Warnings: mdni 18+, big!namjoon, first-time in your relationship, fingering, multiple orgasm (f rec.), dirty talk, a little praise.
wc: 1.7k +
requested
The first time Namjoon realizes he has a size-kink, it’s when he’s got your legs spread wide open for him, and he can see just how wet your pretty pussy is for him.
You two had been watching a movie in the living room, your body snuggled into his side, when you had asked for a kiss. It had started soft and slow, until you were getting up onto your knees to deepen it.
You had been trying for days to show you were ready to take your relationship further, but Namjoon always seemed to keep it controlled. He had been aware he was bigger than average and was hesitant, thinking that it would be too much.
But once you've straddled his lap, it seemed he had finally had enough. With heavy pets of Namjoon's big hands, the kiss becomes hotter, he explores your body, and your hips roll in his lap feverently. Soft whines and moans were swallowed by kisses in between until both of you couldn’t take it any longer.
“Nam-Namjoon, I n-need you!” The words were whispered right in his ear, and it had his eyes rolling, a curse leaving his lips as he nodded his head, manhandling you onto the floor with him.
“Okay, okay, my love, I got you.”
Namjoon takes his time to kiss you on the lips again, pulling your bottom lip with his teeth as his hands help lift your hips up to pull your pajama bottoms and panties off. Your skin was so soft under his hands; he couldn’t help but squeeze your thighs, your hips, rubbing his palms up until they slipped underneath your, his, baggy t-shirt that you wore for sleep.
He groans against your neck when he realizes you’re not wearing a bra, his hands cupping your breasts and kneading your pretty tits in his palms. His fingers pinch your nipples, and he takes great pleasure when you whine loudly, your back arching for him as your legs fall open.
He doesn’t have the patience to take your shirt off; he scrunches the material up and sits back on his knees to enjoy the view of you.
You’re so pretty like this. Sprawled on your back, underneath him, your hair splayed out and your eyes glossy. Your chest heaves with each breath you take, your nipples taut, and goosebumps run down your arms. Your arousal seeps from your drooling cunt and smears down your thighs. You’re perfect.
And it’s when Namjoon’s hand pushes your leg open wider that he notices the size difference. He always knew you were shorter than him, but when he sees his long and thick fingers compared to your quivering pussy, he groans deeply from his chest.
It should be shameful the way it gets Namjoon lightheaded at the thought of stuffing you full of his cock. It doesn’t help that you’re crying out for him, begging for more. “Please, Joonie, don’t t-tease me!”
And Namjoon could never truly deny you.
He stretches your knees to your chest, displaying your wet pussy more to his hungry eyes. “So wet for me,” he sounds almost in awe, his words slurring a little like he’s drunk off your pussy before he had the chance to begin. “Need to - hah - need to prep you, Pretty. Get you nice n’ ready for me, okay?”
Tears threaten to spill from your eyes, and you look so cute biting your lip with a needy pout. “I-I can take it, want you inside, please! Joonie-“ But then your eyes roll up, your mouth parting with a moan as Namjoon sinks one thick finger into your sopping pussy.
“What was that?” Namjoon pants, his jaw clenching from the mere feeling of your spongey walls sucking on his middle finger. His long and thick digit already has a difficult time bullying its way deep inside you, but the face you make is worth it.
Your lewd expression has Namjoon pressing his palm into the little bundle of nerves between your plush thighs. “Speechless after one finger? Thought you said you could take it?” He coos, and your pussy throbs, the vulgar squelch of your cunt slurping his finger echoing against the living room walls.
You've been rendered speechless, Namjoon's finger reaching deeper than any of your own fingers ever could. You had known Namjoon was big; it was one of the many reasons why you liked him. But it was now that you truly understood the size difference - and it only made you wetter.
Your sweet juices coat his middle finger generously, the digit curling and stretching your gummy walls open. He was searching for the one spot that would make you keen, and when he finds it, your legs shake, and he's pressing a second digit inside your drooling cunt.
With two fingers, your whines increase in volume, the palm of Namjoon’s hand still pressing into your puffy clit and making the knot in your stomach twist tighter. “You’re so big,” you huff, your eyelashes wetting with your unshed tears. Namjoon grins. He knows he’s big; he knows because everyone tells him, but when you say it, his cock twitches and his mouth salivates. His other hand lies on your lower stomach, putting pressure onto your abdomen as he stuffs a third finger inside your sopping pussy.
Three fingers stuff you deliciously full, and your tongue lolls out as your face flushes darker. “Yeah, but you like that, right? Can’t you feel me deep inside you?” His fingertips abuse your G-spot, smacking into it over and over again, and your orgasm is barreling closer and closer with each thrust of his fingers. The fingers pressing into your stomach trail higher, and Namjoon’s big body leans over yours. He's all you can see through your blurry vision, and you make out the wicked grin on his lips as his chain dangles over your face. “But here? That’s where my cock will reach.”
As soon as you process his words, your vision whitens, your gummy walls clamping down on his fingers as your orgasm takes over. You shriek, arching your chest up into Namjoon’s as he kneels over your quivering body. His fingers are relentless, prodding your sweet spot again and again as he fucks you through your orgasm.
“That’s it, get your pretty pussy slippery wet for me,” He coos, and your eyelashes flutter, your thighs trembling in the aftershocks as your pussy weeps for more.
When Namjoon's fingers slip from your fluttering hole, you whimper, already missing the feeling of him. You blink heavily as Namjoon unbuckles his jeans, his cock straining against the seam, and your mouth drops open again. From previous heavy make-out sessions that left you grinding your pussy against his lap, you knew Joonie would be bigger than average, but as you watched his hand wrap around his fat girth, stroking the length with deliberate squeezes, you didn’t think it would fit.
“Oh, it’ll fit, Pretty. I’ll make sure of it,” Namjoon smirks, and you’re blinking again because you didn’t even know you said your thoughts aloud. Heat crawls up your neck and cheeks, and you clench your pussy around nothing, pathetically. Namjoon shuffles to kneel between your open thighs, and with a resounding thwack! His hefty cock smacks against your mound. His cock is massive, daunting, the way it lies on your stomach, reaching just under your belly button.
Oh.
Oh!
“Gonna reach all the way to here,” Namjoon muses, and your heart leaps to your throat, your mind dizzy with the news. Before you could attempt to run away, Namjoon pulls you by the ankles to get you where he wants you and manhandles you into one of the nastiest mating presses. Your ankles are dangling over his shoulders, and his solid weight traps your thighs into a big stretch.
And when Namjoon sinks the first few inches into your dripping core, you're immediately cockdrunk, the stretch of his thick girth melting any thoughts you previously had. You’re rendered speechless, your maw slacking open, bubbles of drool gathering at the corners of your lips as he moulds your cute cunt wide open. “Oh, oh, ah!” You’re making all these cute noises, your lungs shaking to breathe as Namjoon’s cock massages all the right spots as it bullies its way into your wet heat. It was like he was pushing into your stomach, to your lungs, stuffing cotton in your head as his tip finally placed a filthy smooch to your womb and your puffy folds kissed his heavy balls in greeting.
Namjoon’s toned hips undulate in tiny gyrations to stretch you to your limit. You can feel every little twitch of his cock kissing your cervix, swashing another wad of precum against your spongey walls and making stars burst behind your eyelids. “S-see? I told you - hah - this pretty pussy c-could take me.” Namjoon heaves a big breath, panting; it felt like he was in heaven. His entire body hummed with electricity each time his cock thwacked against your plush cervix.
You’re sobbing now, whines gurgling from your throat as every heavy thrust from Namjoon’s fat cock plunges through your drooling cunt, plugging you full of him. Him, Him, Him. His pace starts slow and heavy, shaping your gummy insides to every dip and curve of his big cock, to help you get used to him. It has white mist crossing your vision as your pussy throbs around his length, and you fall into another orgasm, your arousal coating his cock with a creamy, syrupy slick that rings around his base.
You can’t speak. Your thighs burn, your tongue sticks out lewdly, and the noises you make come from the back of your throat - he’s made you dumb off his fat cock. You’re only able to focus on the drag of him and the way Namjoon groans. He looks so pretty when his jaw clenches, and his eyes flutter closed. And with your arousal, making the slide inside even more slippery, his thrusts grow in pace, keeping your eyes rolled to the back of your head.
“Tha’s it, taking my cock so well, Pretty. Mm - hah - look at you drooling out of both ends. Let's see how many times I can get your pretty little pussy to cream on my cock.”
A/N: As always, comments, kudos, and interactions are greatly appreciated!
Pairings: Yoongi x f!reader, Namjoon x f!reader, Yoongi x Namjoon, Yoongi x f!reader x Namjoon
Summary: After moving to a new city and getting to know Jimin through work, he introduces you to his friends, a group of weirdos, just how you like them. Getting involved with two of them, without knowing about their past, makes things perfectly complicated.
Genre: Why choose (that counts for all three of them), fluff, smut, new in town, fwb to lovers, comedy, non-idol!au, producer!Yoongi, author!Namjoon
Warnings: MDNI, explicit sexual content (MxF, MxM, MMF), smoking cigarettes and weed, alcohol, angst on the side. Detailed warnings will be listed for each individual chapter.
Genre: exes!au, forced proximity (because what am i without my fav trope), lovers-to-enemies-to-lovers (kind of), slow burn, angst, second-chance romance, heaps of miscommunication.
Summary: A booking mix-up forces you to share a secluded hanok with Namjoon, the ex you still resent, and who resents you just as much. What begins as an unwanted holiday becomes the closure neither of you knew you needed, and perhaps the start of something worth trying again.
Warnings: language, mentions of suicide and cheating (kind of).
Word count: 9.8k
a/n: this has been sitting in my fanfic folder for almost one year now. and finally decided to publish it because i saw pics of joonie in brussels and well.. i just had to. also, as this is a one-shot, there will not be a second chapter 🤍
check out my: masterlist
The hanok in Andong was supposed to be empty.
That was the whole point of booking it months in advance for seven days. All you wanted was just seven days of no work calls, no calendar notifications of when your next meeting would be, and no one asking you to explain something about work in a 30-minute meeting that could have been a short email. You needed this time alone to yourself. Just you, a stack of unread books that has been sitting around in your to-be-read list, and a wooden veranda that overlooked a persimmon tree.
You did not expect your ex boyfriend, Kim Namjoon, to be standing in the backyard of the hanok when you arrived with a duffel bag slung over your shoulder. And Namjoon was staring at the same booking confirmation on his phone that you had opened on yours.
Neither of you said anything for a good one minute.
“It’s you again,” Namjoon said.
And you just nodded at him because what the heck were you supposed to say to an ex you hated with your guts?
Thankfully the host came out just in time, wiping her hands on her apron, and she was very cheerful. Only because she had no idea what she just did. What booking you and Namjoon in her two-bedroom hanok at the same time would do to the peaceful area of Andong.
"Oh good, you're both here! I ran this as a two-bedroom stay during the off season, but I forgot to change the description in that new website! If you expected to have the whole hanok to yourself, I am so sorry! I swear it was the new website and it's a new update! And I didn't think two separate bookings would land the same week. Lucky you, though, the whole place is yours," the middle aged host said. She was still very cheerful even though she acknowledged she made a mistake.
Lucky would be the very last word you would describe this situation, you almost laughed at the host.
Namjoon just stayed calm. You figured it was the media training of being in BTS for years that he managed to stay so calm. He is the leader of the biggest boyband in the world, he probably has faced more awkward situations than this.
But you knew deep down how Namjoon felt. The two of you despised each other and you really didn’t want to go deep in history to explain to the host in front of you why this was a bad idea.
"I can find somewhere else," Namjoon finally said. Gosh, it has been so long since you’ve heard his voice. Years ago you would have been so wet down there just by listening to him talk, but now, you were trying so hard not to vomit.
"Everything's booked out for the festival," the host replied, "you'll be fine, you'll be fine. The rooms have their own doors and modern bathrooms, you will only have to share the kitchen."
“Are you sure the whole area is booked? I just don’t want this young lady to feel awkward having to share this space with a male stranger,” Namjoon said to the host.
“Yes. I run most of the other places too, and they are all booked. Let’s ask the young lady then, would you be okay spending the next seven days sharing a kitchen with this man? He looks nice to me and looks familiar too!” the host said, smiling at you.
“As long as there is a key to lock my bedroom at night, I don’t really care,” you said, shrugging at the host. But when you turned to look at Namjoon, you showed him a gesture that expressed how you wanted him, the richest and most connected person out of you both, to find another place.
Namjoon understood your gesture. How could he have not? You were his first love, someone whom he had a very, very hard and long time forgetting. But he didn’t care about what you were asking him to do, he booked this place because of how serene and peaceful its location is. Plus, the hanok was featured in an Architectural Digest, it has a beautiful architecture hence why the place is usually booked out. Even as Namjoon of BTS, he couldn’t book it up until now. So no, he wasn’t just about to throw it all out for his ex-girlfriend.
“Well there you go! The key and lock work just fine and I do have CCTV outside of the bedroom, so you will be safe and sound! And there are security guards guarding this neighbourhood 24/7. If you just shout, they’ll come right for you! But I doubt you’ll need them, since this good looking young man doesn’t seem to be the type to hurt others!” the host said, smiling at Namjoon and you.
You couldn’t help the mocking laugh that came out of your mouth. This lady didn’t know how the good looking young man in front of her has put you in so much misery.
“Well then that settles it. How long will you be staying here?” Namjoon said to you. It was the first time he was addressing you, the elephant in his room.
“I booked for seven days,” you replied. You didn’t bother asking him the same question, because you heard the lady say something about having to share the same kitchen for the next seven days.
You assumed there was one thing Namjoon still excelled at: hearing only the parts of a story that suited him.
It reminded you of the final month before your breakup, when he accused you of being too close to a co-worker. What he never understood was that your co-worker had come out to you and was going through a very difficult time. It was not your secret to share especially when your friend had specifically asked you not to tell anyone. Being gay in Korea was not easy, and your friend trusted you with something deeply personal that you were not about to share with any soul.
Back then, you tried to explain. You asked Namjoon to listen to your side of the story, you asked him to trust you, but he did not want to hear or trust you, he never did.
It’s really true that men never change.
“Seven days it is,” Namjoon nodded.
“Enjoy your stay,” the host said, waving at the two of you as she left the hanok.
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The hanok has two bedrooms which are separated by a wall so thin you could hear Namjoon breathing on the other side of it.
You forgot how every hanok has this really thin wall so every king and queen whose bedrooms were separate could still talk to each other. You used to think it was romantic, but now, having Namjoon at the other side of the wall just feels more like punishment.
You dropped your bag on the floor of the room because you didn’t even have the energy to unpack. You sat at the edge of the mattress and you could hear Namjoon doing the exact same thing. You could hear the thud of his duffel bag and the creaking of the bed as he sat down.
You have to spend the next seven days with your ex-boyfriend. It would be fine if it was any of your other ex-boyfriend. But not this one, not Namjoon.
It’s just seven days, what could go wrong really? You can survive seven days of anything.
You’ve survived worse, you technically have survived him and that counts for something.
You never planned this trip around meeting him. You didn’t choose Andong to torture yourself. You chose it because you saw this hanok featured in a magazine, and your coworker mentioned about her trip here once and how peaceful and lovely her trip had been. So you listened to the reviews you have seen online and from your own friend. You didn’t think in a million years that the dates you picked were the exact same one Namjoon had chosen for his own separate getaway.
You expected some quiet.
And you did not, under any circumstance, expect Namjoon.
And yet here he was, on the other side of a wall thin enough you could hear each and every movement he makes. It was as if the universe had a sense of humor you will never once find funny.
You thought about calling the host back out, asking if there was truly nothing else like a motel, a shared room for backpackers, or even a bench in some park that is safe at night. But the host already left to wherever she had to go, and it was nearly dark, and some stubborn, tired part of you decided you would rather sit in silence next to a man who used to love you like you were the only thing keeping him alive.
Well, that was before he eventually found your presence hard to be around.
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Nothing much happened on the first day.
Thankfully, you woke up first before him and could occupy the front yard before he could. And Namjoon, to his credit, understood that you being there meant he would be spending most of his time sitting in the backyard. So neither of you saw much of each other.
And when you did happen to see each other. It was during dinner, and even then, you barely really spoke to each other.
One of the complimentary amenities they give when you stay in the hanok is free dinner because no restaurant around here is open at night. The staff or host, you couldn’t tell since you were too busy resting and reading on a picnic mat in the front yard, left a pot of corn soup, bread, and different types of sides. They also left a note that said: ‘help yourselves, we will pick up the food in 30 minutes so please eat before then and do not eat in the bedroom for cleanliness.’
You found Namjoon already in the kitchen with his sleeves pushed up, ladling soup into his bowl.
"Leave some for me," you said.
Namjoon didn't look up as he said, "Didn't know you had a voice."
You tilted your head at him, “Were you waiting for me to talk to you? That’s new.”
"You wish," Namjoon snorted, setting the bowl down on the counter, hard enough that some of it sloshed over the rim, "I was only saying that because you are usually so loud."
You rolled your eyes at him and grabbed a bowl from the cabinet. You filled the bowl without a word and sat down at the opposite end of the table, putting as much space between you as possible.
Towards the end of your relationship, Namjoon never waited for you. He could go days without calling, texting, or meeting-up, and whenever you brought it up, he always had the same answer; he was busy with everything except you. At first, you tried to understand him. You told yourself he was under pressure and that loving someone meant being patient when life got difficult, especially when his life as an idol is so different from life of most people. So you waited for the calls he promised to make after work, for replies that arrived hours later, sometimes the next day. And you waited for him to notice that you stopped telling him about your day because there was never a good time to say anything.
Eventually, you stopped waiting altogether. So you did the same to him. You gave him a taste of his own medicine; the distance, unanswered messages, the quiet indifference he once made you endure.
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"You’re eating like it's a race," you said, watching him finish half the bowl in what felt like four bites.
"I have things to do," he said.
"Of course, the always busy man. "
"Last time I checked.." Namjoon said, stopping before finally looking up at you just to say, "That used to be your excuse too. "
You didn't have an answer for that one, so you ate your soup in silence and let the silence do what it does best. Because Namjoon was right. You did to him what he did to you, but you did not regret it. He needed that wake-up call, although it didn’t change anything in your relationship.
Namjoon finished first, and rinsed his bowl at the sink with his back to you. You didn’t mean to watch him but the view from where you were sitting was to the kitchen. You couldn’t help but see what was happening there. You remembered this view from three years ago, when the two of you were still together.
You shook your head immediately as the thought of your past relationship crept up your mind.
Remember, your life was a living nightmare with him.
You somehow just noticed that his hair was shorter, and without meaning to, your thoughts slipped out of your lips, "You cut your hair," you said.
You regretted it the moment you said it. You hoped he didn’t hear it, but of course he did.
"Two months ago," Namjoon said, still rinsing his dishes, "you're behind."
"I wasn't exactly keeping up," you snorted.
"Could've fooled me, aren’t we in this situation because you knew I’d be here?” Namjoon said.
“Did you develop narcissistic personality disorder after being in the spotlight for too long? I have a life I love that does not involve you at all. I couldn’t care less whether you keep your hair short or long,” you said angrily.
Namjoon would be lying if he claimed to not winch when he heard what you said. But he shrugged it off, you are someone he could care less about. “You used to like it long," Namjoon said quietly, just like you, he didn’t mean to say it out loud.
"Well, apparently I liked a lot of things that didn't stick around," you said, and you felt a sense of regret the second it left your mouth.
Namjoon turned the tap off, set the bowl in the rack as he said, "Goodnight.”
Then he left the kitchen without looking at you.
You sat with your half-empty bowl a while longer, listening to his footsteps go down the hallway, the sound of his door sliding open, and silence was all it followed.
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That same night, through the wall, you heard him on the phone to Jimin.
“Hey Jimin. Yeah, the mixup by the host is crazy, I didn’t expect to be stuck in this hanok with her.”
There was a pause, probably Jimin telling Namjoon to find some other place.
“I tried, even my manager tried too. It’s just fully booked everywhere.. No, no, you don’t need to come. I’m fine. I just need the week to rest and write, it’s still really nice out here in Andong. It’s peaceful, which is something I really need. Yeah. I know. We thankfully don’t really interact much. It should just be during dinner and that’s because the place only has a 30-minute dining timeslot since they have to pick up the leftover food. Yeah, it sucks, but the place is really nice.”
Then Namjoon went silent for a few minutes and you thought his phone call with Jimin was over but then you heard him say, “Jimin, it’s not because of her that I’m staying here. As much as I dislike that woman, I have been waiting for too long to stay in this hanok and the scenery and ambience is something I do not want to give up. So don’t worry about me, I’m fine. Okay, thank you. Good night to you too, bye.”
That woman?!
Is that what he just referred to you as? Just some woman? You snorted at how ridiculous it was. Did Namjoon forget the two of you spent three whole years together?
What a fucking prick.
You thought about the last time you heard him talk like that, and how it used to be you he was talking to on the other end of the phone. But one of your last conversations with him on the phone wasn’t really something as warm as his conversation with Jimin.
“I know, babe. I know I said I'd be there. I'll make it up to you, ____”
Namjoon was always so good at saying he’ll make it up to you when he never did.
Kim Namjoon is a prick and all of his fans would find him disappointing once they knew that he is just a man.
You rolled onto your side now facing the wall, and let yourself feel the hatred towards your ex before finally falling asleep.
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The second day, you woke up to the sound of Namjoon doing pull-ups on the old wooden beam of the veranda, which was, you thought, an incredibly on-brand way for Namjoon to process anything uncomfortable.
You used to find that endearing, now you just found it loud and annoying. Especially since it is still way too early and you were still tired.
You laid in bed a while longer than you needed to, listening to the creak of the beam, Namjoon’s controlled exhale on every pull, the small grunts he lets out on each pull that he probably didn't know he makes. You used to find his grunts hot and it used to turn you on.
Now you were just irritated.
You got up before the sounds he make could turn your irritation into anything more complicated.
You walked to the kitchen through the front yard, avoiding the side of the house Namjoon was in, and made your coffee black. You sat at the dining table, facing the backyard which was close enough to see Namjoon through the paper screen yet far enough that he wouldn’t have noticed you were there.
Namjoon eventually finished his workout routine and came into the kitchen. His breathing was shallow and fast. His shirt had gone see-through, sticking to his well-built figure from the sweat. His arms looked fuller after the workout, muscles still tense beneath his skin as he reached for a glass filled with water. He stood by the sink with his back to you as he drank. The pull-ups left his biceps, shoulders, and his overall figure look way more shredded, and his veins were faintly visible along his forearms.
It was a view that once would have driven you insane.
You immediately looked away before your thoughts spiral into even more nonsense.
“You’re up early,” Namjoon said, still not turning around to look at you.
“You are very loud,” you answered, “it’s hard to stay asleep when a man is having a breakdown on a pull-up bar.”
“You could’ve said something,” Namjoon replied.
You took a sip of your coffee, “Would you have listened to me?”
“I’m listening now,” Namjoon said, finally turning around to look at you.
You looked at him over the rim of your mug, “That’s a little late, don’t you think?”
"That's rich," he said quietly, "coming from the person who canceled on me six times in one month because work got busy."
"You were on tour for eight weeks straight, Namjoon. Do you really want to talk about who canceled on who?"
"I was working," Namjoon said, defending himself.
"So was I," you said, scrunching your face in disbelief.
"Not the same kind of work. Your job was-"
"Don't," you said, standing up so fast your chair scraped out loud against the floor, "don't you dare tell me my job mattered less or whatever the fuck you said to me then. I’m so sick of hearing you say that shit to me."
Namjoon didn't say anything. He just looked defeated, and mostly because he didn’t know what to say to you. He never meant to make you feel like your job mattered less and he never remembered saying such a thing, but Namjoon understood why you would remember it that way.
Your hands were shaking around the mug, so you set it down before you dropped it and you turned away before he could see your face properly. You did not look back at him as you walked down the hallway and shut your bedroom door behind you harder than necessary, but still not hard enough to feel satisfying.
Through the wall, you could hear him sitting down on the dining chair.
And neither of you said sorry, neither of you ever did.
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By the afternoon, you went out to the backyard, where Namjoon was already sitting on the raised wooden veranda of the house. He barely looked up when you spread a picnic mat beneath the tree. You were there to read, while Namjoon was on his laptop with one earphone in his ear.
"Isn’t this a holiday?" you asked, not looking up from the page of the book you were reading.
"I have responsibilities," Namjoon answered.
“You know you’re allowed to exist without making everything productive,” you didn’t have any spiteful intent behind what you said, you genuinely wanted him to take rest too.
His fingers stopped typing whatever he was typing on his laptop, “And you need to stop looking for something to comment about,” he replied bitterly, "you used to just let things be things."
"I used to let a lot of things slide," you sneered, "look how that turned out."
Namjoon exhaled through his nose, his thumb dragging across the edge of the keyboard as if he was trying to find something to hold on to, “You don’t have to keep dragging what happened between us into everything you say.”
“I made one comment,” you snorted and sighed as you closed your book, “and I actually was trying to be nice.”
“Well, I guess you don’t really know how to be nice to me anymore,” Namjoon said, finally looking up at you.
You stared back at him, unwilling to let him have the last word, “Maybe because every time I tried, you found a reason to make it sound like an attack.”
Namjoon said nothing to that.
After a while, he put his earphones back in and turned his attention to the laptop again, and the sound of his typing continued, but quieter this time.
♡━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━♡
The third day, avoiding each other was something intuitive for the both of you. You took your coffee at seven, Namjoon didn't come out of his room until eight. You read on the veranda facing the front yard in the morning, while Namjoon occupied the veranda to the backyard.
The two of you should have felt relieved, but somehow, deep down, you were both still feeling restless.
By late afternoon, you were about to cook some ramen when you accidentally went into the kitchen when he was already there. Namjoon was making eggs, the way he always had, too much heat and with not enough patience for someone who always seemed to preach about being mindful.
"You're going to burn those," you said, before you could stop yourself from commenting on what he was doing. You really didn’t want to start another bitter conversation ending with ugly remarks from you or Namjoon.
"I know how to make eggs," Namjoon replied.
"Do you know? I remember you used to struggle a lot when making eggs, you once set off a smoke alarm trying to make eggs," you let out a small laugh remembering the event that happened in the past.
The corner of Namjoon’s mouth twitched and he eventually gave in and smiled, "That was one time."
"It was still memorable to this day," you said.
"We had a good run didn’t we?" he muttered, flipping the eggs.
"Oh, be careful, Joonie," you said, leaning against the counter with your arms crossed, "you're one comment away from being nice to me."
"God forbid," he chuckled.
"God forbid," you agreed.
For a second, one single, traitorous second, it almost felt like the fun and loving relationship you two had before it all went down. Like the version of the two of you that used to burn eggs together on purpose because neither of you cared about the egg, because doing the activity together was always the whole point.
You went back to the dining table, waiting for him to finish cooking his lunch before taking your turn. Then Namjoon plated the eggs, and nodded at you as he left the kitchen without another word.
♡━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━♡
The host left dinner on the table before the two of you even noticed her come in. Tonight’s dinner menu was grilled mackerel, side dishes in small mismatched plates, and a pot of rice still steaming under a cloth. Tonight, the two of you sat down to eat at the same time.
"She made too much again," Namjoon said, nodding at the food on the table as he sat across from you.
“She thinks we’re about to get together,” you replied. It was not exactly a lie because the day before, when you had gone alone to the nearby shop, the owner asked why you didn’t bring your soon-to-be boyfriend with you. When you asked what she meant, she looked at you as though the answer were obvious.
Apparently, your host had told everyone in the village you were staying there with your soon-to-be boyfriend.
“At this point,” you added, “the whole village probably thinks so too.”
"Let them think what they want," Namjoon flatly replied.
“Easy for you to say,” you said, before adding, “you’re not the one who has to keep correcting people since you’re not exactly going to be walking around the village, are you? Celebrity status and all.”
"I didn't realize being mistaken for my girlfriend was such a hardship," Namjoon said looking at you.
"It is," you said, accidentally filling your bowl with more force than it required, "it's just inaccurate and I don't love inaccurate things being said about me."
"You didn’t use to mind what others were saying about you," Namjoon said quietly.
"I used to do and put up with a lot of things," you said, setting the ladle down hard enough to rattle the pot of rice, "doesn't mean I have to keep being that person just because you got comfortable with her."
Namjoon looked up at you, something changed in his face. You could tell Namjoon was furious, “You are being ridiculous. I never said I wanted you to stop being yourself.”
"You didn’t have to say it,” you answered, “you made it clear in every other way.”
"That's not fair,” Namjoon said as he set his chopsticks down, hard enough for it to make a loud noise, "What do you want me to say, exactly? Nothing I said could have fixed anything back then. I don't see why it would now."
"I don't want you to say anything," you snapped, “I want you to stop acting like you were the only one who got wronged here, the only one who got hurt. You canceled on me too, repeatedly. But somehow, in your head and in your version of the story, you're still the only victim."
"I'm not the victim of anything. I'm just tired of being the only one who remembers trying."
"You never even tried, Namjoon," you said with a blank stare.
He picked his chopsticks back up but he didn’t eat anything. He only held them with so much force that his knuckles went pale around wooden chopsticks.
"You actually really think that? That I never tried? I wasn’t the one getting too close to a coworker after I already told you it made me uncomfortable," he said, visibly pissed off.
“Right, because I was the only one who ever made you uncomfortable,” you snapped, “as if you didn’t do the exact same thing with that fucking girl from Twice!”
Namjoon’s expression changed and he was about to speak but you cut him off first before he could get any word out.
“And for the record, my co-worker was suicidal. He was in and out of hospital because he was a closeted gay man who had no one else to talk to, no one else to turn to. I couldn’t tell you because it was his secret to keep and was not mine to tell. I am loyal to my friends the way I was loyal to you.”
You watched the colour drain from Namjoon’s face.
Namjoon never knew any of that.
He never knew that your co-worker had come out to you, or that the constant messages were not some secret relationship unfolding behind his back. He never knew the man had been scared and alone, trusting you with something that was not yours to share.
All Namjoon had known was that he was texting you every day. That he had called when you were with Namjoon and you always picked up. On his last night before leaving for a world tour, you answered someone else’s call instead of staying with him. Namjoon thought you were already tired and bored of waiting for him and so you went looking for someone who was easier to be around, someone who did not keep leaving you.
And Sana, nothing had happened with Sana. Namjoon and her had gone to a bar behind your back, and that was it. But he did that because he was angry at you. Because some part of him wanted to prove that he could do the same thing to you. Because Namjoon wanted you to feel even a fraction of what he felt when your co-worker’s name kept appearing on your phone.
God, Namjoon really fucked it up.
You asked him multiple times to trust you, he remembered that now. Namjoon remembered how frustrated you sounded, how many times you tried to explain before he stopped listening. Still, he wasn’t completely irrational, was he?
He was hurt, Namjoon was insecure. He was about to leave for two months, and you seemed farther away than ever.
But being hurt did not make Namjoon right.
If anything, refusing to hear you out then had turned his fear into something much uglier.
You didn't touch the rest of your food. Just sat there, angry at the situation the world has given you on your holiday off work. Namjoon wasn’t touching his food either, and both of you were too stubborn to be the one who leaves the table first.
But you got up anyway, because you couldn’t stand the sight of him any longer. So you went to your room without another word shared between you.
♡━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━♡
If you thought the passive-aggressiveness had peaked during last night’s dinner, day four proved you wrong.
It started with nothing, or something small enough to be nothing.
You left your shoes unorganised by the door, a habit you were never able to break since you were a kid. It used to make Namjoon laugh, but this morning, he tripped over them on his way out to the front yard.
“Could you not leave your shit everywhere?” he snapped as you walked past the door and towards the kitchen.
“They’re shoes, Namjoon, not a crime scene,” you said, matching your tone to the way he was talking to you.
“It’s the same thing it always was,” he shot back at you, “you take up space and expect everyone else to adjust around you.”
“What the fuck does that even mean?” you said, confronting Namjoon.
Were you in the wrong? Yes, but It was one fucking pair of shoes and you did not deserve this much anger over one pair of shoes.
“Oh, you want to talk about adjusting?” you pointed at him, “I adjusted my entire life around your schedule for our whole relationship. I adjusted dinners, weekends, holidays, and my friends' weddings. I even missed a fucking job interview because you only had twelve hours before you had to leave again.”
“I adjusted too,” Namjoon barked.
“You didn’t adjust anything,” you rolled your eyes at him, “you kept doing exactly what you wanted. You chose your career every single time, then you thought feeling guilty about it afterwards made it count as compromise.”
“And don’t act like I forgot about Sana,” you continued, “you went to a bar with her behind my back. Just the two of you then I had to watch people gossip about the two of you everywhere while we were still in a relationship, Namjoon. And you do not understand how hard it was trying to survive a breakup with a fucking celebrity whose face is every fucking where.”
Your throat tightened, and out of anger you said, “I wish we never fucking met.”
“That’s not fair,” Namjoon said, the tone of his voice dropping which was somehow worse than him yelling, “I know I went with Sana out of spite and I was in the wrong, I admit that. But I didn’t know what was happening between you and that fucking co-worker. How was I supposed to know there was nothing going on? Can you really blame me for feeling insecure?”
“It wasn’t my place to tell you, Namjoon. All you had to do was trust me, the woman you claimed to love.”
You laughed bitterly before continuing, “You want to talk about fairness? Well, it wasn’t fair that I had to watch you choose work over me every single time.”
“You could have told me what you wanted from me,” Namjoon said.
“I shouldn’t have had to tell you,” your voice humiliatingly cracked, “that was the whole fucking point, Namjoon. If I had to ask you to try, then it stopped meaning anything.”
Namjoon didn't answer you again as he just looked at you before finally walking out into the garden, leaving the door open behind him like he couldn't be bothered to close it gently either.
You stood there a long time, staring at your own shoes, hating both of them a little for starting this fight. Hating yourself, really.
You thought about the night your relationship had actually ended. It wasn’t dramatic, which was always the part nobody believed when you talked about it later on. There was no shouting or any insults involved. There were only two exhausted people sitting on opposite ends of a couch, each waiting for the other to say the thing first, until you finally did.
You remembered saying; “I don't think this is working out.”
And Namjoon didn’t argue, even when some small part of you wished he did. But he didn’t fight for it at all. He just nodded, like you did something he already privately decided too, and all he said was, “Yeah. I think you're right.”
You remembered cursing him in your head when you realised he wasn’t going to fight for you. Because you wanted, more than anything, for him to be the one who tried and fought for the relationship first for once. And when he didn't, some old and stubborn part of you decided that meant he never would have, not even if you stayed.
Namjoon probably remembered it differently. He probably remembered the months before that, all the times he asked you to make time and all you replied was: “soon”. You did that out of spite, you wanted to give him a taste of his own medicine. And maybe in his version, he was the one who kept reaching out, and you were the one who kept pulling away first. When in reality, you only gave him the same energy he was giving you.
It was funny how the two of you shared three years together, yet left with a different story, and both of you were convinced yours is the true one.
♡━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━♡
That night, Namjoon could hear you were still awake through the wall, he could hear the repetitive sounds of short videos playing from your phone bleeding through the thin wood wall between your rooms. He knew you were doomscrolling, you’ve always done it when your mind was too loud for you to fall asleep.
For years, Namjoon told himself that whatever existed between you and him ended because it was supposed to, that too much had happened; too many things were badly said and too many moments were missed. But seeing you again after years, made something painfully clear.
Namjoon has never stopped loving you, and he has always loved you deeply.
He could still read you the way he did back then, even after you’ve spent years apart. And he remembered all of your habits and worse, some part of him still wanted to be the only person who noticed these things about you.
He imagined knocking on your door softly, asking if you were okay, and you letting him in and telling him to sit beside you. The way he imagined it to go almost made Namjoon get up to join you. He imagined taking your phone from your hand and hearing you laugh at something stupid he says, the way you used to when the world had not yet become so difficult between you.
But wanting you again felt cruel.
How selfish would it be for Namjoon to suddenly realise how deeply he loved you only after losing the right to do anything about it?
So that night, Namjoon stayed where he was supposed to.
♡━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━♡
The next morning felt different somehow, though neither of you could have pointed out exactly why it felt that way.
You woke to the smell of coffee, so you headed down to the kitchen and found a cup of coffee just sitting there on the kitchen counter with a note next to it that said: I made too much coffee, feel free to drink this one.
You sighed as you wrapped your hand around the warm cup of coffee.
This had always been Namjoon’s version of an apology. He was never good at walking up to you and saying the words ‘I’m sorry’ outright. Instead, he would cook you something, bring home your favourite snack, or leave a coffee waiting for you as though food could say what he could not.
You found him on the veranda, staring out at the garden. He looked like he barely slept, and you probably looked no better. You sat next to him, just a short distance away, far enough not to pretend things were fine but close enough that it did not feel like you were strangers.
For a while, neither of you said anything.
"I called my sister this morning," you eventually said, breaking the silence, “she asked how the trip was going."
"Ah, what did you tell her?" Namjoon said, lifting his cup of coffee to his mouth.
"That it was complicated," you said, looking down at the coffee in your hands, "she laughed at me and said that's basically been the answer to every question about you since… you know."
"Fair," he replied quietly, "what did you use to tell people? About us, I mean, after we broke up?"
"That it just didn't work out," you said as you shrugged your shoulders, "nobody needs to hear the long version. Plus a toxic relationship doesn't really make a good story."
"I see. Well, me either," he admitted, "I always ended up saying we just had different visions.”
You turned to look at him, “Different visions?”
“It sounded better than the truth,” Namjoon said with his gaze fixed on the garden in front of him.
“And what was the truth?” you asked curiously and without malice.
You expected defensiveness, an excuse, or something about work, expectations, and pressure of being Kim Namjoon. You expected anything that would make it easier for him to avoid admitting what he had done.
But Namjoon’s fingers tightened slightly around his cup before he finally said, “The truth was that I kept asking you to make room for my life when I barely made any room left for you in it.”
You went silent for a while, and couldn't really believe what you were hearing. “You could have said that back then,” you said, “you could have told me how you felt, you could have listened to me when I asked you to trust me, you could have tried more instead of making me feel like I was asking for too much.”
“Yeah, I didn’t know it then,” Namjoon replied quietly.
His voice was quiet enough that you almost missed it, so you just nodded while staring at the cup in your hands, “You didn’t make too much coffee, did you?” you asked.
He let out a small and humourless laugh, you just always know what he was thinking about, “No, I made exactly two cups.”
“Is this supposed to be your apology?” you asked, looking at him.
“No,” he replied, turning his head to look at you, “it’s supposed to be me trying to figure out how to start one.”
“Well, you should start with the words itself,” you answered, smiling at him.
Namjoon looked back out at the garden, his shoulders dropping slightly.
“I’m sorry,” he said after a long pause, “I’m sorry if I made you feel like you had to earn space in my life. I’m also sorry for not trusting you enough and acting out of spite to hurt you.”
You didn’t say anything back at him, you just nodded and gave him a small smile.
The rest of the afternoon was neither warm nor cold. You both kept to yourselves, doing what you had come here to do in the first place. Namjoon stayed on the veranda with his laptop, while you wandered between the garden and your room with your book. Whenever your paths crossed, neither of you ignored the other completely; a glance, a small nod, or a quiet “sorry” when one of you had to pass.
And the air now felt less hostile than before.
♡━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━♡
By evening, something in the air between the two of you had changed enough that when he set two glasses and a bottle of soju on the dining table, you didn't immediately think it was a bad idea.
You almost skipped dinner that night and told yourself you would just eat something small in your room to avoid the whole exhausting event of sitting across from a man who apparently still has the ability to unravel you in under ten words.
But Namjoon was in the kitchen when you came out to get water, and saw him setting a bottle of soju and two glasses on the dining table.
"I'm not trying to start anything," Namjoon said, before you could even say a word, "I just.. I don't want to spend two more days pretending you're not here or pretending as if there is nothing for us to talk about."
You hesitated at first because it could go bad really quickly, but you knew even if it does, all you would have to do is stand up and walk away, "One drink," you finally said, “and that's it."
"Yes, one drink," Namjoon agreed.
You sat down across from him, as Namjoon poured the soju on the glass. When he filled yours up, you drank it way too fast, the way you always do when you are bracing for a conversation you didn't actually want to have.
"So," Namjoon said, refilling your glass without you needing to ask, "are we going to talk about it, or are we just going to keep circling it for two more days?"
"Talk about what exactly?" you answered, though you knew exactly what he meant.
"What happened to us,” Namjoon said, in a very non-chalant way that almost pissed you off.
You sighed as you looked out at the persimmon tree outside, "Fine, then you can talk first."
Namjoon went quiet for a moment, turning his glass in his hands, "I used to think you left because you stopped loving me," he said finally.
"I didn't stop loving you," the words came out before you could stop them, "that was never it. I just got tired of being the only one who kept trying to fix things. I was so tired, Joon."
"I was trying too," he quietly said.
"Were you? I don’t know. I mean yes, you always felt bad about it afterwards, you feel bad about missing things we’ve planned and tried to make it up in your own ways. But you know, your guilt was still not the same as your presence."
He flinched, just slightly, "That's harsh. You did the same too the last few months, you were around yet somehow never around.”
"Well, I was petty then, I wanted to give you a taste of your own medicine,” you replied.
He nodded slowly, looking down at the table, "Yeah I kinda knew that now. I thought it was not like you to act that way; to always have some excuse. It felt like every time I needed you to just be there, you had somewhere else to be."
"Well, I also had a life, Joon. I wasn't going to put it on hold indefinitely waiting for you to have room for me in yours," you said, giving him a small smile.
"I know," he said it so quietly you almost missed it, "I know that now."
"What has changed? How do you realise it now but not then?" you asked curiously.
He thought about the question longer than you expected to.
"Time, I guess, and distance too. Sometimes you just start seeing things clearer once you're not standing so close to the person you hurt anymore," he said as he turned his glass slowly on the table, watching the liquid move around, "I spent a long time telling myself the story where I was the one who tried harder, it was just easier that way. Easier to be the guy who got left than the guy who let something special slip out of his life because he was too busy chasing something else. But now, I don't think you were as absent as I made you out to be in my head and I don't think I was as present and innocent as I told myself I was, either."
You thought about what he said for a moment, surprised by how open Namjoon was to you. This was the Namjoon you knew the first two years of the relationship, the only difference is that he did seem a lot more mature now.
"I’m sorry about the co-worker thing. I really didn’t have the right to tell you what he was going through. I was the only person in his life who knew. He is now married to his husband and has moved out of the country. He’s happier and we’re best of friends now. I don’t think he would have made it out alive if I wasn’t there for him. I just couldn’t tell you then.." you said.
“Yeah.. I should have trusted you more,” Namjoon said.
“And I should have convinced you harder,” you admitted.
“I’m sorry about the Sana thing, I never wanted to be that guy but I did it out of anger and spite.. I’m really embarrassed of myself to this day that it ever happened.”
“Yeah, I figured you did it just to rile me up. You were never the type to do something like that,” you said, before taking another sip of the glass of alcohol in your hands, "Do you regret it?" you asked, "us breaking up, I mean."
Namjoon didn’t have to think about the answer because he has thought about it ever since the two of you were broken up, "No," he said, before adding, "I don't think I do. I think we would've just kept hurting each other even more. I understand why it happened. I get it now, in a way I didn't back then."
"Yeah," you replied, agreeing with him, "me too."
Namjoon poured another round of drinks and the two of you drank slower this time as the conversation drifted somewhere different. The old memories neither of you meant to bring up, the trip you two had to LA, Tokyo, and Singapore, the time the two of got lost trying to find a bookstore that turned out to be permanently closed, the time where you tried teaching him how to drive only for him to hit someone’s bins, the stories of your families and friends that the two of you have missed, the new music you both listen to, and the ugly ceramic bowl with the crack near the rim that you still refused to throw away.
"You still have that bowl?" he asked, surprised.
"It's a favorite bowl of mine, do you think I would just throw it away?" you said with a smile on your face.
"It's an ugly bowl, and you know how I appreciate artists more than anyone you know, but that bowl is just something else that I cannot even defend," Namjoon said.
"It's an ugly bowl I like," you said, defending yourself and the artist.
The two of you laughed, and the conversation drifted from the ugly bowl to the artists and writers you had both been following lately. Namjoon told you about an exhibition he wanted to see but never found the time for, while you complained about a novelist whose latest book disappointed you after years of being your favourite. For a while, it was easy.
"Can I ask you something?" he said after the two of you just finished debating whether J.K. Rowling would ever write anything that could surpass Harry Potter. "Did you see anyone else? After we broke up?"
“I went out with a few but only dated one guy for about eight months. He was.. " you paused, searching for the right word to describe your other ex, "easy. As in everything was just so easy with him."
“That sounds nice,” Namjoon said, though the slight tightening of his jaw betrayed the jealousy he was trying to hide.
"It was boring," you admitted, surprising yourself with how honest you were to him, "I hated how easy it was. I kept waiting for it to feel like something and it never did. I think I broke up with him because I just missed having something to fight for."
"I think about that sometimes," he said, "whether we would've been better off if it had been easy between us. But then maybe having it easy is just not what we were built for."
"Maybe not," you said, before adding, "maybe we were always going to be difficult. I just wish we had gone through the difficult times together instead of being difficult at each other."
"Yeah," he said quietly, agreeing with you, “me too."
By the fourth glass, or maybe the fifth, you really have lost count, the bitterness in the air shifted into something closer to the version of the two of you that used to sit and talk all night long.
"I missed this," he said, and then, drunk Namjoon, without him probably realising it, confessed, "I have missed you ever since."
You went very still in your seat. Namjoon didn't seem to notice what he just said. His eyes were already heavy, glass tipping slightly in his hand, and the soju and the exhaustion of four bitter days have finally caught up to him all at once.
"Joon," you said softly and when you looked over at him, you found him slumped slightly against his chair with his eyes closed.
You sat there for a while, still with a glass in hand, looking at him in the dim light of the kitchen, "Me too," you whispered to no one, to Namjoon who passed out in front of you, "Me too, Joon."
You got a blanket from his room and draped it over him where he was sitting and sleeping, careful not to wake him up.
♡━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━♡
Namjoon woke up the next day in the kitchen with a headache and a blanket he didn't remember getting, and the dread of a man who knew he said something the night before but couldn’t fully remember what. Namjoon got off the chair, folded the blanket, and went looking for you.
You weren’t in the kitchen, and the door to your room was open with your bed already made. He panicked at first, wondering if you had left. But he continued searching for you and he finally found you in the backyard under the persimmon tree, sitting on a stool, with a book open in your lap.
Namjoon walked over to you with his hands in his pockets, "Good choice of book," he said, nodding at the book.
You looked up at him and gave him a small smile before saying, "Thank you."
Namjoon chuckled and let the silence sit for a second before he said, "I'll be checking out early at 4 AM tomorrow."
"I’ll be checking out tomorrow as well," you said looking at him.
"Alright," he nodded, “it's been nice seeing you, ____."
You laughed at him before saying, "Crazy how one night could change the first four days huh? But yes, it’s been nice seeing you too, Joonie.”
Namjoon reached his hand out before he could think better of it and ruffled your hair, the way he used to and you let him.
Then Namjoon walked back towards the hanok, and you watched him go until the sliding door clicked shut behind him.
You just sat there a while longer under the tree, some fruit were starting to drop around you, one by one, and you could hear the soft thuds against the ground.
You weren’t sad, because you knew the past few days had only been an accidental closure for the two of you.
And it was never meant to be anything more than that.
♡━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━♡
Three Months Later - Seoul International Airport, 11:47 AM
South Korea was not small enough for this to not be fate.
A country with millions of people, and somehow it kept finding ways to place the one person you had tried hardest to forget directly in front of you.
You had stopped thinking about Andong. At least, that was what you kept telling yourself. Six bitter days and one drunken confession had not undone everything that happened between the two of you. But they had changed something; how you see Namjoon, and how he sees you.
You saw him before he noticed you were there.
Namjoon was standing by the magazine rack, with sunglasses pushed up into his hair, flipping through something he clearly wasn't reading. He looked good and you hated that you noticed.
Just as you considered turning away, Namjoon looked up from the magazine, and your eyes met. The moment Namjoon saw you, everything in him went still as if time had stopped.
After that night where he drank soju with you, he told himself that Andong had given both of you what you needed: an ending that did not involve slammed doors, unread messages, or either of you pretending not to care. The stay in Andong gave the two of you closure and that was what it had been.
Namjoon left at four in the morning exactly as he said he would. What you didn’t know was that he had stood outside your door for longer than he cared to admit, his hand hovering near the wooden door, before deciding against knocking. You both already said what needed to be said and anything more than that would have been selfish of him.
So Namjoon left.
But, you didn’t know that Namjoon had convinced himself that if it was meant to be, if the universe really wanted the two of you to try again, then Namjoon will be seeing you again.
And now you were there.
Standing right in front of him with your handbag over one shoulder and your other hand on the handle of your carry-on luggage, looking just as startled as he felt.
For one second, Namjoon wondered whether he had imagined you. Whether the lack of sleep, the long flights, and the stupid hope he carried with him since Andong had finally caught up with him.
Then you shifted on your feet, your fingers tightening around the strap of your bag the way they always did when you were nervous and did not know what to say, only then Namjoon realised you were real.
Namjoon put the magazine back on the rack, though he had no idea which rack it belonged to. The airport was still moving around the two of you, you could hear the suitcases rolling over the floor, the announcements over the speakers, and people rushing into their gates, but it all sounded far away to the both of you.
Namjoon spent three months telling himself that, if he ever saw you again, he would not waste it.
So he stepped away from the magazine rack and walked closer to where you were standing.
“Hi,” Namjoon greeted, his dimples appearing as he smiled fondly at you.
You gave him a small smile back before answering, “Hi.”
"You look good," he said.
"So do you," you answered, letting out a small laugh.
“Are you leaving somewhere?” Namjoon asked, still smiling at you.
“Yeah, I have a flight in..” you checked your phone to see the time before saying, “in about an hour.”
Namjoon nodded, his eyes dropping briefly to the carry-on luggage you had with you before staring back into your eyes, “Then I guess I caught you at the right time,” he said.
You frowned slightly at him, not understanding what he meant, “The right time for what exactly?”
“For coffee,” he said, “before your flight.”
You glanced at the departure board, then back at him, “One coffee,” you said, saying yes to his invitation, “that’s all I have time for.”
The airport cafe was crowded and loud, which didn’t influence how easily the conversation flowed. You talked about the ordinary things at first; work, travel, mutual friends, the books you had both been reading. Namjoon told you about a museum exhibition he was preparing for, and you complained about a project at work that had been taking up too much of your time.
It was strange how natural it still felt. And by the time your boarding call appeared on the screen, both coffees had gone cold.
Namjoon walked with you towards your gate, neither of you mentioning how none of really wanted the conversation to end.
"Text me when you land," he said.
You looked at him, all confused before saying, "You don't have my number anymore."
"Well, I could get it."
"You could," you said, smiling as you pulled out your phone and giving him your phone number.
And then, just like that, the two of you had to part ways. You walked towards security while Namjoon walked towards his gate, glancing back to each other more than either of you would admit.
You were two people who once tried to be everything to each other, failed and even hated each other for it.
But somehow, years later, after spending an accidental few days together in Andong, you two found something worth sitting down and trying for.
The world, it seemed, was not quite done proving that sometimes the right person only made sense once you both found yourselves in the right place and right time.
Pairing: fem! art dealer reader x idol! kim namjoon
Summary: You fall in love with Kim Namjoon. A love full of passion, a love that burns quietly and intensely. But what’s the point of love if no one’s willing to risk for it?.
Author’s note: bring ur tissues and a cup of tea cuz i’m about to write my longest fic ever hoes
The apartment was really quiet the day you were leaving.
There was no shouting, no slammed doors. Just the gentle zip of a suitcase being opened for the first time in months, the sound of folded sweaters being laid down like old apologies. Even the air felt subdued, you were making every place exactly the way you felt.
You moved slowly, almost like a zombie, the way someone does when they’re unsure if what they’re doing is brave or stupid. Your fingers hesitated over every item. The scarf from the Amalfi trip. The beanie he used to steal from your drawer because he said it smelled like your shampoo. A mug he bought at a gas station in Seoul because it had a crooked cat on it and made you laugh for five minutes straight. You touched those things like they were burning.
Should you throw it or keep it?
That line had been circling your brain for weeks now. At the gallery, on the subway, even during your meetings, where you were supposed to be discussing lighting angles and shipping crates but instead you were wondering how it was possible to be surrounded by beauty and still feel so hollow.
You didn’t even know when the emptiness started. That was the cruel part, it wasn’t a moment. not one big, ugly heartbreak. It was slow, like rot beneath paint, like silence growing in a house until it swallowed everything else. The pain had become numbness and then just… nothingness.
You were tired of waiting for something, of just waiting for basic things. You were tired for even trying to ask for basic things your partner was supposed to give you in a relationship. Romance, touch, a place— nothing. You hated how you started not expecting, not making it such a big deal. Trying to understand had become a task, a reflex. And you hated it. You were so understanding that it had become a fight for your standards. Now nothing was accomplished, nothing was expected anymore.
And you had stayed, for too long, giving CPR to a relationship that hadn’t had a heartbeat in ages. And mow you moved quietly through the bedroom you two had once made it feel like home. Your home. Your place to land, a place for you. Now it was just a big, boring and empty apartment.
You folded the last shirt and paused. Your eyes landed on the nightstand. His nightstand. And you hated yourself for opening it one last time to see it.
There it was. The ring.
In a box that was already more than eight months old, waiting for the right moment that was never going to arrive. It was just… there, like him. You hadn’t put it on. Not the first time you accidentally found it, excited. Not when he told you he was waiting for the right time to ask you to marry him. Not three months later when you were bored. Not when you were thinking of fixing things, not when you were dreaming of the big day he finally asked you the question. Not ever. And not because you didn’t want to. But because you had been waiting. Waiting for the moment he’d really ask the question. Waiting for the right moment. Waiting for the fight. Waiting for him to see you.
But he hadn’t.
You sat down slowly at the edge of the bed, ring glinting dully in the low light. Your throat felt like it was full of water, like if you opened your mouth, it would all come spilling out. You looked at the ring and thought that maybe you could’ve stayed. Maybe if he had just said something, done something, fought for you… But all you’d gotten was silence. And silence had a way of becoming truth.
Your hand hovered over the nightstand, opening the drawer to leave the box inside. Down all the mess of papers and cables. You left it there, becoming dust as it already was. And you hated yourself for a second, for staying there more than necessary, wishing for a change of heart, for a fight that was never coming, for a life that you had planned with him in your mind… for him, for something… but nothing came. It was just you, like always.
Your gaze drifted to the window, where the city lights lit up the streets. And somewhere in the quiet, somewhere in the ache, a memory stirred— of an art gallery.
Of a man in sunglasses.
Of the first time Namjoon made you smiled.
< Four year and a half ago. Manhattan, USA. >
The late afternoon sun filtered softly through the gallery’s floor-to-ceiling windows, casting long, warm shadows across the polished concrete floor. You moved quietly among the canvases and sculptures, your heels clicking against the cold surface. The space smelled faintly of turpentine and fresh paper. A familiar scent, one that grounded you even on the most restless days.
You were adjusting a label next to a large canvas when the front door chimed. A man entered, head low, wearing a faded baseball cap and oversized sunglasses that hid most of his face. The kind of low-key disguise that almost screamed the opposite. Definitely trying not to be noticed, which was always the most noticeable thing a person could do in a room like this.
Some visitors needed to be approached, others needed to be left alone until they couldn’t handle the silence anymore and had to look for someone to share their thoughts. You knew he was the later one. You let him wandered, let him take his time since there wasn’t a lot of people to entertain as it was getting late.
He drifted toward the centerpiece of the current exhibit you were standing in front of a sprawling, abstract piece by Maya Lin, whose sculptures and installations played fluidly between form and space, light and shadow. This particular canvas was a riot of twisted metal shapes and soft washes of color, both chaotic and meticulous. The man lingered, taking his glasses and studying it with the kind of focus an egocentric art curator would pretend to have.
After a moment, he said quietly, “It’s strange. I’m not sure if I’m supposed to feel unsettled or calm looking at this.”
You nodded, folding your arms thoughtfully. “Well, Maya’s work isn’t about giving you an answer. It’s about making you sit with the tension, between order and disorder, permanence and fragility. This piece, ‘Fragmented Horizon’, is her take on how modern life fractures time and memory. There’s a sort of… simultaneous push and pull in the shapes.”
He nodded slowly, eyes tracing the jagged lines. “Like trying to hold onto something slipping away.”
“Exactly,” you said. “But without nostalgia or softness. More like… acceptance of the messiness.”
He chuckled. “That’s one way to make chaos feel elegant.”
You smiled, watching how the afternoon light hit the canvas and made the colors shift. “That’s Maya for you. Always precise but never neat.”
He tilted his head, curiosity sharpening his tone. “Do you come here often? I mean, to places like this.”
You considered the question. “Well, they send me here since I was in the city for holidays and they were exposing Korean artists. They needed someone to speak the language so—”
“Working in holidays, you must like your job.” he muttered, interested. “Are you a translator?.”
“I’m an art dealer. I mostly work with living artists, commissioning pieces, managing exhibitions, negotiating with collectors who want to own a bit of that chaos.” you shrugged.
His eyes sparkled. “Sounds like you get to know the chaos pretty well.”
You laughed softly. “More than I care to admit.”
He paused, then said, “I talk a lot about art. I like to come to galleries and met new artists, they always have good stories to tell with their art.”
“Stories are everywhere,” you replied, “but it’s rare to find someone who listens.”
He smiled, a genuine, almost shy expression that softened the guarded set of his jaw. “Speaking of stories,” he said, “what about the piece over there?” He gestured toward a smaller sculpture. A delicate, twisting form made from layered sheets of transparent resin.
You followed his gaze. “That’s by Lee Ufan. He works with space and material in a way that makes the invisible visible. Like, the silence between sound, or the emptiness around matter. It’s minimal, but it forces you to rethink presence and absence.”
He looked impressed. “I like that. It’s… quiet. But it says a lot without saying much.”
You nodded. “That’s the goal with good art. It’s always better when you can discuss it with someone.” your eyes met his briefly.
He hesitated. “Do you… do you usually give your number out at galleries?”
“No,” you said slowly, “I don’t unless is work related.”
“Lucky for me.” He smiled. “I’m an art activist. I know a lot of small artists who are dying to have a place. As an art dealer I think you would be great for that. You have a place in Korea, right?.”
You raised an eyebrow, amused. “Do you have credentials?”
“Umm…. not really, but would you pass an opportunity like that?.”
He looked a little nervous. You liked his courage. You thought for a moment, then walked to the counter to grab your card. A small business card that said your name, work number and the gallery you worked in back in the city.
“You’ll have to book a meeting if you want an actual art deal.” you said.
“Work phone” he nodded, slipping the card carefully into his pocket. “Y/n, I like your name.”
“And you are?.”
He stretched his hand and you grabbed it, delicate and soft. He had a musician’s hands, long and unpolished.
“Kim Namjoon.”
For a second, the hum of the gallery seemed to quiet around you two.
You knew that name, of course you did. The disguise might’ve fooled most people, but not someone who paid attention for a living. You didn’t say anything, didn’t let the recognition bloom on your face. And for that, he looked almost grateful.
“Do you usually ask for numbers in art galleries, Kim Namjoon?.”
He chuckled. “I usually don’t ask for numbers at all. But I’d knew I regret it if I didn’t.”
You smiled. “I’m hoping it is because of my great work.”
“That, and something else.” He didn’t let you say anything more, turning around to leave. “Y/n. I’ll be in touch.”
And then he was gone. But his absence stayed in the air, like music that had just stopped.
——————————
It took Namjoon only a day to text you. A Saturday night.
Unknown Number: Hi. I keep thinking about the sculpture made of resin
Unknown Number: The one about presence and absence. That stayed with me
You were curled on the hotel’s couch when the message came through, bare feet tucked under you and a cup of green tea slowly going cold on the table. You read it twice before replying. You’d given your number before and never expected much from it. This felt different. Still uncertain. But thoughtful. You typed slowly.
You: Lee Ufan
You: He’s brilliant. Still refuses to overexplain anything, which makes everyone else write 6,000-word essays about him to cope
A minute passed.
Unknown Number: So basically he’s a mystery that intellectuals are desperate to solve
Unknown Number: Sounds familiar
You smiled.
You: Are you referring to yourself or to the sculpture?
Unknown Number: …. maybe both
Unknown Number: But I’m easier to approach in daytime
You: And without sunglasses?
Unknown Number: Maybe
Your fingers hovered over the keyboard. Then you typed:
You: I’m not sure that’s true
You: you walked around the gallery like you’d been briefed on how not to be noticed by anyone
Unknown Number: Was I that obvious?
You: Obvious in a very practiced, low-effort kind of way
You: The hat was a nice touch, very 2010s indie musician energy.
Unknown Number: Ouch
Unknown Number: Now I regret not buying the resin sculpture to distract you
You: You couldn’t afford it
Unknown Number: You don’t know what I do
You: I know that people who buy art like that don’t wear converse with holes in them
Unknown Number: You noticed my shoes?
You: I notice everything
There was a pause, a longer one. You wondered if you’d overstepped.
Unknown Number: So do I
Unknown Number: That’s probably why I came back
A small knot twisted in your chest. You stared at the screen.
You: You came back? Wdym?
Unknown Number: Three times before I said anything
Unknown Number: You were always rearranging a frame, or telling a couple that “meaning variates” with that one eyebrow lift you did a lot when we talked
Unknown Number: I think I liked that more than the art
You snorted at how cheesy that was.
You: So what do you do for living?
Unknown Number: Music
Unknown Number: bit of writing, some pretending I’m not in music.
Unknown Number: still an art dealer?
You chuckled at that.
You: Yes, but not in the evil capitalist way
You: I find work for the artists who still rent apartments with roommates
Unknown Number: That sounds noble
Unknown Number: also so suspiciously underpaid.
You: I also make deals with big people, that’s where I get my checks from and how I can get not-much-known artists to the gallery
Unknown Number: Very smart
You: That’s why I accepted your number request
You: High risk, high reward
Unknown Number: Is this your way of saying you want to meet again, or of keeping me guessing?
You: … maybe both
There was a pause again. A beat that stretched just long enough to make you think the moment had passed. Then:
Unknown Number: Next Friday, in Seoul. I’ll be in your gallery
Unknown Number: Of course, asking for a tour
Unknown Number: This is a business thing
You: I see, only professional matters.
You: I have a group at 7pm you can join
You: Only if you agree to remove the hat this time
Unknown Number: Done
—————
Friday next week came pretty quickly.
And the gallery had never felt so still.
It was 8:52 PM. The lights were dimmed— soft, intimate track lighting casting long shadows over the concrete floor. Outside, the city was moving in its usual Friday-night blur, but inside, everything had slowed to a hush. Specially since it was 8 minutes from closure and the person you had been waiting for didn’t show up to the tour you had given an hour before. But you were okay with that. Finally able to get a rest while finishing the closure.
You stood barefoot behind the front desk, about to flip the lock on the gallery door. You’d swapped your usual heels for flats and hour ago and pulled your hair up into a loose twist that had started to fall by the time he arrived. Namjoon walked in wearing a dark coat and no hat this time, his sunglasses tucked into his front pocket, not on his face.
Good. He was trying.
“Evening,” he said softly, stepping inside.
“You’re late,” you said, not looking up from the wine you were uncorking.
“Traffic.”
You understood it was probably because he didn’t want to be notice by so many people. You could deal with that. So you handed him a glass without asking his preference. He took it with a small nod of thanks.
“No hat. New shoes. You kept your word,” you noted, glancing down. He was wearing clean boots. Expensive ones, slightly scuffed. Still lived-in.
“I felt like the gallery deserved more respect this time.” His tone was dry but sincere. “And I didn’t want to get roasted again.”
You smirked and walked toward the center of the room. “Come on then. You wanted the tour.”
You moved from piece to piece, your voice low but certain. Not a script, just fluid context. Enough to make him look twice at something he thought he understood.
“This one,” you said, pausing at a large mixed-media piece hung on raw linen, “was done by Hyun Seo Kim. She uses burned textiles, thread, and ash in her work. Her whole process is destructive, controlled chaos. But then she stitches it back together. The idea is that memory can’t be preserved, only reconstructed.”
Namjoon stepped closer. “I’ve never seen ash look… gentle.”
“That’s because she bleaches it after. She doesn’t want the trauma to be obvious. Just present.”
He studied it in silence. “That feels honest.”
You turned to him. “Most honest things do.”
He didn’t say anything to that. Just nodded, like he was storing it for later.
You two moved through the space in slow, deliberate loops, glass in one hand, silence in the other. You weren’t trying to impress him. You didn’t perform your intelligence. You just let it unfold, like a door left half-open for him to walk through if he wanted. And he did. When you both reached the back alcove, you stopped in front of one of your favorite works. A minimalist installation of hanging wires and glass, perfectly balanced so that even the weight of breath shifted the alignment.
“It reacts to people,” you said. “Subtly. Like the way someone’s mood changes the feel of a room.”
He leaned in, careful not to disturb the piece. “So it’s never still.”
“Exactly. But the movement’s so small, most people miss it.”
He looked at you. “You don’t.”
You shrugged. “I spend a lot of time with things that don’t speak.”
He took a sip of wine, but his gaze didn’t leave yours. “That’s funny. I make a living off speaking and I still can’t say half the things I mean.”
You didn’t respond right away. Your fingers traced the edge of your glass. “What is it you want to say right now?”
The question hung between you two like one of the wires, weightless, waiting.
Namjoon’s brow furrowed slightly. Not defensive. Just… unpracticed. Like no one asked him questions he didn’t already have answers to. “I don’t know,” he said finally. “But I haven’t thought about music once since I got here. That feels… rare.”
You tilted your head, curious. “That’s a compliment or a warning?”
He smiled. “Both.”
You two stood there in the hush, just watching each other for a few long seconds. Then you turned, setting your glass down on the narrow bench against the wall.
“Well, since you didn’t book an official tour, this is where the curated experience ends.”
“No encore?” he teased.
You walked back toward the front desk, your voice thrown over your shoulder. “You’ll have to come back and pretend to like conceptual video art like the rest of our donors.”
“I might do it.” He followed you slowly, letting his fingers brush the edge of a sculpture as he passed.
When you reached the desk, you glanced at him sideways. “So?”
“So…?”
“Was it worth it?”
He didn’t smile this time. He just said, “Yes.”
You exhaled, a laugh almost escaping. “Good. I was worried I’d have to break into the champagne fridge to rescue the night.”
He stepped closer, not touching, just close enough that you could smell the trace of whatever cologne he wore, something cedar-based and quiet.
“You still might have to,” he murmured.
Your pulse kicked just slightly. “Maybe next time,” you said, steady. “We close in five minutes.”
“I thought we were already closed.”
“I’m very professional,” you said. “Even during off-hours.”
He looked at you for a moment. Then pulled his phone from his coat pocket and opened a new contact.
“Remind me to thank Lee Ufan,” he said. “Without him, I’d still be pretending to care about Rothko in Chelsea.” You took his phone, typed your personal phone number and name before handed it back. And just before he left— hand brushing the door handle, head half-turned— he said: “Y/n?”
“Hmm?”
“I haven’t wanted to stay somewhere in a long time. But this was… good.”
You watched him go. You said nothing… But as the lock clicked into place behind him and you turned off the lights, you realized you were smiling. And you hadn’t done that in days.
< Four years ago. Seoul, Korea. >
It started with tea.
Neither of you two had wanted more wine. It was already past one, the air inside heavy and comfortable, and you had stood, stretched, and mumbled something about chamomile. Namjoon had followed you into the kitchen, because he couldn’t not. Now, two mugs sat cooling on the coffee table, untouched. You were curled at one end of the couch, socked feet tucked under you, hoodie sleeves pulled over your hands. Namjoon lay on his side across the other end, head propped on a throw pillow.
He didn’t want to go home. Not yet.
“I still think you’re lying about never writing a book,” you said, pointing a finger at him like it was a scandal.
“I told you,” he said, grinning, “I tried one time and I got so stressed for it to be perfect I had to throw it out. I almost had to take pills for anxiety.”
You snorted. “You probably are better just writing music and poems.”
“You’re cruel.”
“I’m honest.”
He looked at you then, a little too long. Your hair tied back in a loose knot, a small smudge of eyeliner still clinging to the corner of your eye. To him you always looked like you were halfway between leaving and staying forever.
“Your turn,” he said, lazily. “Ask something.”
You pressed your lips, thinking. Then: “What do you miss most about before things got big?”
Namjoon blinked. “That’s a surprisingly good question.”
“I’m full of them.”
“I miss…” He paused. “Having time to be bored. Back then, I used to wander for hours. Not even writing. Just… looking. People, cracks in the sidewalk, signs on buses. Now everything’s either scheduled or monetized. Or both.”
You watched him. “You sound older when you say that.”
“I feel older when I say it.”
“Do you regret it?”
“The music?”
“No. The scale of it. The attention.”
He thought about it. Then shook his head. “No. But sometimes I wish I could mute it. Like— have it without the echo.” You nodded slowly, as if you understood without needing him to explain more. “Okay,” he said, recovering his grin. “Now you, what’s something no one knows about you?”
“I once wanted to be a florist.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Really?”
“For about four days when I was twelve. I used to rearrange bouquets from the grocery store and get upset when they were ‘imbalanced.’ I told my mom I was going to run a flower shop where people could come in and say how they were feeling and I’d match them to a bouquet.”
“I’d be selective,” you corrected. “No carnations. No baby’s breath. And absolutely no Valentine’s Day roses.”
He laughed, soft and full.
There was a moment of quiet again. Not awkward, just long enough for the air to shift. Then he asked, “Do you believe in soulmates?”
You looked at him for a moment, eyes unreadable.
“I think some people fit. In a way that doesn’t have to be explained.”
“Not fate?”
“No,” you shook your head. “More like… they recognize something in each other. Something old. Something familiar.”
Namjoon watched you for a long second. “You sound like someone who’s already met theirs.”
You smiled, but didn’t answer. Instead, you asked, “What’s your worst habit?”
He grinned. “Interrupting people when I’m excited.”
“Accurate.”
“Also… leaving too soon. From everything.”
You raised a brow. “Even from people?”
“Especially from people,” he said, then added, more quietly, “Until now.”
You looked down at your hands, picking at the hem of your hoodie. He could tell you were deciding whether or not to believe him. Eventually, you said, “You haven’t left yet.”
He nodded, and said, “Ask me something else.”
You smirked. “What’s my middle name?”
Namjoon grimaced. “…Do I get a hint?”
“No.”
“Is it tragic?”
“That depends on your taste in poetry.”
“Oh god.”
You leaned in, eyes sparkling. “Guess.”
“Something with vowels. It feels like vowels.”
“You’re an idiot.”
“Something French?” You shook your head. He sighed dramatically. “Is it… Eleanor?” You blinked. “Is it Eleanor?!”
You smiled, then mouthed, “maybe.”
Namjoon threw his head back. “I am a genius!”
“It’s not Eleanor.”
“Yah!” he frowned. “I got excited.”
“I just wanted to break your hopes of being a genius.”
He smiled, like you just told him the biggest compliment. “You’re in love with me.”
“I am not.”
He smirked. “You’re very close.”
And you said nothing, but didn’t look away.
Outside, a car passed. The candle flickered. The playlist looped again. And somewhere between the questions and the not-quite confessions, you both realized: whatever was growing wasn’t temporary.
—————
You were lost.
Not metaphorically. Actually lost.
A wrong turn, a closed road, and a stubborn GPS had led you two somewhere outside of Busan city, into a mess of winding hills and stone walls and olive trees that all looked like something from a postcard Namjoon had definitely lied about sending once… It was your first road trip/travel with him. Now that you were dating you were spending more and more time together so a little travel while you two had time off was great. Specially since it was only the two of you. But this, this was a mess. And it had been funny for the first twenty minutes…
Now you had your feet on the dash, sunglasses slipping down your nose, and Namjoon was squinting at his phone like it had personally betrayed him.
“Why don’t you just ask someone?” you offered, trying not to roll your eyes.
“Because I’m a man and I’m supposed to figure it out through trial, error, and unnecessary detours.”
“That’s not charming. That’s a cliché.”
“Exactly. And clichés are comforting.”
You finally did roll your eyes and leaned over to look at his phone. “We’re fifteen minutes from the villa. You just missed a left after the sheep farm.”
“That could describe this entire region.”
You smirked. “So dramatic.”
He pulled the car to the side of the dirt road, sighed, and finally looked at you. “Okay,” he said. “Say it.”
“Say what?”
“Whatever sarcastic thing you’ve been holding in for the last twenty minutes. I deserve it.”
You tilted your head. “I was going to say this might be the most relaxed I’ve ever seen you.”
Namjoon blinked.
“That… wasn’t sarcastic.”
“I know.”
He looked at you. Really looked. The sunlight was pooling in your lap, catching the hem of your linen shorts, the small scar on your knee, the lazy twist of your smile. Your hand was curled around a bottle of water, your nails chipped, your phone face-down on your thigh. You were quiet. Present. Not curating anything.
He hadn’t written a song in two weeks and hadn’t even cared. And maybe that should have terrified him. But instead, what slipped out of his mouth, simple and sudden, was:
“I love you.”
You stilled.
He felt it immediately. The way the air changed. Not colder. Not distant. Just heavier, like the room had shrunk and the road had stopped moving and time was now very, very slow.
You looked at him, your eyes unreadable behind the glasses.
“You said that like you didn’t mean to.”
“I didn’t.”
“Then why’d you say it?”
He swallowed. “Because it’s true.”
A beat.
Then another.
You reached up, slid your sunglasses into your hair, and studied him. Not like a critic. Not like a curator. Just a girl who’d been kissed in the middle of a detour and hadn’t expected it to feel like a beginning.
“I don’t think I can say it yet,” you said softly.
“I know.”
“But I’m not getting out of the car.”
He smiled, something small, barely there, but real.
“Good.”
You reached over, laced your fingers through his, and said, “Now turn the car around before I start doubting your sense of direction and your emotional timing.”
He laughed. It shook out of him without resistance.
And when he drove back toward the sheep farm, your hand stayed in his the whole way.
—————
It was late.
Not late like the night you’d always stayed up talking till sunrise. This was the quiet late. The end of a long day, the kind that left your bones a little heavier, your thoughts a little slower.
You had come back from a full weekend at the gallery. An opening, a surprise artist visit, two canceled deliveries, and a handful of clients who talked too much and bought too little. Namjoon had waited up for you. Not because you asked him to. He just always did. He liked to be in your apartment, waiting for you when he was available. Seeing you, being with you anytime he could. He liked being available for you, even in your worst moods.
You came in, dropped your bag, kicked off your shoes with one hand still holding your phone, hair messily pinned, and your lipstick worn off in the center. He didn’t say anything at first, just handed you the takeout he’d ordered and a glass of water. And you two sat on the couch like you’ve been doing the last couple of months when you gave him the key to your apartment, when you came home like this: your legs over his lap, your head leaned back on the armrest, one of his hands tracing slow, lazy lines down your tights.
“You smell like oil paint,” he said quietly.
You didn’t open your eyes. “Someone spilled gesso all over the hallway. I slipped in it. My knees are a war crime.”
He laughed under his breath. “You’re very sexy when you’re bruised and tired.”
“I’m always tired.”
“You’re always sexy.”
“Your standards are deeply flawed.”
He smiled. “They’re deeply yours.”
And then there was quiet for a while.
You were finishing your noodles slowly. His fingers hadn’t stopped tracing your skin. The TV was on but muted, some cooking show with too much steam and too many close-ups of butter. It wasn’t a romantic night. There were no candles. No dramatic pauses. Which is why it felt exactly right when you suddenly said it.
“I love you.”
Namjoon blinked, mid-chew. He swallowed too quickly and coughed once. You didn’t laugh. Didn’t tease. You just looked at him with this almost-shy, almost-tired certainty, like the words had been sitting under your tongue for weeks and simply slipped free before you could second-guess them.
He opened his mouth, but you spoke again, softer this time. “I didn’t say it before because I didn’t want it to sound like… thanks. Or obligation. Or like I was catching up.” He nodded slowly, still not trusting himself to speak. “But I do,” you added. “I love you. I know it. And it’s quiet, but it’s… constant. Like breathing. I don’t have to check if it’s there anymore.”
Namjoon didn’t say anything right away. He just reached for your hand, lifted it gently, and kissed the inside of your wrist, the same spot he’d brushed his thumb across that first night on the floor you two spent together. And then, without needing to say it again, he smiled that slow, stunned smile people only make when they hear what they didn’t know they’d been waiting for.
“About damn time,” he murmured.
You rolled your eyes, but let him pull you close.
And in the quiet, with nothing grand or profound around you both, you thought: this is great. This is perfect.
< Three years ago. Seoul, Korea >
You two were cooking.
Or trying to. The kitchen was a mess. Half-sliced vegetables, three open spice jars, a pan smoking slightly on the stove. You had flour on your cheek, and Namjoon was holding a wooden spoon like he was conducting an orchestra.
“Okay,” he said, voice stern. “I don’t want to alarm you, but we may have invented a new form of food poisoning.”
You glanced at the pan, then at him. “That’s just… slightly over-caramelized garlic.”
“It looks like regret.”
“You’re dramatic.”
“I’m a realist. A realist with a fire extinguisher under the sink.”
You rolled your eyes and leaned over to nudge him out of the way with your hip. “Move. I’m saving this.”
“You’re gonna dump it.”
“I’m going to elevate it.”
“Oh, now it’s Chopped?”
You gave him a look. “You’re lucky I love you.”
He paused. Still every time you said it. Like it rearranged something in him.
“You’re even luckier,” he said, quieter. “Because I would eat your elevated garlic poison a thousand times.”
You two grinned at each other for a moment. Then you turned back to the pan. He didn’t move. Just watched you. Then, softly: “Do you think about where this is going?”
You didn’t turn around, but he saw the way your shoulders shifted.
“Sometimes,” you said, casual but not distant. “Do you?”
“All the time.”
He stepped closer. Rested a hand on the counter beside your hip.
“I think about what it would be like to wake up next to you somewhere quieter. Somewhere with windows that face east and a real coffee machine.”
Your voice was light. “You hate waking up early.”
“For you, I’d tolerate sunrises.” You smiled at the pan. Stirred once. He went on. “I think about your bookshelves of art history in my space. My guitar in your hallway. Arguing over what color to paint the bedroom.”
“We’d never agree.”
“Exactly. That’s how I know it would work.”
You turned then, leaned back against the counter, arms crossed, wooden spoon still in hand. “You’re making this sound a little like a proposal.”
Namjoon stepped closer, but didn’t touch you. “I’m making it sound like a possibility.”
You studied him, eyes sharp, searching, soft.
“And you’re not scared?” you asked.
He shrugged. “Terrified.”
“But?”
“But I love you more than I fear the part where it could all fall apart.”
A silence passed, then you said, “I think I’d want a balcony. Wherever we are.”
Namjoon grinned. “See? That’s already a ‘we.’”
You rolled your eyes, but didn’t deny it. And then you reached out, quietly, fingers brushing his.
“We could take it slow.”
Namjoon nodded. “We could take it together.”
The garlic burned. The pan hissed. Neither of you moved. Because in that moment, over smoke and risk and flour on your cheek, the future stopped feeling theoretical. It started to feel like something you could build.
Not in one night. But maybe, If you two kept choosing it… Every night after.
—————
The gallery was already humming.
Rows of suited collectors, critics, young interns holding wine glasses too tightly. Warm lighting made everything glow just a little too perfectly. You stood near the entrance to the main room, your talk scheduled in less than twenty minutes. You weren’t nervous. Not about the speaking. You’d done this before. Art history, curation, your specialty in contemporary Korean painters, this was your terrain. What was sitting heavy in your stomach was the ghost of Namjoon’s absence.
You hadn’t expected him to come. Really. He was across the country, prepping for an upcoming televised performance that morning, stuck in rehearsals and press for the next week too. He’d sent a voice note that morning. Tired but warm. “You’ll be brilliant, and I’m not only saying it because I love you but because I know you. You don’t need me there to see it. I’m proud of you, baby.”
And you understood. You always understood. Still. You kept catching yourself glancing at the door.
“Y/n,” someone said. Sophie, your co-curator, adjusting her headset. “They’re ready for you in five.”
You nodded, adjusted your blazer, smoothed your palm against the small stack of notes you wouldn’t end up using. You moved toward the front of the space, where the podium stood framed by two large pieces from the exhibit. Bold, saturated strokes and raw canvas textures behind you. It was a big night. You were hoping to expand your contacts, specially after your conference. The microphone gave a small feedback pop as you stepped forward.
You were two lines into your opening when it happened.
A flicker of movement near the back of the room. Someone slipping in quietly. You didn’t pause. Not really. Just a half-breath longer between phrases. But your eyes caught him— Namjoon. Hair a little messy, jacket half-buttoned, eyes red-rimmed from a redeye flight. His body carried the energy of someone held together by caffeine and adrenaline and the sheer force of trying.
He was here. He shouldn’t have been.
But he was.
You kept going, finished your opening, sliding into your thoughts on spatial symbolism and absence in modern Korean brushwork, but your heart was no longer still. It beat like it knew him again. Like it was grateful. When the talk ended, the applauses were polite, enthusiastic, a few flashes from someone with a press badge. But you stepped down and walked past all of it, past compliments and handshakes and gallery assistants offering you wine, and headed straight toward him.
Namjoon stood near the wall, half out of the spotlight, holding a paper cup of truly terrible gallery coffee.
“You’re not real,” you said, quietly, breathless.
“I’m very poorly rested, but real,” he answered.
“You said you—”
“I changed my mind at 1 a.m. Took the first flight out. Rehearsals be damned.”
You stared at him. “Did you just show up?” you asked, voice smaller now.
“No,” he said. “I came through. There’s a difference.”Your throat tightened. “You were amazing,” he said. “I mean, I only caught the last twenty minutes, but I wanted to stand up and yell like a lunatic.”
You exhaled a shaky laugh. “I didn’t ask you to come.”
“I know.”
“And I wouldn’t have blamed you if you didn’t.”
“I know that too.” He looked at you gently. “That’s why I had to.”
You stepped forward then, and for a moment you didn’t hug him, didn’t kiss him. Just stood in front of him, looking.
“Are you flying back tonight?” you whispered.
“No. We’re going back to the apartment. I plan to sleep for eighteen hours and then take you to that place you love. The one with the ugly chairs and perfect tiramisu.”
You smiled. “You remembered.”
“I remember everything,” Namjoon said.
“I love you so much.” You leaned into him. Tired. Grateful. A little stunned.
And he kissed you hair, right there between gallery walls and strangers, and whispered, “I love you.”
—————
You knew how Namjoon’s world worked… barely. He knew yours pretty well since every time he had an open space he tried to spent it with you at work or home. It was really rare for you to tag alone with his since it was mostly out of country or when you were working. The most you had been with him at work was at concerts, small shows or when he was working in music in his studio at the company.
So when you were on vacation for two weeks, you decided to tagged along to one of his normal days.
“It’ll be boring,” he warned. “Just me in a chair and people talking too fast.”
But you’d smiled, kissed his shoulder, and said, “I like chairs.”
So you went. And it wasn’t boring. It was… relentless.
From the moment you two arrived at the studio, people swirled around Namjoon like a weather system. Stylists, managers, PR handlers, producers. His name was said in every sentence, but never to him. He was always in motion: adjusting in front of a camera, changing his shirt, signing something, nodding through directions, practicing lines.
You sat on a folding chair in the corner of the dressing room, half-listening to the buzz. You pulled out your laptop to answer emails, but your eyes kept drifting back to him. And at one point, he caught you watching. He mouthed, Rescue me. You smiled.
Later, when there was a brief break, he slumped beside you, stealing your water bottle.
“How do you do this every day?” you asked.
“I don’t,” he said. “Some days I hide in closets.”
“Respect.”
He leaned against you lightly. “You okay?”
You nodded. “Just absorbing it all.”
“It’s not always like this,” he added quickly. “This week is… extra.”
You didn’t challenge him. But you also didn’t say, It seems like it’s always ‘extra.’ Instead, you said, “Do you have an actual lunch break?”
He made a face. “Technically, yes. Practically, no.”
You pulled something from your bag. A sandwich you’d picked up that morning, wrapped in wax paper and still a little warm. Namjoon stared at it like you had pulled gold from a shoe.
“I forgot what love tasted like,” he said dramatically, taking it.
You nudged his foot with yours. “Don’t be dramatic.”
“I haven’t eaten since… yesterday, I think?”
“You’re the reason I carry snacks.”
He grinned around a bite. “Marry me.”
“I’ve seen how you cook. Absolutely not.”
He laughed, mouth full.
You two sat like that. Your laptop balancing on your knees, him chewing too quickly, his head resting briefly on your shoulder. Just a moment, in the eye of the storm. And still… you felt the distance. Not between you two exactly, but between his life and yours. Between the slow, curated hush of gallery walls and the frantic, blinking pulse of his world.
You didn’t resent it. But it felt… heavy.
When he got pulled into his next segment, you stayed behind. Alone again in the dressing room. You looked at the schedule taped to the wall. Seven more things to go. A different building after this one. No end in sight. You opened your phone and scrolled through your messages with him. A few voice notes. A photo he’d sent last week of you eating breakfast half-asleep, captioned “Exhibit A: cutest person alive.”
You smiled. But something inside you tugged. You started typing: “Can we maybe block a day off next week? Just us? Nothing huge. Just… be still?”
Then you stared at it. Deleted it. Instead, you sent:
You: You’re killing it today, proud of u
He replied seconds later.
Namjoon: Only cause ure here
You locked your phone. Stared at your reflection in the makeup mirror. Still smiling. Still here. Still wondering how long you could keep up with the pace of a life that never paused. But you were sure you could as long as you want it, because you love him. And if he was always trying for you. You could try for him too.
—————
Rain tapped lightly against the kitchen windows, the kind of soft, even rain that didn’t interrupt plans so much as cancel them without asking. You had moved in only three months ago, bare walls, bare windows, the kind of clean that felt temporary. But tonight, it was warm.
You stood barefoot in front of the stove in an oversized sweatshirt that definitely used to belong to Namjoon. Your hair was twisted into a low bun, lazy and lopsided, and you were humming, off-key and quietly, to a song playing through the tiny Bluetooth speaker on the counter. Something old. Sam Cooke, maybe. Or Ella. You liked to listen to music that made you feel like you were in a slower decade. And your boyfriend always had great recommendations.
Namjoon leaned in the doorway, holding a peeled orange in one hand, watching you stir something in a small pot.
“You’re doing it again,” he said.
“Doing what?”
“That thing where you pretend you’re not a domestic goddess, but you are. Like— look at you! Apron, slippers, vintage jazz, homemade jam?”
“This is store-bought jam,” you said.
“Doesn’t matter. The energy is jam you made at midnight while processing intergenerational grief.”
You turned slightly to glare at him. “Why do you talk like that?”
“Because I’m in love with a woman who makes toast look romantic,” he said, stepping closer and placing the orange in you mouth before you could protest.
You laughed, cheeks puffed, chewing exaggeratedly. “You’re ridiculous.”
He gave you a peck. “You like it.”
“I tolerate it.”
“You adore it.”
“You’re pushing your luck.”
He wrapped his arms around you from behind, resting his chin on your shoulder as you stirred. You leaned into him, sighing softly.
The world felt quiet here. Warm, not in the literal sense—though the stove certainly helped—but in the way your back pressed into his chest, in the rhythm of the rain, in the simple reality of two people with nowhere else to be.
“What are we making again?” he asked.
“Chai.”
“That’s it?”
“It’s enough.”
He smiled into your hair. “You’re enough.”
You didn’t answer immediately. Just reached for the mugs and poured, carefully, like it was a spell. He watched your hands, how precise they were, how steady, and thought about all the things you touched that weren’t meant to last but somehow lasted anyway. You two sat at the little table by the window, legs tangled under the chairs, sipping the tea in silence for a while.
Then Namjoon said, “When we’re eighty, can we still do this?”
You raised an eyebrow. “You think you’ll still like me when I’m eighty?”
“No,” he said dramatically. “I think I’ll worship you. I’ll be the weird old man in the building who writes poems about his wife and forgets to wear matching socks.”
“Joke’s on you,” you said. “I’m going to make you wear orthopedic shoes.”
“I’ll write a song about that too.”
“You’re insufferable.”
“And you’re smiling,” he said, nudging your foot under the table.
You were .
And in that tiny kitchen, with your knees touching and the storm rolling gently outside, you thought: If it always feels like this, I’ll never want more.
< Two years ago. Seoul, Korea >
It was late afternoon when he showed up.
You weren’t expecting him to be back yet. He’d been in back-to-back rehearsals for days, barely texting, let alone appearing in person. Specially since he was supposed to be in another country soon. But there he was. Sweaty, hoodie half-zipped, hair messy under a cap. The kind of entrance that always made you pause halfway through whatever you were doing.
“I had a twenty-minute window,” Namjoon said, breathless, stepping inside. “Thought I’d spend it doing something irresponsible.”
You raised a brow, arms crossed. “Oh? And what exactly is your idea of irresponsibility?”
He grinned. Walked toward you like he already had the answer.
“Kissing you until I forget how time works.”
You rolled your eyes, smiling. “Bold plan. Does it come with snacks?”
Namjoon leaned in, hands settling lightly on your waist. “Just me. Very limited edition.”
You didn’t move away. Not when he bent closer. Not when his mouth brushed yours, slow and soft like a question he already knew the answer to. The kiss deepened easily, like you’d missed it. Like you two had both been holding tension in your shoulders, your spines, your jaws. He kissed you like he was catching up, and you responded like you’d been waiting. His hands slipped beneath the hem of your sweater, fingers brushing warm against your skin. You gasped slightly, which only made him smile against your mouth.
“I forgot how good you smell,” he murmured. “Like coffee and painting and whatever it is you put on your neck that drives me insane.”
“I can’t believe that works on someone famous.”
“I’m extremely weak for you,” he whispered, kissing the edge of your jaw. “Pathetically so.”
You laughed, pulling him down onto the couch with you, your legs sliding around his. His body pressed into your, heavy and warm, and for a second, it felt like everything outside that room had stopped. No shows. No flights. No noise. Just him. Just you.
Your hands were in his hair. His fingers curled under your thigh. Both of your breathing picked up, uneven, mouths parting between kisses like you were saying each other’s names without sound. And then—
Buzz. Buzz. Buzz.
His phone, on the floor. Lighting up like it knew exactly what it was doing.
Namjoon groaned into your shoulder. “No.”
You didn’t move. “Ignore it.”
“I want to.”
“Then do it.”
But he was already reaching for the phone. Still half on top of you, reading the message with a growing frown.
“Shit.”
You sighed. “You have to go.”
“I do,” he said, not moving. Still hovering above you. Still touching you like he didn’t want to stop.
You stared at the ceiling. “You always have to go.”
Namjoon looked at you then. Really looked. “I don’t want to leave.”
“But you will.”
“I’ll come back.”
“And I’ll wait.”
A beat.
Then he kissed you again. Slow. Like a promise. Or maybe an apology.
When he stood, he adjusted his hoodie, cheeks flushed, lips still red. “I’ll text when I land.”
Yoy nodded, quiet. And when the door closed behind him, the room stayed warm. But only with the ghost of him.
You curled into the couch, your body still tingling with all the things you two didn’t have time to finish. And outside, the sun dipped behind the buildings. An unhealthy understanding was growing.
—————
The golden hour fell across the apartment like spilled honey.
You sat cross-legged on the floor, back against the couch, a glass of wine balanced on the edge of a book you weren’t really reading. Namjoon was curled up sideways on the rug beside you, head resting in your lap, hair still damp from a shower, one sock missing. His eyes were half-closed. Music played low from the speakers, something string-heavy and slow, the kind of instrumental that made the windows feel like museum glass.
You two hadn’t had a day like this in months. No flight, no soundchecks, no exhibitions, no rehearsals. Just that. Sunlight and soft clothes, the smell of jasmine from the candle you always forgot to blow out, the quiet hum of domestic peace. You had called in sick to have a moment for you two, you had missed it.
You trailed your fingers through his hair. “You’re shedding.”
“I’m molting,” Namjoon murmured. “It’s part of my rebranding.”
“To what? A golden retriever?”
“No. A misunderstood sculptor. Quiet, mysterious, tragic.”
You snorted. “You’re none of those things.”
“I’m trapped in rap persona, Y/n. Don’t mock my inner artist.”
“Your inner artist drinks chocolate milk and watches anime at 3 a.m.”
He grinned, eyes still closed. “Exactly.”
You two sat like that for a while, just breathing. Just being. Then Namjoon said, “You know that piece we saw in Berlin? The one with the floating glass?”
“The installation with the suspended shards?”
“Yeah. I’ve been thinking about it for weeks.”
“Why?”
“It looked fragile,” he said slowly, “but it was all anchored by invisible tension wires. If you didn’t know the structure, you’d think it was about to fall apart.” You nodded, thoughtful. “And it made me think,” he continued, voice softer, “that love is kind of like that.”
“Like invisible tension wires?”
“Yeah. It looks like it’s floating, like it could fall any second— but there’s stuff holding it together that you don’t always see.”
You looked down at him, touched. “That’s very you,” you said.
“What? Romantic?”
“No. Structural.”
He laughed. “I’m trying to be profound, woman. Don’t ruin it.”
You smiled, leaned down, and kissed his forehead. “I love your brain.”
“I love that you’re the only person who never makes me feel like I have to perform smart.”
“You are smart.”
“You’re smarter.”
“True.”
You two grinned at each other. His hand found yours, fingers tangling like habit.
The apartment smelled like soy candles and laundry. The light was amber and fading. The dishes from the late lunch were still in the sink. Your blouse was hanging from a chair, his hoodie on the floor. Everything was a little bit messy, a little bit imperfect.
But he was there. And you were there. And time, for once, wasn’t the enemy.
So you took everything to make that day even better. Deciding in the night to have a cozy dinner to chat and just be homebodies, at least for a day.
At night the apartment smelled like garlic, olive oil, and ambition. You stood barefoot at the stove, chopping cherry tomatoes with practiced ease. Your hair was half up, your sleeves rolled, and you moved like someone who actually knew how to cook without setting off the smoke alarm. Namjoon, meanwhile, stood to your left, holding a bell pepper like it was a small animal he wasn’t sure how to approach.
“You’re watching it like it’s going to blink,” you said, not looking up.
“I’m observing it,” he said defensively. “I believe in understanding your enemy.”
“It’s not an enemy. It’s a pepper.”
“It’s raw. Which I believe is an important stage in its villain origin story.”
You rolled your eyes. “Cut it into strips. Not chunks. Not chaos. Strips.”
He squinted. “Define ‘strip.’”
You turned, raised an eyebrow, and took the knife from him. In one fluid motion, you sliced a piece and handed it to him. “This. This is a strip.”
Namjoon took it. Bit into it dramatically. “Incredible. Revolutionary. Culinary genius.”
“You’re lucky you’re hot,” you said, taking the knife back.
He grinned, stepping closer behind you, resting his chin lightly on your shoulder. “And smart,” he murmured.
“Depending on the topic.”
“Rude.”
“Or honest?.”
You nudged him away with your hip, still focused on the sauce pan.
“Okay,” he said, hands in his hoodie pocket, “book question.”
“Hit me.”
“Would you rather live inside a Haruki Murakami novel or a Donna Tartt novel?”
You paused, considering. “So, either surreal existentialism with a chance of magical cats and jazz… or beautiful ruin, Greek references, and murder?”
Namjoon nodded solemnly. “Exactly.”
“I’d die in a Tartt novel.”
“You’d thrive in a Tartt novel,” he corrected. “You’d be the one saying devastating things about beauty over a glass of wine right before the plot collapses.”
“And you?”
“Murakami,” he said. “I already feel like a guy wandering through metaphors, missing the point, haunted by dreams.”
You smiled at that. “You just want to talk to a ghost as well.”
“Maybe.”
You stirred the sauce. “Do you ever miss reading just for pleasure?”
“Always,” he said. “Sometimes I get two chapters in and then I get a call or an edit note and it’s over. Makes me feel like my brain is made of bubble wrap.”
“I know the feeling,” you said. “I miss reading slowly. Like… the kind of slow where you reread a sentence five times because it sounds good in your mouth.”
Namjoon walked over to the counter and perched on it, stealing a cherry tomato from the bowl. “What’s the last sentence you did that with?”
You looked over your shoulder at him, smiling softly. “Beauty is terror. Whatever we call beautiful, we quiver before it.”
Namjoon blinked. “Tartt?” You nodded. He whistled low. “Yeah, okay. I’d die in her world too.”
“Probably in a linen shirt. Tragic and elegant.”
“Promise me if I get murdered by aesthetics, you’ll make it sound romantic in the eulogy.”
You smirked. “I’ll say you died holding a first edition and looking mysterious.”
“Perfect.”
He slid off the counter and came to stand beside you again, watching you stir the bubbling sauce. “You’re really good at this,” he said softly.
“At what?”
“This,” he said, gesturing around. “Making things feel warm. Real. Like we’re just… people.”
You looked over at him, eyes soft. “We are just people, Namjoon.”
“Sometimes I forget.”
“Then remember.”
And you leaned over and kissed him, fingers brushing his jaw lightly.
Outside, the city glowed through the windows. Inside, the pasta boiled over, and neither of you two moved to stop it right away. Because sometimes, you let the water spill, when the conversation is that good. When the love feels that close. When time, for once, is yours.
—————
You were late to your own morning.
You’d woken up disoriented, your phone lighting up with a 9:17 a.m. alert and three missed calls from Sophie. You hadn’t meant to sleep in. But Namjoon hadn’t come in until 3 a.m., and when he did, you’d stayed half-awake for an hour listening to him wind down in pieces, shower running, suitcase unzipping, soft cursing as he looked for a charger. He’d crawled into bed around four, smelling like cold air and exhaustion. And even then, he reached for you.
So you stayed awake a little longer. Just so he wouldn’t feel alone.
Now, your hair was still damp from the fastest shower in recorded history, and you were pulling on a wrinkled blazer with one hand while tying your boots with the other. You texted Sophie. “On my way, sorry, cabbing now.”
Your calendar pinged. You’d missed your standing espresso run with Mina, the new artist you had brought in to curate a modernist reinterpretation series. A small thing. Just coffee. But it was already the third time this month.
In the hallway mirror, you caught herself. Tired eyes. Lipstick half-finished. You used to be early to everything. Precise. Present. Punctual. Now?. You’d started sleeping in his rhythm. Eating in his rhythm. Turning down dinners with friends because he might be back in town that night. You’d canceled a trip to Berlin because his rehearsals shifted and he “might have a free weekend.” He didn’t, in the end. You never rebooked.
You smoothed your collar. Stared at your reflection. Said out loud, “You’re still you.”
And for a second, you weren’t sure if you believed it. Because that night, you got home after 8. Namjoon was already there, sprawled on the couch in sweatpants, hair damp from a shower. There was takeout on the table, he’d actually ordered this time, and a bottle of wine he must’ve picked up on the way back.
“You look like capitalism chewed you up,” he said, grinning.
You dropped your keys. “I feel like it.”
He opened his arms. “Come here.”
You did. You sat beside him, tucked yourself into his chest. Let yourself sink. You loved him so much. You were exhausted and tired, but there, with him now, it felt good. You were risking so much, your job, your money, your time. But everything disappeared in a moment like this, when you were tangled in his arms and he was whispering sweet things in your ear…
So you had something to eat. You two watched something neither of you really paid attention to. He kissed your temple and made you laugh. Everything felt okay.
But later, when he dozed off, arm still draped across your waist, you looked over at your laptop. Unanswered messages. Missed calls. That gallery invite you meant to RSVP to. A workshop you forgot to confirm. Your life was shrinking. Not disappearing. Just… folding around his.
And you weren’t sure he’d noticed.
< A year ago. Seoul, Korea. >
You had never been one for anniversaries.
Not the showy kind, at least. No big speeches, no couple selfies with champagne flutes. But you did believe in marking things. Quietly, intentionally. A special dinner. A handwritten card. A night with no interruptions. A day that reminded you why you’d stayed. Namjoon was good in that too. At least for the first one, he had flew you to Paris and took you to an art museum you were dying to go. The second one he was in a tour but bought you a ticket to Barcelona where you two had dinner and he introduce you to a painter you loved. Everything was magical with him.
This year, the anniversary fell on a Tuesday.
You had work all day—client meetings, artist calls, a minor crisis about a mislabeled shipment. You were exhausted by the time you got home, but you still lit the candles in the kitchen. Still set the table for two for later to drink some wine. Still wore the green dress Namjoon once said made you look like you were about to ruin someone’s life in a French film. And he loved it. Namjoon wasn’t in the country. He and the group had a show overseas, a major one.
You hadn’t expected him to cancel it. But the show had wrapped the night before. You’d watched it from your laptop in bed, wine in hand, wrapped in his old sweatshirt. He’d looked beautiful under the stage lights. Exhausted, yes, but alive.
He hadn’t said he was flying back. But he hadn’t said he wasn’t, either.
And Namjoon was always good at the last-minute surprise. The unannounced flight. The knock on the door just when you’d given up. He had that kind of magic, the kind that made you believe in things even when you knew better. So in a special night like that day, when you knew he was only eight hours and could make it in time, you decided to go on with the schedule.
You went to your share favorite restaurant, the one with the rooftop and the quiet view of the city lights. You already had a reservation, Namjoon had made it weeks ago thinking it would be a great place— before the show was confirmed. However, he didn’t cancel it, nor he say he wasn’t going. He did tell you he might not make it and it was very obvious it would be a surprise if he actually did but he always did that. Specially since he didn’t text you all day. So, you decided to wait for him, like always.
At 8:00 p.m., you ordered a glass of red.
At 8:15, you declined the menu, just in case.
At 8:40, you checked your phone.
At 9:00, the waiter asked gently if you’d like to order. You shook your head, throat tight.
The food smelled amazing. The candle flickered between empty seats. Your phone buzzed at 9:12.
Namjoon: Happy anniversary. I love you.
That was all it said.
You stared at the message for a full minute before locking the screen.
The waiter came back. “Still waiting?”
You smiled, small and practiced. “No. I think I’ll take the check.”
You walked home slowly, heels in your hand by the end of the block, the city alive around you in a way you weren’t. You didn’t cry. You didn’t text him back. You didn’t even take off the dress when you got home, just sat on the edge of the bed, lights off, wondering when it had started to feel like this. Like something one-sided. Like hope was an embarrassing thing to hold onto.
It was embarrassing now waiting for him. Did it make you a bad person?. After everything he did for you, was this something to punish him for?. But he had made you have big standards about him, about how he could do anything to see you. But why now it felt like you shouldn’t be hurt?. Was it wrong to hold him to the standards he had made you put him on?. A little mistake, a little thing under the bridge. Was it something to worry? or was it just something you were making a big deal?.
Was waiting for someone to show up too much now?.
The light was soft and grey when you woke. You hadn’t meant to fall asleep on top of the covers, still in the green dress from the night before, makeup smudged beneath your eyes like a fading memory. You sat up slowly, your body stiff, your mouth dry, your phone still beside you on the bed, screen black. You didn’t reach for it right away. The apartment was quiet—almost aggressively so. The kind of silence that hums in your ears, that dares you to fill it. You made coffee without thinking, poured it into the chipped blue mug he always used when he was home. Then, almost accidentally, you poured yourself a second cup.
You stared at them both for a while.
The phone buzzed around 8:45 a.m. Namjoon
Incoming call
You hesitated only a second before picking up.
“Hey,” he said. His voice was rough with sleep, but too alert. The kind of voice that knew it was calling a fire it couldn’t put out.
“Hi,” you answered. Calm. Soft. Nothing in your tone gave you away.
“I wanted to call last night, but everything was chaos. Press, crew dinner. I tried to find a flight, but there was nothing that would get me to you in time.”
“I figured,” you said.
“I thought about video calling, but I didn’t want to…” He trailed off.
“Don’t worry.”
A pause. “How was dinner?”
“I didn’t stay long.”
Another pause.
“I’m sorry,” he said, and he sounded like he meant it. “I should’ve done more.”
You sipped your coffee. It was still too hot, but you didn’t flinch. “It’s okay.”
“No, it’s not.”
“No,” you agreed quietly. “It’s not.”
He was silent on the other end. You imagined him sitting in some hotel bed, probably still in stage makeup, phone pressed to his cheek, trying to read you through the static.
“You’re mad,” he said.
“No,” you said again, and this time it wasn’t soft—it was far. “I’m just tired.”
“Of me?”
“Of hoping for things you used to do without thinking.”
He exhaled hard. “Y/n…”
“I’m not going to fight with you over the phone,” you said gently.
“I’m not trying to fight.”
“I know. That’s the problem.”
He didn’t answer right away.
“I love you,” he said finally, quiet and uneven.
“I know.”
Another silence. This one worse than all the others.
“I’ll be back in two days,” he said.
You nodded, forgetting he couldn’t see you. “Okay.”
“I’ll make it up to you.”
You closed your eyes. Hating that word. You hated hearing that, always did. But more so now than ever.
“Okay,” you repeated, and it sounded like maybe.
Not yes. Just… maybe.
He didn’t come back the next day. It was a week later he finally had time to come back to the country. And almost two days later he was able to be back home. But by that time, it was already too late to talk about something that has already passed. So you two stayed quiet. And for the first time and not last, that night it was just something small that happened.
—————
You found it on a Wednesday, tucked in the back of the nightstand drawer he never used. You were searching for a charger. His drawer was chaotic. Full old receipts, ticket stubs from cities he barely remembered, notes of night thoughts. And then, under a stack of guitar picks and a long-dead pen, you saw it. A small, square box.
You paused. Everything in you stilled. Your fingers hovered above it for a breath, then two. You opened it.
Inside: an engagement ring.
Simple. Elegant. A soft, brushed gold band with a quiet, imperfect diamond that looked more chosen than flashy.
Your heart gave a quiet, panicked lurch. You didn’t cry. Didn’t gasp. Just closed the box slowly and put it back exactly where you found it. You didn’t say anything to him either Not that night. Not the next. You didn’t know why. Maybe because it felt like looking at a letter addressed to you that hadn’t been sent yet. It felt like love in transit. Like something that belonged to his timing, not yours. And you trusted him. Even if everything was hectic. Even if you were fraying around the edges.
You trusted him to get there.
It was two weeks later, near midnight, when he finally told you.
The night was unusually quiet. Outside, the city seemed to hold its breath. No honking, no sirens, just the low hum of a world that had finally decided to rest. Inside your share apartment, the windows were cracked open to let in the cool air, and the sheets tangled loosely around your legs as you two lay there, close but not speaking yet. It had been one of those rare days when the two actually had time. Real, unscheduled time. A slow morning. Grocery shopping. Making pasta without burning it. Watching a movie neither of you finished because you fell asleep halfway through, limbs knotted, breath in sync.
Now, the lights were off. Only the occasional gleam from a passing car painted stripes across the ceiling. You lay on your side, your fingers tracing slow, absentminded lines along Namjoon’s chest. His arm was wrapped around your waist. He hadn’t spoken in a while.
Then, softly, almost like he wasn’t sure if he should say it: “I’ve been thinking about marrying you.”
You didn’t move, didn’t stiffen. Your fingers paused briefly, then continued their path across his skin.
“I mean, not just thinking,” he said, a small, sheepish laugh escaping. “Planning, really. Secretly. Clumsily.”
Your smile was audible, even in the dark. “That sounds very on-brand.”
He let out a breath, clearly relieved you weren’t panicking. “I keep trying to find the perfect moment. The kind you tell stories about later. But every time I think I’ve got it, something happens—another show, an art event, a delay, a rehearsal running late. You didn’t interrupt. “I just…” His voice grew a little quieter. “I want to do it right. For you. You deserve something beautiful. Not rushed. Not after a long flight or in a hallway or between meetings.”
You turned slightly, tucking your face into the space where his neck met his shoulder. You could hear the nervous flutter in his chest. Like your silence was the only thing louder than the city.
Namjoon gently shifted his hand to cradle your face. “Can I ask you something?”
“Mm-hm.”
“If I asked you… someday soon,” he said carefully, “would you say yes?”
You pulled back just enough to look at him. His eyes had adjusted to the dark, fixed on you like you were the only thing he could see.
Your voice was steady and warm, no hesitation. “Of course I would.”
Namjoon’s face softened completely. He looked stunned by how easy it was for you to say. Like part of him had been bracing for uncertainty, and instead got home. “Yeah?” he asked, because part of him needed to hear it again.
“Yeah,” you whispered. “Without blinking.”
He exhaled like it was the first full breath he’d taken all day, burying his face in you shoulder with a groan. “God, I love you.”
You laughed softly, brushing your fingers through his hair. “I know.”
“I mean it,” he mumbled. “I want all of it. Boring weekends. Matching mugs. Bad schedules. Waking up next to you every day until we’re old and weird.”
“We’re already weird.”
“Okay. Older and weirder.”
You kissed the top of his head. “I want that too,” you said. “All of it. And more.”
Namjoon looked up at you again, eyes sleepy and full of so much love you almost couldn’t hold it. “I’ll find the right time,” he promised. “It won’t be long.”
“I’m not in a hurry,” you said. “As long as it’s you.”
He kissed you once. Lazy, warm, and deep with knowing. And when you two fell asleep, it was with yours hands clasped between both, like two people who had already chosen each other, formally or not.
The ring stayed hidden. And you let it. Because you already had the answer. And he already had your heart.
< Seven months ago. Seoul, Korea >
You two were supposed to go away that weekend.
Just the two of you. A quiet place in the countryside, two hours outside the city. No cameras. No phones. No work. Just a cabin, a fireplace, books, and each other. You had planned it for weeks. Namjoon hadn’t had a proper day off in months. You wanted to give him a weekend where he didn’t have to perform, or talk about a setlist, or be anything except yours.
He seemed excited when you told him. He even kissed the tip of your nose and said, “God, I need that. You. Us.”
You booked it that night.
But on Thursday evening, two days before the trip, he called while you were at work. His voice was careful.
“Babe, listen, I know we had the cabin this weekend, but I might need to stay in the city. Something came up with Badu’s label and they want to do a session on Saturday. I know, I know, it sucks.”
You sat in the storage room of the gallery, your phone pressed to your ear, surrounded by crates of borrowed sculptures. You didn’t say anything for a moment.
“Is it urgent?” you asked finally.
“It’s… time-sensitive. I think they’re trying to fast-track something before Badu flies out to Tokyo. I can say no. I mean— if this is a big deal for us, I’ll say no.”
But he said it the way people do when they don’t want to say no. When they’re already halfway to saying yes.
You smiled, though he couldn’t see you. “It’s okay. We’ll reschedule.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah. You should do it.”
“Rain check?”
“Rain check,” you repeated, soft.
You hung up, and you stared at the weekend itinerary you had printed out. His favorite bakery for the drive. A wine tasting in a small town. That local bookstore you thought he’d love. Even a museum you wanted to visit… You folded it all up and slid it into a drawer.
When you got home that night, he was already asleep. Studio hours were brutal. You curled in next to him, your arm across his back, your nose against his shoulder. You didn’t cry. You didn’t get angry. You just waited for him to say something about it the next day. Maybe suggest a new weekend. Maybe show up with coffee and a smile and say, “Hey, let’s pick a new date.”
He didn’t. It was just one weekend, you told yourself. Just one plan. People get busy. People cancel. Still, it sat with you, quiet and dull, like a match that never got lit.
Not a flame. Not yet. But something you wouldn’t forget. Something was changing.
< Six months ago. Seoul, Korea. >
You locked yourself in the gallery’s back office and let out a breath you hadn’t realized you’d been holding since 10 a.m. The artist had walked out. Just like that—mid-meeting, hands flailing, voice raised—and declared he wouldn’t be participating in the upcoming show. Something about the press release tone being “too colonial,” which you had tried to explain wasn’t even written yet. Your director blamed you. The interns stared at you like a live grenade. And to top it all off, you’d spilled coffee on your blouse five minutes before a meeting with one of the museum board members.
By the time it was 7:00 p.m., you felt like the whole day had been gnawing at you from the inside out.
You didn’t want to go home. Not yet. Instead, you curled up on the lumpy chair in the corner of the office, legs pulled up, jacket still on. The gallery lights were out except for a low amber track that lit the sculptures like ghosts. You pulled out your phone and called Namjoon.
He answered on the third ring, his voice half-absent. “Hey, love. You okay?”
“No,” you said.
You didn’t mean to sound so small, but it leaked out anyway.
He hummed. “What happened?”
You exhaled. “Everything.”
“Specifics?”
You tried to organize it, the chaos of your day, into something coherent. “The artist dropped out. Just walked out mid-meeting and said we were culturally tone-deaf. My director was furious. I got blindsided in front of the entire board.”
“That sucks,” Namjoon said, still distracted.
There was a pause. You could hear faint voices in the background, maybe someone talking over a beat. Music. Studio noise. You imagined him in his headphones, half-listening. You waited. Nothing else came.
“I just feel like I’m failing,” you said quietly, more to yourself than to him. “Like I’m drowning in details and no one else sees the full picture. Or me.”
Namjoon clicked his tongue. “You’re not failing. You’re just being dramatic because you’re tired.” You went quiet. He didn’t notice. “I’ve gotta finish this mix,” he said after a beat. “But do you want to come by later? We’ll order something.”
“I don’t really want to be around people tonight,” you said, tears starting to form in your eyes of frustration you couldn’t get out. “I just wanted to talk.”
“You’re the strongest person I know,” he replied, not unkindly. “You’ll be fine.” Then, softer: “I’ll text you when I’m done, yeah?”
You nodded, even though he couldn’t see you. “Sure.”
“Love you.”
“You too.”
He hung up.
You stayed in the dark a little longer.
Your phone screen dimmed in your hand, and you didn’t move. You weren’t angry, at least not in the dramatic sense. No door slamming. No actual tears. Just a subtle ache, like the one you get when you realize a song you loved doesn’t hit the same way anymore.
You had needed to feel heard. Held. Instead, you’d been reassured like a child with a scraped knee.
“You’ll be fine.”
You always were. You always had to be. Of course you will be fine later but you wanted someone to actually hear you out. For the first time, you wondered what it would be like to be with someone who didn’t expect you to already have the answers. Someone who wouldn’t call your strength a reason not to show up.
You stood, stretched your legs, and grabbed your bag. The gallery was quiet, but you left the light on in the main room as you walked out. Let it shine for someone, even if it wasn’t going to be you.
< Five months. Seoul, Korea. >
It wasn’t an anniversary. Not a birthday. Not anything capital-I Important. It was just a Wednesday night you two had agreed on a week ago, in the quiet way people do when they’ve both been slipping through the days without touching each other long enough to notice. You both. were sitting on the couch when Namjoon had looked over at you—half-asleep, feet on his lap, a half-finished script on your tablet—and said, “We should have dinner together next week. Just… be normal for a night. Just us.”
You smiled. “Wednesday?”
“Perfect,” he said. “Wednesday.”
You had marked it in your mind like you do when you don’t want to hope too much, but still want to remember. It had been so long since you two had made time. The kind that wasn’t reactionary. The kind that wasn’t just falling asleep next to each other with takeout on the floor and emails still open. So you planned.
On Wednesday, you left the gallery early. You picked up fresh pasta from that little place down the hill, the one with the handmade ravioli Namjoon once called “dangerously life-changing.” You bought wine, nothing fancy, just something warm and red and meant to be shared. You even found the candle you two used on your first official dinner date, now half-burned and tucked into the back of a drawer.
By seven, the table was set.
By eight, the pasta was cold.
You texted him around 7:30.
You: Everything okay?
He didn’t respond.
You waited until 8:10 before calling. It rang four times before it went to voicemail.
You tried not to spiral. He probably lost track of time. Maybe a recording session ran late. Maybe he was caught in traffic or had bad signal. You checked his location, then immediately felt guilty. It pinged from his studio downtown. You opened the wine anyway. Not to be dramatic, hust to keep your hands busy.
At 8:44, your phone buzzed.
Namjoon: Shit. Fuck. I’m so sorry.
You stared at it for a second. No follow-up. No call. Just those four words blinking on your screen. That’s it?. You typed something. Deleted it. Typed again.
You: It’s okay.
You put your phone down, slowly, and stared at the food. The wine bottle. The candle burning low. It wasn’t the missed dinner that hurt most. It was how easily it had happened. How he hadn’t thought about it until too late. How you didn’t even feel surprised.
At 9:03, your phone buzzed again.
Namjoon: I have an open hour but I’ll have to go back to the studio later
Namjoon: I’ll go now, should I bring dessert or something?
You closed your eyes. Bit the inside of your cheek.
You: It’s late. I’ve got work early.
Namjoon: I’ll make it up to you. I swear.
You didn’t answer.
You turned off the candle. Put the wine in the fridge. Packed the cold ravioli into a Tupperware. You washed the dishes slowly, methodically, like you were erasing the evening in reverse. The bubbles slid over your rings. The water turned lukewarm. The kitchen dimmed as the sun fully disappeared. When you finally sat on the couch, the apartment was quiet. Not sad, exactly. Not angry. Just… silent. Like nothing had happened. And that, you thought, was the worst part.
Because this was supposed to be the night you two tried. The night you looked at each other again, for real. But instead, you looked at your glass of wine. Still full. Still waiting.
And you wondered, When did I start doing this by myself?
< Four months ago. Seoul, Korea. >
You had told him about it a month ago. You had brought it up at dinner, early, gently, the way you do when you’re trying not to pressure someone into caring about something that matters deeply to you.
“I’m giving a talk,” you had said, slicing your vegetables with slow precision. “It’s for the Rothko Foundation event. Big gala. Black tie, way-too-much-champagne type of thing.”
Namjoon glanced up from his phone, nodded absently. “That’s amazing.”
“They picked me to speak about the new acquisitions,” you continued, not hiding your excitement. “I’m going to be in the program. I have ten minutes. It’s kind of a huge deal for the gallery.”
He smiled. “Look at you, Miss Spotlight.”
You’d laughed. “It’s important for me. Would you be there?.”
Namjoon smiled slightly, nodding slowly, like a promise. “Of course I will.”
You’d worked your ass off for it. Navigated donor egos and fragile artists, put together the exhibit proposal in a week, fought for your voice at the table when everyone else wanted a safer, duller speaker. And they chose you. That night, you sent him the event details. He RSVP’d yes.
But it would have been less disappointing if he had just tell you that he’ll try to be there.
The night of the gala, you stood in front of the mirror in your shared bedroom, adjusting the sleeves of your navy-blue dress. The fabric fell just below your knees, structured and classic, the kind of thing that made you feel confident without trying too hard. You wore your hair up. Your earrings shimmered when you moved. There was a part of you, stupid and stubborn and hopeful, that still expected him to knock on the bathroom door with a “Wow,” and a kiss on the cheek, and a “Let’s go make rich people uncomfortable with your brilliance.”
But the apartment was quiet. Namjoon wasn’t home.
At 6:34 p.m., you checked your messages.
Namjoon: Hey, baby. I hate this so much. They moved up the shoot. We’re filming all night now. I’m so, so sorry.
There was a second message.
Namjoon: I sent something to the venue for you. Should arrive before the talk. I love you.
You didn’t reply.
You sat down on the edge of the bed, staring at the carpet. Your heart was doing that thing, folding in on itself like paper too many times creased in the same place. He’d known. He’d known this was important. Not optional. Not a charity auction or a friends-of-the-gallery dinner. This was your night.
And once again, work had won.
The way to the gallery was quiet, frustrated and almost too annoying. Specially since it was a special night where you were supposed to be excited or nervous— Instead you were angry with your boyfriend.
The venue was beautiful, if clinical. Crystal chandeliers, champagne flutes, lacquered smiles. You shook hands with people whose names you couldn’t remember. Your name was printed in the program beneath a black-and-white headshot you hated. And at 8:12 p.m., just before your speech, an usher approached you with a bouquet of white orchids. There was a small card attached. Handwritten.
You’ll kill it tonight. So proud of you.
— N.
You stared at it like it had come from a stranger.
“You’ll kill it tonight.” you repeated.
It sounded like something you’d write to a colleague, not a partner. Not the man who knew what this moment cost you, who’d kissed your forehead while you wrote your talking points and rubbed your back during your mini spiral about what to wear. Not from a man that promise that he would be there tonight when you told him it was important for you.
You folded the card and threw it in the trash.
The worst thing that night was that your speech was perfect. You spoke for ten minutes. Didn’t stutter. Didn’t shake. It was flawless, perfect in any way a good and smart speech could be. Everyone clapped. Someone on the board teared up. The director beamed at you like you were an investment finally paying off.
And Namjoon wasn’t there.
When you stepped off the stage and walked backstage alone, the applause didn’t stick. What did was the silence waiting for you in the dressing room. The hollow space where he should’ve been. No hug. No “You did it.” Just orchids in a vase, propped against a wall.
You pulled out your phone and called Namjoon.
It rang once. Twice.
He answered, breathless, wind muffling his voice. “Hey, babe. I’m still on set. Can I call you in a bit?”
“I just finished the talk,” you said, trying to keep your voice steady.
He hesitated. “Shit—already? How did it go?”
“Well,” you said quietly. “It went well.”
“That’s amazing. Knew you’d kill it,” he said. There was a clatter on his end, voices shouting something in the background. “Sorry, hang on—what was I—yeah, we’re good—sorry, babe, what were you saying?”
Your throat was tight. “I just… I really wanted you to be here.”
A pause.
“Y/n,” he sighed, and not unkindly, just tired. “I wanted to be there too. You know that.”
“I know. I do.” you leaned against the edge of the vanity, your hand clutching the phone tighter. “But it mattered. It wasn’t just about the speech—it was about you seeing it. Being in the room. With me.”
More voices. A door opened and shut.
“I sent the flowers,” he said, gently. “Didn’t they get there? I thought they’d be there before you went on.”
“They did,” you replied. “They were… fine.”
He chuckled, not catching the edge in your voice. “That’s the most Y/n response ever.”
You closed your eyes. “Namjoon.”
“I know this sucks. Believe me, I know. But I can’t get into this right now. We’re literally rolling in ten minutes, and I still have to fix my makeup. I just—I need to focus for a bit, okay?” You didn’t speak. “Can we talk later?” he added. “I want to talk. I just need to get through tonight.”
You almost nodded out of habit. Almost said, Of course, it’s fine, I get it, go be brilliant.
But something inside you ached to say it out loud. To ask him to stay, to make it a big deal and fight. Instead, you murmured, “Sure.”
“You’re amazing,” he said. “Love you.”
You didn’t answer. He didn’t notice. He’d already hung up.
You sat still for a long time, phone in your lap, your hands folded like someone waiting for a train that wasn’t coming.
That’s when it hit you.
It wasn’t that he didn’t love you. It’s that now he loved you comfortably.
He loved you like something that would always be there, even when neglected. Even when ignored. Even when standing alone in a velvet dressing room with someone else’s applause still echoing in your ears. And your pain? It didn’t fit in his schedule anymore. it was only an imposition.
You blinked hard, once. Twice. And then the tears came. Not loud. Not messy. Just steady. A soft unraveling, like thread pulled from the edge of a seam that no one bothered to sew back up.
You cried for ten minutes. Then you stood. Smoothed your dress. Wiped your eyes and went outside to continue the event. Because even if he was not there, it was still your night.
< Three months ago. Seoul, Korea. >
Another fight unraveled the same week. Fight after fight without any income had been followed you two. And the last one came because of laundry.
You had asked him, gently, to please not mix your wool sweaters with the rest of the wash—again. You were tired. You’d been working weekends. The gallery’s next exhibit was massive, and you were overseeing three interns who didn’t know the difference between a loan form and a press release. And Namjoon—half-distracted, headphones slung around his neck—said something like:
“It’s just laundry, Y/n. Not a crisis.”
That was it.
That was the crack that splintered into something bigger than either of you two meant it to.
“Do you know how much I’ve been doing lately?” you asked, trying to stay calm, even as your voice wavered. “I ask for one thing. One thing.”
“You always make everything sound like an indictment.”
“And you make everything feel like it’s not worth your energy.”
He turned then, clearly hurt. “That’s not fair.”
“Isn’t it?” you said, and your voice was rising now, sharp with every silent moment you’d swallowed those past months. “Do you even know what I’m working on? Who I’m curating next? Have you even asked?”
“I’ve been drowning, Y/n.”
“So have I. The difference is I still check in. I still try.”
He rubbed his face, eyes heavy. “I didn’t come home to fight.”
“You barely come home at all.”
You two stared at each other. The apartment was still. The dryer buzzed in the background. It wasn’t the first fight but you were with the same exhaustion as the ones before.
After a long pause, he dropped his shoulders. “You’re right,” he said, quieter now. “I’ve been selfish.” You blinked, a little surprised. “I’ve been stretched so thin I stopped noticing what I was letting go of,” he continued. “I hate that I made you feel like I wasn’t trying. I am trying, Y/n. I know it doesn’t look like it, but I am.”
You didn’t say anything. Not right away. Not because you didn’t believe him. But because you weren’t sure if it mattered anymore.
He stepped forward, reached for your hand. “Can we start over tomorrow? I’ll make dinner. We’ll talk. I’ll actually show up.”
You nodded. You let him hug you. Let his arms wrap around your waist. Let him kiss the side of your head and tell you how much he loved you. And you said it back, softly, automatically.
Later that night, you two lay in bed, facing each other in the dark. He whispered one more apology, then fell asleep with his hand over your waist like a promise. And you stared at the ceiling. You weren’t sad. You weren’t angry. You were just… tired. Tired of trying to be the whole relationship. Tired of reminding him who you two used to be. Tired of convincing yourself that love should be this hard all the time.
And the worst part? You realized you didn’t feel much of anything anymore. No ache. No flutter. No rage. Just quiet. Like your heart had packed its bags long before your hands ever would.
Next week was normal, it felt natural. But two weeks later Namjoon was leaving again. And with him, his word of trying too. And your empathy and understanding were no longer there. Because words meant nothing anymore. Because love can survive almost anything… except being met with indifference
< Two weeks ago. Seoul, Korea. >
It started with nothing.
No fight. No harsh words. Just a missed message. A day passes. Then two. You didn’t text first. You told yourself it wasn’t a test—but of course it was. Not the childish kind. Not a game. Just a quiet question you couldn’t bring yourself to say out loud:
If I stop trying… will he even notice?
The weekend blurred. You worked a long day at the gallery, came home to a half-empty apartment, cooked yourself pasta you didn’t finish. The wine bottle you two opened earlier that week still sat on the counter, uncorked and flat. You kept checking your phone, out of habit more than hope. But there was nothing.
No hey, how’s your day?
No sorry, been crazy, thinking of you.
Not even a meme, a song, a voice note.
It felt surreal. The kind of surreal that doesn’t hurt yet, just itches at the edges. Like something vital is missing but you don’t realize it until you go to touch it.
On the third day, You ran into Sophie, your coworker of years, the one you almost tell everything. You two chatted about curation and studio space until she tilted her head and asked, “How’s Namjoon?”
You smiled too quickly. “Busy.”
Sophie nodded, awkward. “You two are so… I don’t know. Solid. I love that.”
You laughed, soft and brittle. “Yeah. Thanks.”
You didn’t mean to lie. You just weren’t sure what the truth was anymore.
That night, you lay in bed scrolling through old photos of the two of you. Namjoon at the park in spring, lying in the grass, one arm shielding his face from the sun. Namjoon holding a cat that didn’t like him, grinning anyway. Namjoon in your old kitchen, burning pancakes, laughing while you mocked him. It used to be like that. We used to be like that.
At 1:23 a.m., you turned off your phone. Not out of drama, but fatigue. Not to make a point. Just because the ache of waiting was heavier than the ache of stopping.
He finally texted on the fourth day.
Namjoon: Hey. Sorry, this week’s been brutal. Everything okay?
You stared at it.
Not I missed you.
Not I’m sorry for going silent.
Just… a check-in. Like you were a loose appointment on a calendar he’d finally flipped back to. You could’ve said so many things. But all you wrote was:
You: All good. You?
He replied twenty minutes later.
Namjoon: Tired. Always tired lol.
You didn’t write back.
You weren’t angry. You weren’t even sad. Just… done.
Not the kind of done that comes from bitterness or rage. The kind that comes from knowing. From finally understanding that what you’d been holding together with two hands for months was already slipping through the cracks, because he wasn’t holding it with you. Because loving someone isn’t enough if they don’t love you back in the same language, with the same weight.
And sometimes, silence tells you everything you need to know.
< Three days ago. Seoul, Korea >
The apartment was too quiet when Namjoon came home. It was almost midnight, but every light was on. He kicked off his sneakers by the door, half-listening to the click of the lock behind him, the low hum of the refrigerator. He spotted you at the dining table, still as glass. Your coat was still on. Your hair pinned up like you hadn’t touched it since morning. There was a glass of wine in front of you, mostly full. You weren’t drinking it.
“Y/n?” He stepped toward you, rubbing his temple. “Hey. Today was a nightmare, my phone died in the studio, then we lost the mix and—”
“Namjoon.”
The way you said it. Low. Level. Like a wire pulled tight. He looked at you properly now. And he saw it. Not the exhaustion, he was used to that. But something else. Something quieter, colder. Final.
He straightened. “What’s wrong?”
You didn’t answer right away. Just stared at him with eyes that looked like they’d already wept and dried a hundred times in silence.
“We need to talk,” you said.
He glanced at the clock on the microwave. It was 11:43 p.m.
“I leave for Tokyo in six hours,” he said gently. “Can this wait?”
“No,” you said. “It can’t.”
At first it was small things. Your voice low, steady, almost rehearsed. It started with you asking questions.
Did he know how long it had been since you spent a whole day together? Did he remember the last time you two laughed without checking the time? Did he remember you, even… outside of the girlfriend title, outside of the steady, convenient role you played in the margins of his life?
He got defensive. You got louder.
And then it all came out… The missed dinners. The forgotten promises. The way he used to look at you like you were art, and now you felt like a painting nobody wanted to take.
“You think I’m being dramatic,” you snapped. “But I’ve been trying for months, Namjoon. You didn’t even notice I was disappearing.”
He paced. Ran a hand through his hair. “That’s not true. Don’t make this into—”
“What?” you shouted. “Into what it is?”
“I’ve been doing everything I can to keep things together—”
“No,” you cut in. “You’ve been doing everything you can to keep your life together. Your job, your music, your deadlines. And you expect me to just—what—applaud from the sidelines while I shrink myself smaller and smaller so I don’t get in the way?”
Namjoon threw up his hands. “I don’t know what you want from me anymore, Y/n!”
Your voice cracked. “I want you to do something!” He stared at you, stunned. “I want you to stop making me the only one sacrificing,” you said, trembling. “I want you to stop treating this like a luxury. Like love is this extra thing you do when your calendar clears.”
“I’m not choosing work over you.”
“You are,” you said. “You just won’t admit it because your dream looks noble, and my hurt looks selfish.”
He stepped closer, his voice low and sharp. “So what, you want me to blow up my career? Throw a tantrum? Cancel everything and make myself the bad guy—what, to prove a point?”
You laughed, bitter and sharp. “Not always. Not recklessly. But yes— once in a while, yes!” He opened his mouth, but you didn’t stop. “I want you to risk something! Just once. Not because I asked. Because you want to. Because being here, with me, matters enough to make other people mad. To screw up your schedule. To miss a flight. To let someone down who isn’t me.”
His mouth opened. Closed. You could see it—he wanted to fix it, say something, anything, but there was nothing left that words could fix.
You went on, quiet now, your voice laced with every scar.
“I’ve missed meetings. I’ve rescheduled events. I’ve lied to clients and board members because you needed me. I’ve left rooms I fought to be in. I’ve given things up. Not because you asked me to, but because I love you. And I thought… if I just held on a little longer, you’d meet me halfway.” Your voice broke then. “I don’t want perfection. I don’t want you to quit. I want you to want me enough to inconvenience yourself.”
Silence. It was heavy, crushing.
Namjoon looked away, jaw clenched. “So what—what are you saying?”
“I’m saying I can’t keep doing this alone.”
He looked at you like you’d struck him. “You’re not alone. That’s not what this is.” He shook his head, searching for words. “That’s not true.”
“Isn’t it?” you whispered. Silence fell between you two again. You turned from him, brushing your hands down the front of your coat like you were smoothing your own rage. “You love me when it’s easy,” you said. “When I’m quiet, supportive, soft. When I don’t ask you to make space. But the moment I need more, I become a burden. An inconvenience. You treat me like a child who needs attention, not your partner who is asking you for a basic thing.”
“That’s not what this is,” he said, stepping forward. You didn’t move. He lowered his voice. “Y/n, I’m under so much pressure right now. I didn’t think—”
“I know you didn’t think,” you said. “That’s the problem.” Your voice broke again, and he flinched. “I thought we were building something. I thought this was real. But now? Now it feels like I’m holding all the weight while you fly above it all. And you don’t even look down.” Namjoon was silent for a moment. “Say something,” you said, almost begging.
He ran his hands through his hair again. “I can’t fix this tonight. I have to go. I have a flight—”
“I know,” you said softly. “You always have to go.”
He stepped toward you. “Please. When I get back, I’ll fix this. We’ll take time. I’ll plan something. I’ll make this right.” You didn’t answer. He reached for your hand. “Y/n… please. Say something.”
You looked down at his fingers touching yours. But you didn’t hold them back. Because this wasn’t a pause in the storm. This was the end of the rain. He’d leave. And you’d still be here. Alone. Picking up the pieces of a love that had been cracking for months while he sprinted toward a future that no longer had room for you.
“Just go, Namjoon,” you whispered.
“I’m coming back,” he said, almost desperate now. “I’ll fix this—”
But you turned away. Not because you wanted to hurt him. Because you knew: you’d already left a thousand times in your mind. You were just finally listening to yourself.
The tears didn’t come right away. Not that day, or the next. Because this wasn’t the kind of heartbreak that arrived in an instant. This was the heartbreak of staying too long. Of trying too hard. Of loving someone who didn’t even realize they were letting go. You looked around the apartment—your shared apartment—and thought of all the promises you had made in silence. All the ways you had made yourself small to keep you two alive. And then you walked to the closet, pulled out your suitcase, and continued what you had started days ago in your head.
The slow, deliberate act of leaving.
The familiar click of the key turning in the lock was supposed to bring relief — a signal that he was finally home. Instead, it felt like the first note of a dirge. Namjoon pushed open the door, the creak sharp in the stillness. The air inside was colder than he remembered, stripped of warmth. His boots echoed on the hardwood floor, too loud in the silence that swallowed the apartment whole.
He set down his luggage by the door, eyes searching the space instinctively for some sign of life. The small collection of framed photos on the wall, now oddly bare, caught his eye. His breath hitched. The couch where you two used to curl up together was devoid of the usual scatter of blankets and pillows. The side table was clear except for a lone coaster. He moved deeper in, heart thumping unevenly, the pit in his stomach widening. The soft glow of streetlights filtered through the curtains, casting long shadows over the empty rooms.
In the kitchen, his eyes darted to the counter. The bottle of wine from three days ago — gone. The small dishes you always left soaking in the sink — all cleared away.
His throat tightened, a sudden chill crawling over him. He stepped into the dining area. There, a half-packed suitcase sat on the chair, its contents sparse, folded with a cold kind of care. Clothes he didn’t recognize, a scarf you must have left behind, and the space where your things used to overflow. His hands shook as he reached toward the fabric, but recoiled before touching it.
Suddenly, a cold wave of panic swept over him, dragging his breath into a tight, ragged gasp.
“No,” he whispered, voice trembling.
He stumbled back, clutching the wall to steady himself. You’re gone. The weight of it crashed down like a falling building. He pulled out his phone with shaking hands, desperate to hear your voice, see any sign that this was a mistake, that maybe you had a last minute trip, an emergency. Maybe it was a bad dream.
He dialed your number. Ring. Ring But the line never connected. A terse message flashed on the screen.
The number you have dialed is not in service.
He pressed buttons frantically, trying again, but it was the same.
His heart hammered so hard it felt like it might burst through his ribs. He sank to the floor, hands pressed over his face as tears began to fall. His breath came quick, shallow, uneven. A tightening gripped his chest. His vision blurred. He tried to focus on something — anything — but the room spun, the walls closing in.
Please, please, he thought, don’t let this be real.
But it was. The apartment, the ring, the suitcase, everything was proof. And now, the cruelest truth of all: he couldn’t reach you. You had cut him off completely. You didn’t want to see him. Panic seized him fully, and he couldn’t stop the sobs that wracked his body as he crumpled into himself on the floor. He gasped, his hands shook as he reached toward his drawer to grab the little box that was under all his mess. The small velvet box, its lid slightly open. The engagement ring gleamed like a painful secret. He was supposed to asked you this week. You were supposed to be here. “I’m sorry.” he sobbed, his voice breaking through the silence.
He closed his eyes, wishing desperately for a second chance, a sign, anything that could undo the emptiness you left behind. But the only sound was the echo of his own heartbreak.
How could he fix it?.
Namjoon sat on the cold floor for what felt like hours, clutching the engagement ring box like a lifeline. The panic slowly ebbed into a crushing weight, exhaustion threading through his grief. Finally, wiping the tears from his face with trembling hands, he forced himself to stand. He needed to find you.
The cold night air stung Namjoon’s cheeks as he stepped out of the apartment building. His legs still trembled from the panic attack that had clawed at his chest moments before, and his fingers trembled as he pulled the small velvet box from his pocket again—the engagement ring, a symbol of everything he thought he could fix but had only ever endangered. He didn’t know what he expected when he arrived at the gallery — maybe to find you there, or maybe just to stand in the place that had once held your laughter, your quiet moments of shared wonder. It was worst. You were actually there.
The gallery’s lights were low, the air tinged with the faint scent of turpentine and old paper. Chairs had been stacked and art pieces carefully covered, but the quiet hum of closing time lingered like a fragile bubble waiting to burst. He stood just inside the door, clutching the small velvet box in his palm, as if it alone could hold together the pieces of everything breaking inside him. You sat behind the receptionist desk, your shoulders slumped beneath the weight of exhaustion. The sharp lines around your eyes had deepened, etched by months of sleepless nights and silent compromises.
When you saw him, a flicker of surprise and something colder flashed across your face. You said his name quietly, without invitation.
“Namjoon.”
He swallowed hard, stepping forward. “Y/n, I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry for everything. For the time I missed, the promises I broke, for making you feel like you weren’t enough.”
You didn’t meet his eyes. “Namjoon, I have a lot of work—.”
“Please—”
“I don’t want to hear you. I’m not in the mood.”
“Y/n.”
“What?!” you exploded, looking at him. “I don’t want to hear more words. I’m tired of hearing you out.”
“I know.” His voice cracked. “But I mean it, every time. But this— us, it’s the most important thing in my life. I’ve been a fool to let everything else swallow me up.”
Your fingers drummed on the desk, sharp and impatient. “You say all the right things when you want something. But what about the times you didn’t? The times I was waiting, and you were gone?”
He bit his lip, desperate. “I was caught up, I know. But I want to fix it. I want to make it right.”
You looked up then, eyes tired but steady. “Fix it? Namjoon, you can’t fix things with words. Your words don’t mean anything anymore.”
“I’m willing to try,” he pleaded. “Every day, every moment. I’ll change, I’ll be better. I swear it.”
Your laugh was bitter. “You say that like it’s a choice. Like you can just flip a switch.”
“I know it’s not that simple. But I’m trying — I’m really trying.”
Your gaze sharpened, a flicker of something distant in your eyes. “Trying feels like a job you clock out from. Like it’s not me you’re fighting for, but your own guilt.”
Namjoon’s throat tightened. “I want it to be you.”
You exhaled slowly. “Then why does it feel like I’m the only one bleeding here?”
He reached out, but you pulled back, a wall rising between the two of you.
“Y/n, please. I love you. I know I don’t deserve your patience, but I’m begging you. Don’t give up on us. Not like this.”
Your eyes shimmered with tears now, but your voice was cold. “Namjoon, I’m done.” you said. “I’m tired of being the only one who shows up. I’m tired of carrying us when you’re too busy to hold my hand.”
The words hit him like a blade.
Namjoon closed his eyes, swallowing the lump in his throat. “I’m sorry I made you feel that way. I’m sorry I made you doubt us.”
You shook your head, voice shaking. “It’s more than doubt. It’s exhaustion. I’m worn down, Namjoon. So worn down.”
His lips pouted, he tried to clean his tears. “I don’t want to lose you— ”
“You already did.”
There was a silence. Hard. Cold. The way you looked at him, like a decision was already made. Like leaving him was something you had planned for months and finally got the courage to do it. It break him.
He took a deep breath. Then, in a fast and crude way took your hand to put the velvet box you already knew very well.
“If you’re leaving,” he said, voice breaking, “take this with you. It’s yours. Always was.”
You stared at your hand, your throats tightened. And you thought how of a bitch he was for making you do that.
“It was never mine.” You pushed to his chest with anger. Leave
He wanted to beg, to get on his knees and fight for you. But the way you were looking at him. The way you were so exhausted, the way you were angry. He knew he couldn’t make you change your mind in the moment, not when you were so out of reach with your mind and heart, so far away from him.
And just like that, the distance became unbridgeable.
< Three months later. Seoul, Korea. >
The city had softened by spring. The cold that once clung to the buildings like regret had lifted, replaced by light that poured between high-rises and cracked sidewalks like apology. You crossed the street with your coat half-buttoned, a coffee in one hand, the hem of your skirt brushing your legs with each careful step. Your heels clicked a quiet rhythm, one that no longer needed to keep pace with anyone else.
You had moved. Not far, just far enough to start again. A new apartment, a quieter part of town. You still worked at the gallery, but now you curated independently, traveling to other cities for new artists, giving talks where your voice didn’t tremble anymore. You were learning how to live without waiting. You didn’t think about him as much anymore… Not like you used to. But sometimes, still, in the stretch of silence between waking and sleep, he would appear in your mind like a fading note of music. Still familiar. Still unfinished.
It didn’t hurt that much anymore. Because you knew he regret it. He was still looking for a way of calling you, sometimes sending you coffee or things you had forgotten in your shared apartment. You hadn’t being able to unblock him, not really looking for another conversation where you knew would just revive everything that had happened. Specially since it was still new. But you tried to keep your mind busy and away from him.
And it was working, at least a little bit.
That day, your last meeting ended early, and you found yourself walking through a museum you hadn’t visited in years. No one knew you were there. No one expected you. You wandered slowly, the hush of the gallery pressing gently around you like a blanket. And then, like muscle memory, you turned the corner and froze.
There he was. Kim Namjoon.
Standing alone in front of a large canvas, hair longer, posture more closed. He looked like someone who had learned how to carry regret without crumbling under it. He saw you immediately. And before you could make a run, he was walking slowly to you. Standing just in front. And you could have left. Should have. But you didn’t. You two stood there in silence for a beat — not the old silence, thick with grief and expectation. This one was gentler. Like you two were ghosts in a place that had once belonged to both.
“Hey.” you said softly.
He swallowed. “Hi.”
Another pause.
You nodded toward the painting. “You still come here?”
“Sometimes.” His voice was rough. “It’s quieter than my apartment.”
A sad smile tugged at your lips. “It always was.” Silence again. “I heard about your solo project,” you said, eyes meeting his. “The foundation. The benefit shows. That’s… big.”
Namjoon shrugged, sheepish. “It felt like the first thing I did for someone other than myself.” You nodded. Then he said it. Gently, carefully: “I miss you.” You didn’t flinch, didn’t say anything. He looked down. “I wasn’t brave enough.”
You looked at him for a long moment. “No,” you finally said. “You weren’t.”
He blinked. “Do you hate me?”
“No.” your voice was soft. “But I think I spent a long time trying to forgive you before you’d even asked for it.”
He looked like he might cry… but didn’t. You stood there, letting the quiet settle in again.
“I’m sorry.”
Finally, you smiled and took a step back. “Take care of yourself, Namjoon.”
He gave you a nod, tight and broken. “You too.”
You turned to leave but he was quick to grabbed your wrist. You looked back confused. Namjoon had a broken gaze and looked nervous. like he was about to break.
“What are you—.”
“Before you leave. I need to say it. Finally. I need to do something.” You didn’t move. “I’ve been waiting days around your gallery wondering how to tell you this and I found you here just like this… It can’t be casual— I need to tell you” he sighed, eyes getting glassy. “You left, and I didn’t stop you. I didn’t even reach out— Not because I didn’t care. Because I was a coward. I thought if I stayed quiet, if I didn’t fight… I wouldn’t lose. But I did.”
“Look Namjoon—“ You looked away but he kept talking, cutting you off.
“You asked me to risk something and I didn’t. You asked me to do something and I stood there like a goddamn statue. I was an idiot, I thought— I don’t know why I didn’t fight harder and I regret it every second. But I’m here now. And I’m risking everything.”
You frowned confused. “What exactly do you think is left to fight for?” you said, voice like a bruise. “There’s nothing now, Namjoon.”
He stepped closer, just one step, but it felt like a hundred miles. He kept holding your wrist “You, you’re the only thing left I want, even if it’s your hate and resentment. Even if you just want to punch me in the face and scream at me or give me the silent treatment. I’ll take it, I swear I’ll take it. I’ll take anything from you, anything I can have… And I see it now— I see you. Everything you gave. Everything I didn’t.” His voice cracked. “You told me I was losing you. And I just let it happen. I kept waiting for something to change on its own. But love isn’t autopilot. It’s not maintenance. It’s war. It’s showing up.”
You shook your head. “There nothing anymore. Why are you telling me this now?”
He didn’t blink. “Because this time, I’ll risk being wrong. I’ll risk hearing no. I’ll risk everything I should’ve risked when you still believed in me— I love you,” he said. “And I’m not asking you to forget what I didn’t do. I’m asking you to give me one chance to do something now. To fight for you the way you fought for me. Because I swear to God, Y/n… I’ll risk everything for you.”
The silence that followed wasn’t empty, it was holding itself.
You looked at him like you didn’t recognize him. And maybe you didn’t. Maybe now, this time … he was someone new.
i’m so in love with open endings rn
now bitch why tf i can’t write more than 1k paragraphs tfff???? i had to delete so many shit and make the paragraphs bigger i hate itttt
but anyway here’s a namjoon silly little story that i was going to make it a long fic with lot of parts but thought it would be better as just one. i hope you like it >_< my man fr (let’s hate him on here a lil bit tho)
also, i studied art history for a month so don’t quote me on the comments of the artist cuz i don’t know shit i was just trying to be quirky and shit,, also with the books 😓🙏🏼
kim namjoon fanfics that has a special place in my heart! (namjoon masterlist)
A collection of the best (and most well-written) fanfics I've had the pleasure of reading. Thank you for brightening my days and touching me with your words !
prohibido by @personasintro (brother’s best friend!namjoon x reader) completed
new parent syndrome by @1kook (husband!namjoon x reader) completed
how was your day by @kooksbunnnn (idol!namjoon x reader) completed
sprout by @kingofbodyrolls (neighbor!namjoon x reader) au completed
friend or fuck by @joonsmagicshop (namjoon x reader) completed
stress relief finale by @joonsmagicshop (namjoon x reader) completed
a word from our sponsors by @ugh-yoongi (namjoon x reader) completed
oh, honey! by @yoongiofmine (namjoon x reader)
series completed
bookworms by @hoseoksluna (boyfriend!namjoon x reader) completed
subdued by @1kook (namjoon x reader) completed
time by @hoseoksluna (fiancé!namjoon x reader) completed
gang shit by @gimmethatagustd (dilf!namjoon x single parent! reader) completed
baby fever by @95rkives (bf!namjoon x reader) genre: established relationship completed
jealousy by @mikrokosmoslove (namjoon x reader) fwb! completed
namjoon is currently at tokyo for the BTS tour where he meets her, a one-of-a-kind, confident — beautiful pole dancer at the izakaya bar he goes to the last night before he leaves for seoul. he takes her to his hotel and experiences one amazing night of what would be, the best sex either of them ever had.
warnings: strangers au, detailed smut, yearner namjoon, pwp, kissing, fingering in the car, tits sucking, anal, unprotected sex (stay safe pls), oral (m receiving), doggystyle, brief cowgirl position, hair pulling, belly bulge, underwear stuffing (..haha), gagging (oops), dirty talk, joon calls oc a slut once or twice, big dick joon (it’s a warning), oc cries during orgasms, goodbyes (they literally will never meet again).
did i just write 6k+ words of smut? yes, it’s namjoon i can’t help it.
characters: idol!namjoon x bar-dancer!reader
after their two day show at tokyo dome, namjoon roamed the beautiful night streets of shibuya while some of the members returned to seoul and some did their own travelling in tokyo. it was thanks to his usual habit of going to a city not just for work, but also touring it, he ended up at Sakura Izakaya. your usual bustling traditional japanese bar, with pole dancing available only on saturdays. it was the luckiest saturday of namjoon’s life today.
he entered the izakaya all alone with the sole purpose of downing his tiredness into the haze of a few drinks. he took a seat right in front of the stage where stood a shining silver pole with a pink bow on it, printed in glitters was her stage name, “Y/N”.
namjoon sat with a glass of forgotten whiskey, his focus hijacked by the woman moving like liquid mercury against the chrome. she was a vision in shimmering, baby pink pvc — a soft, innocent color that contradicted the raw power in her thighs as she climbed. as she arched her spine, her silhouette hit him like a physical blow, sending a heavy, undeniable throb straight to his jeans.
his mind, usually a sanctuary for lyrics and philosophy, was suddenly overrun by much filthier imagery. he imagined those toned legs wrapped around his waist, the pink straps of her top being pulled aside by his teeth, and her melodic voice breaking into a stuttering moan under his touch.
as she spun into a perfect split, catching his eye through the mirror with a smoky, knowing look, his grip on the glass tightened until his knuckles turned white. the leader of the world’s biggest band was gone, replaced by a man who was losing his mind. he didn’t just want to watch; he wanted to turn these thoughts into reality.
once the stage cleared, he called the manager, who was a young boy not much older than twenty, to ask for her. he wanted to see her. right. now. he would do anything it took to take her with him once.
the manager disappeared for a minute and came back with the graceful woman that was just on stage stealing namjoon’s breath away with her art. now that she was here, he was at a loss of words. that was when she reached out her hand, “hey there, hottie. cat got your tongue?”.
namjoon stared at her hand for a heartbeat too long, his brain struggling to bridge the gap between the ethereal performer on the stage and the self-assured woman now standing inches away. up close, the baby pink of her outfit was even more vibrant, contrasting against the golden glow of her skin. she was not just beautiful, she was ethereal.
he finally reached out, his large hand completely enveloping hers. her skin was warm, still buzzing with the adrenaline of her set.
“kim namjoon,” he managed to rasp out, his voice deeper than usual — a side effect of the tension still coiling in his lower stomach. he didn't let go of her hand. instead, he used the grip to gently pull her just a fraction closer, into the safety of the shadowed area beside his seat.
she let out a low, melodic laugh that made the hair on his arms stand up. she didn't pull away; she leaned in, resting her free hand on the edge of the velvet table, her polished nails digging slightly into the fabric. she purred, her eyes scanning his face, lingering on the way his throat moved when he swallowed. “i saw you watching. you looked like like you wanted to eat me alive.”
namjoon’s gaze dropped to her lips, then lower, to the way the pink straps of her top dug into the soft curve of her shoulder, the way her top tightened around her busty chest. the filthy thoughts from moments ago returned with a vengeance, more vivid now that he could smell the mix of her perfume and the faint scent of the stage fog clinging to her.
he leaned in until he was close enough to see the flick of her pupils. “i was just wondering if you’re as dangerous as you look, Y/N.”
she smirked, a playful, predatory spark in her eyes as she noticed the heavy, weighted look in his expression. “why don’t you buy me a drink,” she whispered, her voice dropping to a teasing lilt, “and find out exactly what kind of trouble i am?”
namjoon didn’t even look at the menu. he reached into his leather wallet, pulled out a stack of yen that was far more than the price of a drink, and slid it across the velvet toward the manager without taking his eyes off of her.
“i’m buying out the rest of her night,” namjoon said, his voice a low, gravelly command that left no room for negotiation.
her eyebrows arched, a small, triumphant smirk playing on her lips. she liked the way his composure was fraying at the edges — the way the polite looking man was being swallowed whole by a raw, primal hunger. she didn’t know who he was, but she felt he was someone who wasn’t supposed to be out in the wild with her like this. it made her want him more.
“going to be an expensive drink, namjoon-san,” she teased, though she was already reaching for the fur coat the manager held out for her.
“i could sell myself for you, darling,” he muttered, standing up. he was so much taller than her, his broad shoulders casting a shadow that seemed to claim her entirely. he leaned down, his breath hot against the shell of her ear. “i need you out of this bar. i need you somewhere where I don't have to share the sight of you with anyone else.”
as they reached the sleek black car waiting at the curb, he got inside and pulled her onto his lap before the driver could even close the door. the shibuya lights danced in his pupils, making them look dark and blown out.
“you have no idea,” he rasped, his thumb sliding on her lower lip, “what you've done to me tonight, baby. i haven't been able to think about anything else since you climbed that pole.”
she looked up at him, seeing the sheer yearning in his face — the way his eyes searched hers for permission to lose control. “then don't think, daddy,” she whispered, pulling him down by the lapels of his coat. “just show me.”
namjoon’s control snapped. his mouth crashed against hers in a starved, territorial heat while his hand found the edge of her shorts, slipping a finger past the barrier to find her slick and aching. as he felt her wetness, his eyes locked onto hers with a look of pure, unbridled triumph.
she let out a sharp, choked gasp, her hips arching off the leather seat instinctively. the sound was like fuel to the fire already consuming him.
“you're so wet for me, baby,” he hissed against her lips, his finger beginning a slow rhythm inside her. he was watching her face, the way her eyes clouded over and her lips parted. “did you feel me watching you? did you know what I was thinking while you were up there?”
he increased the pace, his thumb finding her clit and applying a pressure that made her world tilt. every time she whimpered, he swallowed the sound, kissing her deeper, his tongue mimicking the frantic motion of his hand.
he was starving for her — the scent of her, the taste of her, the way she felt tightening around his hand. “i was thinking how i’d break that pussy apart in every position,” he rasped, his voice sounding like it had been dragged over gravel. “i've spent the last hour imagining every single thing I’m going to do to you,” he murmured against her skin, his hand sliding lower to find the curve of her hip. “how I’m going to make you scream my name louder than the crowd at the Dome.”
“the crowd? Dome? w-what are you..”, she cried out when namjoon slipped another finger inside her burning core. “an athlete or something?”
namjoon chuckled, “something like that.” he was determined to have her come undone once before they reached the hotel. he pulled the strings holding her top together, revealing her bust which was covered by no bra. she was bare, pink and soft against his face. he let out a curse before looking at her flushed face nodding for him to take her mound into his mouth, and the coil in him snapped.
he grabbed her left tit with his mouth, swirling his tongue until her nipple pebbled from the car's air-conditioned cold, his other hand still working two fingers inside her pussy.
“s-sir,” she sobbed out, her fingers tangling so tightly in his silver-blonde hair, she was practically pulling him into her.
“look at me,” he growled against her skin, pulling back just enough to see her eyes. he looked wrecked — completely unstrung by the sight of her bare and shivering under him. “i want to see your face when you break.”
he hooked his thumb over her clit, applying a brutal, grounding pressure while his fingers curled deep inside her. her hips buckled, legs shaking in the pink fur boots as the first wave of a massive orgasm began to roll through her.
“that’s it, baby. give it to me,” he whispered, his voice a dark, velvety command. “scream for me,” he smirked, rolling the window down enough for everyone outside to see her face and hear her scream. “i want the whole of shibuya to know you’re mine tonight.”
she went rigid, her muscles clamping violently around his fingers as she spiraled. namjoon drank in her shattered cries, kissing her with a dark, possessive promise that the night had only just begun.
“that was just the beginning, love,” he rasped, his thumb wiping a stray tear from her cheek as the car slowed to a final stop in the hotel’s private garage. “let me show you how a good girl like you deserves to be fucked.”
the door had barely clicked shut before he had her pinned against it. namjoon didn’t waste a second. his hands, large and calloused, clamped onto her hips with a bruising grip, pulling her flush against him.
he captured her lips in a kiss that felt like a claim, his tongue demanding entrance and finding it easily. “i need you so bad,” he growled against her mouth, the vibration of his voice sending shivers down her spine. “let me worship this gorgeous body of yours.”
Y/N felt a lump form in her throat as he trailed kisses down her jaw, his teeth grazing the sensitive skin of her neck before he settled to suck a dark mark into the hollow of her collarbone.
she was used to the bar; she was used to the transactional, cold hands of men who saw her as a prop or a temporary release. but this? namjoon spoke to her like she was a masterpiece, as if they were prayers, and the way he touched her — made her feel seen in a way she hadn't felt in years.
something shifted in her. a sudden, fiery need to match his intensity. she reached up, her fingers digging into his shoulders, and with a surge of strength, she spun them around. now, it was namjoon with his back to the wall, his eyes wide and dark with surprise as she pushed his coat off his shoulders.
“my turn, sir,” she whispered, her voice low and dangerous.
she sank to her knees. namjoon’s head thrashed back as she freed him; he was enormous, his girth seemingly impossible, but she wanted to make it possible. looking up through her lashes, she swirled her tongue around the head before taking him in inch by inch.
a guttural sound left his lips as she worked, her sloppy, rhythmic friction filling the room. namjoon was ecstatic. he tangled his fingers in her hair and guided her deeper, pulling her head forward until she was gagging. fucking her face, pinning her nose against his pelvis until she couldn't take him deeper.
“god, baby,” he choked out, feeling his soul leave his body. “you’re incredible.”
the tension snapped. namjoon went rigid, anchoring her as a roar ripped from his throat. he came with a violence that shook his frame, painting her throat with thick ropes of heat. her nails digging into his quads in a silent plea for air even as she swallowed every bit of him.
he stayed there, vocal and vulnerable, holding her to his pelvis through broken groans. “good girl... take it all for me.”
when he finally loosened his grip, she pulled back, a thin trail of him dripping from her lip. she looked up, flushed and powerful, seeing the dazed glow in his eyes. he was undone, and the way he looked at her told her he was far from finished worshipping her.
he scooped her up, hoisting her legs around his waist as he whispered against her neck, “the way you took all of me was the most intoxicating thing i’ve ever felt, baby.” he tugged her strings loose, letting her top flutter to the carpet as her heavy, peaked breasts spilled into view. he stripped the remaining pvc and his own clothes away, leaving them both completely exposed.
his mouth latched onto her right tit with a hunger that made her back arch instantly. his tongue swirled around the dark, pebbled peak before he took the entire mound into his mouth, sucking so deeply that the hollow of his cheeks dipped.
“please,” she whimpered, her voice cracking as she felt the raw, heavy throb of her pulse right where his teeth were grazing. “namjoon, i love it… don't stop, god, please don't stop.”
men usually bypassed her chest in their rush for her center — but namjoon was different. he treated her breasts like a sanctuary, moving to the left one with equal fervor, his hand kneading the soft flesh of the right as he worked.
“no... namjoon, wait,” she cried out, her breath coming in short, panicked hitches as her nerves began to fire like live wires. “it’s too much... i’m too sensitive, please, no more.”
but namjoon didn't pull away. instead, his grip on her hips tightened to pin her even closer to his heat. “i've got you, baby. just feel it,” he rasped, his voice vibrating against her wet skin as he ignored her plea, continuing to tease and suck at her nipples until she was writhing from the sheer, ecstatic overload of it.
she felt something hot gush out of her pussy. this was her first time experiencing a nipple orgasm. namjoon was extremely attentive to her and she couldn't stop thinking about the lucky women before her who got to experience him.
he slowly shifted his weight, his large hands lingering on her chest to knead her tits with a heavy, possessive pressure that kept her grounded as his mouth traveled south. he didn’t stop until he reached the dip of her waist, his tongue tracing a slow, wet circle around her bellybutton.
“you taste like heaven, honey,” he murmured against her skin, his voice muffled by the soft curve of her hip. “did you know you’re the most beautiful woman in this entire city tonight?”
she let out a beautiful, airy moan, her back arching off the silk sheets as he continued to descend. she could feel the heat radiating off him, the sheer focus of a man who was obsessed with every inch of her. she reached down, her fingers brushing his ears as she whispered, “then don't make me wait, nam. i want you… i want you everywhere.”
he didn’t need to be told twice. he moved between her legs, his broad shoulders prying her thighs wide until she was completely exposed to the cool air and his burning gaze. “look at how much you came and i havent even dicked you down yet.”
he stood over her for a agonizing second, the sheer size of him casting a shadow over her trembling frame, before he guided himself to her entrance. with one slow, heavy surge, he slid his cock into her, the tight velvet of her pussy stretching to its absolute limit to accommodate his girth.
she let out a sharp, genuine scream that echoed through the room, her fingers clawing at the silk sheets as she felt the massive weight of him bottoming out. the sheer scale of him was more than she’d ever handled, and namjoon watched with a swell of pride as her body struggled to stretch around his depth.
but as her cries grew louder, a sudden, possessive thought cut through his haze. this was his suite, but the walls weren't thick enough for the raw, undone sounds she was making — sounds meant only for his ears. the idea of anyone else hearing her made his jaw tighten with a dark jealousy.
reaching blindly to the side, he grabbed the discarded boxers he’d stripped off moments ago. “i’m the only one who gets to hear you like this, sweetheart.”
before she could protest, he stuffed the fabric into her mouth, effectively gagging her. her eyes went wide, muffled moans vibrating against the cloth as he finally began to move, his pace relentless now that her sweet, dirty sounds were safely trapped between them. the sight of her helpless and silenced, forced to take all of him while she choked on her own pleasure, made namjoon’s blood turn to fire.
the moment her hips bucked upward in a silent plea, he set a pace that was nothing short of punishing. he was fast, relentless, his hips snapping against her pelvis with a rhythmic, heavy thud that sounded like thunder in the quiet room.
as the friction built to an unbearable heat, namjoon’s hand moved to her face, he yanked the fabric out with a sharp, possessive motion, wanting to hear every decibel of her undoing. the sudden rush of air made her gasp, her jaw trembling from the stretch as she finally tasted the room again.
“talk to me, baby,” he commanded, his thrusts turning deep and punishing. “tell me what I'm doing to you.”
“god, thank you,” she sobbed out, her head thrashed side to side on the pillows. “thank you, daddy... for making me feel so full... i’ve never... i’ve never felt this good.”
namjoon’s eyes went dark, a predatory growl vibration in his chest. “yeah? you like me drilling into you like this, you dirty slut? bet you’ll be leaking me for days, won’t you? thinking about how i stretched you out?”
“yes, yes, yes! please... don’t ever stop, just keep ruining me,” she screamed, the words lost in a flurry of messy kisses as he leaned down.
he shifted her legs, wrapping them tightly around his waist so he could lean back and latch onto her tits again. he was a man possessed, his mouth pulling at her sensitive nipples while his hips continued their frantic, bruising work. he felt himself grow even thicker inside her, a physical reaction to the way she was clawing at his back and screaming his name.
namjoon pulled back for a breath, his chest heaving, and his eyes dropped to where they were joined. the skin of her toned belly was stretched tight, and he could see the distinct outline of his cock moving beneath her skin with every thrust. he let out a dark, breathless laugh and pressed his large hand over the bulge.
“baby, look. feel that?” he rasped, pressing down so she could feel the shape of him from the outside. “that's me. i'm that deep inside you.”
her eyes went wide, mind fracturing at the sight and the sensation. “i can feel you... oh god, it's so big... you're stretching me so good, namjoon... please harder, i want to feel you even deeper.”
he laughed, a raw, cocky sound that was pure ego. “greedy girl. i’ll give you exactly what you want.”
he captured her lips in a heated, messy kiss, his tongue tangling with hers while his lower half moved fast. he kept his hand there, pressing firmly into her belly, kneading the spot where he was hitting her from the inside.
“god, yes, namjoon! harder!” she screamed, a string of filthy, incoherent praise falling from her lips as she felt the dual sensation of him inside and out.
“you're such a mess for me,” he growled back, his own face contorted in a mask of ecstasy. “look at you, screaming like a brat while i break you apart.”
they locked eyes, the intensity of the moment more intimate than anything she had ever known. she wrapped her arms around his neck, pulling him down as he found an even higher gear, his thrusts becoming a blur of friction and heat.
“i'm gonna cum! daddy, please! let me!” she cried, her body vibrating on the verge of a total collapse.
“cum, baby,” namjoon urged, his voice a deep, vibrating command against her ear. “cum all over daddy’s cock like the good girl you are, give it all to me.”
she spiraled, her internal muscles clamping down on him in a violent, pulsing rhythm as she shrieked his name. namjoon didn't stop; he chased his own high. his hips moving in short, frantic bursts until he finally let out a loud, vocal roar of release. he came in thick, hot waves, filling her to the brim while his heart hammered against her ribs.
completely spent and unstrung, he finally collapsed forward, his head falling into the crook of her neck. he stayed there, heavy and panting, still buried deep inside her as the world slowly stopped spinning.
the room fell into a heavy silence, broken only by their ragged breathing as namjoon slowly pulled out of her. they both let out a low whine of protest at the loss of friction, watching as the warm, messy evidence of their release began to ooze out her pussy onto the dark sheets.
Y/N reached out with a trembling hand to check her phone on the nightstand. the bright screen cut through the dim neon glow: 1:00 am.
she let out a long, heavy huff of disappointment, her shoulders drooping as she looked back at him. “i have to be home by two,” she whispered, the reality of her life outside this room crashing back in. “my roommate... she’ll worry if i’m not back. she knows how the bar can be.”
namjoon didn’t hesitate. he reached out, his long arms hooking around her waist to pull her back into the heat of his chest. he wrapped her in a tight, vulnerable hug, his chin resting on the top of her head as he pressed a lingering, tender kiss to her hair.
“stay,” he murmured, his voice vibrating deep against her skin. “just stay the night, please. i’ll handle the car, the excuse, whatever you need. i need more of you, baby.”
he pulled back just enough to cup her face, his thumbs stroking her flushed cheeks. “on that stage, you were so graceful — like a piece of art i wasn't allowed to touch. but here? behind this door?” his eyes turned dark and heavy with a fresh wave of hunger. “you were so beautifully uninhibited while i was breaking you apart. i don’t think i ever want to stop being inside you.”
the way he looked at her — with that raw, lusty honesty — made her breath hitch all over again. he leaned in, capturing her lips in a kiss that wasn’t a goodbye, but a new beginning.
fueled by the way he worshipped her, Y/N shifted, her knees finding purchase on either side of his hips as she climbed on top of him. she sat back on his thighs, her bare, marked body glowing in the low light as she looked down at the man who couldn’t seem to get enough of her.
she kissed him with a deep, frantic passion, her hands tangling in his hair as if she could anchor herself to this moment forever. “i’ve never met anyone like you,” she breathed against his lips, her voice trembling. “i don't even know who you are, namjoon, and i get it if you need to keep it that way. i don't care. i just love being like this with you. i’m loving every second of it. i don't want to leave you, but since i have to... let me feel you inside me one last time.”
she didn’t wait for him to answer. she lifted herself up, hovering over his length for a heart-stopping second before she slowly slipped her still-wet pussy back down onto his cock.
the sensation of him stretching her open again made her head fall back, her throat baring as she began to ride him. namjoon let out a low, guttural groan, his hands flying to her waist to help guide her rhythm.
“god, baby, look at you,” he rasped, his eyes fixed on the way she moved. “you take it so well. such a perfect, tight fit for me. you were made to be right on my cock, sweetheart.”
the praise made her move even faster, her internal muscles clamping down on him with every downward stroke. namjoon’s head thrashed against the pillows, his jaw tight. “i love fucking you. do you hear me? i fucking love how you feel.”
they leaned into each other, meeting in a heated, tongue-tangled kiss while she continued to grind against him. as she moved, namjoon noticed her supple, pink tits bouncing right in front of his face, the soft weight of them practically begging for his touch. he couldn't hold back; he reached up, pulling her down so he could take each one into his mouth in turns, his tongue flicking over the bruised nipples he’d claimed earlier.
“yes... joon, thank you,” she moaned, her voice sounding wrecked and filthy. “it feels so good when you do that, please, don't stop.”
he smiled against her warm skin, the vibration of his chuckle sending a fresh spark of electricity through her. but as the friction intensified, Y/N felt her breath hitch. “i can't, joon, i can't take it like this anymore, i need you deeper.”
understanding exactly what she meant, namjoon moved with a sudden grace. he helped her off him just long enough to flip her over, “all on fours baby, like the good girl you are.” she obeyed instantly, her heart hammering as she felt him loom behind her.
he didn't hesitate, prying her hips high before he entered her pussy from the back in one long, devastating thrust. the new angle hit her g-spot so perfectly that they both let out a loud, synchronized moan that echoed through the suite. he stayed there for a beat, buried to the hilt, both of them vibrating from the sheer, raw power of the connection.
he started with slow, agonizingly deep strokes, pulling almost all the way out before sinking back in until he bottomed out. it was torture. Y/N turned her head back, her neck straining as she showed him her pleading, glassy eyes. “please, joon... i can’t wait anymore,” she sobbed, her voice breaking. “please fuck me faster, daddy... i need you to break me.”
namjoon lost it. he let out a sharp curse, his grip on her hips tightening until his knuckles were white. “fuck, baby... you're going to make me cum so good,” he rasped, his voice sounding dangerous. “if you want to be ruined, i’m more than happy to oblige.”
he shifted gears instantly, his lower half becoming a blur of motion. he raised one hand and delivered a sharp, stinging spank to her flushed backside. the sound of his palm hitting her skin cracked through the room, followed immediately by Y/N’s loud, echoing moan. with every successive spank, his thrusts became faster and more violent, driving her face into the silk pillows.
“it hurts... it hurts so good, joon,” she wailed, her fingers clawing at the sheets. “don't stop... please, just ruin me like this! make me yours!”
he leaned over her, a cocky, predatory smile tugging at his lips as he watched her skin turn a delicious shade of pink under his hand. “you’re such a little masochist for me, aren't you? begging for the pain because you know it's the only way you'll feel me properly.”
he reached forward, gathering her long hair into a makeshift ponytail and pulling it back firmly to arch her spine into a steep, agonizing curve. the new angle allowed him to sink even deeper, hitting her sweet spot with a precision that made her world turn white. “oh god, joon! right there! don't stop, just keep hitting that spot!” she shrieked, her body vibrating.
as he pounded into her, namjoon reached down and pressed his thumb firmly against her tight, puckered asshole. Y/N let out a strangled cry, her hips bucking back against him. “please... joon, more... i want more,” she whimpered, the new sensation sending a fresh wave of heat through her.
he didn't hesitate. he pulled back just enough to spit directly onto the tight entrance before destroying her pussy with a series of frantic thrusts. he pushed a long finger into the tight, virgin hole, stretching her open. “you're so tight, baby... i need to stretch you out all the time, huh? you love being filled up in every single way, don't you?”
“yes! yes, please! more, daddy, please!” she screamed, her mind completely gone.
he began to finger her asshole in a rhythmic, prying motion while simultaneously fucking her pussy with everything he had. the dual invasion was too much; Y/N’s moaning became so loud it was almost a constant scream of pleasure. “it feels amazing... it’s heavenly... joon, i can't breathe!”
“i know, baby,” he growled, his voice thick with his own looming peak. “you feel so fucking good clenching around both my finger and my cock. you're so thirsty for me... such a good, thirsty girl for daddy.”
Y/N’s internal muscles began to seize, her body reaching the absolute limit of what it could handle. “i'm close! joon, i'm so close!”
understanding the cue, he pulled his finger out, but he didn't give her a second to breathe. as her body collapsed and twitched from the aftershocks, namjoon’s hand moved to the small of her back, pinning her flat against the mattress. without a break, he angled his hips and drove his cock straight into the tight heat of her ass.
Y/N let out a deafening scream, her back arching so violently her spine nearly snapped. the intrusive, massive weight of him stretching her open in a way she hadn’t asked for — but desperately needed — sent a fresh, jagged jolt of electricity through her spent nerves.
namjoon had completely lost his senses. the refined, polite leader was gone, replaced by a man fueled by a dark, demeaning dominance. he leaned over her, his chest crushing her into the sheets as he began to move with a rhythmic, bruising force.
“you like that, don't you? you're just a filthy little hole for me to use,” he hissed in her ear, his voice a low, terrifying rasp. “look at you, shaking like a pathetic slut while I stretch you out. did you really think I was done with you?”
Y/N didn't pull away. instead, she turned her face into the pillow, a maniacal, dazed smile spreading across her lips. the degradation felt like a drug, a heavenly contrast to the reverence he'd shown her earlier. she loved being treated like his property.
“yes... j-joon, please,” she whimpered, her voice wrecked. “please, use me however you want.”
“i'm going to make sure you can't walk tomorrow,” he growled, his thrusts becoming faster, more animalistic, as he hit the tight walls of her rear. “you’re so greedy, taking all of me in both holes like it's nothing. such a thirsty girl. you were made to be ruined by me, weren't you?”
“yes! I'm your slut! please, joon, ruin me!” she screamed, her eyes rolling back as the dual sensation of the aftershocks and the new, stretching pain merged into a singular, blinding peak.
he smiled darkly against her neck, his teeth baring as he felt her tight entrance clenching around him in a desperate, rhythmic plea for his release. “good girl,” he praised, though the word sounded like a threat. “take it all. swallow every bit of me until you can't take another inch.”
namjoon hauled himself fully onto the bed, his large frame looming over her like a shadow as he braced his weight on his forearms. he began to drill into her, his hips snapping forward with a relentless, jackhammer pace that made the entire bed frame groan in protest. every heavy, wet thud echoed through the room as he bottomed out in her tight, aching heat, his girth stretching her to the absolute limit.
Y/N was a mess of sobbing moans and breathless pleas, her fingers digging into the mattress until the fabric tore. “namjoon... please... it’s too much... it’s so deep,” she wailed, though her hips bucked back against him in a desperate rhythm, begging for the very friction that was destroying her.
“i told you I was going to break you, didn't i?” he rasped, his sweat dripping onto her back as he maintained the punishing speed. “you’re taking every fucking inch of me. say it. tell me who you belong to while i’m destroying this hole.”
“yours... i'm yours... please, daddy, don't ever stop!” she screamed, her voice cracking as her mind completely fractured.
“fuck yeah, take it all baby,” his voice hitting a guttural, animalistic pitch.
he buried himself to the hilt, his body going rigid as he began to cum deep inside her ass. hot, thick ropes of release filled her, the pressure making her stomach feel heavy and full. he stayed there, his weight crushing her into the bed, his balls still pressed firmly against her clit as the violent aftershocks of his climax rippled through both of them.
namjoon slowly pulled out of her, the slick, wet sound of the exit hanging heavy in the silent room. they both collapsed onto the tangled sheets, limbs heavy and hearts hammering against their ribs in a frantic, shared rhythm. for a solid minute, they did nothing but make out, their lips meeting in a deep, bruising kiss that tasted of sweat, salt, and a lingering, desperate hunger.
finally, they broke apart, letting out a simultaneous sigh of relief that signaled the end of the storm. Y/N leaned her forehead against his, her eyes hazy with a dazed, post-orgasmic glow.
“i'm so glad i met you, namjoon,” she whispered, her voice a wrecked, raspy mess. “seriously... you fucked me so good. i don’t think i ever want to be fucked by anyone else now.”
a low, genuine laugh vibrated in namjoon’s chest, his dimples cutting deep into his cheeks as he smoothed a stray lock of hair from her face. “i wish i could stay here forever just for that,” he admitted, his gaze turning briefly wistful.
Y/N’s brow furrowed in confusion. “huh? where are you going?”
namjoon’s smile softened, a hint of the leader returning to his eyes, though he kept his voice light. “i'm kind of a big deal back in south korea, my home,” he said, his thumb tracing the line of her jaw. “so, i have to go back. duty calls, i guess.”
Y/N stayed quiet for a moment, the weight of the word home settling between them. she looked at him — at the broad shoulders and the intelligent, sharp eyes of the man who had just spent the last few hours worshipping and ruining her — and realized there was a whole world to him she would never see. part of her wanted to ask, to search his name, to find out what "big deal" meant, but she felt a sudden, protective instinct over the bubble they’d created.
“okay,” she breathed, choosing not to push for details. “i think i like not knowing. it makes this feel... just ours.”
the air in the suite was still thick and humid, the scent of their shared heat clinging to the heavy curtains. namjoon stood by the floor-to-ceiling window, already partially dressed in his silk robe, watching Y/N as she pulled the holographic pvc back over her damp skin. he didn't offer to help; he just watched with a dark, satisfied hunger, his eyes tracing the way her muscles still twitched from the workout he'd given them.
“i’m leaving, then,” Y/N said, her voice a wrecked, beautiful rasp as she stepped into her tall boots. she looked up at him, her hair a mess and her lips swollen, but her eyes were bright with a defiant, post-coital glow.
namjoon crossed the room, his stride slow, stopping only when he had her pinned between his body and the door. he reached out, his large hand sliding under her chin to tilt her face up, his thumb grazing her lower lip.
“i hope we meet again, Y/N.”
Y/N smirked, leaning into his touch even as she reached for the handle. “trust me, mister namjoon. with the way you handled me, i’ll be feeling you every time i sit down, i’ll be thinking about you losing your mind in this room.”
namjoon let out a rough, appreciative chuckle, his head dipping down to catch the scent of her neck one last time. “good. i’m going back to seoul tomorrow, and i’ll be thinking about the way you took all of me while i'm looking at thousands of faces that don't know a thing about what we just did.”
he reached past her, his hand covering hers on the doorknob. he didn't open it immediately; he leaned in, his lips brushing her ear. “go on, then before I decide i’m not finished breaking you yet.”
Y/N let out a shaky breath, a final, electric shiver running down her spine. she pulled the door open and stepped into the hallway, throwing one last, smoky look over her shoulder at the man standing in the shadows of the doorway — vocal, powerful, and completely unforgettable.
“safe flight, big deal,” she whispered, leaving her with the best, filthiest secret in tokyo.
namjoon watched her until she got into the elevator. no numbers exchanged, no photos taken, hell, he didn’t even know if he would ever get one more night with her. was this all real or was it a fragment of namjoon’s dream?
Hi babe!! How are you? ^^ I want to ask, if you don't mind, if you have some good Nam recommendations. I've been looking for some, but all of them are so old 😔
NAMJOON Reads for @taevescence
i'd do anything to see him smile. i love him so much.
⤷ ゛Baby fever by @yourfavtangerine ˎˊ˗
⤷ ゛Code: Epitaph by @jungkoode ˎˊ˗
⤷ ゛Heart got Teeth by @100vern ˎˊ˗
⤷ ゛Nuts by @foliexaxdeux ˎˊ˗
⤷ ゛Naked by @muniimyg ˎˊ˗
⤷ ゛Between Collisions by @saltedcaramelcupcakes ˎˊ˗
⤷ ゛Unique by @lo1k-diamonds ˎˊ˗
⤷ ゛My Sofa by @kittenan ˎˊ˗
divider by ❝ @uzmacchiato ❞ | happy reading.
‧₊˚🖇️back to namu's library 𐚁
‧₊˚🖇️back to the library 𐚁
i hope you will like these love, lemme know after you read Massi.
title: halcyon days (m)
pairing: knj x reader(f)
rating/genre: m (18+) ; smut ; canon idol! au , age-gap au (reader is 26, namjoon is 31); idol & art enthusiast! namjoon x art curator!reader au
summary: halcyon days – described as a past period that was happy, peaceful, and prosperous, often viewed with nostalgia. this may be a story of such a time. you, an art curator grounded in these seoul gallery walls, meet RM, an idol of top group BTS, whose world moves to an entirely different rhythm. Two lives on diverging paths. But when those paths somehow cross in the arts, something unexpected begins. love that unfolds slowly, like brushstrokes on canvas, brief and fleeting.
note: i would like to think this fic is like my love letter to namjoon. i did way too much research on his purchased art, films, hobbies, living space, art museums, etc. for this and i hope maybe you enjoy this silly writing. i initially wrote 34k words so i have to split it up unfortunately but please stick around for part 2. me and @daegudrama tried our best to edit this nicely, but if you catch any error i am sorry
warnings: language, dialogue heavy, art talk, decision to leave movie spoilers, a lot of smut in many positions (explicit and anecdotal), drinking, posessive namjoon, protected s*x, cunn*lingus, finger*ng, blowj*b, b*ckshots, riding of course, sasaengs, grotesque harassment, heavy angst, some canon and noncanon events
drop date: September 5th, 2025, 5:00pm pst
word count: 20.2k
part 2 | spotify fic playlist | crossposted on ao3 here
—
So many paths that will never cross–this is a thought you constantly have as you stare at the museum and gallerygoers wandering through the exhibition hall, their footsteps muffled by the polished wood beneath them, their gazes fixed on frames capturing bodies, brushstrokes, and meaning.
You often find yourself watching people as much as you watch the art.
Maybe it’s habit. Or maybe it’s the same flicker of wonder you felt the first time you ever walked into the Guggenheim Museum in New York. You’d gone to help a close friend move into the Columbia University dorms to start her first year as an architecture major, and she took you there on a whim. You didn’t expect to fall in love–not with a person, but with the silence between walls, with the hush of reverence, and with the people who stopped in their tracks, struck by something they couldn’t name. Art pieces obscure and beautiful of all shapes and sizes.
That feeling never left you. You chased it all the way to Seoul, through your grad school years at Seoul National University and working at their Museum of Art, through internships at Gana Art Center, and temporary roles at Gallery Hyundai and the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art in Seoul. You finally landed here at Kukje Gallery about eight months ago. First as an archivist. Now, you're curator.
And yet, for all the ways you study art, you’ve always studied people too.
You can’t help it. The way your mind drifts when you see a stranger paused in front of a sculpture or squinting at a canvas. The thoughts creep in.
Who are they?
What brought them here today?
What are they carrying that you’ll never know?
Moments of sonder, you’ve always called it. Realizing every person is living a life as vivid and complex as yours. Yet you pass each other without ever intersecting.
You’ve carried that thought with you ever since.
Still, you never acted on it. Not until one quiet afternoon, in late August, when your body moved before your mind could catch up.
He was tall. Broad shoulders, muscular frame. Thick thighs that tapered into lean legs. Thick-rimmed glasses, sometimes paired with a mask and a ball cap, sometimes not. His outfits rotated from pressed button-downs and slacks to oversized hoodies and shorts. Casual. Low-key. Purposefully anonymous.
He came often, yet never drew attention. Quiet. Observant. Always lingering in front of each painting for longer than most, as if he were dissecting every brushstroke, every nuance.
And despite the hundreds of visitors who passed through the gallery, there was something about him that made your eyes follow him every time.
One day, you left your desk to retrieve documents from the archive room across the hall. As you returned, you spotted him again. He was standing in front of Kim Heungsoo’s Untitled (Two Nudes) and Une Pose. There was something about his expression this time–creased brows, a slight frown. Frustration?
Your curiosity got the better of you.
“Something wrong?” you asked, in Korean.
His head jerked slightly, startled. “Huh?”
His eyes flicked to your chest–your name tag. L/N, F/N. Recognition flickered behind his lenses. Foreign name. He thinks he’s seen you here before, working. Somehow, that small confirmation calmed him.
You noticed the way his stance eased. Still quiet, still a little guarded, but less… rattled.
“Oh, uh,” you continued, “you looked like you were looking at the paintings and thinking really hard, so I was curious to see if you were okay.”
Should you not have asked? Maybe he thinks you’re weird. You’re not sure why after all this time of observing people at museums looking at paintings, that you decided to finally interact with one of them in their most pensive moment.
He just nodded, weighing his next words. For a second, you thought he might brush you off. You wouldn’t blame him for it. But instead, he followed it up with a question.
“Um, do you know who wrote these artwork label descriptions?”
“Oh, these?” You glanced at the placards and then back at him. “That would be me, the art curator of this gallery. Why?”
He glanced at you, and then back at the art, lost in thought.
“I’m gonna be honest,” he began, his gaze returning to the paintings. “I know art is subjective and open to interpretation, but…” He paused, then looked back at you. “I think you’re missing something in your interpretation of Untitled (Two Nudes) and Une Pose. Especially in terms of Kim Heungsoo’s perspective on form and desire. It’s not just about appreciation of the body. It’s about the subtle tension between abstraction and eroticism. Your labels don’t really touch on that.”
Your mouth opened, stunned. You weren’t used to being challenged–at least not like this.
“Uh, what do you mean? I studied these pieces,” you said, defensively. “I curated this exhibition. I spent months researching the cultural context, the artist’s interviews, the stylistic evolution–”
He gave a small shrug, then responded in English, shocking you completely.
“I still think you’re overlooking something important. But I’ll agree to disagree. Thanks.”
And with that, he turned and walked ahead. Just like that.
Leaving you standing in the quiet gallery, blinking at the space he left behind.
He turned and walked away, disappearing further down the hall.
You stood frozen, utterly thrown off, appalled.
What was that?
Did he just… mansplain a label you wrote? Who the hell is this guy? You doubt he’d have any understanding on erotic modern art pieces like you do. This is your forte after all. You learned about all of this through blood, sweat and tears. What does he know?
Ugh. It left you feeling like after eating a sour hard candy,
You wanted to say something back. Something witty, cutting, professional yet scathing. But you held your tongue. You had a job to do.
So you sighed, going back to the office as there were some remaining things you had to do before you head home.
Still… seriously? Who does he think he is?
A few weeks pass.
It’s a slow Tuesday evening in the late summer–still a bit warm, golden light stretching through the tall glass windows, shadows melting across the polished floor. Foot traffic is light. Most people don’t visit galleries on weeknights unless there’s a special event, and tonight, it’s just a few quiet souls drifting through the current nude modernist exhibition.
You’re at the front desk, going through the evening checklist, when a familiar figure enters.
The same figure that lit a flame in you not too long ago.
This time, he isn’t wearing a mask. His black baseball cap casts a soft shadow over his face, but you see him clearly–hoodie, matching gray 5-inch shorts. Still effortlessly tall. And frustratingly… attractive.
No surprise to be completely honest. There’s handsome men like him who frequent museums in Seoul just to feel something or to feel nothing, just performative for their social media or social rich circle.
You’re still mildly irritated with this guy as you see him approach a painting at the entrance, lost in his own thoughts.
You shouldn’t play with fire, but something about him doesn’t let you just ignore him. So you stand behind him and pounce on the moment.
“Are you here to look at an exhibition and tell me I’m bad at my job again?” you ask dryly in English, remembering how this man went on a whole rant in Korean only to end it in perfect passive-aggressive English.
A small chuckle escapes him as he settles into your language. “Hey, no, I’m actually here to sign a few papers. I was just looking at the painting while waiting to see if one of the people I know here would come out, but even the front desk is vacant.” His head gestures to the empty front desk.
You assume he wanted to see the chairwoman, who left to go to a small event earlier. Sekyung’s not even here to help because she went to grab dinner with a friend. So much for a quiet night.
“Oh, I see.” You quirk a brow. “Well, what papers did you need?”
Once again, a hint of hesitation that you catch in seconds because it becomes nonchalance.
“I don’t really like to mention this because I hate bragging,” he adds, rubbing the back of his neck, “but… I donated a bit of money to the gallery. Just to keep supporting research and future exhibitions. I like coming here, and I want to keep coming.”
You pause.
Wait, what. Who the hell is he, even?
Donating money for the arts? No way… but this would make so much sense as to why he was being so critical when you first met him.
Your tone softens, caught between guilt and surprise from your previous thoughts about him. “Oh? That’s actually really kind of you. I can pull up the paperwork for you. What’s your name?”
And again! The hesitation. A flicker in his eyes as he speaks before it goes away.
“…Kim Namjoon.”
Okay?
“Ah. Okay. Mr. Kim Namjoon.” You type it into the system, and sure enough, his name pops up. “I see you here and the pending paperwork. I’ll get the documents printed out.”
He watches you, his gaze studying your face with care. Still no flicker of recognition from you, he thinks.
Do you really not know who he is?
He doesn’t want to be obnoxious, but… he’s Kim Namjoon. BTS. Global phenomenon. Cultural ambassador. A foreigner like you must know who he is, right?
He waits for a double-take at any moment. Even a pause for you to say something about him.
But nothing.
“Oh,” you add, scrolling through the screen, “there’s also a form here about submitting your own pieces for a future exhibition? You collect art?”
His earlier thoughts dissolve. “Oh, uh–yeah. I do.”
“Well.” You flash him a tight-lipped smile. “That explains why you were so critical of my work. You’re a collector after all.”
Another petty remark you throw out. Why are you like this? You’re going to get yourself fired if he reports you to the execs.
He winces a little, chuckling. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to upset you the other day, Y/N.”
You freeze.
Your name.
You aren’t wearing your name tag today–you forgot it at home.
Your eyes slowly lift from the screen to meet his. Your heart thumps once, heavy in your chest.
“How did you…” you start, but your voice fades.
He looks back at you, unreadable behind his glasses and cap, and continues before you can press further. “I apologize about the other day. I was too deep in my thoughts and said something rude without thinking. Is there anything I can do to make it up to you?”
I’m sorry, what?
Your fingers hover above the keyboard. Your pulse thunders in your ears.
Is this… an apology? From him? Mr. know-it-all?
You clear your throat, trying to steady yourself. “You don’t have to do anything. Really. It’s part of the industry. I’ve seen it happen to others when critics walk in–I just didn’t expect it to happen so suddenly. At least… not like that.”
He nods slowly, turning each of your words over in his mind. “I get that,” he murmurs. “I’m not a critic or anything, but I care too much about art sometimes. Especially when it moves me.”
“I can see that, but you’ve already given back to the gallery,” you reply, your voice softening. “That’s more than enough to show you care.”
“But I want to make it up to you, Y/N.”
You blink, caught off guard by his insistence. You hesitate.
Maybe this could help smooth over the tension between you two. He’s a donor. Maintaining good relations is in the gallery’s best interest–your best interest. For your research. Your exhibitions. Your job.
Yes. That’s a good reason.
“…Maybe,” you say slowly, eyes dropping. “Buy me a coffee?”
You bend down to retrieve the printed forms from the tray beside the desk. “Sign here on this page, and then again on the back.”
You place the papers in front of him and hand over a pen. Your fingers brush, just briefly, but it’s enough to send a flush creeping up your neck.
He signs quickly, glancing up afterward.
“How about dinner instead?” he asks. “I know a laid-back spot that has great food. No pressure–just… a peace offering.”
You look at him, a little amused, a little surprised.
“So this is how you bribe people you offend?” you tease.
His lips curve faintly. “Not exactly. Maybe I just want more than five minutes to talk about art… and to hear your point of view.”
You smile, slower this time, your gaze lingering.
“Then sure,” you say softly. “I’d like to hear more about your thoughts, too.”
“Alrighty.” He picks up one of the business cards in the acrylic holder on your desk, flips it over, and writes neatly–his number and KakaoTalk ID.
Namjoon slides the card across the counter. “I’ll message you. Does Friday evening work?”
You nod, tucking the card away into your blazer pocket. “Yeah. That works.”
He bows slightly before heading to the exit, the warm evening light catching the back of his hoodie as the glass doors slide open.
For a long moment, you just stare at the space he leaves behind.
You’re not sure what just happened.
Only that it leaves your heart beating faster than it should.
That night, after your shift, you return to your small studio apartment, kick off your shoes, and curl up on the couch with your phone still in hand.
A part of you hesitates. Should you message first? Will he really follow through?
[You] Hey! Just wanted to confirm for Friday. What’s the name of the place we’re meeting?
A moment passes. Then another.
You tap out of the conversation, scroll through Instagram aimlessly, then tap back in.
Still nothing.
Then–a reply. A few minutes later.
[Namjoon]Yetnal Guksi in Yongsan. 8pm. Let me know if you have trouble finding it.
You pause, staring at the profile photo he uses–some anime character in profile, hair tousled, playing a saxophone. His display name isn’t even his real name. It’s a casual, half-joke Korean nickname. It doesn’t match the polished, reserved guy you met at the gallery at all.
But you don’t question it.
You type back:
You: Got it. Thanks. See you then.
And then, without overthinking it, you set your phone aside and go to bed.
You leave work earlier than usual. Your coworkers agree to cover the last two hours of special guest tours, and you’re quietly grateful.
Still, the journey is long. You take the subway from Anguk Station, transferring at the stop connected to Lotte Department Store. Weaving through corridors of glowing cosmetic ads and the rush-hour crowd, you switch lines again until you finally arrive at Noksapyeong Station.
From there, it’s a ten-minute uphill walk. The evening is starting to cool; your hair sticks slightly to the back of your neck as you pass small bars, cafés, and the slow hum of a residential neighborhood waking for dinner.
Almost an hour in total. Maybe you should have asked him to pick you up. But maybe he’s busy before this. Maybe that’s why he didn’t offer. You hope that’s the reason. And not that he’s some prick after all.
You finally arrive at Yetnal Guksi (옛날국시), a modest, old-school noodle joint with handwritten menus taped to the window and the steady clatter of bowls from inside. Nothing fancy, but comforting. You like that, honestly.
You check your watch.
7:53 p.m.
He isn’t there yet.
You stand just off to the side of the entrance, pretending to browse your phone. Minutes pass. Ten. Fifteen.
No Namjoon.
Your chest tightens. Anxiety blooms slowly beneath your ribs. You pride yourself on punctuality–getting somewhere early helps you stay calm. But it also means sitting in that discomfort longer when the other person doesn’t show.
At exactly 8:15pm, you send him a message.
You: “Hey, I’m here. Where are you?”
No reply.
A part of you starts to spiras. Maybe meeting him outside of work is a mistake. Did he seriously stand you up? Why bother giving you a time, a place?
You’re not sure where he lives. Not like you bothered looking at any of his personal info in his file, but you can’t imagine he’d get here any time soon. It took you awhile to even get here yourself after all.
You suddenly feel eyes on you. An ajumma from the restaurant steps out, drying her hands on her apron.
“Are you coming in to eat, miss? Or…?” Her tone carries the unspoken question: Or are you just going to be loitering suspiciously outside this establishment?
“I’m waiting for someone,” you explain with a forced smile. “But he hasn’t arrived yet.”
Just as you finish, a soft gust of wind lifts your hair–and then a low voice behind you, in Korean:
“I’m here.”
You turn.
Namjoon stands there, slightly breathless, baseball cap pulled low, a thin sheen of sweat on his neck. His hoodie clings to him like he jogged the last few blocks.
“I’m sorry,” he says gently, back in English. “I should’ve texted. Got caught in traffic.”
Irritation that was flickering inside you fades into relief.
He really came after all.
The ajumma nods at you both and waves you inside.
You follow Namjoon into the narrow space–walls slightly yellowed from time and oil, the clinking of metal chopsticks and bowls playing beneath the low hum of a TV in the corner.
Most diners are older–old people sharing soju, middle-aged couples eating quietly, a few solo regulars bent over their bowls. No one pays you any mind, which feels strangely comforting compared to other places out in Seoul.
Namjoon slides into a booth near the back, tucked by a wooden window cracked open for the breeze. You settle across from him, brushing a strand of hair behind your ear as he pulls a laminated menu toward him.
“Want me to order for us?” he asks, glancing up.
“Please do. You said you’ve been here before, right?”
He nods. “Yeah. I come whenever I want something simple and quiet. Their bibimguksu is solid. And we’ll get a small plate of gomabap, too. Mini gimbap rolls.”
“Sounds perfect.”
He flags down the ajumma with a warm, familiar tone–nothing overly polite or stiff, but respectful, like he’s done this many times before.
Soon, two steel cups of barley tea are placed in front of you. You lean back slightly, watching him.
“You come here alone?” you ask.
“Uh, yeah, usually,” he says. “Sometimes with a friend or two, but mostly on my own. It’s pretty peaceful. Away from the crowd.”
You see why. Despite the lack of frills, the place has a worn charm. The light is yellow and soft. The air smells like sesame oil and chili paste. No one’s here to impress anyone.
When the food arrives, the scent makes your stomach flutter. The bibimguksu glistens red with sauce, sliced cucumbers and boiled egg resting on top, noodles glossy and tangled. The gomabap rolls sit neatly beside a small bowl of soy sauce.
You pick up your chopsticks, twist a bit of bibimguksu around them, and take a bite.
Your eyes widen instantly.
“It’s really good!”
Namjoon smiles at your reaction. “I’m glad you like it too.”
“It’s… sweet, spicy, cold…mmm–it has so many layers. I wasn’t expecting this level of flavor.”
“Right? The sauce is just the right kind of fermented. And they don’t cheap out on the gochujang.”
You try a piece of gomabap with soft rice, crisp vegetables, a hint of sesame. Clean and light. Perfect alongside the fire of the noodles.
“I have to admit,” you say, grinning between bites, “I was kind of dreading it being bland. But this might be better than some trendy restaurants I’ve been to lately.”
“That’s the thing,” he replies, leaning on one elbow. “Places like this… they don’t try hard. They just know what they’re doing.”
You nod thoughtfully, then look up.
“So what’s your usual order here?” you ask, half-teasing. “Or is this it?”
“Sometimes kalguksu if I’m tired. But usually this.” He pauses, eyes scanning your face. “I didn’t want somewhere fancy. Figured this would be better.”
“It is,” you say sincerely. “Thank you for bringing me.”
He looks down for a moment, hiding how his smile pulls wider.
You fall into a comfortable rhythm–eating, talking, trading casual stories about art. You tell him about how you once dropped an entire tea tray at your old gallery job and cried in the archive room for twenty minutes. He tells you about buying a sculpture he thought was two feet tall but turned out taller than him. He hesitates to say where he ended up putting it, scared it might reveal too much.
But despite all of his efforts to put up a wall to prevent you from learning too much about him. There’s a part of him that wants to tell you.
He has a feeling. A good feeling. A feeling that you’re a safe person he can confide this with.
And once you ask him this question, it truly has battling with opening up himself to you, to his world.
“So what do you do for work outside the art world, Namjoon?”
Caught off guard, he wonders what to say. Should he really tell you he’s an idol? The fact you haven’t recognized him still surprises him. What would you say if he told you? Judge him? Freak out?
He reminds himself again that he doesn’t know you well, and the thought scares him to share too much given what he’s seen in the past. To him, to his members.
But he decides to be genuine. Lying feels worse. Plus, the feeling he has about you is something he’s never felt about someone before.
He sets down his chopsticks gently, wiping his hands on a napkin, stalling a moment.
“I’m… actually a musician,” he says carefully, watching your reaction.
You blink, chopsticks hovering.
“Oh, really? Like… producing? Or do you perform too?”
He hesitates. “Both.”
You tilt your head, lips quirking. “That’s cool. What kind of music?”
He laughs softly, almost in disbelief. You still don’t know after all these hints, he thinks.
“Mostly hip hop and pop. I’m… in a group. We’ve been around for a while.” A while is twelve years, he thinks.
Your brow furrows. “A group? Like a band?”
“Not exactly.” He leans in quietly, readying for the grand reveal. “BTS.”
A beat of silence.
You stare. For a moment, your brain lags behind your ears.
You run his words over–BTS–and something clicks. The glasses, the quiet composure, the careful words, the way he observes art like air. You knew about BTS–your close friend back home was obsessed with K-pop in her teen years, trying to rope you in with playlists and videos, especially featuring their “leader,” Rap Monster… or RM.
You’d listened here and there, curious, but fangirling over K-pop always felt a little unrealistic. A little too delusional Life was hectic, so the interest faded.
You’d heard headlines about Kim Namjoon in the art world, maybe seen a photo or two online, but none of it mattered much–until now.
Now you’re here, eating dinner with him.
Your chopsticks lower slowly, words whispering out in the quietest voice, “Wait. Like… the BTS?”
He nods, almost sheepishly. “Yeah.”
You laugh, stunned, sitting back. “Wow. I… I didn’t recognize you at all. That’s insane.”
His eyes flick to yours, searching for a change in tone. But there isn’t one. You’re not freaking out. Not grabbing your phone. Just surprised. Maybe a little amused. A bit of disbelief too.
“I thought you looked familiar,” you admit. “But I didn’t want to assume. You didn’t act like… you know. Someone that famous. So i shrugged it off,”
“I try not to,” he murmurs. “It gets tiring.”
“I can imagine.”
You pause, looking down at your nearly-empty bowl, gathering thoughts.
“So that’s why you knew so much about those pieces. You’ve probably been studying art a long time.”
“I try. It started as just going to a museum while on tour years ago. Purely a hobby, just collecting, but now it’s… part of my life. Something I love.”
You nod slowly, still a little floored but smiling. “Well, you’re were still kind of rude about my curated labels.”
That makes him laugh, low and genuine, warming your cheeks.
“Yeah. I deserved that.”
You sip barley tea, shaking off the surreal feeling of sitting across from a global icon who just asked you to dinner at a tiny, greasy spoon. But he’s still the same man who stands in front of paintings, deeply, frustratingly thoughtful.
He doesn’t ask for special treatment, and you won’t give it.
You lean your chin into your palm, eyes softening across the table.
“I’m glad you told me.”
His gaze meets yours, grateful behind his glasses. “Me too.”
You both linger over the last bites, the plates mostly cleared, spice tingling pleasantly on your tongue. The restaurant has thinned out, leaving only a few older couples finishing in silence. The air is warm and still, laced with sesame oil and the clink of silver chopsticks against ceramic.
Namjoon sets down his spoon, wiping his hands with a napkin. “That was nice,” he says quietly, the moment calling for softness.
“It was,” you agree, smiling. “I’m glad you didn’t stand me up.”
His hand comes up, scratching the back of his neck sheepishly. “I was close, apparently.”
You both laugh.
“I should probably head back,” you say, glancing at your phone. “It’s getting late.”
“I can take you home,” he offers immediately.
You shake your head gently, already anticipating. “That’s sweet, but I live a bit far. The train’s faster.”
A flicker of hesitation passes his face.
“But,” you add, standing, light in your voice, “if you’re not in a rush… I wouldn’t mind you walking me to the station. Just ten more minutes.”
That makes him smile–the corners of his mouth twitch like he’s trying not to grin. “Yeah. I can do ten minutes.”
Outside, the night greets you with a soft breeze. Namjoon quietly pulls a black face mask from his pocket and tugs it over his nose and mouth. You notice but don’t comment. It makes sense.
“You don’t have to worry,” you say after a few steps, voice light but sincere. “I won’t tell anyone… about you. I’ve worked with private clients before. I know how to keep things quiet. If you want, I’ll sign something.”
He chuckles, low and warm beneath the mask. “I’m not going to make you sign anything. Honestly, I get a sense about people. And I don’t think you’d do that.”
You glance at him as you walk. “Thanks for trusting me.”
He shrugs, hands in pockets. “It’s not just that. I… don’t have many female friends to talk art with. Mostly my younger sister, my mom or older gallery owners and retired curators who send me handwritten notes.”
You smile at the image. “I feel honored to be in such company.”
He laughs quietly. “No, I’m honored to have you spend time with me. I’d like to see you again. If you’re up for it.”
“I’d like that,” you say, meaning it.
You continue toward the station in a quiet, easy rhythm. Just two people sharing a corner of the night.
This is the nice boundary to keep.
He escorts you to the front entrance of Noksapyeong Station, the traffic humming low in the background, headlights glinting off passing cars. You come to a stop just before the stairs lead down.
“I’ll text you,” he says, his voice muffled slightly behind the mask but still warm.
“That sounds good. See you around, maybe, Namjoon?” You give him a polite bow, hands folded in front of you. It feels a little too formal for what tonight was, but you don’t know what else to do. When you rise, you catch the flicker of something in his eyes–like he wants to say more, maybe even lean in and hug you, but holds himself back.
Silly Namjoon, he thinks to himself. He can’t afford to be careless in public. Not here. Not with who he is. Any passerby could snap a photo, leak a name, turn a small moment into a scandal. And the last thing he’d want is to inconvenience you with something like that.
You’re a kind and smart woman, he thinks. A bit feisty, but he find that endearing. Even just by the conversations he had today, his heart began feeling something, which is rare for him.
Despite all his thoughts about you, he settles on a soft, almost wistful smile. “Will see you sometime in the future. Good night, Y/N.”
“Good night,” you say, your voice quiet as you disappear down the stairs, heading home.
Two weeks pass. No messages.
You don’t dwell on it. Not really. You get it. This is RM. Kim Namjoon. BTS. You’d be naïve not to assume his days are consumed by meetings, recording, traveling, photoshoots, whatever comes with being who he is. You heard he was recently discharged from the military. It makes sense he’s adjusting, returning to a rhythm that doesn’t leave much room for casual texts or catching up with the art gallery girl.
So, on a quiet Saturday afternoon, you throw on an old tee and decide to do a deep clean of your loft in Myeongdong. The space is small but cozy, perched above a cosmetics shop with a big bay window that lets in too much sun during the afternoon. You don’t mind. It’s not like you’re home that often anyway.
You’re wiping down your kitchen shelf, halfway through reorganizing your spices, when your phone buzzes on the counter.
[namjoon]
hey y/n. i apologize, i've been busy so i haven't had the time to message you. how have you been?
You stare at the screen for a beat, lips quirking before you even realize it.
And just like that, the long, continuous, conversation begins. Slowly at first. Then steadily. Messages weaving in and out across days, with gaps and time zones and all the signs of two people trying to find a bubble of time in the chaos of their lives.
He asks about your favorite artists. You ask what exhibitions he’s excited for. The conversation flows easily over the course of days–sometimes a few texts a day, sometimes long pauses between messages–but neither of you seems to mind. You send him photos of art pieces that leave you breathless, and he sends back voice notes when he doesn’t feel like typing.
You both fall into rhythm talking about painters and sculptors and entire exhibitions you wish you could relive. Namjoon talks about his admiration for Yun Hyong-Keun–how the earth tones and minimalist brushwork feel deeply meditative to him–and how Kim Whan-Ki’s dot paintings remind him of memory fragments and starlight. He brings up Roni Horn too, her approach to identity and landscape through sculpture and photography. And Thibaud Hérem, with those intricate architectural drawings. “There’s a weird comfort in the details,” he texts. “It’s obsessive, but beautiful.”
You tell him you’ve always been drawn to the emotional tension in Rothko’s color fields, the sense of vast stillness in Agnes Martin’s grids, and the chaotic sensuality in Cecily Brown’s layered canvases. You mention you once stood in front of Girl on a Swing for twenty minutes, not even realizing you’d been holding your breath. He sends a voice message: “I totally get that. Brown’s stuff is like... the aftermath of a dream.”
Namjoon replies late one night with:
You pause, rereading that line. There’s something deeply sincere in the way he talks about art–as if it’s a language he’s been speaking longer than he’s known himself.
[you]Woah, I’ve always wanted to go. Rothko makes me feel both grounded and like I’m floating. It’s weird but calming.
The next morning, he sends a photo of his bookshelf–several monographs, poetry collections, and a thick exhibition catalog from a Kim Whan-Ki retrospective.
You send a picture of your coffee table covered in old gallery pamphlets and the Cecily Brown zine you picked up in London.
You ask what exhibitions in Seoul he’s excited for. You send him photos of art pieces that leave you breathless, and he sends back voice notes when he doesn’t feel like typing.
Later on he asks about your favorite music artists. You talk about what brought you to Korea, the music you listen to–The Marías, Emotional Oranges, Frank Ocean, Wave to Earth, Se So Neon.
He likes them too. You exchange playlists. Listen to new music you’ve never listened to before.
You tell him you paint in your free time. For fun, not for any hope of becoming famous. He says he admires that, because he only painted something once and thought it’s not his thing after all.
Gardening comes up. He says it calms his mind. You have several plants as well though, you accidentally forget to give them water and have killed a few in the past. He tells you he’ll help you pick the right ones that will be easier to care for next time. You say, next time?
You even get into film. One night, the thread leads to Park Chan-wook’s Decision to Leave.
“It’s one of my favorites,” he texts. “I love how it plays with longing and detachment.”
You admit you haven’t seen it.
A pause, then:
[namjoon] do you want to watch it together?
Your thumbs hesitate above the screen.
[you] uhh, how is that gonna work? is it showing in theaters again?
His reply is instant:
[namjoon]lmao no. it came out a few years ago. we can stream it.
You bite your lip, grinning.
[you] so… you’re inviting me over to your place?
Seen.
Typing…
[namjoon]only if you’re okay with that. no pressure.
Typing…
[namjoon] i’ll even make you tea. or wine. or beer. or ramen. whatever works.
You stare at the message. Then you smile to yourself, heart beating just a little faster.
[you] only if it’s good ramen.
[namjoon] challenge accepted.
October 11th.
It’s another Saturday, exactly three weeks since Namjoon messaged you again after that dinner, and now you’re standing at the entrance to Nine One Hannam.
The building looms ahead, all sleek lines and understated opulence, tucked behind tall stone walls and trimmed hedges. A sign gleams beside the entrance gate. You’ve heard whispers about this place before. A-listers, diplomats, generational wealth. The kind of neighborhood with valet spots for Teslas and private elevators.
And apparently, this is where he lives. Kim Namjoon.
You pause a few feet away, adjusting your long cardigan as your nerves start to hum. Are you seriously going in there? Is this outfit appropriate for a casual hang out with you, art mutual?
These thoughts linger as you look down to your outfit: a navy blue oversized cardigan, a white spaghetti tank top, a denim mini skirt, white converse sneakers.
You spot the small booth outside the pedestrian gate, a security officer already eyeing you as you walk up. The air feels strangely still, as if even the trees here breathe quieter.
You clear your throat. “Hi, I’m here to visit Unit 244A.”
The officer–middle-aged, buzz cut, clearly alert–looks you over with polite suspicion. A foreigner, he likely notes. He reaches for a clipboard and pulls up the visitor log.
“Name?”
“Y/N L/N.” You hand him your ID without hesitation, just like Namjoon told you to do.
He checks the list, confirming. A subtle nod. “Alright. Go on in.”
You give him a quick thank you, stepping past the gate. The building ahead is massive, its exterior modern but quiet in that rich-people-don’t-need-to-try-hard kind of way. Your sneakers feel too loud on the pavement. And now that you’re in–how the hell are you supposed to find his unit?
“Hey.”
You practically leap out of your skin.
He’s there. Namjoon, leaning casually against the wall, dressed down in a forest green Tyler, The Creator Chromakopia Tour hoodie, the hood pulled halfway over his face. His black shorts barely hit his knees, and his long legs look even taller without trying. He’s got his phone in hand, smiling as if this whole thing is the most normal Saturday hangout in the world.
“God, you scared me!” you exclaim, laughing in relief.
He chuckles, easy and deep. “It’s hard to explain directions to a place like this in English, so I figured I’d just come down and walk you up.”
“Well, thank you for the rescue,” you say, nudging his arm lightly.
“You’re welcome,” he grins. “Let’s go. I got food delivered for this occasion, instead of ramen.”
“No ramen?” You say sarcastically. “Might just go home then.”
“Oh, come on. I got something better,” He gently tugs at your shoulders with both hands, before pulling away. He had a moment of realization that maybe he was being a bit touchy when he hasn’t been like this to you before. He’s been like this with his members ever since they all came back from enlistment, but never with anyone else. He doesn’t want you to think he’s weird, like some of these other men out in this city.
The walk to his building is quiet, save for the crunch of gravel and distant birdsong. Inside, the elevator glides up without a sound, and he makes some small talk–but it doesn’t feel awkward. There’s a calm between you two that neither of you feels the need to fill.
When you step into his unit, you blink in surprise.
It’s spacious–more spacious than you thought any Seoul apartment could be. A clean hallway leads into an open-concept living room, where daylight pours through sheer curtains. Stacks of books sit against the walls, climbing toward the ceiling like curated towers. A soft grey couch stretches along the far end, low to the ground, lived-in but elegant. Potted plants fill corners. Sculptures and minimalist furniture round out the space.
But the art. The art.
“Whoa,” you whisper. “This place is… beautiful.”
“Thanks,” Namjoon says, sliding off his slippers. “Took a while to make it feel like home. Got some pieces I really care about, too.”
Your eyes sweep over the walls and freeze immediately on one familiar work.
“Oh my god–” you gasp, walking closer without even thinking. “You have Roni Horn’s ‘But the Boomerang That Returns is Not the Same One I Threw’ artwork? That’s so cool!”
He grins at your recognition, clearly pleased. “Oh yeah! That one hits me hard the first time I see it. I keep thinking about how memory isn’t linear and how we come back to people and places and ideas changed. I have to get it.”
You step closer, looking at the piece with reverence. “You know, I referenced this once in a thesis. It’s about the circularity of memory in contemporary installation art. This line stays with me.”
Namjoon smiles, brushing his knuckles over the side of his hoodie. “See? I knew you’re the right person to talk about this stuff with.”
You turn to him, arching a brow. “Are you saying you lured me here with art and food?”
“Maybe a little,” he laughs. “But mostly for the company.”
You flush slightly, feeling the easy warmth between you again. He motions toward the couch. “Come over, let’s eat before it gets cold.”
You sit on the soft, clean-lined sofa while Namjoon brings over the food–a spread of tteokbokki, fried mandu, japchae, and a couple of dishes you don’t recognize. “You weren’t kidding when you said food was already here.”
“I wanted to impress you,” he says as he sits next to you, cracking open a couple of sparkling waters.
Impress you? There really is no need for that. If anything, you should be the one trying to impress him, the client of the art museum you work for.
The two of you begin eating. Between bites, you look around the curated chaos of his apartment–organized piles of art books, records stacked near a turntable, a small bonsai on the windowsill, and paintings and prints on nearly every wall. There’s a calm sense of order to it all, but nothing sterile. It feels lived in, thoughtful. Like him.
“Do you ever get overwhelmed living here?” you ask softly, chewing thoughtfully on a piece of sweet potato japchae.
“Yeah,” he admits, “sometimes it feels too big. I’m used to small spaces. But I’ve learned to make it feel... grounding. Plants help. Books help. Art helps.”
You nod. “I get that. Your place doesn’t feel like a celebrity’s house. It feels like a collector’s sanctuary.”
He smiles at that, modest but proud. “That’s kind of what I want.”
After you finish eating, he clears the plates while telling you to scroll through streaming apps looking for Decision to Leave.
“It’s on here,” you call out. “Should I start it?”
“Go for it,” he replies from the kitchen, rinsing off a bowl. “You want beer? I’ll get some out from the fridge after I’m done?”
“Oh yes, please.”
By the time he comes over and dims the lights, the film has begun. He settles in beside you on the couch again, this time a little closer. Your elbows nearly touch.
The opening scenes of Decision to Leave unfold quietly. Detective Haejun, a murder mystery, his insomnia, his marriage already dissolving at the seams. A routine case turning seductive, falling for a strange foreigner, his restraint slowly breaking.
You watch in silence, fingertips loosely wrapped around the sweating bottle of beer, but your focus begins to drift–not from the film, but from the proximity. The way Namjoon’s arm lightly brushes yours when he shifts. How his thigh rests just close enough to yours that you have to force yourself not to notice.
You try to focus on the film, but from the corner of your eye, you see the way his arms fold, the slope of his shoulders, the flickering light catching on the sharp cut of his jawline.
Ten minutes in, a sex scene fills the screen. Slow, quiet, achingly intimate but very awkward.
You shift slightly, suddenly aware of your own breathing. Of Namjoon’s proximity. His scent, clean, soft, like cedar and something faintly citrusy, fills your lungs.
You clear your throat.
He doesn’t look at you, but he smirks. “It’s... definitely not a movie to watch on a first hangout,” he murmurs, chuckling as his eyes stay on the screen.
“You didn’t mention that,” you pout, sinking lower into your seat.
“I forgot, I swear!”
You let out a breathy laugh and try to focus.
Every now and then, you glance at Namjoon, who watches with furrowed brows, like he’s mentally cataloging everything. It’s kind of attractive.
“I’ve always loved how Park Chanwook balances contradiction,” Namjoon murmurs during a lull in the dialogue. “Like that line–‘grief as an envelope or slowly spreading ink.’ It’s brutal, but elegant.”
You turn to him, the glow of the screen painting your profile. “That one gets me too. The metaphors in this film are so carefully placed. It’s not just a love story at all.”
He nods. “Yeah. Like when the detective lies to his wife about sushi, but brings the best for Seo-rae. His values contradict, but love bends people that way.”
“Oh! You’re so right!”
You realize he’s such a yapper; now you’re really hanging out with him in the comfort of his home.
“You like Yun Hyong-Keun, right?” he asks at one point during a slow moment. “That scene with the fog rolling through the mountains? It reminds me of his palette. That kind of smoky grief.”
You nod. “I see the vision, filled with the same exact emotions.”
He turns his head to look at you. “You really know how to talk about art.”
You smile, a little shy. “It’s kind of my job.”
Later, when Haejun mentions he has insomnia, Namjoon stirs beside you. “That part hits close.”
You turn to him, brows drawn. “You have insomnia?”
He gives a half-shrug. “Since I was in the military. Something about the routine… or the lack of it. Stress, maybe. Sometimes I think it’s just residual from everything–work, my members, the future. Not knowing what will happen while I’m in there and when we get out.”
There’s a heaviness in the way he says “we.”
You want to say something comforting, but then Seo-rae whispers: “I wish I could give you a piece of my sleep. Just like a battery.”
That’s it.
You both fall quiet.
Neither of you speak for a while after the credits roll. The silence that follows isn’t awkward–it’s full. A current of thoughts stretching out beneath the stillness, taut and invisible.
You finally speak. “You know… when Haejun tells her to throw away the phone, he’s basically telling her to hide the murder, right? But to me, that’s the closest he ever gets to saying ‘I love you.’ Because if he didn’t, he’d let her get caught.”
Namjoon exhales through his nose, slow. “Yeah, it’s tragic. But it’s also… pure, in a way. Like loving someone means making a choice that could destroy you.”
Loving someone… it’s been too long since you’ve done that. Why bother thinking about this now?
You turn toward Namjoon now, fully. The room is dark but you can still see him, his brows drawn in quiet thought, the subtle tension in his jaw, the flicker of something unguarded in his eyes.
After a pause, he sets his empty beer bottle down, the soft clink echoing in the quiet. He leans forward, elbows on his knees.
“It’s getting late,” he says. “But I doubt I’ll be able to sleep. It’s gonna take a few hours, but that’s life.”
You hesitate for a second, then lean in just a little, close enough to really look at him.
“Might be silly, but I wish I could give you my sleep,” you say softly. “So you could rest. So you didn’t have to carry so much, all the time. Living the life of an idol. Plus, I don’t really need mine anyway.”
Namjoon turns his head toward you, his expression faltering for a moment. Like your words knock the wind out of him a little. There’s something startled in his eyes, almost boyish. But then, slowly, a smile spreads across his face. Small. Disbelieving. Touched.
He laughs once…quiet, breathy. Not teasing. Not dismissive. Just... moved. Like maybe he hasn’t heard something so gentle in a while.
But you think otherwise, “Sorry! It’s late and I’m just yapping away. I don’t know–”
“Is that your way of telling me you like me?”
The question lands like a spark in your chest.
Your eyes go wide. “H-Huh?”
Your heart stumbles. Trips. Nearly crashes. The beer bottle in your hand feels like an anchor now–too cold, too slippery. You suddenly feel very aware of everything: the slope of his knees beside yours, the faint warmth radiating from where your thighs nearly touch, the low hum of the movie credits still rolling.
“I–I mean–not like that,” you blurt out. “Not like Seorae or anything, I think I’m just a bit tipsy so the words just–”
Namjoon lifts his hand in mock defense, grinning now, though not unkindly. “I’m kidding,” he says, the words slow and gentle. “Just teasing.”
But the glint in his eyes doesn’t fade. And neither does the silence that follows.
You take a breath, trying to ease your pulse. “Don’t play around like that, Namjoon,” you murmur, the corners of your mouth twitching downward. “Don’t you have someone you’re with?”
The words fall out before you can stop them.
Regret pricks at you the moment they hang in the air. because it sounds invasive. And maybe it is.
You’ve established this simple friendship through your love for art and other miscellaneous things, but questions about anything else–his members, his deeper relationships, his family–certainly feel off-limits.
You shift your gaze down to the neck of your bottle, feigning casualness, even though your mind is screaming. God, he’s thirty-one. He’s too attractive. Too grounded. There’s no way he’s not seeing someone. Even if it's not public. It’s not like you keep up with tabloids, but every friend you’ve had who followed Western bands swore up and down about many secret flings and long-term hidden lovers. Why would Namjoon be any different?
Why wouldn’t he?
But then he answers.
“No,” he says simply. Calmly.
Your eyes snap back up to his face.
He meets your gaze without hesitation, his posture still relaxed. But there’s a weight behind his words that makes them feel true. Not performative. Not for effect. Just honest.
“I’m not,” he repeats. “I haven’t dated in a long time. There was someone over four years ago. And someone else… maybe seven years before that.” There were others he was seeing for a bit, but it never evolved into anything. And usually always, he seemed to be the root cause of that. Not really worth mentioning that, he thought.
He shrugs one shoulder slightly, as if brushing it off, but the quiet undercurrent in his tone betrays him.
“They didn’t last. Not because they weren’t good people. They just–” He pauses. “There wasn’t really time before. Not real time. Not the kind where you could actually… show up for someone.”
You stare at him now. Not just his face, but his whole being. The slope of his shoulders. The tension in his jaw. The lines around his eyes that you now recognize not as age but weariness. You wonder how many pieces of himself he’s had to give away. How much of him is left for himself. For this version of him now–barefoot on a couch in sweats, sipping beer with you at midnight.
You’re about to respond when he shifts, looking over at you again.
“What about you?” he asks, and there’s something shy behind it. Hesitant. Like maybe your answer matters more than it should.
You let out a small breath, eyes dropping to the floor.
“Me? I haven’t dated in a while either,” you admit. “College was… busy. Two or three flings that never really turned into anything. I always chose work, my projects. I guess I just figured there wasn’t room for both.”
Namjoon listens intently, eyes on you, head slightly tilted.
You swallow, voice softer now. “And at some point… I think I just stopped believing I was the kind of person people waited for. I settled just to not date.”
The room falls quiet.
He looks at you–not just looks, but it feels as if he sees you. Like you opening up about your love life rearranged something in him. His brow softens. He sits up a little straighter, knees brushing yours.
“That’s not true,” he says, voice low and sure. “You’re... someone people definitely remember.”
His hand reaches out, tentative, searching. His fingers graze the side of your face, knuckles brushing your cheek in a slow, reverent touch. You freeze under it, heart in your throat.
He leans in a little closer. Not rushing, not assuming. Just closing the distance like it’s the most natural thing in the world. And you don’t move. You’re eagerly waiting for the next move.
And your voice wavers. “Namjoon…”
“I’m not trying to complicate anything,” he says, his forehead nearly touching yours now. “I just haven’t been able to stop thinking about you… and I don’t want to pretend like I don’t want to know you beyond art.”
Your eyes flutter shut.
And in the next moment, you both move–together, unsure of who initiates–but it doesn’t matter. Your lips meet in a kiss that’s hesitant at first, barely a brush. Then again, longer. Surer. Warmer.
Namjoon feels the shape of your mouth, the curve of your breath, the way you sigh into him like you’ve wanted this too.
God, he thinks. She tastes like an escape. A great escape. From all his stress. From sleepless nights. From this whole life he chose to live many years ago.
You both pause, pulling back a fraction, breath mingling. The room pulses with something unspoken.
Then you dive in again. This time slower. Deepening. Exploring. His hand cups your face more fully, thumb stroking your cheekbone as if to memorize the curve of it.
You kiss again and again, and somewhere in the middle of it, you shift forward, knees brushing his. He pulls you in gently, and before you know it, you're climbing into his lap. Straddling him.
Your knees are planted on the cushions below, your hands resting on his shoulders as you settle against him, close enough to feel his heartbeat hammering through the thin cotton of his hoodie.
Namjoon lets out a low breath, stunned at first. Then his hands move instinctively to your hips, steadying you, holding you there like he’s not entirely convinced you’re real.
You’re facing him now, fully, and the sight of you this close, your flushed cheeks, your kiss-bitten lips, the wide, searching look in your eyes, undoes him.
You feel his breath against your neck, his hands warm through the fabric of your tank top. He tilts his forehead to rest against yours, the closeness unbearable in the best way.
“Fuck…I’ve thought about this,” he admits, voice roughened with restraint. “A lot.”
Your heart slams against your ribcage.
“You have?” you whisper.
Namjoon nods. His eyes flick between your own. “Since that evening I saw you at the museum. Since you sent me instagram reels that reminded you of things i’ve mentioned.” He grins, but it fades fast into something more serious. “Since you told me what you loved about Yun Hyong-Keun. Since I’ve seen you wear these sexy, yet simple, casual outfits,”
Your breath hitches.
“I’ve tried not to think about it too much,” he continues. “Tried to stay in control. Be good. Remember that you’re a curator probably just trying to maintain a good relationship with me, your client. But that wasn’t just it for me. You’re just not easy to forget.”
Neither are you, you think. In the last few weeks, you’ve grown to wait for his messages, and hear about his thoughts and his feelings. You’ve enjoyed him sending you selfies. You’ve thought about him late at night.
But the words don’t come out to let him know.
Instead, you lean in again. And this time, there’s nothing tentative about it.
And underneath it all, you have no idea how long he’s wanted this.
To touch you. To consume you.
It might’ve even been from the moment he met you. Reading your labels, opening up a new world to him that amused and frustrated him at the same time.
His hands grip your hips more firmly now, thumbs pressing into the rough fabric of your denim skirt as your mouths crash together again–deeper, messier. You're no longer holding back. The second your hips rock forward, you both inhale sharply. It’s instinct, friction, need–years of restraint unraveling between stolen breaths. You want to feel him, no, need to feel him.
Namjoon groans softly against your mouth, like the pressure against his cock beneath his shorts surprises him. His hands slide up your back, pulling you flush against him, and you feel how hard he is beneath you–thick and straining against the cotton of his shorts. Your breath stutters. You grind down again.
“Shit,” he whispers, forehead dropping to your shoulder as he sucks in air. “You can’t… you can’t move like that unless you mean it.”
“I do,” you breathe, the words barely formed. “I mean it.”
Your fingers curl around the back of his neck, pulling him in as your hips start a slow, grinding rhythm against his. There’s nothing frantic about it. Just drawn-out, indulgent friction. Dry, but heady. Heated. Real.
Namjoon kisses your throat now, lips warm and reverent, dragging along your skin like he’s desperate to memorize the taste of you. You tilt your head back to give him more, gasping when his tongue darts out to soothe where his teeth grazed. His hands remove your cardigan and slip under your tank, splaying wide against your back, dragging up slowly until his thumbs brush just under your breasts.
You arch into him. He pulls back slightly, searching your face.
“Okay?” he asks, voice hoarse, trembling with restraint.
You nod. “Yes. Please.”
And then his hands find your breasts, thumbs brushing over your nipples through the thin fabric of your blue lace bra. Your back curves with the sensation, thighs tightening around him, as a low moan escapes you. He watches your face the whole time, eyes dark and reverent.
“You’re so responsive,” he murmurs, almost to himself. “Fuck.”
Your hips grind down harder, and the sound that escapes him is almost guttural. He grabs your waist with both hands, guiding your movements now, slow and deep, grinding the shape of his cock against your clothed center.
Every motion sends sparks along your spine.
When Namjoon’s fingers slip under the hem of your tank. He doesn’t rush. He just pauses there, his thumbs brushing soft circles against your skin. Then he tugs, gently, not forceful, not demanding. Just a question, wordless but clear.
Your breath catches. The haze in your head lifts slightly, the thrum of arousal edged now with hesitation.
You pull back a little, just enough to meet his gaze. “Wait…” you say softly, fingers curling around his wrist to still him. “Can I tell you something first?”
Namjoon’s eyes are immediately alert, open. “Of course.”
You take a breath. Then another.
“I’m not really… confident about my body,” you admit, trying to keep your voice steady. But it honestly just sounds like word vomit. “Especially not with my chest. My boobs are kind of… weird? They’re not perky. They droop, but not in that cute teardrop way people talk about online or show in porn. They’ve always been like that. Just… heavy. Uneven. And I guess I always worried that guys wouldn’t know what to do with them. Or worse, would see them and just… lose interest.”
God, he’s going to think you’re ridiculous, isn’t he?
However, Namjoon just stares at you for a moment, and then he smiles. So soft, so full of something almost like wonder. A giggle slips from him, not mocking but sweet and earnest.
You blink. “Why are you laughing?”
“Because,” he says, resting his forehead briefly against yours, “You’re talking to someone who once spent an hour staring at Koo Bon-woong’s Nabu at the MMCA, completely mesmerized by the lines of a woman’s back and the uneven curve of her breasts.” His hand strokes slowly over your side, not daring to go further yet. “Or Lee Kwae-dae’s 기대어 앉은 나부 1940년대. Have you seen it? One breast is visibly fuller than the other. Her arms look a little too long. It’s imperfect. But it’s alive. It stays with you.”
You swallow, something cracking open in your chest.
God, you really picked a intelligent man.
“Art doesn’t care about symmetry,” Namjoon continues gently. “It cares about presence. About the truth of something. And you…” His voice drops, reverent now. “You’d be a masterpiece. No matter how you look.”
Your eyes sting suddenly. You don’t know what to say.
Namjoon leans in, kissing your cheek, your jaw. “I want to see you,” he murmurs. “Only if you want me to. But I promise, there’s nothing here that could scare me off.”
You hesitate one last second. Then you nod.
And when he lifts your tank off, slow and careful, his eyes don’t drift. They stay locked on yours, until the fabric slips away and your skin meets the air between you.
Namjoon exhales. A soft, almost awestruck sound.
His hands glide up your sides, reverent, and he murmurs something in Korean under his breath you don’t quite catch. But you can feel the meaning in the way he holds you. Tender. Certain. Present.
Like you were never anything less than art.
And then his mouth is on you again, kissing a path down your collarbone, over the swell of your breast. His hand comes up to cup you while his lips close around your nipple, tongue swirling, sucking gently. New sensations storming through you with these actions.
“Namjoon–” you gasp, threading your fingers into his hair.
“They’re beautiful, just as i thought.”
He moans against your skin, one hand lifting up your skirt to rub at your clit covered by your blue panties. It only pushed Namjoon further seeing that you matched your lingerie just to come hang out with him.
You rock into his touch, needy, grinding down onto his hand and the firm press of his cock beneath you. The pressure is maddening. Delicious. Not enough.
You both move like you’re chasing something–chasing release, connection, the safety of each other’s hands. His thumb rubs slow circles where you’re aching, and your whole body shudders. You’re soaking through your underwear, can feel the wet heat smeared against the curve of him through all the layers between you.
Namjoon’s head falls back, eyes fluttering shut as your hips roll harder, faster. “Fuck, if we keep going–”
“I know,” you whisper, lips brushing his jaw. “But I want to.”
He kisses you again–desperate now. Bruising. Starved. You rut against each other in sync, messy and quiet, until both of you are trembling.
Your breath hitches. Your stomach coils tight. You’re so close.
“I–” you start, but your voice breaks. He hears it anyway. Feels it in the way your body tenses.
“Come for me,” he whispers, teeth grazing your earlobe. “Just like this. I’ve got you.”
You do. With a broken cry muffled against his shoulder, you shake in his arms as your orgasm hits. It rips through you, drawn out by the relentless friction and the heat of his voice in your ear.
Namjoon curses low, grinding up into you a few more times before his hips stutter beneath you. He buries his face in your neck, breath shattering as he comes hard, cock twitching in his shorts against the soaked heat of your center. His grip on you tightens, then softens.
The silence after is thick. Heavy with breath. With everything that just passed between you.
Eventually, you both go still. Your forehead rests against his, your chest still heaving.
Namjoon chuckles softly, breathless. “Shit, so much for taking it slow.”
“Agh, I’m actually embarrassed.” You laugh weakly, arms still wrapped around him. “We didn’t even make it off the couch.”
He chuckles, “Don’t be embarrassed. I don’t regret this at all,” he murmurs, voice low and tender.
You kiss the corner of his mouth, smile against his cheek.
“Neither do I, though now i can’t go home like this.” you groan, carefully getting off of him not trying to stain his likely very expensive grey couch.
“Just throw your ruined clothes in the washer,” he says, nodding toward the laundry area. “Stay the night.”
“Stay the night?” You blink, caught off guard.
He reaches for your hand and threads his fingers through yours. “It’s late anyway. I don’t want you out there with all the drunkards on a Saturday night. I’ll get you one of my shirts…”
Wearing one of his oversized shirts does sound dangerously comfortable, but then he adds with a smirk:
“After we move to the bed and finish what we started.”
Oh my god.
“Kim Namjoon?!” you gasp, then lower your voice with a sharp whisper. “Did you plan this all along? Are you really that deprived of sex as an idol–?”
“Yes. God, yes,” he giggles, dimples flashing. “But hey–I didn’t know you’d actually feel the same way. You played into it too, so we’re in this together.”
You roll your eyes, heart thudding wildly. You had thought about it, of course. But the risk, the reality of getting involved with someone like him always held you back. And yet, he’s the one making the moves. Making it real. And harder to resist.
“I was perfectly content being art buddies,” you mutter, teasing.
“But now we’re doing more than just talking about art. Doing art,” he grins.
“Clearly.”
“Starting again…right now,” he declares before scooping you up into his arms. You yelp in surprise.
“W–Woah! Hey!”
He mutters something under his breath–probably praying he doesn’t drop you–and somehow makes it to the bed in one piece. He sets you down gently, brushing your hair back from your face.
“I have condoms,” he says, already reaching for the drawer in his nightstand.
“Good to know,” you reply, then cock an eyebrow. “But… you’re not gonna make me sign an NDA or anything? This is kind of a big risk, no?”
Namjoon looks at you seriously, hand pausing on the packet. “I already told you. I trust you. There’s no need for all that.”
“I admire that,” you say softly. “And I’d never dream of telling anyone. Not even my K-pop-loving friends from back home. They’d combust on the spot and probably crucify me.”
“Glad to hear it,” he murmurs, then leans in to kiss you again.
The kiss deepens quickly, all tongue and hunger. He lifts your knees gently, unbuttoning your skirt, fingers hooking onto your underwear and skirt and sliding them down with care. You shiver when the cool air hits your skin, but it’s quickly replaced by his touch–his fingers slipping between your thighs, finding your slick heat.
He strokes you slowly at first, kissing you through each quiet moan, then teasing your entrance with one careful finger, then two. When he feels how wet you are, he pulls back from your lips and shifts lower, eyes full of dark, focused hunger.
You barely have time to catch your breath before you feel his mouth on you–warm, insistent, devoted. His tongue slips inside you and your head falls back with a strangled cry. He groans against you like he’s starving for it, like the taste of you is something he’s imagined far too many times.
You buck your hips against his mouth, chasing the wave rising in your core–but just as you’re about to tip over the edge, he pulls away.
“Wait–what–”
Immediate sexual frustration hits you.
But then he flips you gently onto your stomach, his hand sliding under your hips to raise them. You hear the soft rustle of clothes being shed, followed by the rip of a foil packet.
“I’m going to put it in, that okay?” His voice is hoarse with restraint.
You nod into the pillow, voice a breathy whisper. “Y–yeah–ah!”
He presses into you slowly, the stretch making your eyes fly open.
“Oh fuck–” you choke out, nails gripping the sheets. “Couldn’t even wait, damn..”
“I’ve been waiting a bit too long, baby.”
Oh, baby…
You haven’t even seen his dick–but you can feel how big he is. Each inch pushes deeper, and your body trembles around him, overwhelmed.
Is it even possible to fit it inside you? You’ve been thoroughly prepped, but still! You haven’t done this in a few years.
Namjoon lets out a low groan behind you, hands gripping your hips like he’s trying to anchor himself. “You feel–fucking amazing…”
Namjoon’s thrusts start slow–but deep. Each drag of his hips feels like he’s trying to memorize the way your body fits around him, how you twitch and squeeze at every pullback. But it doesn’t take long for him to build rhythm, and then he’s pounding into you like he can’t help himself.
“F-fuck, Namjoon–!” you cry out, forehead pressed to the sheets, grabbing the same said sheets for dear life.
He grunts in response, fingers digging into your hips as he drives himself in again and again, filling you completely every time. You’re reeling–your body not used to this kind of stimulation. No one has ever stimulated you this way. No one has ever wanted to make it known how much they wanted you. Or how badly they wanted to ruin you.
You’re definitely soaking him and these sheets. The sounds between you two are obscene, and it only turns you on more.
Your mind spins. How did this happen so fast? You’re usually so cautious, so calculated when it comes to sex. But he has you unraveling. There’s something about the way he takes you–how open and vocal he is, how tender and filthy all at once. It makes your pulse pound with something deeper than just lust.
Another orgasm sneaks up on you before you can even brace for it.
You clench hard around him with a gasp, your whole body seizing with pleasure. “Shit–shit–I’m cumming again–!”
Namjoon groans loud into your neck, the sound vibrating through your spine. “That’s it, baby. Let go for me.”
Your arms give out under you, and you collapse against the bed, panting into the sheets. He slows for a moment, breathing heavy, eyes searching your face.
“You okay?”
You’re flushed and pissed–and not at him.
“No,” you snap weakly, breathless. “I’m fucking mad.”
He freezes. “Wait–what?”
“I lost myself too quickly,” you groan, turning your face to look at him. “I told myself I’d take it slow, and now I’m already cumming twice like I’m in some kind of fever dream.”
Namjoon’s lips twitch in a smile, clearly amused.
“Don’t laugh,” you warn. “I can go for more.”
He arches an eyebrow. “Oh yeah?”
“I want to make you cum this time,” you declare, sitting up and pushing your messy hair from your face. “Let me ride you.”
That wipes the grin clean off his face, replaced by something darker.
“You sure?” he asks, voice rough. He is gonna fucking love this.
“I’m sure.”
He smirks, impressed. “Alright then. Let’s see what you can do, baby girl.”
You roll your eyes, move quickly, both of you shifting positions. Namjoon lies back, head propped against his pillows, arms resting behind him in a slow, cocky sprawl. His eyes track your every move, and now that you have space to look at him fully–fuck.
You finally see him.
Your gaze drops–and your breath catches.
Holy shit.
His cock, slick and flushed and painfully hard, looks even bigger now that you’re seeing it properly. Veiny, thick, girthy in a way that makes you second-guess every confident thing you just said.
You’re about to put that inside you again? You’ve officially lost your mind, L/N F/N.
Still, you climb over him, hands trembling slightly as you wrap your fingers around the base.
“You good, baby?” he murmurs, watching your expression with quiet concern.
Constantly calling you baby… God…he will be the death of you. This man feels the same too, though you don’t know that.
“Y-Yeah, just processing your... situation,” you mutter.
He laughs, husky and low. “Take your time.”
You hover over him, grip tightening as you angle him toward your entrance. Slowly–so slowly–you lower yourself down.
The stretch makes you groan instantly, your thighs trembling from the effort.
Namjoon’s eyes flutter closed, brows furrowing in pleasure. “Fuck, you feel good.”
You inch down further, and further–until you’re seated fully in his lap, completely filled. Your nails dig into his abs for support.
“God,” you pant, adjusting your hips. “How are you fucking real?”
He gently rubs circles into your back with his palm. “You’re doing amazing, baby. Just go at your pace.”
You nod, focused, letting your body settle before testing the motion–shifting your hips in a slow, grinding roll.
Namjoon opens his eyes to look at you–and the moment your rhythm picks up, his mouth parts in awe.
She’s beautiful, he thinks. Completely unfiltered. The way your brows pinch in concentration, your bottom lip caught between your teeth, the way your chest bounces slightly with every motion–he’s fucking obsessed.
He swore he’d let you take the lead. He swore he’d hold back.
But that restraint doesn’t last long.
Your pace quickens, and the look on your face–the pleasure, the determination, the way you ride him like you own him–it breaks him.
“Shit–” he groans, hands flying to your hips. “Sorry, baby–I need to–”
He slams up into you with force, taking control again, driving himself deeper as you gasp out his name.
“Namjoon–!”
He pounds into you from below, hands guiding your hips down to meet each brutal thrust.
You can barely breathe, let alone think. All you can do is ride the wave of it–the rhythm of his cock stretching you open again and again, the sound of skin on skin echoing off the walls.
You’re both already close–so close–and the heat between you builds to another breaking point–
You ride him hard, the slap of skin-on-skin echoing in rhythm with your quickening breath. Namjoon’s grip tightens on your hips, grounding you through the rapid push and pull of pleasure mounting on both ends.
He watches you through half-lidded eyes, his chest rising and falling sharply beneath you. You’re barely holding on–thighs trembling, eyes fluttering shut as another orgasm builds low in your belly. And then it crests, stealing the air from your lungs as you cry out, clenching hard around him as your body shudders from the release.
Namjoon gasps under you, brows furrowed deep, his voice cracking in that final second as he comes too–hips jerking up as his cock twitches and empties inside the condom, thick and warm, filling it far more than you expected.
He groans, head tipping back, completely undone. “Shit…”
You collapse forward a little, hands splaying out on the solid plane of his chest, using him to steady yourself. He’s warm, his heart thudding against your palms, the faint sheen of sweat across his skin glowing soft in the low light.
You're spent. Or at least, your body should be. But your mind is still racing. You want more. Want to see him fall asleep completely relaxed–without tension in his jaw or worry in his eyes. You want him to feel cared for, too, in a way you’ve never really offered to anyone else.
Carefully, you lift yourself off of him with a whimper at the sensitivity, reaching between your bodies to gently roll the condom off his softening cock. It’s heavy with his release, warm in your hand.
Namjoon lets out a slow, almost incredulous breath as he watches you. “Already eager to keep going?” he asks, a lazy smirk curling on his lips.
“Of course,” you murmur, tossing the condom aside and shifting your body again. You crawl up between his legs, knees pressing to either side of his thighs, hands sliding along his skin. “Now doing this…”
You lower your head and give the underside of his cock a soft, lingering lick–kittenish and slow. His body jolts faintly, oversensitive but already responding. You glance up at him, eyes wide, a faux innocence in your expression that makes his throat bob with a swallow.
You let your tongue trail up from the base to the tip, deliberately teasing, holding eye contact the whole time. His cock twitches against your tongue, not yet fully hard but already awakening under your gentle attention.
“Fuck, Y/N…” he rasps, watching you like he can’t believe what he’s seeing.
You press a kiss to his tip and then lick again, this time with a firmer stroke. “Wanna help you sleep like a king tonight,” you whisper against his skin. “No tension. No stress. Just melt into the pillows and let me take care of you.”
He exhales shakily, his hand lifting to brush your hair back from your cheek. “You’re so dangerous,” he mutters, but the way his fingers linger says he likes that about you.
You giggle softly and wrap your lips around the head of his cock, coaxing him back to life with every warm, wet suck. One hand cups his balls gently while the other strokes the base of his shaft, your mouth working in slow, tantalizing pulls. You can already feel him growing hard again under your care–eager, despite just having cum.
Namjoon groans, one hand clenching the sheet beneath him. “You’re seriously gonna make me fall for you deeper by doing shit like this.”
You hum around him–intentionally letting the vibration tease him deeper–and keep going.
You suck him slowly, deliberately, coaxing him into full hardness again with your mouth, your tongue teasing every ridge and sensitive vein along his length. Namjoon’s hands slip into your hair, not forcing, just grounding himself in the sheer pleasure of your lips around him. His breath grows ragged, eyes fluttering as he tries–really tries–to hold back.
But then your tongue swirls around the head of his cock and you moan just a little, like you enjoy the taste of him, the feel of him stretching your lips. That’s all it takes.
“Fuck–baby, I’m gonna–”
He chokes on the rest of the warning as he comes hard, cock twitching in your mouth, hot spurts of cum hitting your tongue–and more. A thick, sudden spill lands warm on your cheek. You close your eyes and take it all in stride, swallowing every last drop with ease.
It tastes…surprisingly good. Slightly sweet, salty, clean. He really must eat well. Idol diet and all.
You finally pull off with a soft pop, licking your lips, and wipe your cheek with the back of your hand as you glance up at him. Namjoon looks absolutely wrecked–mouth parted, chest heaving, the remnants of disbelief in his eyes.
“Damn…” he exhales, voice hoarse.
His head tips back against the pillows, muscles twitching with aftershocks. He wants to go again–you can see it in the way his eyes trail over you, hungry and dazed–but this time, his exhaustion catches up to him first. For the first time in a long while, his eyelids actually start to flutter shut on their own.
“That…was so fucking hot,” he mumbles, still breathless. “But we need to take a hot shower before we sleep. I also need to change the sheets…”
You glance at the state of the bed and smile lazily. “If we go in together, we could finish faster and head to sleep?” you tease.
Namjoon laughs and instantly reaches for you, sweeping you into his arms again. “Yeah. Let’s go with that.”
He carries you–again, praying he doesn’t trip over his own feet (he’s a bit clumsy) and brings you into the bathroom just to the left of his room. It’s massive. Double sinks, a wide soaking tub set in dark marble, and a luxurious glass-enclosed shower with rainfall and handheld settings.
You both step in, the hot water already running and filling the space with gentle steam.
Namjoon pulls you under the spray and wordlessly reaches for the body wash. His touch is gentle as he lathers his hands, then begins softly washing your arms, your shoulders, your back. His fingers linger, not overtly sexual, but reverent. Almost too reverent. It makes your insides twist with tenderness.
“You okay?” he asks quietly, voice husky and close to your ear.
You nod, but your voice is small. “Yeah. Just…sensitive.”
He leans in and kisses your temple. “I know. You don’t have to push yourself for now.”
You shake your head, eyes closed as his hands gently trace suds over your waist. “It’s not that. It’s just–this feels really nice. And it’s making it hard to go back to a professional relationship.”
Namjoon’s hands pause. His chest presses into your back. “That wouldn’t be a bad thing,” he says, almost too softly.
You don’t reply. Not yet. You simply turn and take the body wash for yourself.
“Your turn,” you say with a little smile, wanting to keep things light.
You gently start working the lather across his chest, over his broad shoulders, and then down his back. The muscles move under your hands like smooth, sculpted marble. He sighs deeply at your touch.
“You know,” you murmur as you wash down the center of his spine, “your back looks like a landscape to me.”
He chuckles. “A what?”
“Like a canvas. Like–I could paint a tree on it. Or wings. Or maybe a river cutting through hills.”
Namjoon hums low, smiling to himself. “You’re such an artist. Everything you touch turns poetic.”
“You’re the one who quoted nude paintings during sex, remember? You even make music about poetic euphemisms of riding you,”
He laughs, the sound echoing off the tile. “Touché.”
When you’re both finally rinsed and clean, he shuts off the water and steps out, grabbing the largest, fluffiest towel and wrapping you in it first. Then he ruffles another towel through your hair, drying you gently like you’re the most delicate thing in the world.
Once you're mostly dry, he hands you one of his oversized white t-shirts. It swallows you completely, falling down to mid-thigh, and smells just like him–earthy, clean, with a hint of something musky and expensive.
“You look really good in that,” he murmurs with a grin as he pulls on his own sweats.
You help him strip the bed, tossing the stained sheets into a hamper tucked in the corner of the room. Then, together, you remake the bed–Namjoon smoothing the fitted sheet while you fluff the pillows and pull the new comforter into place.
When everything’s set, you both crawl under the covers, bodies warm and damp and soft with sleep.
Namjoon pulls you into his chest, your back to him, his arm draped protectively over your waist. He exhales one last time, burying his nose into your hair.
“Can’t believe I’m going to sleep without checking my phone for hours,” he mumbles, already dozing. “You’ve gotta be magic.”
“That’s honestly all just you,” you smile to yourself, your eyes fluttering shut. “Goodnight, Joon.”
“‘Night, baby.”
And just like that, for the first time in a long time, he sleeps soundly through the night.
+
That night became the catalyst for a series of sexcapdes with Namjoon.
You started visiting his place regularly–what started as late-night hangouts became something far more intimate, far more regular. Despite the chaos of his world tour preparation, long hours at the dance studio, late-night recording sessions, and relentless content filming, Namjoon always made time to see you. He'd slip home in the narrow windows between his schedules just to wrap his arms around you, to kiss you like he’d been starved, and to fall into bed tangled together.
Your sex life evolved into something rich and varied, a secret world just for the two of you. Namjoon, surprisingly attentive and open-minded, explored your body with curiosity and care, never rushing, always wanting to understand how you responded to every touch, every angle, every rhythm. You enjoy this too, and opt to go on birth control after some time just to ease the process for you both, while still using condoms at times to maintain protection. These are risky activites after all.
The kitchen table became your first unconventional setting. One late night, dressed in one of his oversized T-shirts and nothing underneath, you’d leaned against the marble countertop while making kimchi jjigae.
One look from him, slow and hungry, and somehow you were up on the dining table seconds later. He tugged your hips closer until your toes barely touched the floor, then lifted one of your legs to rest on his shoulder as he thrusted his cock into you.
The cold contrast of the table made you shiver, but his body was warm and grounding. His hands gripped your thighs tightly as he shoved himself into you, slow and deep, each movement echoing off the kitchen walls.
The stew became cold, forgotten. Namjoon’s breath came heavy against your collarbone as he muttered, “Fuck, I could take you like this every night. Watching your body shake just from this angle–God.”
Another time, in the living room, you’d found yourself in his lap one late afternoon, straddling him while his back sank into the plush couch. You were both reading a book, which soon became forgotten.
The light from the window cast golden streaks across his chest. You pressed your hands against his shoulders and sank down on him slowly, the stretch sharp and perfect. You moved with languid rhythm, your knees digging into the cushions, hips circling as your eyes fluttered shut. Namjoon couldn’t look away. His large hands spanned your waist and guided you as you rode him harder, your rhythm growing frantic, both of you getting lost in the slick, slapping sounds filling the space.
One hand slid up your spine, fingers curling around the back of your neck as he pulled you in for a messy kiss. She’s so fucking beautiful when she’s above me like this, he thought, hips bucking upward. “Just like that, baby… keep using me.”
The shower was chaotic in the best way. Slippery skin, fogged-up glass, and steam curling around your bodies as he pinned you against the wall. Your legs up, wrapped around his waist, water cascading down his broad shoulders as he thrusted into you, the sharp clap of wet skin muted under the patter of the spray. You gasped against his neck while he braced one hand against the tile and the other held your ass, adjusting your angle so he could hit even deeper.
“You drive me fucking insane,” he growled into your ear, barely holding back. And even when he was losing control, he still reached down between your bodies to rub you gently, expertly, pushing you over the edge even as his own release built.
And then even at times, the bathtub. It started as a soak, your back against his chest, legs resting atop the edge, wine glasses on the side.
But the moment you turned to straddle him under the water, your mouths met in a slow, heated kiss, and his cock slipped between your thighs. You guided him inside, gasping as the hot water surrounded you both.
Your movements were slow and indulgent, bodies rocking beneath the surface, water spilling over the sides with every rise and fall of your hips. Namjoon held your waist with reverence, marveling at how your breasts bounced gently with every motion, your lashes wet and cheeks flushed. He whispered, “Baby, you look like something out of a dream,” just before his head fell back against the rim of the tub, lost in the pleasure you gave him.
One night, he brought up the Kama Sutra. You were sprawled on the bed, still slick and panting from a particularly intense session, and he casually flipped through the app on his phone, showing you diagrams. “For art and science,” he teased, nudging you with his elbow. You grinned, your curiosity piqued.
You laughed. “You’re actually such a pervert, Kim Namjoon.”
“You’re no different from me!”
“I’m not even going to argue with that, let’s just try one.”
It wasn’t just pleasure. It was a ritual. It helped him sleep better, too. You felt more livelier again after living in such a draining city. A surprising bonus.
He wanted to visit your place next, but you lived in Myeongdong, right above a busy alleyway filled with cafés and foot traffic from both tourists and locals. Too risky. One slip and someone might spot him, and you refused to be the reason his privacy got breached. So instead, his Hannam-dong apartment became your second home. His sanctuary turned into a shared one.
You started leaving things behind–changes of clothes, your favorite moisturizer, a toothbrush. Eventually, you even had a drawer, then a shelf. He didn’t mind. His closet was massive. You began using his place to rest after museum shifts, sometimes staying the night even when he wasn’t around. He’d given you the door passcode weeks ago, murmuring how precious you were to him while he typed it into your phone himself.
There were quiet nights when things were reversed. Sex first, then lounging, late night talks about music, art, artists, exhibitions, life, etc. One evening after a steamy sex in the shower, still wrapped in towels and slightly damp, Namjoon brought up something you’d mentioned during your first night over.
“You said you wanted to paint a tree on my back,” he says, rummaging through the closet.
You blink. “You remembered that?”
“I bought some body-safe paints and brushes. Even got a canvas drop cloth so we don’t ruin the floors.” He lays everything out with boyish excitement. “I thought it might be fun.”
Your eyes light up. He smiles, gently patting your head. “You’re seriously so cute.”
You both sit naked on the drop cloth, backs resting against the couch, warm lighting casting shadows across the room. Namjoon sits in front of you with his back to you, strong shoulders relaxed, spine straight. You dip your brush into black paint and start with the roots, then move slowly upward–every stroke intentional.
“So… what are we?” you ask suddenly as your brush moves along his lower back.
He chuckles. “Isn’t it a little late to ask that? We’ve been seeing each other for three months.”
“Just checking,” you say with a smile. “We’ve never put a label on this, so I want to know how you feel.”
He pauses for a moment before speaking. “I don’t mind labels. Or not having them. Some of my members don’t like being tied to those terms, especially with our jobs. But… being able to call you my girlfriend?” He turns slightly, flashing you that warm, dimpled smile. “That makes me even happier.”
You blush, caught off guard by his honesty. “Stop… you’re making my cheeks heat up…”
He laughs with his whole body, shaking his head in amusement. “What about you, baby?”
You hesitate. “I’ve been scared of labels, to be honest. I wasn’t sure if that would burden you. I didn’t want to add pressure on top of what you already deal with as an idol.”
Namjoon tilts his head slightly, sensing the sincerity in your voice. “If it’s you, I don’t mind it. Honestly, I think it’d give me more energy if you called me your boyfriend.”
You smile to yourself and dip your brush back in the paint. “Then, okay, my lovely boyfriend, I have finished the art.”
He stands and walks over to the mirror in the hallway between his bathroom and the closet. His eyes widen. “Is this a plum blossom tree in traditional Korean ink style?”
You walk over beside him. “It is. Plum blossoms symbolize resilience, hope, and perseverance in adversity. I think you embody that completely, especially after everything you’ve told me about your journey as an idol.”
Namjoon looks at you softly through the mirror, your reflection beside him glowing with warmth. His expression softens. His heart swells.
He turns and hugs you close, your bare chest pressing against his. You feel the steady rhythm of his heartbeat against your cheek.
“I truly love you, you know that?”
You giggle softly. “Yeah… of course I know. And I love you too.”
He pulls back with a playful smirk. “Now it’s my turn to paint you. Maybe I’ll put some flowers on your chest.”
He’s so precious. You burst out laughing at his cuteness, already reaching for the brushes again.
“Go for whatever your heart desires.”
January.
After months of constant hangouts and long, ongoing conversations, itt’s been two weeks since Namjoon last texted you.
You don’t really mind the lack of communication. You know better than to assume the worst. He’s an idol. He’s juggling a packed schedule with rehearsals, interviews, late-night studio sessions, choreography tweaks, and the constant pressure of the public eye. Silence isn’t always rejection. Sometimes, it’s just exhaustion.
Still, the quiet lingers in your phone like an unopened letter.
You consider texting him to let him know you’ll be at Frieze Seoul, the international art fair held annually in the city, known for bringing together global collectors, artists, and institutions. It's one of the biggest events of the year–a week-long celebration of contemporary art spanning prestigious museums and galleries across Seoul. This year, the after-party for opening night is being hosted by Artue in a private rooftop space above Itaewon.
You’ve seen past articles–photos of Namjoon quietly observing installations at events like this, tucked in black caps or sponsored by a prestigious brand in branded clothing. He’s no stranger to Frieze. He even reposted a sculpture from the fair two years ago. But you doubt he’ll make it this year. With the tour prep underway and pressure all on as the comeback nears, it seems impossible.
Still, you hover over your phone screen. Should you let him know?
Would that be weird? Does he even care about your schedules?
Would maybe seem to him that you’re fishing for attention? Or worse–assuming he’ll be there?
You don’t want to seem like a clingy girlfriend and you also don’t want to interfere with whatever he’s been up to. You get it. Maybe you should just get back to work.
You lock your phone without sending anything.
The COEX Convention Center is buzzing by the time you arrive, bright white lighting softened by the elegant glow of uplights bouncing off glass panels and floral installations. You walk through the tall revolving doors beside the Kukje Gallery Chairwoman Hyun-Sook Lee, CEO Charles Kim, as well as 3 other big gallery staff members you closely work with. Your heels click quietly across the marble.
Your For Love & Lemons Ophelia Gown, a floral satin slip dress clings to your figure, swaying at the hem with each step. The corseted bodice shapes your waist, soft ivory fabric catching flecks of light like pearls. You blend in–yet stand out. Clean and classic. Soft and smart.
“Y/N,” the Chairwoman leans in slightly, speaking over the hum of jazz and clinking glass. “You look lovely tonight. Walk with me.”
You heard the big lady boss, so you do.
“Tonight’s about presence. You don’t have to say much–just listen, absorb, and know who to recognize. Frieze is where art meets capital, and relationships are the real investment.”
“Yes, Chairwoman,” you nod, adjusting your clutch as you follow her into the crowd.
You’re introduced to gallerists from Tokyo and Berlin, a Swiss collector who apparently has a soft spot for Korean post-war art, and a British curator who mentions she follows your gallery’s Instagram. You smile graciously, thank her, accept the champagne flute a waiter hands you. Every few minutes, Director Bokyung Park sweeps past with a whispered cue–“That’s the Arario team. Oh, and the woman in green? She used to work with Zwirner.”
Jiwon and Sekyung, fellow Kukje Gallery assistants, are more relaxed now with drinks in hand, joke quietly near the sculpture exhibit by a Norwegian artist–tall slabs of glass stacked precariously like a frozen Jenga tower. You recognize a few celebrities from afar. One of them, a K-drama actor, brushes past your shoulder and nods with a grin. You smile politely, tucking hair behind your ear.
Matthew Thompson, the international liaison working at the Kukje Gallery with you, leans over and murmurs with his usual British charm, “You’re handling this well. Most first-timers freeze up at events like this.”
“I’ve worked under people like Curator Sungah Serena Choo for far too long to freeze up at events like these,” you reply with a small laugh.
“That’s impressive of you, especially at your age being in this world.”
The night rolls on with curated elegance. Music swells from a live quartet in the corner, and the soft chatter of artists, dealers, critics, and collectors swirls around you like the fizz of your champagne. You’re perfectly composed, but something nags at the edge of your mind.
Would he have come here tonight?
Would he walk through those doors?
And if he did… would his eyes look for you, with the same thoughts that you’d likely be here?
You sip your champagne, gently sway your hips to avoid a passing waiter, and smile at someone you half-recognize from an online networking panel last year.
You remind yourself you're here for the art.
Not for the chance to see him.
But your eyes still glance toward the entrance.
Just once. Maybe twice.
A sudden roar erupts from outside the COEX venue–louder than anything you’ve heard all evening. It crashes through the air like a wave, spilling into the open glass lobby from somewhere far beyond the polished walls.
You glance up. Fans have been camped outside since sunset, hoping to catch a glimpse of their favorite idols and actors as they arrived for Frieze Seoul’s opening. Most can’t even get past security, but they wait anyway, with cameras in hand and phones pressed to barricades.
But this time, the noise is different. Sharper. Higher-pitched. Sustained.
Something tugs at your heart.
Could it be…?
“Oh my god–it’s BTS RM and J-Hope! They’re here!”
Gasps flutter across the floor like startled birds. Conversations falter. Glasses pause mid-air. And then the migration begins–art professionals, dealers, and curious attendees flock toward the mezzanine railing of the second floor, eager to catch a glimpse.
You follow slowly, stuck behind a few people in the crowd forming, your heels clicking against the marble as you try to peek between shoulders and heads. Eventually, you find a sliver of space near the glass edge–and there he is.
Namjoon.
Wearing a VISVIM Crosby short-sleeve leopard print shirt, black slacks, and a sleek crossbody bag. Next to him stands J-Hope, dressed in Louis Vuitton, just as effortlessly casual. Both are flanked by tight security and rich older socialites sponsoring the events, surrounded by camera flashes and waves of cheers from fans outside the building’s lower entrance.
Namjoon’s calm in the chaos, nodding politely to a curator you know who greets him. He lifts a hand in soft acknowledgment toward the crowd below. You just barely catch his profile. His sharp jawline, the lines of concentration that crease his brow.
You freeze. It’s glamorous moments like this that remind you how different your worlds really are. The privacy you shared, your bodies tangled together in the quiet of his apartment, feels so far removed from this spectacle. Still, you can’t help the soft awe that creeps in. He’s so composed. So charismatic. So... him.
Yet, so different from the Namjoon you know.
You turn away before he can spot you. Not like you think he would amongst such a big room with a lot of people.
Back to the exhibit you go. Back to the safe familiarity of your team, who’ve now scattered into small groups across the gallery floor.
Just before adjusting the strap of his bag, Namjoon looks up toward the mezzanine. He catches sight of a figure turning away–your silhouette.
Was that really you? The thought tugs at him, feeling bad that he hasn’t had the time to message you, or anyone really. He needs to finish two more tracks on the album so he’s locked himself in the studio with the occasional Yoongi and Pdogg to help him with producing. Today was just lucky enough for him to have a schedule that pulled him out from the hell pit of work.
And to see the sight of you after so long, it leaves his heart feeling excitement, yet sorry.
He feels bad to cast you aside a bit, but he hopes you understand. But for now, he has other matters to attend to.
The rest of the evening passes in a haze of polite smiles and steady conversation. You network with visiting curators, directors from European museums, and several artists whose work you've followed since grad school. Champagne flutes come and go, passed around by white-gloved staff. You laugh at a lighthearted comment from Matthew Thompson about Americans trying to understand makgeolli, and smile as Bokyung Park introduces you to a pair of Paris-based collectors interested in your last exhibition.
But there’s a dull ache in your chest. You haven’t seen Namjoon again. Not even once.
And yet, you remind yourself–this is your job. He’s doing his. There’s nothing wrong here.
Later, an art world acquaintance you haven’t seen in a year waves you over, and you catch up while waiting for your ride to Artue’s exclusive rooftop after-party in Gangnam. You consider skipping it–your heart feels too unsettled–but something inside you says to go. To loosen up. To reclaim the night for yourself.
And so, you do.
At Artue’s rooftop after-party in Gangnam, you try to loosen up. Lights twinkle above like stars tethered to wires, casting a soft glow across the rooftop. The skyline hums around you, music pulses through the crowd. You sip your drink and sway a little to the sounds of H.E.R. performing, followed by Rosé and Se So Neon. Then Crush, then Dean. It’s electric. Dreamy. The air smells of night-blooming flowers and expensive perfume.
You sip your drink and let your body sway to the rhythm, willing yourself to dissolve into the crowd. For most of the night you’ve managed to stay on the edges, drifting between familiar faces, nodding through conversations, pretending the distance in your chest doesn’t ache.
And then you see him.
There he is.
Front and center near the main bar, Namjoon stands with J-Hope at his side, both of them animated in easy laughter. Two idols flank them, and then Minju Kweon–Head of VIP & Business Development, Asia at Frieze–glides into the circle, her tailored dress catching the light as she leans in to greet them. You recognize a few more faces orbiting in, industry players and rising artists eager for a moment, a smile, a photo. Phones flash discreetly, capturing proof of proximity.
Namjoon poses, not resisting the camera. His hand rests casually in his pocket, his expression gentle, open, polite. He bends down slightly when Minju says something, the corner of his mouth tugging into that warm half-smile that you usually see from him. J-Hope throws his head back at a joke, and Namjoon’s laugh follows, low and familiar.
From where you stand –maybe twenty feet away, tucked into a pocket of the crowd–it feels like a universe. You are close enough to trace the slope of his shoulders, to notice how the glow of the rooftop catches on his rings, yet far enough that he might as well be untouchable. He hasn’t seen you. And a part of you wonders if you want him to.
The divide between you sharpens under the music. Him: easy in his element, at the center of gravity, people orbiting without hesitation. You: an observer on the edge, glass sweating in your hand, caught between the pull of wanting to belong and the urge to disappear.
You start to turn your head, already imagining the neatness of a discreet exit. Better to leave the moment untouched than to risk being pulled into a spotlight you’re not sure you’re ready for.
You sway, feeling a bit dizzy. Snap out of it. This isn’t good for you to ponder about.
“Y/N.”
A hand taps your shoulder, jolting you out of the thought. You blink and turn.
Sekyung.
"There are a couple of idols who said they wanted to meet you. They’re fans of your works."
You blink. "Oh?"
She steps aside, and you’re introduced to two young men–Ricky and Matthew from Zero Base One.
"You curated the Origins of Silence exhibition at Kukje, right?" Ricky says, shaking your hand with a surprisingly warm smile, followed by Matthew complimenting and doing the same.
"It was incredible. Your curation notes alone had me googling artists for hours."
"Thank you, that means a lot," you reply, your nerves smoothing into flattery.
You speak in Korean for a while about a few specific pieces with both men, before Ricky nods politely and excuses himself to mingle further. Matthew lingers.
"You’re American?" he asks in perfect English.
You blink. "Yeah–I’m from California, originally. Are you…Canadian?"
"Yeah, how’d you know?,” He chuckles.
“I can hear it a bit from the accent!”
“Haha, it feels relieving to talk in a language I’m comfortable with." He leans slightly closer, still casual. "I’ve just started tagging along with Ricky at these events, but it feels so awkward trying to act so sophisticated and professional."
You laugh, the tension in your chest loosening more than you expect. "No worries, I feel the same, but hey, you’ve found another international person here to make you not feel too alone."
From across the party, Namjoon spots you.
He had lost sight of you hours ago, but he was sure he saw you earlier. Now, seeing you again–standing so close to Matthew, laughing–it triggers something deep inside his chest.
He knows about Matthew. Funnily enough, before a specific Weverse post of a fan accidently copy pasting the wrong korean meant for Matthew, instead of him.
Young, talented, bright-eyed, full of momentum as Zero Base One ride the high of fourth-gen stardom. It’s not that Namjoon doesn’t respect him. It’s that Matthew represents something Namjoon is beginning to fear.
Time. Change. Relevance.
Namjoon clenches his jaw. He hates when he does this–spirals. Doubts. Wonders if he’s too old, too worn down, too deeply embedded in a life of late-night studio sessions and leadership roles to be someone’s... boyfriend.
Especially yours.
You're younger. Bright. Blossoming in your own career. So perfect for him it almost hurts. But maybe… not meant for him after all?
No. Fuck that.
He pulls out his phone and calls you.
Your phone buzzes in your hand. You glance at the screen. Namjoon.
Your breath catches.
“I’m sorry,” you tell Matthew gently. “I have to take this.”
He nods. “Of course.”
You step aside, barely hearing the music over your own heartbeat as you answer.
“Turn toward the center,” Namjoon says.
Your gaze shifts. And there he is.
Eyes locked on yours. A stillness in a sea of bodies.
“You’re here,” you whisper.
“Meet me by the emergency stairwell door in the back. We can’t talk here.”
His voice is low, firm. Sweet beneath the command.
“Okay.”
You weave through the crowd. He moves too, both of you drawn together like magnets. The stairwell is hidden behind a catering table and a black curtain. He reaches you first, hand closing gently around your wrist before tugging you behind the wall and through the heavy metal door.
"Woah, Namjoon–"
"So when I'm not here, you decide to go talk to other idols?"
"Huh? What?"
"I saw you talking to Matthew, all smiling and shit. What was that about?"
"Huh? Matthew?" The idol you were just talking to? You had already forgotten his name. "Ah, the member from Zero Base One? Our gallery sales assistant introduced me to him were just talking about art and our upbringing abroad. Nothing more!"
"Really? Because it didn't look like that to me, or maybe even others."
"Absolutely not. What the hell are you on about? Are you jealous or something?"
Namjoon sighs, feeling stupid that he let his emotions get the best of him. "No, I'm not.." He scans you and the dress you're wearing. the way it hugs your body, the way it shows your cleavage.
"Doesn’t sound like it to me!"
He looks away, "Ugh, let's go home. We've clearly been apart for a little too long and we’re taking this frustration out on each other." Two weeks doesn't feel too long, but dammit, it does to him. And to you too.
"Woah, wait!" He pulls your arm, pulling you walk down the emergency stairwell. He calls his manager to get the car to pick him up from a backdoor emergency exit that leads out an alleyway. no one should be able to see you two leave from here. He texts J-Hope to tell him that he's leaving ahead of him.
"I'm gonna fuck you so hard that you won't dare to talk to another idol and only think of me," he says as the car arrives and takes you to his place.
You swallow hard.
Tonight is far from over.
The car pulls into the underground parking garage at Nine One Hannam, its tires whispering against the smooth concrete. Namjoon’s hand is already on your thigh, jaw clenched and unreadable, the tension in his body palpable.
The second the door opens, he’s out first, rounding the car to open yours. He doesn’t speak. Just grabs your hand, intertwines your fingers with his, and walks you briskly toward the elevator. His palm is hot, firm, grounding.
The elevator doors close behind you.
It’s like a dam breaks.
His mouth crashes against yours with a hunger you haven’t felt from him in a while–raw, claiming, desperate. He cups the back of your head, tongue sweeping into your mouth, breathing heavy through his nose. Your hands curl around his shirt collar, pulling him closer, gasping when he angles your head and kisses you even deeper.
You worry the elevator will open at another floor and someone will enter, but luckily, it doesn’t happen. It seems the stars have aligned just for you and Namjoon here.
When the elevator dings at his floor, he doesn't stop. Just pulls away with a firm, “Come on,” voice dark and low.
He unlocks his apartment with one hand while the other holds your waist, already pawing at the curve of your hip. As soon as the door shuts behind you, he pins you to the wall beside the entryway, one hand gripping your jaw while the other slides down your side.
“This dress,” he growls softly, eyes raking over your body as though he’s just now really letting himself take it in. “God, baby… you look incredible.”
You barely have time to murmur a breathless “Thank you,” before he adds, voice lower, rougher, “But you look better out of it.”
He tugs at the zipper at the side, peeling the floral satin from your body slowly, watching your expression like a man starving. You step out of it, heat rushing to your face as you’re left in your lace white thong and heels. Namjoon’s already undoing his shirt–each button flicked open with precision–but he doesn’t take his eyes off you.
“You’re mine,” he murmurs, like it’s a fact. Not a question. So domineering, you think.
Your fingers brush at his lips slowly, as if sealing them will silence him and his urge to consume you.
“I know.”
Then he’s kissing you again. Guiding you backwards toward his bedroom without breaking contact, walking you there with strong hands and stolen breaths. Clothes trail behind the both of you: his shirt, his pants, your heels. When your knees hit the bed, he pushes you gently onto it, palms braced on either side of your thighs.
His voice dips. “Lie back. Spread your legs.”
You do–eyes wide, heart pounding–and he climbs over you, muscles taut and tense with restraint. His cock, thick and flushed, presses against your slick folds as he settles between your legs. You reach for him, but he catches your wrists, pinning them above your head.
“You think I didn’t notice?” he says softly, hips grinding forward so the tip of his cock drags through your wetness. “You think I didn’t see the way he looked at you?”
“It was seriously nothing–” you breathe, but he cuts you off with a thrust.
It’s rough. Deep. Your eyes flutter shut.
“Then you won’t mind me reminding you who fucks you like this.”
He pounds into you again, each stroke controlled and precise, angled perfectly to hit the sensitive spot inside you. He lets your wrists go only to push your thighs up higher, spreading you open more obscenely so he can drive deeper. You moan, high and needy, and he growls as he pulls out, slapping the length of his cock against your soaked entrance–once, twice–before plunging back in.
He’s gritting his teeth, forehead pressed to yours, watching you unravel. Your legs are trembling around his waist as he fucks you deeper, harder.
“You like that, baby?” he growls against your mouth. “Only I get to feel this tight little pussy. Only I can make you cry like this.” Thrusts continue as the wet slap of your bodies echoes in the room.
“You’re so…a-ah, f-fuck..Namjoom, please” you moan.
Hell, you are even crying a little–more from pleasure than anything. His pace is ruthless, but he still keeps checking in with soft touches, lips brushing your temple, whispers of “you okay?” that only you can hear.
At one point, he pulls out and flips you over. Presses your chest into the mattress and grips your hips hard enough to leave imprints. When he sinks back into you from behind, he lets out a broken moan–like he’s finally letting his jealousy melt into pure, greedy need.
“Look at you,” he pants, fucking into you with long, possessive strokes. “Taking me so good, even when I’m this deep?”
You whimper something like a yes, your cheek pressed to the sheets, barely coherent.
Then he leans down over your back, lips near your ear. “Let me see that face,” he says.
He grabs your waist, pulls you upright, your spine flush to his chest as he continues fucking you from behind in this new angle. One hand circles your throat lightly, keeping you steady. The other slips between your thighs, rubbing your clit in tight, focused circles. His thrusts grow sloppier as you clench down on him–your body tightening and pulsing in time with the strokes of his fingers.
“Come on, baby. Come with me. Show me who you belong to.”
You explode immediately. Trembling, gasping, your nails dig into his thighs as pleasure rips through you in waves.
He follows, only seconds later, with a guttural moan that sounds ripped from the base of his throat. His hips jerk as he fills you, pulsing deep inside until he has nothing left to give.
Then he pulls out suddenly, breath ragged. “On your knees,” he orders.
You scramble onto all fours, but he doesn't go behind you just yet. Instead, he walks around, grabs your chin, and presses the tip of his cock to your lips.
“Open.”
You do, and he slides in slowly–so slowly–until your mouth is stretched full, lips wrapped around the base. He lets out a shaky groan, hand cupping the back of your head. He doesn’t thrust at first. Just holds you there, watching tears prick the corners of your eyes. Then he begins to move. Controlled, deep strokes that leave you gasping and drooling.
“You take it so well,” he murmurs, thumb brushing your spit-slicked cheek. “All that smart mouth and now look at you. Fuck.”
You give me a sly, silly smile. You’d love to argue a little bit more to rile him up, but your headspace is all over the place right now. Let’s just accept this fate being devoured by one of the finest men in Korea.
He pulls out with a wet pop and slaps his cock across your tongue–once, twice–before giving your ass a sharp smack. “Back on the bed. Face down.”
You scramble into position again, heart racing, and he doesn’t waste another second. He slaps your ass once more before grabbing your hips and driving back inside in one deep, punishing thrust. You cry out into the sheets as he pounds into you from behind, rougher now, voice rasping, “That’s it. Let me fuck the thought of anyone else out of your head.”
“Y-yes!! Fuck!”
Your orgasm crashes through you hard and fast, made sharper by the sting of another slap to your ass as you come. And he doesn’t stop–he keeps fucking you through it, body trembling with effort, until his own release overtakes him with a low, guttural growl.
You both collapse after a few more rounds, tangled in sweat-slick sheets and each other, your breathing uneven, hearts thudding out of rhythm before slowly syncing again. His hand strokes your waist lazily, thumb drawing idle circles into your skin. He presses a soft, lingering kiss to your bare shoulder.
“I’m sorry,” he murmurs, voice low and rough. “I really lost myself… after not seeing you for so long, and then suddenly seeing you talking to another man.”
You giggle, tilting your head toward him. “Ooh, you were jealous? Did you think I lost interest already?”
“Stop, baby,” he groans, hiding his face against your neck. “No. But… I wouldn’t have blamed you, honestly. I’ve been neglecting you.”
“Namjoon…”
“No, really. I’m sorry. I’ve wanted to text you, but I’ve been drowning in work. The album..we’re pushing for release in the next 2 months, and I haven’t been able to–”
“It’s okay, my love.” You cut him off gently. “I figured as much.”
“I missed you so much,” he admits, voice breaking with honesty. “More than I could even say.”
“I missed you too,” you whisper. “But next time… just let me know. Even a short text, so I don’t worry. You were completely M.I.A.”
“I know.” He exhales, brushing a strand of hair back from your face with aching tenderness. “I thought I could power through and surprise you with big news when it was done, but… I was wrong.”
You press your forehead against his, closing your eyes as his warmth seeps into you. “Joonie. Like I’ve always said, don’t worry about it. I’m here now. My worrying yapper king.”
Namjoon chuckles, dimples deepening, eyes soft as he looks at you. “Yeah. You are.”
He lingers like that a moment longer before carefully rolling out of bed, his body still languid from the intensity. He pads to the kitchen and returns with a tall glass of water. The kind of post-sex gesture that’s not flashy, but intimate–like he knows your needs before you do.
You sit up, muscles sore, and take the glass from him gratefully. As you sip, he sits at the edge of the bed beside you, his fingers ghosting down your back.
He hesitates. Then, quietly:
“Y/N… do you want to come by the HYBE building sometime?”
Your lips part, the glass freezing halfway to your mouth. “Huh?”
“I want to introduce you to the members. Officially.”
Your head snaps toward him. “Wait. Really?”
“I think it should be fine,” he explains, careful, like he’s rehearsed this in his head. “People already know I like art. If anyone sees you with me, they’ll just assume you’re an ‘art friend’...someone I know through exhibitions or gallery connections.” His tone softens into something more vulnerable. “But to the guys… I want them to know who you really are.”
The words sink in, spreading through your chest in a way that feels almost too big to contain. Meeting his members. The people he’s built his entire life and career with. The people who have seen every version of him you’ve only caught glimpses of in photos Namjoon has shared with you or just mentions in your late-night conversations with him.
It hits you like a tidal wave.
This is real. Not just a pocket of time you’re stealing together, not just secrecy behind closed doors. He wants to bring you closer, to fold you into the circle of trust he holds so tightly guarded. Your excitement prickles with nerves. What if they don’t like you? What if you say the wrong thing? But beneath all that anxiety is something brighter, warmer: the thrill of being chosen, of being claimed, of being seen. By the person you love so dearly.
Namjoon has always moved with intention. Never rushed, never careless. And this? This feels monumental. Like he’s opening a door you hadn’t dared imagine he’d ever unlock.
Your throat feels tight, but you manage a whisper. “Okay.”
His gaze flickers to you, searching. “Okay?”
You nod, a smile curling shy but sure across your lips. “Yeah. I’d like that.”
Relief washes over him, loosening his shoulders. “I think the guys’ll love you.”
“You sure they won’t hate me for monopolizing your time?” you tease, though your heart’s racing too fast to sound casual.
“Are you kidding?” His grin is wide, boyish, the kind that makes your chest ache. “They’ll thank you for keeping me sane.”
You both laugh, soft and sleepy, and lean back into each other, your head resting on his chest, his arm wrapped around your waist again like muscle memory.
The bath can wait. Sleep can wait. For now, it’s just the two of you. Breathing. Holding. Wondering how everything is somehow moving forward.
to be continued in part 2.
a/n: thank you for reading part 1 of this long one shot i wrote. i had intended to publish this at the beginning of August, but i had a loved one pass away, so i decided against it as I didn't feel it was right, plus I wasn't satisfied with it. it was also around this time i got busier with work and restarted my job search process again due to not wanting to be at my job anymore. so the tldr; is... a LOT happened. this may be one of the last fics i publish in a long time, so i hope you all can appreciate it! it's my most researched fic as i tried to make it as canon as possible for the sake of immersion. please look forward to part 2 releasing on namjoon's birthday 12am KST.
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