They were right in front of each other now. So close that he could feel the warmth that the sun had soaked into her and he tried to not let the longing register on his face. Tried not to clench his hands into fists to hide the way they twitched.
She watched him, eyes searching as they looked into his. There was a question there but, he didn't dare try to figure out what it was asking. He didn't dare hope that she would ask.
That she would… That she...
“Dinner should be done any minute.” He repeated Baxter’s words, it felt strange to say.
Like the wrong thing to say.
But he suppressed the discomfort of the feeling and tried instead to fit a smile back on to his face. It also felt strange.
Something shifted in her gaze.
“We should–”
“Rain.”
“...”
Sadness.
That's what had changed.
The way she was looking at him now. He could see it. Sad – disappointed. She had.. She had wanted him to say something different. To do something different. God knows what (because he won't look to find out) but clearly there was something else that he was supposed to be doing here.
Something he wanted to do.
His mouth twisted before he could stop it.
He covered the expression with his hand and looked away, though not fast enough to not see the effect his response had generated.
Hurt.
Shit.
He sighed. Put a tense hand on his hip and tried his damnedest to collect his patience. He wasn't going to do this again. He wasn't going to be the one to cause Ai more pain. She's been through enough dammit. It wasn't her he was so mad at and he needed to make sure she could see that. It was – he was just mad at himself. At his weakness. Mad that he couldn't keep his own damned promises.
Mad that he didn't want to anymore.
Mad that he was given permission to break them.
The pause went on too long.
He heard the release of one shaky breath.
Ah fuck.
When Rain looked back to her, Ai's head was low, and it was only then that he realized how open her body language had been before, because now it was entirely closed off – hunched shoulders, crossed arms, curled in. Her lashes were low and, if he looked too closely, they almost looked damp. She hadn't been smiling before this, but now he realized that she also hadn't been wearing a frown either – because the one she was wearing right now felt like a sucker punch straight to his ribcage.
Hurt.
God, that wasn't the promise he wanted to break.
“... Okay.” is the next word she manages. Small (so damn small) and almost broken in his ears.
“Let's... Go have dinner.”
And then – she's turning away.
She–
He–
There's... an intake of breath.
He doesn't know why but, for one whole moment, that's all he is. Just one breath. Filling up his blind eyes and his empty head turning his chest hot and full and bright like he just dropped the sun down his throat.
Like he just started to live.
One breath.
Two breaths.
Hot breaths.
Her breath.
Her breath in his chest.
They're kissing.
Retroactively, he remembers the last 30 seconds like a distant but vivid film in the back of his head.
Watching her turn away, seeing a glimmer caught by the sunlight in her eye.
Reaching for her. Finding a hand that was digging crescents into her soft elbow.
Pulling it in. She twisted – tripped into his arms because he didn't mean to pull so hard but he did.
And her lips parted, gasped.
And he watched them.
And he pulled her in.
And they kissed.
They kissed. God, they are kissing. Rain is kissing her – just like he's been aching to, starving to – and she's not pushing away. She's not leaving. She's – she's kissing him back and forget everything else, he barely thinks. It doesn't matter. Because she's in his arms and Rain cradles her waist and her hands slip behind the back of his neck and he knows he makes a noise that sounds more broken than whole but it doesn't matter right now.
For just one moment. One more moment. Ai is his.
The sun is warm on their skin and the room is bright and pink and orange and Ai smells like roses and wet spring. Her lips taste sugarplum sweet and some crazy part of his brain is stupidly delighted to find out she still wears that lipgloss he got her for Christmas. That she kept that part of him, despite all the efforts he went to in getting her to let go. Her sugarplum lips. Amazing. Fantastic. He's so giddy about it, in fact, that he dips her in his attempts to lick the flavour clean away.
Screw dinner. He'll be satiated off this.
She makes a noise somewhere between a whimper and a squeak as he digs in, and it sends so many shivers down his spine that he doesn't immediately register the sound or sensation of her laughing. Laughing. It makes it hard to keep kissing, with the way her mouth keeps curving against his own aching smile. So, he pulls back, just enough to see it (and tries to control the primal ache in him at the way she clutches at his hair to keep him close).
She's crying. It's the first thing he sees and it sends a completely different kind of ache through the whole of his heart, but her smile makes up for every single tear stain on her face. The laughter peels out of her in breathy gasps, trying and failing to catch the breath she left inside his chest. Her cheeks are bright with colour, just like her lips and her eyes are glimmers of open ocean under crystal skies that he would gladly drown in. Let him just float away.
She was so beautiful. Always, but especially like this.
Gently, he dipped close to her again, brushing his forehead affectionately against her.
Touching her.
It made his eyes soft.
It made his cheeks hurt.
It... It made his heart ache.
He was…
He..
God, even after all these years, he was still so in love with Ai.
A/N: So, this was a last minute switch up from the original piece I had for the first day. Originally, it was a piece about Rain's parents, but it was just not meeting my expectations (also it was insanely sad LOL) so I decided to go with a Rain-centric romance instead.
Rain and Ai grow up together in this specific story (OL players will know which) He's the older boy that lives up the street and sometimes plays babysitter, despite only being three years older than Ai and only a year older than Ai's sister, Elizabeth.
Years pass and eventually the two develop feelings for each other, but Rain is too conflicted by his role in Ai's life to fully commit to a relationship with her and ultimately pushes her away - breaking her heart in the process. It isn't until several years pass and the two are comfortable enough with their relationship again that the tension finally breaks and Rain finally gives in to is feelings again.
This moment is the result of that! Hope you all enjoyed!
[poster][Mnet][dance] Rain to host Be Mbitious, prequel to new summer show Street Man Fighter, in May. (4/26)
[poster][Mnet][dance] Rain to host Be Mbitious, prequel to new summer show Street Man Fighter, in May. (4/26)
Image credit: MnetKR @ Twitter, 4/26/22.
— Written by Stephe, Managing Editor ^@@^
Be Mbitious. Be “ambitious.” Get it? I knew you would!
So once again, the industry gets really smart and enlists Rain’s inspirational mentoring and hosting skills for this new upcoming dance show. And we can’t wait.
Be Mbitious is a prequel show that will allow male solo dancers (K-Pop idols, choreographers,…
