring shots at the table. Yizhuo putting a pink tiara on your head at ten minutes to midnight. Heeseung and Jimin making out on the linen couch. Minjeong napping on the unicorn float. He gets a photo of everything and Jay gets a photo of him in the kitchen doorway flexing all of his muscles like a bodybuilder.

Right when the clock strikes twelve, all of you run and jump into the pool, waking Minjeong who rolls over into the water with a start. A rowdy chorus of Happy Birthday begins before you've even managed to resurface, waterlogged and tipsy in the deep end as your favourite people celebrate you.

“Your shots!” Jimin cries out, pushing her hair out of her face. “You need to start your shots!”

You get out of the pool as fast as you can, running towards the table to get your phone before going into hiding. Jimin doesn't take long to follow, but a text from Jake stops you in your tracks. He'd sent it five minutes ago, right at midnight.

jaeyunie: Happy birthday, Yongiiieeee!!!!!!! I love u so bad, ur my bffieee, I hope today is really special and I'm sorry I can't be there, but I promise I'll make it up to you, yeah? Can't wait to see youuuuuuu 💘🐉

The smile on your face is immediate, and if you weren't surrounded by all of your friends, you'd squeal. But you are, so you slip through the sliding doors back into the house and lock yourself in the downstairs bathroom to squeal — and hide — there. When you call Jake, he picks up right away, his handsome face filling the screen.

“Hey, birthday girl,” he says, a breathtaking grin stretching over his lips and showing all of his teeth. “How are you feeling?”

You're not sure where to start. How to properly express just how much you miss him. Closing the toilet lid, you take a seat and settle on telling him you're mad at him instead. “I'm very, very mad at you.”

“What have I done now?” His eyebrows shoot up and his voice is low, deep, which is very cool and very normal.

“You ditched me.”

When Jake laughs, it fills the room like he's right here with you. “I'm not the one who drove all the way across the country, Yongie. You ditched me, alright? If anything, I should be very, very mad at you.”

“You can't be mad at me on my birthday. Maybe another day?” Against your arm, the tile is so perfectly cool you have to resist pressing your entire body to the wall. “Do you have one in mind?”

His smile only widens. It's unjust that someone so beautiful would be so far away—that that someone would be Jake. “Whatever you say, Yongie—I won't be mad at you today. Tomorrow though? I'm pissed tomorrow.”

Just the thought of it sends a rush of heat to the base of your stomach. You've sat in the stands at enough of his football games, and various other sporting stints, to know just how pissed he can get. And just how good he looks when he is. His clenched jaw and squinting eyes. The crease of his eyebrows, how his neck goes red. Pissed at you would be new, though. Nice, maybe.

“I look forward to it,” you admit. “Will you show me Layla now? She's way more exciting to look at.”

The smile falls from his face right away. “Should I die?”

“Not just now. Maybe tomorrow while you're mad at me.”

“Have I ever told you how funny you are?” He squints a little, getting closer to the screen. “Where are you?”

“I'm hiding in the bathroom. I think Jimin's waiting to force twenty-two shots down my throat.” Just the thought of it makes you shudder. At sixteen, taking a shot for each year of your age was a badge of honour. Now, however, not so much.

“You're in the bathroom? Downstairs, right?”

“Yeah, that's what I just said.”

“Open the door then.”

“Is my signal fucked?” You look at him on your screen, tilting your head. “I just told you Jimin's waiting to give me alcohol poisoning, I can't go out there for at least another twenty-four hours.”

“Wow.” Jake frowns. “I drove all this way and you don't want to see me?”

The words pull you up from your seat so fast you almost smack your head on the wall. “You did what?”

“Open up, Yongie.” This time, when he speaks, you hear him through your phone and through the door.

Hanging up, you adjust the straps of your bikini and straighten your tiara in the mirror, peeling back some of your soaked hair. For how much time you spent in the sun earlier, and in the pool just now, you look quite nice actually. A healthy glow to your slowly tanning skin, a slight dark ring of mascara around your eyes that thankfully looks more fun party girl than tearful party girl. You take a deep breath, it's only Jake after all—a fact that does nothing to ease your racing heart.

“Are you really out there?” you ask through the door, desperate to prolong the time apart that you'd loathed maybe one minute ago.

He lets out a chuckle, knocking gently on the wood. “I promise.”

Like something from your dreams, and just like he said, Jake's standing there with a huge grin on his face. He's the greatest thing you've ever seen. “Surprise!” he says. “Happy birthday.”

“How are you—” You pause, shoving his shoulder just to make sure this isn't a very realistic hallucination. Against your palm, his shoulder is very solid and very real. “How are you here?”

Jake's smile curls into something sheepish, his hands resting heavy on your waist. Burning your wet skin. “If you could take a week off from the beautiful woman factory, I figured I could take some time off too. Turns out having a desk job involves a lot of scrolling through r/niceguys and drinking free Gatorade.”

“You…” There are a million ways to end that sentence, but you settle for hugging him instead. He laughs, soft and happy, taking you into his strong arms. He smells like home, like the sweet citrus and bergamot that crowds all of your memories. It's only been a week since you last saw him, but it feels like a lifetime now that he's here. “I can't believe you're here,” you mumble into his T-shirt.

“You know I'd never miss your birthday, Yongie. Not for anything.” Jake brings his hand to the back of your head, gently stroking your wet hair. “I meant it when I said you could count on me.”

Tipping your head back is a small devastation, you miss his chest as soon as you leave it, but the sight of him is worth it. Of Jake and his sweet round, smiling cheeks, his dark eyes meeting yours right away. “But I thought you—” Realisation sets in belatedly, cutting you off. “So you lie to me now? Great. Your employment has made you ugly, Sim Jaeyun.”

He's the furthest thing from ugly you can think of, especially when he's smiling like this at you. Because of you. “Occupational hazard,” he says. “I'm being really brave showing my face right now, but I was sweating in my ski mask.”

“Good call. And speaking of, I didn't take time off work, I'm working remotely.”

Jake's grin takes up half of his face and sends your heart into a frenzy. “My bad, Yongie. Of course you are,” he says, tucking some of your hair behind your ear. “You must be the exception, your employment's only made you prettier.”

“It's hard work being employee of the century,” you admit.

“Yeah, darling. I'm sure it is.” Before you can respond, or fully process the heat coating every inch of your skin, he speaks again. “How does twenty-two feel so far? I only have a few more months left to get ready, so you have to tell me everything.”

“So far?” There's no platonic way to say that twenty-two is perfect because he's here, so you shrug. “Not sure—” At the sound of Jimin's voice over his shoulders you flinch, hiding behind him even though it's too late.

“There you are!” She's wielding the tall bottle of Pineapple AU the boys got for you. Your gift. Yay! “Don't worry, you don't have to take all the shots right now, you can spread them out over the day. Eleven now, eleven later.” She looks a bit like she's had twenty-two shots.

“Jeez,” Jake mutters, getting a good look at her flushed face.

“I'll come find you, Jimin.”

This seems to be enough to satisfy her, for now at least, and she disappears back down the hall, utterly unsurprised by the sight of Jake.

Alone again, finally, he smiles down at you. “I'll help with your shots, alright? Looks like I've got some catching up to do anyway.”

“Me too.”

While Jake gets changed, you head back outside and jump straight into the pool to shock the heat from your skin. It works. Until he walks through the sliding doors and into the garden. His black swimming trunks sit low on his hips. Arms bigger than usual when he crosses them over his chest, eyes flitting around the space until he finds you and smiles. Your heart beats in your throat as the rest of your friends spot him and rush over, enveloping him in happy hugs and excited chatter. They ask him about the drive and work and catch up like it's been months. Nobody mentions his huge arms or his toned stomach that seems more and more defined every time you see it. Jay hands him a beer and he pulls the tab while watching you, laughing at something, he waves at you, all alone in the pool now that everyone's bagged their spot in line at the Jake meet-and-greet.

Good for them.

You swim lazy laps to give your heart something normal to race over and he finishes his entire can before breaking away from the group and backflipping into the pool. You hate yourself for being impressed, feeling a bit like a ten-year-old girl fancying the fastest boy in class. This feeling, you know it well, because you were that girl. Jake was the boy. And now, when he resurfaces right in front of you, his hair sticks to the edges of his face. He doesn't push it back.

“Good evening,” he says, voice already taking on its soft drunken state.

“You're stealing my thunder, Jakey. At this rate, I'm sure you'll wear red to my funeral, or do the splits during the eulogy, or something else attention-seeking,” you huff, splashing him. “It's my birthday, you know.”

“Trust me, Yongie. No one could ever steal your thunder.” He grins, taking the pink tiara from your head and putting it on his own. It suits him. “And we're dying on the same day, remember? Joint casket.”

“I'm starting to regret our blood pact.”

“Our blood pact?” he repeats, incredulous. “How many times do I need to remind you that someone waited until my middle finger was gushing blood before she backed out?”

“I was fourteen!”

“I was thirteen!”

“And you were so, so brave.”

A moment passes while Jake seems to think about that. The pool lights him up brilliant and blue, water slipping in fast rivulets down his skin. Though not a new feeling, it's definitely an irritating one, an embarrassing one, to be jealous of the water. Jealous of how close it gets to be, tracing his cheekbones and acne scars, his stubble. And all with no consequence, no teasing or accusations of feelings. Feelings of any kind. Your hands twitch at your sides, pruned and desperate. Splashes sound from the middle of the pool, though neither of you look to see who it is. There's no need. You could recognise Jay's squeals and Aeri's laugh with your eyes closed. The price of summers and all the seasons in between spent together, you suppose. You'd pay it over and over happily if you could. If it meant you could always have this. It'll be difficult on Wednesday, when you all go back home and get ready to split off into your corners of actual adulthood.

“I'm a coward now, is that what you're saying?”

“I wouldn't have used those words, but I'm glad you did.”

Jake rolls his eyes and says, “Most people are actually nicer in the summer, you know.”

“Yeah, to you maybe. Because you look like that with your shirt off,” you say, surprising yourself and him.

He tilts his head, eyebrows furrowing. “What does that mean?”

You've already swum into the deep end of this conversation, so it's not hard to say, “I think you underestimate how much justice your body does you, Jaeyun.”

“That means a lot coming from you.” With a smile on his lips, he reaches out, toying with the string on your bikini. Cool water slips from his skin onto yours, painting a trail down your body and back into the pool. His dark eyes follow it the whole way, neck, collarbones, chest, until his gaze hits the surface, lingering on the flimsy blue cups holding up your breasts. It all happens so quickly, his staring and the pounding of your heart. The hitching of your breath. Of his. How he swallows, gulps, like maybe this is affecting him as much as it is you until he says, “You're a dream, YN.”

The word strikes you anew, your name from his sweet mouth. He so rarely calls you by your name that it's always thrilling whenever he does. Only ever beautiful, special, when he's the one saying it. And at the end of a sentence like that no less. A dream. Said so simply and just for you. You should be over this by now, over him, but still — again — your breath hitches and a flare of warmth sets your skin ablaze.

“You know that though, don't you?” Jake's voice is quiet against the sounds of everyone else — cans and cups clinking, lyrics screeched off-key — yet it's the only thing you hear clearly. “I've always known it.”

On his head, your pink tiara sits crooked. He almost looks silly. He does look silly, and maybe, if he'd said literally anything else, this fact, this sight, would make you laugh. But no, he didn't say anything else.

Attraction and romance are not the same. You know that well enough. It's taken a lot of kissing frogs to drill it into your head, but you've done it, and you know. Regardless, hearing those words from your Prince Jake is doing a very good job at shaking that knowledge loose. It's only when your back hits the tile that you realise you've drifted into the corner of the pool. He lets go of your bikini, palm resting by your arm on the pool's edge, boxing you in.

To your silence, he says, “I guess I gotta say it more.”

“Is that right?” you whisper.

When he nods, the tiara falls with a measly splash, bobbing along the surface between you. Neither of you lifts it.

“You've got a lot of catching up to do then. Like, ten years worth.”

“Thirteen,” Jake corrects. “Thirteen years worth.”

“I look forward to it.”

A smile breaks out over his face as he picks up the tiara. All the chlorine has spoiled the rhinestones, turning them matte. Gently, he pushes your hair away from your face and sets it on your head again, fixing the little combs so it stays in place. “You're beautiful, Yongie. You're very, very beautiful,” he says. Admits, maybe.

You let out a breath, hoping it can pass for a laugh. Hoping Jake doesn't notice how all of your breaths have been coming out in a bit of a hurry. “Well, I don't work at the beautiful woman factory for nothing.”

It's Sunghoon's announcement of a very friendly game of chicken fight that breaks up your… moment. You're thankful, actually, it gives you some room to breathe, to smile like a maniac while Jake looks over his shoulder at the group. Nobody has to tell you to get out of the pool, you don't waste a second hoisting yourself over the edge. Jake does the same, trailing water all the way over to the electric grill where he dries his hands and ties Jay's apron around his waist.

“You hungry?” he asks. “The real Meat Master's back in town, baby.”

“Not really.” You scowl, taking a step away from him. “And don't let anyone else hear you say that, okay? They won't be as kind as me.”

Red covers his cheeks and his ears and his neck as he heads for the kitchen. “Yeah,” he says. “You're probably right.”

Despite this, his blunder, you can hardly tear your lusting eyes from his body, the flex of his muscles as he walks, the cinch of his little waist, swimming trunks sitting low enough to show the dimples in his lower back. How the water trickles slowly from his shoulders down, the warm kitchen lights making him glow.

A pair of dripping arms wrap themselves around your waist from behind, making you flinch as Minjeong's chin rests on your shoulder, easy to identify by her touchiness alone, but her shimmery peach tanning oil gives her away. Her damp skin sticks to yours. A kiss pressed to your cheek. “I take it you like your present?” she coos, rocking your bodies back and forth. “It was my idea by the way, to surprise you, if you were looking for someone to thank.”

How touching, that your friends care enough to deeply upset you with your biggest fear and then quickly resolve it like nothing happened. Maybe change, as Jake had said last night, isn't as bad as you think. More than anything, you're alarmed by the fact that the best gift you think you could possibly receive is his presence. How disturbing, that you love him this much.

“Thank you, Jeongie,” you say, dragging the E for as long as you can.

Again, she kisses your cheek, mumbling, of course, against your skin. “What was that in the pool? You two all pressed up in the corner…“ Her voice trails off into a whisper as Jake comes back outside with a plate of samgyeopsal and chicken sausages and mushrooms in his veiny hand. Maybe you are hungry after all. “It was extremely hot to watch, I think he was genuinely a second away from tearing your bikini off.”

The thought of it makes you shudder, what might have been were you two alone out here, if Jake wanted what you did. Wanted you. If he'd tugged on the string of your bikini top and taken what you want him to have. You're a dream, YN. You can't help the heat in your cheeks and between your thighs, can't help but watch as his thick fingers turn the knob that starts the grill. As they skewer sausages and slabs of halloumi before carefully placing them on the rack.

Minjeong uses her clammy hand to close your mouth. “Fuck,” she mutters. “I think I get it now.”

Before you can tell her to back off, she's running over to the pool, waiting to sub in for someone. It'll be Yizhuo most likely, who keeps throwing herself from Sunghoon's broad shoulders, for no reason other than liking the feeling of falling into the water. He's too polite to express his frustration, but you can tell from the way he rolls his eyes every time she does it.

“They're pants,” Jake says, nodding over at them as he flips the skewers. “Utter pants.”

You wrap yourself up in a Spider-Man beach towel and sink into the chair closest to the grill, to him, sitting with your legs crossed. “It'd be unethical to play against them, seeing as we're professionals and they're… well, they're pants, like you said.”

Last spring, Sunghoon announced in the chat that you'd be playing chicken fight for money, and it was all you could to do to take up Pilates in preparation—you had probably the strongest core out of everyone here, and together, you and Jake robbed your friends blind, then blew your winnings on a weekend trip to Naples to celebrate. This year however, you and Jake are barred, and your core strength has gone to shit without something to motivate you in the gym.

It's for the best probably, your practice rounds were always garbage because you couldn't focus with Jake's head between your thighs or his huge hands gripping your soft flesh. The way his breath would hitch if you tugged on the right strands of hair by the nape of his neck.

Fuck.

Pushing some of your wet hair back from your neck, he smiles down at you. “I took three of your shots, by the way.”

“My knight in sweaty, muscular armour, wow, Jake.” Looking at him now, with the overhead lights making him glow around the edges, the sweet curve of his pink lips, it's like looking at an angel. He is an angel, you are absolutely certain. Your lovely, beautiful, soft-lipped angel. “I could kiss you,” you blurt out, covering your mouth with your hand to keep in the rest of your thoughts.

He laughs at that, a rushed exhale that he doesn't address before blowing on a skewer of halloumi. It's hot, clearly, because he huffs around the little chunk he bit off. Again, he blows on it then holds it out for you. “Here, Yongie,” he says softly. “Careful though, yeah?”

For a short while, you eat like this, sharing a Heineken with Jake until, naturally, at the sweet sizzle and smell of pork belly coming off the barbecue, everyone comes rushing out of the pool and over to the table, filling all the seats around you. Jay helps plate the food as Jake shuts off the grill, taking off the apron and mumbling at you to sit properly. It's hardly a second after your feet hit the warm tile that he sits in your lap, settling with his back pressed against you and his plate in his lap. To calm your pounding heart, you have to breathe manually, in for three and out for three, but it's to no avail as Jake plays with your fingers and passes food from his plate straight into your mouth. Trying to follow the conversation is impossible in these conditions, so you strain to listen to Tiffany Day's album whispering out of the speaker and chew on yummy samgyeopsal, ignoring the feel of his fingers on your lips every time he feeds you, ignoring how he makes a point to look straight at you, into your eyes whenever he does.

At Jimin's request you take a shot and then another, both poured carefully into your mouth by Jake who can't stop laughing.

“My good girl!” she cheers, a proud smile on her face as she points at you with her chopsticks. “Two down, twenty to go!”

You take another two, then down a full glass of water.

As the guest of honour, you're relinquished of clean-up duty, and your friends diligently snatch anything you dare to lift or stack to help. Your adamance gets Jake kicked out too, the two of you relegated to the linen couch. As soon as you sit down, he pulls your legs over his. His hand covers your knee, tracing shapes into your skin with his thumb. Sometimes it feels like he has to touch you at all times, like his life depends on his proximity to you—sometimes it feels like yours does too, to him. Given the years you've known each other, the years you've gone on like this, you should be used to it. You're not. When he touches your necklace, the star pendant resting on your chest, you have to put in effort not to shiver.

“I can't believe you still wear this,” he says, the words garbled by a yawn.

“I haven't found one I like better. What's your excuse?” you ask, nodding towards the identical star sitting beneath his collarbones.

“Feels weird when I take it off. It's like a little piece of you or something.”

“Or something,” you repeat, understanding.

It was a Christmas gift, years ago now. They both were. Something you saw that simply screamed Jake. Apparently, he thought the same, seeing the exact same necklace and hearing your name instead. It felt like fate when you exchanged presents that Christmas Eve, and even now, though most days you forget you have it on, you're not convinced it wasn't.

With his rosy knuckles heavy on your skin, the necklace feels brand new. Jake has a funny way of making things feel new, making the simplest of moments exciting just because he's there. Swimming. Eating pork belly. Sitting on the couch. He lets go of the star, tucking your wet hair behind your ear before squeezing your knee.

“What are you thinking about?” he asks.

“I'm just happy, Jake. I'm very, very happy right now.”

“Good, Yongie. I'm very, very happy too.” He yawns again.

You roll your eyes, but you can't stop smiling. Can't stop the flutter in your stomach. “My thunder, Jaeyun. Leave it alone.”

When Jake yawns for the third time, you decide to retire, ignoring the chorus of boos that follow you back inside until he slides the back door shut. “Should I lock it?” he asks.

You actually have to think about it before you shake your head, leading the way up to your room.

In bed, showered and sleepy, the two of you lie very still, staring up at the ceiling. It's far too hot for a duvet, but you can't sleep without being covered, so a thin white sheet sticks to your skin. Each time the lighthouse beams into the room, the two of you laugh into the quiet.

“Can I ask you something?” A giggle breaks through your question, bright white shining through the window.

“Anything, Yongie.” He's more tired, and tipsy, than he let on downstairs. You can hear it in his voice, how slow and whiny he's being. “You know that.”

“Does you being here mean you didn't get me a present?”

Turning to look at you, Jake scoffs. You don't dare to look at him. You can't. Still, he asks, “Am I not enough of a gift?”

For the better you think, he has no idea how much his being here means to you. “I mean… maybe if we were watching Bee Movie or you'd brought Layla with you.”

“Okay, Yongie. Fine. I see how it is.”

Right when you look at him, the lighthouse sends another beam, carving his face out of the shadow. This time, you can't laugh. Can't do much more than stare at him. The curve of his pretty lips, his sleepy eyes on you. Pink on his cheeks, his forehead, his nose. You feel very lucky getting to see him like this, and your birthday of all days.

“I'm kidding,” you whisper, afraid of what your voice might sound like if you speak properly. “Kind of.”

Mercifully, the beam slips out of view, leaving him in the dark. No matter though, because you can make out his silhouette as he sits up and leans over the end of the bed. He opens the drawer of the nightstand and puts a small velvet box into your hands. “It's not Layla, obviously, but I hope you like it anyway.”

“We'll see.”

Sitting up too, you lean on the headboard and open it. A thick heart-shaped pendant greets you, a locket, you realise when you take it out. The metal is cool in your palm and the light shines through the window, showing you what's carved on the front of it. Your stomach drops at the sight.

“Happy birthday, YN.” Jake clears his throat. “It's a dragon.”

When you first met, the first thing he ever told you was that his zodiac sign was a horse. You were nine years old back then, a Leo, and the first thing you did when you got home was look up animal zodiac signs on the family computer. The next day, you got to class and proudly told him that you were a dragon—your favourite of the twelve animals available. Yong, he said. That's dragon in Korean. Unfortunately though, like every other 2002 baby, you were a simple horse, but the nickname stuck.

“Yongie,” you say, heart beating in your throat as you run your finger over the tiny dragon.

He's smiling when you look at him, clearly pleased with himself. “Yeah, Yongie.”

Every last detail of this moment latches onto you with unbearable strength. Small wings against your thumb. Laughter ringing out from the next room. Jake. His eyes on you. His gorgeous smiling face and the tumble of butterflies in your stomach at the sight of that smiling face. Summer's hot claws sink into you, leaving their mark on your sweaty flesh. If he asks again, how twenty-two feels, you hope you can relay this to him. And you hope you can sound very platonic and normal when you do.

“Can you… would you help me put it on?”

“Of course.”

You face the windows and unstick your hair from your back. Jake's hands are warm, burning your skin as he loops the necklace around your neck and fiddles with the clasp. Time seems to slow, his breath fanning the nape of your neck. Against your ribs, your heart races. It doesn't settle even when he's done and his touch is a memory.

“There,” he whispers, the sheets rustling as he moves away.

“I love it, Jaeyun. Thank you.” You can't look at him. Not now. Not with tears stinging your eyes. Instead, you wrap your hand around the locket, warming it in your palm. The word feels small, not enough for the swell of your heart in your chest. Not enough for the tumbling in your stomach.

“Good, Yongie. I'm glad, that makes me really happy.” You can hear the smile in his voice. “I didn't put a picture in it, but if you have one in mind, I can take you to the printer and get it sorted out.”

“That would be really nice.”

For a while he says nothing. And you don't move. You don't even squint when the light shines through the glass, frying your retinas. Before you see Jake, you feel him. Feel the solid heat of his chest pressed to your back, feel his hair tickling your thigh when he cranes his neck to look up at you. In the dark, concern scrunches his eyebrows. “Are you alright?”

“Yeah, Jake. I just—” Saying the words always feels like torture, like you're being punished for your feelings. As if unrequited love isn't punishment enough. You have to swallow around the lump in your throat before you continue. “I really, really love it. I love you.”

His smile crinkles his eyes. “And I love you,” he says. Easy as ever. Because when he says it, he doesn't mean anything more than those words. Anything more than a friend loving a friend in the way they should. “More.”

You don't, you think. You couldn't. “I know,” you say instead.

When Jake rolls over, lying on his back again, you curl into his side. If you can't have him the way you want to, at least you can have him like this. Cuddling in bed despite the sticky heat, his arm around your waist, your head on his chest. Falling asleep together. As friends.

You wake up to your phone ringing on the nightstand, alone in the bed. Jake's side of the bed is still warm when you touch it, his scent tickling your nose. It's ten a.m. and your mum yells into the phone, “Happy birthday, sweet pea!”

Her voice is loud and lovely as always as you pull the phone from your ear. “Thanks, Mum,” you mumble, still adjusting your eyes to the broad daylight and bright sun beaming into the room. “Really.”

“You sound tired, are you still in bed?”

“It's ten in the morning.”

“That's practically five p.m. to you,” she points out. “Hangover?”

“Not really,” you say. “Not yet.” This morning has been gentle to your body, because you were gentle-ish last night. Tomorrow morning, however, you're not sure will be the same. Admittedly, with Jake at your side and your necklace burning hot against your skin, sleep was hard to come by.

“Where's Jake? Can you put him on the phone?”

“I don't know, I just woke up.”

Without another word, your mother hands the phone to your father who says, “Hey, love. Happy birthday!”

“Thank you, Dad.”

“Is Jake around?”

“No,” you say, and the conversation doesn’t last much longer.

Birthdays are very strange, only made stranger with each year that passes. People from all dark corners of your life creep out to greet you. Failed situationships — your fault — worming their way back into your life with an HBD! Since starting university, your messages have been relatively quiet, since you've been spending your birthdays here with everyone who you actually want to hear from.

You're on your tenth variation of, thank you, angel, when Jake opens the door. “Ugh,” he groans, looking over his bare shoulders at you. “I really hoped you'd still be asleep, I haven't even lit the candle yet.”

“Candle singular? Wow, Jaeyun. You really didn't have to. I'm honoured,” you say, though no amount of sarcasm could calm the fluttering in your stomach or cool the heat on your cheeks.

Jake's grinning when he turns around, clearly proud of himself and the stack of pancakes he's holding. Stuck into their syrupy centre is a glittery candle in the shape of a two. “Happy second birthday, Yongie!” he says, kneeling by the side of the bed.

You can't help but grin. “I'm two!”

“This was funny in my head,” he mumbles, scrunching his nose. “If you can believe it.”

“It's funny in mine too.”

He lights the candle and tells you to make a wish. Screwing your eyes, you do just that, blowing out the flame in a hurry so you can look at him again. At the lopsided curve of his pretty lips. Jake climbs back into bed beside you, making sleepy conversation while you eat your birthday pancakes—until he falls asleep anyway, keen to complete his eight hours.

Fed and watered, you wash your dishes in the sink, liking the rush of the warm water on your fingers. The repeated motion of dragging the sponge over your plate. It’s actually fun to do it, to see your progress with each swipe, to have complete control over an outcome. Now that you’re here, enjoying yourself, you tackle the surfaces too, cleaning the stove and the countertops until they sparkle, and Aeri gasps at the sight of you, running into the kitchen. She clambers over the countertop to reach you quicker, handprints left on the dark wood, but you can wipe those up later.

“No way, no way, no way!” she squeals, taking the locket in her hands to get a good look. “I hate to give credit to a man, but this is perfect, YN. I'm so happy for you.” She wraps her arms around you in a tight squeeze, unconcerned by the dripping sponge in your hand. “How did he tell you? Am I the first to find out?”

You don't even have time to process or share in her excitement before Yizhuo comes in from the garden, wet hair pulled into a knot at the top of her head. “Find out what?” she asks, pulling her blue towel tighter around her body.

“I was just about to ask.”

“He gave her the necklace,” she explains, gesturing with both arms to emphasise the the.

Pushing her sunglasses up, a flicker of recognition dances across Yizhuo's face, widening her eyes at your chest when she crosses the room. “Great news, obviously, but I'm not sure how this changes anything.” She hugs you too, kissing the side of your head. “Seeing as you were fucking in the pool last night anyway.”

“Who was fucking in the pool?” Sunghoon asks from the doorway, wet hair clinging to the harsh lines of his face. At the sight of the necklace, he smiles, jogging over to join you all, hugging you just like the girls did. “Took him long enough! Good birthday so far then?”

You pry his ginormous arms off of you, squirming to freedom and stepping away. All of them watch you with huge grins, some of the happiest faces you've ever seen, but before anyone else can come in and continue this ridiculous game of broken telephone, you set the record as straight as possible. “No one was fucking in the pool, no one told anyone anything. What the fuck are we talking about right now?”

Aeri's smile drops. “Wait, so how did you get that?”

“Jake gave it to me, which you seem to know.”

“And he didn't say… anything?” Yizhuo's eyebrows furrow.

“Not much more than, happy birthday, and, it's a dragon.”

“Oh, okay. Ignore us then.” Sunghoon clears his throat. “Pool?”

And so begins a birthday like any other, at least since you started university anyway.

You laze around the garden, day drinking lightly and snacking heavily. Taking bikini pictures for Instagram and slipping in and out of heat-induced naps until it’s time to get dressed and head out to dinner.

At the same long table in Seaside Gusto, you sit between Jake and Jay like always. You and Heeseung switch cocktails because you like each others’ better, and at Minjeong’s request, everyone goes around the table and shares something they love about you.

Tears sting your eyes, beyond touched by all the nice things they say, no matter how silly some of them are about it. Yizhuo loves your boobs and butt; Sunghoon loves your summer birthday, because there’s always something to look forward to after exams; and Jimin loves your commitment to overthinking, crediting it with solving all of her problems with no stress on her end. For Minjeong, it’s your loyalty, and Aeri says you paint her nails the best. Heeseung loves your pretty face, and Jay loves your honesty. Last to go is Jake who only stares down at his plate, his silence making your leg shake under the table—now the only quiet one in the restaurant.

Nobody says anything or makes a sound at all, save for your fork scraping parmesan around your plate. “Wow, Jaeyun, am I that bad?” you ask, and it’s supposed to be a joke but you just sound upset, pathetic.

So much so that his face softens and he shakes his head, hand resting on your bouncing knee. “Are you kidding?” His voice is soft, laced with a concern he usually reserves for when the two of you are alone.

When you don’t respond, Jake clears his throat to get everyone’s attention, taking a sip of water before speaking. “I was thinking about the right way to say this, but I guess it’ll be easier to just start talking and see where I end up, you know? Like Jay kinda.” There’s a smile on his face, handsome as ever, but he’s fidgeting with his trouser leg, scratching the side of his chair, tense even though he’s made you all laugh.

It’s been an age since you last saw him this nervous, this uncertain, so long that you’re just pleased you remember how to calm him down. You take his hand in yours, playing with his fingers the way he liked when you were younger. It takes a beat, but, sure enough, his shoulders fall and his shallow breaths level out.

“I was really shy as a kid, sensitive, so I had no friends until I met YN. She was the first person to make an effort with me, or to make me feel like I was worth the effort, I guess,” Jake says, giving your hand a squeeze.

Some twisted combination of his admission and the pressure is all it takes for your tears to spill, running hot and fast down your cheeks. That anyone could have looked at sweet little Sim Jaeyun with his missing incisors and been anything other than adoring hurts your stomach, that anyone could have made him feel less than, and for all your closeness you had no idea. Your vision blurs, the lump in your throat heavy when Jay hands you his napkin. It’s for the best that Jake doesn’t look up from your locked hands in his lap.

“Everything I know about friendship I learned from her. So what I love about you, Yongie, is that you care a lot about others, and you cared a lot about me, you know?”

Around the table, all of your friends coo and fuss over Jake until his face goes bright red. The heat in your cheeks burns with the same frenzy, spreading to coat your neck and chest. It’s only now that he looks at you, wet-eyed and smiling. Beautiful—always beautiful.

“That was perfect, Jake. You said it perfectly.”

With a brilliant smile on his face, he wraps his arm around your shoulder and leans towards you. “I really think you saved me, YN,” he says.

For dessert, the butterflies in your stomach have a giant wedge of tiramisu with a candle in it, and because your heels ache your feet, Minjeong gives you a piggy back all the way home. Curled around Aeri, you take a nap on the couch in the den and right when you blink your sleepy eyes open, everyone else is setting up the house.

Together in the en-suite, you and Jake get ready for the party you can already hear starting downstairs. Music rumbles in from all angles while he gargles mouthwash and you take your makeup off with a cotton pad. It's always fun getting ready with him, even if you take significantly longer, because he doesn't rush you. He's like Minjeong in that way, or any of the other girls, there's just something nice about doing it with someone. Sharing gossip and mascara, spitballing graft techniques and peeing in the same stall.

It’s only your life-threatening crush that makes him different.

Swiping the cotton pad over your eyes, it’s hard not to think about what he said at dinner. You’d been such similar children, bonding quickly over LEGOs and wrestling and painting your nails. It was you who showed him Rayman Origins and he who showed you Hannah Montana. It didn't matter very much that he was a boy, didn't matter at all, he was just Jake. Your friend. Your person. And how much easier it was then, to be around him. To be hugged by him, to have your hand held, without reading into it. Without wondering how long you'll be able to have him in this way before he inevitably meets someone who doesn't like how close you are. How he tucks your hair behind your ear or calls you darling.

He blocks your view of the mirror with his face, leaning in. At the sight, at his closeness, your stomach does a twirl. Splotchy red around the perimeter, a handful of freckles dotting the bridge of his nose. “What's the matter?” Jake asks.

“Nothing.” Your voice comes out softer than you'd like, hardly a mumble over the music.

His gaze flicks around your face, catching every feature before catching yours again. “Your eyes are all watery,” he says, but doesn't move out of the way so you can see in the mirror or have a try at breathing normally.

It's only when you blink that tears fall. Not a lot, but enough for him to frown. You can't even begin to explain what you're crying about, at least without giving yourself away. He cups your cheeks with his hands, thumbs wiping your tears away, and making your breath hitch.

“Hello,” you mumble, sniffling.

A smile plays at the corners of Jake's lips, giving way to a tiny curve. “Hey, YN.”

“Hi.”

“Do you wanna skip this thing? Sneak out and see the lighthouse instead?”

As tempting as his offer sounds, sitting out on the edge of the dock and eating salty fish & chips while the sun goes down, you're a little too excited for tonight to pass it up. This could be the last birthday you celebrate with all of your friends under one roof for a while now that everyone's employed. You shake your head, leaning into his touch. “I'm good, Jakey. Just really happy.”

“Good, Yongie,” he says, a bright smile covering his face. “I'm glad.”

You're not crying anymore, you weren't ever really crying — not properly anyway — but Jake doesn't let go and you don't move away. The moment stretches for longer than you're sure is fully friendly, long enough that your eyes catch his lips, long enough that you notice when his eyes catch yours. His furrowed eyebrows smooth out before raising for a split second. He's everything, the entire world and more standing right in front of you, with your face in his hands.

It occurs to you now, like this, the fundamental difference between a need and a want. You need to have these summers here with him and everyone else, to fall asleep in his arms and wake up sweat drenched on opposite ends of the bed. Need to have him by your side no matter what, in your corner. Jake. Your Jake, as he's always been and always will be. What you want though, is to lean in, to kiss him. To feel his thick bottom lip pulled between yours, to feel the soft flesh between your teeth, his tongue in your mouth and yours in his.

And as if he's read your thoughts, heard them, something changes in his face, hardens for a beat as he clears his throat and lets go of you, backs away until he hits the counter. “Fuck,” he mutters, rubbing at his hip and looking everywhere but at you. “Did you—uh, you wanna finish up by yourself?”

A salt-coated thorn pokes its way into your chest, jabbing the him-shaped wound in your heart. This chronic ache, your chronic affection, souring before your very eyes and making it easy to foster irritation towards Jake. Genuine irritation for the accent he won't let go of, and the stupid phase he had where he only let you feed him if you moved the utensil like an aeroplane. For his stupid brown hair that always dries perfectly even though he doesn't do anything with it. His eyes, his big, round eyes, and the way they get all sparkly when he's talking about something he cares about or to someone he loves. When he's talking to you.

“Not really,” you admit, though he is clearly desperate to be away from you and you from him.

A new desire for both of you. Surely. If it weren't for the knots in your stomach, you might be fascinated by it. That you've known Jake this long and are still discovering new sides to him. Prickly ones. You'd been so sure you knew him, all of him, so sure that you liked all of him. Loved.

This though — the crease of his brows, the set of his jaw, the distance — whatever it means, is quite bad. Feels quite bad. Yet, when you open your mouth to continue, it's to say, “I don't want to go downstairs on my own.”

As if nothing happened, as if he hadn't been repulsed by your closeness, he nods and sits up on the countertop with a smile. The pointy corners of his curved lips, and the crinkle of his nose and eyes, are enough to quell your irritation. More than. It's like seeing daylight, like the sun coming up on a winter morning to melt the snow. That's just how friendships are though, isn't it? How it is to have friends and to be a friend. Minor offences resolved instantly, forgiven, over nothing more than a look or a smile. Friendships are neat in that way—friendships like yours, bloated by the stench of your unrequited feelings, however? Not quite so neat. Too much has changed here already, more than what you can afford, and it's all you can do to keep things exactly as they are.

While you continue getting ready — washing your face, moisturising your legs — the two of you jump from one topic to the next and he is gracious enough not to mention your tears, or how he leapt away from you. “Has this been your best birthday yet?” Jake asks, leaning back on his palms.

“You know what, I actually think, yeah. One regret though…“ You trail off, turning your head to spray deodorant.

“Is it that we didn't order more toasted ravioli to bring home and eat later?”

“How'd you know?”

Jake is smiling when you look over at him, patting his toned stomach and sighing. “Because I'm lowkey hungry again.”

“Fuck,” you mutter, predicting that your own hunger won't take long to follow.

“Fuck is right,” he agrees solemnly, pressing his lips into a flat line.

Now that your armpits are sufficiently deodorised, you only have to get dressed and put on lip gloss. The lip gloss part is easy, of course, but you've been warring over two coverups in your head since you started packing, so you need a second opinion. Bringing your options from your suitcase, you hold them up side by side for Jake to see. “Which one's cuter?”

He purses his lips, eyes flicking from left to right. “Both of them are cute.”

“Can you not annoy me right now, please?” You sigh, resting your hands on your hips while he watches, an amused slant to his lips. “Don't be such a boy about it, Jake, pick one.”

“Try them on and let me see, darling.”

Leaving him in the bathroom to get changed by yourself, you take off your T-shirt behind the closed door and ignore how much you liked the sound of his voice when he said that. Liked the way it felt to be told what to do. You tie up your pink bikini, pull a black crochet minidress over the top of it and adjust the low-cut back in the mirror before showing him. Instead of saying anything, reacting at all really, he just sits there, his wide eyes trailing over your body.

Still, though, in the face of Jake's silence, there's no stopping the burn in your cheeks or the flutter in your stomach. “This is—uhm… you're supposed to tell me how I look.”

“Yeah, no, for sure, yeah,” he says, snapping into motion and clearing his throat. “Will you twirl for me?”

Again, you do as Jake requests, twirling as slow as possible while willing the twitching corners of your lips to stay put. Neutral. Relaxed. You know you look good, of course you do, you wouldn't have brought this dress if it didn't look good on you, if the low back didn't make your waist look smaller and your butt look bigger. Something about him though, about how he looked at you, like he thinks it too, thinks you look good is more than enough to take your breath away, so that you have to focus on breathing to do it effectively.

He's leaning forward with his arms crossed over his lap, chewing on his bottom lip. His eyes flick upward to meet yours, but he can't hold your gaze, looking up at the ceiling instead. “You look… Yeah, Yongie, nice.”

“Thank you for the glowing review,” you mutter, turning to leave, as if your heart isn't racing.

The next time you join him in the bathroom, you're wearing the white dress, and before he asks you to, you twirl for him, as slowly as you did earlier. This dress is just as short as the first, more sheer though, and the low cut is in the front instead, showing off the centre of your bikini top, your cleavage mainly. Now that you're wearing it, you might like it a bit better, preferring how your necklaces sit against your skin.

Jake's face and ears are beet red, his mouth ajar but nothing comes out. You catch a glimpse of yourself in the mirror, suddenly unsure about the pink bikini you'd bought specifically to wear tonight, and fidget with the neckline, covering your chest as much as you can. “I'd change though, if I wore this,” you say, smoothing it over your hips. “Like white bikini instead, I think it'd look better at the front.”

His eyes fall to your chest, to the locket, and then lower, stuck on the pink fabric, on your boobs. He gulps but he can't look away, doesn't even try. “I think you should wear that one, wear it exactly like that, with the pink.”

“Yeah?”

Jake nods, clears his throat. “You really are a dream, YN. I meant it when I said it.”

Neither of you says anything about that, or the way his hands shake while he takes pictures of you and adjusts your poses. It's basically forgotten about by the time he leads the way to the party, humming along to Minjeong's playlist and holding onto your hand. Despite this, your coming downstairs together, you lose him to the crowd quite quickly. The first hour of your night is mostly just hugging people and accepting snacks from paper plates while having the same conversation five hundred times—how have you been? Great! What are you up to these days? Not much. Having a good birthday? The best! Your necklace is so pretty! Thank you, it's from Jake. Aw, you two are so cute! Haha… yeah.

You pose for pictures and receive tall, sparkly gift bags of wine or vodka that you leave on the kitchen counter and garden table so everyone can help themselves. With Nishimura Riki, you have two Jimin-issued shots, bringing your total up to eight out of twenty-two. To Huh Yunjin, you put in a good word for Jay, talking him up like he's the second coming of Christ or the best thing since Compeed blister patches—like he's Jake, basically. And it's over Yang Jungwon's broad shoulder that you finally reenter the garden for good, while you kick and scream, begging not to be flung into the pool while he laughs maniacally.

“I thought you liked swimming!” he calls out, as if you are ten metres away, while approaching the water.

Trying to reason with Jungwon is like trying to reason with a crazy person—you are mostly certain Jungwon is a crazy person. It's for that reason that you screw your eyes shut and brace yourself, though the touch of the water never comes. Instead, it's warm linen on your skin when he drops you. It's Jake at your side on the garden couch when you open your eyes.

He's laughing and it's the best thing you've ever heard. “You should've seen your face,” he says through his cackles. “Fuck, Yongie. That was great.”

All you can do is close your eyes and enjoy the sun, enjoy the sounds of your friends enjoying themselves and the music and the chatter, the splashing in the water. The heat of his skin through your dress, the weight of his arm around your shoulders. Literally anything other than Jake's annoying laugh. It's only when he stops that you open your eyes again and he's staring with his lips parted, his eyebrows pulled together just a little. Your smile is involuntary, immediate, and he looks away as fast as he can, ears burning red.

Jake doesn't look at you until he's cleared his throat. “Food time,” he says, and lifts the most brilliant plate you've ever seen from the other side of him. It's heaped like a buffet plate with all your favourites. Gimbap, pizza, fried chicken, and chips with cheese on top.

You lick your lips despite yourself. “That looks so good,” you groan, far too lazy to get up for your own.

“It's yours.”

“Really?”

Smiling Jake nods his head and you kiss him on the cheek, mumbling, thank you, into his skin before turning your attention to the plate. You take a bite of everything before starting on the chips. Melted cheddar nearly burns the roof of your mouth, but still, undeterred, you chew on, having worked up quite the appetite with all of your socialising. At your side, Jake twirls the end of your ponytail around his finger and explains the inner workings of the Doki Doki Literature Club roleplay Discord server that Jaehyun and Yunjin crossed paths on.

“It was also like seven years ago,” he points out. “I can't even tell you what I was doing online at age fourteen.”

“Oh, you were looking up how to kiss on my laptop and actually fainting when my mum brought it up at dinner,” you supply since he asked, laughing despite yourself because even after all these years, the image of him crying at the table then passing out still cracks you up.

Jake, however, not so much. You're the only one who finds it funny, this secret you've decided to die with, this secret he continues to deny. A disbelieving scoff comes from him, eyebrows touching his hairline. “I'm telling you, YN, that was not me.”

“Yeah and it wasn't me either, so who does that leave?”

“I don't know, Yongie, it must've been a ghost or something.” Jake shrugs, affronted, like always, by your longstanding, well-founded accusation. He was the only other person who knew that your password was JaeyunFan1511, because he was the one who set it to that. “Do you believe in those?”

“Sure.”

“Anyway…“ And he continues, ignoring your laughter. As the story goes, Jaehyun and Yunjin had been in a locked roleplay channel with a couple of others before exchanging social media and learning they lived relatively close to each other. Their friendship fizzled out after a few months, but when they bumped into each other at a uni party last summer, they hit it off and got together. “But he was still in the server, and he had an RP girlfriend! He had two! And neither of them were Yunjin.”

Setting your slice of pizza down, you look over at him, parsing his face for any indication that he's taking the piss. “Are you, like, trying to be funny?”

“I wish, Yongie.” Jake shakes his head. “That's everything I know, I haven't talked to him since he told me.”

You sigh, leaning further into him. “Onto better things at least, for her, now that the coast is clear for Jay.”

“Mm, I'll have to wingman that tonight.”

“I already started.”

Jake's lips curl upwards. “Are you having fun though, darling? I'd say I'm doing a pretty good job of letting you keep all your thunder, right?”

With a mouth full of gimbap you nod your head, chewing a little more before mumbling, “Yes to both.”

He chuckles when he looks at you, wiping the corner of your mouth with his thumb, which is obviously fine and doesn't set off a flutter in your stomach or a hot flush in your cheeks. He smells faintly of sunscreen and chlorine, water dripping sporadically from his pool-darkened hair. It's cold when it hits your thigh, a nice contrast to the heat by your knee, where your sweaty bare skin touches his.

As if she'd been watching you this whole time, just waiting for you to finish eating, Minjeong snatches you from the couch as soon as you're done and drags you over to the big long table where she covers your eyes with her hands. There's a lot of shuffling and mumbling before the entire garden erupts into a disjointed chorus of Happy Birthday, and when Minjeong uncovers your eyes, Jake is holding your cake in front of you, chest and neck glowing orange from the lit candles. He's the only thing you can see. The only thing that matters.

“Make a wish, Yongie,” he says, and his voice is so gentle there's a sting behind your eyes as you screw them shut.

Making the same wish as this morning, and all of your birthdays since your tenth, you blow out the candles and wish for Jake.

After the cake and all the pictures, the energy doesn't seem to deplete. If anything, the music gets louder, your friends getting rowdier. About an hour later, in the bathroom upstairs, you take a minute to yourself, recharging before stepping carefully over and around the people talking and making out on the staircase. You're halfway down when the front door swings open and Sunoo walks in.

Caution to the wind, you sprint towards him and into his arms, giggling when he lifts you up off your feet. “Hola, señor, welcome back,” you mumble into his collarbone. Pulling away, you take a beat just to look at him. It's only been a month since you all visited him in Barcelona for his birthday, but it feels like an age has passed by without the sweet smiling scrunch of his nose and eyes. Without the lemon tang of his cologne or the warm sound of his laugh. The group is complete at long last, your birthday really beginning now at half eleven at night.

His eyes are big and wet when he opens them. “Happy birthday, sweetheart,” he says, sounding just as moved as you. “Fuck, I thought I was gonna miss it.”

You lug Sunoo's suitcase up to the room he and Heeseung always share and help him unpack. “I wanna hear everything,” you squeal, plugging his charger into the socket by his bed.

“No way, tonight's all about you! And I can't believe you didn't tell me Jake finally gave you that necklace.” He reaches out to look at it, brushing over the baby dragon with his thumb. “It's even better than the pictures.”

You roll your eyes but can't stop the smile on your lips. “Jeez, not you too. It only happened last night.”

Sunoo pulls two bottles of Spanish wine from his suitcase and sets them down on the dresser next to Heeseung's aftershave. “Look, I'm just glad it happened at all. Now it's your problem instead of ours.”

“What’s my problem?”

“Jake’s whole I'm in love with Yongie thing,” he says, delighted by his own bad Australian accent. “I mean, it was sweet, obviously, but it gets to a point, you know. Did you freak when he showed up yesterday?”

It does not feel as good as you thought it might to hear that. It actually does not feel good at all. So much so that if it weren't so surprising, you'd have glossed over it, pivoted to something else. Asked how to say, excuse me, Sunoo, what the fuck? in Spanish or something. But it is, to you, extremely surprising, so you say, “Jake's what?”

And Sunoo's eyebrows pinch together, his head tilting. “He’s been saying he was gonna confess with that necklace for as long as I've known him. Is that not what happened last night?” Now that you're looking at him, really looking at him, you see that his hair is shorter than it was last month, by quite a lot actually, so it doesn't flop over like it would normally. Weird.

Weird that you didn't notice, not that he cut it, it looks good. Suits him. “I like your haircut.”

“Thank you?”

“I have to go.”

Sunoo bursts out laughing, bewildered. “If you say so. Talk later, Mrs. Sim!”

In the safety of your bedroom, alone with your swirling thoughts, you pace back and forth, stepping around your open suitcase and the mess of clothes within instead of moving it to the side. It might be nice to organise though, to complete a task you have full control over. Logically, you know you don't have time to do it, but physically, before you can help it, you're kneeling on the hardwood floor emptying out your bag to repack. You fold up your underwear, rolling it neatly to fit in the zipper compartment with your socks. Swimming costumes are next, bikinis and one-pieces separated. Then it's tops, skirts, shorts, and dresses. And lastly, the black coverup from earlier.

It doesn't take as long as you thought it would, tidying up, nor do you feel any better, so you unpack again and do it twice more. Zipping up your now colour-coordinated suitcase, you wheel it into the corner of the room where Jake's is, so it doesn't get in your way. This time when you pace, you clutch your locket. Jake's locket, technically, if the years he spent holding onto it mean more than the night and day you've had it. Quicker and quicker, you pace the room, but your thoughts won't break, you can't get through to them, not properly.

Jake, AKA Mr. Change Isn’t All Bad, wavering in the face of his own ideology while expecting you to take it on board, to trust him. Is he a hypocrite for keeping this secret? Are you? Obviously he was going to tell you at some point, to confess, the locket is proof of that. Proof that a day would eventually arrive when all of this would come from Jake. A day he imagined could have been on this trip. This week. Between yesterday and Wednesday. Any day since he got the locket.

If change is good, if it can be good, why did he keep this from you?

At the sound of the door opening, you halt in your tracks, startled to find Jake standing in the arch behind you when you turn around. “Good evening, milady. Hath the night treateth thee well?” he asks, stepping into the room and greeting you with a deep formal bow. Light from the dock sweeps in through the window, showing off the grin on his face.

You can't bring yourself to share in his amusement, and you know it's bad when the clear sound of his giggles doesn't summon the same giddy butterflies it normally does. For once, his smile does nothing to move you, to settle your nerves. If anything, his smile scares you, makes you feel worse. That he could be so happy with the way things are, so unwilling to change, even for the better, makes you feel a bit sick. It hurts your throat to swallow, to say the words, we need to talk, when you blurt them out.

In the light once more, his smile falls and his eyebrows rise. “Sure,” he says. “Can I pee first?”

“No.”

“Okay, so I wasn't actually asking, YN. Obviously I'm gonna pee if I need to.”

“I'm coming with you.”

Jake lets out an amused breath. “Come on then.” With each step he takes towards the bathroom, the floorboards creak under foot—they do the same when you follow.

Against the locked door, you play with the hem of your dress, folding it up and up and up until your stomach is out before letting it go, the stretched cotton unravelling to graze your thighs again, before repeating the action. Your thoughts are scrambled, zipping by too quickly for you to get a proper hold on any of them, at least for long enough to figure it out. His feelings and yours, deep enough to discuss and share with others, to wish and complain, say, finally, in the face of the smallest hints of reciprocation, yet kept from each other and for all this time, behind closed mouths that begged to be fed. Closed mouths that still beg. You and Jake, and Jake and you, watching and waiting for divine intervention, some act of God or His blessed hand, of Sunoo as it turned out.

The toilet seat hits the lid and the rustle of fabric follows—his swimming trunks. You can't stop your wanting gaze quick enough, looking from your thighs to glimpse the untanned skin of his hips, his thighs and his small ass for longer than necessary, feeling your heart rate quicken before you screw your eyes shut and his pee hits the toilet water.

There's nothing weird about this. Mostly. You've peed in front of all of your friends. It's just that now that you're here, with him, this doesn't really feel like the right time to say everything you need to say, to get everything that's been weighing you down all these years off your chest. This definitely could have waited, at least for a moment where he wasn't standing with his soft dick in his hands. You're good at waiting after all, it's par for the course in your situation, though Jake hasn't quite taken to patience yet.

“Yongie?” he says, for what you're realising is the second time.

The toilet flushes.

“Huh?”

“What's the matter?” Jake asks. He's at the sink when you open your eyes, spots along the edges of your vision, along the edges of him. It takes a second for him to come into focus, his face flushed more than earlier with a worried look cast across it. Thick eyebrows drawn together, squinting eyes searching face. “You look terrified.”

You can only laugh then, pressing yourself against the door, because that's exactly how you feel too. Turning stomach and racing heart. Palms slick with sweat. Under Jake's gaze, you wipe your hands on your dress and give a smile that feels about right. “No, not at all—” You clear your throat, shaking your head. “—Sunoo's here.”

His face breaks out into a grin as he turns to the mirror, soap suds forming on his skin. “Fuck,” he says. “Finally!”

“Yeah, no, exactly. It's just that he said something really weird about you.”

And even weirder than Sunoo's words, is Jake's reaction. How his smile falls, and his body goes completely still for the fastest second—you'd have missed it if you blinked. “What'd he say?” he asks, clearing his throat afterwards then clearing it again.

“It was about us, I guess. That you… He said that you love me, Jaeyun.”

“Ah.” He lets out a breath, shoulders falling, seeming relieved. “Obviously I love you. And I love Layla, and Minjeong, and Jay, and everyone else.”

“Mm, obviously. Uh, the way he said it though, how he put it, it was like you might love me the way I love you.”

His eyebrows raise for a split second. “Oh, yeah? And what way is that?”

“More than I should,” you admit quietly and as scared as you are, it feels nice to say it. To get it off your chest.

If Jake heard you, or registered what you said, cared even, he gives no indication, only turning off the tap and shaking his wet hands over the sink. It would hurt less if he'd thrown up or said, ew, or, yuck, out loud. If he'd laughed. Anything but silence, anything but the way he approaches you only to dry his hands on the plush white towel by the door. It is unbearable to stand here in this, the aftermath, with Jake watching you from hardly an arm's length away. Still, you can't bring yourself to leave, hostage to your feelings and his reaction — or lack thereof — to them. You know now, just how much you love him, because the only thing you want to do is hide your face in his chest, to feel the beat of his heart against your cheek.

When he finally speaks, it's to say, “More than you should?”

You can only nod.

“Would that be okay with you, Yongie?” Jake asks, and the softness of his voice betrays his worry, the depth of his concern. He tucks your hair behind your ear, his hand trembling against your skin. A spark at the contact. “If I loved you like that, I mean? More than I should?”

“Yeah.”

A smile tugs at the corners of his lips, but he doesn't give in. Doesn't take his hand from your cheek or take his eyes off yours. “Are you sure? Because you look pretty upset about it.”

“It just, it scares me a bit,” you tell him, and it's the understatement of the century. If his eyes fell even slightly, he'd see your heart beating out of your chest, begging to be held in his hands, to be looked after by him, like always.

“That's okay.” Jake bites his bottom lip, watching you for a beat longer before taking your hand in his. He brings your palm to his bare chest, pressing it against his warm skin, right over his heart as it races away just like yours. “See, Yongie? It scares me too, a lot.”

He's trying, trying hard, laying himself bare, his literal heart in the palm of your hand, but it is not a comfort. For as long as you've known him, he's only had two real fears, needles and roller coasters, the only two things on earth he can't be pressured into. Otherwise, he spends a lot of time tempering your fears, weathering your storms for you — at least in the moment — dismantling them in a matter of sentences, but this, his honesty, Jake at his most vulnerable, is only scaring you even more.

You're being unfair. You know you're being unfair. Jake is gentle and accommodating and patient, and if you, for all of your flaws, are allowed to be scared, then so is he. You gulp and gulp again, trying to talk yourself down the way he usually does. And if anything, him opening up to you like this, showing this to you, can only be a good thing. He trusts you, he still trusts you, so things haven't changed that much.

Not yet.

“I know it's not what you want to hear, and I can't promise it'd be perfect or even easy, but I can promise that I'm always going to love you,” he admits, his voice so gentle and so sure. “I always have, YN.”

Like they tend to do, his words sink into you, that sweet look in his brown eyes taking over until you feel it too. Feel his certainty as if it's your own, his earnestness. The great rise and fall of his chest as he breathes intentionally, holding a deep inhale before releasing it. Over and over until his heart steadies itself, slowly but surely—the more you watch, the more you feel your heart doing the same thing. Feel the fear subsiding, feel butterflies swirling in the pit of your stomach, feel a smile breaking free.

“Always?” you ask as excitement takes its first breaths within you.

Finally, he caves too, letting a smile curve over his pink lips, a breathy laugh coming out as he nods his head. “I think so, but I only realised when you gave up on our pact,” he says. “I thought I was crazy, slicing my finger open like that just because you asked. And even while I was bleeding out, halfway to death, I wasn't mad you bailed on me, I was just happy to be with you.”

It's hard not to laugh hearing that, at the memory. After he'd done it, he lifted his hand to show you the tiny dot of red on the tip of his middle finger where he'd pricked himself with a safety pin, and flashed you a nervous smile, braces peeking out between his lips. The sight of it, of him, your wounded Jaeyunie, moved you to tears. Great full-bodied sobs that definitely would have alarmed his parents had they been home, or his older brother if he wasn't too busy yelling at his TV screen over a game of FIFA Street. You were beside yourself, apologising profusely because you just couldn't do it, not only would it hurt, but it was extremely unhygienic and do you know how many blood-borne diseases there are out there, Jaeyun?

And just like he said, he didn't get mad or even upset, he simply bandaged his finger and took you into his arms, stroking your hair until you calmed down.

“I think I was too busy trying to hide how I felt to notice that you felt the same,” you admit, in awe of the fact that while your heart had been secretly beating in his direction, his was doing the same in yours. In awe of the fact that right now, you can feel his heart racing again.

“Been a while since then though,” Jake points out, only continuing when you agree. “So I guess things won't change too much between us, right? Since we've loved each other this long, it'll be the same, don't you think?”

Sometimes it feels as if he holds the key to more than just your heart, but to the anxious muddle of your brain as well, so that he always knows what to say to nip your fears in their buds. And has the patience to do it all over again, reassuring you as best he can when they rear their ugly heads once more.

“Actually, I think there's one thing we could change,” he adds.

Tilting your head, you're pleased to find that the idea of something changing sparks curiosity rather than dread. “What is it?”

“We could, like…“ Jake has to stop to giggle, covering his mouth with his hand as he tries to calm down. “Like, kiss, you know?”

“I'd like that, but I think we could do a lot more than just kiss,” you suggest, and it's all it takes for him to cut the laughter.

Effective immediately—every last trace of amusement gone like it was never there in the first place, simply imagined. Replaced by his teeth biting down on his bottom lip and turning the pink white under the pressure. There's something there, to the look on his face, like his gears are turning slower and slower, overheated and lust-laden as yours at the sight of him. Jake's eyes trail every inch of your body, catching on your curves through your sheer cover-up, bright pink bikini beaming through white cotton. His palms scorch your waist when he takes hold of you, his tongue darting out to wet his lips. “Like what, gorgeous? Had some ideas myself, but I wanna compare notes with you.”

Butterflies, heat and awful, awful thoughts descend on you like a sudden shower. Your legs hooked over his shoulders, his teeth in your neck, grazing and biting, his pretty face all screwed up before his jaw falls slack; whimpers and whines and grunts and moans; his thrusts getting quicker, sloppy, until he comes, without a condom obviously. The ease with which you can conjure the thoughts, the clarity of the image and its familiarity is humiliating, that they've occurred to you on many a night spent with your hand between your thighs.

For fear of him seeing your thoughts written all over your face, you bury it in his chest and screw your eyes shut. “Don't be so untoward,” you mumble into his skin, liking the faint nip of salt on your lips when you lick them.

“You were untoward first,” he points out and you can hear his smile in his voice. “You're so hot, Yongie, don't be shy.”

When you muster up the courage to look at him, the pretty red kiss of alcohol and sunburn on his cheeks makes you smile, lips quirking into a giddy, horny curve. In his eyes though, where there had been heat, deep desire, there's only softness. A gaze that is so startling in its tenderness, in its pure love, that it makes your breath hitch in your throat before you ask, “What is it?”

“You love me,” he says reverently, as if he's informing you or he's only processed it now, taken it in.

“And you love me.”

Jake smiles, giving you a firm nod. “Yes, ma'am,” he says, leaning in to finally — finally — close the gap between your mouth and his.

Your mind blanks completely at the feel of it, of his plump lips on yours. A gentle brush at first, like he's testing the waters, like he doesn't know you're utterly gone for him. He licks slowly along the seam of your lips before you open up to him, and then, suddenly, it's everything. It's the taste of the beers he's had to drink tonight, the slip of his tongue over yours, of his damp hair through your fingers. A decade's worth of want, for him, for this, unfolding and collapsing in and around you.

There's no telling where your mouth ends and his begins, no discernment between bumping teeth and smiling lips, nor the shallow breaths exchanged from one to other. Your bodies are as close as they could possibly be, your Jake warm and solid and so in love against you, no room for anything to get between you. Not even his dick that presses thick and hard into you, long, more so than you'd ever realised.

At the first roll of your hips against his, Jake's grip on your waist tightens, a needy groan rumbling through his chest and into yours as he grinds back even harder. A lick of heat sets your body alight, taking over, so that before you even register it, you're pushing his hands lower, down over the curve of your ass. Moaning at the feeling of his greedy palms slipping under your dress, under your bikini bottoms to grab at your bare skin, to squeeze, to smack.

“Fuck,” he mumbles, the word hot against your mouth. “You're perfect, you know that?”

From your lips to his, a breathy laugh passes, an endless flutter going off in your stomach.

“I'm serious, YN.”

“Good.”

Jake smiles, that boyish grin that's never really changed, that's always had the same effect, always makes you smile too. But it doesn't stick around for long, as his focus seems to shift instead towards rocking his hips with yours. The pace he sets, enforces, is maddening, slow enough for you to feel every last inch of him on you, and with dizzying clarity, how he throbs and twitches. Yet, you miss him for the split second he pulls back before he's on you again. You're not sure you'll ever have enough, no matter how much he gives you, you probably won't be fully satisfied until you can peel his skin off and wear it over yours. For now though, you won't pretend there isn't a pool in your bikini, hot and sticky desire gathering between your legs. He presses wet kisses to your cheek, trailing down your neck and latching onto the sensitive spot that makes you weak in the knees, a shiver rolling down your spine as he holds you tighter.

On an exhale, you cry out his name, head against the door, nails sinking into his biceps. With his head on your shoulder, he lets out a jagged breath, his hips stuttering to a halt. “Fuck,” he whispers. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.”

“You did not,” you mumble, amazed by him, by the new heat coming from his swimming trunks and how you somehow want him even more.

It takes a moment for him to catch his breath, never mind speak, but finally, he says, “I did, Yongie. I promise I'm not usually so fast.” He almost sounds distraught, humming when you stroke his hair, scratching at his scalp with your fingernails.

“My sweet baby.” You can't stop yourself from smiling, from asking to see.

“I'm soft and I know it looks disgusting in there. Need a shower, YN.”

“I don't mind.”

He chuckles, lifting his head to peck your lips. “Go ahead, but don't say I didn't warn you.”

It's probably only because he's Jake, and you love him, that the sight doesn't repulse you when you pull back his waistband and take a look inside. Strings of cum connect the fabric to his soft penis and dark pubic hair. He groans at it, turning his head, but you can't look away. “Can I taste it?”

“Sure, Yongie, do what you want.”

What you want is to suck him off, so while Jake covers his eyes with his hands, you get down on your knees and take his dick into your mouth. It's warm and bland mostly, save for the slight salty tang hitting your tongue.

“YN,” he whispers. “What are you—shit.”

You pull off, stroking him with your hand and liking the heat of it as his tip starts to flush, the soft pink turning richer, redder. “I've never tasted it before, and you said I could,” you explain simply, eager to continue, to sate the pulse between your thighs.

“Yeah, but I…” Jake blinks hard before looking down at you. He's very handsome like this, with the sheen of sweat on his skin, shining under the bathroom lights. The thick length of his neck is flushed too, his ears. Your heart stutters against your ribs, your cheeks heating up as he bites down on his bottom lip and sighs. “You wanna suck me off, darling?”

Instead of answering with a simple, yes, you answer with a kiss to his tip, tonguing tonguing his slit while working your hands over the rest of him. It might be pretty if it weren't so big.

“Always so gorgeous, aren't you? Doesn't matter what you're doing,” he mumbles, pushing your hair away from your face with a soft smile. “It's yours, baby, take it all, yeah? Know you can.”

Desperate to please him, to have him in every single way, you open your mouth as wide as you can to take him in, relishing the weight of him, fully hard, on your tongue, the sting of your stretched lips at the corners. It's all you want, all that matters, to keep hearing those sweet little sounds, soft murmurs of your name along with praise. To see the look on his face, disbelief written all over it. Clear in the knit of his brows, his eyes wide for as long as he can keep them open, his swollen lips stuck ajar. It's getting to you, how much he seems to like it, like that you're the one doing it, so much that you can't help but press your thighs together as you bob your head, chasing friction, pressure.

His hips stutter whenever your tongue flicks at the underside of his head, making him grunt. “Just like that, YN, fuck. You know exactly what I like,” he tells you, fingers getting lost in your hair, guiding you back and forth along the length of him, rougher than he seems to realise. “Think this pretty little mouth was made just for me.” Whether Jake means it or it's just horny rambling, it makes your heart race anyway, because you think the same, think it so deeply, so entirely, you feel yourself clenching around nothing.

And when he comes for the second time it's with his tip at the back of your throat and your name on the tip of his tongue. Muttered curses spill out of him as you keep sucking anyway, paying no mind to the hot drops of his release slipping onto your chest and thighs. All the while, you tongue at his slit so he whines, whimpers, and throws his head back, until he can't take it any longer, pulling out. Falling to his knees. You can't resist him, wiping his cum from your skin and sucking your fingers clean. Sucking on his thumb when he strokes your cheek. Leaning in and taking his bottom lip between yours to suck on that too.

“So good, baby,” he mumbles, breathless. “Way too good.”

The heat in your stomach doesn't subside, if anything, it spreads. Especially with the way he looks down at you, his eyes boring into yours, warm pools of deep brown and all the love in the world. “I love you, Jake“ you say, and it feels like the first time. Fresh and exciting and giggle inducing. It is the first time, technically, saying it in this way, for him to hear and understand exactly how you mean it. “I really love you so much.”

“I love you so much too,” Jake says, and it's so much better to hear it from him. He pecks your lips, smiling when you lick into his mouth. “And I'm sorry about earlier, didn't mean to push you like that, yeah?”

A chance for both of you to catch your breath, to calm down, only comes when he gets into the shower. You brush your teeth, liking the dull ache in your jaw and the raw feeling in your throat, skin glowy and radiant after you wash your face. On cloud nine, you sit on the end of the bed to wait for Jake, but you can't sit still. Leg bouncing frantically while you drum your hands against your bare thighs. Restless, you get up and once again, pace the length of the room, this time with a grin you can't control playing on your lips. This surplus energy comes in handy though, because when Jake joins you in the bedroom, he wastes no time getting his head between your thighs and evening the score.

Now that you and Jake have kissed once, a few times — a hundred — it’s impossible to stop. And each time is better than the last. First thing in the morning, you share giddy kisses in bed. And again right after brushing your teeth. Alone in the kitchen, you kiss against the countertop. And again by the pool after he swims four laps to impress you.

His arms flex to show his muscles as he lifts himself out of the water, droplets running down his skin, racing through the dip in his chest, his abs. He’s already starting to tan, a clean line around his hips where the golden skin turns lighter under his shorts. Just the sight of it, the memory of it and everything else you saw last night, heats your skin, tugs your lips up at the corners. Jake straightens his waistband before extending a huge hand to help you up from the concrete, pulling you into him and pressing his lips to yours again and again. He giggles into your mouth, palms holding your hips to his. It’s hard to kiss like this, with both of you grinning against each other’s lips, but you don’t stop trying.

“I. Love. You,” he says between pecks. “So. So. Much.”

You will never tire of hearing him say that, even though it’s the other thing you can’t stop doing now that you’ve done it once. It comes out at every opportunity, for Jake at least, you’ve been having fun teasing him, verbally opposing the flush in your cheeks and the grin on your face. “I. Know. You. Do.”

Unimpressed, he pulls away to look down at you, and seeming to notice your squinting eyes, he turns you around so the sun heats your back and his chest instead of your face. Now that you can see him properly, you can see that his smiling lips are covered in lip gloss. Most of his face is covered in it, shiny pink on his chin and cheeks, the tip of his nose. “Say it back,” he mumbles into your palm while you clean him up, though it’s no use, because you press your lips right back to his.

“It. Back.”

“Not. Funny.”

You pull away, playing with the wet hair at the nape of his neck, twirling the longer tufts of it around your fingers. “Why are we laughing then?” you ask, struggling to stop.

Jake’s eyes and nose are scrunched, happy creases all over his face. “Because it’s funny watching you play hard to get after last night,” he whispers, and the uneven slant of his lips undoes you. “You’re a very bad actor, Yongie.”

Unfortunately, he’s got you there. It was like he’d hypnotised you, cast a spell so that the only things you could say were his name, and I love you. Every single time he touched you made it worse, each stroke of his tongue or brush of his fingers had you reeling, his name hardly more than a desperate cry or a sob—never mind the sight of him kneeling between your legs breathing heavily, his lips and chin covered in you.

Completely defenceless, shameless maybe, you pull the only card you can. “Yeah, well, you’re hard.”

“Your. Fault.” He pushes your hips back so you can’t feel him pressed against you. “Love. You. Too. Much.”

The smile that curves your lips is reflexive, a knee-jerk reaction just like the butterflies in your stomach. “I. Love. You. More.” Flustered and giddy and giggling, you run away from him and all the way up to Minjeong’s room, flinging the door open.

She’s laying on her beautiful four-poster bed, scribbling into her diary, but she abandons it at the sight of you. “Holy shit!” she says, covering her mouth. “You had sex last night.”

You let the door swing shut behind you, biting your lip to stifle a smile. “I wish.”

“Those words don’t match your afterglow.”

“It’s thirty degrees, MJ. I’m sweating.” You roll your eyes, climbing into the bed next to her. “And there’s no such thing as an afterglow when you kiss someone—we would’ve heard about that by now. Although he did finish in his shorts, so I guess we did hook up.”

Minjeong’s eyes are like saucers. “Jake what? Just from kissing?”

“Kissing?” Yizhuo asks from the doorway. “You kissed Jake?”

“They’ve been kissing all morning, I could see them from my window,” Aeri supplies, slipping past Yizhuo and into the room. It’s just like yesterday in the kitchen, except the telephone is working perfectly. “It was gross, in a cute way, I guess.”

“And he came in his shorts!” Minjeong squeals, kicking her feet.

This development, revelation, has Aeri and Yizhuo’s jaws on the floor, gasping as they rush over to the bed and leap onto the duvet in front of you. Having had your first and last sexual experiences during the summer before university, you’ve never had a story to share during debriefs, always in the listener’s shoes eager to hear more.

Spurred on by the thrill of evoking this reaction, you can’t help but say, “Then he came in my mouth!”

Clearly as delighted as you, the girls break out into giggles and applause, nudging each other and hugging you, smiling from ear to ear. Your heart is racing in your chest, the smile on your face aching your cheeks, as they set off in a chorus of oh my gods and finallys. Maybe in the grand scheme of things — at least in your group — a blowjob was hardly anything to write home about, hardly anything to warrant more than a hum or a nod or a what else, but your having given one, and having given one to Jake, made the very admission seem like some kind of generational disclosure, some unique foray into sexual exploration. Made you something of a pioneer, an innovator even.

Like air from a popped balloon, the story launches out of you, from picking your coverup and eating on the couch, to Sunoo’s slip-up and watching Jake pee, absolutely no detail is spared. Especially not when it comes to the feeling of Jake’s head between your legs. The whole time, your cheeks burn furiously and all of your words come out a mile a minute so you have to take a deep breath at the end, the girls watching you with varying levels of shock painted on their faces.

It’s Minjeong who speaks first, tilting her head. “So he’s just as pathetic as he looks? That’s really hot, like, I’m sorry but he’s extremely hot.”

“Right?” Aeri nods.

“I wouldn’t have thought to use that word…” You trail off. In theory, it seems a harsh thing to say, pathetic, but the more you think about it, the more objectively true it becomes. His little moans and whimpers, how easily he got hard in his shorts, how easily he finished. Pathetic. Maybe he is a little, but you like it, love it, feel a shiver down your spine at the thought. “It was sweet in the moment, how I said his name and he just fell apart, but yeah, I guess you’re right.”

Yizhuo sighs, shaking her head. Her cheeks and neck are flushed red. “I’ve never looked at him like that, but… I understand you so much better now, YN. You guys are freaky as fuck, I have to respect it. And I’m a thousand percent sure Sunoo did that on purpose.”

You hadn’t considered that, but it was the exact sort of thing he would do, losing his patience faster than the rest of you and taking matters into his own hands. After all, you and Jake had waited years, and it only took Sunoo a handful of minutes to confess on his behalf. There was no reason to wonder though, it was just as likely he’d gotten the same idea as everyone else had in the kitchen, and sharing your thinking, Aeri says, “I think he just saw the locket and thought the same as we all did.”

“Uh uh.” Minjeong shakes her head, lifting her phone to show you the screen. It’s her text thread with him.

Minjeong: Jake gave her the necklace and didn’t say anything, he’s so fucking stupid. They’re just gonna be friends forever atp all bc he thinks he’ll scare her off

Sunoo: LMAOOOOO poor guy has rocks for brains BUT not completely doomed he just needs our help

Sunoo: *MY help

“That’s a little mean,” you mumble half-heartedly. “It was me being stupid.”

Yizhuo pinches the bridge of her nose. “If you and Jake kissing means we have to be nice to him all the time, I’m voting against this relationship.”

“Yizh—”

“All in favour of JakeYN breaking up right now, say, aye.”

Right in front of you, all of the girls raise their hands and from the doorway, Jimin gawks at you. “JakeYN doing what?”

“Well, we’re not even really…” You trail off, only realising now that you didn’t exactly put a word on what the two of you are. “Together in the official sense.”

Yizhuo sighs. “Oh, Lord.”

For Jimin’s sake — and yours — you tell the story again from top to bottom, while Aeri, Minjeong, and Yizhuo listen again, just as eager and nosey as the first time, oohing and ahhing at all the same parts. Jimin has a lot more questions than they did though—is he big? Yes, Jimin. Thick? Yes, Jimin. He looks like he’d whimper, does he whimper? Yes, Jimin.

With everyone caught up to speed, you rush to your room — relieved to find it empty — and bring your suitcase into Minjeong’s so the girls can help you pick out something to wear to the beach. Luckily, it’s perfectly organised, with all of your swimming costumes neatly rolled up next to your underwear so you don’t have to take everything out to find all of them. At the end of the bed, you stand in a row appraising the spread of your swimwear.

“I think you need to wear the world’s tiniest bikini, so these are out,” Jimin says first, taking all of your one pieces and rolling them back up the way you had them packed. Whether or not she receives the mental thanks you extend her way is anyone’s guess.

“Your ass looks best in this one.” Yizhuo lifts the blue bikini you wore on Saturday night.

Aeri rebuts with a strappy black bikini in her hand. “Your boobs look better in this one though.”

“No, that’s your Instagram bikini,” Minjeong says, shaking her head. “You can’t do anything if you wear that.”

“I guess I could take pictures for Instagram,” you point out, not really caring which bikini they pick, obviously you like them all or you wouldn’t have brought them. The main reason you’re even letting this decision spiral into such a big thing is that you’re having fun with the girls, having fun feeling fully like you’re part of them, one of them. Mostly, your attachment to Jake is harmless, but it comes at the expense of this sometimes.

With her arms around your waist and her chin on your shoulder, Jimin speaks right into your ear, making you squirm. “Or Jake could take pictures,” she sing-songs, and you can picture the waggle of her eyebrows. “Wear the black one, YN, he’ll like it. And I’ll like it if he doesn’t.”

Heeding her advice, you take the black two piece from Aeri. “He’ll definitely like it, he’s a boob guy for sure.”

“I think he’s a you guy,” Minjeong says, gathering up your swimming costumes and packing them away. “What do you mean for sure?”

A pang of heat burns your skin, flooding your cheeks. You can’t even look at her — or any of the girls — eyes darting to the pastel pink painted wall on the other side of the room. The white trim and sheer white curtains. Fanning your face, you finally say, “He was all over them basically, like, in bed.”

From Minjeong’s vanity, Aeri scoffs, spinning around in the fluffy desk chair to glare at you. “For a story you told in grave detail, it seems like you missed out a lot of details.”

“You know what they say.” You shrug, feigning nonchalant like you’re not grinning from ear to ear. “A true gentleman doesn’t kiss and tell, ladies.”

“Okay, so you’re obviously not a true gentleman considering you described the exact movement of his tongue on your cl—” You cut Jimin off with your hand over her mouth.

“Jesus,” you mumble. “I was there, alright? I get it.”

As you’d expect for two p.m. in the dead of July, the beach is heaving. Families dot the sand with bright parasols and screaming children, while lines of vendors sell ice cream and hot dogs and chilled water for more than what’s reasonable. In the middle of it all, on a mass of beach towels, you and the girls drink cider and beat the same long-dead, stupid, stupid Jungwoo–shaped horses as always.

“You could ditch the first two movies and still make sense of the story, Revenge of the Sith is clearly the best.” Aeri huffs, putting her book down to defend her favourite of the prequels. “The Phantom Menace was boring as fuck, you only like it for Padmé’s dresses.”

Even though you’re not part of the conversation, at this accusation, you have to speak up. “No one’s watching Phantom Menace for the dresses, Aeri. Everyone knows Padmé’s best dress is at the Naboo picnic in Attack of the Clones.”

“Thank you!” Jimin pats you on the back, pleased that you’ve come to her defence. “I never even said Phantom Menace was the best, I just like it. Obviously Revenge is better, I mean, isn’t Anakin such a big, strong boy in that one?”

Aeri doesn’t even dignify that with a response, at least not with words anyway. Instead, she puts her head down, face in the towel and lets out a scream louder than your laughter, causing families and couples to look around in terror.

Regardless of the crowd, and oblivious to Aeri’s mounting irritation, the boys do keepy ups in a tight circle with varying degrees of skill. Jake doesn’t drop the ball once, neither does Heeseung. Sunoo does well enough to keep Jake happy. Jay’s very good at kicking the ball, but not so much at the aiming of the ball, which leaves poor Sunghoon sprinting off to the shore before he has a proper chance to play.

It doesn’t take long before Jay gets kicked out and a visibly irritated Jake calls time out. “Yongie,” he yells, waving with both of his arms, lips spreading into a stomach-fluttering grin. “Hey, darling! Sub in?”

You shake your head, pointing over at them. “Jay’s right there!”

Jake actually laughs at that, his head falling back. “We need someone good, Yongie, please?”

“No, thank you.”

His lips curl downwards, pushing out into a pouty frown, but you remain strong, unswayed no matter how cute he is, no matter how much every last fibre of your body cries out to be near him. You’re already tired from the heat, and — having opted for the picture bikini in the end — not actually dressed to run around the beach anyway. Seeming stumped, Jake stands there with his hands on his hips, watching you, perhaps trying to communicate that he’d really like to be spending time with you at the minute. At least, that’s the message you’re trying to send him, willing him to ditch the game altogether and join you on the blanket, though he does no such thing.

It’s Sunghoon who calls Aeri over to play instead, and with a grumble, she swaps with Sunoo so the game can continue. They even work up a rally, now that Jay’s been relegated to ball boy, and before long, Yizhuo runs over to join in too. You and Jimin and Sunoo stay safe on the blanket, watching over napping Minjeong and taking turns to wake her up so she can turn over.

“One more question.” Jimin lifts her head from her book, looking out at the group for a beat before she looks at you. “Was he good?”

“At what?”

“In bed.”

A smile tugs at your lips before you can help it, destined forever to giggle and blush at the memory by the looks of things. “I’d say so, I don’t have much to compare him to, but…” You trail off, looking over your shoulders before leaning in and whispering the rest. “He made me finish twice.”

“Twice?” Sunoo repeats, eyebrows shooting up.

“With his mouth, yeah.”

“So that’s the kissing he was talking about,” he says with a slow nod.

Jimin nudges him, muttering his name, unimpressed. He nudges her right back, rolling his eyes. “What? He’s the one who said a true gentleman doesn’t kiss and tell.”

“Jeez.” She sighs. “You two really are perfect for each other.”

Fighting your smile is futile, so you don’t bother. You’d have to agree with her, eternally thankful that she sees it too, even if she’s told you in a ridiculous context. Pushing your sunglasses up into your hair, your eyes find Jake right away, latching onto the sight. The flex of his back as he stretches this way and that, muscles accentuated by the slick sheen of sweat. The bob of his glistening Adam’s apple in his throat. The tipping back of his head whenever someone drops the ball, how he groans in frustration.

“Hoon, you totally had that, are you fucking kidding?” Jake’s red in the face and pinching the bridge of his nose, but Sunghoon only shrugs, laughing as Jay runs off towards the shore to collect the ball.

This side of him amuses all of you, the loveliest, most patient person any of you know losing his cool over the slighting thing if sports are involved. His hyper-competivity is probably the reason he’s always been so good at football, that he takes it seriously, more meticulous on the pitch than with anything else.

For you though, Jake in this state, all riled up and irritated, is a guilty pleasure. The clench of his jaw, the way he rakes his hand through his wet hair, how he cuts his eyes at Sunghoon, seeming more annoyed by the way he only laughs harder. These tics, and them existing on Jake, force your heart to race, skipping beat after beat against your ribs to no end.

“Sunoo,” you say, leaning forward to get a good look at him. “Tell Jake if he ever feels like being ungentlemanly, he doesn’t have to hold back.”

His ears burn red and he hums in response, giving you a thumbs-up.

“You’re disgusting, YN.” Jimin gives you a discerning look from top to bottom as if she’s relearning you, reassessing, and, clearly liking what she sees, she grins. “I love it.”

You can only smile because you love it too, love this side that he brings out of you, this side that you don’t have to keep to yourself anymore, this side that Jake loves as well—Jake who still stands irritated amongst the group. You’re drawn in completely by the pinch of his eyebrows, by the way his frustration melts away as soon as he catches your eye. The crease of his brows smooths over, and his lips curl up when you blow him a kiss.

Apparently deciding he’s had enough of the game, he comes bounding over the way Layla normally does, further committing to the bit by laying down on top of you, his front to your back, like a hot and gangly weighted blanket. Burying his face into the crook of your neck, he presses tickly kisses to your skin, pecking a trail up to your cheek where he stops and mumbles, “D’you see me play, Yongie? Was I good?”

“Yes, Jake, very,” you say through a smile that aches your cheeks.

Instead of thanking you, his response is to roll over so he’s lying on his back and pulling you close. Everywhere he touches, your skin is on fire, soft fingertips hotter than the shining sun against you. Giddy giggles trickle out of you like water from a tap, endless as the ocean, even while he kisses you—a messy liplock that you can hardly focus on for the thudding of your heart in your ears, for the way your friends cheer and applaud behind you.

He pulls away and it’s an affront, though he’s still smiling, the pointy corners of his lips quirked up and beautiful as he looks at you, breathless. “Why didn’t you wanna play with us? You know you’re my favourite teammate.”

“This isn’t really a sports bikini,” you explain, liking the way his hand falls from your back to your hip, twirling the string. “One deep breath and I’m flashing everyone.”

Jake nods, patting your thigh and letting his eyes fall to your chest. “I can tell,” he says, laughing on an exhale as his hand comes up between you, pulling the black cup more securely over your left breast. “Instagram bikini.”

“Mhm.” You give him a peck, but he holds you against him, his hand slipping into your hair to keep you right where he wants you, which apparently is as close as humanly possible just to kiss you.

It’s never just kissing with Jake though, that’s the thing, and you’re not sure it ever could be. More than lips on lips and tongue on tongue, it’s a full body experience. It’s your knee slipping between his, your foot stroking his calf, it’s his dick hard against you, his hands slipping over your body. The lick of heat in the pit of your stomach, the lightness in your head and in your body like none of it is real, like you don’t really exist. But you could never complain, not when his soft lips move so savouringly over yours. Not when his tongue licks into your mouth with such care, drawing hushed whines out of you, out of him, deep and slow like he wants to feel every single part of your mouth, like he wants to fall into you, to become one.

Unconcerned about anyone else, Jake lets his hand slip over your ass, cupping it gently. And as much as you like it, you lift his hand to a decent height on your waist, making him chuckle. “Couldn’t. Help. It,” he tells you between kisses and breaths. “Not. Sorry.”

“You’re a disaster, Jake,” you whisper, even though you’re smiling, even though the only thing keeping your hands out of the front of his shorts is that they’re too busy tugging his hair. “No decorum at all.”

“I’m saying this in the most respectful way possible, but it’s kinda impossible for me to have decorum when you look like that. I mean, now that I’m allowed to touch you after all these years of wanting to, Yongie, it’s all pent up.” His gentle voice doesn’t match his words or the hungry look in his blown eyes.

You gulp, and the only thing you can think to say is, “Yeah?”

“Yeah.” He nods. “Look so good in black, in everything.”

“Thank you.” Holding eye contact is a feat, but there’s nowhere you’d rather look than at your sweet Jake, no matter how much your cheeks burn.

“Such a perfect girl, YN, even look good in nothing,” he says, and you can hear in his raspy voice, see in his lidded eyes, feel on your stomach that he wants you in a way he can’t have you on the beach, but it just sounds earnest. Sweet.

The smile on your face and the cold sweat on the back of your neck answer for you. At once, it’s affirming and terrifying to hear these things from him, these things that only ever existed in the deepest, darkest recesses of your mind, nestled away behind the wholesome stuff. Cuddles and held hands. Forehead kisses, wearing his hoodie. These things you’ve only ever let out late at night by yourself. All you can do is hide your face in his chest and feel the rumble of his laughter on your nose.

“Don’t need to be shy, Yongie, not with me,” he mumbles, kissing the top of your head.

Leaning back, you face him again, liking the freckles forming in the middle of his face, scattered over the broad bridge of his nose, the red pimples on his forehead and chin, this face you’ve come to know better than your own. As if it’s your own. How could you ever be shy with him? Your bestest friend, your… whatever he is now. Dread casts a cool shadow over you at the mere thought. You press a soft kiss to his lips, but it doesn’t help.

“I’m not shy, this is just weird,” you admit. “No offence."

“What’s weird?”

Motioning into the space between you, you cringe at the way Jake’s face falls, though briefly. He clears his throat before he speaks. “You don’t like… us?”

“I do, Jake. I love it, I just…” You press your lips together and wait, either for Jake to supply the rest of your sentence or the world to come to its fiery end, saving you from the duty of salvaging what you’ve so quickly torn apart. Neither happens, so you push on, ignoring the ache in your chest. “I pictured this for so long that having it, having you, is a bit weird. Not in a bad way, it’s just… as if it’s not real or something, like I’m dreaming.”

Jake pinches your waist, making you cry out and you hear your friends cheering behind you. “See, Yongie? Not a dream. Dreams aren’t nearly as good as this,” he says.

He’s right, but just like he said they wouldn’t, things have changed a lot. Good change — amazing, even — but that doesn’t make this any less surreal. Doesn’t tamp the fuzzy feeling when he kisses you or tells you that he loves you, nor the way he seems to glow whenever you look at him. After all, the sun can’t rise if it doesn’t set, and dream or not, you’ll have to wake up eventually.

Seeming to realise he hasn’t quite soothed you, he changes his tack, stroking your hair and pecking your lips. “Does all of it feel like that or just right now, Yongie?”

You take a moment before responding, trying to feel more in the moment than in your head. Over your shoulder, your friends chat and bicker and laugh, the same as everyone else around you. By Jake’s head, the coarse sand is hot on your palm, slipping easily through your fingers. Against you, Jake is solid, he is warm and waiting. Patient. Yours. On his collarbone, there is a purple bloom in the shape of your mouth. It’s enough to ease the tightness in your throat so you can say, “Just right now.”

Jake doesn’t speak right away, only eyeing you instead, slowly like he’s taking you in. He gulps before he speaks. “I think that’s alright then, Yongie. Because even if this is a dream, I’ll be sleeping right next to you when you wake up, won’t I?” he asks, waiting for your response. You nod, so he continues. “And I’ll love you just as much as I do right now.”

You have no idea how you got so lucky, how someone could possibly love you this much—how that someone could be the one person you’ve wanted so badly all this time. His heart and yours beating in tandem, towards and for each other, bound by a single thread of gold or something greater, and you had no idea.

“Okay,” you mumble, hiding your face in the crook of his neck. “Now I’m shy.”

Holding you tight, he presses his lips to your ear. “So am I,” he admits. “I love you.”

“I love you,” you say back, and it feels more honest than before, better somehow. Better to hear the spread of his lips into a smile, to feel it and his heart racing against his chest. Against you.

Being this close to him is addictive, to deeply inhale his citrus and sunscreen scent, and taste the salt of the ocean on his skin, is maddening. A hot, shaky breath hits your shoulder when you lick his neck, fingertips sinking deeper into your flesh.

The promise of food wasn’t enough to separate the two of you, but the smell of food wrenches you apart, forcing you to join the circle of your friends eating burgers and hot dogs and chips.

And even as you sit cross-legged, laughing and talking with everyone else, Jake’s hand rests on your thigh, and your hand rests on top of his. At least until it’s actually time to eat, and he splits his burger in two while you do the same with your hot dog, giving each other the bigger half—you don’t even have to check to know he’s taken the pickles out. With your thumb, you wipe ketchup from the side of his mouth and he adjusts the cup of your bikini and both of you giggle at the fuss your friends make about it.

Once everyone’s done eating, Jake volunteers the two of you to take away all the rubbish, stuffing carrier bags with styrofoam containers and wooden cutlery and empty cans. He carries everything over to the bins and you do all the sorting before rejoining your friends hand in hand. By the time you reach them, they’re all scattered, split off by activity—napping, drinking, and reading. With you two back, another activity starts: planning. “Are you free tomorrow, darling?” Jake asks, his arm heavy around your shoulders.

“Yes, Jakey.”

A smile plays at the corner of his lips and he nods his head, but he keeps his gaze locked on the shore no matter how long you stare at him. “Same,” he says.

“Cool,” you say, grinning.

Red scatters slowly over his ears and neck, nipping his cheeks as they lift with his smile and finally, he looks at you. Eyes wide and golden in the sun, brown hair blackened and slicked back with seawater save for one stubborn strand over his forehead. He looks like a prince and your heart stutters in your chest at the thought.

“Well… since we’re both free tomorrow, how about I take you out, Yongie?”

“Like, on a date?” you ask, covering your mouth with your hand for fear of screaming at the top of your lungs.

Jake chuckles, taking your wrist in his hand and tugging it down. “Yeah, gorgeous, exactly like a date. Just you and me.”

Heat overtakes you, flooding your cheeks and your neck and swirling in your stomach, an endless stir all throughout your body like a shaken can of fizzy juice. “Yes, please,” you say, but it’s more of a squeak.

“You’re so cute,” Jake says under his breath, pulling you close to kiss your temple. “I’ll pick you up at eight, alright?”

And even though you’re staying in the same house, you nod and tell him, “I’ll be ready at seven. I’m ready now.”

As he said he would, at eight p.m. sharp, Jake knocks on the door of the bedroom you share to pick you up. And as you said you would be, you were ready at seven.

In the external sense at least, because you’ve spent an hour admiring your reflection and taking pictures in the short white linen dress that the girls picked out for you. On the inside, you feel about as relaxed as a fish out of water, your stomach and its contents flipping and flopping. It’s just a shame he arrived before you thought to repack your suitcase or alphabetise your bodycare on the sink. But none of that matters in the end, because when you open the door and see Jake standing behind it, smiling, you can’t even remember what you were so worked up about.

“H—” His eyes widen, looking you up and down and down and up before he clears his throat and he tries again. “You look so beautiful, Yongie.”

“So do you.”

The giggle that he lets out is contagious, passed between your mouths in a kiss that lasts too long. Taking your hand, he leads you through the suspiciously quiet house, hardly a trace of your friends at all as you step out into the garden, going all the way to the back behind the shed. Jake climbs the stile in the fence first, then helps you over with his hands on your waist. On steady ground, you don’t pass up the opportunity to press a kiss to his soft lips.

“I love this dress,” he tells you. “My. Beautiful. Girl.”

Despite the grin on your face, still you keep your mouth on his. “Always. All. Yours.”

“Lucky, lucky me,” Jake says through a smile, giving you a peck and then another before pulling you through the clearing and out to the beach.

Generous perhaps, to call it a beach, this little private strip that’s more giant slabs of glittering rock than sand along the shore where you all used to skinny dip until a rogue jellyfish stung Jay’s ass. A smile splits your lips at the memories, a happy warmth in your chest that only heightens and spreads at the nod of Jake’s head towards something behind you. On the rock furthest from the water, is a cosy-looking nest of blankets and cushions, lined at the outer edge with fairy lights, and a wicker basket in the middle of it all.

“You like it, Yongie?” he asks, a sheepish look in his curious eyes.

“Jake…” You trail off, unable to find the words to express how much you love it. How much you love him.

Behind him, the tide rushes against the rocks, a constant crash that rivals the thud of your heart, darkening the slabs and making them glossy. In your silence, he shifts his weight from one foot to the other, scrunching his nose. “I know it’s not much, but I didn’t want to wait until we got home to treat you.” His voice is but a murmur over the ocean, and still your stomach sinks.

“Are you joking? Jake, no one’s ever do—” Realising how wrong you are, you have to stop mid-sentence, because someone has done something like this for you before, because Jake is always doing things like this for you. Always going out of his way to show you he cares, to make you happy. “It’s perfect,” you say. “It’s absolutely perfect.”

Together on the blanket, Jake lets you open up the basket, beaming as you fawn over the crisps and dip he picked out, the nice cocktail cans and yogurt-covered pretzels, the banana chips. And a delighted laugh comes out of him when you lose your mind at the sight of a clear container with honeydew feta salad inside, chili crisp tickling your nose as soon as you take the lid off. “Look how thin you sliced the cucumbers!” you all but squeal.

Jake, who only ever slices his cucumbers in thick strips, is blushing, beautiful red breaking through his smiling cheeks. “Jay helped a little bit with that, but it was mostly me once I got the hang of it.”

Fuelled by love and hunger and a quick kiss, you continue through the basket. Japchae, tinfoil wrapped ham & cheese toasties, and perfectly pinched dumplings. Raspberries dipped in dark chocolate, and a foggy tub of pork belly. It’s more food than you’re sure you can eat, but you’re happy to try. Apart from what he’d obviously picked up, it’s clear he made it all himself — with maybe some help — and all for you.

Your giggles are instantaneous, light and giddy, as Jake joins in. “So this is why I wasn’t allowed in the kitchen all afternoon?”

He nods. “Worth it?”

“More than,” you whisper, liking the pleased smile on his lips. Looking into the basket once more, you find a heap of shiny gold foil beaming up at you. “Holy shit,” you manage through a laugh.

“What, baby?”

Like a magic trick, when you grab the first condom, an endless string of them follows from the depths of the basket and you can’t stop laughing, genuinely having to fight for breath. “I was wondering what we were gonna have for dessert.”

Jake doesn’t share in your amusement though, his face falling as he snatches them like they might hurt you, and says, “I didn’t put those in there!”

“Are you sure?”

“I swear.”

Even though you believe him, you can sense the evening taking a turn towards how-to-kiss-gate and nip it in the bud immediately, giving him a big hug and assuring him that you know he wouldn’t do that, all while stifling your laughter and stroking his hair.

With Jake’s mood all taken care of, it’s time to tuck in and the food he prepared is just as good as it looks. The japchae light and the pork belly tender, sweet salad with a perfect kick. You can’t help but moan around each bite, around his fingers when he feeds you raspberries, constantly losing track of the conversation as it goes. Patient as ever, Jake only repeats himself or reminds you gently, accepting your apologies with a smile, seeming happy just to be here. Just to be with you. As the heat of the sunshine wanes, so too does your hunger. Having tried everything, you at least feel satisfied when you tap out, pushing your plate towards him. He’s not faring much better than you are, though he does finish off your pork belly. The more time you spend out here, the more you notice how lost he gets in the quiet, frozen in place, staring into the distance.

All it takes to steal his attention from the glimmering shoreline is you squeezing his knee, gaze finding yours, lips curling into a dizzying smile. A lingering peck pressed to your lips, your cheek, and then, “Can we talk about something?”

“Mhm.”

Looking down at his lap, Jake clears his throat and says, “I know a lot has changed between us since your birthday, but in my opinion it’s all been good. What do you think?” It’s only when he’s finished speaking that he looks at you.

“It’s different, but it feels right,” you admit, mirroring the grin that spreads on his lips. “I’m happy, Jake. You make me happy.”

Seeming a bit more sure of himself, he nods, locking his fingers with yours, thumb rubbing the back of your hand. “I’m the same, I mean you’re exactly what I want, Yongie. You’re who I want. You always have been, and you make me so… I just get so excited when it comes to you, even if I read your name somewhere or I hear it, my heart beats out of my chest.”

As he says the words, your heart does exactly that, beating so fast and so hard you can hear it in your ears, feel it in your throat. You can’t believe this is happening, that any of this has happened over the past few days, that tomorrow, when you wake up in the morning, it’ll be to pack your bags and go home.

“And I feel really sorry that you had to hear it from someone else first, but I love you, YN. I love you so much. I wanna do everything with you, and more than anything, I’d like to be your boyfriend,” Jake admits, only taking a beat to breathe at the end. “Is that… would you like that as well?”

Fuzzy warmth finds a home in your chest, blooming and spreading and forcing giggles out of you. Nodding your head, it’s all you can do to hope he can read your mind like he always has. More than anything, Jake, you think. You’re all I want. Like a penny to a magnet, your lips find his, drawn in over and over and over again. You can’t even help it. Can’t help but hold his face in your hands. Can’t help but say, “I. Love. You.” Hardly noticing you’ve been kissing for so long until your knees start to ache against the blanket.

You pull away and don’t wipe your lip gloss from his smiling face.

Once the two of you manage to stop giggling and kissing and lingering and kissing again, packing up the picnic is an easy task. You hand empty containers to Jake who places them neatly in the basket, same with your cutlery and cans and wrappers.

It really doesn’t take long at all and with pursed lips, he latches the basket shut, patting the top and staring out at the shore before saying in a quiet voice, “I really am sorry about the condoms, Yongie. I’m sure it was just one of the guys trying to be funny or something.”

“I know, I know, and I thought it was funny, baby, it is funny. We’ll just take them back to our room and see how many we can use tonight,” you suggest, already looking forward to later, hoping that he’s looking forward to it too, though his expression betrays nothing.

Jake’s eyes flick over your face and he finally smiles, a slow, lopsided, butterfly inducing curve of his lips as he takes your locket in his hand, pulling you closer for a quick kiss. “Lower your expectations, my love. Promise you’ll be happy even if we only use two?”

Your stomach does a swoop at that, my love. “I’d be happy even if we didn’t use any,” you tell him, breathless.

“That would kill me, YN, alright? I’m serious,” he says, with a great big grin on his face.

“Well, we’re dying on the same day, remember? Might not be too bad.”

Even though he chuckles, he rolls his eyes, seeming to give in. “Whatever then, have it your way.”

You hum, shaking your head as you push Jake’s hair from his face to get a good look at him. At his freckled nose and lopsided smile. “Obviously if you want to use a condom we’ll use one, Jakey. Or two just like you said.”

“I don’t,” he admits, shaking his head. “Let’s go.”

A smile curls your lips and a flutter stirs your stomach. “Not before the sun goes down, I want to see it.”

“Sounds good, love. Later then.” And with the matter settled, he kisses your forehead. Then the tip of your nose, then your lips. Unlike the first two though, this kiss is lingering. This kiss is the press of bodies against one another, thighs and hips and chests and lips. It’s Jake’s soft hair between your fingers, his big hands slipping to your waist, holding you as tightly as possible. Like this, you kiss and you kiss and you kiss, separating only for the time it takes to tug his T-shirt up and over his head—all plans of watching the sunset long forgotten.

Still attached at the mouths, Jake lays you down on the blanket, his palm clutching your hip through your dress as he settles between your thighs. A lick of molten need consumes you at the weight of his body on yours, at the closeness of his lean frame. How you’re connected everywhere it matters. Damp press of sweat-slick skin on linen. Grind of rough denim on soft lace. Tug of hair between fingers and warmth of whimpers passed from his mouth to yours and right back.

Wet kiss after wet kiss from neck to collarbone, shallow breaths warm your skin from collarbone to heaving chest, tearing a desperate sound out of you. Teeth on linen, tugging at the neckline of your dress, trembling hands coming up to help, to pull it down and hook it underneath your bare breasts.

Jake pulls away and it’s like seeing God, your breath hitching at the sight of him, at how the setting sun filters through his hair, catching him at the edges so that he glows. His chest rises and falls heavily as he looks down at you, his eyes blown and latching onto your breasts, inching slowly upwards along the shiny saliva path he’s left behind. From his swollen lips, the word, God, falls, a gravelly sound, ragged like it came from the depths of him, enough to make you shiver. He lets his palm roam the length of your body, over your stomach and up between your breasts until his long fingers slip over your shoulder to straighten your locket on its chain.

“Oh my fucking God,” he says, eyes tracking the same path before they flick up to meet yours. “You’re so…” He shakes his head. “So, so beautiful.”

Causing this reaction, being the one to get to him this much, and seeing it, is a rush unlike anything else you’ve ever experienced. In this state, this stupor, you could probably ask him to do anything, tell him, and he would, and only on the basis that it came from you. Inexplicable heat pools between your legs at the mere thought.

“Thanks.”

An unbearable beat passes, scored by the whisper of the breeze and the kiss of tide against rock, before Jake wets his lips and says, “What’d you say, gorgeous?”

“You want them in your mouth, don’t you?” Your wavering voice betrays your nerves, but if he notices, he doesn’t seem to care.

His pretty mouth falls ajar, wordless lips closing and opening again until he gulps, nods his head.

Spurred on by his level of engagement, his willingness and pliancy, there’s nothing you can do to stop your mind from running wild, alight with possibility, the future suddenly an exciting thing for as long as Jake is with you. It’s this, your certainty, your desire, that levels your voice when you speak. “Are you gonna be good and hurry up then?”

“Fuck,” he whispers before clearing his throat and speaking softer than you’ve ever heard. “Yes, love. Gonna be good for you, gonna be so good.” He’s already leaning in.

Taking your nipple between his teeth, Jake has you gasping, has your back arching up towards him as his tongue flicks out over the sensitive skin to soothe it. A cry of his name, a huffed breath, a shudder at every tug, at every lick, at every moan he lets out around you. Caught up in the feel of it all — of his sweet mouth and muffled whines, of the knot tying itself in your stomach — you don’t even notice that his hand has left your other breast until his thick fingers press on the lace between your thighs.

Chasing it, the pressure, your hips buck, grinding until Jake curses under his breath and pulls away. To the chill of the air on your wet chest, you sigh, opening your eyes to the sight of your beautiful boyfriend kneeling between your spread thighs. Straight teeth dent plush bottom lip. Heavy eyelids blink slowly. Pink flush on his cheeks, his neck, spreading to his chest that heaves with his breath. Your toes curl against the blanket. He looks about as good as you feel—looks better. Unsticking the damp cotton, Jake pushes your underwear to the side so the breeze rushes against you, cool and overwhelming and drawing a gasp from your parted lips.

His eyes fall as he spreads your wetness from your slit up to your clit and groans. “Love how wet you get for me, YN, always feel so good.”

Every last inch of your body responds to his touch, to him and the low sound of his voice, to the slow push of two thick fingers into you. Clamping together, your knees knock with a smack, thighs trapping Jake’s wrist where it is. The tension in your stomach is immediate, hot and heavy as he curls his fingers where they are, just brushing right where you need him to.

"Good, baby,” you manage, breathless. “Like that.”

Parting your knees, he pushes further and the sweet pressure sends a burst of blinding pleasure throughout your writhing body. A twist of the knot in your stomach, a moan torn out of you, stars behind your closed eyes at the sound of the smile in his voice. “Such a pretty girl, aren’t you? Don’t know how I got so lucky.”

As always, seeing Jake smile far surpasses hearing it, that broad curve, lips red and puffy around his perfect teeth. It takes your breath away to see him like this, to hear those words from him when it’s exactly how you feel—Jake, Jaeyun, your pretty boy, and you, Yongie, the luckiest girl in the world. Especially when you notice the way his other hand is tucked into his shorts, moving slowly under the denim.

“I wanna see, Jake,” you say. “Take them off.”

Not a second goes by before he undoes his belt and button and fly with one hand to push his shorts down. On the front of his white briefs is a dark patch where his dick strains against the cotton, precum seeping through it. A pang of hunger strikes you, tongue wetting your lips as he thumbs at the damp spot and mutters, fuck, tugging the fabric out of the way. His leaking tip is shiny and red, same as his lips. Veins curve around the rest of him, leading your eyes down his twitching length to where his fingers are wrapped around the base, unmoving.

“Should I…” Jake trails off.

“Please.” You nod and without missing a beat, he spits into his palm and starts stroking.

Save for the pretty way he whines and shudders, how his nose scrunches up and his muscles tense, there’s nothing particularly special about the way he jerks off. What’s mesmerising though, what really winds you up, is the fact that it’s Jake’s big hand on Jake’s big dick. That and the fact that he’s timing his strokes with the pump of his fingers into you. The fact that the wet sound between your legs is only getting louder and lewder. Feverish heat laps at your bucking hips, ravaging your body from the inside out.

“Don’t wanna—” you blurt out, taking a moment to catch your breath, to figure out what you’re trying to say. “I don’t wanna finish like this. Need it now. You.”

“Thank fuck.” He takes his fingers straight from inside of you to his mouth, humming around them. “So good,” he mumbles, shaking his head while your cheeks burn. “You’re so perfect, YN.”

Butterflies fill your stomach, tugging your lips up at the corners. If it were up to you, this moment would never end. Jake, apparently, has other ideas though, asking, “So are we using a condom or am I dying today?”

His question takes a second to process, to make sense of over the pounding rush of blood in your ears. “The second one,” you whisper with a smile. “And I will miss you so, so much.”

A glorious smile curls his lips, a sweet chuckle coming out of him. “Not for too long, love.” He leans down and presses a kiss to the top of your knee. “You sure though? Sounds silly, but you’re allowed to change your mind, YN.”

“I know.” You can’t resist reaching for him, unsure if you can stomach another second without. Against your palm, his hair is soft between your fingers. Behind him, the sun’s last rays cling to the violet sky, streaking it orange. Something twists in your chest at the sight, at the sight of Jake’s brown eyes, shining like brilliant pools of amber. There’s nothing you’d change about any of this, let alone your mind. “I’m sure about this though,” you say, swallowing around the lump in your throat. “About you.”

Jake leans into your touch, lifting his head and kissing your palm when you cup his cheek. “Me too, Yongie. I’m certain.” That certainty is warm against your skin, muffled and earnest. “Forever,” he says and this is the moment you don’t want to end.

You can’t help but take his forever to heart, because it’s a promise he’s always kept. There isn’t much for you before Jake, your memories few and far between up until he moved to your school. “Yeah, Jaeyun. Forever,” you say, and when the words come out, you are absolutely certain that there won’t be much after him either.

The moment it finally happens, you’re kissing. That slow nudge of Jake into you, the complete shrinking of the world to that burning point of your connection, the melting of two bodies into one. His shallow thrusts deepen with each push and pull of his hips until he’s filling you all the way up over and over, further than you thought possible. Pressed to your chest, his heart races just as fast as yours, beating in perfect sync. Hungrily, Jake’s lips move over yours, but his hips still against you, buried to the hilt and staying completely flush—as if the kissing, the brushing of tongues and taste of you, is the point of it all.

I love you, he says, and you say, I love you, too. On a desperate, whiny loop, those three words spill from one mouth into another, back and forth for ages until you can’t tell if it’s him saying it or you.

Until he finishes with a cry of your name, arms giving out so his full weight presses you down. Until you finish right after, shuddering and full and so in love.

As is tradition, you all spend this last morning together. Bright and early, the kitchen is alive at eight a.m., all ten of you moving sleepily around each other while Sunghoon’s lock in playlist blares through the house. After four summers of this, you’ve gotten it down to a science, so that no one is in anyone else’s way and nothing needs to be reheated. It takes forty-five minutes, but with all of the dishes on the garden table, everyone sits around it, ready to eat the breakfast you all helped to make.

Your plate is about as full as can be, with Jay’s gamjajeon, Jimin’s buttered toast, Sunoo’s fried eggs, and Heeseung’s pork belly all warring for space on its surface. Exactly where he wants to be, Jake sits in your lap and his plate has your overflow—his Buldak carbonara, Yizhuo’s stir-fry, and your bacon.

Nosey as ever, your friends barely allow you to have a bite before grilling you and Jake, desperate to know what happened at the beach to make you guys come back so…

“…Weird,” Yizhuo says. “If you hadn’t been holding hands I’d have thought you called it off.”

Around gulps of Aeri’s coffee and spoonfuls of Sunghoon’s assorted cereal, everyone nods and mumbles their agreement. Now that everyone knows about your reciprocated feelings — now that you and Jake know — it seems your friends would prefer one big debrief rather than you with the girls and him with boys. Most of the time, the morning after begins with a group FaceTime call, or a detailed rundown in the chat to catch each other up, so it’s not totally unusual to share everything with everyone at once, and of course, now that two members of the group have hooked up, the next natural step would be to tell the group together. This fact, and your knowledge of said fact, don’t make it any easier for you to find words that accurately convey the genuinely life-changing sex you had last night. How afterwards, you undressed each other reverently to fuck like animals in the shower.

Seeming not to share your reservations, Jake has no trouble speaking. "We weren’t being weird,” he says through a yawn, even though you definitely were. “We were being in love, Yizhuo, you should try it.”

“Yes, but you’ve been in love for as long as we’ve known you, and we’ve never seen you like that.” Minjeong squints over the top of her sunglasses, pointing an accusatory spoon. “Obviously you fucked out there, but — and no offence — was it bad?”

Before you can leap to the defence of your and Jake’s sexual prowess or show them the video you took last night and ask, does it look bad? Aeri sighs, shaking her head. “They didn’t, I counted and all ninety condoms were in the basket, they didn’t even tear one from the strip.”

“Ninety? Aeri, we gave them eighty, you bought the boxes,” Sunoo says, smacking his forehead twice and going, “Stupid, stupid Jungwoo.”

Around the table, laughter is immediate and as you wrap your arms around Jake’s waist to hold him closer, you can’t help but wish you had even one more night to spend together. Can’t help but wish you’d been even a tiny bit less in your head about him all weekend so you could’ve gotten the fullest out of this time with everyone. Only one person isn’t fighting for breath through their cackles, and it’s Aeri who only rolls her eyes.

“Yeah, yeah, because none of you have ever been with someone questionable.” Crossing her arms over her chest, she scoffs and points in your direction. “YN is literally dating Jake,” she says and everyone laughs again, even Jake, who you know is only pretending not to be irritated.

After breakfast, it’s a heated game of rock, paper, scissors that leaves Aeri, Heeseung, Jimin, and Sunghoon on kitchen clean up duty while the rest of you are left to your own devices. Thankfully, you had the foresight to pack your suitcase, and then Jake’s, before breakfast, so all that’s left is kissing and triple-checking that you have everything you came with.

It’s an hour before Minjeong calls up the stairs that it’s time to leave and you’re standing alone in the en-suite, staring at your reflection. Only five days have passed since you left home with the girls, but already you look so different, feel so different. A healthy glow kisses your tanned skin and the semi-permanent bikini straps on your shoulders. Your lips rest in a curve you can’t straighten out. And your locket sits under the star pendant on your chest. Jake’s locket, maybe, if the years he’s held onto it mean more than the days you’ve spent wearing it. Running your thumb over the tiny dragon, the metal is warm in your palm. Changed by the love of those you love — Jake, your friends, and the sun — you can only look forward to what might change next, knowing no matter what, you won’t have to go through it alone.

From the doorway, with his baseball cap backwards and glasses low on the bridge of his nose, Jake is already watching you. His small smile turns into a broad grin, showing all of his teeth as he lets out a happy sigh. Crossing the room to be in his arms is the absolute least you can do, sinking into his chest as he pulls you close. You tip your head back to press a kiss to the base of his neck, making him giggle.

“You ready to go, darling?”

You’re not ready to go, not really—you never are. Already, you want to relive the last few days, see them again with those same fresh eyes. See them with your knowing eyes and make the same decisions a million times over, because all of them have led you here, lead you to this. To Jake’s lips on yours. Regardless, you nod and say, “I am.”

In the middle of the driveway, warmed by the blazing sun, you hug all of your friends as though you’ll never see them again, as if you don’t share a flat with Minjeong, or won’t see everyone at Heeseung’s on Friday for movie night. For what it’s worth though, they all hug you the same way, with tight squeezes and mumbled I’ll miss yous and get home safes.

Once you’ve hugged your way around the circle, you end up in Jake’s arms again, squealing when he lifts you up off your feet. His fingers grip your sides as tight as he can, warmth in your chest at the feeling and a smile on your face even as you try to wriggle free. But over your shoulder you hear the girls burst into laughter, hear Jimin cry out, no way! And there’s something to it, the disbelief in her voice, the sheer joy, that stands out to you, that tugs your heart in her direction, in theirs. You can’t ignore it, can’t ignore how much you hate the thought of having to hear about it from Minjeong at home later.

“Would you mind if I went home with the girls instead?” you blurt out as soon as Jake sets you down on your feet.

The smile on his face doesn’t falter at all, it widens, his eyes searching yours. “That sounds like fun, Yongie. I guess I’ll see you later then.”

“Yeah, Jake, see you later,” you say, and for the first time, the thought of being away from him doesn’t make you feel sick.

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