#I accidently posted this through my alt | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

writingmochi · 11 months ago

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cast: alt kid!soobin ✗ fashion student/designer!fem.reader

synopsis: after soobin's encounter with a person from his original timeline, he experiences doubts if he can settle in this new timeline or not. his alienation and existentialism take a spin in a new world he has to figure out himself, or if he could be courageous enough to ask you to guide him down back to the surface

genre: coming of age, slice of life, friends with benefits au, college/university au, angst, fluff, mature content (drug consumption and explicit smut)

based on: music radiohead's "subterranean homesick alien" (1997) (genre: alternative rock) and my yeonjun series time wave (2021-2022). i recommend reading the series first to know about the world!

word count: 52756 (52.7k)

warning(s): nudity, drug consumption (alcohol, cigarette) and mention of consuming other drugs (heroin), fighting and mentions of bruises and blood, shotgun smoke, blackmailing, implications of suicide, mentions of minor characters' deaths and car accidents, mention of broken home (divorced parents), explicit sex, unprotected sex (safety first!), messy and emotional sex, oral job (m & f receiving), handjob (m & f receiving), marking, squirting, manhandling, creampie (if there is something that i forgot, let me know!)

message of the moon: remember that this story is fiction and do be careful and read the warnings at the top. all the idols mentioned here are not what they are in real life.

it's been a year since i posted the last part of the series and i'm here to fulfil my promise to tell soobin's side and how is it going with him. this is also part of @aduh0308's collab "23 days with soobin" so do check the others out~ and also part of my milestone open collab "discover: 200"! thank you for the support for time wave and for the blog! hope you enjoy and sorry for the delay!!! soobin's canon appearance! ps. (l/n) = last name :3

playlist | part of the frequency modulation anthology

when soobin looks up, panting and sweating, all he can see is the shaded white ceiling from where he is laying.

his puffy tired eyes peer at the almost empty void with lights coming from outside the window across him. the sheer curtain lets the necessary amount to come in whilst the humming from the air conditioner adds to the whole ambience. the moonlight and streetlights shine the dark side of the world in tandem, waiting for the sun to take charge and light the day. yet the tinge of yellow light from the combination is the one that catches his attention. it’s in a lighter tint, but it reminds him of a vision he hasn’t gotten for a long time.

the burning heat that kisses his skin as he sees everything go up in flames. all the greenery at the higher topography engulfs into ashes behind him as even the sea reflects the red and orange fire.

soobin shakes his head to get rid of the vision. but when returning to his current state, he can feel the restraints that tell his body, “not yet. don’t go to sleep yet.“

full of the desire to rest, his gaze slowly fades into nothingness when he finally realizes the metaphorical glass box surrounding him. the box that only allows him to study the room before him; not wanting to interact with it as he doesn’t want to watch his hand go through any item he touches. he looks around throughout the dim yet lively room. a fashion mannequin standing in one corner with pins sticking into the body to let a sheet of fabric stick—its bottom end sways underneath the blowing air conditioner. a group of tall wardrobes that he can imagine have an abundance of clothes inside them. the desk where a small sewing machine is resting alongside stacks of books about design and fashion. the messy floor where clothes lay above the circle-shaped carpet, his included.

his gaze moves to the comforter that rested on his lap. the chilly atmosphere of the room fighting his body heat that had risen as he moves his head on the fluffy pillow. the bed sheets crinkle from movements on the bed as he eyes to the side where there is a wall of collages of outfit designs and models on a catwalk. the other side of the small bed.

beside him, a figure lies still as the comforter rests above their torso. rising and falling following their breathing self facing the wall. soobin’s hand rested behind them, skin-to-skin contact making shivers running down his nerves as he could see the hickeys he placed on their collarbones. the small glimpse of their shoulder shows the small five-sided star tattoo that he also has, remembering what it was like when he tattooed it on the body and how they then tattooed it on his own body. the first time they try tattooing someone.

the only tattoo on your body.

he wanted to rest his hand against you once again, just like the whole of tonight that he spent with you in lust and pleasure—finally getting what he wanted when he arrived at your room uncalled yesterday. you let him, especially with the fast response, as he pleasures you into tomorrow, hammering you into your mattress while he litters down the hickeys on your collarbones from behind. his eyes seeing your bare face self in all its imperfections moaning for him, though it’s perfect to him. but even looking into your eyes from the side profile, he had noticed something different. yet, it’s not as mind-bending as the one you gave from two days back. from you who aren’t the (y/n) he knows.

it’s (y/n) but more timid, closed off, and awkward. yet, there’s determination in her eyes as she arrives at somewhere she should not be. the girl who seems to know more about him than the one who was wrapped in his arms tonight. she who mentioned a boy’s name he hadn’t thought of for a long time.

(y/n) from another timeline. his original timeline.

he remembers the girl describing what happened in her timeline ever since his disappearance. how soobin hurts the only person who cared for him and how she finds him broken when she arrives back in haeyang. yeonjun had mentioned someone named (y/n) before to him back in high school. the way he describes her, she was his childhood best friend before she moved away right after his mother’s passing. two peas in a pod who are always sticking with each other before one of them leaves.

soobin and yeonjun’s friendship started when they both shared a table together in their first year of middle school. the boy had an intimidating face all the time and soobin didn’t even try to befriend him because of it. little did he know how his terrible childhood made him connect with the boy more than he expected—other than the same last name, making soobin wonder if he is related to yeonjun from a line of ancestors somewhere. yet he didn’t expect the connection to be as deep as this. he didn’t expect the (y/n) he’s in a situationship with to be the same (y/n) yeonjun is friends with. even with the differing timelines, as he also knew from talking to you, that you lived in haeyang before.

but in this timeline, yeonjun’s mom didn’t pass away; creating a chain reaction that affects the boy, you, and soobin himself. how it affects all three’s futures. all because of a change from one power set.

the power to control time.

when he gained a power that made the alternate version of you cross timelines; he spent weeks training it as best as he could. even with the uncertain consequences that come with it and the threatening vision he got before getting the power.

for him, it started with a terrifying vision of a forest fire burning haeyang down as he was stuck in the middle of a street covered in blaze, trying to escape the rotting building and dense clouds of smoke to, at least, the coastline before his clothes caught a lick of the fire.

then, he jumped up awake in his bedroom when his eyes landed on the toga hanged on the door handle, on the day of his high school graduation. he activates his power when rewinding time with just an open palm and the right mindset as he gets his fallen lunch back into his arms. a few seconds ago, it was on its way to stain his robe and his dad’s old suit he still kept. that day is printed in his mind. he remembered he still had silvery-blue hair when he met up with yeonjun’s electric pink-haired self wearing his own toga and bringing his own lunch as they both searched somewhere to eat together before the ceremony. the day that he can finally taste the freedom after getting out of the k-12 system.

yet in those weeks too, because of his powers, he scoured more books and files than he ever did for school. ever since he learned about yeonjun’s mom passing away in a car accident here, it reminded him of his own parents’ deaths here too. he had spent his time wanting to find out more about the similitude, but life was too difficult for him to face with the incoming abusive attitudes of his aunt and uncle and the school stress. because of them, he gets his relaxation through the rock music he and yeonjun enjoy and so many youthful delinquent things that paint his teenage years in a much better light; even still marking him to this day. it pushes the thoughts of connecting the pieces into the back of his mind.

that is until he had much free time after graduation, while also training his powers, which reminded him of his small project to connect the dots. with more research, he found out that the similarities even go to the same intersection; the difference is the three people died on the latter—the driver also—while yeonjun’s mom died in a hit-and-run. soobin can’t shake the resemblances as he turns to the archive online and offline of the incident, spending his time in the public library looking at newspapers and a closed case file when he finds out the catalyst tying the two incidents.

the car that caused three innocent people to die.

the driver became a raging alcoholic because of something happening in their life before the incident where his parents became victims, according to the witnesses from family members to neighbors written in the case file. the police can’t catch the license plate number from when yeonjun’s mom died of the incident—it’s not as surveyed as now with the many cctv cameras. but his 10-year-old self can. he was there when it happened. the sedan’s red exterior paint catches his eye even when he sees it scurried from the intersection he and his dad are at as he watches a swarm of people flood the streets and circle the expanding pool of crimson—some were running to catch the fleeting car as he heard people’s frantic concern and calling emergency service. it’s the same red sedan’s wreckage that he sees alongside his dad’s car from the newspaper.

after training his powers for a month now, from rewinding time to slowing down time, he taps into another layer of the power he knows of chronokinesis—something he caught on as said by min, the local art shop retailer he often goes to get his art supplies and whom he also discovers that they had this power before him. the power to travel through art that the power user has made. he stumbles into it accidentally as he is moving out a box full of his childhood stuff a day after finishing his odd jobs of tattooing other people. nearly sneezing from the flying dusk when tidies the contents, he sees the small doodle of people eating pizza. soobin remembers it was when he and his dad went out from a small pizzeria in haeyang at 10 years old, the same doodle he holds when he sees the zooming red sedan passing by. and that’s what happens to him.

the colors of the figures' outlines combined with the yellow and red from the pizza become a blur before he is summoned to the street of the accident. soobin walks hand-in-hand with his dad as they walk to the place where he lives for the visit. his mom is waiting after all. he had wanted to do something different again when he saw the woman who resembled his best friend. his soft features frowning as he had to see the accident again before he realized he had the power to change it.

and what he did to change it was a child-like thing he could do—as he didn’t want to make people suspect him more. he goes to the post and presses the crosswalk button again as he waits for it to do an immediate reset, the red man immediately turn to green when yeonjun’s mom passes the cross. he caught his dad let out a loud “fuck!” at the red car zooming past. but no one died that day, the car zoomed past slower, swerving near him and his dad more who is just starting to walk across, but not hitting the woman as she goes away to do whatever she’s doing. changing the line of time forever.

when he wakes up from the vacuum of time, he meets a room that is unrecognizable. it has open boxes stacking on top of each other and pieces of furniture that doesn’t look like the ones he had in his rock-themed bedroom. he walks to the en-suite bathroom to see himself on with a white t-shirt and small graphic text. the tattoos that painted his body are still there, the loser tattoo on his left arm and the outline sketch of the flower he made himself on his right. that’s when he heard the default ringtone of the smartphone as he scrambled to see who would call him. in his life at that moment, only a few people would call him: his family members and yeonjun. but ever since they died from their drug abuse, only yeonjun has ever called him. he thought he might be friends with yeonjun again. but when he saw the word mom on the ringing phone, soobin choked and nearly fainted away, yet he had to pick it up. his eyes stinging as he pressed the green button.

“hi, binnie bun. how is your first month in college?”

his nose becomes stuffy as his eyes tearing up, trying to articulate his words as best as he can. he missed her voice, the voice that he last listened to when he was 11. and now, he finally can visualize it again. his dad also speaks as soobin stares at his crying reflection from the window of his room, his eyes wandering to follow the number of people his age on the pathways as he hears his mom talk so carefully. recording it to his mind as he notices the age in her voice, something he couldn't do before.

he learned so much about his family by talking with them on that phone call. how they talked about the orientation poster he has to make and how cool it looks like when it's posted digitally; deducting that he’s studying in an art course. how his dad tells him to “tear the town apart like he was back then” and mentioned the old walkman he gave to his son with his rock music mixtape. soobin realized he grew up not that different from his dad. he knew his parents had always been part of a scene when he remembers the tattoos on their arms, but something from his memory reminds him of how he had tried drawing colors into mom’s rose tattoo and dad’s hokusai-inspired wave tattoo. how he, even after nearly a decade without him, is the perfect mix of his mom and dad’s personalities plus interests. he never thought he could be like that until now, and he was in a wailing frenzy when his parents ended the call.

brushing the fallen tears from his eyes, he turns to the desk where he realizes how this timeline’s soobin loves the arts so much as he is in his original timeline. books of sketches on the cluttered desk and coloring pencils scattered with his lit-up laptop showing its lock screen. a card beside the mouse pad shows he’s a design and visual communications major and a freshman—based on the year from both the card and the date on the screen. he always wanted to try enrolling in college, but given his financial circumstances back then, he had to pass it up. yet he is very satisfied to live his young adult life with yeonjun outside of academic responsibilities. his eyeline looks to the top of the card to see where he’s enrolling.

haeyang institute of arts—a university from his dad’s hometown.

his dad moved to the city he’s now living in from haeyang as he enters university. his family join alongside him because of the many more opportunities they might get. he then meets his mom in that same university and the rest is history. dad always loves haeyang and always visits the town for vacation, making mom love it too with her lessons in surfing and other watersports. dad had hoped that when he retired with mom, they could move to the small town to live the rest of their lives. soobin hopes it could happen; especially since he lived in said town for his teenage years.

but, he did not live in haeyang when his parents were still alive. that’s when soobin is realizing now, outside the convoluted information he has gotten, where he is.

a new timeline.

it’s easy for him to climb back into his old habits while reintegrating his new ones as he stayed there in intervals—going back and forth as he couldn’t get enough. in the trials, he'd successfully brought himself back into his tattoo artist way given his appearance and how he relies on that for the added stream of income, realizing the privilege of having a parent that helps you pay your tuition. soobin frequented the places he used to go when he saw a number of people he recognized; remembering the right attitude to befriend them as he entered the same circle of people once again, now a bit more mature and full of obnoxious rich young boys who just tasted freedom, just like he did.

other than scouring the arts made by his other self, he also sees a few books about the solar system, outer space, and astronomy from the items he had to unbox. he knew that that is something he’s interested in before his life was pivoted around by his aunt and uncle’s behaviors. in order to preserve that soobin within him, he embraces this timeline’s soobin’s love for astronomy by making more space-themed projects and tattoo sketches to even decorating one of his four walls full of astronomy posters and sketches he is proud of. all of that is to help mend soobin together to make a singularity, the right combination of one and the other.

because of that and how much progress he has made in his life, he decided to settle down in this timeline.

he felt the most alive here after a long time.

soobin came back home to the original timeline to set up something only for yeonjun. he recounted how the house he lived in with his dead aunt and uncle was his childhood best friend’s house before she moved out. how it has a significant role in his life. so he sets up a written deed for his house after talking with the local librarian he has been acquainted with ever since he spent his free time there without yeonjun; they tell him how the law works and how he can give the house away to him as a gift. he places the house key and letter on his bed as he looks at the cluttered room that he will long for. before he travel away for the last time, he puts the doodle beside the unfinished red poppy he made. letting the red color swirls in his vision before he envelops himself in the vacuum world, retracing his steps, and arrives in his new life.

it’s been a year since he stayed in this timeline and he didn’t know life could be any better than what he had a year prior.

during that one year, he let himself go and tried his best in his new life as a college student. he frequent parties and the hangout spaces he used to go to back in his original timeline, letting out the enthusiastic self that caught the crowd’s attention just like back then; but with a mellower tone to it as yeonjun was always the most out-going between the two. he went to raves and concerts from indie bands trying to break into the music scene. soobin, along with a few friends from that crowd he befriended, created a tattoo artist collective to make it easier if people want to find others who want to be tattooed. and, in one party hosted by some college boys living off campus, he met you.

you’re a superstar in his eyes with your fashionable customized night-out outfit and being placed in a rowdy group of girls, though you seem gentler than the others with your small smirk. you were holding on to a cup whilst leaning beside your friend when you turned your head and caught him looking. soobin had definitely seen your picture on social media when he explored the location tag ‘haeyang’ but he definitely won’t think he might found you in real life. yet haeyang is a small town after all and when someone is so popular, they get the attention of most of the town. soobin walks in an upright position when he approaches you. his large build makes him get curious stares from your friends, yet he stays his eyes on you. your smirk widens as he introduces himself, giving talks gently that differ him to the group of boys that he had seen here. your friends were pushing you to go to him, whispering into your ears that made you giggle. and when your eyes tell him to “take me away from this place”, he does so, bringing you to his room to hook up.

soobin and you caught onto a whirlwind friendship both of you didn’t expect after the hookup and, instead of sleeping after it, both of you talk about what you’ve been doing as of this week, continuing the underlying interesting conversation topic he had brought up before taking you away. the duvet enveloping both of you as you both are trying to get a steady breathing pace, he senses the blooming faint hickeys on the column of his neck as you lay down with your back facing up—turning your head to him as chuckles came out of you both. he never had a close female friend even in his original timeline, but you were so natural that he can’t help but be enamored by you. and it seems like it’s you to him too, with the way you asked him for his number before he brought you back to your hall. then everything expanded as he and you started to hang out at college parties a lot, you and him often went to each other's rooms to hang out with each other or meet with the others. but a few hours later, the image of soobin’s desk clean of books as he puts you there and thrusts in you becomes the reality, letting your nails scratch his back until it’s red from the goodness both of you feel.

he gets roped into your circle more, meeting the likes of karin, elle, and yizhuo as your fashion major friends. and you’ve met a few of his friends too, but since not all of them are college students, it’s not as woven as soobin’s relationships with your friends. but now, he had a friend circle and within that circle, they know you and his relationship as friends with benefits.

yet lately, he realized things are changing. he became clingy to you when he is horny and you’re easily submissive towards him when you are. it’s as if both of you are tearing each others’ walls down brick by brick, to find out more of each other—maybe even more than what you both have. but when he and you tried to try things further outside of the friends-with-benefits realm you are in, it’s always been cut off by something. for him, it’s the clients that want tattoos from him. for you, it was your tasks catching up to you, either from the organizations or your own dream of making a sustainable clothing line. even if you have time for each other to get to know more fathoms that you both actually recognize, you both spend it in other ways instead.

hesitations exuding from both of you and he only realized when he didn’t meet you two days ago. because his rose-colored lens was rudely ripped off when (y/n) from another timeline comes and tells him what happened in his original timeline. his home timeline.

he recalls the sunset view of (y/n) and him sitting on the sandy beach by the campus ground, the rushing wave seems to calm her down as soobin can sense how the girl has an affinity for it by looking at her gaze. she explained to him the reason she visits this timeline: to meet up with yeonjun and seeing his mom alive again. how the yeonjun she met differs greatly from the yeonjun she once knew. (y/n) and he talked more about chronokinesis as she tried to grasp the power she now has. how she described the vision of a blizzard obliterating haeyang. but something this (y/n) said hit him more profoundly than what he expected when he met someone from his original timeline.

“i’m going back,” he watches (y/n) open up a folded drawing, “to my original timeline.”

those seven words she’s spoken hit soobin in his heart as he tried to push away his furrowed eyebrows and frown, trying to make it more positive as he mentioned how he was starting to like the girl before she replied with “you probably like this timeline’s me more… but do you like like her?”

she clouded his mind with the unexpected question, replying with “maybe… i don’t know though. you’re just- i mean, she’s just a workaholic that i don’t think she has time for a serious relationship.”

a small smirk appears on her face when she adds, “well m-maybe you can try treating her differently. other than meeting just to hook up. bring her to the movies, ask her if she want to watch the concerts you’re watching no matter how indie the band is…”

soobin’s eyebrows raised as he protruded a small pout, letting his dimples show up as he looked to see the sun setting on the horizon.

“that might work.”

when he laid back in his bed after bringing (y/n) back to the room he could call his second home here, his state of mind went into such a limbo that all the thoughts in his head were about you, original timeline (y/n), his best friend yeonjun, and his home timeline. he tried to sleep it off, but it didn’t help. that’s when something made him impulsively act.

he steps out of the comfort of his bed and turns on his desk lamp to open his sketchbook, grabbing two different colored pens of black and dark blue as he sketches the visual that is playing in his mind.

figures are sketched in black ink as faceless figures talking to each other, some holding bottles in hand, some holding cups instead, and a few laughing “hahaha” typographies spread around the people. the center of the paper is left empty as he grabs the blue pen and draws another figure that looks so different from the others. its shape is humanoid, but its head is bigger than the others—creating an uncanny valley that exist in the scene. he outlined the clothes and how the being is holding onto a bottle of beer, he assumed, but with the black ink. lastly, he makes a small rectangle on the chest and he writes “soobin” within it.

retreating his posture back to rest against the back of his chair, he sees the finished picture as he visualizes. the lone blue outline humanoid in the middle of the black-lined figures. ever since the original timeline (y/n) left, he sensed his mind was being pulled out of his body for the first time since long ago and he once again sees himself in a third-person view when he walks back to his room. the out-of-body experience also recaps his year-long life here at a fast pace before one word rings in his mind.

alien.

he feels like an alien. because he realizes he is one.

this isn’t his original home after all. this is not the world he was born into. he’s not supposed to be here.

after you mentioned what happened back in your original timeline, he can’t help but feel his heart sunken down into the fathoms of himself. on how he left so suddenly creating panic in the closest person in his life. on how he only thinks about himself as he tries to rebuild his life here. how the “feeling alive in a new world” meaning seems more like an illusion to him. soobin sensed himself crumbling as a tear fell out of his left eye, still staring at the drawing he made in the mid-time of the night. cicadas sounds ringing outside of his window as he can catch a fading muffled sound of people in rooms far from his. the world all become solemn and sound as the doubts he holds back are now crashing the fragile wall and filling up his head like a vase.

he misses the adventures he and yeonjun had in high school. his discovery of rock music and the songs his dad might listen to if he could ask him; but can’t cause he was meters under the ground. he misses the experimental parts of his youth and how, even in his hardest times, he’s still living.

soobin misses home.

“soobin?”

the boy’s startled as he grasps how shaky his chest has been. the sound of unrhythmic breaths enter his sense as another one signals to him the moist that are trailing down from his face, his nape, and his back—the sensation of an air conditioner dies the warming body down. he looks to the side to see you’ve turned around to face him, a frown on your face and eyebrows crinkled. yet even with how puffy your face is for waking up so suddenly, you still are so pretty.

soobin expected little as he wiped the now evident tears and sweat off his face, yet he still couldn’t breathe calmly. his hyperventilation from overthinking swallows up his mind back into the doubts running like a waterfall in his mind. he tried to make it stop,—closing his eyes so tight and shaking his head—when his warm skin met a cold sensation as he blinked open.

“breath with me…” you expressed, snuggling close to him as he instinctively lifted his right hand to put it behind you. shoulders meeting as your hand rested on his exposed abdomen while the comforter slid down to rest right above your breasts. soobin turns his head as you tell him with your eyes and signal by lifting your head up. follow me.

together, you both try to find the right rhythm for him to come back stable. soobin felt the air he was puffing come out staggering as you soothed him more with your hands, messaging him down from his abdomen to his pectorals. trailing it up, you rested your hand against his left chest where you put pressure, studying his beating heart that pumps too fast given the circumstances.

“breathe in and hold,” you whispered to him. his hand that was wrapping you have fallen down to your waist as you also rest your back against the headboard, gripping onto your exposed love handle from behind. he sees you nod as you watch him follow your every signal, a small assuring smile on your face as your hand continues to rest against his heart layers deep beneath his muscles and skin.

“and out.”

you let out a big breathe out as soobin follows slowly, feeling his heart now pumping in a rhythm comprehensible for his body. he didn’t expect to break down even after he had pounded you into the next day; he had poured all of it out the previous night to make himself stable. that’s the reason he is here tonight as he knows that you also have been stressing out about something lately and you say yes instantly to his text. yet, even with the months of you both doing this thing, you both never let out any expressions of sadness. always lightening this up with funny banters or sexy moments. he rested his forehead against your nape when he lets his hips meet yours, trying to flush the thoughts that are fucking him up by fucking it away with you. yet, it lingers and grows. he expected to face it himself, not guessing at all that you would help him calm down.

“you’ve been thinking about many things, haven’t you? your face was all scrunched while we made out. i can feel how your facial muscles tense up when i kiss your face.” you said so eloquently, so different from the hesitation that the girl he met yesterday from his original timeline gave out. you knew how to speak and how to voice out what you want to say. and it’s something he always admired you for.

then, soobin got reminded of what (y/n) said to him about his feelings for you. how the original timeline (y/n) didn’t reject him of his feelings for you, instead giving advice on other activities to do when hanging out to further your relationship. come to think of it, if she rejected it outwardly, it could hurt him more. but if she meant what she said, then you might actually reciprocate what he is feeling to you.

sure, he has had crushes on people in between the binary of boy and girl. but he never went through something so visceral as this. the closest thing to it is with yeonjun back in his original timeline. he and the boy knew that both of them were fruity in some way, but by what he observed, he could only assume that yeonjun liked him as a friend who he could lust over. the guy doesn’t even like dating based on the last time soobin spoke with him, but he has seen him hooking up with a few people, usually in inebriated situations. all the time, soobin assumes it’s always one-sided between him and yeonjun. but when he sees the original timeline (y/n) coming to tell him everything that’s happened when he’s gone, he can definitely sense the effect of her appearing in yeonjun’s life again after a decade. how yeonjun finally meets his person again after a long time since soobin is being bombarded with stories between yeonjun and her.

but this timeline is different. yeonjun’s family is complete whilst yours is not. he also has noticed the sunken skin beneath your eyes, how you now need more than three cotton face wipes to clean your face—you don’t like going to sleep with make-up as he always sees you limping to your bathroom to clean your face up as he makes the bed for you both to sleep in. how hectic the university has been for you as you join many activities like the yearly fashion show hosted by the institute to the social events and your own fashion business. yet, the way you treat him so softly even though it’s behind closed doors is always reminding his soul to be fuzzy and colorful even with the scene he is usually in. everyone knows you both are fucking each other, but you both never done any soft and domestic things in public or on the internet for anyone to see; always showing your confidence and maybe your sexy selves.

yet, being domestic with you seems to be so natural to him. how you sometimes go to the communal kitchens in both of your halls to make instant noodles for both of you; how you and him like bouncing ideas for projects you both have to do for your courses; you have helped him design tattoo ideas for his client and him helping you to find the right style to layer the clothes your designing. it all came naturally and with a sense of ease as soobin doesn’t expect any rewards in return, even if it came to one with you giving him pleasure. but, by what the original timeline (y/n) said to him, it might be because you see him the same way.

but with the level of existentialism he is facing, he doesn’t know if it’s real anymore.

he wishes his powers can come back to him just so he can give his life in the original timeline a second chance.

as he leaves you alone and slips into a daydreaming state, you continue caressing his torso— tilting down to gaze at the tattoos that paint soobin’s body. on his left arm, a five-side star that matches yours after you both lost a dare between you two and karin with her boyfriend. below it, a large tattoo that covers his entire sleeve of a ring planet and a few more than litter his body that you couldn’t quite figure out. you’ve admired the handy work of tattoos that soobin has on his body as they look so clean and detail. but you never learned what each of them meant. tattoos must have meant something for someone to willingly put on their skin. you and soobin’s matching star tattoos also have their backstory as it reminds you both of the long conversations you had with each other about the stars in the sky and how the lights of them are from millions of years ago—soobin is a nerd for this kind of facts and you totally love hearing him ramble on about it.

“what do your tattoos mean?”

soobin silently choked on his breath as he heard you say that, your eye line gazing at his upper left arm before to his eyes. your head is resting against his right chest as his other hand moves to accommodate you entering more into his space. a small smile grows from him as it reminds him of what transpires yesterday in this very room and bed. how original timeline (y/n) is checking his horny self’s thigh before the big revelation he comes to realize. he comments on how this timeline's (y/n) never asked him about his tattoos before. he didn’t know how the power of travelling between timelines can also affect the body in the timeline someone visited even if she asked him—not much knowledge is known about chronokinesis in general because of its limited usage of time and people who had it. yet, is this a sign that even though you were possessed by someone from his original timeline, is some of the memories you get are sticking to the original being of the body as the visitor travels back? he doesn’t know for sure, especially since this timeline don’t have any supernatural individuals, unlike his home timeline.

“well…” he tucks you closer with his right hand so it’s easier to see his right forearm and shows you the tattoo you might not found from your little adventure of gazing at his body. he then uses his free hand to push the comforter away slightly from his lap—his flaccid cock now meeting the air-conditioned room as he points one of his thighs with the squiggly lines painted on the skin.

“this one,” he pointed at the drawing on the thigh, “is the first tattoo that i tried by myself. it’s supposed to be a soundwave visualized but i was trembling so the curves aren’t a good parabola-shaped wave.” soobin tried to compose himself but he can’t help to chuckle as he could remember how nerve-wracking and painful it is to tattoo himself. your nose scrunches as you hold your jaws, but he can still pick up the snickers you’re trying to conceal before he continues.

soobin moves his left arm to allow you to gaze at it closer. the one that is full of tattoos across his sleeve and forearm. “the shoulder one, you know what it is, is the star we both have. below it is the saturn tattoo that covers this whole area.” he twists the entire arm so you can see the whole tattoo in its glory. “my favorite planet of the solar system is saturn, other than earth of course. i always think that earth can have rings if it has enough gravity for asteroids to spin aroun-“

you kiss the corner of his mouth before he continues to babble, “we can theorize about earth having rings anytime. what’s next?” you reply as soobin’s face gets warm before he continues with showing his left forearm.

“the guitar tattoo on the outer side and the drum set tattoo on the inner side is matching with each other. the drum set is just a basic setup of crashes, hi-hat, snare, tom-toms, and bass and it symbolizes my love for rock music. one of the guys from the collective specializes in creating these line art tattoos and i just have to have him give me one, but he gave me two cause he owes me something.” after his tangent, he then pushes his wrist closer to you as you giggle while staring at it, realizing what it is.

“that’s the bunny doodle i made for you.” you gaze at it with pursed lips as he nods exuberantly.

“got it tattoo by myself, had one of the guys sketch it down before using the gun.” he twists his forearm around to show a typography tattoo right below his elbow.

“this is the loser tattoo. i made the typography myself to look a bit like punkish as i just…” he glance at the tattoo before towards you, “i identify with the word so well. like, i wanna make it sound less negative than it is, just like punk is now. that’s what high school soobin thought though.”

your eyebrows raised as you say back, “you’re not a loser in my eyes. i actually think i’m the loser here.”

soobin chuckles, “says you, miss popular.” he felt a light push on his cheek as you let out the sweetest giggle that he’s always associated with you. something that you never show outside people in your inner circle as everyone only knows you as the cool badass girl that you are.

“it’s true though, soob. like… even if people know me as someone who is capable of anything, there must be ONE thing i can’t do, like flying an airplane for example.” you talk animately as your hands also visualize the object in the air, something outrages as you tried to justify yourself to be in the same realm of loser as he is, even if he knows you’re not.

“we can be losers together if you’re still going identify yourself as one.” soobin chirps as you let out so many nods.

he then gazes along the expanse of the skin between you and his body as he sees the final tattoo from the hand wrapping your body. the yellow poppy on his right forearm. the only colored tattoo he has and the first tattoo he got when he decided to stay in this timeline, painting the petal with yellow ink. soobin knows little about flower language but it always fascinated him that each flower species still have a different meaning if the petal colors are different. his favorite is poppy—other than that it’s the base of heroin, his favorite out of the drugs he tried—and he likes that each different colored poppy will mean different things. the red poppy he drew back in his original timeline had a meaning of remembrance and hope. but he didn’t find red poppies appealing anymore after he moved. instead, his affinity turns to the yellow one.

“this is a yellow poppy. it symbolizes optimism and a new bright future. i-“ soobin gulps down his saliva as he looks at the poppy. the sketch of the flower is entirely the same one he did before he left, only the petal colors are different. “i made the sketch myself and asked someone to tattoo it on me. the first tattoo i got after arriving here. and it’s after i’ve made a big decision in my life. i hope that it can help to remind me of the good things that come after that big decision.” soobin looks down, “well, i don’t know if it did though.”

you instantly reach around him as you pull him into a hug. his head rested on your chest where he can hear your heart beating inside you. your nose sniffing his black hair as you then give it a small kiss, calming the clockwork in his mind as you lean back on the headboard and push the comforter to cover both of you.

“i don’t know what you’ve gone through to be here. you’ve always been such a strong guy for me.” you caress his wet-stained cheek, noticing how sticky and cold the surface is. you feel very conflicted as you try to understand what he’s been going through even if you don’t recognize the exact detail of it.

“i don’t want to pry you for information if you are uncomfortable with it. but i wanna say that you have me on your side, even with our unconventional friendship.” you look down towards him, who is staring right at you, the way his sunken eyes resemble yours as you stare at it. an undescribable yearning for you to continue comforting him shows up, but the same hesitance that taints you both to be something more is still there.

“let’s sleep, shall we?”

“class is dismissed. thank you.”

exclamations of “thank you”s and scrapping of chairs ring in soobin’s ears as he tucks his belongings back into his backpack, trying to leave the class around the same time as the crowd as he tugs his hood of his unzipped black hoodie up. stepping out of the class, he watches more classroom doors already open as more of his peers walks out to end the class session, all of them aiming towards the many exits of this building. some were alone, like him—scurrying away as fast as they could, while others take time to wait for their friends. soobin tightens the strap on his bag once again as he steps in and blends into the crowd. the same crowd he has lost touch with ever since his existentialism episode. some people greet him when they recognize him; just giving a small wave as they pass by him. but others ignore him when he tilts his head down and blends in. it is what he desires for the outcome.

his class has been dwindling and ending as he is nearly a few weeks closer to exam week, that means that he has more free time than what his regular schedule told him. sure, he could play with friends of his—but he really wants to be in solitude right now. it doesn’t mean that he stopped being with his friends in the alternative scene or who opened the tattoo business and whatnot because of what he experienced two days ago, that just amplifies what he had been doing because his interests have been expanding more outside of their punkish and alternative scene.

soobin has frequented a local music shop where he discovered new music outside of his knowledge—most are alternative but old in age, older than the bands he and yeonjun used to indulge in and much calmer. the sex pistols are not 100% good for his mental health if you listen to it too much. that’s when he expanded the songs he listened to based on his dad’s rock mixtape that he possessed. queen being replaced by pink floyd and the beatles being changed by genesis. it introduced space rock to him alongside radiohead—other than the song named creep that he knew before. his music palette also expands internationally to include other languages other than including decades from his parents’ generation or even his grandparents’ generation. people usually have places where they get the perfect ambience to create art like nature or buzzing cafes. for him, it’s the music store that inspired him the most. either by the travelling sonic waves entering his ears or the album cover art—which is an underrated art medium—he has gotten a lot of his sketches inspired by them, including his tattoo design. all inspired by the olds and news of alternative music—cause pop can be too poppy for him. yet he doesn’t wanna call his punk ways a “phase” even if he’s trying to consume something new, but he since has gotten more melancholic about it. like how the music he listened to had matured alongside him.

maybe he could introduce you to his local shop. he doesn’t know if you’re interested in it though.

as he sat on one of the benches on the pathway, not knowing what to do in his afternoon—not comfortable enough to mingle with his friends knowing how unstable his emotions are right now and he can’t meet up with you right now because you have classes all day—he’s scrolling through his notes app that is full of brainstorming ideas he kept. the glimpses of his rants about the lecturers he had got for the semester and these classes for giving stupid homeworks make him chuckle before he stops on one note that caught his eye.

places to go in haeyang: recs by ppl n hidden gems

pressing it open, he sees the list of places he had written dated. most of the places already have checks at the side as there are ones he visited back in his teen years back in his original timeline. the people in his scene recommended some; usually involving speakeasies and other hidden concert venues. he let his thumb scroll down to the bottom of the list, expecting all of them to be with checks as he remembered a scene from the places he skim-read, when he came across one place he hadn’t visited that baffled him.

haeyang planetarium and observatory.

he tried to remember why he hadn't gone there as he scoured through his memories, understanding now that it was because he’s been to most of the places on the list together with other people, usually from the ones in his crowd, that they just haven’t visited this place or because none of his people are interested in astronomy like him. but when he sees the words related to outer space observation, he couldn’t help the tug in his heart that is signalling to his well-being.

if he visit, maybe he could understand more of the aliens he is associating with.

his long legs march towards the campus' bus stop as the bus arrives at the same time. stepping inside, people—mostly student—are now dispersing to other places as it goes by stop by stop, a few are going to the food market near here, and more goes to other facilities around here until only he’s left in the bus with a few people on the seats behind him. his eyes gaze at the ocean’s surface that the sunshine is refracting. a group of children playing around on the sand as one of them chases a dog whose leash is flailing everywhere, not minding the incoming waves meeting the sand as they all play along. when he heard the call for his bus stop, he didn’t realize the smile formed on his face before returning to his resting face.

thanking the driver as he steps out, he then looks at his map app to see the route toward the building complex—up the inclining road straight to where he is. soobin’s steps take him over as he sees the neighborhood he’s in. mom-and-pop shops are still open inside buildings with an older-looking architectural style, very different to the amount of gentrification evidence around downtown haeyang and the campus grounds. walking on the side of the mostly empty street, he smelled the aroma of homemade cooking he hadn’t smelt in a while as he had always been bombarded by the MSG of fast foods that he usually bought other than convenience store foods. he almost forgets the smell of it, also the smell of blooming wildflowers and salt produced from the ultramarine. his consciousness floating about his corporeal form as he felt the numbness slowly fade.

soobin inspects the pavement before him. cracks from the old concrete untouched from newness greet him with the historical side of the town that has been established aeons ago. but it’s also a habit of his to look downwards at his feet every time he walks. he can still recall the crimson blood of the incident or the appearance of his aunt with a foaming mouth if he tilts up slightly, especially if there are other people involved as he either trails his vision on his moving feet so to not meet their eyes or on the nape of the person if they’re in front of him. but, on this side of town, he couldn’t help but notice the dwindling number of visitors to the shops.

yet even when he glances at the people that are scattered around the street, they seem so humble and poised. whilst walking towards his destination, he found an older woman carrying baskets of fruits or vegetables from the outdoor market that he passed by and the sight of a grandpa and a younger kid—his grandson from their similar features—walking around with balloons in his hands. it’s very different from the sight of obnoxious young adult drinking their hearts out to get rid of college stress. it’s as if this neighborhood is its own place out of haeyang. as if it’s a planet of its own.

obscured by the branches of various trees, soobin finds the dome-like structure of the observatory. he walks along the nearly empty parking lot as only a few identical buses are parked there, children dressed in uniforms stand on the side of the machinery; it’s the weekdays after all and a good time for a field trip. his figures trail behind them who are still lining up to the entrance, seeing the space theme imageries all over the place as he walks towards the ticket booth. a young teenager sitting behind the glass blowing a bubble from the gum, providing the ticket options.

“for one?” the teen said, chewing on his gum as soobin couldn’t help but see himself in the teen’s place.

“yup.” he places the cash amount on the booth.

“you okay doing the tour with a bunch of kids?”

soobin glances at him who is picking the money up, realizing that it’s more than the cost of one ticket when he finally focuses on it.

“i’m definitely okay with that.” he sees the guy looking back at him when he counts the amount and eyes at the older boy.

“no. don’t give back the change. might help you with your tuition. you’re doing a good job, kid.” soobin replied before he turned away to climb the small flight of stairs. leaving the teen boy staring at him before tucking the tip into his pocket.

he catches the pitter-patter on the floor as he watches the students scramble in lines beside him. most of their height is around his thighs and there are shorter kids too. the sound of an older woman guides the children as soobin stays back with the teachers who supervise them. soobin gives a nod to one of them as his endearing smile with dimples seems to melt their worries away—he’s glad he uses his hoodie now so that they can’t detect the depression that is still oozing out of him. when he enters right along with the group, he stares at the greenery entrance of the first exhibition, depicting the trees and buildings people associated with earth. screens around it shows videos of old commercials combines with new ones that created a sense of nostalgia that hits him in the right place.

“humans are curious beings and those before you have always been curious of the sky.” she points towards the ceiling where it is painted as the bright clear blue sky. “what goes on above the clouds? why is the sun so far but so hot? why does the moon always change shape from half a circle to a full circle to a dark circle? in this tour, we will get to know things other than our beautiful planet,” the tour guide said as she moved, letting the group follow her to a large diorama of a rocket standing tall until the ceiling. the screens on the wall shows slideshows of photos from mission control in a space center, outfits of spacemen display behind the glass box.

“people’s curiosity creates new things and creates-“

“ROCKET!” one kid said as he pointed towards the rocket tall beyond his height, making the others giggle with soobin following along.

“that’s right. a rocket! in the 1960s, humankind made a new achievement: going to space. a cosmonaut was the first one to go to space, and then a group of astronauts landed on the moon! even a dog and monkey have flown to space!” the guide opens her arms to the screen where the records of the 1969 moon landing is playing. “since then humans have been curious, why is there a brighter dot in the sky even brighter than the dots of stars? if people can reach the moon, can we also reach the sun and the stars? with that, we move…”

the guide moves to the new room behind a dark curtain. stepping through, the dark navy walls take dominance along with paintings of the planetary bodies, “to see our planet here as miniature. we are here.” she points at the blue and green-colored ball in a solar system diorama. “you live here. haeyang is here. and now we can see all the other planets beyond earth and the moon that is spinning around us.”

“is this mars?” one of the girls points at the red planet.

“that’s right. the red planet is our neighbor. many scientists and engineers are now trying to make humans reach mars. they have succeeded in putting a robot there as it scouts for martian landscape to discover new things. we will know more about it as we enter the planet rooms. but now we can notice,” the guide pushes a button as the diorama starts to spin. exclaims of wows come from the children as soobin can’t help but think that they are the voices of his head, outwardly shows what he’s thinking as he feels he has gone back to that age again.

“we can see here that all the planets are spinning around this big yellow ball. this one is the sun, the same hot sun that you encounter in the day. the sun has another name, 'sol'. and this is why we call this,” the tour guide widens her arm to show the whole diorama, “a solar system.”

“why is this one spinning the other way?” one of them points to the planet beside earth, the smaller orange ball spinning clockwise instead of counter-clockwise like others.

“venus is an oddball, you see. other than it spinning the other way than its friends, the day and night there is also deadly. you can burn in the day but freeze in the night. it’s a very dangerous planet but humans also found a way to show us what it looks like. we will see more of it soon.”

soobin follows along with the group as he learns about things he knows but things he also doesn’t know as astronomy is one of his interests he hasn’t pursued much other than a designing theme. exhibits upon exhibits walk as his hands move from tucking inside his hoodie’s pocket to be put behind him or even holding onto his phone as he takes pictures he could then spin for inspiration for whatever creative ideas he had, for both college works or anything outside.

but the exhibition that was the most profound to him, as he is currently standing in front of, is the small elevated tub of sand on the podium in front of a hubble space image full of galaxies. the window from above shines the lights from the outside, giving a specific spotlight to it. the exhibit was made by a haeyang institute of arts student coming from the plaque soobin read, capturing an image of the description as he wants to learn about the alumnus’ works outside of this. the words spoken by the guide tell something so deep to him that it makes him stay here while the others continue. each of the children holding a grain of sand in their hand as he follows, pinching the minuscule sand between his thumb and forefinger.

“we will then take the grain of sand and extend our arms to the window above. to the sky.” all of them push their arms out to the window on the ceiling with soobin pushing his arm out, capturing the tiny sand in eyesight.

“how you see the grain of sand with your eyes is the same as what the hubble telescope sees as it’s pointing to the darkest part of space where there are no lights. just like how we are with the sand, it’s not visible this far. but there is still something there. and with that, the telescope captures this picture.” the guide turns towards the image on the wall.

“the hubble eXtreme deep field. it is said to contain over 5000 galaxies. and as we learned before, galaxies have many stars and stars always have planets spinning around them. that means that there many upon many of planets, even planets that maybe the same as earth. and as we also learn about stars and the length of light in the previous rooms, we can guess that the lights from these galaxies might actually come from a long time as the light reaches us. million years to travel to be seen by the telescope. so we don’t know if the galaxies are still there or not as it might occur millions of years from now.”

“i wanna ask,” a kid replied as he dropped the grain back into the tub. “if what miss said that there might be planets like earth out there, and since you tell us that earth is a perfect planet where life lives. then are there beings living on that planet?”

“oh my gosh, aliens!!!” another replies as the group bursts out into the giant discussion session, but soobin doesn’t chuckle along like the rest of them this time because his mind is somewhere else, eyes stuck on the hubble’s captured image.

“well, there might be. aliens could also come in different shapes and sizes. there are some who are human-like and others who are monster-like. they can be big like elephants or small like ants. life may happen in those planets. but we don’t know which one it is. either we haven’t found them or they haven’t found us.”

soobin listens to the door closed as he didn’t buy the ticket for the show. it’s then followed by the steps on the floor as he peeks from the corner of his eyes, seeing the woman—the tour guide—stood beside him. her eyeline looking at the image with him.

“beautiful, right?”

“yeah…” soobin says while nodding, yet the wrinkles between his eyebrows contract as he sighs.

“it’s been so long since i’ve seen people your age visiting the planetarium. i’m happy you are though,” the woman said as he picked up the muffled exclaims from the sky theater.

“ever since local shops dwindled and newer shops entered at downtown, this area isn’t visited as much, especially with the younger ones like people your age. more locals move away as newer things enter and stay.” soobin heard the ruffles from clothing moving as the woman turned to him. “you’ve seemed to have an affinity for this picture here.”

soobin lets out a somber smile, “no matter how many times i’ve seen the image, i found more things to discover.” soobin’s eyes glisten as he takes a deep breath. “the last few days are hard for me. i feel like i’ve been floating away in space and staying there in limbo. a big decision i made for me to stay here came back and bite me in the ass. i probably relate to those aliens watching us rather than people here as i slowly realize.”

“hmm…” the guide said, “i can relate to you. i once was also a new person here. haeyang back then was far more empty. any people living there know each other and i felt like a total outsider when i had to blend in, especially since i came for an internship while waiting for my graduation from college. moving away from the family when i decide to live in a small town all by myself.”

the guide walks to stand in front of soobin, “i felt like an alien visiting the town, especially since i don’t know shit about the culture here. all that was motivating me to stay here is the new planetarium that is hiring people as i want to share my knowledge of space.”

“i recognize this sounds stupid, but why not pursue a career in the space center? be an astronaut and flew up there?” soobin asked as he steps forward towards the woman once again, standing beside her as they continue looking at the picture.

“well…” the woman clears her mouth as she continues, “i wanted to. but something happens in my life that must be so baffling if i talked about it to you.”

“shoot,” soobin replied comfortably, making the woman chuckle.

“i studied astronomy in college but i was an intern here to make design and art choices for the building. the marketing aspect of things as i worked as an assistant to my supervisor. we’re only a two-person team. then, something happens.” the smile on the woman fades away as soobin sees her eyes being cloudy from gaining back the memories, which he presumes are bad ones.

“i saw the sun being so near to the surface, it burns everything. but it stopped as i woke up and i sensed a sizzling feeling in my hand as i stopped a falling paint bucket without touching it. time goes by fast and slow, but i could control it with a wave of my hand as i took precaution of it and other things.”

soobin’s eyes widen as he’s piecing up the woman’s words, words he seems to understand even in their abstract manner.

“one day, i see my planet paintings on the wall here blurry. then i entered something i should’ve not been in when i found myself painting the wall once again. long story short, i’ve changed something about what i paint. i was trying to find the perfect planet to be painted cause i’m still in a dilemma about the jupiter i made. so, i painted saturn instead.” she let out a tight lip smile, yet still exuded warmth.

“when i went out of that vision, i arrived in a new planetarium. it's like the other one but i wasn’t the only intern. another intern was there and we spent time with each other before i realize i fell in love with him. i should’ve gone back and become an astronomer, as you’ve expected. but i love him too much to let him go.” the woman turns her head towards the theater as soobin can identify a silhouette of the man operating the holographic theater closest to the door.

“so i went back and got my degree. then came back here with my long journey where i saw the sun being so close to the surface that it made me panic. it seemed like the sun was stopping me from going back to him. but i stare back at it as i make up my mind and wave the time so i can be here with him,” the woman replied, brushing her fingertips on top of her closed eyelid.

“the person who is me here also studied astronomy, so i still am on track with the opportunity to be an astronomer and study the stars more. but, i noticed my vision was different. going to the hospital, i found out i’m colorblind—probably after fighting the sun back. i was stubborn and wanted to do something, anything, to cure it, but my boyfriend at the time reminded me of how little we had financially. so i stayed behind and instead worked here where i can help educate people on the stars,” she shifts to face the picture, “though i can’t see all the beautiful colors of that hubble photograph.”

soobin stares at the older woman as she turns her head towards him, “i assume we both are aliens to this world. i had know what you are feeling and there is only so much i can do since i can’t go back to my original home now. this is what my husband helped me with back then: when adapting to a new environment, try to share it with someone. there’s a small indie theater around this area that is airing old asian films. by the looks of you,” the woman eyed him up of his all-black ensemble, “it might be your type.”

the boy stood there struck and speechless as the woman turned around to go to the theater, opening the door as her voice became muffled by the excitement of kids as they converse about what they’ve seen, leaving him alone in the large empty space. does the woman also had…? he guesses so…

he was left in a trance when his phone vibrated from the deepest part of his pant pocket. it vibrates along with his hand as he pulls it out, seeing a chain of texts on the screen from one of his friends, han. a notification about a picture being sent to him as he opens the phone, taking him straight to the chat room where he sees a picture of a couple of people taken from a pretty far view; as if it is taken in a hidden way for a reason.

“isn’t that your girl?” soobin reads the message as he looks at the picture and enlarge it, seeing a few pixels of your recognizable features in front of a man. your arms are crossed in front of you, but he couldn’t look at your expression. yet the man beside you seems so familiar to him.

“yeah, the fuck is this?” he sent as han instantly types back

“since when is your girl associated with jeno?” the text said as soobin’s eyes widened when the information clicked for him of the man across from you in his black leather jacket ensemble.

jeno was not someone to mess with. a part of the rare elite haeyang local, his family pretty much owns everything in this town, maybe even the institute as the lee family is their biggest donor. the new business entering and killing local ones? they were placed on the buildings owned by the lee family, even jeno seems like he might also manage a few of them. he’s a dance major in the institute and rumor has it that they open a hip-hop dance class because he wants to. well, soobin doesn’t know much about him other than shallow pieces of information because the performing arts building is far from the visual arts building. but, jeno also has a reputation among his community too—worse than them, even if they’re often seen as bad guys.

manipulation of people, cover-ups of physical fights that soobin heard first-hand, all in a way to make him better than anyone here. he even was blacklisted in the few establishments where the usual concerts are held and drugs are being shared around because of his indecency. but the power of his family strikes through as they can threaten said establishment to lose so much profit so that their son can have fun in the shithole he seems to not blend in. jeno is a dangerous fellow, but why is he associated with you?

soobin’s thumbs on the screen let the screen zoom in more and more until he founds the limit. the amount of pixels there still is not accurate enough to observe every little detail on the image, yet soobin recognized that frown anywhere. the way he always has to smooth it out by himself every time you vent to him during your pillow talk session. you being the workaholic you are—looking perfect in everyone’s eyes—make him the trash bin to the frothing words of rambles coming through your lips. heck, you might even complain about your day-to-day life more to him than when you did it with your group of friends. yet he’s glad you picked him to let him see you in your most vulnerable state.

his eyes glanced back at the picture of galaxies in front of him as he picked up the pattering of footsteps of the school kids, continuing the tour as he could look at the merchandise store across from him—right by the exit. his mind was thinking all over the place when the memory of alternate timeline’s (y/n) seemed to remind him of something. instead of joining in the tour again, he opens his phone and scrolls around to find something.

soobin: hey, you busy tonight?

immediately, he can see the other person texting back.

(y/n): no..? you need anything??

you usually text him back a few minutes after he sends one, but he knows your tell when you’re upset, even if it’s behind the screen.

soobin: let’s watch a movie together.

he stretched his legs out as he awaited at the bus stop. his hand holding onto a brown paper bag with an item he bought whilst waiting for you. the view in front of him is exactly the view of the sea that is always imprinted in his mind; which its variants include the yellow fiery ball sinking into the ocean.

he can’t help but remember his conversation with the tour guide. as baffling as it is, he couldn’t even believe that, in this very timeline, someone had the same predicament as the one he is facing. lost in time. lost in worlds. soobin discovered how encouraging it was to see the husband-wife duo as they returned the children to the bus while he walked after them. the wife gives him a small smile and a knowing nod towards soobin as he returns to see a livelier neighborhood than the one he discovered hours ago when he walked by—seemingly a different one, but the afternoon with its free time makes the people go to the streets.

while he waits for you, he scours down the avenue full of mom-and-pop shops; his vision looking at the crack in front of him instead of the ones his feet are stepping on. he visits the outdoor market he saunters past as more shops are there, mostly selling ingredients or utensils that are needed in a home. the boy takes in the atmosphere of balanced quietness and loudness as people go by him, not minding him once before he sees glittery lights on his skin from the sun reflecting on something. turning towards them, he found the source.

the jewelries are put in an array at the front of a stand and more are dangling on the tiny display rack as he sees a woman not much older than him; almost falling asleep from the afternoon sun right under the shade of the tent. when his footsteps create scrapes on the concrete ground, the woman awakes as she watches his figure looming over the booth. both are silent as soobin looks at the various accessories on display. there are classical-looking ones with chains and pendants. still, there are also modern ones which include charms of letters and symbols—even a few of them match his style as he discovers one that is more retro-looking with an identifiable smiley face.

though his eyes were stuck on one of them when he decided to speak to the shopkeeper.

turning his head as he listens to the rumbling noise getting closer, he sees a similar bus to the one he used in the day slowing its machinery before stumbling to a stop. his head looks upwards to the open doors, watching a few people stepping down and you following behind.

“hi,” you mumbled as you skipped towards him, putting your hands inside your outer’s pocket. a smirk on your face as soobin sees a slight twitch in your smiling facial muscles—there is a leftover of what happened before, even if you changed your clothes to forget it.

“hey. thanks for coming.”

“no problemo. not gonna lie, though. it’s very suspect of you to ask me to go with you for things other than parties or you wanna screw me,” you let out a chuckle before licking your pretty chapped lips.

“i want a change of scenery for our whole ‘relationship’,” he says as he gives the air quotes, feeling one hand heavier than the other as he realizes the paper bag.

“shit-“ his hand fumbles before pushing the bag towards you. “for you,” he said with a thin smile that show his dimples.

“for me? choi soobin, are you possessed or something?” you asked, eyes squinting towards him while grabbing onto the strap of the paper bag.

“or something…” he follows, tucking his hands into his hoodie’s pocket with a cheeky smile on his face.

you peek from behind your eyelash at him, pouted lips showing as you reach into the bag. your palm touches a dense surface, a box small enough that you can grip it between your palm, thumb, and the rest of your fingers. pulling it out, you come upon a plain cream-colored box that is divided into two separate parts. carefully lifting the lid of the box, you identify the appearance of a fiber fabric soft beneath your touch when the light of the setting sun reflects the glint of the accessory inside.

eyebrows raised, you graze the small heart pendant on the golden necklace, seeing the reflection of your altered face with it being etched. you touch the ridge of the pendant when you perceive the familiar ridge like the one on your blush and powder container. opening it, you see it empty yet with the plain golden sheet of the whole necklace.

“what’s this for?” giggles slowly erupt from you as you tilt your head towards him.

“i’ve seen the next outfit you’re trying to make when i came to your room. the green flannel fabric one. i think this is perfect for the neck since it looks pretty hollow.” soobin replied, genuinely replied as he looked at you who let out a knowing glance at him. closing the box with the necklace, you put it back inside the paper bag before placing it in your own bag.

“i should credit you later when it’s done.” you winked as you tidied your bag’s strap across your chest, head turning towards the neighborhood. soobin saw the smirk you held fade away as your feet let you saunter around, leading the charge as he’ll guide you verbally to the cinema.

standing beside you, he sees the small frown you produced as you stare at the buildings around you two. your mind is whirring from the nostalgic feeling you experienced. looks of recognition create a glint in your eyes as your mouth follows, creating the surprised looks that resemble the theater kids when practicing for a stage production. you point towards a small lit-up booth as you tell him that that is your favorite ice cream parlor from the past.

“we should buy one after we finish watching.” soobin replied, the streetlamp’s light reflecting off both of your faces as you turned toward him.

“which way?”

soobin guides you by your shoulders as you walk down the way to the local cinema that the planetarium tour guide told him. both of your footsteps blend in with the cricket noises that are more prominent on this side of the town. he stops you as he looks up to the sign of the local cinema he found and enters inside. a lone worker works by the counter and a surprised yet genuine look comes across their face.

“welcome!” the worker said with a gentle smile.

“hi. tickets for two, please. and what movie is showing today?” soobin asked as you stood beside him. both of your dark clothes blended in with the whole moody lighting of the small lobby area of the cinema. only the lights from the display case give off an unnatural cold tint that stands out from the warm ambiance.

“we bought a box set from criterion with seven movies by the hong kong director, wong kar wai, that we’ll be playing for the entire month. for today, the movie is fallen angels,” the worker replied as they input the order into the computer of the cashier.

“i’ve heard of him before.” you whisper to him before nodding towards the worker. “we would love to watch it and a bucket of butter popcorn, please!”

soobin’s face contorts into a grin as he turns towards you, before continuing his order. when it’s done, he lets you bring the popcorn bucket while he holds both of your drinks to the show theater. stepping inside the lone theater of the establishment, the set of seats creates an intimate experience when looking at the screen. the cushion are soft and fuzzy as you and soobin sit on the seats you bought. not too high in the rows but also right in the middle of the columns—the best seats, according to the worker. besides, only the two of you are watching this evening.

as the light dims and the sound of the projector hums from behind the two of you, you are met with the unusual camera angle of two people in black and white frames. the angle makes the woman smoking so intimate, and enormous on the screen of the theater as soobin has to adjust his seating position. the environment surrounding her is also distorted, making the guy look farther than it seems. then the first sentence is uttered…

“are we still partners?”

soobin looked towards you when she spoke the words. he can’t seem to take his eyes off you as the movie continues, seeing the neon-green reflecting on your face as he turns back to focus on the killer, his agent, and chimo, who he identified with the most. both of your hands meet each other’s in the bucket of popcorn—unlike what the movies usually portray, both of you are not startled and pull away your hands. instead, you lean in towards him as you speak out about the killer’s agent outfit that contrasts with the blondie—both of them have a relationship of some sort with the killer. you also predict the reason blondie bleaches her hair blonde is because she wants to be remembered. yet, the ending struck him as he saw the two unlikely people embracing on the motorcycle as they, finally, see the light of day.

soobin couldn’t help to see him and you in their position.

stepping out of the theater, your feet immediately beeline towards the ice cream parlor you showed him. his long limbs able him to catch up as the night falls on the neighborhood, letting the exteriors of the stores that are still open light up the street. soobin caught the ring by the door as you were already on the counter ordering the ice cream you wanted. the worker gives you a small spoon of ice cream for you to taste as you let out a satisfying hum, rolling your eyes as it lands on soobin who is now standing beside you.

“it tastes just like what i remember. can i get that in a cup, please? what about you, bun?”

“make it two.” he lets out a small smile as the worker scoops the ice creams into both of your cups.

“gosh, i’ve been missing out on many things since i came back to haeyang.” you whispered to him before turning towards the worker, “i remembered you used to have a store in the downtown area… and it’s not there now.”

“yeah, that’s our old location. a big shot bought the building from the landlord and, intentionally, hiked the rent price. so, not seeing any attempts to negotiate with them even if we want to, we moved here,” the worker said as they placed the cups on the counter.

“oh…” you let out in a tiny voice, which soobin could still hear.

you let out a small thank you as soobin follows you to the small window seat booth overlooking the empty street as the moon rises to reach its highest point. holding the cup in your hand even if it makes your hand chilly, you nibble on the small spoon as you taste the food from your childhood. yet, the glee that you let out a few minutes ago doesn’t appear anymore as you gaze outside the glass window.

“wow…” you exclaimed before chuckling, “reality hits hard, huh?”

“huh?” soobin replied as you angled slightly toward him.

“this ice cream parlor is the favorite of my family. whenever summer comes or we want a sugar rush, we would always go here. mine will always be this flavor, while dad goes with the coffee and dark chocolate bitter flavors and mom’s with the sour ones. and now… well…” you glance away.

soobin hummed, “you don’t have to tell me.”

“i w-want to?” your voice pitches up before he watches your shoulder slouch, taking a breath as you resume.

“it hits differently now that my family has broken apart, tasting this same flavor that will always remind me of them. they separated when i’m in high school and i still wonder that, if i hadn’t been having too much fun with my friends, can i mediate whatever problems they have with each other?”

soobin frowns as he hears you talk, cracks upon cracks of the barrier you had crumbled as you continue. on how your mom’s rise in the career ladder leads to her infidelity with her co-worker. how even at the mature age of a teenager, they still want a custody battle of you. but you chose your dad as you then rented an apartment with him and still stayed in the city. you are glad to see him happy with his current girlfriend, but the guilt inside of you for not stopping the conflict still remains.

“they still love each other at that time when i can insert myself in. i don’t care that i had to be their negotiator and mediator, but when it was finalized, i had a lot to stomach. but the shame for not helping stings me so bad,” you replied, scrapping the now empty cup for the remaining melted ice cream. “i think that’s why eating this hits me so much with what happened in the decade ever since i moved out from haeyang.”

“how about you now?” that’s what soobin could muster that makes sense.

“i-uh…” you sighed, “everything changes so much in a decade. when i looked around the neighborhood, i recognized a few shops i went to as a kid. my head was in the clouds before and then seeing gentrification happening in real time now hurts me; especially on what i’ve missed about the haeyang i know. i used to live here, yet it feels so familiar and unknown at the same time. especially with-“ you paused as you looked down, seeing the last drop of the creamy liquid hit the bottom of the cup.

“with?”

“nothing. he’s- he’s not gonna remember me anyway,” you let out as you force your lips to smile, sending the signal to your being to lighten the mood up. “i’m feeling nostalgic and i got reminded of the diner that i used to go to. you wanna eat dinner?”

“we just ate.” soobin giggled as he saw you hyping yourself up.

“i know, but we walk so much and the food we eat is just snacks, okay? my treat.”

“you said we’re gonna split the bill?”

“the diner food’s gonna be my treat, bun. then, we’re gonna discuss the bill when eating. c’mon.” you said as you stood up from the seat and you both walked back into the night, forgetting why he brought you here in the first place when he noticed how you tried to conceal your conflicted thoughts. he should be more forward to asking about what happened in the photo his friend sent, but he just can’t let you be down again when he’s glad to see you’re doing well.

the cloud of smoke from you smells fruity as you take a drag of your vape. soobin couldn’t help but reminded of original timeline’s (y/n)’s attempt to smoke an e-cigarette on that beach which resulted in a coughing fit. he pulls out his own e-cig as you two sit at the bus stop, waiting for the designated vehicle to come as it’s still around ten now. the quietness and the ambient of the night consume both of you as the sound of the rushing waves follows behind from the waves; the waves that you could just go straight to feel from where you’re sitting at. thighs resting next to each other as your feet tap on the ground in a rhythm in which he also fills up.

when the bus arrives, you and him are the only passengers on board as you both sit next to each other. the scent of a sickly sweet fragrance emitted from your respective e-cigarettes fills the surrounding air you both are in. as the bus rolls down the street, you put your head on soobin’s broad shoulder, wriggling your fingers to find his to hold. soobin doesn’t want to comment anything to you, but he knows that starting pda in public is not your usual thing—yes, it’s still one even when you only have the bus driver steering the wheel. it’s always him initiating it first when in public and it’s always side hugs where he has his arm around your shoulders or your arm around his waist. many people know you two are fucking, but you both always show the ‘friend’ part of ‘friends with benefits’ in public.

but in this type of situation, soobin can only think about how convoluted everything is. his thoughts. his reality. his feelings towards you.

you didn’t let go of your interlocked hands as you guided soobin to the diner when you arrived at the downtown bus stop. the pavement was a little bit wet from the condensation of the colder air of the night. exterior signs light up the area as you both can hear the muffled bass booming from pubs, bars, and nightclubs—somewhere you both go to if you don’t have any objective like what tonight has. the street looks abandoned as the night slowly gets later and later, yet the glass windows of the building create a whole different atmosphere that oozes from it. your eyes sting as you see the building; all of them still look the same, but more look brand new from renovations and change of businesses.

yet, the lone american-style diner still remains in between the newly refurbished buildings. like a world outside of its own where time stops and the aesthetic staying that way for years upon years.

pushing the door of the entrance, you lead the charge as soobin follows you inside the unfamiliar place. his eyes meet the lone worker washing their hands before turning towards you. the same solemn smile on your face that shows in the old neighborhood appears again when you both admire the interior design.

“how may i help you?”

both of you shift towards the worker and expressions of subtle surprise blooms on both of your faces as you see who is talking.

isn’t that min?

soobin looks down at the name tag as he sees the word “miya“. when he met min and confided with them on how they also had to travel to another timeline to come out to their parents, he had a feeling that that meant they were here; but he didn’t expect them to work in the diner. the boy has walked past the art supply store a few times but never entered—because he only knows min, not miya.

“hi, this is still open, right?” you questioned.

“yeah! we’re open 24/7 now. you can sit anywhere you like.” the woman gestures to the numerous seats as you and him take off to one of the booths. settling on the cushion, your eyes still wander on the interior rapidly. fingers tapping in an undetermined rhythm as soobin looks across from him to your active sightseeing self. realizing his gaze from a small peek, you turn your head towards him and give a shrug.

“this is so weird!” you mouthed towards him as a shadow came from beside you, placing the menu on the table. staring at the names, your eyes sparkle as you see the overall diner menu that still has the same cuisines from what you remember—with a few new ones you don’t recognize.

“which one do you want?” you utter to the boy.

“i’ll follow you. you’re the one that knows.” he juts his chin towards you, signaling you to pick for him.

as you speak of the order, soobin turns towards the other woman in the room. miya still likes her shoulder-length hair just like how he remembers min has—though styled differently as min has a more masculine appearance. yet, he still can see the feminine influences in her looks as he could only remember min with their neutral look that is a combination of cottagecore and hipster—perfect for a place like haeyang.

then you cut off his thoughts, “hey, uh, miya?”

“yes?”

“is miss ahn still working here or??”

soobin hears you utter a familiar name. the last time he heard it was before he moved here. yeonjun has spoken of miss ahn before as she works in his favorite dining place—getting away from his stepmom’s wrath every time she went home after lectures. at that time he was in the original timeline with him though, he doesn’t hang out at the diner as much. soobin only knows of the diner from yeonjun’s story of him and (y/n) or the takeout both of them ate as they hung out.

“my aunt is still working here. but she’s taking the day shift, so here i am working for the night one.”

“oh, and also…” soobin cuts in, surprising you too. “don’t you also have a store for art supplies and such? i’ve seen you around there before.”

miya raises her eyebrows, stunned, “i do. it’s my mom’s actually. she works there most of the time and i help around as best as i can. working two jobs within the family business,” the woman chuckles, her hands still holding onto the notepad and pencil. “anything else?”

“can we…” you immediately spoke. “can we have two strawberry donuts, please? i don’t know if you cook them all day too because the display case is empty.”

“well… i have the entire night to spend making them. so two strawberry donuts it is.”

“thank you so much.” you convey a smile as miya walks away, slowly turning your head towards him as the smile turns sheepish.

“what are you thinking about?” soobin mumbled as you took the scenery once again before turning back to him.

“it’s been a long time since i went here. yet it all still feels the same as a decade ago. especially when i’m with yeon…” your voice trails off as soobin follows your eyeline. it’s set on the stools that are overlooking the counter, making it easier for customer to look at their orders being processed. soobin can clearly visualize who you’re with as he can see the imaginary apparitions of the young you he knows—the visualizer comes from the childhood photo you and he exchanged—and the young boy who is your childhood best friend.

“you don’t have to answer right away though, but i notice that you’ve been pausing when you almost say someone’s name.” soobin now takes the bait because of your pauses. he can’t wait longer to hear what your relationship with his former best friend, even if it’s different timeline-wise.

“fuck you for being so attentive.” you playfully nudge his hand on the table with yours. the expression you show becomes solemn once again as you open the cabinet in your memories of a certain boy you left a decade ago.

“back when i lived in haeyang, i had a childhood best friend named yeonjun. he’s like the ideal best friend you wanna have in your life. back then, we were always together. those stools right there,” you point towards the stools you gaze, “those were our designated seats here. every time we left school and before going home, we always hung out around downtown. this diner. the ice cream parlor. the bookstore which is now gone…”

you chuckled to yourself as soobin could imagine you playing the memories in your head like a movie, all before your smile turned downwards.

“then i had to move because of a job opportunity my mom had. but, i remember an anecdote around that time when i played at yeonjun’s house, i was drawing something while he was playing mario kart on the nintendo ds, hearing the sounds of the jingling doorknob of the front door as i saw his mom come in with the groceries, looking frazzled.” soobin’s attention caught on to the words as he can predict what yeonjun’s mom would be like—moments away safe from a car accident that could change your whole path in life.

“yeah, so a few days after that, i mentioned to him i’ll be moving to the city and yeonjun had this cute pout on his face before he hugged me so tight that my back hurt, saying that he’ll be missing me. that was a decade ago when children didn’t have social media to note who they were friends or acquaintances with—i was too young to even be allowed to open one by myself. so… yeah… we separated and i never reached out to him since.” you sighed, putting your head in your hands as you rubbed your face: bare of make-up.

“i want to, you know? reach out to him again. but i don’t know what i’m gonna feel. what if he forgot about me? 10 years is a long time,” plates of food and glasses of beverages are placed on the table as you hold on to the fork and knife, ready to munch it down by the looks of your face as you smell the delicious aroma.

“i don’t even know if he’s here or not. he might actually go to college somewhere else ‘cause i don’t see him around here or anyone that looks like him…” you continued as you cut a slice of the chicken before letting yourself consume it.

soobin recalls the conversation he had with original timeline (y/n) and how yeonjun is pursuing his love of video games in a college, but not in haeyang. but, this timeline’s you know nothing about it. something that makes a pang in soobin’s heart and something that seems to hit you too as you emote it so explicitly. he suddenly remembers what his dad would do when someone looks so sad, especially when there are fries on the plate.

you were focusing on eating your food when you heard a muffled call of your name. looking up, you snickered as you tried not to choke on your saliva, seeing soobin’s eyes smile with a skim glaze of regret as he’s sticking two fries so it looks like he has fangs between his top lip and upper teeth.

“soob- HAHAHAHA!” your body laughs along with your voice as soobin can’t control it anymore and follows along with you—plucking the fries and putting one in his mouth before shoving the other into yours. you continue to laugh as you chew the fried potato slice before you calm yourself down, wiping your eyes from the tears.

“WHAT WAS THAT FOR?” you smack his upper arm as soobin grimaces, a look of playfulness showing on his face while you facepalm yours.

“a technique my old man has to make people laugh. glad i could make that work,” soobin answered with giggles between his words as you clenched your abdomen, can’t stop imagining soobin like that, especially since the fries were crooked when he did it.

“you looked like a dumb walrus,” you reply with a grin on your face as soobin’s smiley face follows along, showing his dimples that just melt you more.

“i’m your dumb walrus.”

“shut the fuck up.” you pick up a handful of fries before throwing it to him.

“oh, (l/n) (y/n). you don’t know what you’ve done, did you?” soobin rises from his seat and walks to your side of the booth. you bite your bottom lip as you scurry away deeper into the booth before he attacks you with tickles.

his fingers fluttered against your skin as you giggled, your own hands reaching out to tickle his sides as his body weakened and fell on top of yours. hairs fluttered everywhere as you both laughed, not caring if miya could see you because no other person was there other than her. his hand moves to push your hair away from your face as he stares down. your breathtaking face underneath the white ceiling lights, a different scenery than the dim lights that usually surround you both. his lips parted as he tried his best to breathe. that’s when you reach your hands around his neck and tuck him down, letting his plump lips meet yours.

the kiss started out deeper than the peck you give to him behind other people’s back, but lighter than the lustful ones you both indulged when you know fucking is the next stage. your hand caressing the ends of his black locks that are getting longer on his nape, an unfamiliar passion being shared between the two of you before you push his chest. pulling away, he sees your puffy lips from the elongated kiss as he pecks one last time before standing and going back to his seat. both of you chuckled as soobin gathered the fries you’d thrown to his seat back on your plate—some on his nearly empty plate as you squinted your eyes while you watched him eat it.

as you continue eating your late dinner, miya puts down the plate of the strawberry donuts you recognized on the table. drinking to cleanse the palate, you pick up a donut before pushing the plate to soobin, who follows what you’re doing.

“cheers!” you muttered as your donut and soobin’s tapped against each other before you took a bite of the side. the taste of the strawberry glaze on the top opens a cabinet full of memories of the time you and yeonjun always went here for it. the way your uniforms are a mess because of the hastiness of the time when yeonjun picks you up from your class. untied shoes, missing socks, and untucked shirts between the two of you as you remember the giggles flowing out of you two all throughout the streets and the diner’s interior.

it was you and yeonjun against the world at that time.

and now, you think, it’s you and soobin against the world.

placing the payment to miya as you pulled out your debit card, soobin’s clinginess comes back as his hands draped around your body from behind. yet, you don’t understand if he’s doing this because he’s horny or because he just wants to, which is weird when you’re taking into account your relationship status. friends with benefits was something that people usually hide behind others, something you and soobin agreed upon when you both decide to do it. but there’s something more lingering between the two of you as you and him start to get closer. it usually turns people off if they decide to indulge in it, but you also start to submit to it even when you’re not noticing—your mind makes you remember it with the locked hands as you guide him to the diner from the bus just from tonight.

then, you also remember the excerpt of thoughts you wrote about him and how it influenced you. maybe that’s what you’re feeling.

stepping out of the diner lets you both be blasted by the night breeze as you both tug your outers closer to your bodies. soobin’s hand holding yours as he tucks it into the front pocket of his hoodie. you and he try to match your feet when you walk as the giggle fest continues and flies into the open air.

“you know, soob. you’re nearly the epitome of love languages today.” words are spoken by you as the two of you waited for the red light of the crossing to turn green on the way to the campus grounds.

“what gives?” he puckered his lips, the deep dimple on his cheek showing as you both then continued walking. the light of the headlights from the car stopping at the red light illuminates your legs as you pass by.

“words of affirmation like what we spoke about, giving gifts with the necklace you gave me and the movie ticket, physical touch like,” you looked down at your hand tucked in soobin’s pocket, “right now, and quality time like the whole of tonight. you’re lucky i have a noon class today.”

soobin pokes his tongue to the walls of his cheek as he hums and continues walking as you both try to keep pace with each other. that’s when he sensed your grip in his hand getting tighter, making him pivot towards you as he raised his eyebrows.

“you never told me the reason you asked me to hang out tonight…” you asked, leaning forward as you let out a pout. your chin almost resting against his chest as you glance up.

“it’s… did you meet jeno today?” he tried to conceal it, but being straightforward seemed to be the right choice instead of tittering about the topic. at the mention of jeno, your pout falls away as you avert your eyes from him.

“han told me about it. he says that you were looking upset. so i brought you with me to clear your mind.” he continues as you nod.

“well, you did just that before you told me the whole reason, you dumb-dumb.” a genuine frown shows up on your face.

“hey! you’re the one who is asking…” he replied before he leaned forward, giving a peck to your temple. “besides, this whole thing that we are doing is the last love language that you’re talking 4 out of 5 of it.”

“huh?” you stopped as he cupped your cheek, turning your frown to a smile as he lifted the corners up.

“my act of service for you.”

soobin glances down at the sketches he made in his sketchbook. the combination of flowers and space-like caricatures being shaded with the blunt pencil as he can feel the callus forming near his fingertips because of the way he holds it. tracings outside of the main sketches are left untouched as the graphite’s residue stains his skin, creating splotches of color which tells the tale that the people who are drawn on that paper will not have the perfect figure, including hands and feet.

it’s been a day after he brought you back to your hall after your night out; spending the turn of the day together. he remembered your disappointed face when he told you he couldn’t join you in your room. not that he doesn’t want to, but the reminder of your relationship status stops and reminds him that you both are friends. soobin also reminds you of your class in the afternoon and how you have a meeting with the fashion show crew, how your face lets out a sudden surprise before resuming back to a bummer. yet, it’s a disappointment deeper than what he used to see. the way your eyes glance at him before he left makes him recall how your face fell when he mentioned jeno. a look he never sees on you, yet you shake your head away as you show him the small smile he adores. even with that, the eyes can’t lie.

in the numerous sketches he had drawn yesterday and today, he also made a sketch of your eyes as he remembered them—visualizing the emotion he sensed when you glanced at him. even han commented on it when he stumbles into the room where soobin is tattooing a guy in their parlor, seeing the sketch on his work desk even with its unfinished status; it still looks good and real.

after class yesterday, he had a tattoo appointment for a client. a guy who requested wanted a simple tree on his lower arm that soobin sketched out. when the client told him what he was sketching represented one of haeyang’s signatures, he couldn’t help but remember the tattoo he gave to yeonjun from his original timeline: the tattoo of the ocean wave and the mountain to represent haeyang. soobin could recollect how the other boy grimaces as he grips the bed sheet when tattooing—it is near the neck where nerves go through to the spine and he can imagine how ticklish and hurtful it must be. that’s when he looks up from the back when tattooing to see the face of the yeonjun he knows. his pink hair is still there yet fading away as the bleached locks show up because he’s too lazy to dye it back. soobin had to tell himself to get rid of that thought so he didn’t ruin the tattoo for the client; the hand holding the gun trembling as he remembered his best friend.

as the mid-term week is nearing, soobin has been focusing more on finishing his mid-term projects as a way to “clear his mind.” but the events of the week’s start still haunt him like a shadow behind a beam. yet, they inspired him to do his projects. all the ideas flowing in his mind for his animation and visual storytelling classes are everything related to isolation, loneliness, alien and outer space surroundings. he’s glad that his projects are all individual works cause he doesn’t wanna bother to tell people why he chose aliens in the first place as a topic to do.

soobin rubbed the bridge of his nose as he sat back down on his chair after showering, yet working on the sketches of anything involving what goes on in his mind—mid-term projects, client orders, and you—still makes him sweat profusely. it’s like he could see himself in a third-person view, his figure leaning against the desk with his open sketchbook, his open laptop, and the digital drawing pad left on while he’s here burning his mind out. in times like this, he usually has one of his friends that he relies on, usually han as they are the closest. but when he’s feeling existential, he concludes that only he can understand how to handle it. people’s gonna say he’s crazy if he tells them that this is not his home and that he wants to go home to somewhere beyond this current space and time.

just like what he heard from you two days ago and how you reached out to him at the right time to think about everything all over.

y/n: hey bun!!

y/n: you got free time today?

he reads the screen after the vibration passes, unlocking it and typing his answer before his mind stops him once again.

soobin: yeahhh

y/n: come to my room pls. need help

‘what are you up too?’ he asked himself, yet his body reacted in an instant as he packed his bag before going out of his room. the journey to your hall doesn’t really take long since it’s just a few buildings from here. however, when he walks out the hallways and onto the paths of the campus grounds, he can sense his being floating away. a few people who recognized him gave a small greeting, yet all he could do was give a small nod and smile before he went past them. not everybody knows soobin like everybody knows you, but he can perceive the unintentional pressure of being a known person in his year, his major, or even the whole alt scene in haeyang institute.

stepping inside the hall, he climbs the familiar flights of stairs that is imprint in his memory ever since you showed him which room is yours, knowing which side he should walk to not bump into anyone he comes across. his feet automatically walked through the hallways where guys, girls, and more hang out in the communal areas or even just by the walls in front of the rooms. seeing your name on the board as he walks to the door, he knocks on it with his signature set of knocks you’ll recognize. not going to lie to himself; this feels like the time when he waited in front of the same door at the start of the week, where he was horny and want to meet you, but he realized that you aren’t who you are—an alternate version of you is there instead.

the door opens as a hand reaches out and suddenly grabs his wrist, pulling him inside as it slams shut faster than when it opens, startling himself and even you. you rested your back against the door in an outfit he recognizes as the outfits you usually wear in your room—the tank top and shorts combo. adorning your neckline is a simple gold chain from one of your jewellery collections and he could see the ink of your matching tattoo with his from the sleeveless top. yet, your eyes appear like it was blasted open as the shock dissipates and is replaced with calm, combined with your shuffled hair as you step closer to him.

“glad you came,” you said as you tugged on his wrist. “now, can you undress for me, please?”

“woah woah, (y/n).” he tenses up his arm, “you sure you want us to do this? you’re frazzled.”

“what do you mean- oh for fuck’s sake, soobin!” you turn away as his body follows, eyes widening at the view of the rest of your room.

fabrics of all different colors are thrown on the floor as you lay out your folding desk out from the corner of your room. separated parts of clothing already cut and needed to be sewn together. he catches the green flannel fabric he saw a few nights ago now already become a crop top shirt, a fishnet top showing underneath it around the midriff and stomach area with a creme skort around the waist; the gold necklace he gave to you finishing the outfit. other than that, he sees the other finished clothes thrown on your mattress, some with a semblance of clothes, but some are still too wide to even be called clothes.

“you’re gonna help be my mannequin for just a few of my pieces. just stand there and look pretty while i adjust how it will look.” soobin hears your command, seeing the pencil behind your ear leaf as you tug one of the clothing to him. a light brown-colored shirt made of silk that is around the size of his torso—buttons are still not sewn as soobin reaches behind him, pulling his t-shirt off and exposing his skin to you. he smirks when he heard you little gasp before you walk towards the desk, pulling out pieces of the clothing on the stacks from the top of your bed.

tucking his arms into the sleeves, he realized how wide the diameter was and that it fit perfectly for him. but when he looks down, he notices the end of the sleeves covering nearly half of his palm. the opening of the shirt rested on his body, making a silver of his skin exposed. humming a tune that he shared with you, you turn around with your nose scrunching as you take in the sight of soobin in your sewn shirt. you glance towards the excess fabric as you kneel, making soobin follow your movement as you pull the pencil from your ear, the other hand reaching for his.

“is this around your wrist?” your touch seeps from behind the fabric as you let your fingertip trail up his covered palm to his wrist.

“that’s the one.” soobin confirmed as your thumb pressed on his wrist, right above where the pulse should be.

“okay,” you replied hastily, pushing the pointy tip of your pencil against the fabric where he had told you as you moved with your knees on the floor towards the other hand, finding the right spot and creating small line marks on both of them. pushing yourself up with your hands gripped around his lower arm, they hover around his torso as you grab the ends where the buttons should be and gently pull them simultaneously. yet, the small exert of force still makes soobin hunch forward.

“stand tall.” you push his chin up with your fingers as you tuck the ends towards each other; soobin straightens his back and sees that the ends overlap. your hand plays around with your pencil and turns it around your knuckles and digits expertly. leaning close, soobin can sense your breath against his body as you mark where the shirt ends overlap with each other. he could feel the tickling sensation threaten to burst him but he’s trying his best not to let out a giggle, focusing on you who is biting your bottom lip in focus.

“you’re so tense.” soobin replied as he reached his hand up towards your face, pushing his thumb against the tightened muscles between your eyebrows. he watched your stare calming down from the tension as you tilted your gaze at him. it’s a habit of his when he sees you frowning or jittery, not wanting you to create unnecessary wrinkles on your face just from a bad mood. but, he detected that it’s been there multiple times for the past few months. the way your face looks more tired than usual when you’re not wearing make-up—still his favorite looks of yours. the area under your eyes is sunken as he sees the dark circles forming. your cupid’s bow also turned downwards naturally with the emotions you’re having. the way you have been hiding something from him in your usual pillow talks to even sleeping right after: a sign of your tiredness.

“distract me then,” you replied as you leaned back, allowing a small smile out as you diverted towards your table; pulling out a piece of pants made of dark blue flannel fabric as he took it from you.

“what’s these outfits for?” he pulls down his sweatpants even without your command as you rotate away and rummage to your little cabinets full of pins, needles, and threads. turning around, soobin holds onto the top of the hem of the pants as you carefully tug the shirt in, pulling out the safety pins you bring.

“the fashion show,” you mumbled as you tucked the pins onto the hem of the pants so they fit perfectly with his hips. “the schedule for my model search moved forward into two weeks from now and i can’t do the fitting if my clothes aren’t done. so i have to, at least, make some of the outfits now that i already sketched them out. that’s why i couldn’t contact you yesterday cause i was doing that sort of stuff while juggling with classes and meetings. “

you continue putting the pin on the shirt he’s wearing, right in the middle of his mid-riff as the shirt only shows the chest part of his torso, “and i see a lot of flannels.”

“yeah, made of deadstock fabrics. i still wonder why people don’t use any of the fabrics available instead of using new ones ‘cause you can find gems within the fabrics that people say are ‘outdated’. “ you let out a smile as you pull down your fingers from making the air quotes, taking in the outfit you made him put on. grabbing your sketchbook, you made notes on the exact outfit sketched as soobin stood there leaning on one of his feet, effortlessly modeling for you.

“how do you feel? do you think there’s something amiss?” soobin’s body is being turned by you to the full-body mirror leaning against your wall. your head peeking from behind him as he takes a look at the outfit, seeing the expanse of his skin bare and in need of something to fill it up.

“a necklace would look good. the chest part looks kinda empty,” he answered to his own question.

“that’s what i was thinking.” you pat his shoulder before going to your bed again. you pick up a black tank top and cargo pants as you twist to him, his hand/eye coordination works in tandem when you throw the pieces his way—which he catches perfectly.

“i’ve been wanting to try a fashion set with flannel in them. it can blend in as an all-year type of fabric based on when you wear it and how you style it. it is that versatile.” you mentioned as you returned to the desk, hearing the ruffle of fabric pulled from behind you when you found the sheer fabric that you had only finished making the torso part.

soobin looks surprised as he takes in the star-patterned fabric you tossed to him. the silver sparkles refract the light from the sun coming in when you only give him the part that appears like a vest. then, you bring a long rectangle fabric that you hold near your chest as soobin puts on the unfinished piece. when he allows his eyes to roam once again, he catches onto the other theme he doesn’t notice the whole time as he focuses on the flannel: the space-themed fabric.

he finally sees that one of the tops you made—a sleeveless tube-style top—has the patterns of the moon phase on it. an outer made of cargo was painted with the monochromatic two-color version of earth enlarged, leaving only nearly 2/3 shown on the fabric. accessories that you’ve picked and put on top of outfits have a star, a sun, a moon, or a planet. he shifts back to you as you continue to put the same sheer fabric for the vest he wears on his arm, wrapping the width of it around his muscles.

“is this too tight?” you pulled the fabric around his arm as it wrapped around the skin, making his arm full of speckles of stars—perfectly seeing the image of space on his skin with his saturn tattoo on his upper sleeve.

“nah,” he replied, making you grin as you pinched the two ends of the fabric before marking the right place to sew. “what’s with the space concept?”

head tilts up, you lick your lips as you pull yourself away to place the fabric away. you return with a measuring tape as you let him take off the vest he wore, letting you see him only with the tank top and the pants you just finished sewing last night.

“if you think of it, you might see the square in the flannel fabric as stars like i do. a similar pattern, yet one is so coordinated while the other is chaotic,” you responded while measuring around his legs; length and diameter, from his waist to his chest.

you let out a giggle from the words you said as soobin lets out a pout, the dimples on his forming—it is his curious face after all. however, he felt like you were restricting something.

“not gonna lie, i was having a burnout at the start to choose what kind of theme should i come up with for this line. this is, like… the first time i made outfits that aren’t for me to use. that’s why all of them started so oversized because i have to think about the models that are gonna use my creations.” soobin sees your mouth move as you put the measuring tape from his shoulder to his wrist, and continue writing the numbers in the book.

“but then i got reminded of you. your love for flannel shirts for an outer and the space-like tattoos on you, and both of them seem so...” you subtly lick your lips, “alternative. and that’s why i decided street fashion is like the basic style of it. using flannel and space-themed fabrics all around to showcase my arts and skills.”

soobin sees you stepping back, hand reaching up to your waist after putting the measuring tape around your neck. the plastic material of the tape grazes your skin at the neck as you give him a sheepish smile.

“i just realized that you’re my muse for this line.” you chuckled while shaking your head, brushing your hair away as you massaged your temple. the boy hoped he wasn’t doubting it, that you genuinely mentioned to him how he is your muse for this whole collection, like you to him with his tattoo ideas and sketches he has made.

your body leans back against the windowsill as your shoulder relaxes. the sunbeam reflecting your face as you stretch your spine. the way you close your eyes and sigh, he realizes just how vulnerable you may seem to be. the way you describe what you’re doing to yourself yesterday makes him figure out that you’re overworking a tad bit too much from the regular. but you are a workaholic after all and it seem to be in your second nature to do juggle these complicated things.

yet, soobin worries for you more than you realize. maybe even more than your best friends realized.

“i’m done with five outfits now. i gotta finish sketching the others,” you mumbled to yourself, making soobin invisible before you opened your eyes and met his.

“what is your usual place to get inspiration?” you questioned.

and soobin knows exactly the answer.

“there’s this music store that i buy things from. they have listening rooms so i picked up a few vinyl lps, tapes, or cds before plugging in and letting them inspire what i was making next.”

“that sounds so nice…” you let out a little smirk, “you think you can introduce me to that today?”

“i’ve wanted to do that for a long time,” he replied, making you widen your eyes as he looked like he was being caught; making both of you chortle. you roll them playfully as you push yourself off from the windowsill.

“alrighty, we shall change our clothes then.” you tuck the curtains of your window so it closes until there’s only a little gap, letting the light go in but more of them have a bit of shade. soobin carefully reaches for the clothes you make draping his body and take them off as you turn towards your wardrobe, opening the doors to let him see the outfits you have worn—some he recognized and also didn’t. as you reached for the bottom of your tank top, he realized just how you also didn’t mind changing in front of him. well, you both have seen each other naked in many ways.

however, soobin’s eyes landed on something on your waist.

as you let your tank top and shorts hang on the small rack outside of the wardrobe—seems to be reserved for the finished outfits for the show but you don’t care, soobin analyzes the anomaly on your skin: a dark patch on the right side of your waist. it’s large enough that it stretches from the top of your underwear to the dip in your waist, and dark enough that it looks brand new. he sure has bruised you up when you have sex, but the last time he had sex with you was a few nights ago and he didn’t hold you that tight.

“you’re bruised up.”

your head rotates sideways, peeking from the corner of your eyes towards him, “it, it’s okay. i was in a hurry and accidentally hit a table’s edge. it hurts but not as painful as yesterday when it happened,” you assured as you tuck the ends of your top for the day down to cover it.

a hit to the edge of a table doesn’t make a bruise that deeply colored. he knows because he has done that tons of times before. so, it’s either that that didn’t happen or you’ve crashed yourself against the table so hard. it made him super skeptical, but he had no right to demand an answer from you.

he’s not your significant other after all.

when you both walk down the path and sidewalk of the street to the music shop he had introduced—both of you coupling up with your sketchbooks and bags in hand—soobin always stands by your side as he seems to be worried that you might accidentally hit something. you felt his hand hovering behind your lower back, eyes wandering around to see stray poles on the cracked concrete pavement before navigating you to walk around it. the heat of the sun hitting both of you as you let the afternoon shine evaporate the tiredness out of you.

he detects, from your expression, how curious you are of the place he goes to, strolling around the neighborhood he has familiarized himself with as your legs walk at the same pace as his. both of you went past the bars that many college students go to and many more hangout places. but the place he and you approached looked almost abandoned with a more run-down appearance than the cafes you passed by. yet, when he pushed the door inwards to the unseemingly quaint shop, he heard you whoop.

the sound of harmonies playing from the speaker makes his heartbeat follow along. inside the building, the racks of jackets full of vinyl lp, compact discs, and tapes erected from the ground like a block of skyscrapers. the whole interior design of the music store looks like the combination of hipster style and cottagecore—something that is so haeyang-coded. as it was in the afternoon on a weekday when people are more focused on lunch, the place was empty except for the owner manning the cashier: the same man he and yeonjun met when they discovered this little gem. at that time, all three of them were talking about what it means to be a punk, what the situation was when the man’s love for music grew—including his punk phase. the man is a music connoisseur as he answers with the tacit bits of knowledge memorized in his head—a smile on his face as he can’t help but be glad to see younger generations discovering older songs.

even though in this timeline soobin and the man just started getting closer when he is in the institute, the man doesn’t change much when he meets him again. he still has the sound of jazz fusion playing in his store—becoming the staple background music that guides people to pick which album they want to listen until they go to the listening booths and might claim it as theirs.

“soobin!” the man’s exclaim seems to surprise you enough with his booming voice that you put your hand on your chest.

“mr. kim! any of the listening booths are empty?”

“all of them are, and…” the man’s head turns towards you as you give a nod. he gives a small, subtle gesture to soobin as he steps closer, leaving you to stare at the racks of jazz musicians’ albums in front of you.

“that’s the girl?” mr. kim whispered as he nodded. the older man had caught him mumbling about you before when soobin was drawing his sketches, a silhouette of a woman in front of a window, as he wore the headphones while sitting by the turntables. mr. kim was the first person he even confided with about you—and original timeline (y/n) was the second one. he didn’t mention that you both are friends with benefits, just a friend who he has underlying feelings for.

soobin hummed, a tight lip smile formed along with his dimples, and the man tapped his arms as he follows his expression with his own set of dimples.

“which ones do you want to hear? i think i still have some prog rock albums that aren’t in the racks as i haven’t put them out of the crate.” mr. kim mentioned, motioning to the crate where it has a board and words written in red marker that says, “sell your vinyls, tapes, and cds here for PROFIT!!”; like a pawn shop for physical music media that is dwindling along with the gentrification of haeyang’s culture.

“i’m just gonna grab the one i’m still listening to. also, is the ok computer vinyl still there?”

“it’s sold, but the tape version is still there. you know how to set it up, right?”

soobin playfully rolls his eyes and his smile widens, “of course i do.” then, his eyes go back to you, who is looking at the assortment of blue note records jazz album covers. your fingers stop pushing the album towards you as you continue gazing at the cover.

“why is this so cool though?” you muttered to yourself as he approached, taking pictures on your phone as you flicked the jacket and saw another one behind it. soobin picks up the album he hasn’t finished listening to on the rack across from you and the white radiohead tape that seems to be from the japan release—even with the different writing script, the color scheme can’t fool him for any other album.

“you wanna listen to an album?” he asked, his low register voice vibrating until it reached you. you looked up after taking another picture of the jazz album cover to see him in front of you. the racks stand in both of your ways to each other.

“no, i just like the album covers. like, the more i think of it, the more underrated that album cover as a form of art is,” you said before tucking your phone in your pocket and placing the albums back in their positions.

“that’s what i said before!” he exclaimed back, startling you before your eyes curled, “i mean, i have thought about that before and it is underrated. glad that we have that thought on the same page.” he continues as you just chuckle.

soobin’s moving figure makes you follow him as you meet three doors with a frosted glass window and a small room inside them. entering through one, you’re met with a wall covered in sound-deafening foam and others with musician posters—similar to what soobin’s room looks like in his hall. the floor is carpeted as cushions are available on the floor across the table that holds a radio-turntable combo; serving for vinyl lp, cd, tape, usb, and radio with their dedicated ports and places. ‘so neat.’ you said to yourself.

as soobin closes the door, you can’t help but snicker as he seems to think of what your reaction is, tugging off the shoes as you let your feet graze the carpeted floor. the boy puts down the vinyl disc on the turntable as he adjusts the needle carefully—your careful eyes seeing the shiny part of the disc from the rigged ones. the noise and texture sounds then become clear as the sound of the loud instrumental rings by the room, making him turning the knob of the volume down.

you both settle down as you smell the fresh clean air from the air purifier. the sound of the frantic instrumentals makes you second guess yourself from the sound that you usually listen to with the boy before you. soobin seems to not open his sketchbook as he nods his head to the beat, following the bass hidden underneath the layers. he pushes his body down against the table, making him sit across from where you stand as you can listen to the soundscape of the room change from the combination of the song playing and the hum of the air conditioner. his eyes closed as you watch him enjoying the music while you pull the cushion after putting your bag down; sitting right on it right in front of him as you push the other cushion towards him.

soobin has a small smile that is growing and growing when he hears music he enjoys; a habit that you recognize from the many times he and you are listening to some recognizable or new songs at parties. but, as you heard the song turning mellow, his facial expressions change—lips still in the same position but the way his muscles relaxed makes you also exhale. you had never seen him this serene before. though he is more on the quiet and—sometimes—colder side, you haven’t seen him look this calm and collected in the whole time you know him.

maybe there is something that you don’t know about soobin, the same as he does about you.

sighing wistfully, you let your back slide down on the wall across from him as he sways his head and slaps his thighs to the rhythm. you tug your sketchbook to your lap and let your feet meet his own as your toes curl on top of his; making soobin awoken from his trance as you take in the new sound that seems to be a new song playing.

“shit, fuck! sorry…” he said as you see him rubbing his face, a certain pressure pressed near his eyes as you see a little tear falling out that is probably from the moist.

“i don’t want to interrupt you but you’re the one that invited me here. and you’re the one who chooses the albums and-“

“yeah. i always just fell into an immediate trance when hearing prog rock.” soobin said as he let his spine straight: a position similar to what you are doing.

“prog rock?” your eyes blink.

“progressive rock. your typical rock sound, but it has a more psychedelic tinge and more progressive, hence the synths and name,” he described as you nodded. you recognized his affinity for alt-rock, but you didn’t know that he also listened to more sophisticated and complex things you didn’t know existed until now. maybe it’s because of the people that surround you and him make you think he listens to mainstream music that college kids listen to—and even if it’s an older one, it’s popular because of social media.

“which band is this?” your question is met with a small smile.

“this is genesis‘ ‘and then there were three‘, the band’s first album after one of their members left, which is a ridiculous name because of how laughable it is.” he giggled the last few syllables out before calming himself, “but they’re so good. the drummer is the frontman, which, at that time is, so rare to find and i think it still is now. i’m currently running down their discography and have listened to all the albums before this for almost a month now. so, that’s why i’m focusing on it instead of doing anything else.”

“but, you don’t listen to this track seriously?” your pitch rises, head tilting towards one of your shoulders.

“this track is my favorite of the album because i stumbled on it by accident while searching for new music to stream. the last track of the album, follow you follow me.” he said as the exact words were being sung by the frontman, coming from the speakers. “and after this, i’m moving to radiohead…”

the lyrics ring inside your head as soobin’s fingers tap against his bent knees, curling them close to his chest as you fit in between him and the wall. the song tells a call for adventure as the man calls for his partner if they will follow him as he follows them. your eyes move around his face, his eyes looking elsewhere in a trance as he follows the rhythm. seeing his defined jawline casting a shadow from the ceiling lights and the words of the lyrics being analyzed in your mind, you think of how it matches with your situation.

you two have been following along with each other. even if you have friends here in the form of karin, elle, and yizhuo—soobin is the only friend you can comfortably talk with, and he seems to be like that to you too. but even now, you notice just how he has been trying to keep up with you. when it comes to soobin, you never spend more than twice a week with him. yet, here you are on your third outing. it gives off, to you, a sense of the unknown. you don’t know what he’s been thinking of you to make you go with him nor why you are always agreeing to go as he asked at such lucky times. maybe, time and fate have their own significance for each other. maybe, it’s the words you’ve written in the note titled ‘he’ about him. maybe, it’s the whole situation you are now in that you wanna escape from. and you felt the pain in your waist coming back again.

as you leave your own trancing daydream, you view soobin’s back turned towards you as he puts in the tape to the rectangle-shaped player and presses the play button. he carefully wipes the dust off the vinyl disc before returning it to the jacket, the sound of a wailing guitar heard as he puts the disc jacket on the table, returning to face you as he places the sketchbook against the muscles of his folded legs. you let the music play as the vastness calls for the ideas in your head out into the room, waiting for you to piece them up and show them outward with your design.

“what are you making?” you asked him as you saw a few bordered rectangles on his sketchbook.

“a storyboard. for class. you?”

“finishing up the outfit sketches.” the reply is already on the tip of your tongue as you easily speak out. soobin lets out a smile you’ve seen so much that you know what it implies.

“let’s battle it out! we have until the album ends to make the most progress between both of us. then, we’re gonna compare them!” soobin said, matching his vigor with the underlying one you have exuding from your eyes and body language.

“deal! as the next song starts?” soobin hums to your reply as you let the guitar continues the run along with the wailing vocals.

the starting note of the next song is queueing you up as you let your pencil brush against the paper, leaving a trail of lines that culminate to become a drawing as the song continues. taking a glimpse at soobin, his eyes are staring at his page as his hand moves around the paper. the sound of scratches from both pencils creates echos that adds to the soundscape of the room. your thumb brushing against the graphite as you create shading as best as you can, fingerprints tainted by the grey substance as you focus back on continuing—not wanting to lose the battle.

no spoken word is needed as the two of you sketch the hour away, sometimes catching each other’s eyes as you take a peek from behind your page. soobin’s not-so-comfortable position makes him straighten his legs toward you. his legs are now on either side of you, almost encasing you between his legs as you continue before you retaliate by putting your feet on top of his thighs. the hour passed and you let the last note ring before it fades. you pat the seat beside you as soobin crawls, pushing his cushion first so he sits exactly by your side. you let him have his moment to settle as he leans against the foam wall, remembering your muttering between the two of you on how you’re the lucky one to get the wall instead of him.

“if you don’t share your hand, you lose. rock paper scissors!.” soobin exclaimed as you instantly reacted, putting out your hand out of the three choices. your eyes stare between the two hands as you let out a grunt, seeing you lose your hand against him.

“you first!” soobin exclaimed like a child as he waited eagerly to show him what you made. snuggling closer, you let soobin wrap his arm comfortably around your shoulders as you open the pages you’ve filled, noted with words by your wooden pencil that seem shorter than before. your palm has patches of graphite and even left fingerprints on the light-colored paper.

“it’s basically like the ones i’ve made. the ‘alternative scene-street style’ idea. i realized that i don’t really have to design an entire outfit because i wanna incorporate more graphic t-shirts.” you guide soobin’s eye line with the other end of your pencil, showing a figure of a male with a t-shirt and pants that look so much like him, “i also wanna explore vintage wear and bringing the past back so that i can use that as an excuse to do thrift shopping.”

“but also,” you tugged your knees to your chest as you opened the next page, seeing outfits with squares on them, “i want to push the flannel fabric more while trying to make it genderless. there’s more skirt-shorts combo i wanna try making that can be used by anyone.” you resume, soobin’s eyes move to your face from your hand that is fidgeting with the pencil as he returns to see a small doodle of one of the figures seemingly holding a helmet in their hands.

“what’s that one?”

“this?” you point with the pencil as he hummed.

“i had to continue the space theme somehow, so i added a few elements of that, specifically the old ones like vintage space outfits. i have to find space-themed specific graphic tees and maybe space-themed patches i can sew for the outers. it could be star wars or star trek-based, but it’s definitely gonna be about outer space. so i can conclude that it’s gonna be an alt scene line with flannel as the main fabric and has a vintage theme that includes space elements.” you replied before clearing your throat, a small smile adorning your face as you turned to face him.

“and you have to finish it by when?”

“two weeks. though the others had about a month to finish.” your voice trails out, curving sideways when you speak. yet, soobin caught that as he watched you shaking your head before returning to him.

“now, what do you have?”

soobin opens his book as you both see the rectangles scattered on the pages. scribbles of notes written on the side as well. your eyes observed how most of them are created with the pencil’s infamous shade, except for one thing.

an alien made of blue ink.

trailing through the rectangles you noticed are numbered, you can visualize a crowd of people slowly opening (from the arrows drawn outwards) as the next rectangle focuses on the alien, holding a cup of something that is made by the pencil; a cup that is something so other world for it. the next part is how the composition looks like it is taking place from behind the alien: in the alien perspective as soobin shaded a figure that contrasts with the others that are just outlined. then, a picture of the alien looking solemn as you assume it still looks at the figure before an arrow under the head signals how it will turn its head. the next part is a blurry visual which is made of the graphite pencil being blurred to create an undefined look—catching soobin’s hand who also has patches of them too—as it continues to the next part when the alien opens a door to a balcony.

soobin, knowing that you are done inspecting the final rectangle, turns the page to the next one (the final one) as you are met with a page full of detailed drawings. your eyes expand as you can’t hold back the exclamation when you let your eyes trail the sketches of the planetary bodies decorating the sky, the alien on the left corner of the whole two pages as you examine soobin’s details on what seems to be a comet strip. planets of differing sizes made with blue ink in front of the shaded pencil background. the ring planet design looks the same as soobin’s tattoo as you study the drawing, being pulled in by a feeling that is slowly getting familiar.

“why do you like space so much?” the words came out as you’re still looking at the drawn paper. rustling came from beside you as soobin repositioned himself, preparing to answer such a hard question from a simple sentence.

“well, to me, outer space is a time machine—timeless and mysterious. lights are being beamed across a blank background that was sent millions upon millions of years even before us. it’s something new and old at the same time. yet, we don’t know how to pinpoint anything until we see it. i realized that the world is larger than what i thought when i searched more about it.”

“and the alien?” your words stung him more. gulping down his saliva, he exhales the breath that was caught in his throat. blinking as he tries to find the right answer.

“it’s… me. it’s me.” soobin said, nodding his head before continuing, “i’ve been having this- very existential episodes recently, and the more i see the alien, the more i relate to it. it’s like being stuck within an invisible force that, just, doesn’t want you to adapt. yet, you’re trying your best to do so before you realize that that invisible force was there all along.”

the boy turns towards you, “then it came crashing down as excruciating as an hourglass that has been turned upside down, each grain drops, it becomes more painful as you slowly realize it.” he licked and pouted his lips, his dimples showing up with shadows underneath it courtesy of the lights in the ceiling. as you are taking in his words, you can’t stop yourself from shaking your head even if you want to do it inside your mind only.

“soob, you’re, like, the most adaptable being i’ve known in my life. the way you just embrace haeyang’s alt scene like you’ve stayed here before going to the institute is amazing to me. you even have a job here even if it is commission-based, but you can still independently get money.”

“but, i’m not as adaptable as you, you know? i’ve said this before when we met but you’re a social butterfly who everyone knows. people sing praises to you as you try to include everybody in the conversation. that openness is how you meet me after all—even with us looking like total opposites of each other,” he elaborates as you give him a small grin.

“yet we are the same.” you raise your hand, nearly touching soobin’s face as it creates a small startle from you before he grasps the hand in his and presses it to his cheek. the warmth of him curing the cold on your palm, his eyes looking more like stars that besprinkle the sky beyond the light blue of the day.

you climb onto soobin’s lap as he allows it, his bent knees creating a backrest for you as you slowly ruffle his black hair before tidying it up softly. it’s a habit of yours that soobin notices when you both are in bed after doing everything you did, stabilizing each other’s breathing pace as you play with his head that rested on your chest. soobin, usually, follows along with the rhythm you created as he tries to breathe, looking up towards you who has a shine on your face from the phone while you’re scrolling through your chats in the dim light of his room before you notice him staring at you.

“if you see yourself as an alien, then i’m an alien too.” your hands wrapped around soobin’s broad shoulders, his eyes tilting up as you look downward. he connects your forehead as you meet the sound of his exhales before he closes the gap and lets both sets of lips connect. tilting your head to the side, you let yourself hold on to soobin’s pronounced clavicle as he lets one of his hand cup your face, not wanting to let go. the other hand trailing down your side as it comes across something that makes you yelp.

“OW!” you hiss, tilting back on soobin’s legs as you find his hand at the bruised area of your waist. then, it all comes down in a flood to you as you glance back at soobin’s eyes now full of concern, a look you wish you didn’t see as it just breaks your heart a bit more.

“sorry. i-“ the way his warm palm slowly lands on the surface of the part you’re hurt, as if soothing it down, “i noticed it back in your room. what happened, honestly?”

your breath came out staggering, mind floating elsewhere as you mumbled, “that’s why i relate to you so much.”

“what?”

“oh-“ you’re hoping he didn’t catch that as you continue, “it’s from the fashion show meeting when i acc- accidentally hit the table. i was in a hurry and crashed onto the table. so yeah, haven’t gotten time to compress it yet since i’ve been hustling to finish a few of the outfits.”

“you have to. it’s internal bleeding, (y/n).” his voice presses into a tone that lets out an unfamiliar emotion from when you usually hear from him, making you look away as he still tries to catch your vision’s line. his hand reaches back to cup your cheek as you give up on avoiding him. you can sense the sting in your eyes as if soobin’s gaze is the one that triggers it.

“when’s your deadline supposed to be and why is yours different from the others?” soobin’s voice has an unfamiliar grit to it. you can hear the scratch when he spoke and from how his jaw becomes tense.

“a month from now. and, and that’s because i have so many things to do, soob. other than the outfits, i still have to arrange the show and whatnot-“

“you have juniors and colleagues that can help you with that, (y/n).”

the way soobin speaks about your position on the staff makes your heart feel heavier than ever, and more and more of your tiredness peaks out of their sleep to push you to realize more than you already know. you let him caress the apples of your cheeks as you relish in his warmth that comforts you, that makes you stay awake like the ray from the sun hitting your skin.

as the boy sees you with your eyes closed, calming yourself down as he hears his pulse on his thumb from the push on the surface of your skin, he remembers the specific day on the beach once again.

he observed original timeline (y/n) enjoying the calm wave as the sunbeams put a spotlight on both of them. the boy swears he might’ve picked up her sob as she told him about yeonjun, but he also remembers a sentence that was supposed to be fleeting yet it sticks to him more. he had done one of them before, so why not continue?

“come with me to watch the band gigs tomorrow, bun. it’s a weekly show i usually go to hear and find new indie acts.” your eyes open as soobin brushes your creases before you let out a frown. the way your eyes gleam at him and how you slant your head tells him everything about what you want to say, and that it’s another correct advice to give from the girl he met for a few moments about you. of course, cause she is you.

“bun. i, i want to but there’s another meeting going on and i have to go.” yet even with that, he can understand you speak through your gritted teeth.

“come on. procrastinate with me, (y/n). fuck them for not letting you have your free time.” his hand brushes your hair as you gaze downwards at his rising and falling chest.

“my kpi. soobin. it’s going so well. also, i have to show them i’m a good role model cause many of the juniors join the show team because of me and i feel responsible for that-.”

“and let you do most of the work? that’s not it, you know.” soobin leans his head closer, his thumb pressing on your lip, stopping you from rambling such deflection. you can see your reflection from his wide eyes as if what he cares about at this moment is you and your well-being. he lets his lips kiss yours and his thumb doesn’t hinder the way his lips curve to meet yours even if it’s the corner of your lips.

“i also want my girl to relax.”

his reply melts the hardened substance that is surrounding your heart. if you still want to push to go to that meeting tomorrow, the way he looks at you makes you think otherwise. cause, there’s no fault in having fun, right?

yet, even the word fun seems so foreign to your tongue. even with your outward appearance being the social butterfly people recognize you as—the same people don’t know how you do behind that facade. yet, here is soobin. your intimate friend who seems to want to get closer and closer. well, your status is as friends but with the way he has asked you to hang out with him multiple times this week alone, he’s pushing the boundary of your relationship further and further.

but you remembered the notes you wrote. it is what you want to feel, right?

“ha…” your shoulder slouched before you look down on the thumb on your lip, “fuck it, okay.” you grab his wrist in your palm before fully connecting your lips with his.

“come here.”

the sound of pitter-patters from footsteps creates reverberations coming from the bathroom as you walk straight to sit on your mattress.

“close your eyes.”

you let your eyelids cover your sight, protecting it from the afternoon sun that is shining through your window. a 2000s throwback playlist being played as you hear the humming from in front of you following the sung melody. the bed dips right beside you as you feel a cloud of breath against your skin. the pointy pencil eyeliner decorated around your eyelids and down to your waterline, then it was replaced with a brush blending it in with the eyeshadows that also colored the space by your eyes.

“open.”

your eyesight is blurry as you recognize the figure in front of you: karin’s sharp eyes become sharper as she squints whilst tidying up your makeup. the brush caresses near where your eye bags are as you try to flutter the dust out. your lips feel so light because of the amount of lipstick you wore—only one thick layer rather than the whole combination of liners and glosses. you still have the frozen bottle you’re holding by your waist, pressing on the exposed bruised skin from the web-like fabric being lifted with your other hand. the crop top shirt you are wearing rests on your shoulders, creating a sabrina top appearance. the fishnet top peeks from behind the shirt layer along with the straps of your black bra. from the corner of your eyes, you see the star tattoo that soobin inked on your shoulder—not ashamed to cover it up.

“and voilà!” karin exclaimed as she picked up your round vanity mirror, tilting it towards you as you examined the makeup she helped you with. it was simpler than what you usually wear for parties. your thick liquid eye-lined eyes are now a bit more rounded because of the pencil eyeliner that is painted on your lid and your eye line at the bottom. the blush isn’t too thick to let you show your complexion from the textures of your skin to your dark circle. but it’s different for your lips as you wear the darkest shade you can find. karin’s hand pulls the sleeve of your green flannel top a bit more downwards as she shows a bit of herself in the mirror from behind you.

“well?” your smile replicates her signature smirk.

“i love it! thank you, boo.”

“you’re welcome, babes!” she exclaims, her hands pulling the mirror off of your hands and plopping it to the side. your torso being held on the shoulders as you watch karin scanning your outfit. then, she reaches for your collar. a tug from her making a bit of your head and neck move as she adjusts the necklace you’re wearing, letting the gold out so it can shine underneath the ceiling lights.

“look at you being an alt kid. this is gonna be your rockstar look day-in day-out,” she replied as you let out a tight lip smile. though she noticed the way your palm was rubbing against itself. instantly, she stopped it, feeling how sweaty it was.

“are you that nervous?” karin questioned, letting you give out an awkward grin as she pulled you upright and walked you to your full-body mirror. from the reflection, you can see the outfits you assemble for the fashion show on the hanger as karin will help you put them inside the plastic covering.

you let your eyes scan yourself on the first outfit of the fashion show collection you made fully from your hard work. the way karin helped it fit you as best as it could as you see her proud expression from behind your shoulder.

“you look like a total baddie, (y/n). if soobin isn’t more whipped for you than he usually is, then he will be.” you try your best not to laugh but you let a chuckle crack through. the drip from the condensation of the unfrozen bottle trails down your skin and tickles your belly button—it reminds you of the soothing way soobin’s breath touches your skin as he trails down kisses from your mouth to the band of your pants.

“how’d you know sammy’s the one for you?” you focus on her face as she pouted her lips. her pointer finger tapping against the bottom one as she hummed, extending her thought process.

“as shitty as it sounds, i don’t know. i just feel it, you know? but you felt that before with jeno-“ she paused, realizing that she spoke of he-who-shall-not-be-named.

“oof, that hurts,” you replied with a hand against your beating heart, jokingly nipping your bottom lip. but you had a feeling to yourself that that isn’t a joke because of the way your mind travels to something dark.

“apologies for that. like, you don’t know how much i wanted to talk to you about that video between you and jeno that is circulating, but you went mia…”

“wait, what video?” you tilt your head to her. karin’s eyes enlarged, and you recognized that look from anywhere. her eyes quivering as she spoke something you don’t recognize, even if it involves you.

“it’s a video of you and him arguing.”

“who the fuck recorded it and spread it around? the heck?” you exasperated self say as you close your eyes. your head is pulsing as you didn’t consider just how gigantic this is becoming. that’s why—you now understand—that soobin knows you were with jeno the day he invited you to watch a movie together. tears are prickling from the corner of your eyes as you fan it away, trying so badly to not ruin karin’s makeup she had helped with.

“hey, you know that whatever happens, you have me, right? there’s sammy, elle, yizhuo, their partners, and soobin, okay? knowing your boy, he’s gonna punch the heck out of jeno even if he tries playing with you again.” you nod along with her words, agreeing to what she says. but the way this fucking guy berated you reminds you of the last time you were here a decade of sorts ago. someone in your class was always teasing you—fucking kids, right?—and it got out of hand that your hair was once being pulled during recess, making the boy who is approaching you to play during recess furious.

yeonjun.

you remember how he’s trying to pick up the words to describe what happened as the kid who pulled your hair was bleeding out from the elbow, pushed by the boy himself. the teacher asked you for testimonies along with your classmates—who defended you as the kid is known to annoy almost every student. you were just the unlucky victim for that week. yeonjun let out a small smirk he had as he greeted you when he walked out of the counseling room, his open palm pushed forward for you to hold so you could continue to venture to your usual snack time in ms. ahn’s diner.

you miss him and you don’t have any contact with him. you don’t even know if he remembers you or not.

but the more you think of it, you can catch a bit of the yeonjun you know in soobin now. it’s as if soobin is the more mature of the yeonjun you know: soft-looking yet could intimidate, especially when he shows his tattoos. you could see them being friends if they met, but you don’t know if yeonjun would “approve” of you being with him, knowing his ‘good boy’ streak you remember him as and how the last time you met him, yeonjun was obsessed with his video game consoles and not rock music.

“yeah, i know.”

karin pulls the bottle out of your grasp as you let out a small hiss from the warming skin, hurting your bruise yet you recognize it’s helping with it. she pulls the fishnet top down before lightly tugging it into your creme skort. your head moves down as you spot the glint of the golden heart pendant resting on top of the buttons of the green flannel top. on the other side of the room, you heard your default ringtone chiming, signaling that soobin was waiting by the entrance of your hall now.

“don’t forget to pack the outfits up and put them on the rack with the others. and good luck on your study date with sammy. thank you so freaking much, karin.”

you pucker your lips as you air kiss karin’s cheek while she does the same, “and good luck on your date with soobin. let me know what happened cause i wanna know everything!”

you give her a nod when she smirks as you sling your bag and its strap rests right in the valley of your chest. saying another goodbye after tying your boots, you walk down the hallway. you greeted a few of the other residents on this floor who seemed to do a double take on your display that is more alternative, not recognizing you with this appearance. but you embrace it and throw away those expectations as you carefully glance at the bruise beneath the fishnet top, seeing it nearly coming back to the color of the skin in that area from the dark patch you had yesterday and the day before.

stepping out of the hall’s door and down the flight of stairs, you see the figure of the boy you recognized.

his inked arms illuminated by the afternoon sun in his tank, created from a cut-out sweater as he wears his regular cargo pants. soobin perks when he hears you dragging your feet against the pavement, pivoting his head to let you see the black thin line adorning his thick bottom lip right in the middle. your surprise was also met by his, letting his eyes roam on your body to see the fashion show outfit you are doing a trial in. though, you know where his eyes focus on: the gold heart-pendant necklace that hangs around your neck.

“you look…” he commented as you joined him, a smile already threatening to show as you tilt your head.

“‘look’ what? ugly?”

“not a chance!” he exclaimed, making the seal of your lips open as you let out the widest smile you haven’t entirely done for a while.

“i know what you meant, bun~” you nudge your shoulder towards him as he bit his cheek, his dimple showing up every time he puckered his lips. “you too, actually. now i kinda wanna see you with a real lip piercing.”

your hand reaches to his face as you let your thumb caress the fake piercing down to the surface of his lip, making the clip behind a little more snuggled up as soobin can’t help but pucker his lips to kiss your fingertip. you pull back before you continue staring at him, looking towards the nearest gate to the street outside of the campus.

“what are we waiting for?”

and as you said that, his hand grasped yours and dragged you towards the path you were implying. you let the breeze blow against your skin as soobin’s larger stride makes you try to keep up with his pace by jogging beside him before you take a breather at the bus—that arrived at the right time as you step towards the bus stop. finding no one on the bus other than the driver, you take a seat and look at the mundane beauties of daytime haeyang—something you haven’t focused on. your head rested against soobin’s shoulder as his hand wrapped around your lower back as you continued gazing at the way the ball of fire shone on every man-made structure you passed by or the sonder you got as you watched people living their lives.

but then, the bus goes into the main forest road as it climbs on the hills. the green chlorophyll leaves change the scenery in an instant, almost like someone turning the color spectrum dials to make it work. the bus hums as you can hear rumbling vehicles walking past, most notably an old sedan driving past as you see their windows all down and hands coming out to graze against the gusty kinetic wind. the car scurries away before going to the right as the clicking sound of the bus’ signal lights turns on for the next stop.

“we’re here. but we still have to walk,” soobin said as he pulled you up. you nodded your head as you both walked towards the exit, letting out a small thank you to the driver before the bus drove away. following the boy, you both walk at a steady pace as you hear the sound of the birds chirping and the breeze going past the leaves in the middle of the forest. behind nature’s call, you can pick up the muted bass ringing from behind the trees as more vehicles drive past you.

you jumped when you sensed another limb covering your mid-riff, soobin’s arm wrapping around your waist as he tugged you next to his side. you watch him eyeing down on the waist, where your bruise is at, as he doesn’t want to tug it with too much force. steadying yourself, you mimic him as you wrap your arm behind soobin’s back, continuing to walk in peace when you can see the forking road getting closer. the same road that the sedan took a turn to the right.

you thought the road to the right led you to another smaller pathway toward the venue, but you were met with a large dirt parking lot. dust and dirt lifting from the moving vehicles as they’re finding a space to park. people wearing clothes similar to yours gather towards the building at the farthest side from the road you had to go through to reach here. as you step closer and inspect the building, it looks to be an abandoned convenience store just based on the storefront appearance where wood boards stick to where the windows are. the goers line up in a queue as you inhale the familiar scents that you’ve smelled in the parties you usually go to. yet, even with their menacing appearance, they seem to be so cordial, unlike the people you met at said parties. it’s like there is an unspoken rule between them to have fun while staying safe.

as you both walk closer to the line, you can’t help but take out your vape as you try to blend in. soobin’s chuckle rings from beside you as he pulls out a box of cigarettes instead, something he hasn’t pulled out near you. you scramble to get the lighter out of his hand as he tugs one stick out. flicking the wheel, the spark lights up as soobin lets the end of the cig engulf in fire, seeing your hardened fingertip from the amount of pins and needles prickling it crack from the friction. tucking the lighter back into the pocket he pulled the box out, you view the environment you’re in as you check out the people stepping out of the building who are already looking so intoxicated and with sweat sticking into their bodies from the shine of the sun. the evidence of what they’re doing inside: moving their hearts out, letting out all the stresses in life. it appears to be so cathartic and you can’t wait to get the same feeling inside.

soobin’s fame seems to shine brighter in his scene as you count how many people are greeting him. you can hear them talking about the tattoos they want to make with him as he replied with his charisma level reaching the maximum or even more. the way your cheeks are heating as they greet you with him makes you tug yourself closer to him, hiding half of your face behind his arm as you let your fingertips caress his tattooed poppy flower. the queue continues to move as you both step towards the bouncer standing at the front. the bouncer seems to recognize soobin as when you two walk to the front, you see him glancing between the two of you before giving a bro hug to soobin where he whispers a few words to him before giving a wink towards both of you. your eyebrows are lifted as the boy guides you to enter the concrete building that is crumbling in a few parts, seeing the people around drinking in a cup from a bar on one side of the room while a crowd gathers and cheers in front of the stage where a band has finished playing.

“we’re amperhyphen! thank you so much for having us and have a good day.” a group of boys bowed down before walking off the stage with their instruments unplugged as the stage crews climbed up and cleaned the stage. soobin said that it was a gig concert so new artists will perform following the schedule. it’s clear with the amount of people moving on the floor as they come and go.

he flicks the stick’s ash as it falls into the space on the floor. his hand tugging you closer as you lead the way to the very back of the mosh pit. looking upon the ocean of heads, the stage is dimly lit from the spotlight hanging above—letting you see the second story of the store that seemed more like a supermarket now with its larger build. the crowd seems to disperse as people wait for the next act; a never-ending loop of fun in the subterranean scene.

“what do you want to drink?” soobin said right to your ear.

“something cold, please. i’m getting kinda parched,” you replied, still inhaling from your e-cigarette as he guided you toward the bar. the dispersing crowd hangs out by the bar as they get a refill for another round of musical chaos, making the bartenders work extra hard as they pour around the drinks in. soobin spoke of what you two will get to one of bartenders as you let yourself gaze at the environment you’re in. though haeyang is a town you believed you know much—because you spent the first decade of your life here—you learn nothing about this, about the small yet powerful gathering spot where people can hang out just to enjoy music. mosh pits in small towns are rare enough, yet you don’t realize there is one as crowded as this here. much of the people you silently watch are people you don’t know, but they look to be around your age and older. there is even a sapphic couple who seemed to be the same age as your dad still hanging out here.

it’s like this place is where anyone can be anything they want; let go of the stress and expectation of life just by hearing a piece of music you can enjoy even if you don’t know it. no expectation of fame and social recognition.

your vision is stuck on one goer getting their bruise tended by a punk with a studded leather jacket. there is a gash around their calves as the punk’s appearance doesn’t scream ‘they could heal people.’ but a smile on your face has grown from it as the goer genuinely talks with the punk with no type of discrimination that you’re familiar with. a nudge felt on your shoulder as you turn to find soobin with a glass in his hand, pushing forward for you to pick it up. you peer down to see it’s your favorite cocktail as soobin tells you he has paid for it already, settling down beside you as you face the spacious room where more people are walking around.

“what kind of band perform here?”

“mostly indie alt-rock bands, so any alternative and derivative genres from rock like grunge, punk, metal, garage, emo, all that stuff. many of the songs being performed here are usually self-made or covers. but there upstairs,” soobin points towards the balcony area you saw, “many of the talent managers sit there to gaze at the crowd. haeyang is a small town but its underground scene is vibrant. it’s kinda like back in the 90s when you watch bands perform as they’re trying to catch lightning in a bottle for their musical career,” the boy replied as you both sipped on the cold and sweet alcoholic beverages. the way it calms you down but also makes you warm because of the substances in it.

“you seem so well-versed in this topic.” you winked, internalizing another side of soobin you’ve just known now. his eyebrows raised before he let out a small smile. “if you like rock music so much, can you play instruments too?”

“to be honest. i can’t.”

nodding, you continued to sip as you picked up the crowd cheering for the next act going up—silhouettes walking on the stage even from the dim spotlights, “which instruments do you think you’ll be good at if you play one?”

instead of answering, he turns to you, “which one do you think i’ll be the best at?”

letting you let out a chuckle as the spotlights earn their clarity once again. you see a four-person band coming up to the stage as they plug their instruments into the machines such as speakers and pedals.

“not gonna lie, you’ll be good at drums. you’ve always been slapping your thighs whenever we listen to music together and you did say you like genesis‘ drummer,” you remembered so when you saw and heard him in the listening booth yesterday. but the significant moment that came to your mind is when you and he are trying to finish your tasks together as the deadline is at midnight; soobin’s playlist plays in his room as you are covered only with his shirt, sitting on the floor so you can let your aching thighs straighten out. the boy sat beside you only with his sweatpants, tapping his palm on his thighs with the heels of his feet alternating following the rhythm—trying to get an inspiration on what words he’ll write next. the tapping and clapping mixed along with his humming as he follows with the melody of the song playing, easily adapting to the songs even with key changes.

“or you could be a vocalist too. your voice is so nice to listen to.” you continued, finishing your drink with you, tilting your head back. putting the glass on the bar counter as you caught the frontwoman introducing the band. turning your head, soobin follows as he does the same thing—letting you lead the way to the space behind the crowd gathering as he trails the path you took.

you stood behind at a respectable distance from the mosh pit. the sounds of clapping and cheering suggest, to you, that the band has been gathering enjoyers and crowds alike who listen to their creation and how they might’ve perform in different gigs all throughout the towns here and near haeyang. soobin’s presence is now so recognizable to you as he stands beside you, eyeing the stage as you hear the familiar flicking sound once again; the faint light beside you catching your attention before it sizzles out. the crowd gets more excited once the band is tuning their instruments. people accidentally nudged you as they move to the front—their apology etiquette still surprises you as you’ve been hit harder than that during college parties yet no one didn’t even acknowledge it. your hand grips onto soobin’s nude forearm as the speaker rings, the faint sound of crackling noise heard as the bass drum plays and echoes through the space.

when the guitarist strums the strings, you watch as people’s head moves following the rhythm as the cheers become louder and louder. even you can’t stop yourself from nodding your head. the hand that is gripping onto soobin’s makes him notice you bopping to the fast beats. the crashes from the cymbals pierce through the sound as your muscles contort, following the band’s playing. you glance towards soobin, who is nodding his head alongside you, his other hand holding onto another stick of cig as the familiar scent hits your senses.

“if you enjoy rolled-up cigarettes, then why do you smoke e-cigs with me?” you asked, a little loudly as near to his ear as possible. his furrowed eyebrows straighten as he thinks of the answer.

“people don’t like the smell of it. that’s why i pick fruit scent e-cigs when we hang around your crowd.”

“and what is this flavor?”

soobin looks at the burning stick between his fingers. your body is already facing him as you let your hand swing the arm you’re holding along with the beat. leaning to your ear, he whispered, “nothing.”

“that’s straight tobacco?” your baffled expression made him grin as he nodded along. you playfully hit his chest as he lets go of your hand before wrapping the arm behind you. goosebumps showing on your skin alongside the chilly breeze from the space when his arm meets your fishnet-covered lower back.

“you wanna try?” his voice is getting muffled by the band as they now play their second song—the guitar and drums blaring expands with the speakers. you nod your head as you rub your palm clean on your skort, ready to grip onto the thin cylinder as soobin takes his own puff first.

yet, with your hand already in front of you to let the stick slip between your fore and middle fingers, the hand that holds your back trails up your spine instead and is behind your head. he pushes you closer as he gives you the familiar knowing look, tilting your head to the side to let him do his usual thing: letting his lips meet yours. instead, he brought his lips right in front of yours and unconnected. the hot cloud flows inside your mouth cavern as you taste the familiar mild flavor you get from your vape now being accentuated. gone were the fruity flavor that is familiar to you as you let your mouth agape, clearing the smoke out between you two before your hand reaches to cup his cheek, closing in on his lips as you nibble on his bottom lip.

with the sound of the band playing and the colorful spotlights illuminating the dark space, you can see the fireworks exploding behind your eyelids, following the way your heart explodes with all of them harmonizing in tandem to culminate into your thoughts and emotions. your eyebrows crease as you try to focus only on his lips, only on soobin, as everything around fades away. the way both of your lips fall into the familiar routine excites you with the unknown elements you only recognize by now. your hand holding onto his posture to steady both of you, both of his forearms now wrapped behind you as he only let one palm rest behind you—the other still holding onto the cigarette that is burning fast. tears forming from the ducts from how long you’ve closed your eyes, the feeling you have been harboring about him all flowing out with that one small action.

from the past week—since you both had sex in your room—you can sense the chemistry between the two of you changing in real time. every time you both make out when you hang out outside of both of your rooms and parties you two attend, it feels a lot more personal. from when he laid you down on the booth seat at the diner and to when you sat down on his lap in the listening booth of the music store. all the emotions and thoughts shared between you both have culminated and exploded with this as you let the feelings seep through the cracks that is your barriers before they fall way into the likeliest place: into him. the words you’ve written about him in your notes are scribed on repeat in your head as one sentence rings true.

‘do i truly like him?‘‘ yet, even that is an understatement.

do you truly love him?

with your swollen lips, you both pull back to take in the stuffy, narcotic scent that’s combined with the fresh air of the forest flowing inside. his lips glisten under the radiance from the spotlights—a string of saliva connecting both of you as soobin throws the cigarette that has been burning so much to the ground beside you both. he signals with his head towards you, letting your shoes step onto it to let the fire out. breathless and speechless. that’s what you both are as you gaze at each other’s eyes, letting you read what he says as you are exuding one of your own on the same wavelength.

“i-“

“well, well, well…” a voice calls out, making you sense the trail of sweat on your nape falling down to your spine. the calm, peaceful glass box you and him were standing within now broken into smithereens. a voice you’ve been dreading to hear from the last time you met her: the day you get your still healing bruise.

you turn your head and peek at the voice’s owner, seeing the smirk you’ve been trying to forget for the past week.

“herin…”

“hello, (y/n). and who i can guess is soobin?” her voice pitches up as your eyes tremble, the combination of doses of alcohol and nicotine making you jitter as the blooming bruise on your waist lingers on as the pain comes back once again, reminding you of how it happened.

“what, what are you doing here?” you nip your bottom lip.

this is not a place where you see herin to be. in your eyes, herin is just another student of the fashion major, hair-dyed platinum blonde that compliments her skin tone as she shows up in a crop tank top. you met her back in orientation days, even being in the same group to do the tasks and getting to know the campus life. but as more time passes, the collaborative dynamic you once had with her turns into tension as you both join the fashion show crew and how she also joined the fashion student committee that you failed to get into—how you realized she treated you not like how she treats the others. you sure were hoping you find a friend in her, but fate tells you otherwise before you fall into the circle that is karin, elle, yizhuo, and the others; including soobin. yet, her smile makes your body tense and she replies.

“what are you doing here? aren’t you supposed to join the meeting today?” her smirk widened as dimples showed on her cheeks. you knew that when you spoke to soobin yesterday, but as you read the group chat often even with how you have turned on real-time notifications, you know that the show people aren’t needed but it’s better if join in. you just didn’t expect to find her here. it’s like she pushed herself to make you remember what you “owe” her—like how she’s been chasing you in the chat. but ever since you muted her, she becomes frontal: resulting in your aching body now.

“what meeting? i was supposed to be there? is, isn’t today for marketing and tenants?” you asked back, hearing how your voice trembled right at the end as you could hear the scoff coming from the girl.

“well, now you are because the agenda of the meeting today is about you.”

what? you want to speak out. yet the way your facial expression form encapsulates it perfectly—earning a giggle from herin.

“i don’t know if you are naïve or ignorant. but, your creamy face is all over social media and group chats.” the way her eyes look at you reminds you of that day as you stared up at her, holding onto your side as you felt the pain surge from your lower half when the force hits back at you too much at your waist. “i didn’t know you were that desperate, (l/n). but now we see the ‘reason’ why you are the fashion major’s golden girl-“

you listen to the sound of soobin’s hand rummaging in the pocket of his pants as he pulls out his phone, the screen illuminating his face as you watch the numerous notifications showing up from the reflection on his pupils, which he opens. your palms start to sweat as you can’t bear to open your own phone, knowing that the way soobin’s jaws tighten up makes you assume your phone may be exploding with notifications now if you don’t put it in do not disturb mode.

“well, now your boy also knows who you are, (y/n).” herin’s voice is the only coherent sound that comes to your hearing. you can’t handle it anymore and wrap your palm around soobin’s wrist for a chase of comfort. but he pulls away fast.

his face is full of hurt with the frown coming from his plushy lips. your eyes peek at the screen that is fading black, seeing the recognizable picture you still remember taking a long time back then. back when you were with your ex.

“is this true?” soobin said as he let you see his screen and you could sense your blood vessels exploding as the imaginary knife that was already plunged into your back pushed deeper behind you.

the subject in the picture is you—only your upper half is shown, yet you recall you are naked in that frame—white liquid all over your face as there is a caption of “teachers’ slut” on it. eyes watering, you can’t help but gasp for air as you remember the past few days that had happened. heck, the past few months that happened. the notable conversation you had with jeno, and the way he threatened you as you refused to go with his choice. you remembered what he said faintly—memories of it erased from your mind when you and soobin went out all night long that day.

“you’re gonna regret not coming back to me (y/n).”

“no- no! no, it’s not, soobin. please…” you reach your hand towards him, but you flinch as he pulls the phone back against his chest. you catch his eyes moving all around the place as he looks between the phone and you.

“well, it’s true though, (y/n).”

your actions stop as you catch a familiar voice from behind you, the shuffling of feet heard as the person you’re dreading to see now stands by you, beside the girl with a terrifying smirk on her face.

“teacher’s pet and golden girl, huh? more like teachers’ slut.” jeno spoke as he let out a chuckle, “and the fact that it’s plural stuns me, (y/n). you like yourself a gangbang action?”

“jeno, please. i know it’s you.” you try to retaliate, yet the crack in your voice doesn’t exactly show your courage and confidence when you look away from his gaze, noticing more and more gazes on you. some of the people in the crowd at the back turn towards you as they hold the phone in their palms, eyes looking between it and you like what soobin did. your breath picks up as you can only resort to soobin, turning your head to him as you pick up the faint whispers of the crowd as they peer at you; dissecting you like you’re an anomaly in their society. so suddenly, you want to cover up every exposed skin of the outfit you now use, grabbing any outer you can get—even stealing it if it’s the last resort—and get out of there as fast as you can.

“what do you mean it’s me, huh? gaslighting much, (y/n)?!” jeno replied as your jaw slackened and you couldn’t find the right words. that’s when you see the darker shadow on herin’s tank top and near her blue jeans, wrapping around her as she is tugged closer to the shadow’s owner, just like what you and soobin did most of today. chasing its movement, you realize that the shadow is from a leather jacket: jeno’s leather jacket.

as the epiphany hits you like a tsunami, the tear ducts that moist your eyes when you and soobin kiss produce many more tears as it pours out much of what you’re feeling. turning to soobin once again, you can read how conflicted his face has become as the tears pour more and more.

“believe me, bun. please, i’m not- i didn’t-“ you sob, your chest heaving as you put your palm against the middle of your chest, trying to breathe. yet the more you stay in the venue, the more stuffy it becomes.

“it’s always been you and it’ll always be you. i promise, soobin. please believe me.” you nodded your head to tell him you were telling the truth. that you don’t know shit about any of this. that you haven’t slept with anyone other than soobin himself. that the picture doesn’t tell the entire truth. yet, you know you’re losing the mind games now. and the green light of the exit becomes the beacon as you mumble a last “i’m sorry for hurting you so much, soobin,” before you run towards the exit, pushing people away as you can only think about coming back to your room, but you recognize it won’t be as safe because the walls are so thin that things like this spread fast.

soobin’s loud voice as he shouts your name fades into obscurity as he sees you blending in with the light, both herin and jeno are laughing as the crowd now gathers around the three of them. the conflicted feelings he’s experiencing now all aside as his only aim is to rid that laugh out of both of their faces.

his hand forms into a fist as he punches jeno across his cheek, earning a shriek from the girl beside him as the crowd exclaims. soobin recognized a few of them in the crowd but he didn’t care as he took another shot at hitting your ex, now at the stomach as the boy fell back. jeno’s thicker structure approaches soobin as he takes a punch to his abdomen, filling it with the bruise that’s gonna come as he can feel the contact of the rings jeno wears. but, soobin doesn’t want to stop. all he sees is red and your teary face as you look at the two beings of a joke that he now knows has been giving your life hell.

“soobin! fucking stop!” soobin recognized the voice of the bouncer he greeted every time he goes inside, looking down at jeno who has a cut on his cheekbone, whilst the boy take a punch to the face—feeling the bleeding starting from the part of his bottom lip where his fake lip piercing at and also another bleeding cut on the bridge of his nose. his body is being pulled back by the bouncer as another security staff handles jeno who is still charging at him. both of them are trying to finish each other off even with their battered and bruised bodies.

“I’M GOING TO FUCKING KILL YOU.” soobin’s growl sounds so unnatural to him that he even got scared of himself while jeno replied with his own set of profanities that he just can’t take seriously.

“I CAN RUIN YOUR LIFE IN A SNAP, CHOI SOOBIN.” the boy’s sentence is now muffled by the crowd that is still listening to music as the bouncer drags him away to the exit of the venue. soobin’s body gave up as he followed the bouncer out to greet the piercing daylight, hurting his eyes as he tried to adjust quickly. his breathing is ragged as the bouncer’s gaze at him is filled with such a disappointing expression. yet, he can’t stop the way the tears are falling down his cheeks and combining with the spilling of his own blood.

“the girl- the girl i was with. where did she go?” soobin asked the bouncer, his eyes moving around anywhere near the building and the parking lot. maybe you’re just taking a fresh air and sitting near the trees on the edge of the forest, waiting for him to come out so he can comfort you after he processed some things he understands out of all the nuances he caught onto in such a short time.

“she left, running. turning left to the downtown area,” the bouncer said as he let go of soobin, who was trying to steady himself as he picked up the phone and speed dialed your number. yet, all he could hear was your familiar caller tune playing as he let the beeps play until the operator told him he couldn’t reach you. soobin’s hand brushed against his wounded face and messy hair, not caring about his appearance and how the red color now spread across his facial skin

because all he can think about now is you.

“(y/n)-“

“the number you’re calling is not available-“

“for fuck’s sake!” soobin wiped his hand across his sweaty face, throwing the phone to his bed as he sat against it on the floor. he felt the drying scab from the bruise that he got for fighting jeno. trying to call you since yesterday, yet you aren’t available all the time. he had gone to your room yet you didn’t answer—resting in front of your room until he perceived his wounds drying up by themselves, hoping you would come back; yet you didn’t. he tried reaching out to your friends, and they all gave the same answer: they don’t know where you are.

so as the night blankets this side of the world and ends another day, he goes back to his room and clean himself up; patching his self as he looks at the mirror of the bruises blooming on his face. his phone is always near him, hoping that someone—anyone—can tell you of your whereabouts. that’s when han reached out to him, calling him to tell him what he had found as soobin told him what happened.

“i tried tracing back the photo that got spread. come back from a burner phone number from haeyang. like the numbers that our plug usually uses. you know what’s interesting about the number?“ the statement comes so quickly, yet he knows this guy. han is one of the most meticulous guys he knows and full of patience—he is the guy that tattooed the large saturn on his arm after all. he is also very tech-savvy and always knows if things are scams or not. the guy was the one that told him of your photo with jeno; he knows just how significant you are to him from both of their talks in the break room of their tattoo parlor.

“yeah, gimme.“ soobin replied, pulling the cotton off the area where he puts the antiseptic to clean the dried wound. the sound of the call echoed in his bathroom walls as the dark creeps into his room, awaiting its time to start the new day at 00.00.

“it’s connected to an email by the name of herin.”

though he tried to get away from you as he saw your photo in that compromising position, hearing his friend’s revelation makes him recall what you said, recalled your expression towards the two who seem to terrorize you. the way you try to cover your waist even if it’s dark in the room. the way you tried to fight back, yet the nerves come for you. he realizes you’re telling a part of the truth, but not the whole truth. if they bother you so much, why don’t you tell him or any of your friends?

it reminds him of when he was with yeonjun back in middle school. when he first moved in and don’t know shit about anyone in the middle school—still not close enough to the guy who he called his best friend—he was being made fun of for looking geeky. the only thing he had in his hand was his sketchbook he uses to cope with the trauma even if it’s already been a couple of years since his parents died, pages upon pages of his dark-themed illustrations are the only thing he could relate to. yeonjun was the epitome of the middle finger when soobin told him about what he faced and his idea for revenge comes from pranking the boys that made fun of him. he can imagine you and yeonjun at age 7 or 8 doing the same thing, especially since—based on yeonjun’s testimony—you are close by the hip and hang out all the time.

but the more he realizes, this version of you doesn’t have any eagerness to reconnect with yeonjun, unlike the (y/n) that visited him. and he understands that it’s because of the trauma you both might and might not have. the way original timeline (y/n) told him about how she came to this timeline means that she knows firsthand yeonjun’s reaction to his mother’s death. and that traumatic experience bonded them as even when she went back to haeyang, she had hope that she’ll meet yeonjun again. yet, for you, yeonjun is just a friend that got away. he had a few childhood friends whom he remembered the face but not the name and that is just what you and yeonjun in this timeline are doing. but when (y/n) visited his home nearly a week ago and with what she talked about him with soobin, she knew the only right thing was to go back to be with her yeonjun—well, his yeonjun too.

his ever-changing existential thoughts are being struck down by meteorites to go to earth, sonder coming to him so hard he realizes now that even if he misses home back in his original timeline, he might have a foundation of a new one with you. the way you both make out in the dark feels so deep more than he had ever felt. it’s as if you wanna tell him something, reaching out to him more and more with the way you both hung out with each other so much. and now he knows this is a test. does he trust you and does he trust himself?

soobin changes his clothes into a basic white tank top and navy shirt as an outer combo with jeans before tucking his shoes and going out into the sunset. he had realized he missed the only class that day cause he was trying to reach out to you so much as he wallowed in the thoughts of everything that was happening for the past week. the blowing breeze from the ocean already reaching him as he walks towards the off-campus area. his eyes continue looking at the crack on the pavement, yet their position is lifted now because he is always looking towards you, to check if you are okay as he guides you or you guide him. he glides towards the street full of people his age, full of franchised-brands of stores having their signs light up as it makes the dusk brighter—in a way that he couldn’t see the moon and the stars as clearly as he was in the old neighborhood you and he were days ago.

when the other kids seem to go to fast-food restaurants or neon-lighted nightclubs, his head only has one place in his mind: the diner you and he went to that night. the knowledge of the neighborhoods is printed from the many years he had lived here as he can track the layout of the sidewalk he has to take. when he arrives at the diner, he can identify a few pickup trucks parked as the warm light exudes out of the windows to lighten the dark sky. the bell chimes as the door opens and he can see truckers sitting separately as an old lady tends to the counter, the sound of sizzling enters his ear as she turns around, a smile on her face.

“what can i help you with, boy?” she asked, remembering that she wasn’t there last time. recalling what you spoke to miya when she was tending to the counter, he now knows that he’s talking to the infamous miss ahn that you and yeonjun had talked about.

“i’ll take a club sandwich and some coke, please?” he replied sitting on the seat that overlooks behind the counter.

“sure thing!” the woman replied as soobin let out a sigh, setting down his phone on the counter with the screen facing up, hoping that another piece of information would come to him once again. the sound of dionne warwick‘s ‘walk on by‘ playing from the jukebox transports him into a different time, like when he was here with you. he didn’t feel time running at all that time when you both were here sitting in the booth that he’s taking a peek at behind his shoulder. just conversing about some ridiculous teammate shenanigans you got from one of your group projects as he relayed with his own, and also the discussion you both had about the other movies like fallen angels you both had watched. surely, a friday night should make the diner packed, but then he got reminded of the gentrification of haeyang that was taking place and how, business-wise, the diner was losing the race with other businesses.

when the plate of food and glass filled with coke is set in front of him, he plays along with his food as he thinks about his position in this world. how the alien imagery since then has been sticking by him, but he couldn’t help but remember your comments about it. about how you are a loser and an alien too and it gave him a sense of overwhelming comfort, even if he doesn’t agree with what you are saying. however, with everything that happened yesterday, he can’t help but push himself to see in your position, seeing what you’re facing in reality and if it’s accurate to what he thought. another level of alienation in the worst way possible when it’s not even your fault.

he was chewing his food when he heard the chime from the bell that disrupted his line of thought. soobin wanted to get back into his mind and he wanted to tune out the world once again when he listened to the new customer beside him ordering.

“good evening, miss ahn! can i get two strawberry donuts to go, please?”

“right away, young man- oh my!” soobin sees miss ahn turning around as she sees the person who orders right beside him. he can’t help but peek from the corner of his eyes where he sees a boy with dark cyan hair that seems to fade away, thick-framed glasses on his face as he tugs the knitted sweater he’s wearing.

“yeonjun! so glad to be seeing you here!”

yeonjun?

soobin pivots his head in a whiplash as he sees the boy sitting on the stool beside him. his side profile is so identifiable as he remembered the last time he saw him, he was still with pink hair—which he realized that this yeonjun probably never had. soobin’s eyes sting as his mind plays the notable memories he had with the boy beside him, how he remembered running into the night as they sneaked out of their houses to hang out with each other. the way the boy laughs along with him as they headbang to the punk songs played by the bands. how his face grimaced as soobin tattooed the angel wing on his back. yet he realizes that this yeonjun doesn’t have the same memories as he does. this yeonjun is different. there is no connecting line between him and the boy but-

“i think i’ve seen you before?” soobin’s head lifted as he didn’t realize he was just staring at the space on the counter between him and the boy. he followed where the sound came from to see yeonjun, who had his front side turned to face him. the familiar grin on his face as his nose scrunches make his heart beat faster.

“you’re the boy that’s with (y/n), right? soobin?” yeonjun continued.

“i, well, how’d you know?” he asked, his voice coming out so soft as he tried his best to calm his feelings—scared that he might burst out with the tears.

“you’re everywhere on (y/n)’s account- i mean- i’ve caught a photo of you both on my dashboard before.” he replied as he pushed his hand out, the other hand pushing his glasses up his nose bridge as he spoke, “i’m yeonjun.”

soobin’s hand reacts so impulsively as he grasps the hand of the boy that he should also call his best friend. at first, he thought his hand was going to go past the boy’s—he didn’t think it was real corporeal form—but when both of their palms touched each other, he could sense the electric spark from it; but with yeonjun’s graceful smile continuing, soobin understands that he doesn’t feel it at all.

“i’ve heard about you before from (y/n).” soobin replied, doing three handshakes before both of them let go as he continued eating the food that was getting colder.

“re- really? what did she talk about me?” the boy leans his head against the upright arm on the counter; something he has seen yeonjun do whilst they converse on their school desks.

“that you both were best friends before she moved away. that this diner was you two’s hangout place. and much more, honestly.”

yeonjun nods his head, a tight-lip smile on his face. “that’s good. i actually tried to reach out to (y/n) through social media before i went back here. i promised her when she came to visit me that we meet up, but it seems so inadequate of me to reach out. i mean-“ he shrugs, “she’s on a different level than me.”

your visit? yeonjun must have thought that the (y/n) that visited him was you, but soobin knew otherwise that the (y/n) that visited him was the (y/n) from the original timeline. yet, soobin couldn’t bear to tell him the truth because he also didn’t know how to do it without blowing yeonjun’s mind away. the way (y/n) told soobin how the original timeline yeonjun knows about her chronokinesis has already created a collateral impact on him. he knew this yeonjun was smart—from the way (y/n) described him at the beach of the numerous trophies and medals—but telling the guy that his concept of space and time is wrong when a person from an alternate universe can travel back and forth with a power to control time can alter him significantly.

“oh yeah, where’s (y/n) anyway? are you here to meet her or- oh…” soobin glanced at the way yeonjun’s gleam faded as he spoke, reminding him of the way original timeline (y/n)’s way of talking, “i’m sorry. i just remembered that i saw the photo.”

“don’t say sorry to me. i’m just collateral damage. i’ve been trying to reach out for (y/n) this whole day and it’s been unsuccessful.”

yeonjun hums as he turns his body to the front of the counter, tapping his fingertips against the top of it as soobin continues eating with a slouched shoulder. “you seem to care for her.”

the boy notices soobin peeking at him when he slants his head. soobin learned he couldn’t lie to him more, even the yeonjun he remembered knew how to read body language so well, “more than care actually.”

yeonjun nods his head as he sees miss ahn who is packing the donuts into the brown bag, “even if we are separated for a decade, (y/n)’s not that kind of girl.” soobin turns his head to face the boy who is playing with the ends of his sweater’s sleeves.

“she’s one of the most hard-working people i’ve ever known, always attempting to achieve everything she wants to achieve and she doesn't play dirty cause that was my role in our youth.” he chuckles to himself. soobin can’t help but smile when he hears it.

“she’s not one who plays dirty unless it’s necessary for her survival. she once had to face one guy from my class in a game of dodgeball in our shared gym class. i told her that the guy was messing with me like sending me notes and stuff. and she was capable enough to catch the ball and play mind tricks with him to get a win.” yeonjun brushes his hair as soobin now sees how the guy doesn’t even have ear piercings.

“even when she visited me at my home, she was such a good sport even though we ended it awkwardly. but she made an effort to visit me even if none of us reached out in the first place.” soobin remembered what (y/n) said about how she embarrassed herself. but the way he spoke of you about the dodgeball story just based on the timeline of young you and yeonjun, he can assess it happened in both timelines. and when he spoke of (y/n) that visited him, he can detect the parallel of it with you. even if you both aren’t the same attitude-wise, he could conclude that how this is who (y/n) is universally, the same as with yeonjun with his cheekiness even though this one has a bit of timidness to it.

the brown bag is placed in front of yeonjun as he pays to miss ahn, waiting for the change as he swerves the stool back towards soobin, “i don’t know when i will get the courage back to meet her again. but i’m glad that i encounter you, soobin. i have to go back to my college town and-“

miss ahn gave the change back as she stepped away to serve another customer who just come in. soobin gazed at yeonjun who stood up and took a step to stand in front of him. the boy stared at the blue-haired’s features as he felt a pat on one of his shoulders.

“take care of (y/n) for me, okay? you’re very capable of doing so. and send my regards to her as well.”

with two last pats, yeonjun takes off towards the entrance. miss ahn’s farewell rings into his ear as he eyes the boy, who faces away and leaves him. a few drops of tears fall down his cheek as he lets his hand caress the shoulder that yeonjun pats, seeing his former best friend leave as catharsis hits him. the sense of sadness and satisfaction runs throughout his blood vessels as he finally gets a proper farewell to his friend.

soobin turns around on his stool with a new sense of determination, eating up the sandwich as he has now caught a new anchor to tie him down forming in his mind: in the shape of you.

he still eyes the phone’s screen, the hope that you will call him remains. but then, he heard another rushing footsteps enter the diner as he saw miya coming into the room from the back kitchen. her facial muscles are so contorted but thaw as she sees soobin. “oh thank fucking goodness.”

“miya, is my shift up?” miss ahn asked before she walked to the front of soobin.

“no, not yet, auntie.” she told her before angling her head towards soobin and stepping towards him, rapidly saying, “i tried to reach you but (y/n)’s phone was locked and she doesn’t have anyone on speed dial. so, i tried my best to get to you but i don’t know which hall you live in. so i tried walking to one, but you were not there. i’m fucking glad i found you now.”

“miya, slow down, please? what’s wrong?” she leans back and takes a huge needed breath.

“it’s (y/n). she stayed with me since yesterday. she went on a rambling spree about what’s happening to her and i’ve calmed her down as best as i can. she was okay last night and i wanted to bring her back but she said that she didn’t want to.” miya wiped the sweat that had trickled down her forehead. “so i let her stay at my place and i went to work at the art shop this morning. after closing down and going back to prep for my shift here, i realized she was drinking my wine bottle. i’ve forgiven her for it, but all she wanted was to speak to you.” miya finished explaining as soobin didn’t realize he was holding his breath.

“she’s dozing off before i left and i already got rid of any alcohol near her. but it’s best if you come with me cause she still can wake up.” miya’s eyes landed on soobin with a scrutinizing look before they faded away as she catches a glimpse of her aunt looking at the nearly finished plate in front of him.

“i can pack up your meal so you can get to her, poor (y/n).” miss ahn said as she picked up the plate that soobin had. he hurriedly pulled out his card to pay for the meal as miya helped with it. soobin’s eyes were looking down at the counter, his lips turn into a frown as the worries are coming back to him. when he looks up, miss ahn gives him a larger bag with the container of his food and beverage before she turns around and gives him a familiar brown bag he saw minutes ago.

“oh no no. you don’t have to.” soobin tries to stop it yet miss ahn persists.

“the strawberry donuts are on the house. i hope this could help (y/n).”

“i... thank you so much.” soobin answered as he bowed his head, picking the bags in his hand as he followed miya who was already jogging in front of him. she must’ve been tired of walking around the neighborhoods trying to reach him from the brief episode from today she had told him, but her tiredness doesn’t show as she races back to her place.

as he came across a street with four-story-tall apartments, he followed miya who stepped inside the hallways, trailing along the floor as it resembled his and yours residential halls. she makes him stop at the door in front of both of you.

“i’m going to leave you here because of my shift.” she then taps the code into the keypad, “you can go back if you want to after you’re done. her clothes and bag are inside a tote bag at the coffee table.”

“okay, thank you so much for helping (y/n).”

“no problem.” miya stepped away instantly after she pushed the door open, leaving soobin to face a dim apartment.

as soobin stepped inside, he was met with a dark hallway leading to a kitchen with a small night light on. the living room was dim also, but he could hear the sound of sobbing near the curtains towards the balcony. there, beneath the moonlight that is seeping in, is you sitting with your back against the wall. your head folding forward so your forehead rests on top of the folded knees, tucking yourself into a self-hug.

“hey…”

your head instantly lifted because of his one word, as he can see your eyes widen.

“soob-soobin…” you let out in your hoarse voice, trying to stand up before you tumble and nearly fall as your hand holds the wall. he walks towards you to hold you up as your eyebrows furrowed. your palm gripping his upper arms as he relaxes the muscles between your eyebrows, straightening them as you look towards him.

“it is you…” the way the corner of your eyes droops down as you sniffle away your sobbing makes him cup your face in both of his hands. soobin remembered how he sketched your eyes, full of wonder and curiosity, just like what he always sees with you. but now, he could see the many details he hadn’t gotten before, but one was extremely evident: the cracks on your irises as you stared back at him.

“it’s me. hey-“

you wrap your arms around him as you tug yourself so close to him, not wanting to let go. he can feel every surface of your front touching his as he adjusts his arms around you too. one holding onto your head and the other around your nap as he caught a glimpse of light on your neck. drawing away slightly, he could see the golden pendant shining in between the shadows he and you made before you pulled him back to you. you sob more and more, and he doesn’t care that the tears and snot stained his white tank. the hand on your nape runs down your back, soothing you with every caress as he lets you control the pace. as the sobs become lighter, you lean back as you shift your head away, not wanting to make eye contact with him.

“be, believe me, soobin. i didn’t do it. not at all. it’s jeno cause he owns the photo-“

“i know. i know, bunny,” he replied, using your nickname of him towards you as he leaned in and gave a peck on your temple. your head lulled, sniffling the sadness away as you caressed his nape. pivoting back to him, you have a pout on your lips as soobin reads what your eyes are telling him. the hand that was holding your head trails down to hold on to the heart pendant.

“help me stay…”

soobin’s shocked face doesn’t show as he realizes what you implied, but he lets himself nip his bottom lip as he can sense the tears threatening to come out and glisten in his eyes, “please… bun. you’re the only one that understands me. and if you leave me, i don’t know what else to do.”

at once, he tucks you back in your rightful place by his torso, tilting his head to kiss your head as he soothes you with sweet and comforting sayings.

“i will, (y/n). i swear i will.” he pulls away a little before giving you a peck on your lips. they stayed pouted as he was watching you trying to return to the sobering surface, eyelids heavy as all you wanted to fall asleep and get rid of the mental and physical exhaustion you were having.

“you wanna go back home?” he brushes your tears away.

“yes, yes, please. my key is in the front pocket of my bag.” your words slur as soobin guides you to sit down on the sofa. he tugs the tote bag to see your clothes from yesterday already being folded. his hand reaches for your bag as he opens the zipper pocket to find the key before tugging it into his pocket. soobin then kneeled down, grabbing your hands to wrap around his shoulders as he lifted himself up, tugging you up so you have a better position as he piggybacked you.

your breath on his skin sends shivers down his spine as you hold on to him, letting you sleep as he picks up the tote bag and the takeout from the diner and lets them hang along his arms. adjusting the weight on his body from the bags until it’s all secure, he opens the door to miya’s apartment and brings you out into the night, taking you back home.

everything was blurry when you opened your eyes.

the soft duvet caresses your skin as the light being beamed at your face makes the dizziness come back, but you are aware of your surroundings as you eye the window. the sound of a calm song played by an acoustic guitar greets you as you push your body upright, stretching it as you let your eyes roam, studying where you are right now.

rubbing your swollen face, you find yourself in your room which is still as clean as ever thanks to karin. looking down, you see yourself in your usual tank top and shorts combo you wear in your room but you eye the outfit that hangs on the handle of your wardrobe: the clothes that miya lend you.

everything comes crashing down as you tuck your knees close to you, letting your duvet cover your front as you catch the flushing of the toilet and the sound of steps on the floor. the memories of last night only came out in clips and scenes, wrecking your brain that instantly works to piece up the truth—from you drinking half of miya’s wine bottle before passing out on the floor that cools your warm skin, then you see soobin coming up to you in your messiest state. even thinking about it makes your brain subduedly pulsing and it caught his attention when he stepped out from the bathroom.

“you’re awake…” you glance upwards to find soobin with a small smile, he’s shirtless as you can see the droplets of water falling from his jaw. he walks closer and pulls you into a hug. your head resting against his abdomen as he soothes you down, putting one hand behind your head.

“i’m hoping that since it’s saturday, you have no other schedule set cause you need a breath of fresh air. truly.” he spoke as you grasped one of his hands, soothing it with your own while humming an agreement. “you need more ibuprofen? you already had one when we got here when i fed you the instant ramen before you totally passed out.”

“i’m… okay. i guess?” you replied while leaning your head back to see his face as he looked down at your body on the bed. “i’m sorry for worrying you so much and for getting you involved with this.”

“nah, i wanted to get involved. and i should be the one saying sorry for not being there with you,” he answered, seeing you shaking your head as you brushed your sleepy face once again with your free palm.

the memories of the past two days coming back into your mind, yet you already felt numb to it. exhaustion and demotivation came to you simultaneously, and you were glad you got them near the end of the semester. after everything you’ve gone past, you just want a peaceful day where nothing happened, letting your mind rest and relax as you think of yourself retrospectively. all you wanted alone time, but even that was destructive to you. you confided with miya as you stayed at her place, telling her the truth of what happened at the diner that you could only call your haven, staying there until she let you stay at her place because you didn’t want to face the hoard that speaking so degradingly about you. you still don’t know if you are brave enough to speak the truth again when facing him, and how you now realize the interconnectedness of jeno and herin just from that brief interaction at the venue. how each line of the conflicts you’ve been facing this semester is now clear.

“you’re taking me somewhere?”

“uhuh… but i gotta go back to my room first to get a change of clothes. i’ll probably pick you up in 10 minutes to let you prep yourse-“

“can i go with you?” you pursed your lips. “i, i don’t think i’m brave enough to stay here alone after what’s happened. i can clean up at your room too and we can go together.”

“okay,” he instantly agrees as he pulls away and hauls you to sit on the side of the bed. your feet touching the fuzzy surface of the carpeted floor as he helps you stand up. the sleepiness is still lingering as you lightly stumble towards your wardrobe when soobin lets you go to put on his clothes.

you pull out a simple casual outfit that echos soobin’s usual style of graphic t-shirt and ripped jeans and you also pull out a hoodie to cover yourself up—both from exhaustion and to not let people see you. the sound of fabric being dusted clean is heard as you grab your undergarments before tucking them into your crossbody brown handbag along with the belongings you pulled out. you eye the outfit you wore to the concert, remembering the fashion show you had to take care of, but the painful memories of it are the prominent thing instead. letting your phone go as you tuck it back in your bag, you turn around and see soobin already prepared as you eye your room to check any items you might left behind. he goes out first as you pull up the hood to cover your head and you both walk side by side to go outside of your hall.

it was still pretty early at the campus—around 8 in the morning. the only people that you see are people working out in the morning, from the joggers to the cyclists. the serenity of the atmosphere makes you able to breathe properly for the first time since yesterday and to let the oxygen circulate into your cells. you glance at soobin who knows where he is going, yet his eyes are stuck on the path you’re on. the hand that was brushing his then holds onto his wrist, making him pause his movement as he peeks at you from the corner of his eyes. you reach your hand up to his jaw to push it upwards, seeing the way his adam’s apple gulping on his neck and how long it is after you repair his posture. a dimpled smile comes from him as he interlocks his fingers with yours and brings you back to his room.

the warm water flows down and soothes your skin as you get yourself a proper shower. soobin’s presence is right behind you as you both shower together in silence. you look closely at his face when you notice his wounded face, hissing as you recall the only thing that came into mind was when you both were at the venue. you could piece the image in your mind even though you aren’t there; how soobin has gotten punches from jeno. with the way you hiss and a light grimace on your facial expression, he reaches his hand and rests it beneath your chin before pushing your cheeks together with his thumb and forefinger, making your lips pout as you let out giggles he also follows. few words were shared as if you both knew that you just wanted to enjoy this peaceful moment with him, and you both knew that the conversation you both had to speak about would come out after he brought you to the place he wanted to bring you.

the bus was still pretty empty on the saturday morning towards noon. only those who are doing morning exercise have come and gone as they arrive back or arrive at the beach to get a few waves in for their surfing or just enjoy the beach. the route the bus has gone by two significant stops for you in the past week: the stop by the old neighborhood you and soobin went—you catch a glimpse of the crowd in the wet market as they try to find the resources to survive for the week—and the stop near the concert venue that you and he visited. the bus goes past the still ever-crowded venue as it climbs deeper and deeper into the forested hill. the newly rising sunbeams being split by the leaves as the greenery calms you down even more. the bus then tells of the last stop of its route as it arrives at the bus stop by the entrance of the infamous lake.

stepping out, you see the parking lot has a few cars in it as you see the freely entered entrance to the lakeside. booths where businesses are placed are being set up for another day. the campground area has a few tents standing upright and the wooden deck stretches out to at least four meters deep from the edge of the lake. you were already tugging the strap off from your shoulder so it rests on the nearest surface, already wanting to sit by the deck and let your legs dangle by the water when soobin spoke.

“this is not what i wanted to show you.” your eyebrows raised as you looked down to see soobin’s hand outstretched; instantly locking with yours as he guided you into a trail in the forest.

the trail was only made of a path that only experienced people could find out as he expertly pushed the branches out of the way following the path covered with bushes. you both are still within the vicinity of the lake as the trail traces around the lakeside. it was as if he’d been here before to know exactly the place he wanted to show you, but soobin’s not a haeyang resident for all you recall. you remembered hearing him mention his parents who lived in the city and how they still converse with him, unlike yours who are busy with their own partners now after their divorce. the sunlight refracts from the calm water on the lake, little waves made by the creatures living in them as you can see a glimpse of freshwater fishes swimming about, eager to be fed or if they’re unlucky, will be fished out by the people that you found preparing their fishing poles by the deck. you glance back, seeing the place you arrived at getting smaller and smaller as you both reach a clearing on the other side of the lake where you were. you eyed a wider dirt path that goes to an asphalt road as if it is made to be a little hidden nook in the lake’s vicinity.

“thought we want some peace rather than being scared by the sudden noises of children playing.” soobin replied as he pulled out what looks to be a blanket of his that you’ve seen he uses for his bed. spreading it on the ground, he rested down and sit facing the lake, patting the space for you to sit on as he tried to tug something out of his bag. your vision watches him pull out a bag of food that you recognized, a smile growing on your face as you realize it.

“i know it’s not much. but i found you through miya when i went to the diner yesterday evening. so, here is my leftover club sandwich, and miss ahn also gave us strawberry donuts-“

“you met miss ahn? wow…” you eyed the brown bag and back at him, “even i haven’t seen her again.” your hand placed on your stomach, as you can hear it rumble.

“go ahead. you haven’t eaten since last night.” he opens all the packaging as you snatch up a sliced piece of club sandwich in your hand. it still is tasty even if it’s cold, but you are glad that you’re getting your body energized. you hummed playfully as you let your taste buds work, sighing as he followed suit—drinking the bottle he brought from his mini fridge as you and he left the room.

“welp…” you brush away the crumbs off the corners of your lips, “now you realize just how much of a loser i am, soob.” you tried to joke it out, already knowing that he wanted an explanation of what happened to you to get you into this mess you’re facing. you don’t even want to find out the status of your membership in the fashion show committee because of how jeopardizing the whole predicament is—you’re tired of defending yourself when no one seems to believe you.

“you don’t have to talk about it.”

“but i know you want me to,” you replied to him, scooting your butt as you sat closer to him and putting the bag of food in front of your legs. “i owe you an explanation after all.”

soobin hums as you both stare at the flight of birds that seem to dip their toes into the lake gathering the group up as they fly away into the horizon behind the edge of the trees that surrounds you.

“starting from the beginning, jeno is my ex and i dated him throughout my freshman year. very early indeed, i know. we got to know each other because we were in the same orientation group along with herin too. i didn’t know he was that much of a red flag back then,” you chuckled as you shook your head at how stupid you were to believe the guy and let him date you, “but when i started hanging out more with my fashion major friends, they told me who he really is and the amount of evidence that just piled up to convince me of his true character. he’s the one that made me as popular as i seem to be, though people knew me more as his girlfriend than what i am now.”

rubbing your sweaty palm, you exhale a long breath then continue, “and so, he has gotten too possessive. ‘(y/n), don’t do this!’ ‘(y/n) don’t do that!’ and i at the time was very much more submissive? than i am today. i wanted to make it work, but my friends convinced me to break it off because they made me realize how he showed me off like a doll he owned. i did just that and he went ballistic. i blocked his number and socials and tried to get rid of him. focusing on building my career as a designer rather than thinking of boy drama, so i ideate on making a sustainable clothing line out of leftover fabrics and i joined the fashion show crew so i have more experience.” you tuck your knees closer to your chest as you glance at soobin, who was still facing the lake as if he doesn’t notice you turning towards him.

“i fear having a serious relationship and was branching out for more casual hookups and such, and that’s when i met you. i didn’t have any other hookups after you and after that night we did it together. it’s, like, i just found the right one who still wants to be awake to hear me rant during a pillow talk even if we are tired of fucking.”

soobin lets out a smile as his dimple deepens into his cheeks, glancing at you now as you shy away, turning your head towards the lake as you purse your lips to find the right words to continue.

“so we have this relationship between us, me having a good social life with the people we met through my friends and parties, and i rose from my lowly position of a volunteer to be liaison officer to now working in the show department and gaining friends from the show committee. yada yada yada. but i didn’t know that herin was also a staff in the fashion show crew and i met her now who is leading the marketing department.”

“you always had bad blood with her.” soobin commented as he let his long legs outstretched, resting on top of the blanket-covered rocks and pebbles as it helped relieve his muscles.

“i do and the thing is: i don’t know how it happened. suddenly she was just, trying to belittle me as much as she could. my friends helped me stay away from her most of the time but then we got a class together and she threw balls of papers at me. long story short, she has a higher position than me in the crew because she had a way from being a student committee and she took advantage of that.”

“and you don’t fight back?” he eyes you, full of expectation, and all you can do is pout your lips. you always present yourself as a strong, independent, young adult woman who faces challenges head-on and is not scared to be a social butterfly—making you famous among your peers. but, you were the only one who knew the true you. the whole truth behind this facade you’ve been cultivating since you moved out of haeyang.

“we’ll pin that ‘cause it’s gonna get to there.” you clear your throat as he gives you the bottle, letting the water ease the dryness as you resume, “so yeah. she started putting her jobs on me and i can’t say no. her power overshadows mine and she could definitely tell my supervisor if i defy her. not only that, but since i got accepted to showcase my clothing on the show, i could lose both my position and my opportunity to showcase my work if i don’t behave. but from doing the jobs and meetings, physically, i’m slowly getting tired. but then i realized if it shows, i will get berated again. the cycle will repeat.” you take a glimpse at soobin whose eyes are looking at the area around your eyes. you’re too late to realize how sunken your eyebags must be as you usually wear enough concealer to cover them up.

“jeno then appeared, and he was trying his best to persuade me to get rid of my chance to be in the fashion show lineup, saying that his ‘girlfriend’ wanted to do it and in return, i could be a model for her fashion line. i openly said no, but he just threatened me then he mentioned you and how you just cannot be compared to him, trying to make me turn back to him cause he had more money and power as a haeyang local. but, i still caught on to him saying he had a girlfriend and just said no. he said something along the lines of ‘you’re gonna regret not coming back to me’ but i shut it out. well, i didn’t expect that to be recorded and spread around.” you giggle. you always come back to humor as your coping mechanism, thinking back on what types of decisions you made back then that you definitely won’t make now.

“then at the meet-up with the fashion show crews, i had finished doing my task for the stage design and all of that stuff when herin approached me, saying that i didn’t give her tasks back even though i remembered i already sent it to her through email—just like she wanted. but she got called out for not giving the tasks back to the project officer and because she didn’t ‘find’ any incoming email from me in her inbox, that’s how i got pushed.” you looked down at your shirt-covered stomach, “and got the bruise you saw.”

you turn your upper body to face fully at him, your eyes drooping down as you swallow your saliva, “but believe me when i say that i don’t ever slut myself to my teachers. the pic that was spreading was taken by jeno and i consented to that like the fucking idiot i was. i thought he might delete it after we broke up but using it for blackmail seems to be the reason he seems to have so many pics of people in compromising positions in his phone when i secretly look through it during our relationship.” you let out sigh, having the weight falling off your shoulder and you seem to hear it drop onto the rocks you are sitting on, cracking a few of them like your heart does when you see the picture spreading across the socials. just like how it is when you realize you might’ve broken soobin’s trust in you after you open up so much to it.

“now for the main course: the reason i don’t fight back.” you face back towards the lake as you catch soobin’s head turning towards you. “when i moved out of haeyang at 10 years old to a city i didn’t know, i always felt like an outsider. people asked me where i was from and where or what is haeyang if mentioned it. it was hard for me to adapt but then i realized: i had to blend in to survive. so i did that, and it continued throughout middle school, high school, and when i enrolled here. the only way for me to survive was to blend in with the crowd that could belittle me. but then meeting you change my perception.”

soobin’s hum rings in your ears, him taking an interest in what you are trying to say. with a few blinks, you let your eyes rest on his face. “you have this color of your own when i looked at you. like, even if you are trying to blend in, you still have your own interests and it’s from your alt scene shenanigans and astronomy, for me. how even if people say that your interests are a bit out of left field, it still piques my interest in you. it makes me think of what my interests are outside of fashion, cause i don’t think i had one.” you close your eyes to think of the next words to say when your memory throws you into a scene where you and soobin sit on the sand at the beach while viewing the sunset. yet, your conscious mind tells you that this never happened before, making you guess that is this jamais vu? clairvoyance? you don’t know for sure.

“when you showed your alien-inspired storyboard to me at the music store, i was and still am genuine to say that i see myself in it too. i realized just how alienated my life was when i felt exhausted from going with the mainstream; to join an event crew so it can look good on my cv, to go to parties so i can get more followers. and how i realized just how fake everything is when i started stopping regularly opening my socials nearly a week ago and you don’t know how glad i am that you’ve been wanting me around you.”

you watched as soobin’s eyebrows crumpled as he gazed at you, making your lips tremble as you stared at the blue sky above you from the opening of the forest. even if its color is reflected on the lake’s surface, you rather view it instead when the sun is still not high enough to blind you. the sky blue is clear as the sky doesn’t have enough droplets to create one rain cloud, and even from the distance you are in, you can see a deeper color of blue if you look closer to the sky as best as you can.

“the earth does look good if it has rings around it.” you blurted out, making soobin let out a silent gasp that made you chuckle, “just imagine if we can see the streaks of creamy white on the surface of the sky now even if it’s daytime. it would be so beautiful that admiring it’s just enough to lighten up your day,” you mumbled out, visualizing with your eyes on how the rings would be so far yet still is visible enough for people on the planet to observe it. yet it only created a small part of the circles that surround the planet.

“i wish i could be an alien to see it from space. i bet it looks more marvelous than here.” your eyes caught him as you read his face to find it took a downturn from the smile that was on. instantly, you reached out to him as you let your fingers rest against his.

“hey. i didn’t know my words would affect you that way and i’m sorry for that-“ your word got cut off as you closed your eyes, letting his lips meld into yours as your hand moved on top of his, cupping it as he did with your cheek with his other hand. the kiss is reminiscent of the one you got at the gig venue, though a bit more melancholic, as if soobin’s trying to tell you something from it like you did to him before. as he pulls back to let you both breathe, your thumb meets his fallen tears as you cup his face with both of your hands.

“fucking hell…” soobin cursed as he wipes his eyes, making you look at him in concern as his eyes rapidly moves, trying to get away from you who still looks at him. he licked his lips and took a deep breath. he rubs his sweaty forehead as you give a peck on the button of his nose. you see him contemplating something as his adam’s apple moves once again, pulling out the strawberry donut so you eat it. he follows as you soothe him, hand caressing his back as he eats his own portion of the donut. the taste always brings back the memories you had with yeonjun, but now it has the memory you had with soobin when you invited him to the diner for the first time.

soobin stands up as he puts the leftover bags inside his own for the nearest trash can and pulls you onto your feet. you both fold the blanket after you clean it up, brushing it hard with your hands so the specks of dirt fall. and now you stand with open arms, heart, and mind. all you are—as you say so—can now be read like a book to soobin as you told him how it happened, and he didn’t seem as upset as you predicted.

“i also want to share one more place with you.”

“you’re tiring me out,” you jokingly said as he let out a pout, but just from the way his eyes gazed at you with his tilted head—you knew it was serious. “okay, uh, let me help.” you stand up and help pick the blanket up before folding it against your chest. his eyes already looking towards the path, but the pathway closest to the road before he goes back towards the dirt path you both went through.

“just wanna ask, how’d you know a place like this exists by the lake? i used to visit this lake back when i lived here but i didn’t know that exist.” you try to keep up with soobin as his face just slowly going back to his resting no-certain-emotion face. both of you trekking down the path where you can see the lake getting more crowded with the visitors coming from the weekend.

“i used to go here with a friend of mine if we wanted to rest from downtown, taking a down time, and just talking things out. it helps you speak up and i’m proud of you for that. but i think this place i’m gonna bring you to is much more appropriate with what i’m going to tell you.”

a friend of his? is it when he was a freshman? did he have a friend he never told you about? your guess is han, but from the stories soobin told you, he’s just a business partner of his from the identifiable dynamic. yet, come to think of it, soobin knows much about haeyang even if he only stayed for around two years. it’s like he has the hidden gems around the town in his mind, like a local telling stories about the town they lived in for years. you couldn’t do that with haeyang now because you recognize little and from the memories that made you nostalgic but also painful to remember. maybe it could be how you brought yourself up and how it makes you not attentive enough to the changes here. this used to be your home a decade ago and is your home now.

sipping on the bottle of lemonade you bought for the two of you, the bus ride brings you onto the slanted road that takes you down the hills of haeyang. the background is the picturesque view you’ve always seen by the coast. more people come and go on the bus as you’ve just realized how much you missed out on haeyang. the way miss ahn’s diner still caught people’s attention, the two-story bookstore you used to go to in your childhood on the block corner now changes into a japanese ramen restaurant, and just how lively the town is outside of the areas you only frequent in your college career.

back when you were little, you always saw haeyang as a town you could tackle with yeonjun and your bicycle rides. everybody knows you as it seems so intimate and quaint. when you moved out, everybody told you that haeyang was nowhere; it’s so small compared to the metropolis you lived in where everything exists. then, you come back, still with the same mindset that you had from the city when you realize how much you failed to look out at the changes in haeyang. yes, sure it is smaller than the city you used to live in. but haeyang had a much more distinct color of blues and greens compared to the city’s dull monochromes. and you only realized it now as the color saturation come back, as you let go of the expectations and people’s perception about you that insecure you so much to say “fuck it.” the rose-colored glasses you wore back then were still there, but the tint changes to clear as you see haeyang into how it is—a vibrant hipster town that you don’t mind staying in longer.

the bus ride was quiet as all you could do was admire haeyang in a new light—soobin knew what you were doing as he didn’t bother you at all. the bus takes you past the campus and into a more residential area of haeyang where soobin signals you that this is your stop. stepping out of the bus, your eyes are stuck on the lighthouse on the edge of your eyeline, still standing as ever from when you were old enough to identify it. the surrounding houses make your heart bloom as the blocks still look the same as what you remembered. you can visualize yourself riding a bicycle just like some kids are doing now, riding past you as they converse on it. you glance at one of the turns to the blocks, recalling the road to yeonjun’s home that snaps back into your memory.

“i want you to close your eyes for me.” you shift towards soobin, who speaks with a cheeky smile, “take my hand and close your eyes. it’s a surprise.”

“okay…” you answered, slowly closing the lids of your eyes as your hand grips soobin’s tightly and he signals you to walk with him to your next destination.

with your sight covered, it makes you notice on how alive haeyang is, the sound of the skidding of bicycles followed by exclaims of children, the smell of the sea that is just kilometers away from here, the sun that hits right enough that you aren’t burning. you try to rake your head at where soobin is taking you and how he knows this neighborhood. you remember the small park you used to play when you were 6, on the jungle gym and colorful slide—though you don’t know if it’s still there. the lighthouse is near here but you remembered that there was a bus stop near it, so it makes little sense why he told you to step off here. you think about how soobin guides you, feeling how he tells you to turn a corner just by how he walks and how you let your legs follow him. the moisture made from your eyes is threatening to come out, but you relax yourself as to not destroy the surprise he has for you.

you sense soobin slowed down as he remains an arm’s length distance so you don’t collide with each other. your lips open as you take in your breath of oxygen and you feel hands on both of your shoulders.

“turn your body for me, please?” soobin’s familiar whispers tell you as you let him turn your torso to where you should be facing. from your closed eyes, you could see an imposing shadow taller than you and obscuring the sun. its shape is more rigid with angular lines all over.

“you can open your eyes.”

at first, it was blurry, but when you blinked it away, you let your eyes wander along the sight he was showing you.

it’s your house. the house that you lived in haeyang a decade ago. your eyes wander to the window placements and they’re still the same—you can look to the window above to know that it’s your room. it has vines and moss growing from the cracks of the exterior wall, and overgrown grass on the lawn, as if it is abandoned so it can rot. you notice a pristine white sign beside the carpool your dad used to park the family car at.

FOR SALE.

soobin’s hands are still behind you as you glance to see him also tearing up whilst seeing you tearing up. your eyebrows raised as you turn your body to face him, not knowing what to say other than, “how’d you know this place?”

his eyes tilted down to scan the cracked pavement as you brought a knuckle to brush the tear away from his cheek, a wistful sigh coming out from him. “i’d know this place is significant to you because it’s also significant to me.”

what?

didn’t soobin only come to haeyang at the same time as you were at the start of your freshman year? what does he mean it’s significant to him too? these thoughts are running down your mind as he steps towards the front door, making you chase him down as you state, “are we trespassing in? soobin, answer me.”

“do you want to see it or not?” he replies with a stern voice, making you taken aback as you let him kneel and work on the lock with what looks like a needle he got from your place. as much as it is morally incorrect to trespass into a property that you don’t own, the place looks abandoned enough that people might not notice if staggers stay inside or not. plus, it is your home once.

the lock clicks as soobin carefully opens the door handle, pushing forward as you greet the dusty hallways. though it has a dull color from the gray dust collecting, the place still has the same color as what you remembered in the past. dust flies as you both step into the hallway that leads you to the open space at the back. you feel weird seeing the old home that you left, a few pieces of furniture still settled inside but no sign of who lived here, because you recognize the items of furniture as the ones your family left behind when you moved—not needing them cause the new place already has better furniture.

the open space that is the living room, dining room, and kitchen combined still lets out a sense of familiarity for you. it opens to the empty backyard full of grass, either an empty spot of them or a spot full of overgrown.

“i-“ you wanted to say something but paused as everything came down on you and you felt a tear running down your cheek. all the memories of your childhood when living in the house clouded your mind. you remember how you and yeonjun always played tag in between the living room and backyard with his mom and your mom reminding you both to be careful, how you used to have a dollhouse in the backyard where you and he played family with you two’s favorite plush dolls.

and you turn to soobin, who has tears falling down his eyes, making you hold on to his face as you hug him to calm him down.

“i also want to share with you how the alien storyboard happens and anything that happens this week.” he rubs his sweaty forehead as you give another peck on the button of his nose, “but you’re going to think i’m crazy.”

“no, i’m not.” you lightly tell him, trying to ease the mood. but with the place that you are in and what he told you, you knew something must have happened to this place that also affected him so significantly. you eyed the plastic-covered sofa that is still put in the same position you remember, thinking of how much you spent sitting on it and how it still is preserved when you see no holes in the plastic.

“but to do that, i also have to tell it from the beginning.” he pulls away from your arms as he lifts the plastic covering off the sofa, eyeing the blanket he had in his bag before spreading it out to cover it. his sitting figure knowing that you’re there for another serious discussion with him—something you now learned you have always liked with him. you follow suit, resting your hand against the exposed knee of his ripped jeans as he leans back against the sofa, letting out another sigh.

“i,” he starts, “i used to live here, but it’s not in this line of time.” your ears perked up at the last words, tilting your head to tell him to continue.

“i was eleven and i became an orphan. both of my parents died in this car accident and i had no choice but to live with my next of kin which are my uncle and aunt. they moved back to haeyang—my dad’s family was from here—and he bought a home here after i graduated elementary. then i started middle school here and i sat next to a boisterous boy who you know because his name is choi yeonjun.”

hearing soobin speaking the name of your childhood best friend’s name makes you gasp. everything you remember about telling him about yeonjun seems to be fake when you realize he knew him, even more recently as the last time you saw him was at age 10. you noted some discrepancies in his story, but you let it slide as you want to understand why he has been wanting to stay by your side for the past week.

“he became a best friend of mine all throughout my teen years. the bestest of friends and might be even more. i used to have a crush on him actually, but i know he doesn’t see me that way so i’m just happy to be by his side. i started tattooing when i was with him, even tattooing him many times like i’m his designated tattoo artist. but the first thing that makes us close is the traumatic experience we both face: that his mom also died from a car accident.”

“but-“ yeonjun’s mom didn’t die here. you still remember an episode in your life when you were at his house and how his mom came back to buy some groceries and whilst you ate waited for your parents to pick you up. but, her frazzled appearance caught your attention, remembering yeonjun asking her what happened as she told you of a near-death experience she had gotten in a comedic way. if she was meant to die—like what soobin is saying of his different “line of time”—she survived here.

“yeonjun’s mom is still alive?” soobin finished your sentence as he nodded along, “that is true. and it relates to what i said on how i lived here but not in this line of time because,” he scoots closer to you as if someone is in trouble for hearing it, “i’m not from here. my body is really from here cause there is soobin here, but there are parts that are not. i’m from a timeline where my parents died but they’re alive here, a connected string of events from when yeonjun’s mom died but she’s alive here.”

he looks at his palm, lifting it as he opens it widely. he lets his fingers stretch as wide as he can as if he’s trying to show you something with it. “in my timeline back then, some people can be given this power to control time. i knew someone who had one like this which is miya’s variant in my timeline name min. so we discussed how it happened and told them how i got mine when i graduated high school. in those days, i was a punk who didn’t have a plan for the future other than partying and drugs. but i still have a lingering thought about how my parents died and how they died here in haeyang just like yeonjun’s mom. so i dedicated my time after high school to find out the truth because it’s too much of a coincidence. then i find a connecting dot: the same car.”

you’re trying to unravel the strings of it in your mind as you pin down which pieces of information have already been elaborated, but the way soobin speaks about it is so articulate, as if he has a script in his mind; as if he knows he has to tell it someday.

“the same car that killed yeonjun’s mom also killed my parents and that revelation breaks me. i was getting comfortable using this power, chronokinesis as what min and i called it, but then a thought came into my head: what if i prevent the crash from happening? do you remember when we talked about the most traumatic experience we witnessed and that i talked about a car crash?” he nudged to you, who was looking at his lap as you pieced up the words he had flown.

“yeah, i do.” your eyes move back to meet his as he nods, already signalling to you that you know the answer. that the car crash soobin witnessed back when he was a child was the same accident where yeonjun’s mom died.

“long story short, i succeed in saving yeonjun’s mom. and i arrived here, as a freshman at haeyang institute of arts and my parents were alive and well. i see myself having the tattoos i had back in my original timeline—that’s why i believe my body hijacks the body here—but i still remember the memories of the past soobin here too. i connected the dots on how it happened and i went back to realize that yeonjun hadn’t seen me for five days from the five days i spent time here, wanting to know how my life was here. and i realize how satisfied i was because i got my parents back and have a better life than the trauma of dead parents and abusive kins.”

“so you had to choose?” you blurted out, too engaged in the story that you just realized what you said yet you still continued, “between your original timeline and here?” you listened to the way soobin sighed, knowing what you were saying was true.

“yes. and you see, chronokinesis doesn’t stay in the soul who possessed it. a world-ending scenario haunts the users and they have to stop it with it. what min or miya told me, the way to stop the apocalyptic event was to find a remedy in yourself. they do when they come here to come out to their parents here or some other timeline they went. but the only thing i had to remedy for myself was the truth of my parents’ passing and to get out of the misery i was having.” he stops, gulping down his saliva and reaching to take a bite of his thumb’s nail before he resumes.

“that choice was so cruel. i either had to stay here and disappear from my original timeline or go back to be with yeonjun who needed a support system but then a forest fire happened and burned haeyang. so i chose to stay here and prepare everything, even the house i lived in to be given to yeonjun so he could take care of it. and when i decided to stay here, my powers were gone. i can’t go back if i want to.” soobin brushes his fallen hair away from his face as he moves his head to look elsewhere.

“then you met me and we became… us.” you seemed to summarize correctly what he was saying. but you also see it visually when you’re at the party where you first met him. he looks like someone who is trying to blend in when his aura just stands out to you, and you believe that you’re the only one who notices it.

“things become normal as we do our thing of being a college student: studying, partying, and building networks. until a week ago when i came across you, well not you now, but you from my original timeline.” soobin replied, licking his lips as he was waiting for your reaction. but rather than surprised, you feel satisfied as you can piece up the random memories that came to your mind of when you and soobin were on the beach or when you saw a look to be the face of yeonjun, much older and with a blue hair, that you don’t remember how it got there.

“she was there to meet yeonjun, to tell the yeonjun back in the original timeline on how his mom is here. back then, i also heard stories of (y/n) from his perspective. never did i expect you were also the (y/n) yeonjun was talking about. she only visited for a day but then we talked about what happened with each of our lives and i got the news from her that yeonjun wasn’t doing so well after my disappearance. and when she goes back and you return, i had this immense guilt crushing me.” his voice trembled.

“then the existentialist thoughts are coming. what is my purpose here other than to be selfish when my best friend was suffering when i was not there? is all of this is just a fluke? i felt like an impostor because i am one. and the thing is, i can’t go back.”

you can feel your eyes stinging as you listen to his monologue of revealing anything.

“and that’s why i see myself as an alien, 'cause i am an alien. an alien who is homesick but doesn’t have a way to go home cause the way to go back was buried on top of my selfishness to feel happiness.” the muscles around your eyes crease as you see his tears fall once again, the white of his eyes are now becoming from pink just about how hard he has been pouring out his feelings. your hand reaches out behind him as you remember when you caught him having a panic attack that night in your room, not being able to fall asleep, and how you realized that that was the reason for it.

“so i tried to grasp everything that feels real for me about living here and the only thing i could grasp was you. you’re the only real thing to me and even with our conventional relationship, you still are the only person i’m comfortable being myself with, both the me from this timeline and me from my original timeline. what that (y/n) makes me realize is how my feelings for you have bloomed so much. so she gave me tips: to let myself out to you more so you’re comfortable enough to tell me about yourself.”

you remembered a note on your phone that implies that specific thing—it’s been a diary of your thoughts you didn’t think would get spilled. but you gotta have to thank your variant self who actually tells soobin, cause you don’t think you might change your perspective of life if he hadn’t opened up about himself through all the hangouts you had outside of both of your comfort zones. just how monotone your life has been that you can’t also give the same tour of hidden gems he had brought you.

“i tried to make you know who i am to anchor myself back to earth because you’re the one i can trust to lean on when i face this problem of mine. every time i was with you, no thoughts of it ever came back and that’s how i realized just how much i like being with you, no matter how busy or hidden we are.” he turns his body to face you, grabbing onto both of your hands in his as he grips it hard. huge exhales coming out of him as even when you stare at him, the tears are pricking your eyes. his eyes stares at yours, expressing from the way he look just how determined and tired he also seems.

“please, help me stay…”

his words echo the same words you remember telling him last night. when you said it, you were already on the brink of a decision between life and death, as you seemed to be ready to give everything up to have a peaceful life. but when he said it, you learned just how big of a scope those words can be; because other than him also wanting to live, his predicament is much bigger.

because he wants you to help him make a home here so that he won’t feel homesick again. he wants you to be a place where he can fall back if he is floating too high to the edge of space.

both of you are aliens and all you two want is the place to belong.

and you know where you belong.

leaning in, your lips connect with his own as you feel the tears falling down your cheeks. soobin’s breath hitches before he calms—his hands gripping onto yours as if you might go away. the same feeling you felt during the kiss at the concert comes back once again, now with more colors. you sensed soobin’s hands letting go of yours as he cupped your cheeks, holding you so tenderly in his hands as if you were a piece of something so fragile. your hands trace up to rest on his shoulders as you tilt your head, letting him closer and better for you to breathe. everything you both faced from the past week being poured out onto the pool where you both are swimming in, drowning yourself with so many thoughts and things as you can’t help but think about how hurtful soobin must have felt. to think that he wasn’t needed. to soobin telling you the things that you’ve felt ever since you moved away.

you’re the one that pulled back first, resting your forehead against his, eyes closed as you just feel his breath against yours. your hand moves to the back of his head, holding him like he is doing to your cheeks—not wanting to let go because you’re afraid he might float away from you. your lips brush against his as he gives slight pecks, getting your heart beating so much that you can sense warmth around your chest cavity that could burst if you don’t hold back.

opening your eyes as you lean slightly back, you see how a sunbeam lights up his swollen eyes perfectly, making them look like crystals that are so beautiful and more valuable than any gems out there. your head tilted against one of his palms, making you pout as he gives you his signature smile, complete with the dimples showing.

“i’ll help you stay.” you blink away the tears, undeserving of seeing such a beautiful sight in front of you, “you deserve a place to belong, soobin. and i’m glad that i could call you mine.”

soobin lets out a wistful sigh before a chuckle, brushing his nose against yours, “i’ll gladly call you mine if you say so.”

you nod your head as you pull him back into a kiss, letting the emotions flow around you as if the aura exudes out of you twirls around you both. his hands tracing your outfit, the oversized graphic t-shirt being pressed down as he felt your warmth seeping out and you felt the coldness more. you’re breathless, tilting your head back as soobin trails his lips down to your jaw, licking the skin before he trails to your neck. giggles coming out of you as soobin remembers the part you are most ticklish, your hand trailing to the end of his t-shirt as you press your palm against his abdomen—something he likes you to do. he pulls back as you feel the hickeys blooming against your skin, nodding your head as you already lifted your elbow up so it’s easier for him to take the tee off of you.

your skin breathes as you feel the colder atmosphere of the room touch the surface. the sun shines into the abandoned home directly from the backyard glass door behind you, casting a shadow of you against him as you see the shape of your body. looking down, you could still see the hickey marks he left nearly a week ago, healing up along with the appearance of a golden necklace resting above the valley between your breasts: the golden necklace he gave to you. the heart pendant rested perfectly above your sternum almost hidden by the bra as soobin pressed down on it, making you give out a sigh from the combination of sensations all over your exposed skin. nipping your bottom lip, you didn’t expect him to leave it there instead of taking it off like the others.

shivers running down your spine as he caresses your covered nipples—your hands tugging on his t-shirt so he could also follow you. he lets his t-shirt fall down with your bags on the floor as he leans in to give you a kiss, another hand reaching down to cup against your nether region even if it is walls behind the jeans and your underwear. tracing down, you sense his muscles contracting from every movement he exerts under your touch. then you land your hand on his left chest, feeling the heart beating underneath it rapidly as you whisper sweet nothings against his lips. his hand reaches behind you, expertly pulling off the hooks of your bra as it falls between the two of you. you can feel his heart relax under your hand—following along with your own pulse.

he still let his eyes gaze on you as if this is the first time you had sex with him, seeing his adam’s apple move as you both communicate without words. he leans down, tracing his nose between the valley of your boobs as he kisses your skin, tracing the skin around where the chain and pendant touch. your free hand holds onto his raven locks softly as he moves to kiss your right areola, letting his hand take care of the left as he playfully pinches your nipple to make it perky alongside sucking on the other—feeling the gush of moist beneath you. your hand also moves to his nipple, knowing just how much he likes it as you can feel the blood streaming down to his nether regions.

“ahh, fuck…” your moan is airy, tilting your head back as soobin interchangeably plays with your boobs. most of the time he does it, he usually plays with it like a stress ball: slapping it around and making hickeys on it. and he seems to do such that, but it’s full of emotion and care underlying his actions. you let both of your hands trail down both sides of his body, feeling the ridges of his ribs beneath your touch as you skim his v-line. soobin wasn’t the most muscly man you’ve seen, but you love him for his realistic healthier body that still has fat in it, making it easier for you to grip on him without hurting his other organs. your hands hold onto the belt area of his jeans, telling him to straighten up so you can easily pull it down.

soobin notices as he pulls back, his chapped lips now full of saliva that is also glistening on your torso. he kneels on the cushion of the sofa, raising his hips up so it is a straight down motion for you to do. leaning closer as you tug the button out and zipper down, his bulge shows from underneath the black fabric of his underwear as you pull the jeans down to his knees. pursing your lips, you kiss his bulge which seems to grow more, earning sighs from him as he brushes your lips with his thumb.

“look at you,” he said, making you look up as you take in his thumb, wetting it all up for him as you give his fingers a suck to wet them up. soobin pulls away as he lets the wet thumb trail your chest and the necklace that decorated it. with your teeth free to grip the rubber band, you pull down the boxer to be met with his cock fully erect, springing out and hitting your hairline. a free hand gripping it, you felt the tip touching the corner of your eye as you caress it with your cheek, lips nipping the closest part to them. your other hand reaches down to play with his balls, lightly squeezing them as you feel his other hand gripping your hair. the other wetter one trailing down your spine as you bend forward.

you trail your lips up from the base to the tip as you give it kisses, letting you taste his pre-cum as you wipe it with your tongue. “just like that,” soobin commented.

your mind going into overdrive with thinking on the things he loves when you suck him off. though rarely when you both meet up, sometimes oral is enough to satisfy him and he usually wants it when he has a block that stops him from drawing. in you two's dynamic, soobin has always been the more dominant and even though you tried to dom him, he instead becomes a service dom that gives you whatever you like. he trained you as best as he could so you could take him as deep as you can, and you definitely will try your best to appreciate him for that.

slowly, you push your head down as you take soobin’s shaft in, wetting him until the midsection of his cock as you let your hand wipe the rest that isn't taken. your tongue idle in the position so that it can drag under his shaft, letting your saliva wet him. your eyes tilting up to see him as he faces his head upwards, jaws slacken as groans come out of him. and you felt it, the way his other hand now goes inside your jeans from behind, caressing your wet core as two of his fingers play with it.

“so wet already. only for me, yeah?” he questioned, looking down at you who is taking him so well, earning a breath hitch as your nose touches his pubic area, swallowing in a relaxed manner as you have taken him deep multiple times—as you already know how to take his cock down your throat so you don’t gag. you pull the cock out, hearing the slurping sound ringing through the big spacey room.

“only for you,” you replied, voice already not as clear as combined with your emotional outburst and what you are doing. your hands move, both of them around his cock, as you suck on the tip. letting go of one as you take him until your nose touches the other hand, both of them work in tandem as you also feel him stimulate you by teasing his fingertips to your hole.

“my girl,” he replied, hand gripping onto your hand to make you still as you let him move his hips so his shaft moves between your circled hand and into your mouth cavern. you whine as you feel him enter not one, but two fingers into your moist walls, making you lean back as he teases you once again. your free hand grasps his thigh, tracing the soundwave tattoo he told you about with your saliva and his excess release. you were panting for air when he pulled out, his face creased as you knew he was about to cum.

you let him pull your hair away as you also lift your hips to kneel like him, letting him spread your saliva from your mouth down to your sweating body as both of your lips slam into each other. the way the start was all so soft was now gone as you both let your teeth smash to each other, tongues exploring each other as you let him taste himself. his hand reaches your own jeans as he takes care of the button and zipper, pulling it down along with your underwear as you lay yourself down—head on the armrest.

his breath tickles you as he followed where your body is, not for a second hesitating to give your clit a kiss—making you shriek as you immediately close your mouth and cover it with your hand. your eyes look upwards, calming yourself down as soobin stimulates you with his lips and tongue. you see the unfamiliar ceiling, reminding you that you aren’t in your room, reminded you that you are in your old home on a couch that you might last sat on a decade ago. soobin’s fingers prodding around your lower lips and finding the right hole to push in, feeling fuller than when he did it a few moments ago as you turn to see his eyes staring at you and your heaving chest. he always knew what you liked, and he seemed to pull every stop out like you do. moans are going out louder than usual but you are inherently silent from the amount of times you have to hold back when you both have sex in your or his rooms. but the sensation is different. you feel yourself gushing even more, brushing his bangs as you watch the sweat trailing down his forehead.

“fuck, how can you feel better?” you exasperated, feeling his chuckle stimulating your sensitive core as he continues. his hand trails up to your stomach and presses it down so you don’t move your hips around, making a moan let out of you as you can feel every surface of his tongue prodding inside you. one hand on his hair—gripping tightly onto his locks to push him closer—and the other resting on top of his hand that’s pressing down on your stomach, curling your fingers on it as you tilt your head back from pleasure.

“cum for me,” you hear him mutter before continuing his journey of pleasuring you. your mind becomes hazy, signaling you to follow his command because he knows that you’re edging closer and closer—you both know so much about each other’s body that it makes you feel hot and shy at the same time. a loud moan came from you as you felt the gush rushing down and all your muscles becoming relaxed, his thumb playing with your nub as you see your excrement shining on soobin’s face- wait…

“you squirted.” he lifted his head as he mumbled, licking your release near his lips and even picking some that were sticking to his head. your panting becomes more audible as heat flows to your cheeks, making you cover your face as soobin laughs before plopping his weight above you—not all of them so as to not crush you down.

he moves both of your hands from your face as you look to your side to see the muscles on his left arm tense from holding himself upright. his long limb reaches onto the floor so that he doesn’t fully crush you. you eye the tattoos that painted his arm shines from the sun seeping into the room, biting your bottom lip as you reach your closest hand to caress it up. the doodle of a bunny that you made, the elaborate avant-garde lines of the drums, until the monochromatic saturn that you wish it could spin with your touch. you return your gaze to soobin, who is following the way your hand glide to his face. pushing your thumb against his skin, you gather the remains of your cum towards his lips just; like what he did before you suck him off. soobin’s thick lips gladly take the thumb in, giving it a good suck so that none of your taste remains uneaten. the scene left you agape as you pushed his head to let him meet your lips once again.

these feels different. the rhythm of your foreplay, the dynamic that goes from a rough, passionate stimulation to a slow loving, all seems to become a harmony that you and he made, like the music you usually played in the background when you are fucking. but now both of you are the ones that are controlling it. as you let his tongue battle with yours, you realized just how in sync both of you are: knowing each other’s likes and dislikes, knowing when one has to cum, understanding each other’s limitation and to give you a cool down. these feels much tender, much more love than just the plain—though not—old sex you usually have. your limbs tangle with each other as you enjoy each other’s presence all exposed with no weight, pushing you back after what you both have told to each other.

the way his hand moves to your hip breaks the trance, a single signal to remind you of the rock-hard cock leaning tall against the skin of your stomach. you move your hips as you let your legs wrap around him, feeling the breeze enters your vaginal walls that have already been stretched by two—maybe even three—of soobin’s fingers.

“make love to me, soob,” you mumbled, seeing the stars in soobin’s eyes sparkle even brighter than the sun that is lighting the world.

“i love you so much,” he mumbled, positioning the tip of his dick as he plays with your wet lips, earning a groan from you who is just wanting him to fill your hole.

“if i said it back, would you plunge yourself deep in me?” you replied with pursed lips as you cradled his face in your hold. he replied by giving the palm a kiss, making you answer with, “i love you too, bun.”

the stretch increases as his three fingers are never enough to fill you up to the brim. you can feel his tip kissing your cervix as soobin kisses down your neck. tears brimming in your eyes from the overwhelming feelings you are having, from the relief, to the lust, to the love. your legs automatically lift as it rests near his shoulder blades.

“fuck, (y/n). you still so tight even if i shape your walls to match my cock.” he reacts, moving his hand so he can let one of your feet rest right on his shoulder by the front, folding you in half as you smile and feel the tears mixing up with your saliva. you bring him down as he looks at your crying self lovingly, knowing deep down just why you were crying so hard as he tells it to you just from a kiss of his lips. soobin’s eyes landed on the way the heart pendant slips down your torso with every thrust. yet, he doesn’t stop ramming into you at the pace that you both enjoy. you can’t remove your eyes from the pleasure painting his face, jaw opens and eyes rolling back just like you do. your fingertips caress where his dimple is, pressing it down as soobin’s smile shows it to you.

as you both relentlessly pleasured each other—his shaft shaping your walls to make it only for him—you could only stare at each other as the world turned into a blur. the orange and black colors paint your surrounding blurs out so they can highlight him like he’s the light at the end of the tunnel: because he is your savior from digging too deep into the abyss of negative thoughts. he is so beautiful and you hope you are the same to him.

“i’m cumming.” you mumble from the rolling moans coming out, trying to calm yourself down as you don’t want to bother the other people living in the other houses besides the one that you are in. streaks of white flashes in your eyes as your cum lubricates your walls for him to continue on. his lips brush against yours as you heard him groan out, mumbles of curse words and praises coming out as you accept it with a kiss whilst his warm cum filled you. his back rises and falls with your chest as you are engulfed in his shadow, your fingers curled against his back as you are under his protection. and you feel him getting hard again.

“come on,” you muttered as you lower your legs to his waist, locking your feet together as you push him off of you with the strength you reserved—he reacted so well as to know that you want to mount him. with your position switch, he rested his head against the other armrest of the couch as you let your tight grip on his cock go. folding your knees so you can move easier, you feel his warmth gushing down from your walls as you see both of your cums out of your hole. his hands move to grip your side as you both look down to see the white circle on the base of his cock. you giggle so lovingly as soobin just gazed at you, setting aside your overstimulation as you move on him—lifting your hips up before letting him impale you down his enormous cock.

your face wretches as he kisses your cervix once again, feeling every blood vessel of his shaft shaping your ridge. your closed eyes letting you see the sun as you stretch your spine, nearly bending backward because of the feeling he gives you spreading all throughout your words. soobin’s dirty talk is non-existence as you can only hear groans and moans coming out of him that combine with yours. leaning forward, you rested your arms beside soobin’s head as he rubbed his hand down your spine—letting you feel the tingle as he traced every ridge of the bones making it. your forehead resting against his as both of your breaths combine with each other, hums, moans, and whines coming from you as he whispers incoherent words yet still looks at you with his sparkling eyes. both of your swollen lips meet once again as he pushes his heels down and hips up to match your rhythm. your necklace dangling in front of his face as he tries to kiss it, remembering that’s one way of him showing his love to you.

“s-soob- fuck fuck fuck.” your pronunciation comes in the same rhythm as you meet his movement. his palm resting against your neck as he gives you a bit of pressure that makes your head spin more.

“make me yours…” you hear him mumble out as your body shakes, an overwhelming amount that makes you float into space as you lean down against his chest and let your nipples graze his pectoral. his kisses and licks bringing you down while he guides you to make him cum again. his warning to you makes you look back down towards him, blurry in your eyes yet you can still trace his features as you lightly brush his lips with yours, giving it a small yet enough kiss as he pushes his hips up and stays there, his cum painting more of your walls as you can hear the sloshing sound of both of your releases. all messy, but all because you made love.

his hands rested on your lower back as he pushes your hips down on his, not wanting to let you go off his cock as you both calm down. you give him light kisses on his face before you push yourself off of him, his hand already by your core as when he can see his semen coming out, he pushes it in.

“stay in there!” he groaned as he pushed his fingers to make you take all of his load, tossing your underwear from the jeans as you quickly put it on, letting its fabric be the barrier to make him stay inside.

as you tried to walk—limping because of your hips from that much of a workout—you eyed the overgrown backyard of the house, noticing that the tree that was there on the corner of the yard was now gone as you could view the lighthouse in tandem with the cloud-covered sun setting down. the backyard door is ajar when you push it open, letting the outside wind kiss your nude body you are comfortable to show because of how tall the fences are—as it’s only for you and soobin to see. stepping out onto the patio and sitting down by the stairs leading to the garden area, you close your eyes as the breeze pushes your tears away from your face, helping you breathe the clear air that the world has allowed you to consume. your eyes stare upwards, seeing the purple that follows the orange as the sun says goodbye.

you felt something wrapped around your shoulders as soobin stepped in to sit beside you, wrapping the other end of the blanket around his shoulder until it covered your naked upper bodies. instinctively, you scoot yourself towards his warmth as he wraps his arm around your waist, letting you rest your head against his collar.

“now that i think of it, even if the earth has rings around it, they could ruin ecosystems on the surface,” he said, before clearing his throat because of how much it’s been used to let out his pleasure. the apples of your cheeks rise as you try to stop yourself from laughing.

“like, the rings can cover the sunlight and that could harm nature. trees and plants not getting their food, the temperature might be colder for the places that are covered by the shadow. haeyang’s probably gonna be a part of it and we can’t see the nature that we see now.” he finishes his tangent, turning his head to see you pecking his shoulder, making him chuckle as you both stare at the changing colors of the sky in all your bareness—to face the world with each other.

soobin looks at his reflection in the mirror as the hairdresser styles his head once again, brushing the hair down after it gets dried by the hair dryer. leaning in to look closer, he sees himself as a different man as the dresser behind him smiles at his reaction. he reaches for his bag to pull out a tip before going to the cashier to pay for his new hairstyle.

though the weather was hot as the sun still shone brightly in the afternoon, the hoodie he was wearing combat the blowing wind of the sea as much as he walked down the pavement by the beach. the pavement was newly fixed, yet he didn’t know much more about it as he told himself to always raise his head up—“so you don’t hurt your spine.” you said—as he eyes the coast of haeyang whilst walking towards the campus ground. his hood lifted to not let the sun burn his skin too much and to not show his new hair to the public yet.

he eyes the students walking around the campus as all of them are avoiding the sun, yet soobin embraces it even with the thick material he’s wearing. his lips rests in a natural state, his cupid’s bow lifting upwards as he scans the buildings he has gone past to find the right one he wants to visit. people who know him greet him as he goes by, making him let out a knowing nod as he only has one place in mind.

a signature set of knocks on the door later, the door opens to see you wearing a hoodie, shorts, and the golden heart necklace peeking out as you raise your eyebrows up. your hands reach out to drag him inside when you catch a glimpse of light on his hair.

“you’re hiding something,” you stated with a squint in your eyes as he takes in your room that is tidier than usual, even with the amount of clothes that are work in progresses unfinished as you were sewing them with your sewing machine. soobin’s eyes looks elsewhere but with a smirk, making you push the hood off of his head as you see the new hair style he has. a bleached blond even brighter than the sands of haeyang’s coast.

“the heck?” you replied, making a pout forming on his face as you leaned in to kiss it away while you traced your hand to his face, tilting it whatever you liked as he enjoyed your gaze on him.

“why blond?”

“you know… a new world, a new chapter. a change comes with that,” he replied, holding onto your waist as he leaned to give a peck on your nose. “oh yeah, how about your position?”

“oh that…” you give him a pout while he soothes you down your side, “i talked to my supervisor and told them i’ve already done my job until it’s done. told her about everything we know and found out about herin and she said okay to that. so, yeah. i’m free now other than finishing the clothes for the fashion show.”

“how about herin?” a chuckle came out of you as lightly pat his new hair.

“they’re gonna do a town hall meeting for that because i found out that i wasn’t the only one being blackmailed like that. but who knows after it’s done? cause i don’t. i can’t go to the town hall meetings anymore cause i’m not part of the ones making the show. i’m the participant in the show now,” you replied before you jumped, pulling yourself back as you turned towards the desk where you put your tools at. hearing the distinct familiar sound of a tin sheet, soobin sees you pulling out a container that still has the cookie’s brand name on it. but when he looks closer, he can see a thin hole at the lid.

“i got this container from elle and it made me think of an idea,” you pulled the cover off as he can see a ziplock bag of buttons, “that since we are going to save money together for the house, we can put in our contributions here. the black is mine and the white is yours. and remember: minimal 25% of your monthly income.” you step closer, covering it, “but are you sure that we can use your saving account, bun? aren’t your parents not gonna question where you get that much money?” you tilted your head as soobin reaches his hand out to rub your hair.

“my parents know we’re gonna buy that house, bun. heck, if we have bought it, they might wanna visit and stay at our house so they can hunt one for their own retirement home. it’s been my dad’s dream to go back and live in haeyang.” soobin replied, remembering the conversation you both had about the house where you both used to live. the house you plan to buy in the future.

“heck, i think my parents might help with the down payment and might take out a loan and give it to us because they’re excited that i’m staying in haeyang for a long run.” he continued as he settled himself down on your bed, pulling out his drawing pad and laptop as he is connecting it through the port.

“that might be a hassle for them,” you stated.

“it’s easy. they can take away the rest of my monthly pocket money for the rest of my college years to help pay the loan.”

“and how are you going to take care of yourself?” you replied as you spray the clothes you’re have done stitching with water so you can iron the creases out.

“money from tattoo commissions and probably gonna make lend some for me. if you don’t mind, though.” he winked as you giggled, “and if we saved money with your method, when can we buy the house?”

you hummed as you ran the hot iron down on the fabric, thinking as you got rid of the creases before you turned the clothes on the other side, “probably when we graduated.” you replied, licking your lips as you picked up the iron and clear the creases.

“and you’re gonna be there, right?” soobin’s question makes you snort, making you place the iron and turn it off as you stride towards soobin who has pulled out all his essential tools to do his projects, either tattoo designs, college projects, or maybe one he might haven’t told you.

your hand reaches his newly bleached hair as he puts his hands around your thighs, his head resting on your midriff as he tilts his head upwards to look at you. “of course i’ll be there. you’re not gonna get rid of me that easily, choi soobin.”

he reacts by kissing your tummy as you push yourself away from him, making him whine as you return to the clothes that you are hanging on the hanger and covered with the plastic covering. “how many outfits do you have to work on?” his voice reaches you.

“three more.”

“how am i gonna brainstorm then?” you hear him whine to get your attention, making you sigh as you hang the outfit on another rack you bought just for the fashion show outfits you’re going to showcase—one isn’t enough as you realized.

“just bounce your ideas on me, kay?” you turned your body around as you saw soobin with his arms leaning behind him on your bed, open wide to let you step in between his legs so he could hug you.

“three more outfits. and i’m yours forever.” you winked and he nodded, seeing you already walking to grab the fabrics you have to sew together as he opened his software to see the frames for his animation project, all based on his creation and both of your stories named ‘subterranean homesick alien‘, based on his favorite song from radiohead‘s ok computer.

yet, soobin doesn’t feel as homesick anymore, because he is building his new home with you; his fellow subterranean alien partner.

taglist: @raeyunshm @endzii23 @fluffyywoo @camipendragon @hiqhkey @wccycc @cha0thicpisces @y4wnjunz @yeehawnana @beansworldsstuff @kimipxl @stayzentiny @rebsmoonn @boba-beom @angelbythewindow @ttyunz

time wave taglist: @rein-deer-stuffs @kookthief @papiibuprofen @soobsfairy444 @yeombin @jaemacchiatto @zgkigia @strawbrinkofdeath @moaberryjjunie @fandom-kay

#k-labels #cultofdionysusnet #txt imagines #txt scenarios #txt smut #txt angst #txt fanfic #txt x reader #soobin x reader #rsc: time wave #rsc: fm #cr: soobin #cs: txt #sc: regina #discovery: 200 #collaboration with the moon

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formulauno98 · 1 year ago

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Once Upon a Time in France | Chapter Eight // Part Two

Life is funny, the way it can turn on its head in a matter of seconds. Sometimes it happens naturally, sometimes it's helped along by friends or foes, and in your case, it would be the latter.

Word Count: 8.2k

Warnings: Angsty angst (Sorry guys!)

Author’s Notes: Disclaimer, purely fiction, no-one is married in this alt-universe.

SATURDAY AM

Following your x-rated beach romp, you and Toto had decided it was wise to spend the night apart as your motorhomes were so far away from each other and yours was in sight of prying eyes, aka Lara. You tossed and turned all night, having gotten used to falling asleep in the comfort of Toto’s arms, so when you woke early on Saturday morning you felt anything but refreshed.

Rubbing your eyes, you leant across your bed to reach for your phone where it was charging. Three new messages.

(08:03) Morning my love. The FIA has called a meeting so I can’t go yet. I promise I will go afterwards. I hope you are okay and got some sleep. X

(08:10) Actually I will go now. X

(08:21) Ignore that, Stefano caught me. I am so sorry I know you are worried. X

You knew it was going to be tricky this morning and sighed as you considered the possible consequences of last night's actions. Surely a one-time slip-up was not going to get you pregnant, and as he said, Toto was a slightly older man, but then again stranger things had happened.

You typed out a reply.

Morning, hope you slept okay too. No worries, I will ask around in the medical centre just in case. Don’t panic xx

Groaning as you got out of bed, you quickly got ready for the day, trying your best to cover up the dark circles that had appeared under your eyes. So much for a romantic getaway and relieving stress.

———

As you strode through the paddock towards the medical centre, you prayed you wouldn’t run into anyone you knew. For once luck was on your side and you made it unscathed and uninterrupted to the small motorhome normally reserved for injured drivers or mechanics who had had an accident.

Knocking awkwardly on the door, you hoped someone would be there already.

“Come in.” called out a voice from inside.

Opening the door, you took a deep breath. “Hi, how are you?” you said to the woman sitting inside the trailer.

“Very well thank you, how can I help?”

Suddenly feeling incredibly vulnerable, you shifted nervously, “Well… the thing is, I was wondering if you happen to have the morning-after pill?”

The woman’s eyes widened in surprise, it was obviously not a common request during race weekend.

“Oh.” she said, taken aback, “Let me see. I’m not sure if we do to be totally honest.”

She busied herself at the shelving unit behind where she had been sat, rifling through boxes and boxes of pills and potions.

“Ooh you’re in luck,” she said, pulling out a dusty-looking box.

“For real?” you thanked whatever Gods were currently watching over you.

“Hang on, hang on, I think it’s out of date.” she said, scanning the box, “I’m so sorry, you can’t take it if it’s expired, it won’t work.”

“Shit.” you said under your breath, “Do you think anywhere nearby will have them?”

The woman grimaced, “To be honest no, but I could ask the paramedics to bring some when they come up later?”

Your eyes lit up, “Oh my gosh if you could that would be amazing! Can I leave you my phone number?”

“I can’t promise but I will try.” the woman said kindly, “Sure, let me grab a pen and paper and I’ll call you if they bring them.”

You quickly scrawled your number on the post-it note, thanking the woman profusely for her help before making your way back towards the Mercedes hospitality area. Hopefully, it meant that you would be okay. Not sure if Toto was still in the FIA meeting you decided to drop him a text.

Good news, I went to the medical centre and they’re going to get it for me. Panic over xx

As you walked along you felt your phone buzz. He was obviously out of the meeting.

Good

From the length of his text, perhaps he was still in the meeting. A weight off your mind, you felt much better about the day before you as you made your way up to your office.

“Morning Y/N.” It was a joy to see the friendly face of Rosie as you walked through the hospitality area.

“Hey Rosie, how are you?” you said, stopping to chat for a minute.

“Good thanks, George is being a weirdo though,” she said, her pretty face screwed up.

“What, how come?” you said, concerned as she’d never complained to you about her normally doting boyfriend.

“I don’t know. He didn’t want me to stay in his motorhome last night,” she said, her eyes looking like they were on the brink of tears.

“Aw no Rosie,” you said, slipping an arm around her shoulders, “I’m sure he was just getting into the racing mindset.”

“But we always stay together now,” she said sadly.

A sudden thought hit you, “I wonder, his motorhome is more or less attached to Toto’s. Maybe he was uncomfortable with it?”

Rosie’s eyes lit up, “Oh, maybe! But Toto wouldn’t say anything,” she lowered her voice, “Especially not when you’re there.”

“I wasn’t actually,” you said absentmindedly.

“Really?” asked Rosie.

“I promise. We both needed a rest,” you said tactfully.

“Oh, ok, this makes me feel better,” she said, looking much happier than she had done a moment ago.

“Happy to help. Honestly, I’m sure that’s it,” you said reassuringly.

“Thanks, Y/N. I don’t know what I’d do without you,” she said, smiling.

“Probably more of your job,” you said laughing. “Right, I have to go and actually work, I’ll see you

around okay?”

“See you,” Rosie said as you made your way towards the stairs up to your office.

———

The morning flew by, full of endless calls and emails. But you still hadn’t heard a peep from Toto. Starting to get concerned, you were about to drop him a text when he came bursting into your office.

“Well hello stranger,” you said smiling, your face immediately dropping as you saw his thunderous expression.

“Did you not see?” he asked exasperatedly.

“See what?” you asked, wondering what could have him in such a panic. Was it a car emergency? Was

one of the drivers sick?

Toto sat down on your small sofa, his head in his hands. “Sky.”

“Sky?” you repeated. “They’re normally okay, what happened?”

“Christian,” he said.

At this point you were concerned, Toto had a temper but this wordless fury was something you’d never seen before.

“Toto, I know Christian’s a dick. What’s new?” you said.

As he’d been scrolling through his phone, Toto had found the clip he was looking for and silently passed it across the table. It was footage from after the FIA meeting. Sky had collared Toto and Christian and they were side by side looking deeply uncomfortable.

“So, any upgrades for this weekend Toto?” asked Johnny, the Sky reporter.

Just as Toto had opened his mouth to answer, Christian butted in, “Toto’s got himself a whole new ride, didn’t you hear Johnny?”

Although Johnny was off camera, you could tell that he was uncomfortable from his response, “What do you mean Christian?”

“He’s got a hot, young girlfriend following him around the paddock,” said Christian smugly.

Beside him, Toto looked beyond furious, as if he was trying his hardest not to punch Christian then and

there.

Ever the professional, Johnny replied, “That’s interesting Christian, but I think our viewers are more interested in Mercedes’ performance for the weekend as opposed to Toto’s. No offence Toto, I’m sure your new girlfriend is a lovely woman. Lucky lady!”

Pausing the video, you interjected, “This is not so bad Toto! Johnny handled it well.”

“No, there’s more,” said Toto glumly.

Playing the video once more, Christian quipped back “But Johnny you know her!”

“Do I?” asked the confused reporter.

“Yes, she’s their Director of Communications, Y/N, the one who’s always on Toto’s arm.”

You could see Toto sitting across from you, balling his fists in silent rage, while on the video he looked livid once again.

To give him his due, Johnny tried to save the situation, “Well that’s lovely. Congratulations Toto, so I’ll try one more time. What upgrades have you brought?”

Stopping the video you sat back in your chair, feeling sick to your stomach.

“Fuck.” you said, looking at Toto.

“Fuck indeed,” he said. “I want to kill Christian.”

“Me too,” you said. “What is actually wrong with that man?”

Toto just shook his head, too angry to speak. As if on cue, your phone suddenly buzzed multiple times. It was the Comms Team Whatsapp group, blowing up as they had all seen the interview.

What’s this about you and Toto?

OMG! Is this true?

Wtf is he on about?

“Fuck.” you exclaimed, once again, looking at Toto pleadingly. “It’s my team, all asking if it’s true.”

Toto sighed, rubbing his forehead, a nervous tic that always emerged when he was feeling the pressure. “Let me think for a moment.”

Sitting there awkwardly, you began to scroll through your email when a new one pinged through. It was from Pamela from HR, asking you to meet her on Monday. She’d obviously seen the video too and was not happy.

“HR wants to see me on Monday,” you said fearfully.

“For real?” he replied, “Don’t talk to them I will.”

‘Toto…” you started.

“Don’t. It’s not fair for them to take it out on you,” he said, his eyes now full of concern. “I don’t say this often but I own a third of the team. What are they going to say to me?”

“That’s true.” you said, “Although now I have to handle this with our team and the media.”

Toto stood up, crossing over to where you sat, bending down to meet you at eye level, and taking your hands in his. “Look Y/N, it will be okay. We can downplay it with the team and I will take care of HR so you don’t need to worry?”

“Sure.” You said, “I hate that man.”

“Me too.” said Toto, leaning forward to nuzzle your neck, “I don’t want him to ruin things before they even have a chance to begin.”

“Me neither,” you said, kissing him softly square on the lips.

“Don’t worry, I will fix this.” he said, breaking the kiss, “I had better go. Let’s reconvene in the garage later.”

“Thank you,” you said.

———

Unlike your usual confident self, this situation had reduced you to hiding in your office for the rest of the morning, dreading the moment you had to walk into the garage later on. You knew eyes would be on you and Toto as Sky interviews tended to gain the most traction amongst the paddock.

Your phone had continued to blow up all morning, the only saving grace being that thankfully the news seemed to be very much contained within the Formula One microcosm so you had yet to face any scrutiny from your family and friends.

When the time came to make your way down, you stood up, straightening your team shirt and took some deep breaths. Nothing had really changed and you had to remember your trusty mantra, as the saying goes, today's news is tomorrow's chip paper. Hoping that qualifying would gloss over this bump, you got moving.

Entering the garage you were absolutely correct in your fears that eyes would be on you. Engineers who never normally blinked all did a double take, curious to see what all the fuss was about. Fortunately, Lewis came to your rescue.

“Hey Y/N, how's it going?” he said, hooking an arm over your shoulder in some kind of side hug.

“Good thanks, well… I’ve had better days. How are you?” you asked, managing a smile for the charming driver.

“Ah, don’t worry, people don’t care that much,” he said, aware of exactly what was bothering you.

“Tell that to HR,” you said quietly.

“HR?” Lewis’ eyebrows shot up, “Can’t Toto like overrule them?”

You smiled weakly, “That’s what he said.”

“Yeah he will, don’t worry.” said Lewis, “I need to go and see the big man, want to go together so it’s less weird?”

Really appreciative of Lewis’ ability to navigate any social situation you nodded, following him through the maze of engineering equipment strewn around.

“Hey boss!” said Lewis, clapping his hands on the back of Toto’s shoulders where he sat hunched over a monitor, glowering.

Turning around Toto looked surprised to see you alongside Lewis. “Hello.” was all he managed.

“You okay?” asked Lewis, clearly concerned for his normally confident boss.

“Yes, sorry,” said Toto, turning back around to face the monitor.

Exchanging a puzzled look with you Lewis added, “I came over to ask you about this upgrade package.”

Tuning out their technical discussion your eyes swept the garage. Maybe Lewis was right and people really didn’t care. No one was giving you a second look, maybe all was well.

“Y/N.” you snapped out of your thoughts as Tom approached you, “Can I have a word?”

“Hi Tom,” you said somewhat robotically, “Sure, but I do have a lot to go through with this lot. Is it urgent?”

Looking bashful Tom replied, “No no it can wait. Talk later.” As he walked off you could see his eyes going back and forth between you and Toto.

———

You weren't surprised, you knew that the team would be curious about your newly revealed relationship and Tom was always the first to find out gossip. As much as you felt guilty for keeping them in the dark, another part of you thought about the fact that the relationship was still very new and it would be extremely awkward at this point if it weren't to work out. Deciding to bite the bullet, you settled down on the stool beside Toto.

“Hey,” you said.

Toto flicked his head around quickly, barely acknowledging you with a quick “Hi” before going back to studying his monitor. On any other occasion his innate awkwardness would have made you laugh but today it felt as if it was apt.

SATURDAY PM

As qualifying got underway Toto barely took a second glance at you, something that as much as you wouldn't want to admit it put you out. He was always normally sneaking glances in the garage and the fact that now he was actively avoiding you was almost insulting. To make matters worse Lara had decided to come and sit down in the garage and you could feel her mean eyes boring into your back. You still couldn't understand her problem and you were absolutely sure that it ran deeper than just the fact that Toto had seen with the engineer. But that was another issue for another day.

Unfortunately, the day was going from bad to worse as you could see that Lewis and George were both struggling during qualifying. You knew it was especially bad when Bono, normally the world's calmest man, looked like he was about to panic. He was looking thoroughly perturbed by the results that he was seeing on his monitor and was struggling to keep cool on the radio as he spoke to Lewis.

Ultimately neither of the drivers made it out of Q2, a disappointing result for the team and one that definitely was not going to help Toto's bad mood. As the two drivers came in, hanging their heads in shame, you tried to get a little nearer to Toto to see to gauge what he wanted to do next. However, in the place of your normally warm boss turned boyfriend, you were met with a cold shoulder. He dismissed you every time you tried to get his attention, at one point spinning around so that his back was to you.

Pissed off by the way he was acting, you silently slid off of your stool and made your way over to Tom.

“Hey Tom, what was it that you wanted to speak about earlier?” you asked, still glancing over at Toto who looked positively raging.

Looking nervous Tom stuttered, “Well, that interview this morning… what was that? Is it true?”

You sighed, lowering your voice, “Look, Toto and I are close. You know that. But what Christian said is not true. He was just trying to wind up Toto once again.”

Tom looked slightly relieved at the news, “Thank fuck for that!”

Surprised by his reaction, you asked, “Why?”

Tom also lowered his voice, sneaking glances across the garage, “Well, he’s… Toto. He’s old and grumpy as fuck. I like him a lot but I couldn’t imagine you two…”

You laughed, “Naw, he’s a big old softie really.”

Tom’s eyes lit up, “Oh my God, it is true!”

Crossing your arms, you protested, “Not at all! I just think he gets a bad wrap.”

“Sure sure,” said Tom unconvinced, his eyes still playing tennis between you and Toto, who was now snapping at a poor engineer who seemed to have done something to displease him, “Such a catch.”

“Tom..” you said warningly. “Don’t you have some sponsors to be looking after anyway?”

“They all left for the day.” he said smugly, “I came down here to make sure Ben and Louis got some content with Lewis drinking Monster Energy.”

“Well then, maybe you should be doing that,” you said coldly, not thrilled with the way Tom was speaking to you, his manager.

He looked surprised by your cool tone but nodded in agreement, “Right boss. See you later.”

Your eyes still on Toto, you barely acknowledged Tom leaving your side. Thankfully, Sophie appeared as if from nowhere, always eager to help.

“Hi Y/N.” she said cheerily, her enthusiasm never going down, “How’s everything?”

“Great thank you,” you said, trying to buoy your mood.

“Is there anything I can help with?” Sophie asked eagerly.

“Yes actually, I have a few potential sponsors coming down tomorrow and I’d love to gift them some team merchandise, could you please organise this with Mo? I’ll forward you the email.”

“Sure,” said Sophie brightly, “Y/N, can I ask you something?”

Sighing, you braced yourself for a repeat of the conversation that you’d just had with Tom.

“Of course,” you said, trying to remain level-headed.

“Do you think I could invite a friend to a race soon?”

This was not what you were expecting at all, “Oh my gosh, of course, let me know which race and you can have some of my paddock pass allowance.”

Sophie looked thrilled, “Really? Thank you so much, you’re the best boss!”

Smiling, you replied, “Just let me know when.”

“Thank you, thank you!” she exclaimed, “Also, I hope this is not out of line but…”

“You saw the Sky interview?” you interjected.

“Yes,” she said meekly.

“Christian Horner is always looking for ways to wind up Toto. If you pardon my French, he was talking shit. As usual.”

Sophie looked a little shocked, “Oh. Okay, that makes sense, but isn’t that slander?”

“I suppose,” you said nonchalantly, knowing full well you couldn’t accuse him of that.

“That’s so weird of him.” She said, “Toto looks so angry, I’ve never seen him like this.”

You shrugged, “He gets like this sometimes.”

Sophie grimaced, “Well, good luck for your meeting with him. I will go back and sort the gifting for you.”

“Thanks, Sophie,” you said, grateful for your assistant. As annoying as she could be sometimes, her

heart was in the right place and you were growing fonder of her by the day.

———

As you waited in Toto’s office for your usual post-qualifying debrief, you were nervous. He hadn’t ever been this cold towards you and you hoped beyond hope that Christian hadn’t ruined everything. The clock ticked on, and by the time he stormed in, he was twenty minutes late, again something very unlike him.

“Hi,” he said, taking his seat across from you and whipping out his iPad.

“Well hello to you too,” you said, put out by his abrupt tone.

“Sorry. I am just not in the mood,” he said, his shoulders tense as he furiously typed something on his iPad.

‘Okay.” you said, sensing that maybe it was time to go, “I can leave you in peace?”

Toto sighed, “No I don’t want that. Sorry”

“It’s okay, to be honest, what is there to say?” you said.

“Lots.” he said, slamming his iPad shut, “I’ve had the Board on the phone, they’re pissed.”

Your mouth dropped open, “The Board?”

“Yes.” he said wearily, “They’re not happy with me.”

“Fuck, Toto,” you said, not sure what to say.

“Indeed.” he said sharply, “After I spoke to HR, they told me that the Board requested they meet with you. Y/N they want you gone.”

Tears welling in your eyes, you thought about everything that had transpired, “Well. Then I guess we have no choice.”

Toto looked at you pleadingly, “No, we do. Pushing my feelings for you completely to one side, you are the best Director of Communications our team has ever had.”

“Well there have only been three...” you said, wiping away a tear.

“Oh shut up.” said Toto, “You’ve raised a hell of a lot of sponsorship money, appeased people who were going to jump ship and managed the press brilliantly. Not to mention onboarded new sponsors that no one else ever would have considered.”

Giving Toto a small smile, you replied, “Well all in a day's work.”

“Exactly, so I don’t see how they can let you go,” Toto said, reaching across his desk to take your hand in his. “You need to argue your case.”

“Okay,” you said weakly.

“Did anyone ask you about the interview?” Toto asked, his demeanour now shifted back to concerned boyfriend.

“A few people, how about you?” you gulped, trying to stop crying.

“Same.” Toto said, “Don’t cry please, I don’t like it when you cry.”

“You’ve never seen me cry, what are you on about?” you said, wiping another stray tear.

“Yes I have,” he said indignantly. “Remember in Baku?”

Casting your mind back, you remembered. You’d cried when you thought about all the things people would say if they found out about you and Toto. “Oh yes,” you said quietly. “I wasn’t wrong was I?”

“Shh.” said Toto, wiping away your tears with his thumb, “No one is saying anything like that. Bono said he didn’t believe it because you’re too good for the likes of me.”

Shaking your head, you replied shakily, “Bullshit.”

“He’s not wrong.” said Toto, “If you saw us in the street together, you’d think wow, lucky guy punching above his weight. He must be loaded or have a really big dick.”

Snorting with laughter, you replied, “Well then they wouldn’t be wrong.”

Toto rolled his eyes, “You know what I mean.”

“No, I don’t actually,” you said, your tears having dried up. “Toto, I love you for you, not for your money or your clout or your just slightly larger than average dick.”

“Just slightly larger than average?” Toto said, raising his eyebrow, “Shit, that hurts.”

“That’s what she said,” you said with a smirk. “Joking aside, you’re so kind, you’re so patient, you make everyone around you feel valued. These aren’t common traits, especially not in some bigshot

businessman.”

Toto looked pleased with himself, “I try.”

“You succeed,” you said, leaning across and kissing him on the corner of his mouth.

“Okay, so we have a plan,” said Toto. “And if anyone asks about us in the meantime, denial is not just a

river in Egypt?”

You burst out laughing, “Jesus, 1982 called, it wants its joke back. Yes, that’s what I’ve been doing all morning.”

Toto shook his head, “You’re so mean to me.”

SUNDAY PM

As disastrous as qualifying had been, it was nothing compared to the race itself. George had suffered damage to his front wing early on after a small collision and was stuck in P14 behind a DRS train. Lewis wasn’t faring much better and was trundling on at P5, a considerable gap to make up if he wanted a podium.

Morale in the garage was at an all-time low and despite your chat the previous afternoon, Toto had reverted back to his bad mood. You'd once again spent the night apart due to the inconspicuous sleeping arrangements so you'd hardly seen him until you'd arrived in the garage.

He had snapped at Sophie, something that you would be having a word with him about and grumbled at the catering team about his coffee being too hot. All in all, not the man you knew and loved.

By the time the race was coming to a close, George was still floundering at P9, having fought for a few measly points and Lewis continued to run his own race in no-man's land at P5. It was the worst performance of the season and a rare slip-up for your well-oiled team. Frustratingly Red Bull were P1 and P2, meaning they would gain a significant amount of points, letting them pull ahead further in the Constructors Championship.

As the two Mercedes crossed the chequered flag, the garage weakly applauded, more out of politeness than enthusiasm. You clocked that Toto wasn’t joining in, looking utterly dejected.

Knowing that Sky wanted to talk to him, you apprehensively made your way over.

“Hey boss,” you said weakly, careful not to give anything away once again as you knew that your colleagues were still deeply suspicious.

“Hello.” he said, “Sky wants me?”

“Yes.” you said, “Shall we go?”

“If I have to,” said Toto.

Behind him Bono caught your eye, winking at you before teasing. “Damn, Christian Horner is right, the sexual tension. It’s palpable.”

Smirking at the goofy race engineer you replied sarcastically, “I know right.”

Toto however, was not amused. “Bono now is not the time.”

“You’re right, sorry boss,” said Bono, catching your eye once again and making a face.

Toto strode off, leaving you struggling to catch up, almost having to pick up a light jog.

“Hey, slow down big man,” you said, as you finally caught him up.

“Sorry.” he said, “I just want this over and done with.”

Concerned as you’d never seen Toto so down in the dumps you tried to reassure him, “It’s fine, we had a shit weekend, it happens. At least we’re not Haas.”

Offering you a small smile, Toto seemed to rally around a little. “That’s true.”

You soon reached the Sky podium where Johnny, Jenson and Naomi, the three presenters, were eagerly waiting for Toto.

As the production team miked him up, you could feel their curious eyes on you, all having been present for yesterday’s interview. You looked nervously towards Toto who was studying the floor with great interest, clearly also apprehensive.

Fortunately, you needn’t have worried, Sky were always professional and without the addition of Toto’s arch nemesis, they stuck strictly to work-related questions. It seemed as if you had both panicked for nothing and ultimately people didn’t really care who a Team Principal shared his bed with.

They did, however, ask Toto for answers on why performance was so poor this weekend, something that he struggled to answer as the technical team were still trying to figure it out themselves. It wasn’t the worst interview but for sure not the best.

Just as Toto stepped down from the platform to give his mic equipment back, your phone buzzed.

Hello Y/N, it’s Sylvie from the Medical Centre. I am sorry but I did not manage to get your pill. I recommend you go to the doctor asap.

Trying not to betray your emotions, you hurriedly typed a reply and put your phone away as Toto said his goodbyes to the Sky team.

Wandering back towards the Mercedes hospitality area your head was spinning. In the chaos of the weekend, you had totally forgotten about your morning-after pill debacle. You couldn’t remember off the top of your head but it had now been over twenty-four hours and you weren’t sure how long you had before it wouldn’t work.

“Everything okay?” asked Toto, sensing your mind was elsewhere.

“Yes thanks, that was good. Well done,” you said shortly.

“Are you sure?” he pressed.

“Yep. All good,” you said, forcing a smile.

Toto looked confused but ultimately gave up pushing and you made your way back through the throng of teams in comfortable silence.

You were nervous about the team debrief that was to follow the race but in a way grateful that the team’s poor performance would be the main topic of discussion.

“Y/N,” Toto suddenly turned to you as you made your way up the stairs towards your respective offices, “Don’t get upset but I have to go back to Monaco later.”

“Huh?” you said, surprised at this news. You had been due to take the jet back to the UK together with several colleagues. “How come?”

“Just some business,” he said mysteriously, not giving anything away.

“Okay, sure,” you said, not sure what to make of this. In the events of the race weekend, you’d almost forgotten about your impending meeting with HR and were suddenly nervous that you would be doing it without Toto in the office, let alone the country.

“I’m sorry I can’t be there for your meeting,” he said, starchily. “I will check in though.”

“Okay,” you said, surprised by his suddenly frosty attitude.

MONDAY AM

The flight back to the UK had been uneventful and you’d sat in silence as the team furiously picked apart the race data, trying to get to the bottom of why Lewis didn’t have the pace. You felt rough once again, not having slept a wink. Toto had left shortly after the debrief and you hadn’t heard a peep since. It was unlike him both on a personal and professional level and as much as you hated to admit it, it had deeply upset you.

The landing was smooth and as you made your way down the stairs and onto the tarmac, the doom of having to face HR really set in.

“Everything okay?” asked Rosie as she made her way towards you. You would be sharing a car with her and George as you were all going straight to the factory.

“Yeah,” you said quietly, tears once again pooling in your eyes.

“No it’s not,” Rosie said kindly before turning around to her boyfriend who was also heading over

“George, will you go with the guys? We have some work things to chat about.”

Looking put out at being dismissed by his girlfriend, George shrugged and replied, “Sure, see you

later.”

“Thanks,” you said, sliding into the back seat of the car, Rosie following suit.

“So what’s up?” Rosie asked kindly.

You sighed, “I don’t even know where to start.”

“At the beginning maybe?”

“Very funny,” you said, rolling up the privacy partition so that your driver wouldn’t overhear.

“Oh that kind of story?” said Rosie, knowing that whenever the partition went up, something was afoot.

“Ugh, so did you see the Sky interview with Toto and Christian on Saturday?”

“Yes, wait is that what you’re worried about? C’mon, it was Christian Horner. Nobody takes a word he says seriously.”

You smiled weakly, “Really?”

“Yeah!” Rosie huffed, “Everybody thought he was being an idiot. And for the record, everybody said Toto would in no way be able to pull you.”

“That’s what Bono said to Toto!” you said.

“See!” said Rosie, “The whole thing was ridiculous.”

“Well, the Board doesn't think so. They’ve called me into a meeting with HR later.”

‘What the fuck?” said Rosie, “Because of a stupid Sky puff piece?”

“Yup.” you said, “We originally thought it was just HR and Toto asked them to cancel it but turns out it was the Board.”

“Fuck.” said Rosie, “But really what are they going to say?”

“I don’t know.” you sighed, “I re-read my contract last night and it says no relationships with colleagues.”

“Does it?” said Rosie, “Well that’s me and George fucked then.”

“No offence but the Board doesn’t care about you or George. Toto is the figurehead of the team, I guess they don’t like the image of him sleeping with his employees.”

“Oh…” said Rosie, “Well, surely you can just say it’s not true?”

“The thing is, I would but then what if this goes somewhere and then they find out we lied?” you said.

Rosie looked ecstatic, “You think it’s going to go somewhere?”

“I hope so.” you said, “Toto told me he loved me the other day.”

“Oh my God!” Rosie squealed, “Tell me, when, where?”

You grimaced thinking back to what had transpired on the beach, “Um, so we went to the beach on Friday night.”

“That’s why you didn’t come out!” Rosie exclaimed, “I knew it!”

You smirked, “Well anyway we watched the sunset on the beach and then had a little cuddle and he told me he loved me.”

“A little cuddle?” Rosie quirked an eyebrow, “Did you have sex on the beach?”

You blushed, thinking back to that evening, “No…”

“Oh my God, you’re blushing, you totally did!” Rosie said, “I’m not surprised by you but Toto! Didn’t think he was the type.”

“Rosie..” you started, “Breathe a word of this to anyone and I will kill you.”

“How was it?” she asked, “I want juicy details. Ugh, you’re so lucky, I wish George would do all this stuff.”

You laughed, “Well, it was a really bad idea.”

“How come?” she asked.

“Well… I don’t want to scar you.”

“Y/N, I overheard you getting eaten out by our boss. I think we’re past that.”

“Touché.” you replied, “We got a little carried away and he finished in me.”

Rosie looked as if she was going to combust, “And?”

“I’m not on any birth control.” you paused, “I tried to get the morning-after pill at the medical centre but it was expired and they couldn’t get it. And then everything kicked off with the interview and the bad quali so I ran out of time.”

“Fuck.” said Rosie, “You should have come to me.”

“It’s okay, there was nothing anyone could do. Toto was going to drive to a pharmacy but he ran out of time.”

“What are you going to do?” Rosie asked with concern.

“Well firstly if I survive this meeting, I will hotfoot it to the doctors,” you said. “Toto’s fucked off to

Monaco so I’m not even sure what is going on there.”

“Weird.” said Rosie, “I’m surprised he’s letting you do this meeting alone.”

“Me too,” you said, looking at the fields as you rolled closer and closer to the factory.

MONDAY PM

Sitting in your office, you steeled yourself in preparation for your upcoming meeting. Glancing at the clock you had three minutes to get to the HR office so you decided to bite the bullet and make your way down, for what was likely to be your last meeting in this role. To add insult to injury, Toto had not contacted you all day, not even to ask if you’d landed safe or to wish you luck. It was totally unlike him and you couldn’t help but be disappointed in him.

Knocking gently on the door, Pamela’s voice rang out, “Come in.”

“Hi,” you said, surprised to find that it was only Pamela present.

“Hi Y/N, how are you?” the older woman said politely.

“I’m okay thank you, how are you?” you said, battling to make small talk.

“Very well thank you. Now I’m sure you know why you’re here today. The Board were not happy to discover your personal relationship with Toto, especially in the manner that it was revealed. It does not reflect well on both the team or Toto so they have asked me to step in and call this meeting.”

“Wow you got straight to the point Pamela,” you said, not thrilled with her tone.

Ignoring your grumbles, she continued, “They want to conference call to discuss the matter further. Before I dial, is there anything you want me to know or say that will help?”

Softening your expression as after all, it was not Pamela’s fault, you replied, “That’s okay, I will explain everything to them directly.”

“If you’re sure,” said Pamela apprehensively, reaching for the conference phone at her desk.

As the Teams ring rang out you felt sick with nerves. You weren’t expecting to be fighting your case directly with the Board. Steeling yourself, you thought about the achievements that you could reel off, not to mention the additional revenue that you had raised.

“Good afternoon.” came a voice through the speakerphone.

You recognised it as Robert, the chairman. Surprised he would be on this call, you politely replied, “Good afternoon Robert.”

“Hello.” called another voice. It was David, another one of the principal investors. They’d sent in the heavy hitters.

“Hello everyone.” Finally a friendly voice, it was James from the Technical team. He occasionally joined Board meetings.

As more of the upper management joined the call, you were increasingly surprised that Toto wasn’t going to be a part of it. Surely he would want to fight his corner?

“So are we all here?” said Anne, the Company Secretary.

“No, we’re waiting for Toto.” replied Pamela, “He should be here any minute.”

Shocked by this revelation you immediately felt more confident.

“Of course he’s late,” said Robert in a clipped tone.

Right on cue, there was a knock on Pamela’s door. It was none other than Toto, looking red-faced and out of breath as if he’d been running the whole way.

“He’s here,” said Pamela, sensing they were impatient to start.

“Hello everyone,” said Toto, trying to hide the fact he was out of breath. Greetings were murmured through the speaker, merged together as multiple people spoke at once.

“Good afternoon Toto,” said Robert curtly.

“Good afternoon Robert,” replied Toto, equally as shortly.

“So I just want to preface this call with the fact that everything said on here will remain strictly confidential,” said Pamela, taking to the floor. “I’d first like to state that Y/N signed our standard contract, in that employee/employee relationships are strictly forbidden. Toto’s contract is different and does not have this stated anywhere. This does not, however, excuse his transgression and as part of our ethos, we would strongly discourage any abuse of power between an employee and their superior.”

Toto looked livid, having caught his breath he sat bolt upright, shooting daggers at Pamela.

Pamela continued, “Following Saturday’s interview with Sky Sports and Toto, it was revealed that Toto and Y/N have been pursuing a romantic relationship and several members of the Board have raised concerns that this is entirely inappropriate, not to mention a breach of Y/N’s contract. I would like to begin by giving the floor to Robert, who I believe feels especially strongly about this matter.”

“Yes,” came the voice from the speaker, “I was very surprised to learn of this news. For many years Mercedes has worked tirelessly to create a clean-cut professional brand image. Toto has always been exemplary of this and I was shocked, to say the least when our direct competitor brought his recent behaviour up. Y/N is still relatively new to the team and I voiced my concerns during the hiring process that she was too young to be taking on such a Senior role. I believe what has happened is due to this.”

“I…” Toto started before Pamela shushed him.

Robert continued, “In my opinion, the only way forward is for Y/N to discreetly leave her post. I do not want the press catching wind of this and spinning a narrative that is not in line with our brand values.”

“Robert.” started Toto again, before being cut off by David.

“Toto, we will hear from you shortly, but I would like to add that I am surprised you did this, knowing the repercussions. We always laugh at your counterparts at Red Bull and Ferrari but they have never brought a scandal like this upon their team.”

This time James interjected, “Look, guys, I know you’re not thrilled about this but I travel with the team and this is the first time I’ve heard anything about this. Everyone in the garage doesn’t believe it’s true and do we even know for a fact that it is? You all know what Christian Horner is like and this feels like somewhat of an overreaction to a situation we do not fully understand. I think we should let Toto speak.”

You could always count on James to stay level-headed in a tricky situation, there were a few grumbles and Robert piped up, “Sure, I would love to know what he has to say for himself.”

Toto cleared his throat, “Well, I am very disappointed with the way you have approached this. As James said, we all know what Christian Horner is like and he will say anything to make us, especially me, look bad. Normally it is something professional but this time he hit below the belt and made it personal.” He continued, “So to explain exactly what has been happening, I have been pursuing a relationship with Y/N outside of work, however, we have been keeping it very discreet and under wraps and entirely separate from our duties in the workplace.”

“So you are together?” butted in David.

“Yes. We are.” confirmed Toto, looking weary, “I was not aware that Y/N had a line in her contract that expressly forbade a personal relationship as I do not have that within my contract, however, I do not believe that her career should suffer because of her affiliation to me.”

“Well, I’d like to hear Y/N’s side of things.” piped up Robert, “Surely you were aware of this clause in your contract?”

“Hello everyone.” you said shyly, “I have to say, my contract is over thirty pages long and having re-read it over the weekend, the relationship part is a very small line towards the end. When I signed it, I paid it no mind as I did not expect to find love in the workplace.”

“Love?” guffawed Robert, “I know Toto, this is just another fling.”

This time Pamela interjected, “Robert, may I ask that you remain professional and listen to what Y/N has to say.”

Smiling at the older woman, you continued, “Yes love, Robert. When we began our relationship, we agreed that we keep personal and professional entirely separate so as not to disrupt our work and I have to say I think we have managed to do so successfully.”

“So I have one question,” interrupted James, “How long has this been going on?”

“A little over a year,” said Toto.

Your eyebrows shot up, yes Baku had been over a year ago but strictly Montreal was only six weeks ago.

Murmurs followed once again before James spoke, “Wow. Okay, so I would like to say that I do believe they kept things separate as I sit immediately next to them for hours at a time every weekend, spend countless hours in debriefings and meetings and travel on the jet and had no idea. I knew that they were firm friends but had no inkling of a romantic relationship”

“But this does not answer how Christian Horner came to discover the relationship?” asked David indignantly.

“I have my suspicions on that,” said Toto cryptically. “He is always digging for dirt and I suppose this time he couldn’t wait to spill.”

“Well, I for one, still believe that the right thing to do is to excuse Y/N from her post, no questions asked and we find a new Director of Communications,” said Robert, unmoved by anything he’d heard.

Annoyed that this man was so stubborn, you could no longer contain yourself. “Look, Robert, I understand I have breached my contract but I would urge you to think about what I have brought to the team. I have increased sponsorship revenue by 40% in one year and entertained new sponsors who have brought priceless good press to our team, as opposed to the dinosaurs we had before. I have convinced partners to stay who were all but ready to jump ship for a rival team when times were tough and I’ve grown our Comms team considerably, giving us additional media opportunities that we never would have explored previously.”

Toto turned to face you, glowing with pride. Even Pamela looked suitably impressed with your spiel.

Silence followed for a few seconds before Robert replied, “I understand this, but it doesn’t change that you fundamentally broke your contract and there has to be consequences. It’s all very well throwing out these numbers but you’ve undone years of hard work in one swoop.”

‘Robert.” stated Toto very succinctly, “Frankly, if you want Y/N to go, I will go with her.”

You were floored, Toto would leave his role for you?

His admission was met with deathly silence before David spoke. “Now Toto, don’t be so dramatic. I know you wouldn’t do that.”

“I will,” said Toto stubbornly. “I run this team and I know that Y/N is the best Director of Communications we’ve ever had. It would be stupidity to let her go. And I say this from a purely professional standpoint”

More silence followed before Robert replied. “Look, let us discuss this further. For now, I would recommend that Y/N takes a temporary leave of absence and waits for this to blow over.”

“Fine,” clapped back Toto, “Then I will take a leave of absence. Good luck.”

Pamela’s face beside you was one of pure shock.

“I’d rather you didn’t,” replied Robert.

“Then we both stay,” replied Toto bluntly. “We will continue to be discreet and laugh off any comments from rivals.”

“Fine.” said Robert, “But if I catch wind of anything affecting the team performance she goes.”

You gulped, not liking the way he was referring to you.

Pamela piped up, “From a Human Resources point of view, we cannot decide things like that in this manner. In my opinion, what we do is we draft another contract for Y/N that she can sign and we can put some stipulations in if need be.”

Thankful for the older woman’s expertise, you nodded in agreement.

“Fine.” said Robert, “Well let’s wrap this up, we’ve wasted enough time this afternoon. Speak soon.”

Goodbyes were murmured in response before Pamela rang off the call.

“Well, that was interesting.” she said, “So you two? I wouldn’t have guessed either.”

You smiled, “Thank you, Pamela, sorry about all of that.”

Toto stood up from beside you, “Yes thank you, Pamela, they are a nightmare.”

“You’re more than welcome,” replied Pamela, offering you both a warm smile, “But I don’t want to hear of any office hanky panky yes?”

You giggled, “Believe me after all of this, that is the last place I want to be doing anything.”

“And it might be tricky with our glass walls.” joked Toto.

“Indeed,” said Pamela waving you out of her office.

“Well, do you want to get a tea?” asked Toto, putting his hands awkwardly in his pockets as he strolled down the corridor beside you.

“Sure,” you said, aware you still had much to discuss.

———

As you both had a relatively free afternoon, you decided to pop out of the factory for your tea. It was a nice day and you had more privacy wandering along the river bank than you did in Toto’s goldfish bowl of an office.

“Toto, there's one thing I don't understand. Why did you say we were together for a year?” you asked.

“Well, six weeks sounded silly and we technically did begin our romance then,” Toto said bashfully. "I liked you from the get-go but when we kissed in Baku, everything changed."

“That’s very schoolboy of you. You know I think I fell for you in Monaco. I know nothing happened but you looked so handsome at that yacht dinner party, I would have had you right there if I could have,” you laughed, turning towards Toto, “Thank you for coming all the way back, I didn’t expect it.”

“Monaco, really? You looked beautiful that night too, " Toto beamed, "And why would I not come back? I had to go to Monaco for a meeting with a supplier and got on the first flight out of Nice this morning.

“Oh.” you said, surprised he took a commercial flight, “I see.”

“Is everything okay with us Y/N?” Toto suddenly asked, concerned.

“Yeah.” you said, “Sorry, I just feel kind of stupid, I felt like a kid being told off at school.”

“Me too,” said Toto.

“You did?” you asked.

“Of course, it’s worse for me in a way. Everyone thinks I’m some old perv.”

“You know when I call you an old perv it’s a joke right?” you replied.

Toto smiled, his kind brown eyes crinkling, “You know what I mean. You could hear the shock even in James’ voice.”

“I don’t think he thinks you’re an old perv. I think he probably feels stupid that he didn’t notice.”

“Maybe.” said Toto, stopping in his tracks, “Hey, I guess we all have our stupid moments.”

“Indeed we do.” you said, looking up at the tall man before you, “I’m glad we were stupid though.”

“Me too,” said Toto, quickly checking you were alone before bending down to kiss you.

Unfortunately, however, you weren't quite alone as a pair of all too familiar eyes were watching you from behind a bush a little way along the river. Nor did you hear the click of the camera shutter, capturing your intimate moment in a freeze frame image.

#formula one x reader #toto wolff fanfic #f1 x reader #onceuponatimein...

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