wenoberry

[wenoberry]

im so obsessed with sohee recently it's making me feel crazy LIKE HOW IS HE SO HOT BUT LITERALLY SO CUTE UGH IDK IF I WANNA BITE HIS CHEEK OR DROP DOWN TO MY KNEES AND SVCK HIM OFF

[loveanton]

no way back to eighteen 2 | lee anton

⟶ summary: in freshman year anton wrote you a letter he hoped would come true someday. two years after losing you, he returns to new york only to realize love doesn’t disappear just because people do.

˗ˏˋpairing: musician!anton x f!reader ❀ genre: slow burn, second chance (?), friends to lovers to enemies to…? ❀ word count:  23.4k ❀ staring: manon (24)- katseye, anton(23) + sohee (24)- riize, jake (25)- enhypen. ⟶ warnings: swearing, miscommunication, emotional immaturity, consumption of alcohol, toxic relationship dynamic, angst, unresolved tension, “right person, wrong time,” jealousy, please let me know if i’ve missed anything!

✎ ୭: after months of working on part two, she’s finally here! in all honesty, i wasn’t really planning on writing a second installment but there was a comment left on the first half that meant a lot to me, it’s been deleted but it stuck with me because the whole reason i wrote this was to deal with my own grief surrounding a relationship/what it did to me (this is way more romanticized than what i went though but it was healing nonetheless) seeing my words help someone else going through what i did meant a lot and pushed me to write the other half, so wherever you are, thank you!

♪: chasing shadows by alex warren, heal by monsta x, burning down by alex warren ft joe jonas, yard sale by alex warren, before you leave me by alex warren, fever dream by alex warren, lying by prettymuch ft lil tjay, phases by prettymuch, love me twice by kerr mercer, reading into it by aidan bissett, gone 2 long by prettymuch choir version, everything by alex warren, two years by rosé, losing you by wonho, once in a lifetime by john michael howell, strong by one direction, this town by niall horan, in other words by ed sheeran and heaven by ed sheeran.

NYU senior year; denial and bargaining

“I love you,” Anton hears you whisper, so quietly it drifts into the night.

His body feels heavy beneath yours, pleasantly warm from where you’re tucked against his chest, your bare leg thrown over his while the city glows faintly through the dorm window beside his bed. Somewhere outside, people are still celebrating graduation. New York continues moving around the two of you like tonight is ordinary, as though the world hasn’t just shifted between you both.

I love you.

After years of dancing around it, you’re finally saying what you’ve both known to be true. Anton keeps his eyes closed anyway, relief washing through him so suddenly it almost makes him dizzy. The tension that’s lived in his chest for four years finally begins to loosen. Every fight, every jealous silence, every cruel thing neither of you could take back, every moment spent wanting each other so badly it became unbearable to stand in the same room without turning it into a war zone suddenly feels fixable.

Even now, after everything, Anton can still picture two of you actually trying this time instead of hiding behind rules and half-truths. You had looked at him like you believed him when he talked about returning to New York. It was as if part of you already lived inside the life he was describing.

A brownstone somewhere in Brooklyn with old hardwood floors and shelves overflowing with the books you swore you’d write someday. Your manuscripts scattered across the dining table while he sat nearby pretending to work on lyrics only to keep getting distracted watching you pace around the room talking to yourself whenever you got stuck on a chapter.

Anton has spent so much time loving you in secret that the idea of finally being allowed to do it openly still feels unreal.

He hears your breathing hitch unevenly above him then slowly, your body shifts. At first he barely notices it, assuming you’re only trying to get comfortable but the second your warmth begins slipping from his arms entirely his chest tightens instinctively.

The mattress dips softly beneath your weight as you pull away from him and Anton nearly opens his eyes right then, confusion flickering through him. Instead, he stays still and tells himself not to overthink it. You’ve both had a long emotional day. Graduation, the walk through campus, the conversation in the dorm room, maybe you just need a minute to breathe.

You just told him you loved him, people don’t say things like that before leaving.

So he waits.

The room falls quiet except for the faint rustle of fabric and your uneven breathing as you move around in the dark. Anton listens, suddenly hyperaware of every tiny sound filling the stripped dorm room around him. The sound of your zipper being pulled back up. The quiet sniffle you try unsuccessfully to smother. His stomach sinks slowly.

No…you wouldn’t.

Anton’s fingers curl tighter against this bare thigh as understanding begins creeping in. His throat burns suddenly. You let him talk about the future, that thought hurts more than anything else. You let him sit there beside you on this bare mattress and talk about coming back to New York, about long distance, about trying for real this time while nodding softly like you believed in it too. You curled against his chest while he painted entire years in front of you so easily that he couldn’t fathom that there could ever be a version in time where the two of you didn’t end up together. Yet the whole time, you already knew you were leaving.

Still, some pathetic hopeful part of him refuses to accept it completely. Maybe you’re only overwhelmed? Maybe you just need space to think? Maybe in five minutes you’ll crawl back into bed beside him and laugh shakily about nearly leaving. Maybe tomorrow morning the two of you will wake up tangled together in this nearly empty dorm and start figuring it out one difficult step at a time like actual adults instead of scared college kids.

Anton wants that version of reality badly enough it physically hurts but the sound of the door unlocking shatters any hope immediately.

His heart seizes so suddenly he almost reacts, almost sits up and calls your name before stopping himself at the last second. Instead, he stays frozen in disbelief while light from the hallway spills across the room through his closed eyelids.

Anton hears you pause at the door, for one horrible second, hope surges through him all over again. Maybe you changed your mind? Maybe you’re looking back at him right now realizing this is insane, realizing you can’t spend four years loving someone only to disappear the second they finally ask you to stay.

Before Anton can even relish in this hope, he hears the door click shut. He peels his eyes open, expecting to find you standing by the door, looking apologetic for even considering it but you’re nowhere to be seen.

The dorm feels different intsantly. Your dress is gone from the floor beside the bed. His suit jacket no longer hangs loosely around your shoulders where it belongs. The room still smells like you, skin and perfume and the faint trace of champagne from earlier tonight but your absence settles over everything immediately, hollowing the space out so quickly it almost makes him nauseous.

He stares blankly at the ceiling for several long seconds before the first muffled sob reaches him through the door. Anton squeezes his eyes shut again.

You’re crying outside in the hallway.

The realization tears through him slowly because he doesn’t understand. He genuinely fucking doesn’t. You cried while kissing him tonight too. You cried when he talked about staying. You cried when he held you afterward like he never wanted to let go. Every part of you seemed to ache toward him just as desperately as he’s always ached toward you so why are you leaving?

His body shifts before he can think better of it, shoulders lifting slightly from the mattress, about to go after you but the movement dies halfway through because what would be even say? Stay? Choose me?

Haven’t I been asking you to do that for years already?

Anton drags a shaking hand over his face before finally sitting up, the bare mattress creaking softly beneath him. His eyes land on the suitcases by the wall waiting to be packed into cars tomorrow morning, he takes in the dorm that once held memories he never wanted to forget but now holds a memory he wishes he could scrub from his mind.

The future he spent the last hour imagining suddenly feels humiliating.

Outside in the hallway, your crying grows quieter then eventually your footsteps disappear entirely.

Anton doesn’t move for a long time after that. He stares blankly at the closed door for hours on end. Any second now, he thinks. Any second now you’ll come back. You’ll open the door crying harder this time, maybe angry at yourself, maybe embarrassed but you’ll come back. You’ll crawl into bed beside him again and admit you panicked. Tell him you got scared. 

Anton would forgive you immediately. That’s the worst part, he knows he would.

His eyes flick toward his phone laying abandoned near the edge of the mattress. He reaches for it only to find nothing. No messages, no phone calls. Nothing. His thumb hovers uselessly over your contact for several long seconds before he locks the screen again and tosses it back onto the bed. Calling you now feels pathetic somehow, too desperate.

Still, he barely sleeps that night.

Every tiny sound from the hallway makes his heart skip a beat. Every burst of laughter drifting up from the street below tricks him into thinking maybe you came back with Manon or changed your mind after all. By four in the morning, Anton is still sitting awake against the headboard, fully dressed now, staring at his phone screen. You never call.

By the time sunlight starts creeping weakly through the dorm windows, something inside him feels broken beyond repair.

He finally gets out of his bed at 6:00 AM. He folds the last of his clothes in silence and shoves loose papers and notebooks into boxes until the room no longer resembles the place he spent the last four years of his life. Every now and then his eyes drift back toward the door without meaning to, some stupid hopeful part of him still expecting it to open.

It never does.

Around noon, he texts his mom to come get him. His flight to Korea isn’t for another three days but Anton suddenly can’t stand the thought of remaining in New York any longer than necessary. The city feels wrong now, haunted by your memory.

By the time his mom pulls up outside Palladium Hall later that afternoon, Anton already has his suitcases stacked neatly beside the curb waiting for her. She takes one look at him through the rolled-down passenger window and immediately frowns. “Honey, did you sleep at all?” She asks softly.

Anton forces a small smile that doesn’t reach his eyes. “A little.”

The drive back to Jersey passes mostly in silence. His mom talks occasionally about graduation, about how proud she is of him and how exciting Korea will be but Anton barely absorbs any of it. His forehead stays pressed against the cool window the entire ride while New York slowly disappears behind them.

The only thing he can think about is you.

Whether you made it home safely, whether you cried the entire car ride back home with your parents. Whether you regret leaving yet. Whether you’re staring at your phone right now debating calling him the same way he keeps debating calling you. You never do.

The first week after graduation passes strangely. Anton waits for you in humiliating ways. Every time his phone buzzes, his heart jumps before crashing again seconds later. He checks your socials more than he should, rereads old messages, scrolls through photos from sophomore year at three in the morning while sleep continues avoiding him completely.

Still, he rationalizes your actions. You’re overwhelmed, he initially thinks. Post-grad life is terrifying. Maybe you needed space to process everything first. Maybe the idea of long distance scares you. Maybe you regret leaving but don’t know how to come back after making such a dramatic exit.

Anton builds entire narratives around those possibilities because the alternative hurts too much to consider.

When he and Sohee finally leave for Korea, Anton almost breaks down in the middle of Newark airport after spotting a copy of Fourth Wing sitting in one of the bookstore displays near their gate. Your favorite series. The sight of it hits him so suddenly he has to stop walking.

Sohee notices immediately. “Anton?”

Anton shakes his head once, pressing the back of his hand hard against his mouth while tears burn violently behind his eyes. He feels ridiculous crying in the middle of an airport bookstore over a novel but suddenly all he can picture is you freshman year curled up in his dorm bed reading passages out loud while he pretended to be annoyed about it.

Anton looks away quickly, wiping at his face before the tears can fully fall. “Sorry. I’m fine.” he mutters hoarsely.

He isn’t but Sohee gives him a pass, he knows how deeply Anton loves you and how hard this week has been. When they finally arrive in Korea, Anton feels stagnant. The apartment he and Sohee move into is nice enough, modern and clean with huge windows overlooking the city skyline but Anton drifts through it.

Weeks pass in a blur of studio sessions, meetings, vocal training and late nights wandering convenience stores with Sohee after practice because neither of them knows how to cook yet. They make memories there despite everything…dumb ones. Sohee nearly setting the kitchen on fire trying to fry eggs at two in the morning, falling asleep on the studio couch during recording sessions, drinking cheap beer on the apartment balcony while the city shines beneath them.

Anton laughs sometimes, he even smiles but underneath all of it, something still feels off. Almost as if a part of him got left behind in New York, sitting on a bare mattress listening to you cry outside his door.

Two months after graduation, Anton still hasn’t deleted your contact. He still checks his phone before bed every night and still half expects to hear from you eventually. He decides to channel that grief into a song, forever immortalized.

Anton sits cross-legged on the floor of the apartment living room with his guitar resting across his lap while it rains outside. The entire apartment is dark except for the dim light glowing from his laptop. Sohee fell asleep hours ago but Anton hasn’t managed more than thirty minutes of rest at a time in weeks.

His mind keeps replaying the sound of the dorm door closing over and over and over again. It’s a torment he can’t escape, from the click of the lock to the sound of your tears. On nights when his mind decides to really mess with him all he can hear is your wshispered I love you.

Anton’s fingers brush absentmindedly against the guitar strings before a melody finally slips out. “Darling, handle me with care…”

The words leave him before he can think too hard about them. “Cover me in bubble wrap…”

Anton closes his eyes, letting the memory pull him under completely this time instead of fighting it. “I’m scared you really mean it…that you’re never coming back.”

He takes a minute to process and then suddenly the rest of the lyrics spill out almost violently, every thought he’s spent two months trying to rationalize clawing its way free all at once. By sunrise, the rough draft of Before You Leave Me sits unfinished in the notes app on his phone.

For the first time in weeks, Anton feels slightly lighter. Not at all healed but a tad bit lighter.

Unfortunately for him, the feeling doesn’t last long.

Seven months after graduation, your absence still lingers in every corner of Anton’s life like something stubbornly unfinished. Enough time has passed that the grief should’ve dulled by now, at least according to everyone around him.

He and Sohee’s schedules have become busier over the last five months, days bleeding into nights inside recording studios and rehearsal rooms while producers toss around words like potential and breakthrough. Sometimes Anton catches glimpses of himself in the booth glass during sessions and barely recognizes the person staring back. He’s thinner now, quieter too.

Not in an obvious enough way for people to worry long term but enough that Sohee notices every time Anton zones out halfway through conversations or instinctively checks his phone after long recording days despite there never being anything waiting for him there, you still haven’t called.

At first Anton convinced himself you only needed time. Then he convinced himself you were scared. Then he convinced himself maybe you thought reaching out would only make things harder for both of you. Now? Now he doesn’t know what to think anymore.

The song helps a little, Before You Leave Me ends up becoming the first thing Anton writes after graduation that actually feels honest instead of performative. Raw enough that even Sohee goes quiet the first time he hears it played back through the studio speakers. Their producers think it’s too honest so they shut down releasing it as his debut song.

Still, honesty doesn’t equal closure. If anything it just leaves Anton with more room to think. Which is exactly how he finds himself sitting across from Sohee seven months after graduation in some tiny restaurant in Seoul, half drunk off cheap beer after a brutal twelve hour studio session. The place is mostly empty save for a couple arguing near the back and an exhausted waitress wiping menus down behind the counter.

His phone rests face down beside his drink, untouched for once. Sohee eyes it anyway before taking another sip of beer. “You know…most people would’ve moved on by now.” He says carefully.

Anton looks up slowly from where he’d been absentmindedly picking at the label of his bottle. “What?”

Sohee shrugs one shoulder. “It’s been seven months.”

The number lands unpleasantly between them, seven months. Seven entire months since you slipped out of his arms in that dorm room and disappeared from his life. Anton hates hearing the time quantified out loud because it makes the situation sound pathetic in a way he’s been trying hard not to acknowledge.

“She made her choice when she walked away. At some point you have to stop waiting for her to change her mind.”

Anton’s jaw tightens immediately. “I’m not waiting.”

Sohee just looks at him flatly. The expression alone is enough to make irritation spark beneath Anton’s skin because they both know it’s a lie. He might not still be sitting around expecting your call every night the way he used to but some part of him is still caught between the version of you that loved him and the version that left.

“You don’t know her the way I do.” Anton mutters finally, looking away again.

Something flashes across Sohee’s face. Frustration? Anger? Exhaustion? Anton can’t quite place it. “Are you being deadass right now?” he asks with a short disbelieving laugh. “You think I didn’t know her too?”

Anton says nothing.

“She was my friend too, Anton. Just because I didn’t fuck her like you did doesn’t suddenly negate four years of friendship.”

Anton’s head snaps up instantly. “It was more than sex and you know it.”

“Doesn’t seem like it.” The words hit harder than Sohee probably intends.

Anton stares at him in disbelief for half a second before anger finally cracks through the exhaustion. “Fuck you.”

“Truth hurts.” Sohee fires back immediately. “You built this entire fantasy around someone who didn’t pick you and you still act like she’s some tragic victim in all of this.”

“She loves me.” Anton fires back because if he can’t argue anything else, at least he knows without a doubt you love him.

For a moment, Sohee just stares at him across the table then his expression softens into something almost pitying. “Then why did she leave?”

Anton opens his mouth immediately, instinctively ready with another excuse. Another explanation. She panicked, she was overwhelmed, long distance scared her, post-grad life hit too fast. The words rise automatically after months of repetition but for the first time since graduation, they stop before fully leaving his mouth.

Suddenly, sitting there across from hius best friend who is staring at him with such strong pity, Anton realizes something that makes his stomach twist violently. Every explanation he’s ever made for you still ends the same way: with you leaving.

No matter how many times he rewrites the story in his head, no matter how gently he frames your fear or how desperately he tries to rationalize your choices into something less painful, the truth remains ugly and unavoidable: you knew he loved you, you knew he wanted you. You knew he was willing to stay, to try, to build an entire future around the two of you if you’d only met him halfway and you still walked away.

Anton suddenly thinks back to that night, to the way he laid there afterwards imagining you’d come back through the door at any second while you cried somewhere out in the hallway. Even then, even at his absolute lowest, he spent more time trying to understand your pain than acknowledging his own.

Something bitter curls low in his chest. When had you ever done the same for him?

Sohee watches the shift happen in real time, watches something inside Anton finally begin to crack. Anton looks away first, jaw tightening faintly as he stares down at gis beer bottle in front of him.

For the first time in seven months, he lets himself consider the possibility that loving someone might not actually make the way they hurt you acceptable.

Year 1 postgrad; anger and avoidance:

Heartbreak sells surprisingly well.

Anton learns that somewhere between the fifth meeting with his producers and the hundredth comment under the teaser clip for his song Yard Sale. Apparently there’s something commercially irresistible about a twenty-three year old singing about destroying the remnants of a relationship he still clearly hasn’t recovered from.

His label calls it authenticity while online edits of Anton leaving bars at 1AM and staring moodily through car windows circulate alongside the same fifteen second snippet from the bridge.

I thought about just striking a match but it’s hard to burn a memory.

That line quite literally changed his life. Overnight, Anton Lee went from some random trainee posting song covers online to a name people suddenly know. His monthly listeners climb obscenely fast and strangers online begin dissecting his lyrics trying to figure out who they’re about.

The funniest part is, none of it feels artistic to Anton.

The song wasn’t written because he wanted to create something meaningful. It was written because he woke up one morning in the apartment he and Sohee shared and realized you were still everywhere despite being gone nearly a year. Your books remained stacked beside his desk and your birthday cards still sat tucked away inside drawers. He found one of the swim meet posters you’d made him shoved carelessly behind the couch one afternoon and nearly lost his mind over the fact that you somehow still occupied physical space in a life you no longer belonged to.

Anton briefly considered burning all of it. That was the thought that eventually led to Yard Sale. The problem wasn’t the objects themselves, it was what they carry. Every hoodie, every photograph, every annotated novel still holds traces of you and Anton has grown tired of living inside a mausoleum dedicated to someone who chose to leave him behind. Anger settles easier in his chest these days than sadness ever did. Anger lets him function. Anger lets him sleep. Anger lets him stop checking his phone every twenty minutes like some pathetic dog waiting by the door.

So when his management jokingly suggested holding an actual yard sale as promotion for the EP release, Anton eagerly nodded and said sure. That’s how he ends up hungover on the curb outside a rented Seoul bnb while strangers sift through the remains of your relationship.

The afternoon sun sits unpleasantly bright overhead, reflecting harshly against the lenses of his sunglasses while fans drift in and out of the house carrying armfuls of things that once belonged to some version of the two of you and promotional merch. Folding tables line the front yard cluttered with books, old clothes, random dorm decorations, vinyls, polaroids of New York, concert tickets and pieces of a life Anton spent four years building beside you.

Somewhere behind him, Yard Sale plays faintly through outdoor speakers while fans laugh excitedly amongst themselves. His management team had nearly combusted from excitement when clips from the event started circulating online earlier that morning.

Apparently people found the entire thing iconic, raw. A genius marketing move.

Anton finds it mildly horrifying but not enough to stop.

If anything, part of him almost enjoys the performance of it all. There’s something strangely cathartic about watching strangers carry pieces of you away in paper shopping bags like they’re purchasing clearance items instead of evidence that he once loved someone enough for them to have such a large impact on his life. Every sale feels oddly vindicating. Like proof he can let go too. Proof he’s finally doing what everyone spent the last year begging him to do: move on.

Still, every now and then the absurdity of the situation hits him hard enough to leave him briefly disoriented. It’s a strange thing, these people don’t actually know what they’re touching.

The oversized gray hoodie some girl happily ties around her waist used to smell like your perfume for months because you constantly stole it during late-night study sessions. The scratched vinyl somebody buys for one hundred thousand won once played in the background while the two of you danced drunkenly around his dorm sophomore year after Manon snuck alcohol into the building.

One guy walks off with a chipped ceramic mug you bought from some tiny bookstore café in Brooklyn and Anton has to physically stop himself from saying be careful with that.

None of it should matter anymore, that’s the entire point. His fans laugh excitedly while digging through boxes labeled with sharpie slogans from his song: ALL THE LOVE IS GONE. NAME YOUR PRICE. YOU CAN HAVE MY PAIN.

“Can you sign this too?”

Anton glances up to find a girl around his age holding one of the physical EP copies against her chest while nervously extending a pen toward him. “Yeah, sure.”

“You saved my life with this song by the way,” she blurts quickly while he signs his name across the cover.

Anton’s hand pauses briefly against the glossy paper before continuing the signature anyway. “Oh…thank you.”

The girl’s shoulders relax almost instantly. “I’m serious, my boyfriend and I broke up a few months ago and I swear I had your song on repeat every night.” She laughs faintly, embarrassed. “It just made me feel less alone, I guess.”

Something in Anton’s chest twists unpleasantly at that. Despite everything, despite the bitterness that’s settled into him over the last year and the resentment he still carries around like a second skin some days, comments like these still affect him more than he expects. Maybe they always will.

He knows exactly what it feels like to become unnoticeable to yourself after heartbreak. To replay the same conversations over and over until your own thoughts begin sounding hostile, until the memories rot inside your head. To feel humiliated by how much you miss someone who couldn’t be bothered to consider your emotions when theu left.

If his music softens that loneliness for someone else, even briefly, he’s grateful for it. He just hates that he had to endure it deeply enough to write the songs in the first place.

The girl smiles as he hands the EP back to her. “Please never stop sharing your words.”

Something unexpectedly warm settles in Anton’s chest at that. Not enough to erase everything else but enough that he finds himself nodding genuinely instead of offering the practiced half-smile he’s spent most of the afternoon hiding behind. “I’ll try,” he says quietly.

The girl beams one final time before disappearing back into the crowd clutching the signed EP against her chest. Anton watches her go briefly before another album gets slid toward him, then another. The line continues moving steadily while sunlight crawls lower across the street.

A few fans drift out of the house laughing amongst themselves carrying old hoodies and records beneath their arms. One guy excitedly shows his friend a polaroid he’d managed to snag from one of the tables and Anton immediately looks away before he can accidentally recognize which memory it came from. That’s become another skill lately, looking away.

“Can you sign this too?”

Anton looks up distractedly before his gaze lands on the object in her hands and immediately stills.

A worn copy of 1984 stares back at him. The edges of the pages are bent from overuse, colorful tabs sticking out messily along the sides while familiar handwriting litters the margins in faded pen. Anton recognizes it instantly because he used to watch you annotate books for hours sprawled across his bed, muttering complaints whenever authors disappointed you.

For one brief horrible second, the noise around him fades completely and suddenly he’s nineteen again watching you sit cross-legged beside his dorm window arguing passionately about symbolism while sunlight spills across your face. He remembers teasing you for taking fiction too seriously only for you to snatch the book away from him looking scandalized.

“Literature matters, Anton.”

The memory hits so vividly it almost knocks the breath from his lungs. These were real memories once. Not lyrics, not branding, not fan theories or spotify streams. Just two stupid college kids building a life around each other so naturally Anton genuinely believed there would come a day where the timing was finally right.

Now strangers rummage through those remnants like they’re vintage thrift finds.

Anton stares at the novel a second too long and something uncomfortable twists low in his chest because unlike the hoodies and polaroids and random dorm decorations scattered across the tables, this was never supposed to end up out here.

He doesn’t even remember packing it into the boxes management hauled over this morning. Somewhere between the hangover and the cameras and the endless stream of people picking apart the remains of his relationship, it must’ve slipped through unnoticed. His first instinct is immediate and visceral: take it back.

The thought slams into him so quickly it nearly startles him. He wants to snatch the book from the girl’s hands and shove it somewhere nobody else can touch it, somewhere hidden and safe. The novel holds too much of you inside it to belong to strangers. Your thoughts fill nearly every margin, your tiny sarcastic comments squeezed between paragraphs, entire pages dedicated to debates you went on and on about at two in the morning while he fought sleep beside you.

There’s probably an old receipt tucked between chapters because you constantly used random things as bookmarks instead of actual bookmarks like a psychopath. The realization makes his heart tighten painfully beneath his ribs. This feels different than selling clothes or records or posters. This feels like giving away pieces of your mind.

The thought unsettles him enough that for half a second he almost reaches for the book. Too cruel, something inside him whispers. Anton nearly laughs at himself.

Too cruel?

Wasn’t you telling him you loved him before leaving anyway cruel? Wasn’t spending the better part of a year pretending he could somehow rationalize your absence into something less painful cruel? Wasn’t your silence that followed cruel too? The fact that while Anton sat awake writing songs about you, you somehow managed to continue existing beyond him?

Anton suddenly feels exhausted by his own inability to let you become the villain in peace.

The girl shifts awkwardly in front of him, clearly oblivious to the war unraveling silently behind his sunglasses. “Uh…if that’s okay?” she asks hesitantly, holding the book out toward him again.

Anton blinks once before forcing a smile back onto his face, something carefully practiced and detached.

He uncaps the marker slowly, leaning forward against the table as he finally takes the novel from her hands. “Where do you want me to sign?”

The girl points vaguely toward the inside cover and Anton nods once before lowering his gaze back to the page. The girl thanks him profusely afterward, clutching the novel against her chest before disappearing back toward the house looking thrilled by her purchase. Anton watches her go longer than necessary.

“You good?”

The voice pulls him out of it. Anton looks up just as his manager David steps onto the curb beside him with a grin stretched broadly across his face, phone in hand displaying what looks like social media metrics. Sohee trails behind him more slowly carrying another box of EPs beneath one arm.

“People are eating this up,” David says, almost laughing as he turns the screen toward Anton. “The clips already passed a million views.”

Anton glances briefly at the screen, edits stitched together of the yard sale and of him signing memorabilia.

These are literally the artifacts of my failed relationship.

The thought settles unpleasantly in his stomach but Anton only leans back slightly against his seat and gives an easy shrug instead. “Guess public humiliation’s good promo.”

David barks out a laugh immediately. “That’s what I’m talking about!”

He slaps Anton hard on the shoulder before disappearing back toward the house again, already answering another phone call halfway through the yard. Anton watches him go for a second before exhaling quietly through his nose.

Beside him, Sohee lowers himself onto the empty seat beside him with considerably less enthusiasm than the rest of the team surrounding them. He sets the box of EPs down between them and begins organizing copies into smaller piles while Anton recaps the marker in his hands. For a minute neither of them says anything.

The speakers continue playing songs from his EP somewhere behind them while people drift in and out of the house. “We should do something tonight. Celebrate your first EP release properly.” Sohee says eventually.

Anton pushes his sunglasses higher up the bridge of his nose before glancing sideways at him. “Sure. Let’s go clubbing.”

Sohee snorts immediately. “I was thinking more like kbbq and shots at home.”

Anton laughs quietly under his breath. “That sounds boring.”

“You say that now but by midnight you’ll be drunk out of your mind and nauseated.”

Anton reaches for another EP and flips it open lazily. “Please, I’ve got the tolerance of a man made of steel.”

Sohee shakes his head though there’s a faint smile tugging briefly at the corner of his mouth. It fades just as quickly though, his expression settling into something more hesitant afterward. “Are you okay?” he asks finally.

Anton looks over at him properly this time, confused enough that his brows pull together slightly above the rim of his sunglasses. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

Sohee hesitates. “You’re selling your stuff, Anton…I get it if this is…a lot.”

Anton stares at him for a second before scoffing quietly and looking away again. “When I’m depressed over her everyone tells me I need to move on.” He uncaps the marker again with more force than necessary. “Now I’m finally doing it and suddenly that’s a problem too?”

Sohee opens his mouth slightly before stopping himself because no, this doesn’t actually look like moving on. It looks like hiding.

It looks like Anton taking every ugly emotion he still carries around and drowning it beneath loud music and alcohol and productivity until he no longer has to sit alone with himself long enough to admit he’s still hurting. Sohee knows that. He’s known it for months now every time Anton stumbles home at four in the morning smelling like vodka. Still, selfishly, Sohee prefers this version of him anyway.

He prefers the Anton who laughs again. The one who jokes with producers and drags Sohee out drinking until sunrise and actually leaves the apartment instead of sitting silently in dark rooms replaying your memories like a punishment. Angry Anton might be reckless but at least he feels alive again. That version from a few months ago scared him more.

Sohee exhales quietly instead of pushing the argument further. “Sorry,” he mutters, nudging the box of EPs toward him slightly. “Forget I said anything.”

Anton doesn’t respond right away. He just lowers his head again and signs another album.

A few months after the EP release, Anton’s life settles into something strangely hollow. Not bad, necessarily just busy enough that he rarely has to sit still with himself long enough to notice how numb he’s become.

The success of his EP snowballs faster than anyone anticipated and suddenly Anton’s days are swallowed by recording sessions, interviews and endless meetings with people who speak about his heartbreak like it’s a lucky career breakthrough instead of the thing that cracked his life clean down the middle.

His anger fades eventually, eroded down into something more…paralyzing. That version of Anton who spent nearly a year furious at you for leaving becomes harder to maintain over time. Anger requires energy, it requires commitment. Eventually even resentment grows tired of itself. By the time summer bleeds into fall, Anton mostly just feels detached from everything around him.

The partying slows down around then too. One day Anton just realizes he’s exhausted by the performance of it all. Pretending requires too much energy these days. Anton still laughs though. Still works, still spends long nights producing music because it’s the only thing that consistently quiets his thoughts long enough for him to breathe properly. From the outside, he probably looks better now than he did during the anger phase of everything. Less volatile. The truth is he mostly just feels empty.

It’s close to midnight when Anton makes it home, exhaustion plaguing him after spending nearly ten straight hours at the studio working on tracks that probably won’t even make the album. He barely gets halfway through kicking his shoes off before his phone starts buzzing in his pocket. He pulls it out to look at the caller ID, Manon. A small smile pulls briefly at the corner of his mouth before he answers.

“Well hello, big shot.”

Anton snorts quietly, tossing his keys onto the kitchen counter before putting the phone on speaker. “Big shot? That’s a new one.”

He hears her hum in response. “Gotta keep you on your toes.”

Anton laughs softly under his breath as he grabs a water bottle from the fridge. He and Manon never really stopped talking after graduation. Maybe there were periods where life got busy or time zones made things difficult but somehow they always found their way back into conversation eventually.

Sometimes she calls him while rushing through airports on the way to another fashion event halfway across the world. Other times Anton calls her from studio couches at three in the morning while producers argue in the background over tracklists. Their friendship survives mostly because neither of them asks too many dangerous questions.

“How’s the celebrity life treating you?” Manon asks while Anton leans back against the kitchen counter.

Anton twists the cap off his water bottle slowly.  “It’s…overwehlming but good, I think.” He pauses briefly before letting out a quiet laugh. “Still weird hearing people recognize me in public.”

Manon hums quietly, not saying much in response. The conversation settles easily after that, slipping into a rhythm only old friendships really manage. Manon tells him about a brand sponsored after party and the celebrities she met while Anton absentmindedly peels at his water bottle label.

For a little while, things feel normal but then somewhere through the phone, a male voice drifts faintly into the background. “Hey, dinner’s here.”

Anton barely reacts at first. He assumes she has company over, Manon is constantly surrounded by people these days anyway. Still, something about hearing an unfamiliar man’s voice in her apartment…that she shares with you catches his attention just enough that he glances down at his phone briefly.

“Oh my Gosh, finally,” Manon says away from the speaker before returning. “Sorry, continue.”

Anton snorts quietly. “Meret Manon, do you have a boy in your room? Am I interrupting something?”

Manon lets out a loud incredulous laugh immediately. “Puh-lease. I like my men older and slightly mean, you know that.”

Anton smiles faintly to himself, twisting the cap of the water bottle between his fingers. “So you do have somebody over.”

“I have food over,” she corrects.

In the background, the same male voice speaks again, quieter this time. “Do you mind if I throw this in the wash?”

“Sure, I have some stuff in the dryer though,” Manon mutters away from the speaker.

Anton huffs out another quiet laugh. “Wowww, he’s even doing his own laundry load? What, is he sleeping over too?”

“Well not in my bed at least.”

Silence floods the line quickly. Anton stills against the kitchen counter while realization washes over him. On the other end of the phone, Manon seems to process what she just implied at exactly the same time he does because her breathing catches sharply. “Oh fuck,” she mutters.

Manon exhales quietly through the speaker, the sound heavy with regret. “Anton–”

“Is she seeing someone?” The question leaves him before he can stop it.

His voice sounds calmer than he feels. Anton stares blankly out at the reflection of himself in the dark apartment window while his grip tightens unconsciously around the water bottle in his hand.

On the other end of the line, Manon says nothing. That silence tells him everything before she even answers. Anton closes his eyes briefly because somehow this hurts more than he imagined it would. Not because you’re dating someone else per se. Logically, he understands this was always going to happen eventually. A year has passed since graduation, the two of you live on opposite sides of the world now. He knows life keeps moving whether people are emotionally prepared for it or not.

Still, some pathetic part of him secretly believed you’d stay suspended in the same grief he’s spent the last year trapped inside.

“Manon,” he says quietly after the silence stretches too long.

“You weren’t supposed to find out like this.”

The confirmation knocks the air out of his lungs. Anton lets out a slow breath through his nose before leaning further back against the kitchen counter, his eyes drifting shut again. For one humiliating second, his mind immediately betrays him with images he never asked for. You curled beside somebody else in bed. Another man existing comfortably inside spaces Anton once imagined himself growing old inside. Somebody else hearing your laugh at midnight. Somebody else learning all the little things Anton used to think belonged only to him.

Suddenly every fear he spent months outrunning comes clawing violently back to the surface all at once. Maybe loving somebody else is easier for you than loving Anton ever was. Maybe you don’t panic and pull away every time things become too real with this guy. Maybe you finally became the calmer, softer version of yourself Anton spent four years fighting for. Maybe the problem was never timing…maybe it was just him.

“What’s his name?” Anton hears himself ask eventually.

“Jake.”

Jake. The name feels painfully ordinary. Not some larger-than-life replacement worthy of stealing you away. Not someone impossible to compete against. Just some random man, it almost makes him nauseous.

“He’s nice,” Manon adds carefully after another long stretch of silence. “He treats her really well.”

The statement almost feels insulting in ways Manon clearly doesn’t intend. Anton treated you well too.

He loved you for years in every exhausting way a person possibly could. He waited for you, defended you, rearranged entire pieces of himself trying to become someone easier for you to choose. He sat there on that bare dorm mattress and offered you every vulnerable piece of him and you still left him anyway.

Anton laughs quietly under his breath, the sound hollow enough that Manon immediately goes silent again.

“Well,” he says eventually, voice flatter than intended. “Good for her.”

He means for the sentence to sound indifferent, instead it comes out exhausted.

Manon hears it too. Anton can tell by the way she goes quiet afterward, as if she’s suddenly become hyperaware of every word leaving her mouth. Guilt settles awkwardly between them after that. The conversation limps forward for another ten minutes anyway, both of them pretending things haven't shifted.

By the time they hang up, Anton feels even more numb. Somewhere in another country, you’re eating takeout with another man while Anton stands here trying not to imagine what your life looks like now that it no longer includes him.

The thought settles unpleasantly beneath his ribs because this is the first real proof he’s gotten that your world continued forward without him. The realization haunts him more than he expects it to.

After that, distancing himself from Manon happens slowly enough that Anton almost convinces himself it isn’t intentional at first. He takes longer replying to messages, misses calls occasionally because he’s “busy” at the studio. Sometimes he even types responses out only to leave them unsent because suddenly talking to her feels dangerous in ways it never used to. Manon becomes accidental collateral damage.

Every conversation now carries the possibility of hearing your name beside someone else’s. Jake said this. Jake liked that restaurant. Jake came over again. Anton realizes quickly that he genuinely cannot survive listening to you build a life with another person before he’s emotionally ready for it so he avoids the possibility entirely.

At first Manon tries to push through it anyway. She sends him random videos from work trips and stupid memes at three in the morning like nothing’s changed. Anton responds less and less each time. Eventually weeks start passing between conversations instead of days.

She stops calling as often after a while too.

One night Sohee casually asks why he and Manon never talk anymore and Anton immediately changes the subject so abruptly it leaves an uncomfortable silence hanging over the apartment afterward. Sohee doesn’t press but Anton catches him watching him strangely for the rest of the night anyway.

The truth is Anton misses her terribly. He misses it all. Not just you either but the version of his life attached to New York. The version where his phone buzzed constantly with messages from Manon and Sohee and you arguing about dinner plans or edits on your manuscripts or whose turn it was to buy snacks from the campus convenience store for movie nights.

Avoidance becomes easier than confronting that grief directly.

Months pass like that. Winter settles over Seoul by the time Anton fully realizes how isolated he’s allowed himself to become. His career continues climbing regardless. More songs, more interviews, more fans.

One night after coming home from another schedule he barely remembers participating in, Anton finds himself sitting alone at his desk while the apartment remains dark around him. His eyes drift absentmindedly toward the bottom drawer and before he can stop himself, he pulls it open.

Your handwriting greets him immediately: birthday cards, folded sticky notes, random scraps of paper covered in rushed penmanship he would recognize anywhere. Slowly, Anton picks one of the notes up between his fingers: don’t forget to eat before practice idiot ! ♡

Another one reads: you’re going to make something incredible one day. i know it.

There are years worth of these tucked inside the drawer. Encouragement written during finals weeks, tiny affirmations slipped into his backpack before meets, birthday cards filled with rambling emotional paragraphs only you would write.

Anton sold almost everything else, the hoodies, the records, the physical evidence of your relationship he convinced himself he no longer needed but somehow he kept the words.

The realization settles heavily over him because somewhere across the world you’ve moved on with your life while Anton still sits here in the middle of the night rereading proof that once upon a time, you loved him enough to remind him to eat before swim meets.

A hollow laugh slips quietly out of him before he can stop it. “Guess I’ll sell these when you win a Pulitzer, make a fortune off that too.” 

The joke lands weakly in the silence. Anton sighs before carefully placing every note back inside the drawer instead of throwing them away.

Year 2 postgrad; acceptance and relapse:

Eventually, with lots of time, touring and therapy Anton Lee has finally decided to leave you as a ghost in his past.

Not forgotten exactly, Anton doesn’t think he’ll ever fully forget you. You were too woven into the fabric of his life to pretend you became meaningless after enough time passed. Four years worth of memories don’t simply dissolve because a relationship failed before it ever had the chance to properly exist. Rather, he now knows there’s a difference between carrying someone with you and allowing them to consume you whole.

Healing happens rather mundanely for him, ghere’s no dramatic breakthrough moment where he wakes up one morning suddenly free of you, it’s less cinematic. One day he realizes he’s gone nearly an entire afternoon without thinking about you. Another day he hears somebody mention New York and his chest doesn’t tighten painfully on instinct anymore. Slowly, life stops revolving around your absence.

Therapy helps more than Anton initially expects it to. He hates it at first, hates sitting in a cold office while a stranger dissects emotions he spent years trying to outrun through music and alcohol and work. For the longest time he kept trying to frame the breakup like some tragic impossible love story ruined by bad timing and fear but eventually even Anton grew tired of romanticizing his own pain.

The truth was much uglier and simpler than that: you hurt him.

Not accidentally, not in some beautiful poetic way destined to inspire albums and interviews and think pieces online about heartbreak. You hurt him genuinely and deeply and for a long time Anton kept refusing to let himself acknowledge the full extent of it because loving you still felt tied to protecting you somehow.

Eventually though, he finally comes to terms with the fact that what happened between the two of you wasn’t fair. Yes, he became toxic during senior year, Anton can admit that now with enough time between himself and the version of him who spent months angry and reactive. There were moments near the end where he became manipulative in ways he isn’t proud of, where resentment started bleeding into every interaction between the both of you, until loving each other became exhausting but even then Anton still chose vulnerability.

That’s the part he keeps circling back to in therapy sessions and sleepless hotel nights staring at unfamiliar ceilings. At the very end of everything, when it would’ve been easier to shut down completely or laugh in your face, Anton still sat there on that bare dorm mattress and offered you every honest piece of himself. He asked you to stay. He told you he loved you then you left anyway.

For a long time Anton desperately needed there to be a reason large enough to justify that kind of heartbreak. Something catastrophic or impossible to overcome; distance, timing, fear. Anything. Ultimately though, he had to accept the possibility that maybe there never was some grand explanation waiting to be uncovered. Maybe you were simply two young people who loved each other deeply and still couldn’t make it work. Oddly enough, that realization frees him more than it destroys him.

By year two, Anton’s life finally starts resembling something stable again. His career explodes in ways he and Sohee nevr fully anticipated during those early studio sessions in Seoul. The success from Yard Sale snowballs into bigger opportunities, bigger crowds, bigger expectations. Before You Leave Me eventually gets released too after years of label hesitation and somehow that song climbs even faster than the others. People cling to it viciously online, turning lyrics Anton once wrote half-delirious at four in the morning into captions and comments beneath videos of their own heartbreak.

Sometimes it still unsettles him a little, the way strangers consume pieces of his grief like entertainment but he’s learned not to resent it anymore. If anything, Anton feels strangely grateful these days knowing something that once nearly destroyed him managed to become comfort for somebody else.

The strangest part is that success no longer feels tied entirely to pain anymore either. For the first time since graduation, Anton starts writing songs that aren’t solely about surviving you. Some are still about love, of course. He doesn’t think he’ll ever stop writing about love in some capacity but the desperation slowly fades from his work. His upcoming album becomes less about heartbreak and more about what comes after it. What remains once the grief settles enough for you to finally examine the shape it left behind.

Anton himself feels softer too. The partying and late nights have stopped completley. He just grows tired of waking up hungover in unfamiliar apartments beside people he doesn’t remember speaking to. These days he prefers quieter things. Studio nights with Sohee, solo walks through cities during tour stops, reading in hotel rooms while fans scream his name somewhere beneath balcony windows outside.

For the first time in years, Anton finally feels like a person again instead of an open wound. That doesn’t mean you disappear completely though. Sometimes, usually late at night after interviews or long rehearsals, Anton still catches himself wondering whether you’ve ever heard his music. He knows you avoid searching his name online. Manon let that slip months ago during one of their carefully navigated conversations before immediately changing the subject afterward.

Other times, Anton finds himself searching your name instead. Not obsessively the way he used to. Every few months he checks the New York Times best sellers list almost absentmindedly, eyes scanning for your name among authors and essayists and novelists. He never finds it but he keeps looking anyway because even after everything, Anton still believes you’ll get there eventually.

You always said you would.

Despite how badly the two of you failed each other romantically, despite the resentment and grief and silence that followed graduation, Anton never stops rooting for you. You were friends once and friends never stop rooting for their friends.

Somewhere along the way, he and Manon eventually find their way back to each other too. Neither of them ever properly addresses the distance that formed between them after Jake. They don’t really need to, both of them understand what happened without forcing each other to relive it aloud.

Manon becomes cautious with your name after that, Anton notices immediately. She stops casually bringing you up in conversation, sometimes he even catches her hesitating slightly before mentioning New York altogether. Eventually Anton tells her she doesn’t have to do that. “I’m okay, Manon…seriously” he says softly one night while she calls him from the backseat of some car in Switzerland.

He truly does mean it. Not in the sense that seeing you again wouldn’t still affect him, Anton isn’t naive enough to believe six years worth of love and grief could evaporate completely but you no longer feel like something actively destroying him either.

Which is probably why Anton agrees to the New York interview in the first place. His publicist pitches it casually during a meeting about the rollout for his first studio album. A weekend some change in the city, a few interviews, some promotional shoots and a live acoustic performance tied to the release. Should be wasy enough.

Part of him always knew returning would feel strange but another part genuinely believed he’d have more time before confronting it.

“You don’t have to decide now. We can always move the press run somewhere else.” David tells him, glancing up from his tablet.

Anton stays quiet for a second longer than necessary before exhaling softly through his nose and nods once. “No, it’s fine. I’ll do it.”

Truthfully, Anton thinks maybe it’ll be good for him. Therapy has taught him enough to recognize avoidance when he sees it and whether he likes admitting it or not, New York has remained the final untouched piece of his grief. Maybe going back is the last step.

Once it’s agreed upon, his team starts making the necessary phone calls and arraignments. Flights are booked and hotels are confirmed. Unfortunately for him however, he has to go alone. Sohee is somewhere in Australia finishing the international leg of his own tour following the release of his sophomore album. It had dropped a few months prior and unexpectedly performed even better than Anton’s first EP.

The flight to New York is oddly reflective. Somewhere over the Atlantic while most of the cabin sleeps around him, Anton sits awake with noise-cancelling headphones hanging loosely around his neck, staring absently out the window at nothing but dark sky.

Two years ago, the idea of returning to New York felt impossible. Back then he genuinely believed the city itself had become uninhabitable for him. Therapy gradually forced him to confront how much power he’d handed grief over his life after graduation.

Now though, sitting thirty thousand feet above the ocean with his first album on the verge of release and a life that finally feels stable beneath him, Anton mostly just feels thoughtful.

There’s nervousness, of course. He doesn’t think anyone could return to the place they experienced their first real heartbreak completely unaffected but it no longer feels like fear. That distinction matters more to him than he expects. Fear would imply the city still owns some part of him. It does not.

By the time the plane finally lands the following evening, exhaustion clings heavily to him but the moment Manhattan begins materializing outside the tinted car windows on the drive from JFK, his spirit lifts a bit.

His manager talks occasionally from the passenger seat about tomorrow’s schedule but Anton barely absorbs any of it. Every few blocks, another memory rises instinctively before fading again just as quickly. A ramen spot he and Sohee used to frequent after music theory. A convenience store where Manon once forced Anton to buy her food at 2AM because she had run out of dining dollars and he was the “rich” one of the friendgroup. The downtown bar where the two of you spent the entirety of sophomore-year pretending not to flirt while Manon watched in open disbelief from across the table.

It’s strange how memory works. Anton spent years convinced returning here would feel catastrophic only to realize grief can coexist with nostalgia.

When he and his team finally arrive at the hotel, restlessness settles into him almost immediately. They breeze through check-in and while Anton is examining his maps app trying to figure out what food places are nearby, he realizes alarmingly how close by they are to NYU.

He tries his best to ignore it. He showers, unpacks, flips mindlessly through television channels while messages from management continue flooding his phone regarding tomorrow’s interviews but none of it helps. Anton realizes quickly he cannot return after all this time only to lock himself inside some luxury suite pretending he doesn’t care.

Around 8PM against everyone’s better judgment, Anton grabs his leather jacket from the chair near the bed and heads downstairs. His bodyguard looks deeply unimpressed the second Anton appears in the lobby pulling his watch onto his wrist. “Absolutely not.”

Anton snorts softly while fastening the Lange & Söhne Odysseus into place. “I’m just gonna walk around Manhattan, no biggie.”

“It’s eight at night.”

“It’s New York. That’s basically morning here.” He counters.

His manager pinches the bridge of his nose immediately. “Anton–”

“I’ll text.” Anton interrupts before either of them can fully start. “Promise.”

Neither looks convinced but reluctantly let him go mostly because Anton has become annoyingly good at slipping away whenever he wants space badly enough.

When he finally makes it outside, he just stands there beneath the hotel awning watching the city move around him. He takes in the place he once called home with a faint smile gracing his lips before setting off.

He walks without much direction at first, hands shoved deep into his jacket pockets while familiar streets slowly unfold around him piece by piece. Some storefronts changed entirely over the years while others remain painfully identical.

A tiny pizza place downtown reminds him of drunkenly splitting slices with you on the curb at one in the morning after a party neither of you actually wanted to attend. Everywhere he turns, another version of himself surfaces briefly then disappears again.

In time, sadness settles over him. He recalls what his therapist told him during one particularly difficult session after he admitted feeling guilty whenever he missed you.

“You’re allowed to mourn things that were real to you. Healing doesn’t require pretending you never loved them.” She had said gently.

He takes a deep breath and lets himself feel the entirety of his emotions. He lets himself miss the version of his life that existed here before everything unraveled. The friendships, the tiny apartment parties, the stupid late-night walks back from campus. The years where loving you still felt hopeful instead of exhausting.

By the time 10PM rolls around, Anton feels consumed by his emotions. He walks aimlessly until he finds himself standing in front of phebes. He smiles faintly at the neon sign, another relic from his past.

Suddenly, a drink sounds lovely. Whether in memory of you or simply to drown you out, he’s not sure. After another moment passes, he pushes the door open.

present day; forgiveness

“Howdy, stranger.”

For a second, you just stare at him.

Anton is physically here, seated beside you at a sticky downtown bar like the last two years never happened. “A-Anton?” you manage finally, your voice embarrassingly thinner than intended.

His mouth curves slightly at the way you call out to him. “The one and only,” he says, the response corny enough that under different circumstances you probably would’ve rolled your eyes. Instead your stomach drops so violently you almost feel nauseous.

Two years. Two years of forcing his memory into smaller and smaller corners of your mind, convincing yourself that choosing a life without him had been the right thing to do and somehow seeing him for the first time in years feels worse than every version you refused to imagine because Anton isn’t standing in front of you angry or devastated the way some selfish part of you always pictured him.

He looks…fine.

You suddenly become horribly aware of yourself. The empty shot glasses beside your elbow. Your still-damp cheeks. The fact that less than an hour ago you were crying hard enough to choke over a letter he wrote at eighteen.

Humiliation crawls hot beneath your skin.

Even worse, he notices it. Anton’s gaze flickers briefly toward the cluster of empty shot glasses near your hand before returning to your face again. Not judgmental exactly, which somehow makes it even more unbearable. Back in college, Anton had always possessed this irritating ability to look through you and know exactly what you’re saying without having to open your mouth.

You suddenly wonder how much he can still read now. The thought makes you straighten instinctively against the barstool, fingers curling tighter around the edge of the counter as if better posture might somehow disguise the fact that your entire life imploded less than two hours ago.

You steal a glance at him and slowly realize with a strange wave of panic that you can’t read him anymore. It’s an almost sobering thought.

“You look surprised,” Anton says after the silence stretches a little too long.

You let out a small disbelieving laugh. “You think?”

His smile pulls slightly wider at that. “Fair.”

The bartender appears again, glancing between the both of you before nodding toward Anton. “What can I get you?”

Anton’s eyes flick briefly toward your drinks again before he answers. “Whatever she’s having.”

Heat immediately floods your face but you say nothing. The bartender slides two fresh shots onto the counter between you both before disappearing again and suddenly you become hyperaware of how close Anton is sitting beside you. Close enough that you can smell his cologne faintly, you realize it hasn’t changed.

“How’ve you been?” Anton asks quietly.

The question should be simple but hearing it from him feels impossible to answer. You open your mouth once before shutting it again because what are you supposed to say? Bad? I blew up my relationship an hour ago because I accidentally admitted I never stopped loving you? I cried over a letter you wrote me at eighteen then somehow manifested you into existence?

Instead, you force out the first lie that comes to mind. “Good.” You clear your throat slightly. “Busy.”

Anton nods once like he knows you’re lying but has decided not to embarrass you by pointing it out. His restraint unsettles you almost as much as seeing him here in the first place. Your old Anton would’ve pushed immediately. You can practically hear it in your head: What happened? Talk to me.

The silence that follows is heavily awkward and unfamiliar. You used to know how to exist around Anton so naturally that conversations never required effort. Now you can practically feel yourself thinking before every sentence. You clear your throat softly, fingers tightening around the edge of the bartop. “So…what are you doing in New York?”

Anton leans back slightly against the stool beside you. “Press stuff mostly. My publicist booked interviews for the album rollout. I’ve got a whole press week thing happening.” He says casually.

Publicist? The word catches you embarrassingly off guard. For some reason, despite everything Manon mentioned earlier, some part of you still imagined Anton’s music career as smaller than this. Booked and busy, she’d said earlier tonight with a shrug like Anton was just picking up a few gigs instead of apparently having entire press schedules arranged for him in New York.

Another reminder of how you don’t know the man sat beside you. You genuinely know more about random coworkers from your publishing house than you do about the person you once thought you might spend the rest of your life with.

“Right…your album.” You murmur.

His gaze flickers toward you briefly at the tone in your voice but he doesn’t comment on it. “Manon played me one of your songs tonight actually,” you admit before you can overthink it.

Anton’s expression shifts almost imperceptibly then. “Yeah?” he asks quietly.

You nod once expecting him to ask which song, ask what you thought about it but he doesn’t. For some reason, that hurts too.

Instead he glances down briefly at the shot glass sitting untouched between his fingers before saying, “That tracks, Manon’s been a pretty big supporter of my music.”

The statement is casual yet guilt still curls hot and ugly beneath your ribs because that used to be you. You used to be the person shoving headphones over your ears while Anton played you his unfinished demos at three in the morning. The person sitting cross-legged on his dorm floor listening to half-written lyrics while he rambled about melodies and production. You used to be the first person he looked for whenever he created something new. Now apparently that role belongs to Manon.

The realization leaves you feeling strangely displaced from your own life. Worse still, it forces you to confront how disconnected you’ve willingly made yourself these past two years. Anton and Manon stayed close enough for her to know his music intimately while you’ve spent all this time deliberately pretending that entire side of him didn’t exist at all.

“Oh…that’s good.” You say softly before looking down at your hands.

Anton studies you quietly for a second after that, fingers turning the shot glass slowly against the bartop. It hits you yet again yhat you can’t tell what he’s thinking.

“How long are you staying?” you ask finally, mostly because you can’t tolerate the quiet stretching any further.

“A week,” Anton answers.

You nod. A week, a lot can change in a week your subconscious tells you. You open your mouth to ask what he’s up to but he beats you to it.

“I’ve got a pretty packed schedule though. Interviews, performances, meetings. A bunch of stuff.”

You nod again even as disappointment settles quietly inside your chest. Of course he’s busy. Of course he has a life now that exists completely outside of you. Anton finally reaches for the shot glass then, lifting it between his fingers and for one panicked second you realize if you don’t say something now, this interaction is going to end. He’ll finish his drink, leave this bar and disappear back into the version of his life you no longer belong to.

“Could I maybe see you again before you leave?” The question comes out rushed and you immediately regret it. You sound desperate.

Anton visibly chokes slightly on the shot halfway through swallowing it, coughing once into his fist before setting the glass back down harder than intended.

Your eyes widen instantly. “Oh my Gosh! Sorry,” you rush out, mortified.

Anton shakes his head quickly, still clearing his throat slightly. “No, it’s fine.”

You immediately reach for your glass and throw back the shot, needing something to quiet your growing embarrassment. Finally, he says carefully, “My manager is pretty strict about staying on schedule.”

You swallow. “Oh.”

Anton watches you quietly for a second longer before exhaling softly through his nose. “I’ll…let you know if anything opens up.”

You nod immediately even though embarrassment is already crawling violently up your spine. “Right. Yeah, of course.”

You can’t meet his eyes anymore. You focus intensely on your second shot glass before grabbing it and throwing the tequila back in one smooth motion. The burn barely registers this time. You actually asked him to see you again and he practically turned you down. You can’t be upset with him because it wasn’t like he was rude either. He isn’t cold with the way he answers, punishing you or even trying to make you feel small. If anything, his tone is painfully considerate.

Anton taps twice against the bartop with the tips of his fingers before glancing toward the bartender. “Can I close out?”

The bartender nods immediately, reaching for the little receipt book. Anton gestures briefly toward you as well. “Can you close hers too?”

Your head snaps toward him instantly. “Oh! You don’t have to do that.”

Anton barely even looks up while reaching into his wallet. “It’s fine.”

“No seriously, I can–”

“Just let me pay the tab.”

You go quiet after that. The bartender returns with the receipt machine a second later and Anton hands over a black card effortlessly before signing the slip. You watch the movement of his hand stupidly, your thoughts drifting somewhere dangerous again because you remember those fingers ink-stained from songwriting and tangled in your bedsheets and brushing hair behind your ear during quiet nights in the library.

Now they’re signing bar receipts for you like you’re strangers reconnecting politely after college. Once everything’s settled, Anton slides off the stool beside you and reaches for the leather jacket hanging loosely across his seat. The movement feels oddly final. He shrugs the jacket on before looking back at you again. “Don’t drink yourself sick, alright?”

You nod obediently and open your mouth to extend the conversation, to say anything to get him to stay even if it's just for a second longer. “Anton–”

He pauses and looks at you patiently. For one hopeful second, you think maybe he’ll stay. Maybe this is the part where everything spills out messily between you both and everything gets fixed. To your dismay, Anton cuts you off gently before you can say whatever disastrous thing had started climbing up your throat.

“Be safe getting home, okay?”

It shuts you up instantly because never in the four years you knew Anton Lee had he ever been the one to leave first. He used to linger in doorways just to keep talking to you another minute longer. Used to walk you home even when it inconvenienced him. Used to stand outside your dorm after arguments waiting for you to come back because the idea of ending the night at odds with you physically bothered him.

You were always the one doing the leaving. That is…until now. You watch him turn toward the exit a second later and disappear out into the New York night without looking back once.

You don’t stay much longer after that. The bartender gives you a sympathetic look while clearing the empty glasses scattered around your section of the bar and the pity of it alone is enough to make you want to crawl out of your own skin. You grab your phone quickly, shove it back into your bag and leave before you can humiliate yourself any further.

The subway ride home passes in a blur. You barely register the people packed into the train around you or the screeching sound of metal against tracks. Your mind loops relentlessly instead, replaying every second of the interaction over and over until you feel nauseous from it.

Anton looked good…he looked healed. Anton left.

You unlock the front door mechanically when you make it home and step inside only to immediately find Manon’s suitcases sitting packed neatly beside the entryway ready for her early morning flight to Miami.

The sight of them makes something twist strangely in your chest too. Everything feels like it’s moving forward without you lately. You stand there for a second too long staring at the luggage before quietly heading toward your room almost entirely on autopilot. You barely bother changing clothes before collapsing onto your bed emotionally spent and half-drunk.

To your misfortune, sleep never comes.

Rather, you spend the entire night staring blankly up at the ceiling replaying the image of Anton walking away from you over and over again until the memory starts feeling almost cruel in its repetition.

It’s around 8AM when you start to hear shuffling outside your door.

At some point after three in the morning you gave up pretending sleep was coming and opened your laptop instead, convincing yourself maybe if you wrote something you could outrun the constant replay of Anton walking away from you.

Unsurprisingly, it doesn’t work. The blinking cursor mocks you from the center of the screen while your unfinished manuscript sits open beneath it. Six years ago, you genuinely believed this book would become your entire future. During undergrad, the story lived inside you so vividly it practically begged to be written…now every sentence feels strained and unnatural almost as if you’re trying to speak a language you’ve slowly forgotten over time.

You stare blankly at the same paragraph for nearly twenty minutes before eventually backspacing the entire thing with a frustrated exhale and harsh clacking of your keys.

You close your eyes in acceptance when a knock comes on your bedroom door. You glance up just as Manon leans lightly against the frame already dressed for her flight, her airport outfit somehow still looking expensive and effortless despite the fact that it’s nine in the morning. Sunglasses rest on top of her head while her carry-on suitcase waits behind her in the hallway.

Her gaze flickers immediately toward your laptop screen. “Well look at you.” She says slowly, brows lifting slightly.

Instinctively, your eyes drop back toward the manuscript still open on the screen. Embarrassment twists in your chest because you suddenly become hyperaware of how pathetic this probably looks. You haven’t meaningfully touched this novel in months and now suddenly after one emotionally taxing night you’re sitting at your desk pretending you’re going to become a writer again.

“It’s not really going well,” you admit quietly.

Manon hums softly before stepping further into the room. “Still, it’s open.”

You let out a weak breath at that and glance back toward the blinking cursor. “I couldn’t sleep.”

“Figured when I heard you pacing around the apartment at four in the morning.”

Heat crawls into your face. You reach over and close the laptop gently, unable to look at the unfinished draft any longer. Manon watches you carefully for a second. “Any progress?”

You shake your head almost immediately. “Nothing’s coming out right.” Something softens briefly in her expression then. “It will.” The certainty in her voice almost hurts.

“Anyway…I came to say bye before I head to the airport.

Usually you’d tease her about abandoning you for the grandeur of her job but exhaustion has scraped you too raw for humor this morning “Right. Miami.” You say before standing from the desk chair.

Manon nods once. “With the hoochie daddies.”

Despite everything, a small smile pulls at your mouth. You walk her toward the doorway quietly before stopping there awkwardly, suddenly overwhelmed. Manon notices immediately. “What?”

You hesitate long enough that she straightens slightly then finally say, “I’m sorry.”

Confusion flickers across her face. “For what?"

You look down at your hands because suddenly maintaining eye contact feels impossible. “For…all of it, I guess. For putting you in the middle of everything with me and Anton all these years. For making you walk on eggshells around both of us.” You exhale shakily through your nose. “And Jake too.”

You clear your throat and continue. “None of it was your responsibility but somehow I kept making it yours anyway.”

You slowly look up to meet her eyes and find her looking at you with pity and understanding. “I appreciate you saying that.”

Relief and shame twist together painfully inside your chest. You hadn’t fully realized until yesterday just how much emotional weight you’d placed onto everyone around you these past two years. Manon spent so long carefully filtering conversations and balancing loyalties between two people she loved because you couldn’t bring yourself to confront your own feelings directly.

Manon takes a deep breath before gripping the handle of her carry on tighter. “I think there are some other people who could use an apology too.”

Your lips press together immediately because you already know who she means. For the last twelve hours your mind has revolved so violently around Anton that you almost allowed yourself to forget there’s another person bleeding from the aftermath of your choices too.

“Yeah…I know.” You admit after a moment.

Manon gives you a smile before bringing you in for a hug. “Good. I love you.”

You wrap your arms around her instinctively, eyes squeezing shut. Through every terrible decision and every selfish avoidance tactic you’ve made these past two years, Manon still stayed.

“I love you too.”

She squeezes you one more time before finally pulling away. You stand there watching while she slips her shoes on and adjusts her sunglasses back over her eyes. A second later the apartment door clicks shut behind her.

For a while, you just stand there motionless in the middle of the hallway. You retreat back to your bedroom on unsteady legs and sit down at the edge of your bed. You blindly reach for yout phone that’s sat underneath your pillow. Your thumb hovers uncertainly over Jake’s contact for nearly a full minute.

Part of you still wants to avoid this. To delay it another day, another week. To keep pretending maybe if you ignore everything long enough the consequences will somehow soften. That’s always been your problem though, avoidance. You’ve always loved romance in theory more than practice.

You knew how to exist inside almosts and maybes and how to romanticize stolen glances and unresolved tension. What you didn’t know how to survive was reality.

Reality meant Anton sitting on that bare mattress senior year asking you to choose him outright. Reality meant his voice shaking while he admitted he loved you and realizing suddenly that your answer possessed the power to devastate another human being permanently.

Reality meant understanding that if you let yourself fully love him back, if you allowed the relationship to become tangible and public and real, then one day he could leave too or worse, he could stay long enough to realize you weren’t worth all the devotion. Back then you convinced yourself you were protecting both of you somehow. In reality, you were mostly protecting yourself.

As long as things remained undefined, you never had to fully risk rejection. You never had to hand somebody the ability to break your heart. You got to exist inside his devotion without surrendering your comfort.

Anton saw you too clearly, he loved you too directly. There was nothing curated or fictional about the way he cared for you.

Your throat tightens painfully as another realization settles over you slowly. Jake was easier because he represented the kind of adulthood you thought you were supposed to want while Anton represented the terrifying possibility of actually being seen completely.

In trying to avoid hurting yourself, you ended up hurting both of them instead. The thought fills you with deep regret. You take a deep breath and unlock your phone again.

8:48 am | you: can we talk?

The typing bubble appears almost immediately.

8:48 am | jake: yeah.  8:49 am | jake: my place in an hour?

The conversation ends there because what else could possibly be discussed over text after last night? There are no words capable of softening what you admitted outside your apartment building. You force yourself off your bed and make work of getting ready for the day. You shower mechanically then brush your teeth, pull on jeans and a sweater without really registering any of it.

When you’re finished you grab your bag from the hallway and catch a glimpse of yourself in the mirror hung above the shoe rack. You look awful.

For a second you consider fixing your makeup properly before realizing how absurd that thought is. You’re not going to see Jake to salvage anything, you’re going to end it.

The reminder makes your heart clench in sadness and guilt. You steel your shoulders and exit your building to get this over with. Your subway ride downtown passes mostly in silence. You sit near the back corner of the train clutching your phone tightly while you go over what you could possibly say in your head.

By the time you finally reach his building, your heart is beating so violently you feel slightly nauseous again. You stand outside the entrance for a second longer than necessary staring blankly at the familiar glass doors. The elevator ride up feels suffocatingly quiet. When you finally reach his apartment door, your palms are damp with anxiety.

You knock twice and wait a few seconds before the door swings open. Jake stands there already dressed for the day in a dark sweater and slacks. You note the bags underneath his eyes and the slight puffiness, you notice he also didn’t sleep last night either. Neither of you speak, you just take each other in before Jake steps aside from the doorway silently. You take a deep breath as you walk in.

The apartment feels colder than usual.

The heat is still running through the vents and the same instrumental playlist Jake always keeps on during the mornings plays from a speaker near the kitchen but something about the space feels unfamiliar now. Maybe because for the first time since you met him, there’s no warmth left between the two of you.

Jake closes the front door behind you then walks further into the apartment without saying anything. You stand awkwardly near the entryway for a second before following after him. Usually when you came over, Jake would kiss your forehead immediately or ask if you wanted anything to drink before you even sat down. Sometimes he’d tug you toward the couch before you could fully take your shoes off because he claimed you never greeted him properly after long days apart.

Today he just gestures faintly toward the living room. You sit carefully at the edge of the couch while Jake remains standing for a moment longer, dragging a hand slowly over his face before finally lowering himself into the armchair across from you. 

It stays silent for a long while. Your hands twist restlessly together in your lap while Jake watches you with an expression you can’t fully read anymore. You realize suddenly that you don’t actually know how to begin this conversation. There’s no graceful opening for something like this; there is nothing capable of making the damage smaller.

“I’m sorry,” you say finally, Jake just stares at you.

His reaction immediately makes your stomach twist because you suddenly hear how insufficient it sounds out loud. Almost two years together reduced down to I’m sorry. “That’s it?” he asks.

Heat crawls violently into your face. “Jake–” “No seriously,” he cuts in, leaning back against the chair slightly like he physically needs distance from you right now. “That’s all you have to say to me?”

You open your mouth then close it again because you genuinely don’t know what else you can say. Jake laughs softly under his breath but it’s clear there’s no humor in the sound. “We were together for almost two years. Every day you told me you loved me…was that all bullshit?”

“No. No, Jake, it wasn’t like that.” You defend automatically.

“Then what was it like? Because from where I’m sitting, it kinda feels like I spent two years dating somebody who was in love with someone else the entire time.”

“I did love you,” you insist weakly. “I tried, I really did.”

Jake’s jaw tightens faintly at that. “Did you?”

You look at him hurt and offended, you open your mouth to respond but he cuts you off before you even get the chance. “Did you actually try? You still keep another guy’s things hidden away in a box you won’t let anybody touch, You refused to move in with me every single time I brought it up and let’s not forget how fucking horrified you looked when my mum mentioned marriage.”

Your breath catches because you honestly didn’t realize he noticed that. You look away instinctively because suddenly maintaining eye contact feels unbearable. Every ugly truth you’ve spent years carefully avoiding now sits exposed between the two of you anyway.

Jake exhales sharply through his nose before leaning back against the chair again. “If nobody else in your life is willing to tell you this, I will. You’re selfish.”

You flinch almost imperceptibly.

“Being in this relationship with me while you were still in love with somebody else was selfish.” Jake continues. “Dragging me along while you figured your shit out was selfish.”

Tears slip quietly down your cheeks now but you don’t interrupt him because deep down you know he’s right.

Leaving Anton behind had been selfish, trying to force yourself into a relationship with Jake because it felt safer had been selfish too. Even the way you handled the aftermath afterward: shutting people out, forcing Manon to tiptoe between you and Anton, letting Sohee disappear from your life because facing him meant confronting your own guilt…all of it had revolved around protecting yourself from discomfort first.

Not once did you stop long enough to fully consider how your actions hurt others, the implications of your choices and the hurt it left in its wake. Jake watches your tears fall silently and something in his expression softens into pity.

“I really loved you…I need you to know that.”

Your chest caves inward painfully. “I know.” Your voice cracks around the words.

He shakes his head slowly while looking at you.  “I hope all of this was worth it.”

You sniffle and wipe away your tears that can’t seem to stop. Jake drags a tired hand down his face before finally looking back toward you again. “You should go.”

You look up at him hesitantly, you don’t want it to end like this. “ Jake–”

“We’re done.” He says softly but firmly. “Please just…go.”

You stare at him for another second longer before finally nodding. Slowly, you stand from the couch and reach for your bag again. Jake doesn’t look at you while you walk toward the door. Your hand wraps around the handle before you stop suddenly. You turn slightly toward him, your voice quieter now. “I really am sorry.”

Jake finally looks up again.

“You were amazing to me and I hope someday you find somebody better than me. Somebody who can love you the way you deserve.” You pull the door open and leave before either of you can say anything else capable of hurting more.

The subway ride back home feels longer than the ride you took to his penthouse somehow. Your chest still aches from the look on Jake’s face when you left. You squeeze your eyes shut briefly and lean your head back against the train wall.

Selfish.

The word continues echoing around your head. You hate how quickly your instincts still try to defend yourself against it. You make it back home a little after twelve. You kick off your shoes and head straight to your bedroom before collapsing face-first onto the mattress without bothering to change clothes first.

You scream into your pillow out of pure frustration and sadness. It does little to ease your emotions. You huff before rolling over to face the ceiling, Mid roll, your eyes catch your laptop. Before you can stop yourself, you sit up and grab the laptop quickly and pull it into your lap before flipping it open. Your fingers hesitate for a second before they go flying across the keys: Anton Lee.

You let out a small gasp at all the results that populate. Interviews, magazine covers, performances, endless fan edits plastered across your screen. Photos of Anton leaving airports in oversized hoodies while flashes from paparazzi cameras illuminate his face, videos with millions of views. Articles dissecting lyrics you once heard half-finished at two in the morning from the edge of his dorm bed while he strummed absentmindedly against his guitar.

You stare blankly at the screen while your chest tightens painfully. The realization leaves you strangely hollow. You spent two years freezing Anton in place inside your mind meanwhile he kept growing beyond it…beyond you.

Now, millions of strangers know his voice more intimately than you do.

Your fingers move automatically after that, clicking through clips and interviews trying to reconstruct the last two years of his life from fragments. It’s bittersweet, seeing how he’s grown while you’ve stayed stagnant.

After hours of watching his interviews and reading articles, you find the courage to listen to his music. The first song you brave is titled Yard Sale.

At first you just sit there listening numbly, your fingers curling tighter around the edge of the laptop. Every lyric drips with resentment and grief…he hates you.

By the time the song ends, tears are already slipping silently down your face again. Your eyes drift downward toward the comment section beneath the video.

this man went THROUGH it 😭 the fact that he literally sold his ex’s stuff for promo is insane an actual yard sale was genius marketing idc i still can’t believe the actual artifacts from their relationship were there

Confusion flickers through you immediately. Your brows pull together slightly before your fingers begin moving again almost on instinct, clicking through linked videos and reposted clips until eventually you find it.

At first your brain almost refuses to process what you’re looking at. Anton sits outside some house in Seoul wearing sunglasses and dark clothes while fans swarm folding tables littered with objects from your relationship like they’re browsing a flea market: your books, his dorm decorations, hoodies you used to steal constantly during college.

You let out a disbelieving breath, those things meant something to you. They weren’t props or clever marketing concepts, they were pieces of your life. Pieces of him…pieces of the two of you.

Yet he sold them. All you can think is: I meant so little to him he could give us away to strangers.

You stare at the screen for another few agonizing seconds before abruptly snapping the laptop shut in hurt and undeservingly, anger. You shove the laptop away from yourself almost instinctively before curling tightly onto your side beneath the blankets.

You don’t leave your bed for the rest of the day.

Anton’s text comes four days later.

Long enough that you had stopped checking your phone every five minutes like a loser. Long enough that after your midnight deep dive through articles and interviews and fan edits and the Godforsaken Yard Sale clips, you had finally managed to tell yourself the truth as you understood it, Anton did not want you back in his life.

The bar had not been softness, it had been mercy. You’d mistaken his kindness for openness because that was easier than admitting the alternative: Anton Lee hates you.

You watched strangers pick through the remains of your history like it was clever promo instead of proof you once loved him. You watched as pieces of a relationship you never even had the courage to name properly was laid out on folding tables for people to carry home in shopping bags. The copy of 1984 hit hardest. Not because it was rare or expensive or even the most sentimental thing there but because it was your mind flattened into paper. Your thoughts lived in the margins, your underlines, your outrage, your rambling annotations about the world and what it was becoming.

You gave it to Anton because you thought he’d understand why it mattered. Back then, he was one of the only people you knew who would stay up with you talking about the meaning of life and whether people were doomed to repeat the same mistakes forever. You thought he would want to see the way you saw things. You thought he would treasure it because it would mean treasuring you.

Then there it was in a stranger’s hands, reduced to a clip online and a comment section full of people calling the whole thing iconic. You told yourself that if Anton had been willing to give away your copy of 1984, then whatever tenderness once existed between the two of you had burned out completely and been replaced with a deep hatred.

You stare at the message anyway.

4:13 pm | anton: got time to meet?

For a second, you genuinely wonder if you’re misreading it. Your eyes move over the sentence twice, then a third time, then a fourth as if the words might rearrange themselves but they don’t. Anton asked. After four days of silence, after gently shutting you down at the bar, he reached out.

4:16 pm | you: yeah

The typing bubble appears immediately.

4:16 pm | anton: i’m at dale’s

Somehow that feels worse than if he’d picked a random coffee shop downtown. Dale’s is not neutral ground. It seems the universe apparently still isn’t done humiliating you.

4:17 pm | you: i can be there in ten

It takes you closer to fifteen.

The entire subway ride there feels like one long self-inflicted bout of nausea. You sit rigidly in your seat, phone clutched too tightly in one hand. Somewhere between stops, you catch sight of your own expression and look away almost immediately. There’s something deeply undignified about still being this affected by him. More undignified still is the fact that despite everything, despite Jake, despite the yard sale, despite the songs, despite the bar, some shameless part of you is still relieved he texted at all.

By the time you push open the door to Dale’s, your pulse is pounding hard enough to feel audible.

Nothing about the place has changed, the bell above the entrance still gives that same annoying jingle. The shelves still feel slightly too narrow for how much stock they try to fit into the store. It even smells the same; old paper and coffee. The familiarity hits fast and unpleasantly, another reminder of how much of your life still lives in this part of the city no matter how hard you’ve tried pretending otherwise.

You find him exactly where you knew you would: the back corner near the beanbags. The spot by the window where the two of you used to sit shoulder to shoulder with cheap wired headphones split between you, Anton reading whatever music biography or pretentious think-piece he’d picked up while you pretended not to be annoyed by the way he kept pausing your playlist to tell you random facts. The same corner where you’d spend hours reading to the point where the owner had to remind you the store was closing.

Anton is already seated when you get there, half-sunken into one of the beanbags with a copy of 1984 open in his hands.

He looks up at the sound of your footsteps. Something shifts across his face when he sees you, it’s gone before you can name it. His mouth curves a little, softening into a smile that only seems to make the awkwardness worse.

“Hey.”

You stop a few feet away, suddenly unsure what your hands are supposed to do, if you’re supposed to smile, whether you’re meant to sit down immediately or stand there like an idiot. “Hi.” You reply timidly.

Anton closes the book over one finger to keep his place and gestures vaguely toward the empty beanbag across from him. You lower yourself into it, acutely aware of how ridiculous this probably looks from the outside. 

For a second neither of you says anything. Anton finally sets the book aside on the floor beside him. “I’ve been doing a lot of press, sorry it took me a while to get back to you.” He says.

You shake your head too quickly. “No, it’s fine.”

Understatement of the year. The letter has been needling at you for days now, taking over every corner of your mind. You’ve spent four days replaying sentences he wrote at eighteen, four days trying not to think too hard about the fact that the boy who wrote I would’ve chosen you is now a man you can barely read across a bookstore.

Maybe that’s why the words leave you before you can stop them. “I got your letter.”

The sentence lands clumsily between you. Anton blinks once. “Umm…what letter?”

For a second, all you can do is stare at him. Eventually you say, “The English 102 project...the letters to the future?”

You see the recognition light up his face before he lets out a small breath through his nose, a laugh following that. “Wow, I forgot about that.”

The casualness of it stings more than it should. “You forgot?”

Anton shrugs one shoulder, his hand lifting to rub at the back of his neck. “I wrote that when I was eighteen.”

The words hang there between you, simple and factual and somehow still capable of breaking you. Four days. You’ve spent four days carrying that letter around, rereading lines he apparently hasn’t thought about in years. You don’t know why that hurts exactly.

“Right,” you say quietly.

Anton studies you for half a second too long before clearing his throat and shifting the conversation elsewhere. “I’ve got a live taping later tonight, press stuff. I wanted to at least see you before that since I don’t have much time left here.”

You nod slowly, trying not to linger too hard on that. See you before that. Like this is a stop on his schedule, as though you can be folded neatly between interviews and whatever version of his life exists now that has nothing to do with you.

“What are you performing?” you ask.

Anton leans back slightly in the beanbag. “My latest song Before You Leave Me and a cover of This City.”

You hum and look down at your hands. “I’ve been listening to some of your stuff.”

That seems to catch his attention more than the letter did. “Oh yeah?”

You nod. “Yeah.” You could stop there, you probably should but for whatever reason you don’t. “I came across Yard Sale. I saw the promotion.” You say instead.

Anton’s mouth flattens. He doesn’t look surprised or even shocked, moreso…resigned? You keep going anyway because now that it’s out there you can’t seem to stop yourself. “I just…” You swallow hard. “Did I really mean that little?”

Across from you, Anton scoffs softly under his breath before turning his gaze fully toward you. “You think that’s why I did it?”

You hate how quickly your face heats. “What else was I supposed to think? You sold everything.”

Anton lets out a slow breath through his nose, one hand dragging over his jaw before dropping back into his lap. “I sold it because I couldn’t keep looking at it.”

He looks down at the floor for a second before saying flatly, his voice devoid of any warmth. “You left but your stuff was still everywhere. Every drawer I opened, every shelf, every corner of my apartment had some piece of you in it. I couldn’t look for my own charger without finding traces of you.”

Anton huffs before continuing, “I’d be having a normal day and then suddenly there’s one of your stupid sticky notes, a hoodie, little things you left in our dorm that you never came back for and that was it, I'd be paralyzed for the whole day.”

The shame that follows his words leave you shifting uncomfortably. You had come into this conversation so sure yard sale meant hatred or indifference or some clean, final severing of whatever had once existed between you.

“So no,” Anton says finally, turning back toward you. “It wasn’t because you meant too little. It’s because you meant too much.”

The sentence knocks whatever air you had left clean out of your lungs. You look down at your hands because meeting his eyes feels impossible now. “I wish I’d stayed,” you say before you can stop yourself. The words come out smaller than you intended. Barely more than breath. They sound humiliating the second they leave you, too naked and two years too late but you can’t take them back.

Across from you, Anton goes still. You hate yourself a little for saying it but you’ve always been selfish haven’t you? You were always selfish when it came to Anton.

When Anton finally speaks, his voice is quiet. “I think maybe you had it right.”

Your head lifts slowly. His expression hasn’t hardened, if anything, he just looks exhausted beyond belief. “I spent a long time hoping you’d choose me…I really did.”

Your throat tightens. “And now?” you ask, even though some part of you already knows the answer.

Anton glances toward the window briefly before looking back at you. “Now I think we would’ve destroyed each other.”

You don’t fight him on it. You can’t. Not because it doesn’t hurt, because it does.You say nothing because you know he isn’t wrong. You know exactly which versions of yourselves he means. The boy who kept handing you his whole heart like maybe one day you’d stop being afraid to hold it. The girl who kept mistaking avoidance for maturity and fear for wisdom. The two of you spent years loving each other in ways that felt huge enough to survive anything, all while quietly becoming worse for it.

Your vision blurs. You look away quickly, blinking hard. Anton looks away too. That small act of mercy almost undoes you more than anything else he’s said. Even now, even after all this, he still has enough tenderness left in him not to force you to be watched while you come apart.

After a second, he leans forward and reaches for the copy of 1984 resting beside him. He stands, brushing his hand once over the cover before tucking it beneath his arm.

“I should go,” he says.

You nod because what else can you do? Anton takes a step, then pauses. “For what it’s worth,” he starts, the steadiness of his voice makes you look up again, “I meant everything I said in that letter.”

You have to bite your bottom lip to keep it from wobbling. Even the part about choosing me? You think to yourself.

“You’re gonna write the book. I still believe that.” He says.

You just stare at him. He shifts the book slightly beneath his arm, his expression softer now than it has been this entire conversation. “You’re still in there, that version of you, the one who thought she was going to become something. I still think she was right.”

He gives you a small nod after that, like the conversation has reached whatever end he came here for then he leaves you sitting there in the back corner of Dale’s with your hands clenched in your lap and your throat thick with tears, carrying the unbearable weight of the one thing you somehow never expected Anton Lee to give you after all this time. Not another chance, not absolution but faith.

For a long time after Anton leaves, you don’t move. The bookstore carries on around you. Life carries on while you stay in the beanbag, your hands still clenched tightly in your lap and your throat aching. The tears fall silently, humiliatingly while you stare blankly at the empty space Anton occupied minutes ago.

After everything you did to him, after all the years you spent punishing him for loving you honestly, Anton still looked at you like there was something worth salvaging in the wreckage. Not the two of you but you.

Eventually when it becomes clear you can’t stay curled up in the back corner of Dale’s forever without drawing attention to yourself, you orce yourself to stand. You swipe angrily beneath your eyes, collect your bag and leave the store without buying anything.

The train ride does nothing to give you reprieve from your thoughts. Anton’s words replay relentlessly in your head. You’re gonna write the book. I still believe that. You’re still in there. You hate how badly those sentences get to you.

Maybe because they feel too close to the version of yourself you’ve spent years trying not to think about. The girl who wrote letters to the future and believed without irony that she would become something extraordinary one day. The girl who moved to New York convinced talent and ambition alone would be enough to build a life out of words. Somewhere along the way, you stopped being her.

Your head tips back against the train wall as Manhattan flickers past in fractured glimpses outside. Anton still believes in that version of you more than you do. It really would be easier if he hated you. Easier if he had given you something cruel and definitive to carry home instead. Something you could use to justify staying exactly as you are; small and frozen in the past.

By the time you make it home your head is throbbing. You unlock the apartment and step inside without bothering to turn on the main lights. The place still feels emptier with Manon gone. Your bag slips from your shoulder and lands softly near the couch while you stand there in the dimness.

Anton is on magazine covers, Manon gets flown across the world for work and fashion weeks and race weekends. Sohee is on a world tour of his own. Everyone kept going.

That’s what hits you hardest in the silence of your apartment. Not even just Anton, all of them. Manon built the life she used to joke about wanting, Anton took his grief and somehow turned it into art, even Sohee who once lived half in Anton’s shadow became someone with his own orbit, his own career, his own stages and schedules and cities waiting for him. Everyone kept becoming who they said they would be.

And you? You stayed here.

Not physically, not exactly. On paper your life moved too. You graduated, you got the job, you built the relationship, you learned how to answer emails and survive office politics and smile through meetings. Yet beneath all of that, in the place that mattered, you stayed suspended in the same grief and self-inflicted punishment. Standing here now in the half-dark with Anton’s voice still echoing through your mind, you finally understand what it really was: stagnation.

The realization is so sharp you have to grip the couch to stay standing. You don’t know what comes next yet. You don’t know how to undo years of shrinking yourself down into something easier to carry. You don’t know whether writing the book will save you or if it’s already too late to become the person eighteen-year-old you swore you would be.

But for the first time in a very long while, standing there in the dark with your heart still in shards from everything Anton did and didn’t say, you know one thing with painful certainty.

You cannot keep living like this.

“Are you sure about this?”

You glance up from the cardboard box in your arms to find Mia standing beside your desk, one hand curled around her coffee cup, her expression caught somewhere between concern and admiration. Around the two of you, the rest of the editorial floor hums on as usual. You set the box down on your desk and tuck a loose folder beneath your arm. “If I don’t do this now I don’t think I ever will.”

Three days have passed since Dale’s. Three days since you stood in your dark apartment and finally admitted what your life had become. The very next day you handed in your two week notice. Was it impulsive? Probably but maybe this is what you need.

The two weeks are mostly ceremonial anyway. Your boss made it abundantly clear after your resignation that she has no intention of assigning you anything substantial enough to justify keeping you beyond the bare minimum.

Next week you have a meeting with a mid-level publishing house in Brooklyn. Nothing guaranteed, nothing particularly glamorous either. They’re small enough to still take unsolicited fiction seriously and large enough that getting signed by them would mean your novel might actually have a future outside your laptop screen.

You spent the last three nights finishing the cleanest draft you could manage, editing until your eyes blurred, shaping it into something worthy of being read by someone who doesn’t already love you enough to lie.

If the meeting goes well, maybe they’ll sign you. If they sign you, maybe this whole reckless, humiliating leap of faith turns out to be the first decent thing you’ve done for yourself in years. If it doesn’t…well you’re trying very hard not to let yourself finish that thought.

Mia leans against the edge of your desk while you start sliding old marked-up manuscripts into the box. “Well,” she says after a beat, “we’re gonna miss you.”

You huff softly under your breath. “No, you’re gonna miss making me print your pages because you never remember your login.”

“That too. When you become famous, dedicate your first book to the entire floor.” She grins.

The laugh that escapes you is small but genuine. “I’ll think about it.”

Mia gives you one last smile before walking over to her desk. You settle into your chair again to finish the last real assignment your boss dumped onto your desk this morning with a clipped, irritated, “At least make yourself useful before you go.”

It’s an op-ed, one last editorial bone thrown your way because nobody else on staff wants to touch it. The brief sits open in front of you now. A culture essay about regret.

Your fingers rest lightly against the keyboard while the cursor blinks on your google drive. Outside your office window, the city continues moving, cabs inching through traffic, pedestrians shouldering past one another.

Regret and timing. How ironic. Your boss wants something short and detached yet all you can think about is Anton: Anton at eighteen writing letters to the future, Anton at twenty-two sleeping in a dorm bed while you slipped out of his arms, Anton at twenty-four in Dale’s telling you maybe you had it right because the two of you would’ve destroyed each other.

You crack your knuckles as you think about what to write. You open a fresh document and type the title before you can stop yourself. For a long second, you just stare at the screen then you begin.

No Way Back To Eighteen

There is a particular kind of lie people tell themselves after making a life-altering choice. It’s not usually phrased to sound like a direct lie. In fact, it often sounds rational. We tell ourselves we did what made the most sense with the information we had at the time. We call it practicality. We call it timing. We call it growing up. Sometimes, if we are especially committed to preserving our own self-image, we even call it kindness.

What we rarely call it is fear.

For a long time, I believed the most painful decisions of my life had been inevitable. If something was always going to happen, then no one is really to blame for it. There is comfort in that kind of thinking. There is also cowardice.

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the stories we tell ourselves in order to survive our own choices. About how often fear disguises itself as wisdom and how easily self-protection can be mistaken for emotional inteligence.

I’m writing this now because I have spent years mistaking those things.

In college, I loved romance in theory more than I ever knew how to survive it in practice. I loved it in books, where longing was curated and miscommunication always arrived with the promise of eventual resolution. Fiction allowed me to admire vulnerability from a safe distance. Real love was different. Real love asked things of me I did not know how to give. It asked for honesty that I did not know how to tell and worst of all, it asked me to risk humiliation.

Years ago, there was a boy who loved me with a kind of intensity that should have felt like safety. Instead, it terrified me. He knew the version of me that still believed she was going to become something, the smart, sharp witted girl who could make people laugh without trying. He also knew the parts of me I tried to keep unlovable, the uglier truths I worked hardest to hide from everyone else and somehow he never looked away. He was never interested in the idea of almost, he wanted forever.

I loved him too. That is the least complicated part of this story and maybe the saddest. Love was never the absence, courage was.

When the time came to choose something real, I left.

For years, I told myself leaving had been the wiser choice, the kinder choice; the inevitable one. I turned my own fear into philosophy because the truth was harder to sit with: I was not protecting either of us. I was protecting myself. As long as our relationship remained undefined, I never had to risk being fully known and then rejected anyways. I got to remain loved without surrendering any real control.

In trying to protect myself from heartbreak, I became the source of it. There is no graceful way to write that sentence. There is certainly no graceful way to live it.

The internet, as it does, eventually found its own version of this story. Not the full one, just the public fragments. Songs people turned into captions, clips and theories and edits. I watched strangers build mythology out of what I had once experienced as private intimacy. I watched the person I love become known to the rest of the world in ways I had forfeited the right to. It’s a deeply disorienting thing to become the unnamed girl in someone else’s art, especially when you know you earned your place there.

So let me remove the ambiguity now, because ambiguity has been my disease for years. I am the girl in Anton Lee’s songs. I was the one who left.

I was the one who kept choosing the safer life and calling it the smarter one. I was the one who hurt people and then hid from the consequences.

What I understand now, far too late to be useful to the people I hurt, is that regret is not always proof that you did not know better then. Sometimes it’s that you knew exactly what was required of you and were not brave enough to meet it.

There is no way back to eighteen. No way back to dorm rooms and bookstore afternoons and the arrogant certainty that there will always be more time. There is no undoing what I did. No version of this essay where the right arrangement of sentences transforms damage into something beautiful.

But there is this: I loved you. I still left. For years, I called that decision inevitable because regret is easier to survive when you twist it into fate.

If I had been brave enough back then, I would’ve stayed. There are some losses you do not begin to understand until you realize you helped create them.

You read the final line once more and then before you can chicken out and delete the whole thing, you attach the file to the submission link and hit send. Once the file uploads you stand abruptly, smooth your palms down the front of your skirt and mutter something about needing more coffee to no one in particular before stepping away from your cubicle, desperate for any small errand that might keep your mind from what you’ve just set loose.

“I promise kid, the second promotions are done, you've got a long break waiting for you.” David promises Anton. The latter can only laugh in response. The same phrase has been said since the beginning of his career.

David keeps one hand on the SUV door while the other presses lightly against Anton’s back, ushering him forward while the driver finishes loading the last suitcase. “I’m serious this time! No promo, no appearances, nothing. You disappear for a week and enjoy the labor of your work.” David adds, already half-distracted by his phone pinned between his shoulder and ear. 

Anton only rolls his eyes playfully before humming in response. The door shuts behind him with a heavy thud that muffles the sounds of outside. For the first time all day, he’s finally met with some peace and quiet. He slumps back against the leather seat and closes his eyes briefly.

His day had started before six with glam and one last filming session for Vogue's youtube where he filmed a what’s in my bag video. After that came tiktok promos in a cramped studio with ring lights, then a rushed lunch he barely touched, then more cameras, more smiling and photoshoots.

Now it’s a little after five pm and he’s on his way to JFK to catch a flight to Japan.

Sohee is there already, Anton is supposed to meet him for a few days before heading back to Seoul to his own schedule. He’d been looking forward to it all week, seeing Sohee and cheering him on.

He tilts his head to the side and opens his eyes as he watches Manhattan get drowned in rain, he briefly wonders if his flight will be grounded due to how hard it’s coming down. He only sighs before closing his eyes again to reflect on the week and three days that he’s had. From the press run, to the city and finally to the fact that he saw you twice in the span of a few days after two years of silence.

His mind drifts back to phoebe’s against his will.

He thinks of you sat at the bar, drunk and glassy-eyed. Anton still doesn’t know what he was supposed to do with that. How he was supposed to look at someone he once loved so deeply and pretend it didn’t matter that you looked so defeated.

He knows he didn't owe you anything but he also couldn’t stomach leaving you there to keep drinking so with embarrassingly shaky hands, hands he still wonders if you noticed trembling, Anton paid your tab and told you to be safe getting home because that was all he could do now. You no longer belonged to each other. Kindness was the only thing he had left to offer you.

The second he stepped back out onto the sidewalk, his stomach turned so violently he had to brace a hand against the brick wall beside the bar and breathe through the sudden sick rush of memories and grief. He stood out there for nearly five minutes trying not to throw up.

He truly had no intentions of reaching out after that. At least, that’s what he had told himself but as the days passed you were all he could think about.

About how defeated you seemed. It bothered him in a way he couldn’t quite rationalize away so despite the pain and distance, Anton reached out because he needed to know if there was anything left of the girl he used to love.

Seeing you there in the bookstore nearly broke him all over again. Not because you looked beautiful, though you did. It was something worse than that. You looked like grief had reached into you and made itself comfortable. You almost looked like a mirror. Not of who Anton was now but of someone he had once been. The sight of it unsettled him because he knew that particular vacancy too well.

Anton had lost you once. He couldn’t bear the thought of grief finishing the job.

So he said what he could. He left you with the only thing that still felt clean enough to offer. Not another chance. Not love, though God knows that was still there. Just belief, the hope that maybe if it came from him, it might reach the part of you that had slowly started to evaporate.

He only hopes now that it was enough to wake you up.

Just as he starts drifting off, his phone starts vibrating in his lap. Anton opens his eyes slowly, expecting a final itinerary text from David or maybe Sohee telling him of what shenanigans they’re going to be up to in Tokyo instead his screen is full of notifications.

Messages from his PR manager, mentions across all his socials and a missed call from Sohee. His brows furrow as he tries to read the notifications as they come in but it’s far too much and far too fast. Just as he’s about to open Twitter to see what’s going on, another call from Sohee comes in. He frowns before answering.

“Hello?”

Sohee is quiet for a second before asking, “are you alone?”

The question is strange enough to make Anton sit up properly. He glances toward the driver in the front seat, none the wiser, eyes fixed on the road while rain falls against the windshield.  “I’m on my way to the airport, why?”

Another beat passes then Sohee asks carefully, “have you looked at your phone?”

Anton’s stomach tightens for reasons he doesn’t yet understand. He huffs softly through his nose and drags a hand over his face. “Dude, just say what you clearly want to say.”

Sohee exhales on the other end. “____ made a post.”

Anton stills. “What?”

“A piece,” Sohee corrects quickly. “Like an article or an essay or something? I don’t know. She…she names you directly.”

For a second, Anton genuinely thinks he must have misheard him. “What are you talking about?”

“I’m sending the link just…read it.”  Sohee says. His voice is less cautious and more concerned. The line clicks dead before Anton can say anything else. A second later, the text comes through.

Anton immediately clicks on the link and is brought to an op-ed titled No Way Back to Eighteen. His chest tightens automatically.

He reads the piece and the more words he processes, the more anger starts to burn in his stomach. I loved you. I still left. Anton’s jaw tightens so hard it starts to ache.

His thumb scrolls back upward and then down again, rereading certain lines because his brain refuses to absorb them correctly the first time. Rage cuts through his grief, his vindication poisoned by the timing. After all these years, he finally managed to move forward. He managed to leave Dale’s with something close to peace. He had said what he needed to say and while it hurt, it had been clean.

This is not clean. This is you reaching into wounds he finally managed to scar over and prying them open in front of the entire world.

Anton feels suddenly, violently furious.

He lets out a short, disbelieving breath that sounds nothing like laughter. His voice when he speaks is low and unsteady. “Why would she do this?”

Anton swallows hard, staring at the line If I had been brave enough back then, I would’ve stayed until the words start to blur. “Why now? Why the fuck now?”

The only person in the world who can answer that unfortunately is not within his vicinity. Anton leans forward abruptly in his seat and orders his driver.

“Turn around.”

The driver glances back through the mirror, confused. “Excuse me?”

Anton grips the phone tighter in one hand, the article still open across the screen and looks out at the rain drowning the city he had been so ready to leave behind. His chest is rising too fast now, anger and grief and love and disbelief all fighting for dominance.

“Turn the car around. Take me back.”

Anton gives the driver your address that he got from Manon years ago to send her care packages. The rest of the drive passes in a blur of wet glass and red taillights. By the time the SUV pulls up outside your building, he is out of the car before the driver has fully shifted into park.

The rain hits him instantly, cold and relentless, soaking through his jacket within seconds. The car door slams behind him and then he’s taking the front steps two at a time, phone still clutched in one hand, his heart pounding violently.

He starts banging on the door without any real plan beyond needing it to open. “____!”

He bangs again harder, palm flat against the wood. “Open the door!”

Rain runs into his eyes, down the back of his neck, through his hair and over his mouth. He wipes at his face uselessly and pounds again. “____, come outside!”

He’s met with silence again. Anton hits the wood with the side of his fist again then braces one hand flat against it and drags in a breath that does nothing to calm him. He’s about to call our your name again when he hears you from behind him.

“Anton?”

He turns around fast and squints. You’re standing a few feet away on the sidewalk beneath an umbrella, your work bag still hanging from your shoulder. All Anton can do for a moment is stare. He had spent the entire drive over imagining this moment, imagining you on the other side of the door, imagining what he would say first, how angry he would sound, whether he would still be angry once he actually saw you. Now faced with you, some of his anger gives way.

“What are you doing here?” you ask.

Anton’s anger almost fizzlies out but then his eyes catch the article on his screen and it’s like its been reignited all over again. “What the fuck was that?”

Your brows knit together immediately. “What?”

“The article.” He lifts the phone in one hand, rain dripping from his wrist down over the screen. “Why would you write that?”

Your eyes dart to his phone and you say nothing for a beat before softly calling his name. “...Anton–”

He immediately cuts you off. “No. I don’t want to hear anything but the truth. Why did you write this? Why now?”

You suck in a breath and try again. “I didn’t write it to hurt you.”

He laughs once. “Then what the fuck did you write it for?”

He continues because his anger is too volatile to let him stop and breathe. “I was leaving. Do you understand that? I said what I needed to say to you, I got in the car, I was on my way to the airport and then you decided to publish that!”

Your brows pull together. “Anton–”

He cuts you off again. “What was the reason? To embarrass me? To expose me? To punish me for loving you?”

Your mouth parts immediately. “No!”

“Then what!?” Anton demands. “Because I genuinely do not understand what that does for me. If you actually cared about me you wouldn’t have written this, put my full fucking name on it and thrown it out into the world like I’m supposed to what? Be grateful?”

You flinch at that. Good, some mean part of him thinks. Good because he is soaked standing outside your apartment like he has lost his mind and all because you decided that today, of all days, was the day to tell the truth. 

You tighten your grip on the umbrella handle. “That’s not fair.”

Anton actually scoffs. “Fair?”

“You don’t get to act like I’m the only one who made this public!”

That stops him for half a second. “That’s not what I did.”

He sees your eyes widen in pure disbelief. “Are you being serious?”

“Yes.”

“You wrote songs about me!” You yell at him.

“I wrote songs about what happened to me.” He argues.

“And I wrote about me! So what exactly is the difference, Anton? That your version got to hide behind metaphors and mine didn’t?” You shoot back.

Anton frowns, truly not grasping your point. “That is not the same thing.”

You laugh at him but there’s no humor in it. “No, you did worse.”

He goes still in disbelief. “Worse?”

“You sold our love.”

Anton looks at you as if you’ve grown a second head. “What are you talking about?”

“Our things, Anton!” you snap, the umbrella jolting in your grip with the force of your voice. “The hoodies, the polaroids, my copy of 1984?”

So thar’s the hill you want to die on? Anton thinks to himself, this argument again. “The book? That’s what you’re mad about?” He asks, rainwater dripping down his face.

You look at him scandalized.  “It wasn’t just a book and you know it.”

Before Anton can defend his actions again, you barrel on. “You sold pieces of me to strangers and now you want to be morally outraged because I named you in an article condemning my own actions?”

Anton takes one step toward you before he can stop himself. “I sold things you left behind.”

His correction clearly leaves you stunned. You blink at him, trying to come up with something in response but he continues on. “You left yet I was the one paying the price every fucking day! I couldn’t move around my own place without being reminded of someone who decided I wasn’t enough to stay for!”

Your face falls slightly at that but Anton is too far gone to soften any of his words now. “So no, don’t stand there and tell me I sold our love like I was trying to cheapen it. I was trying to survive it!”

You say nothing, just stare at him in pure anger and hurt. Anton thinks you might finally back down and offer to scrub the internet of your think piece but then your eyes flash in a way that tells him you’re not backing down either. “And what do you think I’ve been doing?” you ask.

Anton stares at you. “Is that a joke?”

“No.”

“Because it fucking sounds like one.” He retorts.

You flinch at that. “You think I haven’t been miserable?”

He laughs again before shoving his phone away in his pocket and getting even closer to you. “Miserable? You created this! You know what real misery looks like? Misery looks like spending years turning someone into songs because that’s the only way you know how to carry what they did to you! Misery looks like finally getting to a place where you can breathe and then opening your phone to find out the person who left you loved you the whole time and just…did it anyway!”

You open your mouth to argue but he speaks over you, not even giving you the chance. “Do you understand how humiliating that is? Do you understand what you did to me with that piece?” He takes another step closer, close enough that the edge of your umbrella clips uselessly against his shoulder. “You didn’t just name me, you told the whole world I wasn’t enough. That our love wasn’t enough. So agin I ask you, what the fuck am I supposed to do with that?”

All the fight seems to leave you at once as you tilt your head up to get a better view of him. “I wasn’t trying to humiliate you.”

“Then what were you trying to do? I can’t think of anything that doesn’t make me feel like some punchline.”

You take a deep breath. “I wrote it because I couldn’t let you leave again believing I didn’t love you enough.”

Anton goes still, the words knocking some air out of him. You swallow hard before continuing. “I know I’m years too late….I know that and I’m not asking for another chance.”

Anton says nothing. A part of him wants to stop you, keep you from ruining the last remaining bits of his well deserved anger but another part of him…the one that has loved you since he was eighteen needs to hear what comes next.

“I just…I couldn’t let you leave again thinking I didn’t love you enough to stay. Thinking you weren’t worth staying for.”

You slowly lower your umbrella, letting the rain beat down on you. “You were. You were always worth staying for.”

Anton can feel his chest rising and falling rapidly as he tries to fight off tears. “I wasn’t brave enough to try and I was too selfish to think about anyone but myself. I kept calling it timing and fate but really I just…didn’t want to risk getting my heart broken so instead I broke yours and then spent years acting like ignoring you would make it easier.”

There is something almost unbearable about hearing you say aloud the things he had once spent years searching for. You squint against the rain as it falls in your eyes. “I know I did this to us, I know what I ruined. I didn’t write it because I thought it would fix anything. I wrote it because I couldn’t let that be the story you carried out of New York. I couldn’t let you leave thinking I didn’t love you enough.”

Just like that, the last of Anton’s anger gives way. His face twists before he can stop it. He looks down briefly, rain mixing uselessly with the tears he can no longer hold back. He had imagined this conversation so many different ways over the years, imagined what it might feel like to finally hear you say it, to finally have proof that he hadn’t misunderstood the depth of what was between you, that he hadn’t spent all this time mourning something pathetic and one-sided. None of those imagined versions account for this, none of them prepared him for how much it would hurt to be right.

“I love you,” he says, the confession sounding a lot less romantic and more like defeat. “I love you and a part of me probably always will.”

Your face crumples completely. Anton sucks in a deep breath, choking slightly on his tears. “But I cannot do this again.”

You nod immediately, tears spilling from your eyes too and somehow that hurts him, the way you don’t fight him. “I won’t choose you unless you’re choosing me too.” His words seem to catch you off guard. 

“No matter how hard I tried, no matter how far away I got, no matter how much therapy or music I threw at it, it was always you for me, ____.” He steps closer, close enough now that there is barely any space left between your bodies. “I cannot go through this again if you’re just going to hurt me again.”

Your head starts shaking before he’s even finished. “I won’t…I swear Anton. I won’t.”

Anton searches your face, rain and tears blurring his vision until all he can really make out is your mouth trembling. “I love you,” you say, more urgently now. “I love you, Anton. I always have.”

Anton steps even closer. Your umbrella is useless now, hanging slack at your side while both of you stand there getting soaked through. Anton trembles as he works up the courage to ask you the one question he’s never dared to ask out loud. “When you said it, that night…when you told me you loved me before you left…did you mean it?”

Your entire face changes. Your brows pull together in confusion and then realization flashes across your face. “You were awake?” you ask.

He nods once. You sob at the admission, completely letting go of the umbrella now, your hand flying to your chest. “I always meant it.”

The second the words leave your mouth Anton closes the distance and kisses you hard. His hands come up to cradle your face as his lips crash into yours. His fingers tremble as they press into your rain-cold skin. You meet him with equal urgency, your fingers twisting into the front of his soaked jacket hard enough to wrinkle the fabric beneath your fists. The rain keeps falling around you sliding down both your faces and gathering at the corners of your mouths but neither of you pulls away.

His thumbs drag shakily along your jaw, tipping your face up deeper into the kiss. You let him maneuver you in any way he pleases, willing to give him whatever he wants to take. When he pulls away, both of you are breathing hard with his forehead resting against yours, your hands still fisted in his jacket.

His eyes stay shut for a minute as he tries to collect himself before he opens them and looks at you. “I don’t want to go back…not to who we were.” He watches as you nod, staring at him dazed. Anton swallows and wipes away the trail of spit he left behind on your lips. “If we do this I want it to be different, a fresh start. I want us to learn how to be in each other’s lives without destroying each other first.”

A small smile tugs at your mouth. “Friends first?”

A smile breaks out across his face too. “Friends who are very clearly in love with each other.”

You laugh at his words and Anton feels his heart soften at the sound. He leans in and kisses you once more, gentler this time.

You nod against his mouth. “Okay,” you whisper. “I’d love to start over.”

For the first time in years, Anton lets himself believe you.

taglist: @emislove @liaajk @satsgu @oncyanii @yoursyuno @wonbunniez @sakvya @antonnuguholic @kylie99z @kimvitamingyu @prousthouse @jijiyi @night-poem @maripositaa @chocochipnim @lovialy @yayayawnnz @winterbeartaehyungbestboy @dreamiestay @m0shim0shi

[loveanton]

TIMBER (lee chanyoung) | MASTERLIST

🍃 summary: after one reckless mistake too many, your parents send you away for the summer in hopes that a few months in the countryside with your grandmother might finally straighten you out. you fully intend to count down the days until you’re free again…right up until a bug loving little boy and his father begin making the mountains feel a little more like home.

❀ pairing: single dad!anton x f!reader ❀ genre: single parent au, slow burn, rich kid au, found family ❀ word count: tbd ❀ rating: 18+

⟶ warnings: profanity, drinking, mentions of marijuana use, family conflict, absentee parent themes, discussions of teen pregnancy and young parenthood, mild injury/hospital visit, child illness/injury, discussions regarding co-parenting, suggestive content, sexual content, kissing, talk of societal class devisions, parental abuse, more to come.

🌱a/n: can you tell i’m a sucker for anton? send in an ask or leave a comment to be added to the taglist. chapters will be posted every friday at 12pm est starting june 5th ! maybe sooner if i get impatient.

tag navigation: **possible spoilers ahead!** #🌲– everything to do with this universe | or #au: timber! for specific asks or blurbs from this universe.

↳ status: incomplete 🪵

↠ chanyounglee: social media peek

↠ chapter 1: the exile (8.7k)

↠ chapter 2: reality check (9.3k)

↠ chapter 3: planting roots (7.2k)

↠ chapter 4: the reckoning (6.7k)

↠ chapter 5: baby momma drama (6.5k)

↠ chapter 6: casts and cuddles

↠ chapter 7: storm warning

↠ chapter 8: wildfire

↠ chapter 9: timber

↠ chapter 10: evergreen

➾ chapter minis:

🌳 mini #1: read in between chapters 2 and 3

🌳 mini #2: father’s day, can be read whenever

🌳 mini #3: minyoung and noona day, can be read whenever

🌳 mini #4: read right after chapter 5

[wenoberry]

I have the PHATTEST crush on lee sohee

[bluesayani]

softly, slowly

pt. four ; here | pt. six ; here

WORD COUNT 7.1k

PAIRING(S) anton x fem!reader

NOTE(S) okay last one for da night, you’re welcome

ABOUT THE STORY drinking, kissing, suggestive, jealousy(?), SEX IMPLIED BUT NOT ANTON AND READER

—

The next morning, you wake up earlier than you need to. Not because you have anywhere important to be. Just because you know you’re seeing Anton. Which apparently is enough now.

You lay in bed for a minute staring at the ceiling before finally sitting up with a quiet sigh, already mentally planning everything. After showering, you take your time getting ready for once—doing your makeup carefully, straightening your hair until it falls exactly how you want it to.

Halfway through deciding what to wear, you catch yourself overthinking and stop. It’s just Anton. The thought settles you almost immediately. Not just Anton, obviously. But Anton. The person who’s seen you cry in a broken-down car and still looked at you like you were something precious. You settle on comfort after that—a light grey hoodie, short denim shorts with little rhinestones on the back pockets, shin-length socks, and your white tennis shoes. Simple. Cute enough.

You grab your purse and your bag of books before heading into the living room to wait. And wait. And wait a little more. At first you don’t mind. Anton was usually early if anything, so ten minutes late honestly surprised you more than annoyed you.

But when it creeps closer to fifteen, you start preparing your fake offended speech in your head. Something dramatic. Something about punctuality. Then there’s a knock at the door.

You immediately stand, trying to arrange your face into something unimpressed as you walk over and pull the door open. But the second you see him— your entire act disappears.

Anton stands there slightly out of breath, holding a bouquet of tiger lilies in one hand. Bright orange. Beautiful. Your mouth parts slightly before you can stop it. And Anton, somehow, looks almost nervous.

“Im so sorry I’m late,” he says quickly. “I lost track of time.”

You stare at the flowers.

“…You got me flowers?”

He glances down at them briefly like he forgot he was holding them.

“Yeah.”

Your heart does something embarrassing.

“For what?”

Anton shrugs slightly, suddenly shy again under your attention.

“I just wanted to.”

That answer somehow hits harder than if there had been a reason. You look back at the flowers, then at him, unable to stop smiling now.

“They’re beautiful,” you say softly.

His shoulders relax a little.

“Good.”

You step aside to let him in, immediately carrying the bouquet carefully to the kitchen. As you fill a vase with water, Anton quietly wanders farther into the room. And of course, the first thing he notices is your giant bag of books sitting by the couch. He looks at it. Then at you. Then back at it.

“You were planning to study anyway, weren’t you?”

You glance over innocently. “…Maybe.”

Anton laughs quietly under his breath before effortlessly lifting the bag onto his shoulder.

“I brought my laptop,” he says. “I assumed this would happen.”

“You know me too well already.”

“Mhm.”

You try not to smile too hard at that. A little while later, the two of you are back in his car again. It’s strange how natural it feels now. Like there’s already a rhythm to this.

The drive to the bookstore café is easy and familiar, sunlight pouring through the windows while the two of you talk about random things—Harvey’s dramatic reaction to the flowers when she briefly emerged from her room, Anton’s sister apparently already asking when you were coming back, the fact that you genuinely needed to study today whether you liked it or not.

“You say that every day,” Anton points out.

“Because every day it’s true.”

“You’re still going to end up distracted.”

You glance at him suspiciously. “By what?”

Anton looks over briefly, completely calm.

“Me.”

You stare at him.

“…That was smooth.”

“I know.”

You smile so hard you have to look away.

The bookstore café is even prettier than you imagined. The second you walk inside, you’re hit with the smell of coffee, pastries, and old books all at once. Shelves line almost every wall, soft music plays somewhere overhead, and tucked near the back are little seating areas surrounded by stacks of novels. It feels warm. Quiet. Like somewhere built specifically for the two of you.

Anton lets you wander for a minute while he orders, your fingers trailing absentmindedly across book spines until he eventually calls your name softly from the counter. You walk over just in time to see him already paying. Again.

“Anton.”

He hands the cashier his card without even looking at you.

“You can complain after you drink the coffee.”

“You’re impossible.”

“That’s not new information.”

You narrow your eyes while he smiles faintly to himself.

Eventually, the two of you settle into a little nook in the corner near a tall shelf of books. There’s a small couch pressed against the wall and a table barely big enough for both your drinks and study materials. Naturally, your books take over most of it anyway.

Anton helps set everything up without complaint, moving your notebooks around carefully while opening his laptop beside you. For a while, you actually do study. Shockingly. Kind of.

You read over notes while Anton works quietly beside you, the occasional sound of typing mixing with soft café chatter in the background. Every now and then, you catch him looking at you. Not in a distracting way. Just… fond. Like he still can’t fully believe you’re here.

At one point, you glance up and catch him doing it again.

“What?” you whisper.

Anton blinks once like he got caught.

“Nothing.”

“You were staring at me.”

“You’re pretty,” he says simply, then goes right back to his laptop like he didn’t just completely derail your nervous system.

You stare at him in disbelief.

“…You can’t just say things like that randomly.”

Anton looks back over slowly.

“But it’s true.”

And suddenly studying becomes significantly harder.

Eventually, Anton finishes his essay. You know he’s done because his typing finally stops, and when you glance over, he’s leaning back slightly with the exhausted expression of someone who just survived writing about symbolism for three straight hours.

“How bad was it?” you ask.

Anton closes his laptop slowly. “I never want to discuss metaphors again.”

You laugh quietly.

“What was the poem even about?”

“A dying bird.”

“…That sounds depressing.”

“It was,” he says flatly. “And somehow also apparently about capitalism.”

You stare at him. He stares back. Then the two of you burst into quiet laughter loud enough that the girl at the next table briefly glances over. After that, Anton shifts his attention completely toward you.

“Okay,” he says, pulling your flash cards toward himself. “Study time.”

You groan immediately.

“I liked you better when you were suffering with poetry.”

“Mhm,” he hums. “Define tachycardia.”

You blink.

“…Fast heart thing.”

Anton laughs under his breath. “Heart thing?”

“You know what I mean.”

For the next half hour, the two of you go through flash cards together, though “together” mostly means Anton patiently trying to keep you from giving up while you spiral dramatically every ten minutes.

“What’s the normal respiratory rate?”

You squint at the card.

“…Breathing amount.”

Anton physically lowers the flash card and looks at you.

“I’m trying my best.”

“No, you’re trying something.”

You kick his foot lightly under the table while laughing.

Despite your complaining, he’s actually really good at helping you study. He explains things calmly, never making you feel stupid when you forget something, and somehow always knows when you’re genuinely frustrated versus when you’re just being dramatic.

Unfortunately, after a while, your brain officially stops functioning. You stare at another flash card for a full ten seconds before dropping your head dramatically onto the table.

“I can’t do this anymore.”

Anton laughs softly beside you. “You absolutely can.”

“No,” you mumble into the wood. “I’m switching majors.”

“Mhm.”

“I’ll become a florist.”

“That’s a big jump from medicine.”

“At least flowers don’t have respiratory systems.”

Anton snorts quietly at that, shaking his head. You finally look up at him again, and the expression on his face immediately makes you narrow your eyes.

“What?”

“You’re funny.”

“No I’m not.”

“You really are.”

The way he says it is so genuine that it almost catches you off guard. Like he actually means it. Your face warms slightly as you sit back up properly.

Anton studies you for another second before asking softly, “Why did you choose pre-med anyway?”

You blink. Then your expression softens a little.

“My stepdad, mostly,” you admit.

Anton listens quietly.

“He’s a surgeon,” you continue, absentmindedly tracing the edge of one of your flash cards. “And growing up… I don’t know. He was just kind of my hero.”

Anton’s eyes stay on you carefully, attentive in that quiet way he always is.

“He worked insane hours,” you say softly. “But he still always came home and made time for us. He took care of everyone all the time.” You smile faintly to yourself. “I think I just wanted to be someone like that.”

Anton doesn’t respond immediately. He just watches you for a second with that same unbearably soft expression again.

“That makes sense,” he says quietly.

You glance at him. “Why literature?”

Anton groans instantly. “Because apparently I enjoy unemployment.”

You laugh loudly enough this time that someone actually shushes you from across the café. Both of you immediately whisper apologies through your laughter. Then Anton shrugs slightly, smile lingering.

“My dad liked poetry,” he says after a second. “He used to read to me a lot when I was little.”

Your expression softens immediately.

“And I don’t know,” he continues quietly. “It just kind of stayed with me.”

The conversation drifts after that—slow and easy and personal in a way that makes time disappear completely. By the time either of you notices the clock again, nearly three hours have passed. You blink at it.

“Oh my God.”

Anton looks over immediately. “What?”

“We’ve been here forever.”

He glances at the time and laughs quietly. “Yeah… we kind of have.”

Reluctantly, the two of you start gathering your things. Anton once again carries most of your books despite your weak protests, and before long you’re back in his car with coffee remnants and tired eyes.

The late afternoon sun pours gold through the windows as he starts the engine. For a minute, neither of you says anything. Then quietly, almost without thinking, you admit—

“I don’t really want to go home yet.”

Anton glances over immediately. There’s something in his expression that says he understands exactly what you mean.

“Yeah,” he says softly. “Me neither.”

Your chest tightens a little. But then he sighs, tapping lightly against the steering wheel.

“I have a lecture in like… an hour.”

You groan dramatically and sink lower into your seat.

“Skip it.”

Anton looks over at you in complete disbelief.

“You would never actually tell me to skip class.”

You immediately point at him. “Exactly. Don’t skip class.”

He laughs quietly under his breath.

“For a second I almost considered it.”

“Anton.”

“I’m kidding.”

“You better be.”

He smiles to himself before pulling out onto the road. For a few minutes, the car fills with easy conversation again. Then, after a brief hesitation, Anton speaks.

“There is something tonight though.”

You glance over. “Like what?”

“One of my friends is having a party.” He says it casually, but you can tell he’s gauging your reaction carefully. “I wasn’t really planning on going.”

“You hate parties?”

“I don’t hate them.” He pauses. “I just usually get bored.”

You smile faintly at that.

“But,” he continues, glancing at you briefly, “I think it’d be infinitely less boring if you came with me.”

Your stomach flips a little. Then immediately drops.

“A party?”

Anton notices instantly.

“You don’t have to,” he says quickly. “Forget I asked.”

“No, I just…” You laugh nervously. “I don’t really go to parties.”

“Like often?”

You look at him blankly.

“…Like ever.”

Anton blinks once.

Then immediately shakes his head slightly. “Okay, never mind then. We don’t have to go.”

But weirdly enough, the idea doesn’t sound completely terrifying. Not with him. You glance over at Anton again—at the calm way he’s driving, the way his hand rests loosely near yours again, the way he never pressures you into anything. And before you can overthink it—

“I’ll go.”

Anton looks over immediately.

“Really?”

You nod slowly. “Yeah.”

A small smile spreads across his face.

“Okay,” he says softly.

You already feel nervous.

“What time?”

Anton glances back toward the road.

“Ten tonight.”

- 🩶 -

The second you walk through the dorm door, Harvey looks up from her laptop like she sensed drama entering the room.

“Well?” she asks immediately.

You kick your shoes off casually, trying and failing to act normal.

“There’s a party tonight.”

Harvey freezes. Then very slowly closes her laptop.

“A what.”

“A party.”

“With Anton?”

You nod once. Harvey stares at you for exactly two seconds before shooting up from the couch so fast it almost looks painful.

“Oh my God, I’m going.”

You blink. “What?”

“I’m absolutely going.”

“It wasn’t my invitation to hand out—”

“Text him.”

“Harvey—”

“Text him.”

You sigh dramatically but pull your phone out anyway. Anton responds almost immediately.

you can both come lol i don’t care

Harvey beams victoriously from across the room.

“I knew he liked me.”

“He tolerates you.”

“Okay, same thing.”

The next couple hours pass quickly after that. Harvey finishes her Zoom meetings while occasionally yelling things from across the room like: “WE ARE GETTING YOU PARTY HOT.” and  “TONIGHT IS ABOUT BRANDING.”

You still don’t fully know what that means. By seven-thirty, panic officially sets in. You stand in front of your closet for ten whole minutes staring at your clothes like they personally betrayed you. Nothing looks right. Everything suddenly feels either:

too plain

too dressy

too innocent

too uncomfortable

too much like someone who has never been to a college party before

Which, unfortunately, was true. You groan quietly and bury your face in your hands. For a brief second, you consider texting Anton for help. Then immediately decide against it.

One, you kind of wanted to surprise him. And two, Anton absolutely did not know more than you about what girls wore to parties.

Which is when realization strikes. You slowly lower your hands and look toward the bathroom. You literally live with a party god. Harvey is blow drying her hair when you walk in dramatically.

“I need help.”

She shuts the blow dryer off instantly.

“That bad?”

“I have nothing to wear.”

Harvey squints at you through the mirror for a second before sighing deeply like this burden has been placed upon her specifically by fate.

“Move.”

You follow her back into your room where she immediately starts digging through your closet with increasing disappointment.

“…You dress like a kindergarten teacher who drinks tea.”

“I like sweaters.”

“You own seventeen cardigans.”

“They’re cute.”

“They’re devastating.”

Eventually, after another minute of searching, Harvey turns toward you decisively.

“No. We’re using my clothes.”

Your eyes widen instantly.

“Harvey, I can’t wear your stuff”

“Yes you can. Stop being dramatic.”

Ten minutes later, she emerges from her closet holding your fate in her hands. A gold sequined mini skirt. A matching gold corset-style top with rhinestones. And gold heels. You stare at the outfit in fear.

“That is tiny.”

“It’s fashion.”

“That is underwear with like… aspirations.”

Harvey physically shoves the clothes into your arms.

“Go.”

And somehow… somehow, she was right. After doing your makeup, curling your hair, and helping you accessorize, the final result shocks even you. You looked good. Like… really good. 

The gold made your skin glow, your hair fell perfectly around your shoulders, and for once you actually felt older than nineteen. Confident. Pretty. Maybe even a little dangerous.

Harvey, meanwhile, looked insane in the best way possible—a black mini dress, glossy lips, red-bottom heels, and enough confidence to power a small city.

When you finally hear knocking at the door around ten, your confidence immediately evaporates.

“Oh my God.”

Harvey grins at your panic through the mirror.

“What?”

“What if this is too much?”

“It’s not.”

“What if he thinks I look weird?”

“He literally looks at you like you invented happiness.”

You groan quietly and try fixing your hair again. Harvey grabs your shoulders dramatically.

“Listen to me,” she says firmly. “You are hot. Anton is obsessed with you. Everything is fine.”

Before you can argue further, she marches to the door herself and swings it open.

“Anton!” she greets brightly.

You hover awkwardly near the hallway for half a second before finally stepping into view. And immediately— Anton goes completely still. Like genuinely still. One hand still on the doorframe. Eyes locked on you. His brain visibly stops functioning.

Your confidence disappears all over again. Suddenly you’re hyperaware of everything—the skirt, the heels, your makeup, the way he’s staring. Harvey looks between the two of you smugly.

“Close your mouth a little,” she tells him casually.

Anton blinks hard like he just came back to earth.

“I—”

He stops. Tries again.

“You look…”

His eyes flick over you once more before quickly returning to your face like he’s trying very hard to be respectful and failing slightly.

“…Really pretty.”

Your cheeks instantly heat.

“Thank you,” you say softly.

Anton rubs the back of his neck slightly, suddenly looking shy himself.

“No, like…” He laughs quietly under his breath. “Wow.”

Harvey beams like she personally handcrafted the reaction.

“I know,” she says proudly.

Anton finally tears his eyes away from you long enough to glance at her.

“Oh, you look nice too.”

Harvey narrows her eyes immediately.

“Wow. What a downgrade.”

You laugh despite yourself while Anton groans quietly.

“That’s not what I meant.”

“Mhm.”

But even while Harvey teases him the entire walk downstairs, every time you glance over at Anton— he’s still looking at you like he can’t quite believe you’re real.

The car ride to the party is significantly less relaxing than the drive to the bookstore café earlier. Mostly because Harvey is in the backseat. And Harvey, unfortunately, believes silence is a personal failure.

She leans forward between the seats approximately thirty seconds after Anton pulls away from the dorms.

“So,” she says immediately, “what exactly are we?”

You almost choke on air. Anton glances over briefly before focusing back on the road, though you catch the faint smile threatening at the corner of his mouth.

“Harvey,” you warn.

“What? I’m curious.”

“You’re nosey.”

“That too.”

Anton laughs quietly under his breath. Harvey points dramatically between the two of you from the backseat.

“You kissed.”

You immediately cover your face. Anton grips the steering wheel a little tighter.

“We did,” he admits carefully.

“It’s not that big of a deal,” you mumble.

“It absolutely is,” Harvey argues. “You’ve liked each other for, like, seven years emotionally.”

Anton laughs again at that while your face burns.

“Okay,” Harvey continues. “Next question. Who said it first?”

You blink. “Said what?”

“That you liked each other.”

Both you and Anton go suspiciously quiet. Harvey’s mouth drops open.

“You BOTH just existed silently in love?”

“We were not in love,” you say quickly.

Anton clears his throat beside you. “Yeah.”

Harvey narrows her eyes. “Mhm.”

Some questions are easier. How you met. Who made the first move. (Technically you, though Anton argued the coffee from the secondary day you met should count for something.)

Other questions are significantly worse.

“So,” Harvey says casually at one point, “who fell first?”

You immediately look out the window. Anton suddenly becomes deeply focused on traffic. Harvey gasps dramatically.

“Oh my God, neither of you know.”

“No, we’re just ignoring this question,” you decide.

“Cowards.”

But eventually the embarrassment melts into laughter anyway.

The three of you spend the rest of the drive joking around, Harvey teasing both of you relentlessly while Anton occasionally fires back surprisingly good comebacks that make you laugh harder than they probably should. By the time you pull up to the house, your nerves are buzzing all over again. The party is definitely a college party.

Music pulses loudly enough to feel through the car doors, groups of people crowd the front yard, and lights glow through every downstairs window. Your stomach immediately flips. Anton notices before you even say anything.

“You okay?”

You glance over at him. He’s already looking at you softly again.

You nod once. “Yeah.”

You think you are.

The second you step out of the car, Anton naturally falls into step beside you. Harvey wanders slightly ahead, already distracted by people and noise, while Anton stays close enough that your shoulders occasionally brush. As you approach the front steps, his hand settles lightly against the small of your back. Warm. Protective. Guiding. Your heartbeat instantly speeds up. At the front door, a tall guy with messy dark hair immediately spots Anton from across the room.

“Anton!”

The guy pushes through a couple people before pulling Anton into one of those complicated guy handshakes you’ll never understand.

“Thought you weren’t coming,” he says.

“Wasn’t planning to,” Anton replies.

Then the guy’s eyes shift toward you. Immediately his expression changes into something knowing.

“Ohhh,” he says slowly.

Your face warms instantly.

He looks back at Anton. “This your girl?”

And without hesitation—

Anton says, “Yeah.”

Just like that. Simple. Certain. Like it’s obvious. Your stomach flips so hard it’s honestly concerning. The guy grins immediately.

“I’m Seunghan,” he tells you.

You introduce yourself quietly while trying very hard not to think too hard about the way Anton just referred to you.

Your girl.

Your girl.

You might actually pass away.

After a little more conversation, Anton gently guides you farther inside, his hand still resting against your back while you move through crowded rooms full of loud conversations and music. The house is warm. Too warm, honestly. People dance in the living room, others crowd around tables, and somewhere upstairs someone is yelling the lyrics to a song terribly off-key.

You stay close to Anton instinctively. Not because you’re scared exactly. Just overwhelmed. He notices every time. Every single time. Eventually you reach the kitchen, where drinks cover almost the entire counter.

Anton looks down at you. “You good?”

You nod once before glancing nervously toward the alcohol. Anton follows your gaze immediately. Then, gently:

“Have you ever drank before?”

You hesitate.

“…No.”

He doesn’t react badly. Doesn’t pressure you. Doesn’t tease you. He just nods once like that answer is perfectly fine.

“We don’t have to,” he says easily.

But weirdly enough, you want to try. Maybe because you’re already here. Maybe because you trust him. Maybe because you like the idea of experiencing new things with Anton specifically. So after a second, you quietly say—

“Can you make me something?”

Anton looks surprised for half a second before smiling softly.

“Yeah,” he says. “Of course.”

You watch carefully while he mixes something together, explaining each thing he’s adding so you know exactly what you’re drinking.

“It’s light,” he promises. “And it doesn’t taste terrible.”

“That sounds reassuring.”

He laughs quietly while handing you the cup. You stare at it suspiciously before taking a careful sip. Immediately, your face twists. Anton physically laughs.

“It’s bad!”

“It’s 90% juice.”

“It tastes angry.”

He’s laughing hard enough now that he has to look away briefly. You glare at him before trying another sip anyway. This one goes down slightly better. Until suddenly you cough unexpectedly from the burn. Anton’s entire demeanor changes immediately.

“You okay?”

You nod while coughing once more. “Yeah— yeah.”

He gently takes the cup from your hands for a second.

“You don’t have to drink it.”

“I’m okay,” you insist quickly, laughing a little now too. “I just wasn’t expecting that.”

Anton studies your face carefully like he’s genuinely checking for distress. Then finally, once he’s sure you’re alright, he smiles again. And God. The way he’s looking at you right now— like you’re the cutest thing he’s ever seen— might honestly be more intoxicating than the drink itself.

The party gets easier after that. Or maybe you just get lighter. A little warmer. A little less stuck inside your own head.

You and Anton stay mostly in the kitchen, occasionally drifting into conversations with people he knows before eventually finding your way back to each other again.

Harvey disappears at least twice, reappears with chips once, and at one point announces she’s “networking socially” before vanishing upstairs with a group of girls. You don’t question it.

Anton only drinks a little. You notice that pretty quickly. Especially compared to everyone else around you.

“You’re barely drinking,” you point out eventually.

Anton shrugs lightly, leaning back against the counter beside you.

“I’m driving.”

“You can still drink a little.”

“I am drinking a little.”

“That was like half a sip.”

He smiles faintly into his cup.

“I wanna be sober enough to get you home safely.”

Something about the way he says it makes warmth spread through your chest again. Like taking care of you is the most natural thing in the world to him. At some point, you end up sitting atop the kitchen island while Anton stands between your knees, one hand loosely holding his drink while the other rests casually beside you against the counter.

The music is louder now. The house warmer. Your body feels pleasantly fuzzy in a way you’ve never really experienced before. Not out of control. Just softer around the edges. You laugh easier. Talk easier. And honestly, a huge part of it probably isn’t even the alcohol. 

It’s Anton. The way he keeps leaning closer to hear you. The way his eyes stay on your face even when the room around you is chaos. The way he looks at you like you’re the only person here he actually wants to talk to.

“You’re smiling a lot,” he points out quietly.

You blink. “Am I?”

“Mhm.”

“Maybe I’m happy.”

Anton’s expression softens immediately.

“Good.”

Your stomach flips again. You’re about to say something back when suddenly—

“Anton!”

A girl’s voice cuts through the kitchen loudly. Before either of you can react, someone practically launches themselves toward him. A pretty girl with long dark hair wraps her arms around Anton excitedly.

You go still immediately. She squeals his name dramatically while hugging him. And completely ignores you. Anton catches himself after about half a second, awkwardly patting her back before gently pulling away.

“Oh— hey, Jennie.”

You notice it instantly. The slight tension in his shoulders. The way his smile doesn’t fully reach his eyes anymore. Jennie either doesn’t notice or doesn’t care.

“Oh my God, I haven’t seen you in forever,” she says quickly. “Where have you been?”

“Busy,” Anton replies simply.

“How’ve you been?”

“Good.”

Very short answers. Almost painfully short. You stare quietly down into your cup. Jennie keeps talking anyway. You can practically feel yourself shrinking sitting there while she stands close to him, touching his arm every few seconds while she talks.

And then finally— finally— she notices you.

Her eyes flick over slowly. Up and down. Taking in your outfit, your makeup, the fact that you’re sitting extremely close to Anton. Then she smiles. And immediately you know it’s fake. Not mean exactly. Just… sharp around the edges.

“Oh,” she says lightly. “Hi.”

Your stomach twists. You smile politely anyway.

“Hi.”

“This is…” Jennie trails off, looking toward Anton expectantly.

Anton answers immediately.

“This is my girlfriend.”

Your heart still reacts embarrassingly hard to it. You knew he probably just said it because explaining our actual relationship would take too long - but, still.

Jennie’s smile twitches almost invisibly.

“Cute,” she says.

You don’t know for sure. But you’re about eighty percent certain this is one of the girls Anton used to hook up with freshman year. Something about the familiarity. The confidence. The way she’s looking at him.

Jennie turns her attention toward you again.

“I love your outfit,” she says sweetly.

You can’t tell if she means it.

“Thank you.”

“Where’d you get your top?”

You blink slightly, suddenly feeling weirdly put on the spot.

“Oh— um. My roommate actually let me borrow it.”

Jennie nods slowly like she’s evaluating you for some reason.

“You’re a freshman, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Aww.”

You smile awkwardly. Anton shifts slightly closer to you. Small. Subtle.

But enough that his body brushes your knee.

Jennie keeps talking anyway, mostly to Anton honestly, bringing up people and stories you obviously weren’t there for. You try to follow along politely, nodding every once in a while even though you mostly feel out of place now. Smaller. A little stupid, honestly. Especially when Jennie laughs and says: “You used to be so much more fun freshman year.”

Your stomach tightens slightly. Anton’s expression changes immediately.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Jennie blinks innocently. “Nothing bad.”

But the air shifts anyway. You suddenly become very aware of your drink in your hands. Of how dressed up you are. Of how inexperienced you are compared to girls like her. Jennie turns back toward you again.

“So how long have you guys been together?”

Before you can panic about the answer, Anton speaks calmly.

“Not long.”

Jennie hums knowingly. Then her eyes flick back toward him.

“Well,” she says lightly, “don’t disappear again.”

Anton gives a polite nod.

“Mhm.”

And somehow, despite how kind he’s being, it’s painfully obvious he wants this conversation to end. Eventually, Jennie finally excuses herself after another minute.

“It was nice meeting you,” she tells you.

“You too,” you answer automatically.

The second she disappears into the crowd, the silence between you and Anton feels completely different. He immediately looks back at you.

“You okay?”

You nod too quickly. “Yeah.”

Anton studies your face carefully.

“You sure?”

You take another sip of your drink to avoid answering right away. And unfortunately, the alcohol makes it harder to hide the tiny sting of insecurity sitting in your chest now.

Something shifts after Jennie leaves. Not dramatically. Not enough for anyone else to notice. But enough that you feel it. The conversation between you and Anton continues, technically. He still stands close to you, still checks on you every couple minutes, still listens when you speak.

But your brain won’t stop replaying things.

“You used to be so much more fun freshman year.”

You know it shouldn’t bother you this much. You know Anton didn’t do anything wrong. Actually, if anything, he handled it perfectly. But still.

You suddenly feel very aware of the differences between you and girls like Jennie. Girls who knew how to flirt effortlessly. Girls who had experience. Girls who belonged at parties like this. Meanwhile, you were sitting on a kitchen counter trying not to cough after two sips of alcohol. You hate that the comparison gets to you.

And honestly, the alcohol makes it worse. Everything feels slightly blurrier now. Softer. More emotional. You keep trying to shake it off. Anton notices you getting quieter almost immediately.

“You okay?” he asks again after a while.

You nod automatically.

“Mhm.”

But your smile feels smaller now. The music feels louder. The party suddenly feels too crowded. You haven’t seen Harvey in almost an hour either, though you’re honestly not worried. Harvey could survive most natural disasters entirely off confidence alone. Eventually your phone buzzes in your hand.

Harvey:

SEUNGHAN IS HOT BTW i’m staying here tonight don’t wait up

You stare at the text for a second.

Then another one immediately appears.

Harvey:

DW, USING PROTECTION ❤️

You physically gag.

Anton notices instantly. “What?”

You turn your phone toward him. He reads the messages once. Then immediately covers his face with one hand while laughing quietly.

“That sounds like Harvey.”

“She’s disgusting.”

“Mhm.”

Despite yourself, you laugh too. But the weird feeling still lingers underneath everything. And unfortunately, you keep drinking. Not a dangerous amount. Just enough that the warmth spreads deeper into your limbs and your thoughts start slipping out easier.

At some point, you stop sitting on the counter and practically melt into Anton’s side instead. Your head rests against his shoulder while he talks to someone from one of his classes, your fingers loosely curled around the front of his shirt without even realizing it.

You’re clingier now. Much clingier. And honestly? Anton seems to find it adorable. Every few minutes he looks down at you with this unbearably soft expression that makes your stomach flip even in your current state. But eventually, when you reach for another drink, Anton gently catches your wrist.

“I think that’s enough.”

You blink up at him slowly.

“I’m fine.”

“I know.” He smiles faintly. “But tomorrow-you won’t be.”

You pout slightly. Anton laughs quietly under his breath.

“You drank on an empty stomach.”

You immediately point at him accusingly. “That sounds like your fault.”

“How?”

“You were supposed to feed me.”

Anton shakes his head, still smiling.

“You’re done drinking.”

You groan dramatically but let him take the cup from your hands anyway. The room feels warmer now. Too warm. You bury your face briefly into his shoulder with a sigh.

“Tired?” he asks softly.

“No.”

A pause.

“…Maybe.”

Anton rubs your arm gently.

“You’re getting sleepy.”

You shake your head stubbornly against him.

“I wanna stay.”

“You say that now,”

“I’m serious.”

Anton looks down at you for a second. And you can practically see the exact moment he realizes something. He knows. Soon you’re going to get sick. Not immediately. But soon.

Your eyes are glossy now, movements slower, body heavier against his. And because Anton is unfortunately responsible and caring and annoyingly good at taking care of you— he makes a decision.

“I think we should go home.”

You immediately lift your head. “What?”

“You need water and food and sleep.”

“No, I’m okay.”

Anton gives you a look.

You grab lightly onto his sleeve. “I wanna stay with you.”

Your voice comes out softer than intended. Almost needy. Anton’s entire expression changes instantly. His eyes soften so much it physically hurts you a little.

“I know,” he says quietly.

Then even gentler:

“But if we stay longer, you’re gonna feel horrible later.”

You sigh dramatically and lean against him again.

“You’re too responsible.”

“I’ve been told.”

You stay stubborn for another minute anyway, mumbling weak arguments while Anton patiently talks you through every single one. You were never going to win. Not when he’s looking at you like that. Not when his hand keeps brushing your hair back gently. Not when his voice gets all soft and careful. Eventually, with one final exhausted sigh, you give in.

“Fine.”

Anton smiles faintly. “Thank you.”

“You manipulated me.”

“Mhm.”

“I’m serious.”

“I know.”

But he still presses a tiny kiss against the top of your head afterward like a reward for cooperating. And somehow that makes agreeing worth it anyway.

- 🩶 -

The car ride back is quieter than usual. Not uncomfortable exactly. Just… different. The kind of quiet that feels like your thoughts are louder than anything either of you could say.

Anton keeps one hand on the wheel, the other resting lightly on your thigh like he never even considered moving it. His touch is steady—warm, grounding. Like he’s trying to keep you anchored without needing to say anything.

You stare out the window most of the time. Streetlights blur softly past. The city feels distant in a way it didn’t earlier. When the dorm building finally comes into view, something tightens in your chest. Anton parks smoothly near the entrance and cuts the engine.

For a moment, neither of you moves. The silence stretches again. Then you turn your head slowly toward him.

“Do you actually like me?” you ask.

Your voice comes out smaller than you expected. Anton blinks once. Then immediately turns toward you fully, confused.

“What?”

You swallow.

“I just—” You hesitate, suddenly aware of how your words sound. “Do you actually like me?”

His expression shifts instantly. Softens. Concerned.

“Of course I do,” he says quickly. “Where is this coming from?”

You look down at your hands.

“I don’t know.”

That’s the honest answer. But it doesn’t feel like enough. Anton watches you carefully, like he’s trying to understand what changed in the last hour. You sink a little further into the seat, voice quieter now.

“It just… feels like maybe I’m not—” You stop yourself, shaking your head slightly. “Never mind.”

“No,” he says gently. “Finish.”

You hesitate. Then it all spills out anyway, messy and unfiltered.

“It feels like maybe you like me, but like… not enough.” You swallow hard. “Like you’ve been with other people and I don’t know. I just… I don’t know really know how to do this”

Anton’s entire face changes. Not irritated. Not distant. Just immediately attentive in a way that makes your throat tighten more.

“Hey,” he says softly. “Look at me.”

You do, reluctantly. His hand leaves the wheel for a second and rests closer to you again, not gripping—just there.

“I like you,” he says clearly. “A lot.”

You blink.

“And—” he continues, a little slower now, choosing his words carefully, “I’m not going to compare you to anyone else. And I’m not going to treat you like someone I’m trying to impress by rushing things.”

Your chest tightens. You glance away again. He continues anyway, voice steady.

“I know this is new for you,” he says. “I know you haven’t done a lot of this before. And I don’t want you to feel like you have to catch up to anyone.”

You go quiet. The insecurity is still there, but it shifts slightly now—less sharp, more embarrassed. Anton exhales softly.

“And I would absolutely like to do more,” he adds honestly, a faint, slightly awkward smile appearing. “But I don’t want to do it in a way that makes you feel pressured or like you’re supposed to be something you’re not ready to be yet.”

That hits differently. You stare at him for a moment.

“…Oh.”

Anton’s expression softens again.

“I like you,” he repeats quietly. “Not some idea of you. You.”

Your throat feels tight in a different way now. More frustrating than sad. Because part of you realizes what this really is. Not him not wanting you. Him trying too hard to make sure he doesn’t lose you. You let out a small breath, looking down at your lap.

“I’m being stupid,” you mutter.

“You’re not,” Anton says immediately.

You shake your head slightly anyway.

“I just…” You hesitate again, quieter. “I saw her and I don’t know. I guess I just… felt like I was behind or something.”

Anton’s brows knit slightly.

“Jennie?”

You nod once. He goes quiet for a second.

Then he says gently, “You’re not behind anything.”

You don’t answer. Because you’re not sure you believe it yet. Anton watches you carefully, then adds a little softer:

“I’m not comparing you to anyone either.”

That finally makes your shoulders loosen just slightly. You exhale, rubbing your thumb against your fingers.

“…Okay.”

It’s quiet again after that. But it’s not the same kind of quiet as before. This one feels like it’s settling. Understanding, even if it’s a little uncomfortable. Anton squeezes your thigh lightly once, grounding.

“You okay?” he asks again, softer now.

You hesitate. Then nod.

“Yeah,” you say quietly. “I think so.”

Anton studies you for a second longer, like he’s making sure. Then he gives a small nod back.

“Okay.”

Neither of you moves right away.

The dorm lights glow through the windshield.

And for the first time since the party started, you feel like you’re actually back in your own body again—just a little overwhelmed, a little embarrassed, but still here. Still with him.

Maybe it was the alcohol, but you suddenly felt bold. Bold enough that you unbuckle your seatbelt and lean over towards him. You can tell by the look in his eyes he knows what you’re about to do. But before he could hesitate, you press your lips to his. 

It starts off gentle, he tastes slightly like the alcohol from earlier. You didn’t realize how much you missed kissing him like this until now. After a couple more seconds the kiss depends and your tongues gently softly brush against each other

Your fingers tangle in his hair and he reaches over the console between you two, holding your waist gently. This is a feeling you’ve never felt before - your body felt warm and tingly, more than before. You just didn’t want to stop kissing him, as if you needed him. 

His touches were gentle, his mouth soft on yours. One of his hands moves from your waist to your jaw, holding it gently. He was good at this. How was he so good at this?

Nevermind, you knew how he was good at this, but you didn’t want to think about that right now. Right now he was with you, not anyone else. It didn’t matter that you weren’t as experienced as him, that’s what he said. But is it the truth? You shove your feelings in the back of your mind as you focus back on kissing him. Your hands trail down his arms before crawling up and underneath his shirt. He immediately makes a soft sound that makes your tummy flip. His freezes before pulling back and catching his breath. 

You look up at him and he’s already looking at you. He sighs before holding both of your hands and giving you a sincere look.

“I’m sorry, I let this go too far,”

His face looks almost ashamed, and you’re immediately concerned.

“What do you mean? We don’t have to stop, I liked that.”

As soon as your hand reaches for his face again, he stops you and shakes his head gently.

“You’re drunk.”

Those words hit you like a bus. It was true, no matter how much you wanted this - you weren’t thinking straight. You weren’t sober. You suddenly feel embarrassed. Like really embarrassed. Anton seems to notice this and quickly tries to reassure you.

“I liked it, trust me I really did. You don’t know how bad I want to… but I want you to make that decision to take that step with me when you’re in the right state of mind.”

You just muster a nod, looking down at his hands.

“Okay.”

After a few quiet seconds in the car, Anton shifts first—like he’s making a decision.

“Okay,” he says softly. “Let’s get you inside.”

You nod, a little slower than usual, still feeling the lingering warmth of the night and the soft haze in your thoughts. He gets out first, circles around, and opens your door like always. This time, though, his movements are extra careful. Like he’s keeping you steady without making it obvious he is.

The cool night air hits you the second you step out, and it helps a little—enough to make your thoughts feel slightly less foggy around the edges. Still, you instinctively drift closer to him. Anton notices immediately, of course he does. His hand finds the small of your back as you walk, slow and steady toward the building.

The dorm hallway is quiet when you get inside. Echoes of the party still cling to you in a distant, muffled way, but here it’s calmer. Safer. Familiar.

The stairs feel longer than usual. You take them slowly, and Anton matches your pace without complaint, one step behind you in case you stumble. Every so often his hand hovers near your arm, ready without being obvious about it.

By the time you reach your door, your steps finally stop. Anton does too. There’s a pause. Not awkward. Just… suspended.

You turn to face him fully. He’s standing close—closer than he usually does in public spaces, but still careful. His eyes are already on you, soft and attentive, like he’s waiting to make sure you’re okay before anything else.

You don’t really think about it. Not properly. Your emotions feel louder than your logic right now, everything still a little too warm, a little too blurred at the edges. 

You lift your hands. Anton stills slightly when your palms come up to his face. Not pulling away. Just… pausing. You gently hold his cheeks like you’re trying to make sure he’s real.

“Are you mine?” you ask quietly.

The words come out soft. Fragile. Anton’s expression changes instantly. Not confusion. Not amusement. Just concern—deep, immediate, careful concern.

He exhales slowly through his nose, and his hands come up gently to rest over your wrists, not removing them, just grounding them.

“Hey,” he says softly.

Your eyes stay on his. He searches your face for a second longer, and whatever he sees there makes his expression soften even more. He leans in just slightly—not closing the distance, just enough that his voice is quieter when he speaks.

“You’re a little out of it right now,” he says gently.

You blink slowly.

“I’m okay,” you insist, but it comes out softer than you meant.

“I know,” he replies immediately. “But you’re not thinking fully straight.”

That lands differently. Not harsh. Just real. His thumbs rub lightly against your wrists, steadying.

“I like you,” he continues, voice calm. “A lot. But I’m not going to answer something like that when you’re not fully here with me.”

Your chest tightens a little. Confused. Emotional. Maybe a little frustrated, but not at him. At yourself. Anton’s expression softens further when he notices that shift.

“Hey,” he says again, quieter. “Look at me.”

You do. He smiles faintly—not teasing, not distant. Just warm.

“I’m here,” he reassures you. “Okay? I’m not going anywhere.”

A pause. Then, gently:

“But I need you to go inside, drink some water, and get some sleep.”

Your hands slowly slide down from his face, like the energy to hold them there finally fades. Anton doesn’t let go of your wrists immediately though—just lingers there for a second longer to make sure you’re steady.

Then he slowly releases you. The moment you’re no longer holding onto him, something in your chest feels oddly empty. You swallow.

“…Okay,” you mumble.

He nods once.

“That’s my girl,” he says softly, almost instinctively.

Your stomach flips even through the haze.

Then he steps back just enough to give you space to unlock the door. You fumble slightly with your keys, but he doesn’t rush you. Just waits. Patient. Constant. 

When the lock finally clicks, you pause again. Turn back toward him. He’s still watching you. Still soft. Still careful. You don’t say anything this time. Just give him a small, tired look that tries to hold everything you’re feeling at once. Anton seems to understand anyway.

“Goodnight,” he says gently.

You nod.

“…Goodnight.”

Then you step inside.

Before the door fully closes, you hear him add quietly—

“I’ll text you when I get home.”

And you nod once more, even though he might not see it. The door shuts softly behind you. And only then do you realize how much quieter everything feels without him right there.

—

TAGLIST: @oncyanii @rickittys @taetaebambi @kingsoowolves @letterstohyeon @sugu81 @rixieisfreaky @emislove @yoursyuno @byunchoi @luvkeiiii @rawrxnne @deighsees

[astrogirlangel]

what doja said

[evawwave]

Doubting Online Love. Park Wonbin

Part 1: Reader's POV

onlinebestfriend!wonbin x onlinebestfriend!reader, reader is neutral gender. Story based on a real situation.

the screen glows in the dim light of your room, casting a soft blue hue over your face. It's 2am, and your fingers are hovering over the keyboard, but your attention is entirely on the past messages you had with Wonbin. the man of your dreams. ​you've known each other for a year now and that friendship somehow feels more tangible than the people you usually know. A man being sweet, funny, comforting, and handsome as well, is everything that weakens you, that makes you head over heels.

​wonbin is everything you typically avoid in a person. He is loud in his enthusiasm, he loves to yap about his day, his frustrations, the details of his life that he insists on sharing with you. he is social, surrounded by a constellation of friends, yet he always orbits back to you. you've got your own world, your own circle, but in the hierarchy of your heart, he occupies the throne. He is your priority, the person you check for first thing in the morning and the last thought before you drift off to sleep.

​your feelings are a tide. they pull back, leaving you content in the safety of just being "best friends," only to surge forward a few months later, making your heart stutter every time his name pops up on your lock screen. It's a cycle you've come to accept. You tell yourself it’s just the comfort of the connection, that natural, invisible thread that binds you two across the distance.

​but deep down, in the spaces between the jokes, the disagreements, the late night calls, you know the truth: he is your anchor. he is the last man you ever imagine needing, the only one who has managed to dismantle your defenses without even trying.

​wonbin is no longer just a friend, he is the atmosphere you breathe. He follows you in your mind when you're walking in the school hallways, echoing in your mind during lectures, his presence a constant hum beneath every task you perform. While your classmates are discussing about exams or weekend plans, you are elsewhere, living in the space between his latest message and the next one.

​It’s become a ritual of devotion. When he drops a comment in your group chat and the others scroll past it, leaving him hanging, you are the first to strike. You swoop in to acknowledge him, your thumb hovering over the screen like a loyal sentry. You are his only witness, the only one keeping a tally of his thoughts. Sometimes, you wonder if the others notice the speed of your replies, the way your attention is solely tethered to his digital footprint. Does the way you mirror his online activity, popping up the second his status turns green, give you away? You don’t care. You're too obsessed to worry about optics.

​your physical world has grown quiet, almost desolate. your real life friends have become background noise, their faces hazy and unimportant compared to the crisp, glowing clarity of wonbin's texts. why bother building bridges with people who are physically present but emotionally distant, when you have the love of your life right there in your hands, 24/7?

​it’s an intoxicating kind of isolation. you've traded the tangible for the virtual, convincing yourself that this specific, hyper focused connection is superior to anything else. after all, who wouldn't be addicted? who could walk away from the feeling of being the only person who truly sees him?

You get outside in your balcony to get some air after finishing watching the new episode of your series of the moment, as you get a notification of Wonbin's Instagram close friends story update. He’s sent a mirror selfie from the gym. captioning about how he "finally" lost weight, that has been his goal for months and that makes you smile. "Fuck, he's so fine..." You mutter under your breath. That would be very awkward if you told him word by word what you think of this photo. You and Wonbin barely say compliments to each other. But he already liked two of your selfies, which means already a lot: He finds you pretty. So you liked his story as well, to return the favor.

You decided to open your DMs with him now that you noticed that he's online. The screen light is harsh against your face, but you barely notice. Your thumb moves up and down, flicking upward, watching the blur of months of conversation fly by.

​Then, you stop.

​There it is. Three words, simple and unadorned, sitting in a bubble sent three months ago: "I love you."

​Back then, those words didn't land. They were muffled, drowned out by the noise of a relationship that was already rotting from the inside. You were so occupied with your cheating ex, wasting your tears on someone who didn't deserve your attention, that you treated Wonbin’s confession like a casual, platonic sentiment. You had brushed it off, and even chuckled at his dramatic nature.

​But tonight, the air in the balcony feels heavy with the weight of it. ​Read now, in the silence of your solitude, those words hit with the force of a physical blow. You wonder if he still thinks like this way until this day.

Does he? You've never get to know what he truly feels about you. ​​the frustration is a bitter, cold knot in your stomach. You look at your DMs with him, and the imbalance is glaring. it's a ledger of your own desperation: screen after screen where you are the one reaching out, you are the one starting the conversation, you are the one trying to bridge the gap. you feel like a ghost haunting his inbox, pulling strings to make a puppet dance, praying for a sign that he's actually there.

"​what am I to him?"

​the question circles your mind. are you just a convenient echo chamber for his boredom?

​you scroll back to the "i love you" text from three months ago. Did it even mean anything, or was it just a casualty of his fleeting moods? the paranoia begins to bloom, dark and invasive. You start to dissect every interaction, wondering if you were ever truly the priority you convinced yourself you were.

​and then, the worst thought of all takes root, sharper and more painful than any other: What if there is someone else?

​what if while you are sitting in the dark, tethered to the glow of your phone and losing touch with everyone around you, he is out there giving his attention, his real, tangible presence, to someone who doesn't have to wait a day for a reply?

​the fantasy of your "natural connection" begins to fray at the edges. you realize you’ve been building a temple for a god who might not even be listening. you are the only one worshipping, the only one keeping the candles lit, and suddenly, the fear that he might never answer your questions, that he might never let you past the walls of his digital charm, feels like an impending, inevitable truth.

You updated your Instagram note, targeted to him: "Stop giving me mixed signals." You go back inside your room and drop your phone onto the bed as if it's suddenly burned you. The silence of your room feels heavier now, amplified by your own audacity. ​part of you, the part that is still so dangerously obsessed, is holding its breath, waiting for a DM, a reply, anything to prove that he noticed, that he cares enough to ask what’s wrong. But the voice of your experience is louder, colder. You know the pattern: he only cares when it’s convenient. He is a master of selective affection, appearing in your life like a warm sun only to eclipse himself whenever he grows bored or distracted by the real world. ​You lay back, staring up at the ceiling, feeling the familiar, acidic sting of frustration. You've signaled your pain, and yet, the needle on the compass remains stuck, pointing toward his indifference.

It's all because of that lack of communication. You need to catch yourself up. He's the man of your dreams and you can't miss that. So you broke the silence again and sent him a text.

"Hello, how are you? Have you eaten? I know we haven't talked in a day but I still think about you, and I miss you a lot. do you even miss me?"

You turned off the phone and immediately went to sleep. Not wanting to regret, because you've got one life. And If you wanted to reach for what you craved for so long, You had to do it.

To be continued...

[wenoberry]

going FERAL over blonde sohee I'm not even kidding

[riizebangtan]

BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE BLONDE SOHEE AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

[andmaeve]

ANTON LEE— seeing your sign with your # at their concert

Content: anton pretends to be a fan, fluff, crack, friendship, nothing crazy just yet

A/N: I was scrolling on Pinterest and saw some aesthetic photo with an idea like the title so I thought it’d be fun to make it a smau story. Could potentially turn into a series but we’ll see ;) enjoyuh!

SERIES HERE!— (on going)

for context, you and your bsf thought it’d be a genius idea to put your phone number on a sign at the RIIZE concert you both were attending together. Expecting nothing but a night of unsuccess, a day goes by and little do you know, someone actually answers.

©andmaeve | 𝑫𝒐 𝒏𝒐𝒕 𝒕𝒓𝒂𝒏𝒔𝒍𝒂𝒕𝒆, 𝑴𝒐𝒅𝒊𝒇𝒚, 𝑷𝒍𝒂𝒈𝒊𝒂𝒓𝒊𝒛𝒆 𝒎𝒚 𝒘𝒐𝒓𝒌. 𝑻𝒉𝒂𝒏𝒌 𝒚𝒐𝒖

[wenoberry]

Sooo.. Who's gonna write it for us???

[antonsprincess]

i will sit right there don’t play with me lee sohee ❤️‍🩹

[aeritakus]

﹏⠀⠀ ⠀⠀⠀⁺ ⠀DOWN BAD LOSER! ⠀ ⁺⠀⠀⠀𔗨⠀⠀﹏

sypnosis. finally accomplishing the dream of going to college with your long distance best friend , life seems to be at an absolute high so far ! your dormmates are cool as fuck , you're making a ton of new friends , classes are lowkey a breeze , absolutely nothing could go wrong ! that's until you learn more about her family history when going back to her hometown for break and meet her unfortunately cute older stepbrother . now how are you supposed to tell your best friend you've fallen completely head over heels for some down bad loser who's related to her ? featuring. @wynrosie as yn , anna of meovv , stella of hearts2hearts , lexi of girlset , mackiah and kyrell of ampersandone , jo and maki of &team , yechan of 82major , keeho of p1harmony , anton and sohee of riize , gyuvin of zerobaseone , jake of enhypen , more to be introduced .. warnings. fat jokes , excessive cussing , small typos , lmk if there are more ! pairing. anton x fem!reader status. ongoing , 03. 25. 2026 – ??? taglist. open! ask to be tagged ♡ @luvkeiiii @aphantassia @jvngw0nlvr @rawrxnne @adidistupipi @oncyanii @love4yubin @meeoowchi @yougotmeoohlala @tonddosstar @luvvyushii @m1korwia @nishimoona @emislove @xoanton @banez @woonhakworld @sugu81 @jellyousq @rixieisfreaky @sugarwater-cyanide @yuu-kizx @kyubing

﹙goated roomies﹚ ⠀ ﹒ ⠀ ﹟fugly neighbors ⠀ ﹒ ⠀ absolute losers！

⠀ 𓏴⠀⠀ 𓌔𓌔⠀⠀acceptance day ⠀ 𓏴⠀⠀ 𓌔𓌔⠀⠀meet and greet ⠀ 𓏴⠀⠀ 𓌔𓌔⠀⠀desperate times ⠀ 𓏴⠀⠀ 𓌔𓌔⠀⠀holy regrets ( wc. 550 ) ⠀ 𓏴⠀⠀ 𓌔𓌔⠀⠀mark lee is not back again ( wc. 872 ) ⠀ 𓏴⠀⠀ 𓌔𓌔⠀⠀pell hall hell ⠀ 𓏴⠀⠀ 𓌔𓌔⠀⠀break break break ⠀ 𓏴⠀⠀ 𓌔𓌔⠀⠀home sweet home ( wc. 953 ) ⠀ 𓏴⠀⠀ 𓌔𓌔⠀⠀what's your type? ( wc. 1.2k ) ⠀ 𓏴⠀⠀ 𓌔𓌔⠀⠀basement yard ( wc. 930 ) ⠀ 𓏴⠀⠀ 𓌔𓌔⠀⠀you gonna holler at your boy? ( wc. 1.1k ) ⠀ 𓏴⠀⠀ 𓌔𓌔⠀⠀uh oh, awkward! ( wc . 425 )

⠀ 𓏴⠀⠀ 𓌔𓌔⠀⠀extra: ucla brothers

[ailanailass]

Wonbin is so hot

[wontonsoooup]

݁ ˖Ი𐑼⋆ terrapin ⠀.ᐟ

your first semester at uni! university is known as a "fresh start" to get rid of the past. and maybe, you'll meet the boy of your future?

pair: campuscrush!anton x fem!reader.

genre: fluff, strangers - situationship - more? short smau series hehe 🐶

TABLE OF CONTENTS

pfs : ycjs🦄🌈💘 , soccerbooizz🍅

OO1: first day

OO2: when we laid eyes

OO3: matchmaker of the year

OO4: walk to class

before you continue: kys/kms jokes, swearing, my kind of humor, inaccurate timestamps, this MAY suck pls bare wif me.. -_- slow uploads

☘️ authors note : OMGGG i can't believe its here! i've been dreading to post this but i hope you guys will be as hooked as i am rn.. YES! the title is basedof terrapin by clairo.. 🐰 anyways PLZZZ ENJOY!!! ヾ(≧▽≦*)o

[loveanton]

no way back to eighteen | lee anton

⟶ summary: in english 102 you were asked to write a letter to the future; you wrote to yourself while anton wrote to you. two years after graduation the letters return but you’re too late to be eighteen and too late to start again.

˗ˏˋpairing: nyu student!anton x f!reader ❀ genre: slow burn, friends to lovers, miscommunication trope + situationship ❀ word count:  20.8k ❀ staring: manon (18-24)- katseye, anton (18-23) + sohee (18-24)- riize, jake (25)- enhypen. ⟶ warnings: swearing, emotional cheating (present timeline), jealousy/possessiveness, miscommunication, ambiguous relationship dynamics (situationship), implied sexual content, consumption of alcohol, toxic relationship dynamic, angst, unresolved tension, “right person, wrong time,” open ending. please let me know if i’ve missed anything!

✎୭: this was so fun to write! started it last year around christmas then lost the drive but so glad i picked it back up!! i recommend listening to: before you leave me by alex warren, yard sale by alex warren, i'll be waiting by cian ducrot choir version (fun fact, this is the song that inspired this fic), phases by pretty much and this city by sam fischer. enjoy my butterflies <3

NYU freshman year

You don’t think you’ll ever forget the day you met Anton Lee.

The way he smiled as he steadied the side of your bookshelf while you fumbled with the screws. The way he pointed to the stack of novels still waiting in their box and asked you a million and one questions about each and every one of them: why you owned them, what they were about, which ones you loved and which ones you thought to be overrated. He didn’t even seem to notice that you were sweating from the effort of screwing in the nails, too caught up in listening to your rambling answers to help steady the bookshelf.

It was move-in weekend. Your parents had driven away the night before, leaving you with swollen eyes and a lump in your throat while your roommate Manon laughed at you all night for crying. She called you a baby and said you’d survive but truth is, survival didn’t feel possible until two mornings later when Anton and his roommate Sohee came knocking on your door.

They came bearing gifts: bagels and watery hot chocolate stolen from the dining hall. “We saw you moving in,” Anton had explained quickly, voice tumbling over itself. “Thought maybe you could use some help.”

Then Sohee, grinning, lifted the plate in his hands and added, “Plus, we saw you at the frat party last night. Figured you’d need food.”

Manon gasped like they were saviors then shoved you aside to grab the first bagel and announced right then and there that the four of you were friends now. You could only laugh, stepping back to let them in, not realizing you’d just opened the door to the rest of your life.

From that morning on, the four of you were impossible to untangle. What was meant to be a favor quickly became a habit; Anton and Sohee were always at your door and Manon always let them in.

Friday nights meant football games where you painted your faces in sloppy stripes and screamed yourselves raw from the bleachers, even though you didn’t understand half the rules, just that your school was winning and that was enough.

Saturdays were for swim meets with posters in hand watching Anton slice through the water and touch the wall first every single time. His cheeks always burned when you swore he’d be captain next year, shrugging off the praise even as pride bloomed in his chest.

Sohee had his concerts. The three of you filed into the auditorium with flowers clutched tight, screaming every time he had a solo until the choir director threatened to throw you out. You would struggle to keep in your laughs for the rest of the night.

And then there was ballet (Manon’s bright idea), an elective she convinced you to take, neglecting to mention you’d be performing on stage three times that semester but Anton and Sohee showed up anyway, front row with phones raised high, clapping politely like you were professionals. Without fail, they always took you and Manon out to dinner afterward because they knew how hungry you’d be.

When November came around and the semester started to come to a close, you pushed tables together in the dorm lounge for Friendsgiving, each of you bringing something from home. Anton and Sohee taught you about their Korean traditions, Manon brought a mix of her Ghanaian and Swiss dishes and you explained yours between laughter while food was passed around. It felt like home.

They felt like home.

By December there was a tiny Christmas tree you and Anton decorated while Manon and Sohee strung lights around your room. You exchanged cheap gifts wrapped in too much tape and cards scribbled with words that mattered more than the presents themselves. When you all went away for the holidays, you kept in touch, making plans for what the spring semester would hold.

When spring finally rolled around, it didn’t feel quite as terrifying as fall had. New York was no longer something you were surviving but somewhere you were beginning to belong to.

You built your schedules together over late-night takeout the first week, promising to meet for lunch between classes and somehow you all ended up in the same section of English 102.

You were the only one who treated it like it mattered, you figured it was the English major in you. Manon used it as an extra hour of watching shows, Sohee half the time scribbled choreography notes in the margins or finished homework for music theory and to give Anton credit, he at least paid attention…even if you sometimes caught him doodling staff lines in the corners of his notebook.

It was a small class, tucked into one of the older buildings and the professor had a habit of asking open-ended questions that usually went unanswered but you liked her. She had a soft spot for fiction and a drawer full of chocolate she passed around during presentations.

The second semester moved faster than the first. There were fewer homesick nights and more impromptu trips to Chinatown; more movie nights in the dorm lounge with popcorn that always burned; more inside jokes scribbled onto whiteboards in the dorm halls; more of Anton sitting cross-legged on your bed with his guitar asking you to read his lyrics out loud just to hear how they sounded coming from someone else.

It’s the last week of classes and Sohee and Manon both opted to skip, completely over the school year while you decided to go, Anton tagged along so you wouldn’t be alone. The classroom is only half full and students are lounging around studying for their last finals.

You’re in the front row with Anton beside you, passing the time with a game of tic-tac-toe in the margin of his notebook until your professor claps her hands together. “Alright,” she calls, smiling at the groans she knows are coming. “Time to go over your last assignment of the semester and don’t worry, it’s not an essay.”

She reaches for a stack on her desk and lifts a small box of envelopes. “I want you all to write a letter. It can be to yourself, to a classmate, to anyone who’s made an impression on you during your freshman year. Seal it up, give it to me and I’ll send them back to you…two years after you graduate.”

You pout at the catch, two years? You glance at Anton expecting a joke but he’s sitting unusually still. His pencil, the one he always chews on, is balanced between his fingers frozen mid-tap against his notebook. You nudge him. “Earth to Anton?”

He blinks out of whatever world he drifted into and awkwardly laughs. “Yeah? Sorry…just thinking about who to write to.”

“Yourself,” you say easily, already reaching for the envelope your professor is passing down the row.

He hums noncommittingly and reaches for an envelope, turning it over in his hands slowly.

You don’t waste time and start writing immediately. You sign and date the corner of your lined paper and start spilling little pieces of who you think you’ll become. You ask future-you about the bestseller you hope you’ll write, ask if you officially move to New York, you add a line about Manon wondering if the two of you really commit to living together postgrad. Then you steal a peak at Anton who still seems to be lost in thought before hesitantly writing: I hope we stay close.

You don’t think much of it, it’s a throwaway sentiment. When you finish, you look up and see Anton still hasn’t written a single word. His notebook is blank, still untouched almost like he’s afraid to write.

“You okay?” you whisper.

He startles again. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m—I’m fine.”

He clears his throat, flips open his notebook and finally starts writing but not in his usual messy handwriting, rather slower and neater. You can’t see a single line of what he writes and you don’t try to. It feels…private.

When the lecture is over, your professor calls out. “Alright, pass them forward!”

You lick your envelope, seal it closed and hand it off. Anton hesitates for a moment before sealing his and slides it into the pile with everyone else’s. As you pack your bag, you say, “Kinda weird to think we’ll get these back in what…five years?”

He hums softly. “Feels so far.”

You don’t notice the way he looks at the envelopes as your professor tucks the box under her arm. You don’t notice the way his fingers flex like he’s itching to pull his back out. Once you make it outside Anton bumps your shoulder playfully as you walk. “Lunch?” he asks.

You smile and loop arms with him. “Obviously.”

You don’t think about the letters again.

Present Day

“Happy birthday to you~”

You stir awake to the faint sound of someone humming low and off-key in your ear. For a split second, you think it’s Manon, already back from whatever glamorous event she’s working in Paris this week but when you blink your eyes open, it’s your boyfriend Jake sitting at the edge of your bed, hair messy, still shirtless and holding a cupcake with a crooked candle stuck in the middle.

“Happy birthday to you…” he sings softly, dragging out the tune like he’s trying not to laugh at himself. When you groan and drag the blanket over your head, he nudges your leg gently with his knee. “Nope. Come on, you have to listen.”

You groan and roll onto your back covering your eyes with both hands. “Jake, it’s too early for this.”

“It’s nine,” he says through a laugh before going back to singing.

You peek at him between your fingers and see his proud smile and you don’t have the heart to argue. When he finishes, he leans over to kiss your forehead then whispers, “Happy birthday, pretty girl,” before offering you the cupcake.

You sit up, eyes still heavy with sleep, hair a mess and voice rough. “Where’d you even get a cupcake?”

He tilts his head towards your door “Bodega downstairs. I told them it was your birthday and he insisted on giving me the biggest one.”

You smile despite yourself and bite into the cupcake. A few crumbs fall causing Jake to brush crumbs from the corner of your mouth with his thumb. There’s something so intimate about it you glance away for a second, suddenly aware of the quiet apartment around you. Manon’s job as a social media coordinator for a global beauty brand has her in Europe more often than in the apartment you’ve shared since graduation. You barely see her these days except for late-night FaceTimes and the rare occasions when she’s home.

And Jake…well, Jake has slowly filled the leftover space.

You met him last spring at a mutual friend’s housewarming party; soft-spoken, polite, a little awkward but in a cute way. He works in Manhattan as a business analyst, wears button-downs even on weekends and chips in towards your rent on months you’re behind. He’s the kind of guy your parents hoped you end up with.

“So,” he says, settling beside you, his knee bumping yours. “What does the birthday girl want to do today?”

You shrug. “I work today, remember? Manuscript review.”

He frowns. “Are they seriously making you work on your birthday?”

“That’s the life of an editorial assistant,” you joke, nudging him. “Also, I really don’t mind. It’s kind of relaxing.”

He doesn’t look convinced but he wraps an arm around your shoulders anyway, pulling you into his side. You let yourself fall against him, warm and comfortable, your cheek resting on his chest. Your life isn’t perfect, you’re two years out of graduation, living with a best friend who’s never home, working a job that’s adjacent to the dreams you once wished on stars for but it’s safe and Jake has become part of that.

He kisses the top of your head. “Well, my parents want to take us out tonight. They reserved that Italian place you love downtown. They’re excited to celebrate with you.”

Your stomach flips. Jake’s parents adore you, they treat you like you’re already part of the family. His mother meal preps for you and his father forwards you articles about “the best books to read in your twenties,” because he thought you’d appreciate it as an aspiring author.

It should make you happy but somewhere in the back of your mind, a tiny voice reminds you of a ghost from your past, someone you thought would be your forever. You shove the thought away. Jake is watching you, fingers still drawing circles on your knee, waiting for your reaction. You force a smile. “That sounds…nice.”

He beams at you. “Great! The reservation is for six pm.”

Jake takes your plate from you and sets it aside on your nightstand before crawling back toward you on the bed, his knee sinking into the mattress beside your hip.

“You know,” he murmurs, brushing your cheek gingerly, “you look really, really beautiful right now.”

You huff a sleepy laugh. “I look like a raccoon.”

He dips down to kiss the tip of your nose. “A beautiful raccoon.”

You swat his chest but he only laughs, leaning in to kiss you properly this time. His lips move against yours with a fervour that leaves you breathless. His hand slides to the back of your head, his thumb grazing the curve of your jaw as his ring presses coolly against your skin. You gasp and he takes the opportunity to deepen the kiss.

“____,” he groans against your lips, his voice filled with need.

You nod, your fingers tangling in his hair, pulling him closer. He pulls back just barely, lips brushing yours as he whispers, “Let me spoil you today.”

“Jake…” you start but he kisses the rest of your sentence away, smiling against your mouth.

His hands trail down your sides, fingertips tracing lazy lines over your hips. You shiver and he notices. “Come here,” he breathes, shifting suddenly. Before you can question it, his arms scoop under your thighs and back, lifting you effortlessly off the bed. You gasp, arms flying around his shoulders. “Jake!”

“What?” he teases, carrying you toward the bathroom with ridiculous ease.

“Put me down!”

He laughs and shakes his head. “No.”

You try to glare at him but it’s impossible when he’s looking at you like this: totally in love. He nudges the bathroom door open with his foot, sets you gently against the counter and presses another kiss to your forehead. “Shower with me?”

His fingers toy with the hem of your sleep shirt, waiting for your answer. You breathe out a tiny laugh. “Are you trying to make us both late?”

He smirks. “Maybe.”

“Well…” you slide your arms around his neck, pulling him closer, “I guess we can be a little late.”

His grin turns boyish and triumphant. “Have I ever told you I love you?”

You laugh in response as he turns on the water, steam already curling through the room. You kiss him again, slow, sweet and a little dizzying. He smiles into it, hands tightening at your hips. For a few minutes, nothing exists except the heat of the room, his lips on yours and the familiar comfort of being held exactly how you want to be held. Eventually, he pulls back, brushing a thumb along your jaw one last time. “Okay,” he breathes, trying and failing to look composed, “we should actually get ready now.”

You nod but neither of you move until he leans in for one more soft kiss, barely a brush of lips, gentle enough to make your chest tighten. The two of you take turns washing the other off before exiting the shower to finish getting ready.

You brush your teeth beside him while he wipes steam from the mirror. It’s a familiar routine: him toweling off his hair while you lean over the counter to apply moisturizer. His overnight bag sits in the corner, small and a little pathetic-looking, holding only a few shirts and a toothbrush. He’s mentioned wanting a drawer here more than once, half-joking, half-hopeful. You always deflect with something logical like, “You don’t sleep over enough,” and he laughs it off but the truth sits heavy in your chest even now.

The last person who ever had space in your dresser…the last person whose hoodies lived on your chair, whose shirts were folded next to yours, whose medals hung on your desk when his dorm ran out of space…

You shut the thought down before it forms completely.

Jake buttons his shirt next to you, humming softly as he tucks it into his slacks and you force your heartbeat back into the present. “You look beautiful,” he says, straightening your collar with both hands and kissing your cheek. “Ready?”

You nod, stepping into your shoes while he slings his bag over his shoulder. A moment later, he takes your hand gently, squeezing once and the two of you head out the door together.

By the time you make it to the office, the day slips into its usual rhythm. You spend most of the afternoon hunched over your desk, flipping pages and scribbling notes in the quiet hum of the office. It’s not glamorous, not what you used to imagine when you thought about becoming a writer but it’s close enough to feel like you’re still reaching for it. Close enough to keep you here.

At some point, your coworker swings by with a quick, “Happy birthday,” dropping a mini chocolate bar onto your desk before disappearing again. You thank her, a little surprised, turning it over in your fingers before setting it aside.

You check your phone more than you mean to.

A text from Manon, some blurry photo from a rooftop in Paris, miss you, birthday girl!!! followed by a string of hearts.

Another from Jake: Can’t wait for tonight. What kind of cake do you like?

You purse your lips at the question before typing something back but your fingers hover for a second longer than they should before you lock your phone and flip back to the manuscript in front of you.

By the time five o’clock rolls around, you’re gathering your things, slipping your notebook into your bag, the weight of the day settling into your bones. The city greets you with its usual hum: taxis blaring, people rushing, the air thick with late afternoon heat as you make your way down into the subway.

The train ride home is familiar. You stand wedged between strangers, one hand wrapped around the pole as the car lurches forward. You watch your reflection flicker in the window between stops, your mind drifting in and out of nothingness.

By the time you step back into your apartment, the silence greets you again. You move through it easily, showering quickly, changing into something nicer, smoothing out the details until you look like someone who has her life exactly where it’s supposed to be.

At exactly six, your phone buzzes.

jake <3: I’m outside.

You grab your bag, take one last look at yourself in the mirror then head downstairs. Jake is leaning against his car when you step out, a bouquet of flowers in one hand. He straightens the second he sees you, his entire face lighting up. “Wow,” he breathes. “You look…wow.”

You laugh, walking toward him. “Hi.”

“Hi,” he echoes, stepping forward to kiss you softly before handing you the flowers. “Happy birthday.”

“They’re beautiful,” you say, genuinely touched as you bring them closer.

“Wait,” he says quickly, reaching into his pocket. “I have one more thing.”

You blink as he pulls out a small, familiar red box. Your stomach dips slightly. “Jake…”

“Just open it,” he insists, smiling.

You hesitate for half a second before flipping it open. Inside sits a delicate gold Cartier bracelet, the light catching against it in a way that makes it sparkle. It’s beautiful no doubt about it but also unmistakably expensive.

For a moment, you don’t say anything. “Do you like it?” he asks, watching your face carefully.

You blink, forcing yourself back into the moment. “Yeah! Yeah, it’s…it’s really beautiful.”

“I saw it and thought of you, something you could wear every day.” He says, stepping closer. “Here, let me.” He adds gently, taking it from the box. “

You hold out your wrist and he fastens it carefully, his fingers brushing your skin as he adjusts it into place. He beams, clearly satisfied, pressing a quick kiss to your temple before opening the passenger door for you. “Come on. We’ll be late.”

Dinner goes by smoothly.

His parents greet you like they always do, his mother pulling you into a hug, his father smiling warmly as he asks about work, about writing, about everything you’ve been up to. The restaurant glows softly around you, low lights and quiet chatter filling the space as wine is poured and plates are passed. Conversation flows naturally. You laugh when you’re supposed to, answer questions easily, slip into the rhythm of it all like you’ve done this a hundred times before.

And then—

“Well, I was just telling Jake the other day…it won’t be long before we’re celebrating something even bigger, will it?”  His mother says, setting her glass down with a small smile, her eyes flicking between the two of you.

Your hand stills in his and Jake lets out a small, awkward laugh. “Mom…”

“What? You two are so good together. Anyone can see that.”  She says lightly.

His father chuckles. “Don’t mind her, she’s still upset that your brother eloped.” He turns to face you, “you’re already part of the family, hun.”

You nod automatically, the word family settling somewhere in your chest in a way that feels heavier than it should. “That’s sweet,” you say.

Jake squeezes your hand under the table in reassurance, like this is something good…something to be happy about and it is, it should be.

This is what people want, isn’t it? Warm dinners, parents who already look at you like you belong. A boyfriend who plans ahead, who shows up early with flowers and expensive gifts.

You used to think you wanted this. You still think you do. So why does it feel like you’re sitting just slightly outside of your own life, watching it happen instead of fully living it? You smile when Jake’s mom asks you another question, nodding along, answering without really hearing yourself. The conversation flows around you but your thoughts have already drifted somewhere quieter, somewhere harder to look at.

This isn’t how you imagined twenty-three.

You thought it would be louder, messier. Late nights that bled into early mornings, candles stuck into a store-bought cake at midnight because someone forgot to plan ahead. You thought there would be party-city decorations taped unevenly to the walls, balloons already starting to deflate.

You thought there would be handwritten cards, messy, rushed and filled with inside jokes. Cards that meant more than the gifts themselves.

You’ve spent so long telling yourself this is what you wanted: a life that makes sense, a relationship that feels safe, a future that doesn’t come with question marks attached and now that you’re sitting in the middle of it, surrounded by everything you once thought would make you feel whole, all you can focus on is the quiet, unsettling feeling that something is off.

That maybe wanting something for so long doesn’t mean it’s right when it finally finds you.

Jake squeezes your hand gently, grounding you just enough to pull you back into the moment. “Everything okay?” he asks, his voice low.

You nod too quickly, offering him a smile that feels convincing enough. “Yeah. I’m fine.”

And you almost believe it.

Nothing here is wrong. There’s nothing to point to, nothing to explain why your chest feels this tight, why your thoughts keep drifting just out of reach, why you feel like you’re standing on the edge of something you can’t quite name. So you let the conversation pull you back in, let yourself laugh when you’re supposed to, respond when spoken to, slip back into place like you’ve done all night but the feeling doesn’t go away.

It lingers, a persistent question you’re not ready to answer: why does something you’ve wanted for so long feel so unfamiliar now that you have it?

NYU sophomore year

You don’t realize what time it is until it’s already too late.

Your laptop screen is the only light in the common room, the rest of the floor is quiet. Your fingers move quickly over your keyboard, words spilling out faster than you can second guess them, the story in your head finally taking shape.

Manon had been there at some point, curled up on the couch scrolling through her phone but you barely noticed when she got up. Sohee had said something about grabbing water, or maybe snacks before disappearing. Anton had been sitting across from you, half-watching whatever you were writing, half-doodling in the margins of his notebook. You don’t remember when he left either.

You’re too deep in your fictive world to notice how all your friends have slowly abandoned you until a voice cuts through. “Yo.”

You glance up to see Anton leaning against the doorway, hair slightly messy, hoodie sleeves pushed up his arms. “I think I left my captain’s hoodie in your room,” he says, scratching the back of his neck. “Can you come check? I don’t wanna just go in there if you’re not—”

“Oh, yeah,” you say immediately, already pushing your chair back. “It’s probably on my desk.”

You follow him down the hall, still half in your story and unaware of the date and time. When you reach your door he lets you walk in first. The second the door opens you’re met with confetti to the face.

“Surprise!”

You jump so hard you almost drop your phone. Streamers fly into your line of vision, balloons bobbing against the ceiling as Manon and Sohee burst out from either side of your room, laughing as they shout over each other. “Happy birthday!”

You blink, completely stunned, your brain scrambling to catch up as you take in the decorations strung haphazardly across your walls, the pile of half-inflated balloons in the corner, the cheap plastic banner taped slightly crooked above your bed.

“Oh my gosh! What!? when did you??” You laugh breathless, pressing a hand to your chest.

“We’ve been planning this all week,” Manon says proudly, already reaching for you, grabbing your shoulders and shaking you lightly.

“You were too busy ignoring us, writing your little stories to notice,” Sohee adds, grinning.

“I was not ignoring you!” you protest, laughing as you turn in a slow circle, taking everything in.

Up close, the details start to settle. You notice the fairy lights, finally. They’re strung the same way you always keep them but now they’re lined with polaroids of tiny moments clipped between the wires. You step closer without thinking and reach up to examine one between your fingers.

There’s one from your latest group trip to China town, Sohee had taken it after you had all gotten matcha at a new cafe. There’s another of  you asleep on Anton’s lap, you think it’s from midterms week. One of Anton, taken from further away standing by the pool, hair still wet, turning toward the camera like he didn’t realize he was being watched and then one of all four of you, squeezed together in your dorm room, slightly blurry but unmistakably yours.

“You guys…” you start but your voice trails off.

Behind you, a match strikes. You turn just as Anton leans over a small cake, carefully lighting each candle one by one, tongue pressing lightly against his cheek. The flicker of the flames catches in his eyes as he straightens then he starts to sing. “Happy birthday to you…”

Sohee joins in almost immediately, louder and off-key on purpose and Manon follows right after. Anton steps closer as he sings, holding the cake out toward you, the candles casting a soft light across his face. He’s smiling as he reaches the end. “…happy birthday to you.”

The song ends with laughter and clapping, Sohee whooping loudly while Manon squeezes your arm. Anton just nods toward the candles. “Make a wish.”

For a second, everything fades and all you can think about is this moment, the three people standing around you, the way it feels to be surrounded by something this loving. You wish, simply, that it never changes. That the four of you stay like this, that this…whatever this is, lasts.

You blow out the candles.

“Okay! Cut the cake I’m hungry.” Sohee cheers immediately.

Anton disappears for a second, setting the cake down to grab plates and a plastic knife. When he comes back, he hands you the first slice. You glance down at it, then back up at him. “Wait…this is my favorite!”

He shrugs like it’s nothing. “You mentioned it once.”

“When?” You ask.

“During Sohee’s birthday. You were complaining about the flavor.” He says, already cutting another slice.

You let out a scoff, shaking your head. “I was not complaining.”

“You were,” Sohee calls from across the room.

You playfully roll your eyes, “yeah well who wants an ice cream cake for their birthday? You can eat ice cream whenever!”

Anton huffs a quiet laugh, handing out the rest of the plates. Manon grabs your arm again before you can think too hard about it, pulling you toward the center of the room. “No more talking. We’re dancing.”

Before you can respond, Sohee is pushing something into your hands, a flimsy plastic sash that reads BIRTHDAY GIRL in glittery letters and Manon is already placing a slightly crooked tiara on your head.

You go along with it, laughing as she spins you around, the tiara slipping slightly and the sash twisting awkwardly across your chest. At some point, you catch Anton watching you from across the room. He’s leaning back against your desk, arms crossed loosely, a half-smile playing at his lips like he’s trying not to laugh at you.

You don’t linger on it. You let yourself get lost in the music and the company of your friends. Grateful to have a found family.

After your birthday, things don’t change. At least not much…not really.

The four of you still move through campus like a unit, still fall into the same routines, the same late-night hangouts and shared meals and crowded study sessions. You still end up in each other’s rooms, still spend weekends bouncing between games and practices and whatever last-minute plans Manon decides are non-negotiable.

Somewhere in the middle of it all though, something shifts…between you and a certain chestnut haired swim captain.

Anton ends up in your room more often, stretched across your bed with his head propped against your pillow while you sit cross-legged beside him, laptop balanced on your thighs. At first there’s always space between you, enough to pretend nothing’s different.

Until there isn’t.

Until one night you realize you're laying down now, shoulder pressed against his, your arm brushing his every time you move, neither of you shifting away. Until another night turns into you curled slightly into his side, his hoodie bunched under your cheek, his breathing slow and steady beside you like it’s the most natural thing in the world.

No one says anything about it.

Lunches start happening without the others. At first it’s accidental, running into each other after his swim practice, both of you starving, deciding to grab something quick before your next class but then it becomes a habit. “Just us,” he’ll say, like it doesn’t mean anything. As if it’s not becoming something.

You wander through the city together, ducking into small places you find on a whim, sharing fries, trading bites, talking about everything and nothing all at once. He listens when you ramble about your stories, asks questions like he actually cares about the plot and fictional worlds you build. You start saving things to tell him.

You don’t realize you’re doing it until it’s impossible to ignore. Late nights turn into later ones. Text messages that stretch past midnight, then one, then two, until your phone is the last thing you see before you fall asleep and the first thing you reach for when you wake up. Your 8AM classes become harder to sit through, your focus slipping in and out because you’re thinking about something he said hours ago, replaying it without meaning to.

“Why are you smiling at your phone like that?” Manon asks once, eyeing you from across the room.

“I’m not,” you say too quickly, locking your screen.

She hums unconvinced but lets it go. You start doing that more than you’d like to admit, shrugging things off, brushing past questions, lying to your friends…to yourself.

You tell yourself it’s nothing, that when you choose to sit next to him instead of across from him, when your knees brush under the table and neither of you move that it’s platonic. You tell yourself that when people start to notice.

“You two are always together,” Sohee says one night, not accusing, just observant.

“We’re literally all always together,” you shoot back, a little too fast. Manon glances between the two of you, something knowing flickering across her face before she looks away.

You laugh it off. You tell yourself it’s easier that way because nothing happens. There are no confessions, no grand moments you can point to and say that’s where it changed. No one crosses a line that can’t be uncrossed. If anything, the two of you become experts at hovering just beneath it, circling something unspoken and pretending it isn’t there.

You let it, whatever it is, exist in that in-between space. Until it’s everywhere. Until it’s the first person you look for in a room and the last person you say goodnight to. Until it’s his hoodie thrown over your chair, his water bottle sitting next to yours, his name lighting up your phone more than anyone else’s.

It's not until you're packing up to go home for summer break do you realize the cold hard truth: you've fallen for Anton Lee and you have no idea what to do about it.

Present Day

It’s been a week since your birthday and dinner with Jake’s parents. Manon is back, the apartment finally feeling like itself. She has music low in the background as she sits cross-legged on the living room floor with her laptop open, clips from Paris flashing across the screen as she edits.

You’re in your room, standing in front of your mirror, finishing your makeup while Jake lingers behind you. Today is date night. He’s already ready, button-down crisp, sleeves rolled slightly and watch fastened neatly at his wrist. He’s been watching you for the past few minutes, leaning against your dresser patiently waiting on you. “You almost done?” he asks.

“Almost…two seconds.” You say, leaning in to swipe mascara across your lashes. 

“Mm,” he hums, pushing himself off the dresser. You don’t notice when he starts moving around your room, his attention drifting to the little things you’ve left out, your books stacked unevenly on your desk, the loose papers of your novel you edit at night, the memory box that sits in between your bed and night stand.

It’s tucked just slightly out of place, the lid not fully closed from the last time you went through it. Jake pauses, glancing toward you for a second before crouching down, curiosity getting the better of him. You’re still focused on your reflection when he lifts the lid.

Jake smiles faintly when he finds the box filled with letters and polaroid. He starts flipping through the pictures one by one; Manon mid-laugh, Sohee mewing at the camera, a blurry shot of what looks like a dorm hallway. He keeps shuffling through them until he comes across a picture of you and a man he’s never seen before.

“Babe. Who’s this?”  He calls, turning the photo slightly in his hand. 

You turn just enough to see what he’s holding and your stomach drops. It’s you after Anton’s swim comp wrapped in his captain's hoodie while he stands beside you, medal hanging from his neck and arm slung loosely around your shoulders.

You move before you can think about it. “Jake!” you cross the room quickly, faster than you mean to, snatching the photo and the box from his hands in one motion. “Why are you going through my stuff!?”

Jake blinks, thrown off, hands lifting slightly in defense. “Woah! I wasn’t…I didn’t think it was a big deal.”

“Well, it is,” you say, a little sharper than you intended, already setting the box aside like putting distance between it and him will fix something.

Jake exhales, running a hand through his hair. “Okay…I’m sorry. I just…I saw it and I got curious.”

You don’t respond right away, turning back to your mirror. Jake watches you for a second then asks. “Who is he?”

Your grip tightens around your makeup brush. “No one,” you say coldly.

Jake lets out a quiet, disbelieving breath. “He doesn’t look like no one.”

You don’t answer. “Is he an ex?” he presses.

You cringe before you can stop yourself. “Can you just…drop it please? I said it’s nothing, Jake.”

He frowns, something frustrated flickering across his face now. “I’ve told you about all my exes. Why are you hiding this?” He says, a little more pointed.

You open your mouth and then close it because what are you supposed to say? Anton wasn’t an ex but he also wasn’t someone who meant nothing. Whatever it was that the two of you shared existed in the realm of what if’s and dreams.

“I’m not hiding anything,” you say finally but it comes out weaker than you intend.

Jake studies you, eyes narrowing just slightly. “Then explain it.”

You let out a quiet breath and set your makeup brush down. “There’s nothing to explain. He was just…someone from school.”

“Just someone?” Jake echoes, glancing toward the box you shoved aside. “You’re clearly wearing his hoodie and he’s got his arm around you like…like that’s normal!”

“It was normal. We were friends.” You snap, more defensive now.

The word hangs there, thin and unconvincing, even to your own ears. Jake doesn’t respond right away. He just watches you, his expression shifting from confusion to frustration like he’s trying to understand what you’re not saying just as much as what you are.

“Okay. I’m just gonna be blunt.” he says after a moment. Your stomach drops. “Do you have feelings for him?”

You freeze for half a second, your reflection staring back at you in the mirror, eyes just a little too wide, lips parted like you might actually answer him honestly and for the briefest moment, you consider it. You consider turning around, saying I don’t know or it’s complicated or something real but the truth is messy. The truth doesn’t make sense. The truth would ruin the life you’ve built these two years away from Anton so instead you laugh.

It comes out light and dismissive. “That’s…not even possible,” you say, shaking your head as you turn back to the mirror, picking up your makeup brush. “You can’t have feelings for someone you never even dated. That’s just…” you shrug slightly, meeting his eyes through the reflection, “...dumb.”

Even as it leaves your mouth, something inside you recoils. Still, you don’t take it back. You let the lie sit there between you. You add it to the long list of lies you’ve told. Jake watches you for a few seconds longer, trying to decide if he believes you or not. His gaze lingers, searching your face for any signs of hesitation. You don’t give him anything.

Eventually, he exhales. “…okay,” he says quietly.

He glances at his watch then back at you. “We should go. We’re gonna miss our reservation.”

You nod quickly, grateful for the out. “Yeah.”

You set your brush down and reach for your bag before following him out. You catch Manon’s eyes on your way out and there’s no doubt she heard your conversation. The frown she gives you on your exit speaks volumes.

NYU junior year

You don’t remember who pulled who into the room first. All you know is the music is louder out there but here it’s quieter. Anton’s mouth is already on yours, wasting no time the second the door shuts behind you.

The kiss is messy and rushed. You barely have time to catch your breath before he’s backing you up, hands firm at your waist as you stumble together, bumping into the edge of the bed. You laugh softly against his lips, breathless. “The door’s not even locked,” you murmur, glancing over his shoulder for half a second. “Someone could walk in.”

Anton doesn’t pull away, if anything he leans in closer, mouth dragging from your lips to your jaw then lower. “Let them,” he murmurs against your skin like the idea doesn’t bother him at all.

You huff out a quiet laugh, fingers sliding into his hair, tugging lightly just to hear the soft exhale it pulls from him. “You’re insane.”

“Insane about you.” He rebuttals.

His hands skim up your sides as your back hits the mattress as he follows you down and lays his body weight atop you. The room tilts slightly as you turn your head. The window is cracked open just enough to let the cool night air slip in, you can see the city lights flickering somewhere in the distance and all you can think about is how different this is. How far this feels from where you were just a few months ago.

Over the summer, you’d convinced yourself distance would fix it. Back home, surrounded by everything that came before NYU, it was easier to pretend. Easier to ignore the way your phone lit up with his name, easier to let texts sit unanswered a little longer than they should then a little longer after that. You told yourself it was space, that it was necessary. That whatever had started to grow between you at the end of sophomore year would fade if you just…stopped feeding it.

For a while, it almost worked. By the time you came back in the fall, you thought maybe the awkwardness would carry over, that things would feel different but Anton didn’t act like anything had changed. He showed up the same way he always did. Bright smiles, casual touches, sitting a little too close like he always had so you followed his lead.

You laughed like nothing had happened and slipped back into your routines. You ignored the way your chest tightened every time your hands brushed or when he said your name with reverence. You were able to keep it up until December.

The four of you had stumbled into a crowded frat house on a Thursday night. You’d gotten separated from Manon and Sohee somewhere between the kitchen and the stairs, weaving your way through strangers until you ended up by the makeshift bar.

You got to work on making yourself a drink when one of the football players approached you. It started the way those things always do: small talk, a drink pressed into your hand, someone leaning a little closer to hear you over the music.

There was no pressure behind it, no second layer to peel back and analyze. You took a sip of your drink and batted your lashes up at him. You opened your mouth to ask if he wanted to go somewhere more private only to be stopped by a hand wrapping around your waist.

Your entire body reacted before your mind had a chance to catch up, breath catching sharply. You didn’t need to turn to know who it was. You knew the weight of his hand, the way his thumb slips under your shirt and rubs slow circles along your v-line.

“Hey baby,” he said over your shoulder.

You malfunctioned at the pet name while the footballer glanced between the two of you, something in his expression shifting. “Oh…are you…?”

“Yes,” Anton said, cutting in before he could finish.

You turned then, finally looking at him, your brows pulled together in confusion. You opened your mouth to question it, to push back but he was already moving. His grip wasn’t tight but it was possessive enough that you followed without thinking, letting him guide you through the crowd towards an empty hallway.

“Anton what was that!?”

He shrugged before letting you go. “I didn’t like it.”

You stared at him, trying to understand what that meant. “Didn’t like what?”

He clenched his jaw before responding. “All of it. The way he was flirting with you, looking at you. I didn’t like it.”

Your breath caught yet again but you tried to compose yourself. “Okay…but that doesn’t mean you can just…what, pretend I’m your girlfriend?” You said slowly, trying to keep your voice steady.

He huffed a quiet laugh at that, shaking his head like you were missing the point. “Why are we still doing this?” he asked suddenly.

Your stomach dropped. “Doing what?”

“This,” he said gesturing vaguely between you, frustration bleeding through. “Pretending like nothing’s here.”

You blinked, your thoughts scrambling to catch up.

“I gave you space. All summer I let you pull away and I didn’t push, I didn’t ask questions and when we got back, I played along. I acted like it was fine.”

The words hit harder than they should. Maybe it was because he was right. You did feel it, you had always felt it. You had just been better at pretending you didn’t.

“Anton…” you started but it came out quieter than you intended.

He stepped closer closing the distance just enough to make your breath catch again but he didn't touch you. “When are we going to stop acting like this is nothing?” he had asked.

That night ended the way it probably shouldn’t have. With your back pressed against the cold tile of a frat house bathroom, your hands tangled in his hair as you kissed him like you were trying to make up for every moment you didn’t.

You’re pulled back to the present when Anton’s mouth dips lower and he leaves open mouthed kisses across your stomach. You sigh at the feeling of his tongue dragging across your skin before letting your right hand drop to his head to tug at his hair, relishing in the whimpers he releases.

You smirk at the hold you have on him, literally and metaphorically. You tug a bit harder when he leaves a kiss below your navel right above the button of your mini skirt. Before he can go any further, you tilt his head up to look you in your eyes.

You take delight in the way he obeys but your satisfaction is snubbed out by the reminder of what led the two of you to this room. “Who was that girl?”

Anton’s brows lift slightly like he genuinely has no idea what you’re talking about. “What girl?” he asks, voice calm.

You narrow your eyes at him, unimpressed. “Don’t do that.”

“Do what?” he presses, the corner of his mouth twitching like he’s fighting a smile.

You let out a quiet scoff, your hand slipping from his hair as he shifts, sliding off you and settling beside you on the bed. The sudden space between you feels wrong immediately. You turn toward him without thinking and climb right back into his space, swinging a leg over his lap to straddle him. His hands automatically go to grip your waist and pull you in closer, bucking his hips a bit.

“I’m talking about the girl downstairs. The one who was following you like a lost puppy.” You say more direct now.

Anton exhales softly through his nose and grips your hips a bit tighter. “She wasn’t following me like a puppy,” he says, still playing it off.

You tilt your head, studying him. “Really?”

He shrugs but he doesn’t look away from you. “She’s no one.”

“That’s not what it looked like.” Your fingers press a little more firmly into his shoulder from frustration and jealousy.

“Why do you care?” he asks quietly, rolling his hips below you to create friction. You falter for half a second from the weight behind the question and your growing arousal.

“I don’t,” you say quickly, your gaze flicking away for just a moment before returning to him. “I’m just asking.”

He hums unconvinced, his right hand sliding a little higher on your hips, holding you there a bit more firmly now. “She’s just some girl Sohee was trying to set me up with,” he says, watching your face carefully.

Your expression tightens before you can stop it, something like a scowl flickering across your face as your fingers curl slightly against his shoulders. “Oh,” you say but there’s nothing neutral about it. You lean in before you can think too hard about it, kissing him again, harder this time. Anton moans against your mouth and kisses back with equal fervor, almost whining when you pull back.

“I don’t like that.” You murmur against his lips, shaking your head slightly.

Anton lets out a quiet breath, his grip on you tightening as he leans up to chase your lips. “She doesn’t matter. I promise.”  He says, the words brushing against your mouth.

His forehead bumps yours for a second, his gaze lingering like he’s waiting to see if you’ll push again, if you’ll question it, if you’ll admit why you even asked in the first place.

Instead you push him back to tug his shirt off and set off on laying kisses along the column of his neck and chest. Making sure to leave behind angry red bruises that show he’s off limits.

That’s how it goes with the two of you. Tonight it’s a girl downstairs, someone neither of you care about until suddenly you do. Yesterday it was the way Anton’s jaw tightened when your hand lingered a second too long on your partner during workshop, his quiet mood lasting the rest of the night until you finally snapped and asked what his problem was. Next week, it’ll be something else entirely.

It always is. You push, he pulls. He pulls, you push harder. Neither of you willing to step back far enough to end it, neither of you brave enough to step forward and call it what it is.

With spring break coming up, you only pray a change of scenery is enough to give the two of you some reprieve.

𓈒⠀𓂃⠀⠀˖⠀𓇬⠀˖⠀⠀𓂃⠀𓈒

Seven days later

The ocean stretches out in front of you, endless and blue. Manon is beside you, sunglasses pushed up into her hair, already halfway through her third drink like she’s trying to make the most of the “unlimited” part of the resort package. You’re stretched out on your stomach, book open in front of you while Sohee and Anton ride jetskis in the clear blue water.

Spring break had been Manon’s idea. It started over winter break with a facetime call. She had been pushing for a cabin trip at first but Sohee and Anton were doing a cruise and your parents had planned a last minute family trip and suddenly the whole thing unraveled before it ever really came together. Manon had sulked for all of ten minutes before pivoting completely.

She proposed spring break in Cancun. Next thing you knew, you were booking an all-inclusive resort in Cancun, splitting costs and promising it would be fun.

It’s day three of five now and so far it’s been exactly what you expected. You’ve drank more than your liver can probably handle, eaten so much food to the point of expanding your stomachs and backs and the four of you have spent hours in the water with salt drying into your skin.

Somewhere in between all of it, you and Anton had smoothed over whatever that moment at the party had been but things haven’t exactly gone back to normal either. You think it’s all the sexual tension floating around the two of you. All four of you share a room, Anton and Sohee on one bed, you and Manon on the other. It’s hard to sneak away and get alone time. You’ve resorted to living vicariously through the characters in your books you packed.

Manon lets out a satisfied sigh beside you, tipping the last of her piña colada back before setting the empty glass in the sand. “Okay…I’m gonna go get us more drinks before they try to cut me off.” She announces, pushing herself up with a little wobble.

You snort, lowering your book just enough to glance at her. “You’re already pushing it.”

She waves you off like it’s nothing, already brushing sand from her legs and adjusting her bikini straps. “They love me,” she insists, flashing you a grin before turning toward the bar.

You watch her go, eyes narrowing slightly as she weaves her way across the sand, pausing once to steady herself before continuing on like nothing happened. Shaking your head, you let out a quiet sigh and settle back down, turning your attention to your book again. The pages of The Nightingale blur slightly in the bright sun but you try to focus anyway, letting the words pull you somewhere else.

You only make it a few lines in before something bumps lightly against your foot. You blink, glancing down to find a volleyball resting against your ankle, grains of sand clinging to its surface. “Sorry!” a voice calls from a few feet away.

You look up to see a guy jogging toward you, slowing as he gets closer. He lifts a hand in a small, almost shy wave, offering you an apologetic smile as he comes to a stop. “Didn’t mean to interrupt…uh that kind of rolled away from us.” He gestures back toward the makeshift volleyball court set up a little further down the beach, a few people still standing there watching.

You push yourself up onto your elbows, brushing sand from your forearm before reaching down to pick up the ball. “You’re good,” you say, offering it back to him.

He steps closer to take it, fingers brushing yours for a brief second. “Thanks…what’re you reading?” He asks, lingering just a moment longer than necessary.

You glance down at the cover, holding it up slightly. “The Nightingale.”

He nods like he recognizes it, you’re not entirely convinced he does. “Is it good?”

You shrug lightly. “So far.”

He smiles at that. “I was gonna say, you look pretty into it.”

You huff a quiet laugh, closing it partway. “I was, until your game attacked me.”

He laughs, scratching the back of his neck. “Can…can I buy you a drink? As an apology.”

You hesitate for half a second, your instinct to say no rising automatically but it stalls before it reaches your mouth because what would you even say? “No, I can't, because there’s a boy on a jetski somewhere who gets jealous even though we’re not together?”

Before you can figure out how to turn him down politely, movement catches in your peripheral. Manon is making her way back across the sand, two drinks balanced in her hands, her sunglasses now crooked on her face. In front of you, Sohee and Anton are just stepping off their jetskis, laughing about something as they walk toward you.

Your stomach tightens. The timing is almost cruel. “Actually, I—” you start, already half-turning toward Manon, ready to use her as an out.

“Oh perfect,” Manon cuts in easily as she reaches you, not missing a beat as her eyes flick between you and the guy in front of you. “This one’s for Sohee,” she says, pressing one of the drinks into his hands the second he gets close. Sohee takes it without question, too busy thanking her to notice anything else.

You fight the urge to jump her. You have to remind yourself she has good intentions. You turn back to the stranger, forcing your expression into something kinder. “Yeah…um one drink is fine.”

Your eyes flick over to Anton but he lets nothing slip. He pushes his hair away from his forehead and laughs at a joke Sohee makes before settling down in the sand next to Manon.

“Cool, c’mon.” The stranger says, smiling a little wider now that you’ve agreed. He offers you his hand and you take it, dusting off sand from your stomach and thighs. You adjust your bikini straps before following after him.

Anton doesn’t look your way again.

The walk to the bar is short but it feels longer. The music gets louder the closer you get, you spot people crowded around the counter sipping on colorful drinks. The stranger introduces himself somewhere along the way, says his name is James. You tell him your name before settling against a free spot at the bar.

He leans forward slightly, catching the bartender’s attention. “Two tequila shots please.”

The glasses slide across the counter a second later, salt clinging to the rims. He picks one up and hands it to you, fingers brushing yours again. “To spring break,” he says with a grin.

You force a small smile, lifting your glass to meet his. “To spring break.”

He starts talking again, something about where he’s from, how long he’s been here but your attention drifts before you can stop it. Back toward the beach where Anton is perched in the sand soaking up the sun.

It makes your skin itch how unaffected he seems. Makes you feel dramatic for the reaction you had at the party. You wonder if he even cares, if whatever this is only feels like something more when you’re alone with him.

You swallow, the taste of tequila still lingering, suddenly too aware of everything.  “I’m sorry. I think I’m actually gonna go lie down. I’m not feeling great.”

James pauses, clearly thrown off but he recovers quickly. “Oh…yeah, of course. Are you okay?”

“Yeah. Just tired.” You nod, already stepping back.

He hesitates for a second like he wants to say more but then smiles. “Okay. Maybe I’ll see you around?”

You nod once. “Yeah…maybe.”

You don’t wait for anything else. You don’t grab your things or call out to Manon or wait for anyone to notice you’re gone. You just turn and walk, the sound of the ocean fading behind you with every step, replaced by the quiet of the hotel lobby as you push through the glass doors. The air conditioning hits your skin but it does nothing to cool the burning embarrassment building under it.

You make your way to the elevators without thinking, pressing the button and crossing your arms over yourself as you wait, your reflection staring back at you in the mirrored walls. The doors slide open and you step inside, pressing your floor and exhaling slowly. Just as the doors begin to shut, a hand catches them. They part again with a soft chime and Anton steps in.

The space shrinks immediately. You don’t say anything at first and neither does he. The doors close behind him and the elevator starts to move, the elevator music filling the silence between you.

For a second, you think about staying quiet and letting it pass. Letting this be just another thing that goes unspoken but the question comes out anyway. “Do you even care about me?”

Anton turns his head slightly, brows pulling together. “What?”

You shake your head immediately, already regretting it. “Never mind.”

The elevator climbs another floor. He waits a beat before speaking again, his voice deeper this time. “You looked pretty cozy at the bar.”

You turn to face him fully but he’s not looking at you. His gaze is fixed straight ahead, jaw set. You let out a small, disbelieving scoff. “So you can flirt with whoever Sohee throws at you but God forbid I let a guy buy me a drink?”

Anton exhales sharply, rolling his eyes. “Why are you bringing her up again? I told you she means nothing!”

“It’s the principle! You don’t get to act like that when you do the same thing. That's called hypocrisy Anton.” You shoot back, frustration rising now, pushing past whatever hesitation you had before.

“It’s not the same thing!” he snaps, finally turning toward you. “You’re the one who said we can’t tell anyone. What am I supposed to say to Sohee when he tries to set me up with someone? Huh? What was I supposed to say after the party about the hickies you left on my neck? You can’t get pissed at me for a boundary you insist on keeping!”

You falter at him throwing your rules back at you. You hate how he’s right, how you can’t come up with a logical and fair defense in response to instead you reach for the one thing that always gives you distance. “This is dumb. We’re not even together.”

The elevator dings softly as it reaches your floor. The doors slide open and you step out automatically, expecting him to follow, already bracing for the argument to continue the way it always does, looping back in on itself until one of you gives in.

However, when you turn around he hasn’t moved. He’s still standing inside, one hand braced against the railing, looking at you like he’s seeing you clearly for the first time. There’s something in his expression that makes your chest tighten.

He looks hurt. Genuinely hurt. When he finally speaks, his voice is quiet.

“Then let’s end whatever this is.”

Present Day

As the waves of pleasure finally begin to subside, you find yourself tangled between Jake’s arms and your sheets. Both your breaths mingle in the warm air and Jake wraps his arms securely around you, holding you close as his heartbeat gradually slows. You can feel the aftershocks of your climax coursing through you as your eyes slowly shut.

One of his hands is lazily tracing over yours, turning your palm up and brushing along your fingers. “I’m never gonna get tired of this,” he murmurs, more to himself than anything.

You huff out a quiet laugh, the corner of your mouth lifting into a smirk. “Mhmm, good I’ve got some more tricks up my sleeve.”

Jake lets out a groan, “Such a fucking tease.”

You laugh and open your mouth to retort but get cut off by the door swinging open. “Hey, do you have a—oh.”

Manon freezes mid-step, one hand still on the door, her eyes flicking from Jake to you tangled together in your bed. “Shit! Sorry! My fault!”

The door shuts just as quickly as it opened. You groan instantly, dragging your blanket up over your head like it might erase the last ten seconds. “Oh my gosh.”

Jake lets out a quiet laugh above you, chest rumbling against your cheek. “She definitely saw everything.”

“Stop. I can never leave this room again.” You mumble from under the covers, mortified, pulling them tighter around yourself.

He hums in agreement but his fingers hook into the edge of the blanket, tugging it down slowly until your face reappears. “Yeahhhh,” he says, amused, brushing your cheek. “That was…a little embarrassing.”

You narrow your eyes at him but there’s no real bite behind it. “How reassuring.”

He smirks in response before shrugging a shoulder. You try to hold onto the annoyance but it dissolves into a laugh as you let the blanket fall back to your chest. For a moment, neither of you say anything. His thumb finds your hand again, tracing the same absent pattern across your fingers. After a beat he speaks up again.

“You know…this could be avoided.”

You peek up at him, brows pulling together. “How?” you ask, still half-curled into him. “Our lease isn't ending anytime soon and Manon’s had a lifelong aversion to knocking.”

He smiles faintly at that but it doesn’t quite reach his eyes this time. His thumb pauses against your hand for a second before continuing. “Well…what if you moved?”

You blink, your mind struggling to catch his drift “Moved where?”

He shifts a little beneath you, propping himself up just enough to look at you properly. “To my place.”

You stare at him for a second longer than you mean to, your mind catching up in pieces. “Your…place?” you repeat, slower this time.

“Yeah. I mean…it just makes sense, right? We’re already spending most nights together anyway.” He gestures vaguely around your room, a small smile tugging at his lips. “And no surprise interruptions.”

You let out a soft breath that almost sounds like a laugh but it doesn’t quite land. Your mind starts racing as you struggle to piece together where this is coming from. Realistically, this isn’t a crazy thing to bring up, this is the kind of thing people do. The kind of next step that fits neatly into the version of a relationship the two of you have.

You just hadn’t…thought about it…with him.

“Jake…” you start but your words die on the tip of your tongue. You push yourself up slightly so you’re not completely folded into him anymore and try again. “I feel like that’s…kind of a big step.”

He nods, like he expected that. “It is but we’ve been together for a year. It’s not like this is coming out of nowhere.”

Your gaze drifts for a second. His penthouse flashes through your mind; clean, quiet, perfectly put together. You’ve been there enough to know it’s nice…really nice. It doesn’t feel like a place you belong or could call home. “I just think…maybe we don’t have to rush it?” You say slowly, choosing your words carefully.

The second the words leave your mouth, you feel the shift. Jake’s hand stills against yours for half a beat before he lets it relax again. “Rush it?” he repeats.

You shake your head quickly, pushing yourself up a little more, tucking your blanket around you some more. “Okay maybe not rush, I just…” you exhale softly, searching for something that sounds right. “I like where we are right now. I don’t think we have to…change it yet.”

He watches you for a second, weighing what you’re saying. His thumb brushes over your knuckles again but the movement feels more less sure now. “I’m not trying to rush you. Just thought…we were on the same page.”

You nod, trying to offer him a reassuring smile. “We are,” you say, even though something in your chest tightens as you do.

He nods back, like he’s choosing to believe you. “Okay,” he murmurs.

NYU senior year

The summer after junior year, Anton Lee disappeared from your life.

Not all at once but rather slowly, as if he intended to hurt you the way you had hurt him. His texts came later and later until they eventually stopped altogether, conversations never got picked back up and there was a loud silence that filled in the blanks for you. This wasn’t temporary.

You tried to hide behind your ego, told yourself that it made sense. Said that after everything that had happened between the two of you, maybe this is how it was always meant to end.

When the line had been drawn as clear as could be, you filled your time with other things. You still talked to Sohee and Manon, spent hours writing in your room about a perfect world where things worked out for your main characters.

You convinced yourself you were fine. Better off even without Anton. It was easy to think that way when he wasn’t standing right in front of you. Then September came and with it, the last semester the two of you would ever share again.

Just like that, he was back. It dawned on you that it was just as easy for Anton to delude himself when you weren’t standing directly in front of him, when the two of you weren’t sitting side by side pretending nothing ever happened between the two of you in front of your friends.

Like clockwork, you fell back into your familiar pattern. Only this time, the Anton you had grown to love wasn’t the one who came back to you. You think you lost that version somewhere in Cancun.

This time around, you thought it couldn’t be as bad as junior year…how wrong you were.

This time, neither of you cared to pretend. Gone was the sneaking around, no more stolen moments hidden behind closed doors. Whatever this was between you existed out in the open now. Unlabeled and undefined but impossible to miss.

Parties turned into something else entirely. What used to be fun, loud nights with your friends became a game the two of you never agreed to but always ended up playing anyway. How far can you push before the other snaps? How much can you get away with before it finally crosses a line?

Anton started it more often than not. He’d lean a little too close to someone else, let his hand linger just long enough for you to notice, sometimes even going as far as taking them upstairs. They’d disappear for a few minutes, never long enough to confirm anything but never short enough to ignore. It was never enough to call him out without sounding crazy but it was always enough to make burning hot jealousy rip through your chest.

When you would finally corner him and ask him what the hell he was doing, he’d only smirk before asking. “Why do you care?” It would be followed by a condescending hum and, “We’re not even together.”

He would throw it right back at you. The same words you used first, the same ones you threw at him in Cancun. You would sneer at him before stomping off, your pride fully kicked in. You would find someone of your own, someone easy. You would let him talk to you, let him get you drinks, let yourself be seen with him just long enough to prove a point you didn’t even fully believe in.

It would work for all of an hour before your attention would start to drift back to Anton. All he would ever do is give you one look and suddenly nothing else mattered. You’d make some excuse, slip away and leave whoever you were with standing there confused while you found your way back to him like you always did.

Manon tried, truly, to get you to have some self-respect. She would set you up with people she thought were easier and healthier. You’d go along with it at first to humor her. You’d exchange numbers, let conversations start only to lose interest almost immediately. Your replies got shorter then slower, until eventually they stopped altogether. It never made it past that.

From what you heard from Manon, Sohee tried too. He pulled Anton aside more than once, told him he wasn’t being fair, that maybe he should date outside of the friend group, give someone else a real chance only to be told, “We both know what we’re doing.”

Eventually, they both stopped pushing. Not because they approved but because they realized nothing they said was going to change it because as much as the two of you didn’t work like this, you still worked everywhere else.

Anton still walked you back to your dorm after late lectures, hands tucked into his pockets while the two of you talked about nothing and everything all at once. He still bought you lunch when you forgot your student ID, didn’t even let you argue about it. You still showed up to his swim meets with posters you’d spent too long making, shouting his name like you were born to cheer him on.

You still sat together at family dinner with Manon and Sohee, still laughed at the same jokes, still fell into each other on the couch during movie nights like it was muscle memory.

You’re good at that part…too good and that’s what made it worse.

Manon and Sohee didn’t understand it. They couldn’t figure out how the two of you fit so easily everywhere else, how you could be this…effortless together, only for everything to fall apart the second it turned into something more.

But you know why and so does Anton.

Neither of you said it out loud but it lingered in every argument, every glance and every moment where one of you almost gave in and the other refused to meet you there.

He hasn’t forgiven you for Cancun. Maybe even how you treated him leading up to your fight. He’s still holding on to how easily you turned off your emotions when others were around, how quick you were to deny him the chance of ever being more than a dirty little secret.

As for you, you’re too proud to fix it first. It’s humiliating enough knowing how thoroughly he’s ruined everyone else for you.

So you don’t cave, even when it’s the only thing you want to.

To your relief, somewhere along the way the two of you stop fighting as much. Not because anything gets resolved or because either of you finally says the thing you’ve been circling for two years now but because there’s nothing left to argue about that hasn’t already been said in a hundred and one different ways. You think it’s because he didn’t want to be on bad terms during graduation.

The last few weeks fly by, it’s easy to not notice time slipping away from you when things are as easy as they once were freshman year.

Today is commencement.

Just like that, the last four years of your life collapse into a single moment. You’ve imagined this day a hundred different ways but none of them feel quite like this. None of them capture how quickly it slips through your fingers.

One minute you’re walking across the stage, heart pounding, the announcer calling your name, next it’s over. Your tassel is turned, people are clapping, caps are already being tossed into the air before you’ve even had the chance to process it.

It all blurs together.

The months of deadlines, the nights spent hunched over your laptop swearing you’d start earlier next time, the early mornings you dragged yourself out of bed for classes you almost skipped, the crowded study rooms, the shared meals, the laughter—it all collapses into this one fleeting stretch of time that feels both too fast and impossibly long.

No more classes to rush to. No more last-minute submissions or group chats blowing up at two in the morning. No more of this.

You barely have time to sit with that realization before you’re being pulled in every direction. Pictures with your friends, your family, your professors. Someone is fixing your cap, someone else is calling your name, your phone is buzzing endlessly in your hand. It’s overwhelming in the best way.

By the time your parents decide you’ve taken enough pictures and accepted more gifts than your arms are capable of holding, you find yourself sitting at a long table surrounded by the people who made these last four years what they were.

Come six o’clock, you’re tucked into your seat beside Manon and her sister, your cap and gown long forgotten in your dads car. Across from you, Sohee is mid story with your dad, hands moving animatedly as he recounts something from freshman year.

Beside him sits Anton. He sits a little more relaxed than usual, one arm draped over the back of Sohee’s chair, a small smile tugging at his lips as he listens. Every now and then he chimes in, correcting Sohee or adding details that make the story even funnier and it’s so normal.

Eventually, plates empty and conversations start to taper off. You push your chair back softly, leaning toward Manon. “I’m gonna step outside for a second,” you murmur.

She nods without question, too caught up in whatever story Sohee’s telling now to look too closely. You slip out quietly, the noise of the restaurant fading behind you as the evening air hits your skin, cooler now.

You exhale slowly, stepping just far enough from the entrance to give yourself space, the sounds of laughter and clinking glasses muffled behind you. For a moment, it’s just you and the quiet hum of the city.

The door opens again and you don’t have to turn around to know it’s him.

Anton steps out beside you, he doesn’t say anything right away, just shrugs his suit jacket off his shoulders and holds it out toward you. “Here,” he says softly.

You hesitate for half a second before taking it, the fabric still warm from him as you slide your arms through the sleeves. It’s too big, swallowing you just slightly, the faint scent of his cologne settling around you.

“Thanks,” you murmur, pulling it closer around yourself.

He nods once, hands slipping into his pockets as he leans back against the wall beside you.

For a moment, neither of you says anything. Anton shifts slightly beside you before breaking it. “You wanna go for a walk?” he asks.

You glance over at him, really looking at him for the first time since you stepped outside. His hair is slightly out of place from the day, his tie loosened just enough to make him look less put together.

“Yeah,” you say, softer than you mean to.

He pushes off the wall and falls into step beside you, his arm brushes up against you but neither of you say anything or move away. You walk without a destination at first, letting your feet carry you down familiar streets, past places that have become second nature over the last four years. Neither of you rushes to fill the silence and for once, it doesn’t feel like something that needs fixing.

Eventually, without either of you meaning to, you find yourselves standing before your dorm. The place where everything started. You let out a small breath, something soft and almost disbelieving as you take it in. The windows are dark now, the halls inside probably already half empty with everyone moving out.

“Wow,” you murmur, more to yourself than anything.

Anton huffs a quiet laugh beside you. “How fitting.”

There’s another pause. You glance at the entrance, then back at him. “Do you wanna go in?” you ask.

The words hang between you. Anton’s gaze flicks from you to the building and back again. For a second, you think he might say no. Instead, he surprises you and nods. “Yeah,” he says quietly.

You barely have time to register his words before he’s putting in the building code and pulling the door open for you.

Inside, everything feels different. The lobby that once buzzed with voices and movement now sits in a strange, hollow quiet. A few stray boxes are stacked near the walls, abandoned or waiting to be taken, and the fluorescent lights hum faintly overhead.

It’s like stepping into a memory that’s already started to fade. You walk further in first, your eyes drifting over everything like you’re trying to hold onto it. The couches where you and Manon used to sit for hours, the corner where Sohee would pace while practicing, the hallway that always smelled faintly like burnt popcorn no matter the time of day.

“Feels weird,” you murmur.

“Yeah,” Anton agrees quietly, falling into step beside you.

Your feet carry you on their own. Down the hall. Past doors left ajar, rooms half-empty, beds stripped down to their frames. The place that once felt too small for all the life inside it now feels too big without it.

By the time you stop, you’re standing in front of a door you’ve walked through more times than you can count. Anton’s old domr. He hesitates for just a second before pushing it open.

The room is almost empty. His side of the room is stripped down completely, mattress bare, desk cleared, shelves wiped clean like he was never there at all. Sohee’s side looks the same. The only thing left is what couldn’t be taken yet, suitcases by the wall, a few stray items waiting to be packed last.

It shouldn’t feel like a punch to the chest but it does. You step inside slowly, your gaze dragging over the space where you’ve spent so many nights cuddled in Anton’s arms.

“Damn,” you breathe, arms crossing loosely over yourself, still wrapped in his jacket.

Anton shuts the door behind you, quieter this time. “Yeah.”

The silence stretches again, heavier now. There’s nowhere to sit except the bed so that’s where you perch yourselves. You lower yourself onto the bare mattress, the springs creaking softly under your weight. He follows a second later, sitting beside you but not too close.

You take in the room again, noting the way things have changed over four years.

“I hated this year,” you admit after a beat.

Anton stills beside you but you continue. You swallow, fingers curling slightly into the fabric of his jacket. “Not…the school year itself…just—” you shake your head faintly, searching for the right words. “Us.”

You let out a small, humorless breath. “I hated knowing I lost you before we even got back in the fall. The silence over the summer, the way everything after that just felt like we were…punishing each other.”

Anton exhales slowly, his gaze dropping to his hands. “You think I didn’t hate it too?” 

You glance at him. “I hated all of it. You think I wanted that? I wanted to be with you.” He shakes his head slightly. “Every time I got close, every time I chose you…you pulled away.”

Your chest tightens. “I didn’t—” you start but the words fall apart before you finish your sentence. He’s right, you always chose to avoid him, from sophomore year when you realized you were falling all the way up to junior year after he confessed. He picked you yet you made it nearly impossible for him to stay with all the rules you set, the way you kept him hidden but would burn with fury when anyone else tried to fill your place beside him.

The truth sits there between you, ugly and unavoidable.

“It’s not too late,” Anton says quietly as you sit in your discomfort.

There’s no teasing in his expression now, no deflection, no pride. “We don’t have to keep doing it like that. We could…actually try.” He adds, softer now.

For a second, you let yourself imagine it. What that would look like. What it would feel like to finally stop fighting it, to call it what it is, to choose each other without all the conditions and rules and distance you’ve spent the last two years hiding behind.

Just as quickly though, reality comes crashing down. Every fight, every misstep, every moment where one of you reached and the other pulled away. Two years worth of proof, the two of you star crossed lovers destined to fail from the moment he showed up in front of your dorm and offered to help you build your bookshelf. You know how this ends.

Your gaze drops, your fingers smoothing over the edge of the mattress like it might ground you. “Sohee told me you’re leaving,” you say instead.

It’s a clear deflection and Anton picks up on it the second the words leave your mouth. He exhales, leaning back slightly on his hands. “Yeah. We’re going back to Korea for a bit. See where things go from there. Maybe LA after.” He admits.

You nod slowly, like you’re processing it, even though you already have.

“But that doesn’t mean—” he starts.

You don’t let him finish. “Long distance?” you ask, glancing at him.

He hesitates for a fraction of a second before nodding. “We could try. I mean it. Something real this time.”

Something real. The words settle in your chest, heavy. You want to believe him…you almost do but wanting something has never been enough for the two of you.

You nod like you agree, like you believe him, even though you don’t and before he can read too much into it, you lean forward, closing the space between you, pressing your lips to his. The kiss is softer than anything you’ve shared before.

It doesn’t feel like a fight or a distraction or something meant to prove a point. Anton stills for half a second surprised before his hand comes up to cup the side of your face, pulling you closer as he kisses you back.

His movements are slow and deliberate, almost like he’s trying to memorize you rather than consume you. His thumb brushes along your jaw, your cheek, as his lips move against yours with a kind of care you haven’t felt from him before.

His hands slide down from your face, pausing briefly at your shoulders before drifting lower, fingertips grazing along the edges of his jacket still wrapped around you. He tugs it gently from your arms, letting it fall somewhere beside the bed before his attention returns to you, eyes flickering over your face like he’s seeing you clearly for the first time in a long while.

You don’t look away.

Your breath catches softly as his hands find the zipper of your dress, hesitating for just a moment, giving you time to stop him, to say something, to pull away. You don’t.

He takes the hint and slowly unzips your dress. His gaze never leaving yours until the fabric is gone and discarded somewhere behind him.

He leans in again, pressing another kiss to your lips before letting it drift to your cheek, your jaw, the curve of your neck. Each touch softer than the last, like he’s making up for every moment he wasn’t like this before.

You let your hands move too, undoing his tie, then his dress shirt, guiding him just enough until he pulls back to shed the layers himself. The fabric drops to the floor without care, forgotten the second it leaves his hands.

When he comes back to you, it’s closer. His forehead rests briefly against yours, both of you breathing the same air, your breaths mingling together and become one. You take your time to remember his face, all the beauty marks and smile lines then his lips find yours once more.

There’s no urgency in the way he touches you, no rush to get anywhere else. His hands move as if he’s learning you all over again, like this version of you is something fragile. Something he doesn’t want to break.

You fall back onto the bare mattress together, the springs creaking faintly beneath you, the room around you stripped of everything except this.

Your orgasm crashes into you, shattering you completely. You barely register the sounds you’re making, Anton swallowing them with a desperate kiss. Your breaths tangle, uneven and shaky, his hands still holding you like he doesn’t quite know how to let go. “I love you.” He chokes out as he spills in you.

It feels like a freight train has hit you. Your chest tightens so suddenly it almost hurts, your breath catching as everything inside you stumbles over itself. Your hand lifts on instinct, brushing his hair back from his face so you can see him clearly, really see him.

“I love you too,” you breathe. You finally allow yourself to say the words you’ve been aching to say for the past four years.

Anton exhales against your lips, something in his expression breaking open just slightly before he leans down again, kissing you reverently. You kiss him back just as gently, your fingers still tangled in his hair, holding him there for a second longer before pulling back just enough to look at him again.

“I love you,” you say once more. Making sure he knows, he understands you have and will always love him.

Anton gently pulls out and a soft whimper escapes your lips at the loss but he’s quick to drop down beside you, pulling you into his embrace, cradling you against his chest like it’s second nature. His arms wrap around you securely, one hand splayed across your back while the other traces slow, absentminded circles into your skin. It feels like everything you’ve ever wanted.

You tilt your head slightly, looking up at him. His eyes are already on you. “Did you mean it?” he murmurs.

You nod against him, your fingers coming up to rest lightly against his chest. “I always did.”

Anton exhales softly, his hand sliding up your back to rest at the base of your neck. “Then we can make it work. It doesn’t have to end like this.”

You don’t humor him with a response. Instead, you trace slow patterns into his skin, listening as he continues. “I’m being serious, ____. We could try. Long distance for a bit…until things settle.” His thumb brushes lightly along your shoulder. “And then I’ll come back to New York.”

Your heart stutters at that.

“I don’t wanna be anywhere else long term. We could…get a place. A brownstone, maybe. Fix it up how we want.” He says with a small laugh.

You smile faintly despite yourself, picturing it without meaning to. You had mentioned freshman year wanting to be a NewYork Times best selling author living in your very own brownstone, that’s how you would know you made it.

“You’d have your own space to write,” he continues, glancing down at you. “I could finally hear all those stories you never let anyone read. Help if you want or just…be there.” 

Tears slowly start to fill your eyes. “And you could tell me when my lyrics suck.” He adds teasingly.

You let out a quiet laugh, shaking your head. “They don’t suck.”

“Some of them do,” he insists, nudging you slightly.

You hum, pretending to consider it. “Maybe.”

He smiles at that, something soft and boyish slipping through as he turns his head to look up at the ceiling. For a moment, you let yourself stay there. In the version of your life he’s painting so easily, as if it’s something already within reach. You nod along when you’re supposed to. Add small comments, let him talk, let him believe you’re right there with him.

His voice eventually slows, his words tapering off as the exhaustion of the day finally catches up to him. His grip on you loosens just slightly, his breathing evening out as sleep begins to pull him under.

You stay still beneath him, listening as his breaths deepen, as the tension finally leaves his body completely. When you’re sure he’s asleep, you tilt your head just enough to look at him again.

You take in the way his lashes rest against his cheeks, the faint crease between his brows that’s finally smoothed out, the pink of his lips. Your fingers lift slowly, brushing his hair back from his forehead one last time, lingering there for just a second longer than necessary.

“I love you,” you whisper, so quietly it drifts into the night.

You fight the tears as you pull away. Slowly untangling yourself from his arms like you’re afraid even the smallest movement might wake him, might stop you from doing what you already know you’re going to do. You gather your clothes from the floor, dressing in silence, your hands moving on autopilot.

When you make it to the door, you pause. You sniff once before looking over your shoulder. He’s still there, still unmoving. Still looking like something you could’ve kept if things had been different.

Your throat tightens but you don’t let it stop you. You open the door and slip out into the quiet hallway, letting the door close softly behind you. Only then do you allow yourself to cry, to mourn what you never let yourself have.

Present Day

By the time you step off the train, your head is still buzzing with red ink and rejected edits.

The day had dragged at the publishing house, hours blurring into each other under fluorescent lights while you sat hunched over your laptop, eyes burning, flipping between manuscripts and stories that weren’t yours. Words you were supposed to fix, shape and make better even as your own sat untouched in the notes app on your phone.

Your boss hadn’t made it any easier. Hurling insults from her glass office at the all editors as she sat with her legs up on her desk eating a deli sub.

All you want is your bed.

You dig through your bag as you walk, fingers brushing past your notebook, your wallet and the lip gloss you swore you lost two days ago. Your keys are always at the bottom no matter how many times you tell yourself to keep them somewhere easier to reach. You let out a quiet sigh, already half-annoyed at the effort it’s going to take to find them.

The sound of someone calling your name cuts through your annoyance. You look up and blink in confusion. Jake stands a few feet away leaning casually against his car, one hand resting on the hood of his stupidly nice sports car, the other tucked into the pocket of his slacks.

He smiles when your eyes meet his. “Hey baby.”

For a second, you just stare at him. You hadn’t been expecting him. Your fingers that are still in your bag tighten slightly around nothing, your thoughts lagging a step behind as you try to catch up. “Jake? What are you doing here?” You ask as you finally pull your hand free, letting your bag fall back against your hip. 

He pushes himself off the car, stepping a little closer as if he doesn’t see anything wrong with showing up unannounced. “I texted you. Figured I’d come pick you up.”

You blink, pulling your phone from your pocket. The screen lights up immediately, a string of notifications you hadn’t bothered checking once you left the office. His name sits there near the top.

“Sorry. I must’ve missed it.” You murmur, locking your phone again without really reading anything.

“It’s okay. I thought we could grab dinner or something. You look like you had a long day.” He says quickly. 

You let out a small breath, something between a laugh and a sigh. “That obvious?”

“A little,” he admits, reaching out to brush his thumb lightly under your eye like he’s checking for something.

The touch is gentle and familiar. You should lean into it but instead you step back just slightly. “Yeah. It was…a lot.” You say, adjusting the strap of your bag over your shoulder.

Jake watches you for a moment, something flickering across his face too quick to fully catch. “Well,” he says, straightening a bit, deciding not to push it. “Come on. I’ll drive.”

He gestures toward the passenger side, already moving to open the door for you. “Um…actually,” you start, shifting your weight from one foot to the other. “Raincheck? I kinda just feel like staying in tonight.”

Jake’s hand stills on the car door for half a second before he nods. “Cool, then I’ll take you to my place.”

You bite the inside of your cheek. “No. I think I’d rather just stay home.” You say softer now, shaking your head slightly. 

His brows pull together just a fraction. “Home?”

“Yeah,” you say quickly, filling the space before he can. “Manon’s leaving soon, remember? That F1 thing in Miami? I haven’t really gotten to hang out with her before she goes so I just…I wanna spend some time with her.”

The lie comes out smoother than it should. You don’t mention that she’s probably already half-packed, that she’ll be out the door early tomorrow, that “spending time” really just means existing in the living room watching The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives together before retreating into your room to shower. Maybe use TikTok for a bit before crawling to your laptop to open the same document of your novel that hasn’t seen real progress in weeks.

Jake doesn’t need to know any of that though.

You watch as his tongue presses into the inside of his cheek, something tightening in his jaw as he exhales quietly through his nose. “____,” he says, and there’s a shift in it now. “Seriosuly?”

You blink at him, feigning confusion. “What?”

He lets out a short breath, pushing the car door closed. The soft thud echoes a little louder than it should between you. “Why don’t you like coming to my place?”

You straighten slightly, defensive before you can stop yourself. “I do like your place.”

“Okay, then why does it feel like you avoid it?”

“I don’t avoid it,” you shoot back, adjusting your bag again just to have something to do with your hands. “Jake, I just said I’m tired. I wanna go home.”

His gaze doesn’t waver. “So come home with me.”

You exhale, slower this time, trying to keep the moment from tipping over into something else. “Jake…”

“Why won’t you move in?” he asks, more direct now, finally naming what this is realy about.

“Can we not do this today? I just got off work, Jake. I’m tired.” You sigh.

He shakes his head immediately. “No ____, because every time I try, you shut me down.”

“I don’t shut you down,” you say quickly.

His eyes widen just slightly, like he can’t believe you’re actually going to pretend that. “You don’t?” he repeats, incredulous now. “You brushed it off last week. You brushed it off the week before that. Every time I bring up anything about us moving forward, you throw up these impenetrable walls!” he gestures vaguely toward you, frustration bleeding through.

You roll your eyes. “That’s not what I’m doing.”

“Then what is it? Because I don’t understand what this is supposed to be anymore.” He presses.

You cross your arms over yourself, more to shield than anything else. “You’re making it into something it’s not.”

His jaw tightens. “Am I?”

You shrug, ready to dismiss him and this conversation but he speaks up again. “Is this about that guy in your memory box? In the polaroid?”

Your head snaps up, irritation flaring instantly. “Why are you bringing him up again? I told you he’s nothing!” The irony of your words are not lost on you.

“Because you clearly still feel something for him!” he fires back, matching your energy now, all the patience he’s been holding onto slipping. “You don’t react like that over someone who’s ‘nothing,’ ____!”

You let out a disbelieving laugh, shaking your head like he’s the one being unreasonable. “You’re reaching.”

“Am I?” he pushes, voice rising just slightly. “Because from where I’m standing you’re looking really fucking guilty!”

You roll your eyes, already turning away from him like that’s the end of it. “This conversation is over,” you mutter over your shoulder, digging back into your bag as you head for your building.

“____.” He calls. You ignore it.

Your fingers close around your keys, finally finding them at the bottom and you pull them free. “Don’t walk away from me!” Jake booms from behind you.

You continue up the steps, not giving into the way he baits you. You clench your jaw as you reach for the lock on your door when he yells out again. “Why won’t you just choose me!?”

Unable to keep a hold on your cool, you whirl around, anger rising faster than you can contain it, words already spilling before you can catch them. “Because you’re not him!”

You gasp the second you finish your sentence. There’s no way you just said that. “Fuck—” you breathe, your voice breaking as your eyes widen. “Jake, wait—I didn’t mean that, I didn’t—”

Only problem with that is that you did mean it and Jake knows. “Yeah. You did.”

The calmness of his response is worse than anything else he could’ve done or said. You take a step toward him, panic rising now, hands half-lifted like you can fix it if you just say the right thing. “No, Jake, listen to me—”

He wastes no time in turning away from you and heading to his car without another word. You hurry after him, heart racing reaching for the passenger side. “Jake! Please! just let me explain—”

You try tugging the door open but the handle doesn’t budge, he’s locked the car. You look up just in time to see him start the engine, his gaze fixed straight ahead, not even sparing you a glance. “Jake!”

He doesn’t stop. The car pulls away from the curb in one smooth motion, tires scraping slightly against the pavement as he accelerates, merging into traffic and away from you. You swallow hard, your vision blurring just slightly as everything starts to catch up all at once.

For a second, you’re still facing the street like he might come back if you just stand there long enough but the space he left behind stays empty, cars passing through like nothing happened. You step back from the curb slowly, your footing uneven as you make your way toward your building.

The world around you keeps moving, people pass, a couple across the street glances over before quickly looking away, your neighbor lingers by the front steps a little too long before pretending to check her phone.

Heat creeps up your neck at the fact that she definitely heard but you don’t have it in you to care. Not really. You adjust the strap of your bag on your shoulder and try to feign normalcy. Your phone buzzes in your hand, dragging your attention down to the screen.

It’s an email. The subject line almost knocks the remaining air from your lungs.

Subject line: English 102 – Letter to the Future, ____.

For a second, you just stare at it. You almost ignore it. You almost shove your phone back into your bag and deal with…everything else first but your curiosity wins out and your thumb moves before you can think too hard about it.

There’s a short message from your old professor explaining that the letters were scanned and sent out now that everyone has graduated, a small note about reflection and growth and how she hopes you’ve become everything you once wrote about.

Your chest tightens slightly as you scroll. Before you is a scanned copy of your own handwriting. You sink down onto your front steps without really deciding to, your bag slipping from your shoulder as you bring the screen closer to read.

Hi…me? This feels weird. I don’t even know how to start this without sounding dumb but I guess that’s kind of the point? You’re probably not the same person writing this anymore so…hi. I hope you’re okay….I hope you’re happy. Right now I feel like everything is just starting. Like I finally made it somewhere I’ve been dreaming about for years. New York still doesn’t feel real, like I’m going to wake up and be back home again lol. Did we stay? Please tell me we stayed. Also…did we write it? Our book? I keep telling everyone I’m going to be a New York Times bestselling author one day and they all nod like I’m insane or don’t have what it takes. I think I do though. I think I have it in me. I just hope you didn’t give up on that. Oh! And Manon, are we still friends? She’s literally my favorite person right now. We keep joking about living together after graduation like it’s a given. Did we actually do it? Because I feel like we would be so good at it. Does Sohee come to visit like he says he will? Does he freeload and steal our food before offering to pay us by singing old Justin Bieber?

There’s a pause in the letter. You can see it in the way your handwriting dips slightly, like you hesitated even back then.

Anton…I don’t know why I’m even writing about him but…he’s really nice. Like, really nice. Being around him makes me…happy. There’s something about him, I don’t know. Anyway, I feel like he’s going to do something big one day. I don’t know what yet but I know he has it in him. I hope he accomplishes all of it. I hope we stay close.

Your vision blurs before you even realize you’re crying. The girl who wrote this…she sounds so sure…so hopeful. So painfully unaware of everything that would come after. You let out a shaky breath, your hand coming up to cover your mouth as the tears finally spill over, sliding down your cheeks before you can stop them.

You don’t even notice the second email come in right away. It’s only when the ding sounds and your phone buzzes again, sharp against your palm, that your eyes flick to the top of the screen.

Subject line: English 102 – Letter to the Future, Anton Lee.

Your breath stutters. For a second, you think it has to be some kind of mistake, a glitch. Maybe your professor sent things out in bulk and accidentally attached the wrong file to the wrong name.

You tap it anyway.

The screen shifts and there his handwriting sits. Neater than yours and slightly slanted. You can almost see him again, hunched over his notebook in that classroom, chewing on his pencil, tapping it against the page while he thought too hard about the assignment. You start reading.

It’s kind of funny how we’re supposed to capture something meaningful in a letter like this. As if we can freeze a version of ourselves in time and trust that it’ll still make sense years from now. I don’t think it works like that. I think people change too fast for that. Or maybe not fast enough. Maybe we just carry different versions of ourselves at the same time and pretend they don’t contradict each other. Right now, I feel like I’m somewhere in between a lot of things. Not really who I was when I first got here but not fully who I’m supposed to be yet either. People talk about “finding yourself” like it’s a destination, like one day you just wake up and everything clicks into place. I don’t think that’s real. I think it’s more like…you keep going and hope you recognize yourself along the way. Freshman year is almost over and it already feels like something I won’t ever get back. Not in a sad way. Just in a…you don’t realize how important something is until you’re already moving past it kind of way. Like how certain days feel bigger than others for no reason. Or how certain people do.

Your breath catches before you even get to the next line.

I think you’re one of those people for me. I didn’t expect that. If I’m being honest, I didn’t expect to get this attached to anyone here. I’ve never really been good at that. Not in a cold way, I don’t think. Just…sometimes it feels like people experience things in a way I can’t fully reach. Like there’s always a small gap between what they feel and what I understand but with you, it’s different. Or at least it feels different.

You swallow hard.

I don’t know how to explain it without sounding like I’m overthinking something simple but I think about you more than I probably should. Not in a weird way. (Okay, maybe a little in a weird way.)

A broken laugh escapes you through your tears.

I think about the way you talk about things you love, the way you only ever read hard copy versions of books. The way you get frustrated when people don’t take writing seriously. The way you appreciate the more sentimental things life has to offer. It makes me want to listen. Even when I don’t understand half of it. I don’t know what happens after this year. I don’t know what happens after any of this, actually. Everyone keeps asking those big questions like where we’re going, what we’re becoming, what the point of all of this is supposed to be and I don’t have an answer. I don’t think anyone really does. But I do know this: I’m really glad I met you.

Tears slip faster down your cheeks, dripping onto your screen.

I almost didn’t, which is the craziest part. (crazy am i right?) If Sohee hadn’t dragged me to your door that day, I probably would’ve just…kept walking and you would’ve just been another person in the hallway. Someone I passed by without thinking twice. And now I can’t imagine this year without you in it. I don’t know if I’ll ever say any of this out loud. I feel like I won’t. Not because I don’t want to but because I don’t know if I’m supposed to. There’s a version of this where I tell you and everything changes. Maybe for the better, maybe not. And there’s another version where I don’t say anything and I get to keep what we already have. I think I’m a little selfish when it comes to that. So if you’re reading this and I never told you…I think I liked you. No

The word is scratched out slightly, like he went back over it.

I know I did. I just didn’t know what to do with it. Maybe by the time you’re reading this, I figured it out. Maybe I told you and we laughed about how obvious it was. Maybe we tried. Maybe we didn’t. Maybe we’re still in each other’s lives in some way that makes sense. And if we’re not…then I hope you’re still writing. I hope you didn’t let anything or anyone convince you to stop. I hope you became everything you said you would, even if it looks different than you imagined. And I hope, in some small way, I was part of that version of your life. You were my favorite part of this year. I think you might be my favorite part of college. And if I never got the chance to say it properly…then just know I would’ve chosen you.

The sob hits you before you can brace for it.

It tears out of your chest, sharp and broken, your whole body folding forward as if the weight of it all finally catches up to you at once. Your phone slips slightly in your grasp but you don’t let go, your fingers tightening around it like it’s the only thing keeping you tethered to reality.

“Fuck—” you choke, dragging in a breath that doesn’t quite fill your lungs. Your shoulders shake, your head dropping as tears fall freely now.

You walked away. You walked away from him.

From every version of him that tried quietly, stubbornly and consistently to meet you where you were too scared to stand. The freshman who hoped you’d stay close, the sophomore who fell for you in all the ways possible, the junior who asked you to stop pretending and the senior who laid everything out and still chose you.

“____?”

A soft calling of your name cuts through your self deprecating thoughts. You don’t look up right away, too far gone. It’s only when you feel a shift beside you that you finally blink through your tears to find Manon perched beside you on your stoop.

She sets her bag down beside her and just looks at you for a second, taking you in, your tear-streaked face and your trembling hands. “You got the letter?” she asks gently.

You hiccup, the sound catching in your throat as your brows knit together. “W-what? H-how did you—”

Manon exhales softly, leaning her elbows onto her knees. “I got mine at dinner.” She folds her hands before continuing. “Anton told me he wrote to you.”

Your head snaps toward her. “What?”

She shrugs one shoulder, nudging her bag further aside with her foot. “Beginning of sophomore year.” she adds.

“He—” you start then stop because what is there to even say to that?

Manon watches you carefully for a second longer before letting out a quiet breath. She leans back slightly, bracing her hands against the step behind her. “Are you finally done running?” she asks.

The question lands like a slap to the face. For a moment, you don’t answer. You just stare at the ground between your feet, your tears slowing but not stopping, your mind replaying everything at once.

Manon doesn’t fill the silence, lets you sit in it however uncomfortable it may be. For the first time in two years, you don’t deflect. “I didn’t know…I didn’t know he—” your throat tightens again, cutting you off.

Manon hums quietly. “Yeah, you did.” She says.

You flinch slightly at that. She softens almost immediately, nudging your knee with hers. “Maybe not like this but…you knew.” She amends, nodding toward your phone.

You don’t argue. Manon exhales, dragging a hand down her face before resting her chin in her palm. “I knew about the two of you before…Sohee knew too, by the way. Maybe not everything but…we knew enough. His feelings weren’t exactly subtle.”

A weak, humorless laugh escapes you. “I thought we were so slick.”

“Please,” she snorts lightly. “Everyone could see it except you.”

You shake your head, more tears slipping free. “That’s not…”

“It is. I’ve been watching you self-sabotage for two years.” She cuts in frimly.

The words sting. Not because they’re harsh but because they’re true. “I got frustrated,” she admits after a beat, her tone quieter now.

“Watching you push him away then get mad when he didn’t stay exactly where you left him. Watching you settle for…less.” She gestures vaguely, she doesn’t even need to say Jake’s name.

Your gaze drops as you think about every time she defended Anton during senior year. Every time she looked at you like she was trying to understand why you kept choosing the harder option.

“I should’ve stopped you…with Jake I mean. I knew you didn’t love him the way you loved..the way you love Anton.”

You don’t deny it. You sniff, wiping at your face with the back of your hand as you look away, the street lights blurring together in front of you. The two of you sit in silence for a beat before Manon speaks up again.

“...I still talk to him.”

Your head turns so fast it almost hurts. “What?”

Manon shrugs, like she expected that reaction. “Not all the time but...yeah. We keep in touch. Sohee too.”

“He’s…okay?” you ask.

She nods. “He’s good. Booked and busy. Music stuff is actually going really well.”

You smile, at least he accomplished his dreams. Manon studies your face for a second before reaching into her bag, pulling out her phone. “Actually…” she hesitates then unlocks it, scrolling for a moment. “There’s something you should hear.”

She taps her screen then turns it slightly so you can see. “It’s his latest release, he sent it to me two nights ago.”

You look at the title and your heart constricts all over again. Before You Leave Me.

Manon presses play and you listen with baited breath. You don’t make it past the first verse before your vision blurs again.

Darling, handle me with care Cover me in bubble wrap I’m scared you really mean it That you’re never comin’ back

Your chest caves in slowly, your hand tightening around your phone as the next lines play.

Know I can’t change your mind But how could you just leave like that?

Manon doesn’t say anything beside you. She just lets it play, lets it sink in. The chorus hits and it feels like it knocks the air out of your lungs completely.

Just give me one more night Hold me like you’re still mine Oh, love me for right now Before you leave me

You squeeze your eyes shut but it only makes it worse. The memory overlaps with the sound, his arms around you, his voice against your skin, the way he held you like he already knew you were going to go. Like he was asking for something you were never going to give him.

I know it’s gonna hurt Watching your footsteps turn So, love me for right now Before you leave me

Your shoulders shake as the realization settles in. He knew. Some part of him knew. Even that night when he was laying there with you, when he was telling you about brownstones and writing and staying, he knew you might still walk away but he loved you anyway.

You drag in a shaky breath, pressing your palm harder against your mouth. “Stop.” You beg Manon, turning away from her. “Turn it off!”

She complies right away. The music cuts off mid-line, the silence that follows almost louder than the song itself. “I can’t—” you choke, dragging a hand down your face. “I can’t listen to that. I can’t!”

“Okay. Then what can you do?” She asks.

You blink at her, thrown off by the shift. “What?” you rasp.

“What can you do, ____?” she repeats, leaning forward now, elbows braced against her knees. “Because I’ve watched you do this for two years. Self destruct and wait for the damage to pass by.”

Your brows knit together, a weak shake of your head already forming. “That’s not—”

“You don’t get to sit here and act like this blindsided you. None of this is new. The only thing that’s new is that you can’t pretend you didn’t know anymore.”

“That’s not fair,” you mutter.

“No. It’s not. That’s the point.” She rebuttals.

She softens slightly. “You knew he loved you and instead of meeting him there, you made him work for it then punished him by walking away. You don’t get to fall apart like this and act like you’re helpless in all of it. You made choices too.”

“I was scared,” you admit, barely above a whisper.

“I know,” Manon says.

Nothing is said beyond that. After minutes of sitting in silence, Manon pats your leg softly. “His number hasn’t changed.”

She doesn’t linger after that. Manon pushes herself up, brushing her hands against her dress before reaching down to grab her bag. She pauses for half a second, like she might say something else but whatever it is, she decides against it. Instead, she gives your knee one last squeeze then she turns and heads inside, the door clicking shut behind her, leaving you alone on the step.

You sit there a moment longer, your phone still in your hand, his letter open on the screen waiting for you to do something with it. Your chest still aches and your eyes still sting but you sniff once and remind yourself you caused this pain.

You look down at your phone again and swipe out of the email, not wanting to face it anymore. Tonight, you need to forget it all. You inhale slowly and push yourself up from the steps. Your legs feel a little unsteady at first but you adjust, sliding your bag back onto your shoulder and wiping at your face with the sleeve of your jacket.

You walk aimlessly down the street back towards the subway entrance. You swipe your metro car and step onto the platform, the train arrives in five minutes. You get on, not thinking of the destination, just letting your feet carry you.

Your mind drifts, your thoughts looping through everything that’s just happened; Jake’s face, Manon’s words, the letter, the song…Anton. You stare out the window as the train carries you further and further into the city.

Eventually, the train slows and the doors slide open. You step out onto the platform you haven’t stood on in a while, the familiarity hitting you in a way that feels almost disorienting. Your feet move before you can second guess it, carrying you up the stairs and out onto the street.

You walk and walk and walk. You don’t stop until you’re standing in front of phebes. The neon sign flickers faintly above the door, the same way it always did. You can hear the music from outside, muffled but familiar.

For a second you just stand there taking it all in. You haven’t visited NYU since graduation, haven’t made it to this side of town since you left Anton. You push down the thought the second you push open the door. Inside, it’s exactly how you remember. Dim lighting, sticky floors and music just loud enough to drown out your thoughts if you let it. The layout hasn’t changed. 

You slide onto a stool at the bar without hesitation. The bartender who approaches you isn’t one you recognize. “What can I get you?”

You don’t hesitate. “Two shots of don julio, keep the tab running.”

The bartender nods, already reaching for the bottle. He pours quickly and slides the small glasses toward you with a dish of lime wedges. You grab the first shot and lick the salt rim before tossing the tequila back in one smooth motion. You suck in a breath through your teeth, chasing it with the lime, blinking hard as your eyes water.

“Rough night?” the bartender asks, seemingly unfazed.

You let out a humorless snort, setting the empty glass down a little harder than you mean to. “Try two years.”

He pauses for half a second, caught off guard by the honestly then offers a small awkward smile. “Yeah…that’ll do it,” he mutters, already stepping away to tend to someone further down the bar.

You don’t watch him go, you just reach for the second shot. This one goes down easier. Or maybe you just don’t care as much. Either way, you welcome the burn. You exhale slowly, fingers wrapping around the empty glass as you start to twirl it against the bartop. Your mind won’t stop.

Jake. Manon. The letter. The song. Anton.

You’re already lifting your hand to signal for another when the stool beside you scrapes softly against the floor. Your jaw tightens at the new presence, irritation flaring up faster than it should. It’s barely five pm on a Thursday, the place is practically empty. There are a dozen other open seats and this asshat chooses the one right next to you? Seriously?

You roll your eyes, turning fully now, already halfway into telling them to move. “Excuse me,”

The words die the second they leave your mouth and your eyes catch sight of who the stranger is. Sat before you is none other than Anton Lee.

For a split second, he looks just as caught off guard as you feel. His brows lift slightly, his posture stilling like he wasn’t expecting this either. It’s gone as quick as it came.

Your eyes tear away from his gaze to take him in greedily, trying to make up for two years worth of absence. His hair is longer now, falling around his face and dyed a deep auburn. It’s styled back enough to show his forehead.

Your gaze drops. His gold chain is still there, resting against his collarbone. The same Lange & Söhne Odysseus sits at his wrist. He’s dressed simply, jeans and a henley, sleeves pushed up to expose his forearms.

Your eyes lift back to his face. You find him staring at you too, like he was inventorying all the new details about you. Anton’s lips curve into a gentle smile despite everything that sits between you.

“Howdy, stranger.”

taglist: @emislove @liaajk @satsgu @oncyanii @yoursyuno @wonbunniez @sakvya @antonnuguholic @kylie99z @kimvitamingyu @prousthouse @jijiyi @night-poem @maripositaa @chocochipnim @lovialy

[antqnh0lic]

🦕💭 260501

(8:18 PM KST)

word for word

bar for bar

got dressed by sungchan hyung

ㅋ

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