#at this point i'd like to lock Buck in a room with a laptop

[ganxiously]

my main problem with the 'relapsed' thing is that it's telling me Buck has still not thought things through. Bobby is the one who compared it to addiction and Buck just took that and ran with it like come on, man. Why all the plagiarism? What the fuck do you feel about this relationship? I don't want other people's words and other people's advice from your mouth. I want you to say what you think and what you feel for once. because like every fucking thing else, his actions give away the truth that he seems to be simply incapable of perceiving.

[mingtinys]

For Lovers Who Hesitate

pairing : jeong yunho x f!reader , (no gendered terms used)

angst , hurt / comfort , bittersweet ending , nonidol!au

warnings : language , mentions of alcohol

word count : 1.7 k

requested ? yes

a/n : this was written with the intention of a f!reader as per the request, but i think i actually ended up writing it without any use of gendered terms

Love, show me love If I can, if I only can I will shine a bright light on you

Yunho loves you. He always has.

He loved you hopelessly through childhood. From the moment you moved in next door to the day you held his hand at your high school graduation.

He loved you unapologetically throughout university. Through all the long nights you spent studying in the library. Through every gross, smelly, frat party he rescued you from after having a little too much to drink. Through his lowest points and his highest moments, his memories are filled with nothing but your comforting words and cheers for his achievements.

When you drunkenly kissed him at Hongjoong's New Year's party, he swore he loved you more than ever.

Yunho loved you selfishly through your first relationship and quietly through your first true heartbreak. He loved you recklessly and impulsively when your lease ended and he suggested you just come live with him. Even if he knew it was a bad idea.

And Yunho, unfortunately, still loves you the night his world crumbles.

You're still drunk, clinging tightly to Yunho as he struggles to hold you upright while fighting with his key and the lock. You groan out something about your head hurting. It makes Yunho laugh.

"Yeah, well that's what you get for challenging Jongho to a drinking contest." Finally, the key slips in and he's able to drag you over the threshold and onto the couch for the time being. "I don't think I've seen you drink that much since our sophomore year."

"I've learned my lesson, now please stop talking so loud," you whine, throwing your arm over your eyes to block out the harsh lights of the living room. Yunho forgoes mentioning that his voice is merely above a whisper and flips off all but the standing lamp in the corner.

"Thank you," you mumble.

"You've got ten minutes here before I'm dragging you to sleep in a real bed." He teases, knowing too well your habit of just knocking out on the couch and waking up the next day with complaints of your neck hurting.

"I really didn't mean to get this drunk, but Jongho just kept going. That guy is insane. You gotta admit though, I held up pretty well there for a while. . ." Yunho takes the end of the couch and lets you ramble. Finding your inability to filter out any thought before it reaches your lips rather entertaining.

"Not to mention I got five–" you hold up your palm with fingers splayed for emphasis –"bucks off of Mingi. Pff, asshole seriously thought I'd tap out after the fifth shot." Yunho bites back a smile, remembering the look on his friend's face as he begrudgingly slapped a five in your palm.

"–And I really just wanted to have one more memorable night with all of you before I leave–"

You keep going, but Yunho feels his world stop on its axis. The words "before I leave" are suspended in the air and making it heavier. He nearly chokes trying to take a breath only to find the air has left his lungs.

"W-What did you say?"

Your words taper out, and you lift your arm to peek an eye out at him. "Wait, which part?"

"What do you mean before you leave, Y/N?" The question comes out more desperate than he intends.

Your head pops up, and Yunho watches realization hit you like a bucket of ice water. Leaving you sober and wide-eyed. "I didn't mean to say that. . ."

Yunho so desperately hopes it was a slip of the tongue. Just your alcohol-laced brain mixing up your words. But the look on your face and the weight in the air snuffs out that last ember of hope. The conversation of what you told him last week about being interviewed for an internship resurfaces. The tab you accidentally left open on your laptop with price estimates for flights to Europe. Yunho can feel every single year of missed opportunities crash down on him in full force all at once. The tears well up in his eyes before he can stop them.

"I um," your voice wavers. "I was going to tell you. I just couldn't find the right time."

You give him a pause to respond, but Yunho doesn't speak. He can't speak.

"Do you remember the internship I applied for? They want me to take up my dream position at their office in France." Yunho's breath hitches at your words. You reach for his hand, taking it in both of yours, but Yunho finds it hard to take comfort in the gesture. "It wouldn't be forever! Three years max, two if it goes really well, then they'd transfer me back to Seoul for a permanent job."

"How long?" When he finally gains the courage to look at you there are glistening streaks down your cheeks. "How long until you have to go?"

"A week."

A week? A fucking week?

Yunho doesn't know how he should feel. Which emotions he should let bubble to the surface and which he should bury deep inside for your sake. Anger. Hurt. Despair. It's all too much.

"I haven't decided yet." It should make Yunho feel better, nothing is set in stone quite yet, but it doesn't. Because he has this sickening feeling you're about to ask him if you should go and he isn't positive he can give you a selfless answer. The answer he knows he should give. The answer that will simultaneously rip his heart into shreds.

So he speaks first, voice quiet and unsure. "It sounds like a really good offer. I'm not sure why you'd say no–"

"I would if you asked me to."

Time freezes the moment those words leave your lips. And it's in that lingering state that Yunho realizes he's waited too long. That maybe, just maybe, this whole time you've loved him just as much as he has you. That all those times he's convinced himself out of saying those three simple words were nothing but opportunities wasted. The regret of never being brave enough, of hesitating for reasons now null, is so overwhelming it nearly drowns him.

Yunho isn't sure if you remember anything you said in the morning. Because you tell him the news again over breakfast and it hurts even worse the second time around. But this time he's prepared, so he slaps on a mask of excitement and holds back the bitter taste on his tongue as he congratulates you.

Even as you ask him that question he's been dreading, he keeps the façade.

"Really? So you think I should take it?"

"It's been your dream since forever, it'd be pretty stupid to pass up something like this."

"Yeah, you're right. Thanks, Yun, for everything."

In fact, he keeps up the façade of selfless excitement for his best friend until the night before you depart. Until you seek him out in his room just past eleven.

"Could I stay with you tonight?"

What's he gonna do? Say no? When has he ever been able to deny you? So he nods and pats the spot next to him and sits with you until you're ready to talk.

"Nervous for tomorrow?"

You sigh. "Who wouldn't be? I'm leaving everything– everyone I know and love behind."

"Just for two years," Yunho reassures. Though the phrase is more for himself. It brings no comfort.

A silence falls, and in it you’ve drifted closer, knees bumping Yunho's and hand clasped in his. He feels your breath on his face before he registers what's happening. Your fingertips against his jaw, your nose brushing his, his heart violently slamming against his ribs. Yunho can feel every minuscule sensation like a storm brewing on the horizon and it nearly sends him spiraling.

But then, your lips press against his. The bed creaks under your shifting weight. Your touch is anguish and mercy all in one. Yunho's hand finds its place on your hip, anchoring him, and the rainclouds dissipate before they can pour down from above. Parting so that a bright light may shine down on you.

Yunho loves you. Always has. Always will. And as hard as he's tried, for your sake and his, for as long as he has, he can't hold it back anymore. Yunho's resolve is nothing but a shadow of what it once was. Even if you leave, even if you stay; in spite of it all, he will not delay the dream he's dreaming ever again.

"I love you."

For a moment, Yunho isn't sure if the words actually left his tongue. The only indication he has of their existence comes seconds later with a small gasp that leaves your lips as you pull away. Your eyes bore into his like you're searching for something in them. Yunho isn't sure if you ever find whatever it is you're looking for. Or perhaps you do, because your lips part and you whisper that same sentence that can make his heart stop in an instant.

"Tell me to stay. I will."

He wants to. You've no idea how badly he wants to be selfish. To utter that one simple word and have you in his arms forever, here, just like you are now. But he knows he can't.

It's unfair to you. To hold you back from your dream just because he was too cowardly to do something he should have long ago. Because he hesitated for too long. Because he was too stupid to see what was right in front of him all along. So instead, he bookmarks this moment. Takes note of the way you fit in his arms, the warmth of your lips on his, the moment when his heart finally felt full. He jots it all down under the chapter of things to never forget. And when the lingering feeling you leave becomes too much, when his lonely heart can't be soothed, he'll open this page and read it. Over and over. Until the day you return, he'll recite it like a poem.

"I'll wait for you," he says, with more certainty than he's ever felt in his life.

Then, when night comes  We will carve our own secret  I place a bookmark on the night that will become memorable, and open it up without anyone knowing