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rrxnjun · 2 years ago

Text

potential • z. chenle

pairing. zhong chenle x fem! reader genre. rich kids au, childhood friends au, friends with benefits au. angst, fluff, suggestive. word count. 20k (20.079) warnings. alcohol consumption, swearing, mentions of sexual activity, sexual innuendos, a heavy make out session or two, use of lyrics from ariana grande and sarah close and masking them as my own words a/n. why do we call it a rich kid chenle au when he's a rich kid irl. anyways for the fact that this was one of the most spontaneous fics ive ever written it sure did take a lot of time to execute. took a lot of inspo for the lifestyle from the sky castle kdrama so if its not accurate dont @ me bc ive never been rich LMAO

playlist. in my head – ariana grande ; successful – ariana grande ; nonsense – sabrina carpenter ; supermodel – måneskin ; that's what i like – bruno mars

You saw his potential without seeing credentials. And maybe that's the issue.

August 28, 2020 – somewhere in the Bali sea, 1:27 AM

The music is loud. The weather is humid.

Wrapping up the summer before your senior year, dancing around in the bar of the cruise ship in the middle of the ocean, one last stop before your 28-day cruise around Southeast Asia is over, the loud music from the bar rings in your ears as you dance around, a glass of expensive Mendis coconut Brandy swirling in your hold. The taste of the alcohol on your tongue burns, not quite used to the burning sensation in your mouth– this is one of the first times you’re drinking, since your parents were always big on prestige and acting classy. Your parents went to sleep, though– excited to explore Benoa tomorrow, to immerse themselves in nature and explore Bali’s temples and heritage. You, on the other hand, took this as an opportunity to party– accompanied by none other than your parents’ friend’s son, who grew into the position of your childhood best friend solely because his and your family have always been close, choosing to spend vacations together; a relationship that was mostly fueled by the immediate closeness of you two during the summer breaks and ski trips to Swiss Alps every January.

And while you’re no stranger to pearls, charity events in your parents’ mansion in Hong Kong, golf courses in Miami and fashion shows in Milan, growing up in the world of designer bags and prestigious titles, you feel quite stranded in the middle of the sweaty teenagers, all of them with the same social status as you, drinking expensive alcohol and swinging your hips to the EDM music playing through the speakers. It almost feels like this is the first time you’re able to enjoy yourself without anyone’s supervision, screaming at the top of your lungs into Zhong Chenle’s face as he laughs at you on the dance floor, and truth be told, you could care less about the pictures you’re going to take for your Instagram tomorrow, showing everyone just how good you’re doing and how much fun you’re having on your lengthy cruises around the continent, because somehow, even though the bar is clothed in gold and you feel a bit like in The great Gatsby, this feels like the least pressuring part of the whole trip.

“We should go to parties more often!” you scream into Chenle’s ear, taking a sip of your Brandy as you twirl yourself around him, the straps of your sparkly spaghetti-strap tiny top falling off your shoulders in a moment of carelessness, your thoughts somewhere completely else. You may be 19 years old and insanely wealthy, but that still doesn’t mean you are experienced in the art of partying– quite the opposite, actually, having to always seem cultivated and presenting yourself in a way that would suggest that your family is high on prestige and recognition– so to finally be surrounded by people your age, dancing along to the music and jumping up as you all chant the lyrics to Barbie girl by Aqua (how ironic) feels quite ecstatic.

“Like our parents would let us,” Chenle rolls his eyes, lips almost pressed against the shell of your ear as he makes sure to get close enough for you to hear him.

Sighing at his argument– knowing he’s absolutely right, but also hating the fact that he had to ruin your mood by stating it out loud– you shake your head as you down the last bits of your drink, putting the heavy glass onto the tray of a waiter that’s passing by to gather the rest of the empty ones scattered across the shiny tables in the corner of the room. Your brain is starting to get a little fuzzy and you can’t help the giggling escaping out of your throat whenever your eyes meet Chenle’s, the flush on the boy’s cheeks hinting at the fact that he’s not any better at handling his alcohol than you, having just as much experience in heavy drinking and partying as you do.

You’re only 19 years old and you don’t know a lot about the world. After all, you were brought up in a family that always did everything for you– you never had to move a single finger. You never even had to clean your room, because your parents had people that would come by every morning while you were in school, just so you could arrive home to a tidy place when you were done with your lectures. You went to a private school, so you were always surrounded by people with a status similar to yours. You spoke about your tutoring classes that cost more than groceries for a middle-class family a week, you talked about your trips abroad, and if you had time, you even went shopping with your classmates after school before your driver picked you up and drove you back into the suburbs; your neighborhood guarded by a gate, the asphalt behind it so much smoother than it is in the rest of the town.

You never got to experience partying like this– only gaping with an open mouth when you saw those scenes in the movies you watched on Netflix in your own private movie room. And if you’re being totally honest, you never imagined enjoying such a thing. You never had the experience, so you didn’t really yearn for it, but now that you’re here, surrounded by loud music, experiencing the weird emotional feeling that comes with being in a crowd screaming in joy at the same time first-hand on your own skin, you don’t think you’ll be able to go back to how you were before.

This is not how rich kids party. At least not when their parents are around.

“You’re gonna be hungover tomorrow morning,” Chenle mutters into your ear when your eyes light up at the sight of more alcohol, contemplating on getting another drink, just because.

“And you’re not?” you tease him, pointing to his glossy eyes and lazy walk, his legs tangling with each other every few seconds from the haze he’s been put in just by having a few drinks. The sight is quite funny– the ever-so composed millionaire son is now a troubled mess in your eyes; one wrong step and he could ruin the image his family has spent years to build up, but it doesn’t seem like either of you care, tripping over your feet and lounging at each other in the middle of the dance floor.

Feeling like you’re playing a dangerous game, hanging off his neck and swaying your hips to the rhythmic beat, you gape into his blown-out eyes and desperately try to get your brain straight. The more you drank and the more you spent time in Chenle’s close proximity, the less you were able to control your emotions and the weird thoughts in your brain that have been slowly eating up all your notions for quite some time now. Gaping at his plump lips and feeling his palms burning at your hips, his fingers ever-so-slightly hovering above the curve of your ass, you’re finding it hard to concentrate on the music or on the words spilling off his tongue, his voice never shutting up even in the loud bar. You always told him he talks too much, but he doesn’t seem to mind– he seems to actually take much pride in his annoying tendencies, talking your ear off on multiple occasions even when you tell him he should probably stay quiet for at least a minute, so your brain could recharge.

Truth be told, you listen to him most of the time anyway. He always talks and you always listen, rolling your eyes at the snarky parts and giggling at the jokes; so the fact that you suddenly can’t focus and just desperately want him to shut the fuck up must be the effect of all the alcohol you’ve been drinking tonight.

And your next step might as well be the main consequence of the coconut Brandy as well– because even though you’ve been dreaming of his plump lips on yours for quite some time now, you’ve never actually dared to act up on the desire. But your intention to make him go quiet seems to be working when the train of words stammering out of his mouth is cut off, a surprised noise trailing out of his throat when you kiss him on the dance floor; and to your surprise, he doesn’t seem to mind your weird sign of protest to his endless talking– quite the opposite, really, as he lets you take the lead and taste the mix of alcohol in the Long Island cocktails he’s been drinking the whole night off his tongue, your hands mindlessly trailing up to thread themselves into his hair.

This is not your first time kissing a boy– you once pecked Song Eunseok on the lips when the two of you sneaked out of class one day in 9th grade– but you never once kissed anyone with such passion and desire before. You’re not sure where you got all the courage from and you’re also not sure where you learned all of this– but it must be working, with how heavily Chenle’s breathing when you finally let go of his lips and he rests his forehead against yours. In no time, he’s chasing you down again, drunk not only on the alcohol now as he tilts his head to get closer, one hand resting on the side of your neck, just a few inches below your jaw, keeping you in place.

“You should learn how to shut up,” you mumble against his lips, breathing heavy as you break away from him again and open your eyes to meet your gaze with his. The music is still loud in your ears, but you swear you hear a static noise somewhere in your brain, a tingle in your fingertips making you feel like you’re about to have an out-of-body experience. Your drunken brain is not allowing you to ponder about your actions that much, not letting you think and contemplate the fact that you just made out with your childhood best friend on one of the most expensive cruise ships, drinking alcohol you weren’t supposed to spend so much money on, and maybe that’s a good thing– because there’s nothing stopping you in having the time of your life, no overthinking making you doubt your next steps and no feeling of shame or regret making the whole experience bitter as you dance pressed against your companion, letting him press short, yet daring kisses to your lips as time passes.

“I think I’m good,” he snickers, when the music suddenly cuts out, an announcer telling you that the bar closes at 2 AM and that this song is the last for the night.

Sighing in disappointment– because who even knows when the next time you’ll have this opportunity will come– you let Chenle lead you out of the bar, his hand glued around your exposed waist. Your walk is a little loop-sided and you two almost smash into the glass door (doesn’t matter that it’s automatic and it quite literally opened in front of your figures). Soon enough, you’re met with the golden interior of the cruise walls again, the design a little vintage, yet still luxurious, reminding you of the movie Titanic. Tripping over the doorsteps, hands getting caught on the red, velvety curtains hung around, you giggle at every word that comes out of Chenle’s mouth, bodies slowly, but surely getting closer and closer to your suite bedrooms. You’re quite sure your parents could hear you talking outside in the hall, but you choose to not ponder on what they would think of you if they saw you in this state too much, instead making yourself believe that they’re long asleep and won’t be woken up by your voices resonating through the quiet space.

“So I guess this is where we say goodnight?” you mumble, hanging off Chenle’s neck. His breath smells of the vodka-tequila mix when he hovers over you, bodies off-balance pressed against the cold wall just outside of your bedroom. Flashing you a grin, face looking close to a cheshire cat, he nudges your nose with his, a quiet hum landing to your ear, not heard by anyone.

“Or we could stay up a little longer.”

Squirming under his touch, his lips softly, yet still a little uncoordinatedly landing on yours, you waste no time in unlocking the door to your room– even though you have a bit of trouble with finding the key in your small purse, even surprised you haven’t lost the bag somewhere in the middle of the night– letting your childhood friend in to your space at the suggestion, your clothed bodies falling to the soft cushions of the water bed.

You’re only 19 and don’t know much about the world when you messily undress yourself under your friend’s eyes, blinded by the glints in his deep chocolate orbs when he looks at you from above and attacks your neck with kisses. And you usually don’t regret much, considering yourself a responsible individual, always rethinking everything and making sure it’s the right choice, but when you look back at this day now, you don’t really know if sleeping with Zhong Chenle on a cruise around Southeast Asia was the brightest idea of yours, considering the mental turmoil it’s gonna cause you on the way.

Well, at least you can say you lost your virginity somewhere in the middle of the Bali sea, and at least that’s something to boost your ego with, am I right…?

July 12, 2007 – Tokyo DisneySea, 2:21 PM

If anyone asked you for your favorite childhood memory, you wouldn’t have a hard time picking one. Sure, one would think you have too many pleasant memories to choose from, so realistically, you should take more time to pick and weigh the value of each one, contemplating if the trip to Rome was a happier memory than the summer you spent in Los Angeles when you were 10, but you are 100%, completely in tune with the fact that if anyone ever asked you this very question, the words falling off their tongue with interest and enthusiasm, no judgment and no hidden intentions behind their question, you’d have an answer ready with a smile on your face.

You don’t hold much emotion to your past memories. You’ve been on more vacations than you can both count and remember growing up, and so even though you do think the pictures you took in Italy came out good and your skin glistens prettily in the warm sun, even though you do think you experienced a lot of fun while going to the Target for the first time with your nanny– the woman your mum hired just because your parents were too busy with their business meetings the whole time you walked the streets of Los Angeles with the new woman you were supposed to trust with your life at the ripe age of 10– you wouldn’t say any of those memories are as close to your heart as the trip you took to Japan with the Zhong family when you were 6, the summer before attending first grade.

This was the year you and Chenle watched the Pirates of the Caribbean together for the first time, and even though it wasn’t in the initial plan, you two spent hours and hours and hours of the flight persuading your parents to take you to Tokyo Disneyland, because you heard from his cousin Yizhuo that you could meet Jack Sparrow if you went. While your plan didn’t exactly work and the two of you didn’t get to go to the large theme park– because your parents were busy, mostly traveling because of business and so they didn’t have the time to arrange it, the amount of sulking you two did when you arrived to the rented house in the expensive part of Tokyo to the teenager that was supposed to watch you two for the time being was enough for him to take you two on a short train ride to the twin of the famous theme park– the Tokyo DisneySea.

The 15-minute train ride you three took to the theme park was your first, and also last time you ever rode such a mean of transport. All you were used to were expensive sports cars and limousines– you never imagined that people took such transport even every single day, at times. You and Chenle were so immersed in the journey that it was hard for your babysitter to get you out of the train, your small, excited bodies almost tripping over your own little feet as the raven-haired boy dragged you through the streets of Maihama station.

You could see the towers of the park and you could smell the salt from the sea even from a distance. The whole atmosphere felt magical, giggles often erupting out of your throat as Yuta– the boy your parents hired to watch over you for the day– bought a bubble blower from one of the stands and blew out bubbles you two chased around and tried to pop before they got to the ground. There were no expensive cars in sight, no people dressed in suits and designer shoes– well, except from the two of you, but you couldn’t quite grasp the idea of how much your attire cost at that age yet– and you felt truly, insanely happy. The adults that always watched you when your parents went to business meetings were stern and serious, never letting you have much fun, but today was different, and you find yourself wondering why your parents even let you be babysat by a reckless teenager in the first place. He was 16 at the time– 10 years older than the both of you– and when you look back at the day now, you think it was the time pressure that brought your parents into hiring him. You bet they paid him a lot of money, hell, you bet they even lended him a credit card he could use to entertain you two for the whole afternoon, and even though you found him using it a few times, you didn’t think he spent just as much as all your previous babysitters did.

Not that you knew the value of money back then, after all. Maybe the fact that you couldn’t tell how much money everything was worth back then is what truly made the whole day so carefree and happy for you.

You were children of wealthy Chinese business owners. You always had everything they saw in your eyes– you didn’t even have to say it out loud and it was held up to you on a silver platter. This day, though, you didn’t even have to use that much money– if you truly compare it to other vacations your families have been to– and you can’t help but think it’s ironic how despite this fact, this day is still your favorite childhood memory.

The Tokyo DisneySea was catered to a more mature audience– even serving alcohol in the premises, a thing no other Disneyland does– but even though you were just 6 and couldn’t drink and there was no Jack Sparrow waiting for you in the streets of the theme park, you and Chenle had a blast. Maybe it was a good decision on Yuta’s part to take you to the DisneySea instead; it catered to your Pirates of the Caribbean needs perfectly despite it not being the initial theme. The ships and wooden coasts and harbors were enough for your imagination to create stories about pirates in your head, the three of you attending various rides and screaming at the top of your lungs together over the course of the afternoon.

“Wanna go to the Tower of Terror?” Yuta asked you, his toothy grin on full display as he dragged you two to the scary ride when you finally got to the American Waterfront.

The teenager was wearing a black muscle top with L’arc en ciel written on it– you found out only a few years later that it was a japanese rock band– and with his long, black hair falling to his forehead, he looked just like the person that would enjoy scary rides and horror movies. You, however– you weren’t prepared to get scared by green ghosts and eerie music. Not at 6 years old anyways, although you doubt you’d do better on this day.

If there’s one thing you need to know about Zhong Chenle, it’s the fact that he’s a lover of horror. And Korean dramas. But mostly horror– a few years later, when you were both the age Nakamoto Yuta was when he brought you to the Tokyo DisneySea, your friend came to a Halloween party dressed like the clown from IT and managed to jump-scare you every moment he physically got. There was no surprise in the small boy liking the idea of attending the scary ride, and no matter how hard you tried and protested, there was no use in you saying no. Because the two of them wanted to go, and you, quoting Yuta, ‘couldn’t just stay alone outside’, so you were pretty much forced into the darkness of the Tower of Terror, your small body pressed against Chenle and Yuta’s– you refused to sit anywhere but sandwiched between the two in the middle of the cart– shutting your eyes close when the scary music started playing and you could feel the anxiety forming in the pit of your stomach.

You trembled the whole time, panic resting in your beating heart, and somewhere along the way, you found yourself clinging to Chenle’s small hand, squishing it so hard he screamed at you in the dim lightning of the ride. You didn’t let go, though– that’s what he gets for dragging you along– fracturing his bones wasn’t in your concerns, if it made you feel more secure and safe.

The fond memory of the day ends with the moment the scary ride is over and you finally get out of the darkness– with Yuta having to carry your out of terror half-paralyzed body from the cart. To this day, you still don’t have a clear outlook on why this day is your favorite childhood memory, but you think it might be the mix of Chenle’s excited laughter as he scared you every two seconds after the ride, the apologetic hug he enveloped you in after you almost burst to tears the third time, the taste of the sausage Yuta bought you two for dinner, the taxi ride to the rented house you had to take in a rush before your parents got back from their business meeting, and the melodic voice of your best friend when he sang you the opening theme to the Pirates of the Caribbean before you two fell asleep on the same bed in your hotel room.

Either way, despite the terror, you don’t think you’ve ever had this much fun ever again.

When you peed the bed that night, your parents decided to never hire a teenager to look after the two of you again. From that moment alone, there was less horror, but also less fun.

May 5, 2019 – tennis courts in Jinqiao, Shanghai, 4:17 PM

One would think that growing up with Zhong Chenle would put him into a position of your almost-brother. And while you did agree with the statement on most days– like when he laughed so hard that snot came out of his nose and almost fell into your lunch plate when you were 15, or when he shot you with his paintball gun so hard you had a bruise on your knee for three weeks when you were 17– you think you’re starting to slowly outgrow this phase.

Zhong Chenle is no longer a brotherly figure to you when you two pick up tennis at the ripe age of 18.

It wasn’t either of your ideas, of course. Tennis is not a sport a teenager just suddenly picks up one day because they’re interested– at least not when you’re incredibly wealthy and can pretty much afford any other hobby in the entire world. No, it was the idea of Chenle’s mother– because, quoting, ‘the kids barely go out these days, they might as well pick up a sport!’ – and with the copycat tendencies of your dear mum, you were dragged along into it as well. And so now, during the finals season, on top of that, you two have to go play tennis on one of the private tennis courts your families rent for three hours a day every Friday afternoon instead of studying or focusing on getting your stress out of your body doing other, much more enjoyable things.

“You know, you look a little too excited for someone who hates playing tennis,” Renjun– the neighborhood kid (your parents being business partners for quite some time now made you and the short boy become friends somewhere along the way)– states, snickering as he lays on one of the benches on the side, his own tennis racket thrown carelessly on the ground as he watches the two of you running around the court, playing.

“I only do it because I’m bored,” Chenle mutters under his nose, sending the little yellow ball over the net with much force, making you run to the other side of the court.

“And I only do it because I need to prove to him that he’s not the best at everything he tries,” you add, sending the ball back to your friend.

“Just say you want to impress him and go,” Yizhuo– Chenle’s cousin from his mother’s side– teases you from the bench, sitting next to Renjun. Her remark doesn’t go unnoticed by you as you send the yellow ball her way after her cousin passes it towards your side of the court again, aiming precisely for her forehead but missing, earning yourself a terrified yelp out of the girl when she scootches closer to the boy next to her.

“That’s totally not what’s going on, but sure,” you roll your eyes at her when she throws the ball back, but you don’t feel interested in continuing the game anymore. Tiredly walking closer to the two sitting at the little shaded bench, wiping the sweat off your forehead, you try hard to not think of the snarky remark that was sent your way.

Is it really that obvious? Because sure, you’ve always found Zhong Chenle to be your brother figure over the years of growing up– but there’s something about the humid air of the tennis court and his competitiveness that have you eyeing him when he takes a sip from his water bottle or when he adjusts the hairband sitting on his damp forehead. He wears shorts that reveal his calves very nicely, and when you play 2 on 2, you find yourself focusing less and less on the game– earning yourself a frustrated yell from Ning Yizhuo herself as she plays along your side– and more and more on the Gucci tennis shoes adorning his feet as you scan the boy up and down, his figure growing taller and taller each passing day captivating you in a sense you’ve never quite experienced before.

“I can’t believe my mum dragged you all into this shit,” Chenle giggles when he sits next to Renjun on the bench, following you to the shade. There’s only 20 minutes left in the time your parents rented the court for and you figure that you can spend that time recharging your energy instead of playing the boring game.

“Not me,” Yizhuo says, “she made my mother feel bad about not signing me up for any sports. You know, your mum’s pretty persuasive, especially when it comes to looking good in front of everyone. If it wasn’t for my mum, I wouldn’t be doing this shit,” she complains, shrugging as she adjusts her ponytail that’s always sitting neatly on the crown of her head.

“I love the fact that Renjun here is the least athletic out of all of us, but he is the only one here willingly,” you snicker, earning yourself a chant of amused laughs at the spoken truth. Now, nobody forced Huang Renjun to come play tennis with you every Friday– but the fact that he doesn’t have many friends in the neighborhood was what made him come along, too bored on his own and with nothing to put his attention to. He doesn’t like playing much, but everything’s better than sitting alone at home, am I right?

The three of you gossip about everything and nothing– the new family in the neighborhood, especially, because Renjun saw their son last Sunday and found his outfit absolutely atrocious (“You’d think people with money would at least know how to dress well, but no. That’s not the case with that Wen Junhui guy.”). The time passes by quickly, and when the timer on Chenle’s phone goes off, signaling that the three mandatory hours at the tennis court are finally over, you all stand up and walk over to the gate, shoes dragging along the sandy surface of the ground with much tiredness. At least you’re getting some cardio in…

“Is your driver coming to pick you up?” Chenle asks as you pay goodbye to your friends, both of them getting into expensive cars waiting for them at the parking lot. Turning to him, you hum in agreement, suddenly shy under his gaze. It’s not even summer yet, but the May sun is already harsh on the skin, getting redness to spread along his cheeks, only further sculpting his handsome bone structure you’ve grown so familiar with over the years.

“What about you?”

“Told my mum I’ll walk home instead. It’s not like it’s only a 20 minute walk anyway,” he mutters, rolling his eyes at the irony of you having to drive home despite living only a few meters away from him, in the same wealthy neighborhood. You grew up together, in the same mowed lawns, in the same green labyrinths of your families’ villas, in the same high ceilings and golden accents on the interior of your houses. After watching him from the corner of your eye, you start to wonder about what changed between the two of you that made you so weak to him now, that you’re both 18. Did he change? Was it the fact that you were now both adults? You don’t think that’s the case– because even though you were 18, there were no more responsibilities waiting for you than they were the years before.

“My driver can take you,” you say, kicking the rocks below your feet, “well, unless you want to walk home alone instead,” you add, noting his previous sentence.

You see him take a sip out of his water bottle, shrugging at your suggestion. Chenle’s not a fan of inefficiency, no matter the fact that you can afford anything you could ever want. It’s a quality of him you find quite strange some days, but you don’t ponder on it too much.

You’ve known each other since you were in diapers. And after replaying all the memories you have with the boy in your head, you think that your 18 year old self isn’t so stupid for falling for him. See– you’ve got to know a lot of men over the course of your life. Many tried to get with you barely before you even grew into an adult, seeing the vision of money and the social status you could give them. Some, on the other hand, never gave you back the attention you were giving them. All relationships you had in your life were blinded by the imaginary price tag you always carried around with yourself, and so everything always stayed surface-level and plain. No wonder you fell for Chenle– no matter how long it took you to get to this part of your friendship– he’s the only one that ever showed you his true self, he’s the only one that ever trusted you enough to go deeper in conversations with you and treated you like a real human being. You know him well and he knows you well; he’s like a book you always find yourself rereading, excited to find that your favorite characters always stayed the same. At the end of the day, you think you were always meant to fall for Chenle.

Standing under the blazing sun, you wait for your driver to get to the tennis courts. You wait for 10 minutes, then 15– and when you get a little too overheated, Chenle offers you his water bottle and mumbles something about being on time. When the time passes 45 minutes after your driver’s supposed arrival, your friend turns to you with a glint in his eye, a grin sitting on his annoyingly handsome face.

“Wanna walk home with me instead?”

And the truth is, you don’t find yourself disagreeing. And you also don’t find yourself hating the walk up the hills of the neighborhood– no matter how tiring it was to your already exhausted limbs– and you don’t find yourself complaining about the lack of AC or the vehicle driving your ass home to your, admittedly, too big of a house. Chenle entertains you with his talks– because he always talks too much for his own good– and when you stop paying attention to him and lose track of where you’re going, he drags you back to the sidewalk by your hand and your fingers stay interlocked when he teases you about the fact that you almost got ran over by a white Cadillac.

“Listen, there’s this song I think you’ll like,” he hums when you’re 5 minutes away from your house, pulling out his phone out of his back pocket and opening up the Spotify app. He plays you a song by Ariana Grande, singing along to the lyrics of the chorus. His voice goes thin when he tries to mimic the singer’s voice, dragging along the english sentences of ‘it feels so good to be this young and have this fun and be successful, i’m so successful!’, irony seeping from his tone. Your hands are still intertwined as he swings them back and forth and you don’t even really care about the subtle implication of the lyrics he’s singing– because it’s Chenle, and despite being just as wealthy as you, he’s no stranger to calling you a snob.

When you’re 18 and walking back from your weekly tennis endeavors, you can’t help but feel the fluttering in your heart when your friend twirls you around in your driveway, your white tennis skirt childishly fulfilling your unsaid dreams of becoming a ballerina, before he walks to his house standing on the opposite side of the road.

You don’t even care that your poor driver got fired by your mother right after she realized he forgot to pick you up from the tennis court as much.

October 17, 2020 – a charity evening, Shanghai, 9:11 PM

Your whole life so far has been guided in the aura of money. When you were little, you didn’t realize it as much– your young, undeveloped brain couldn’t phantom the fact that your annual trips to Italy and summer vacations at yachts and in the Paris DisneyLand weren’t a normal occurrence to everyone. You couldn’t understand the value of money, and you think that maybe, you never truly will. Because you were born fortunate, never having to worry about a single thing, always living in wealth and with gold around your neck.

The closest you are to understanding just how much money your family truly has is at the charity evenings you are forced to attend. Walking around, mostly bored– because truly, you didn’t have much of an idea just how much money you’re sending to the unfortunate parts of Africa and what the whole thing even has to do with you, when the money wasn’t really yours in the first place– you try to at least look through the flier your family made for the event, reading through the carefully crafted sentences, feeling at least a little sorry for everyone that doesn’t get to live the way you do.

“Isn’t it funny how this is the only way our families can present themselves in a good light?” Chenle mumbles when he reads over your shoulder, a dry chuckle leaving his lips.

Turning around to look at your companion, you furrow your brows at his snarky comment. “What do you mean?”

“Well, we give to charity so people don’t hate us as much,” Chenle shrugs, taking a sip from the champagne poured in a tall glass you’re pretty sure your mother spent hours and hours picking out when renting this place, just so everything could be perfect.

“It’s just jealousy,” you say as you walk side-by-side with the boy, the expensive fabric of his white button-down hugging his body in all the right places, leaving you light-headed when you let yourself indulge in your thoughts for too long and stare at the curves of his forearms. It’s been a few months since you slept with your childhood friend– and while you must admit that you regretted it a little when you woke up in the morning, with a hangover and sore limbs, you also didn’t regret it as much as to turn the offer down when it was next brought to you. And the next time, and the next…

“You think?” Chenle asks, and his interest in your answer seems genuine.

“Yeah,” you nod, shrugging to yourself, “we have more money than any of them ever will, so it’s only natural for people to feel jealous and talk spiteful things about us.”

Chenle hums at your answer, licking his lips before he looks you dead in the eye, the smallest glint of irony shining from behind the dark orbs, making you shrink under his gaze. “It’s not like it’s hard work anyway,” Chenle mutters, “if it wasn’t all stolen money, at least the charity work wouldn’t feel as fake.”

You stop in your tracks at the comment, furrowing your brows. “Stolen money?”

The boy next to you snickers at your clueless eyes. It’s no wonder you never really cared about the source of your family’s wealth– you were born to it, so you never had a reason to doubt it. And truth be told, you never really complained either. You don’t think anyone in your place would, really. You just accepted it the way it is, and you never asked any questions. For all you know, your parents are hard working business owners– you bet their money is well deserved for the amount of effort they put in– so to hear that it’s stolen money, from someone who is in a similar position as you, on top of that, you can’t believe your ears.

“I mean, they’re business owners. Let’s not act like both yours and my parents don’t meddle with the taxes at least a bit, sweetheart,” he chuckles, shaking his head in disbelief, “if I were all those people outside of it, I’d hate myself too.”

His words do little to comfort you. They do quite the opposite, really, and even though Zhong Chenle has no proof to show you of the fact that your parents might have at least a bit of dirty money on their hands, you can’t say you don’t trust a word that comes out of his mouth. You start to wonder if you’re that gullible– and who is the one lying straight to your eyes now, if it’s your friend or your parents– and you start to believe that you’d trust everything Chenle tells you, because that’s just the relationship you have with him. He could do anything and you’d follow him to the end of the world. It takes years to build that bond, and so even know, although you have the urge to scream at him for talking such things about the ones that brought you to this world– this perfect, shiny world– you find yourself holding back, the bubble around you bursting in a second, although you spent 19 years of your life living in the fake glory and bejeweled experience. Opening your mouth to ask him more about the matter– to get yourself out of the confusion you’ve been put in with just a few sentences uttered out of his always too-honest mouth, you turn to the boy when a man with a camera approaches the two of you, asking to take a picture of you.

And you comply, because what else are you supposed to do? This is how you’ve been raised. You smile for the pictures, you grin when you find yourself in the magazines, you nod when people recognise your name, you greet people with a polite nod, because you never know when someone wants to make business with your parents and you wouldn’t want to ruin good opportunities for them, would you?

With Chenle’s arm around your waist, your body instinctively leaning into his touch, you smile for yet another picture for the portfolio. Sometimes you feel like a princess– with everything it takes; both the royal responsibilities and the special treatment. More often than not, you find yourself enjoying the spotlight.

“Now they have proof that we were here,” Chenle mumbles into your ear, his lips gently brushing the smooth skin, “wanna get out of here? This party doesn’t look as enjoyable as the last one we went to,” the boy references the time you spent together at the cruise ship, with both the screaming on the dancefloor, and also the aftermath in your room, making heat puddle in your cheeks as you swat his hand away before it gets too low on your back in front of everyone in the room.

“I have to give a speech, but… maybe later?” you look at him, innocently batting your eyelashes at him, when the boy shrugs and takes a step back, downing the last drops of champagne from the expensive looking glass.

“I’ll be waiting back home,” Chenle says, “I bet our parents will stay until this all ends, so we have plenty of time for ourselves when you decide you’re tired of the gala.”

He disappears out of your sight the moment after, putting the empty glass onto a tray of one of the waiters carefully walking across the room, his back escaping out the front door. If you squint hard enough through the glass, you could see him getting into one of the sports cars he got from his parents for his 18th birthday– the vehicle driving off in the hands of his driver for the night, since he just had a glass of alcohol– and leaving you alone in the world of faux and feathers, fulfilling the responsibilities given to you by your mother. And for the first time– not only because you hate giving public speeches– you so desperately want to follow him, getting out before midnight like Cinderella, never attending another one of these evenings ever again.

You don’t, though. You’re an obedient daughter.

And when you call him up from the entryway a few minutes after midnight, his rough hands welcoming you to his bedroom by undressing the thousand-dollar Tiffany dress you wore to the event– being the aftermath of his previous words or not, you start to think how ironic it is that your attire for the evening cost more than than the monthly rent of the people you were giving to in your speech.

After a while, your words turn bitter.

March 23, 2020 – South Cape Owners Club, Namhae-gun, Gyeongsangnam-do, South Korea, 1:17 PM

“Did you really have to choose the most boring thing to do for your birthday?” Chenle mutters under his nose when all of your parents stride forward to get another hole in one, beads of sweat appearing on your foreheads as you stand directly under the midday sun.

“This wasn’t my idea, okay?” Renjun huffs, carrying his golf equipment with him, the silly-looking golf gloves tugged right off his hands when his parents are no longer in sight. “All I wanted was to visit my grandma, but they decided we needed to do something special for my birthday, and when I couldn’t tell them anything I’d like to do, they dragged everyone to play golf.”

“I was thinking more like… clubbing and then crashing at your grandma’s place overnight, but okay…” Yizhuo snickers, watching as all of your parents joyfully talk between themselves, their conversation rarely leaving business matters as they play golf with as much enthusiasm as one can have while focusing on this boring sport. You don’t really know who made this game and why they made it– you can imagine seventy thousand different ways you’d love to spend your afternoon doing instead, more than a half of them supposedly more mundane than the sport itself; but you still know you’d enjoy even sitting down and getting ice cream better than having to pretend you’re interested in, what Chenle called, rich-people-only sport.

“Maybe I can sneak a bottle up into my room later, but I’m not promising anything,” Renjun shrugs, sighing to himself as he takes out his phone from his back pocket and shakes his head at the sight of the time appearing on his screen. You’ve been at the golf course since 10 AM, and with how interested in the game your parents seem to be, you’re not leaving any time soon either.

Not really engaged in the conversation– because Chenle once told you you complain too much (you truly thought he was the one doing so, but you believe pretty much everything that comes out of the man’s mouth, because he’s mostly right about things) and you think you’ve done your fair share of complaining on your way to the golf course in the first place– you look around, trying to find a thing that could occupy your attention instead. Finding anything fun to do while playing golf may just be the hardest thing to do, but when you notice your companion Chenle missing and his figure appears striding towards your small group in a golf cart, the vehicle going full speed (even the barely 40 km/h looks like it could kill when he seems to not give a single damn about running you over), and suddenly, your mind is occupied enough.

Screeching when the golf cart barely misses your figure, you jump to the side and watch Chenle laugh from the driver’s seat. His malicious instincts barely ever leave his body and the operation of a golf cart is seemingly bringing out the worst in him– thank god he barely drives anymore– and you can’t help but laugh at his little stunt when the cart comes to a sharp halt and he waves you three over with a motion of his hand.

“Hop on, motherfuckers, we have places to be!” he says, all of you following his footsteps and jumping into the small vehicle– you in the passenger seat, next to Chenle, and Renjun and Yizhuo taking the two seats on the back. Once you’re all in, the engine grunts with the speed Chenle’s intending to get to in the weak thing, the atmosphere shifts into one with much more fun and adrenaline– because you know you’re not supposed to ride the carts (not this fast anyway) and when your parents find out, you’re gonna get in a lot of trouble. No, you’re not going to get grounded– you’re not a kid anymore– but the silent treatment and nagging from them about being well-raised and respectable members of society is enough to leave you scared of their anger for the rest of your lives.

“Slow down, I’m gonna fall out!” you scream when Chenle takes a sharp turn, the golf cart almost toppling over on the green grass.

“I got you, don’t worry,” he notes, one of his hands loosely falling to your thigh to keep you in place, your skin heating up even more from his touch now, enjoying the hold but also fearing the eyes of your friends from the backseat. Your earlier terror is quickly erased with another sharp turn the driver takes– having much more things to worry about now, surviving being one of them– and when he zooms past the group of middle-aged people standing a few meters ahead of you, you already know you’re in big trouble.

Now you’re gonna get scolded for abducting a golf cart. When it wasn’t even your idea in the first place.

Well, that’s something to worry about later.

Chenle drives with the cart all over the golf course, the vehicle providing you enough entertainment for the next few minutes until you get tired of the ride. Looking over at him on your side, gaping a little at the view of your childhood friend driving the cart with only one hand, the other one still securely glazing your thigh, you almost choke out with how attractive the strange sight is to your eyes. Forcing yourself to focus on the road– and thank god, because if you didn’t hold to the side of the cart now, you’d surely fall out despite Chenle’s reassuring words and his hold on your leg– when the man cuts through a small hill in the golf course, the vehicle jumping up and falling back down making you scream in terror mixed with just a bit of excitement.

“Fucking hell, at least warn us before!” Renjun screams from the back, followed by Yizhuo’s amused laughter. You can only imagine Renjun’s almost fallen out, and even though the mental image looks hilarious, you really don’t need him to get hurt today, because he wouldn’t shut up about it for the next 8 working days. And it’s his birthday, after all– you wouldn’t wanna ruin it by having too much fun.

And so, with a last giggle escaping the boy’s throat, Chenle brings the golf cart to a halt, the vehicle stopping far enough from your parents to not get scolded immediately for making so much ruckus at the golf cart, the four of you enjoying the silence, still recovering from the wild ride. Smiling fondly to yourself and gaping at the boy next to you again, you suddenly grow appreciative of him. If it wasn’t for his wild nature, you would still be sulking somewhere on the golf course, pretending to enjoy living your snobby life alongside your parents. You bet even Renjun himself will find this moment captured in his brain as a core birthday memory, and the more you stare at Chenle’s side profile, the more you want to hold his face in your hands and thank him.

“Ew,” you hear Yizhuo’s voice from behind you, bringing you out of your thoughts. Looking back to see what she’s referring to, you watch her gaze landing on Chenle’s hand playing with the flesh on your thigh, heat suddenly rising to your cheeks in being caught in the exact position you feared a little while ago.

“What–” Chenle snaps his head back at his cousin, while you quickly shrug his palm off your skin, but it’s too late now– you’ve been caught in the act and now you can’t do anything to erase Ning Yizhuo’s memory.

“You know, I thought you two were cousins at first. Like, from your dad’s side, I mean,” Yizhuo sighs, shaking her head in disbelief at the two of you, her comment not doing much to ease the situation either. Chenle seems to be confused at her words, his face scrunching up as he glares at the girl.

“We’re not,” you note, clearing your throat and looking at her with a glare, mentally praying for her to drop the topic.

“Yeah, thank god,” Chenle adds, and you should’ve expected him to make the situation even worse– it’s Zhong Chenle, after all– but his next words shock you and leave you gasping, mentally killing him right here and in this moment, “that would make a lot of things weird.”

“Ew,” Yizhuo repeats, and suddenly, that perks up Renjun’s attention– the boy previously facing the other side of the golf course and not paying you three much care– as he looks around and watches you with confusion in his features.

“What are you talking about?”

“That they are–” the girl takes it upon herself to explain her findings, but she’s quickly cut off by a sound of a middle-aged woman screaming through the place, her small figure striding towards the golf cart.

“Zhong Chenle, what do you think you’re doing?!”

And with that scolding tone, the previous topic is dropped. Thank god.

June 12, 2020 – Zhong Chenle’s room, Shanghai, 11:21 PM

A hand stroking through his hair, smoothing back the bangs and revealing his forehead in the dim blue of the neon light in his room, you lay on your side next to your friend Chenle, a blanket carelessly thrown over your half-naked middles to shield you from the breeze. You hum a song under your breath as you play with his locks, the black disappearing between your fingers like sand, eyes carefully watching his tired expression.

If you thought hard enough, you could see the little boy you first met at your parent’s conference room when you were 3 materialize in front of your eyes. His cheeks were chubby and he was short, waddling behind you almost a head less than your size, and his voice was thin as he asked you for your name. From that moment on, you knew you were supposed to stick together– and while your parents were the first relative to bring you two together, you didn’t mind always being glued to each other’s hips.

When you look closer at him now, it’s hard to see that boy in him. Harder than you expected, if you’re being totally honest. Don’t get me wrong, you can still see in his features– even though his cheekbones are more prominent now and his jaw is more chiseled, lips plumper and his figure built more firmly than when he was a little boy– but there’s something about his demeanor that completely changed over time. He seems less enthusiastic, and while one would think that it’s just him growing into being a more laid-back and relaxed person– he’s not a kid anymore, after all– you think there’s something more to it, you just can’t quite put your finger to it.

Seeing him close his eyes every once in a while, lids falling under the weight of his tiredness and the comfort your gentle strokes through his scalp give him, you feel your heart clench with all the care you’re currently putting into the boy, and all that you’ve been putting into him throughout your growing up. After so many years– after getting so close and intimate with him– you don’t think you’d be able to let the boy go, and just the sheer image of ever losing him or leaving him behind leaves you trembling with anxiety.

And so, despite being afraid of ruining the calm atmosphere that comes after making love to him, you speak up with a weak voice, contrasting to what you’re logically supposed to feel after getting to know the news this morning– just because you have to know.

“Lele?” you mumble, hearing him let out a hum, his voice sounding as if he’s half-asleep, but you know he’s listening to you. “What are your plans… after you graduate?” you ask. The day of graduation is coming faster and faster towards you, the years you’ve spent at high school finally fulfilled after all the effort you put in on your finals.

“Dunno,” he replies, eyes barely opened as his arm that’s been previously laid on the mattress in between your two bodies moves to your hip, fingers drumming over the soft skin, “why?”

“Just wondering…” you speak, voice barely louder than a whisper. The boy stays silent– his eyes once again closing on themselves as you continue to play with his hair. One would think he’s fallen asleep, not awake enough to have this conversation, and you would even believe the fact and let the conversation go, thinking you’d find another time to dwell on this topic, but then, as a surprise, his voice startles you from your deep thoughts when he curiously inquires you, the hand on your hip steadying.

“What about you?”

Taking a deep breath in and out, a smile battling to take over your lips, you lick your lips in the heartbeat that comes before your answer. Swallowing your nerves– because even though you should’ve told him the moment you got the news this morning, you’re somehow stressed out about the action of doing so– you open your mouth and finally break the rules to him.

“I… I got to Yale,” you say, on your toes. The joy and relief you felt this morning when you saw the email appear on your phone screen is daring to creep into the way you speak to Chenle right now, but you’re keeping it in. Not letting yourself scream and shout the accomplishment from the rooftops, you look at the boy, not a change appearing on his face at hearing your announcement. “I got into their business program,” you add anxiously, waiting for him to say something– anything– to your news.

As your friend, he’s supposed to be happy for you, isn’t he? He’s supposed to hug you now and squeeze you and tell you how you’ve done a good job and that he’s proud of you and that he’s cheering you on in your dream. None of it comes, though, as he only hums and nods at your sentences, not even bothering to open his eyes to look at you when you oh so excitedly talk to him about your life goals.

Something inside of you breaks just the tiniest bit, your mood falling as you anxiously chew on the inside of your cheek.

“Are you not gonna say anything?” you demand, halting your movements through his raven locks, averting your touch and looking at him curiously.

You watch him as he finally opens his eyes and looks at you with an empty look, licking his lips before humming again and asking you in a tone of voice that barely meets interest or excitement. “So you’re gonna be a businesswomen like your mum when you get your degree?” he asks, nodding to himself.

“Yeah,” you answer, clearing your throat. You’re a little confused at his weird stance towards the topic, but you battle out a tight-lipped smile. “I’m hoping for it.”

He hums again, the noise seemingly enough for him to consider it a valid conversation holder, a deadpan: “Good,” leaving his lips after a second, making you furrow your brows in confusion and utter disappointment. This is not the way you imagined the conversation to go– this is not how you wanted it to go at all.

Heaving out a sigh, you tug your arm to yourself, contemplating on speaking up– knowing you’re just gonna make everything worse if you do– but doing so anyway. “That’s all you’re gonna say?”

“I mean, what else is there to say?”

Looking at him in disbelief, your face scrunching up in various different emotions, all mixing into one– disappointment being the dominant feel, you think, you scoff at him. This is not Zhong Chenle as you know him, and sure, he hasn’t been the most overly-excited, cheerful individual these past few months, but you still think you deserve at least a bit of praise for the achievement of getting into one of the hardest universities to get to in the world, no?

“I don’t know, you could… congratulate me, I guess…? Tell me I did a good job, I dunno… would be nice,” you mutter, snickering once more to prove your irritation with the man.

“Oh,” he says, looking genuinely surprised, taken-aback, even, “well, congrats on the legacy admission, I guess,” he says, nonchalant, as if his words aren’t a dagger to your heart each second that passes, your blood pressure rising as the reality downs on you that he’s being serious and that this is not a sick joke.

“The legacy admission?” you repeat, eyes big and shocked, your whole body moving an inch away from him on the bed without you realizing.

“Yeah,” he shrugs, not a bit caring about breaking you from the inside, the humiliation slowly creeping from the tips of your fingertips to the depths of your soul.

“So you’re saying I went through the whole admission process and put in so much effort only for you to say that I got in because of stupid legacy?” you chirp, gazing at him with sharp eyes, blood boiling from the impact of his words. “What legacy are you even talking about?”

“Don’t act like you’re not a nepo baby,” he snickers, rolling his eyes.

Gasping at his words, baffled at the unexpected reaction, you stand up on the bed and stare at him with sharp eyes. At a loss for words, you stutter a little when you speak up again and utter out the next words, hoping to hit him where it hurts. “Like you’re not?”

“Never said I’m not,” he shrugs, “don’t have a problem with admitting I am.”

“So you’re saying I only got to university because of my parents,” you get out, glossy eyes scanning his peaceful figure, “so you’re saying I’m not smart enough to get into Yale?”

“That’s not what I said–”

“But you implied.”

“You only hear what you want to hear,” Chenle sighs, as if he was tired of your antics, which only makes you more furious at the whole interaction.

“No, Chenle–” you stutter, his name rolling off your tongue as if it was meant to stop him with hurting you even more for discrediting your efforts, yet, you can’t find any more words to say to him as you stare at this limb body laying on the soft mattress of his king sized bed, shaking your head in disbelief.

Standing up from the bed and scattering around the room for your clothes, ignoring the way putting them on in front of him makes you feel like you’ve been stripped away from all your dignity, you hurriedly come to the door of his bedroom, almost forgetting your phone that you gather on your way out from the messy desk in the right corner of the room.

“Where are you going?” he asks monotonously, watching you move through the place.

“Home,” you bark out, running your hand through your hair as you walk back to the door, ignoring the hot tears pricking your eyes at the feeling of your whole entire world collapsing in on you when he mourns from the bed.

“Don’t be mad, it’s not like I said anything bad…”

“Goodnight,” you snap, not bothering to look back at him as you escape his house in the middle of the night, running through the street to your house much earlier than you anticipated, wiping at your cheeks with angry palms.

This is the first time he disappointed you, and you can’t tell if that felt worse, or if it was the excitement slowly and painfully stripping off your bones, making you feel like you’re running around without your flesh, completely see-through for everyone around.

June 27, 2020 – IFC Mall, Shanghai, 4:33 PM

“Do you think this makes my ass look extra hot?” Yizhuo asks, gaze shifting from you to Chenle to Renjun, the four of you currently in one of the designer shops at the mall. Leaning on the wall, arms crossed on your chest and chewing on the inside of your cheek, you shrug, not a word escaping your mouth.

“I’m your cousin, I’m not looking at your ass like that,” Chenle mutters under his nose, sighing as he takes a seat on one of the expensive looking sofas situated in the changing room, resting his head against the neck rest and closing his eyes in what seems to be tiredness or annoyance– either of, or both mixed in, equal parts.

“Oh come on, I need to know!”

“It does look super hot, Yizhuo, now can you–”

“So you are staring at my butt!” Yizhuo excitedly yelps, pointing a sharp finger towards Renjun, a bright grin settling onto her lips when the accused boy stutters, cheeks reddening at her comment.

“You literally asked us to, for fuck’s sake!”

“You could’ve refused, just like Chenle did,” she shrugs, smiling to herself in victory. If anyone was listening to your conversation right now, they would surely have a lot of questions you wouldn’t be able to respond to. Hell, even you’re confused half of the time you hang out with Ning Yizhuo– what the hell is going on in her head?

“He’s your family, of course he refused,” Renjun mutters, shaking his head as he drags a hand through his hair in despair.

“Whatever you say, Renjunie,” she chirps, closing the curtain behind her and changing back into the pants she wore when she got to the store in one swift motion, leaving the boy puzzled with her next words as she walks up to the counter, “I’m only buying those because you think I look super hot in them, just so you know.”

Paying for her things and escaping the store, the rest of you tagging along, you notice the boy aimlessly trying to forget about the whole situation, and his prayers were listened to, after all, since Yizhuo seems to drop the topic after teasing him so much, turning to you instead. Walking alongside with you, leaving the two boys a few steps ahead, she nudges you with her elbow, raising up her brow in question.

“What’s up with you? You haven’t even tried anything on,” she notes, “and we both know you’ve been eyeing that new LV collection, so there must be something bothering you.”

Sighing, hating that the girl knows you so well– that, or you’re being awfully obvious– you roll your eyes in annoyance and try to shrug the topic off. “It’s nothing, I’m fine.”

“Well, that’s obviously a lie. Is it something with Chenle? You two are usually all over each other, so–”

“It’s not about Chenle,” you snap, cutting the poor girl off, “so drop it.”

“Did he say something stupid? I know my cousin, come on. I can slap some sense into him, sweetheart, just let me know–”

“Please let it be,” you insist, tone of voice almost a little too sharp for your own liking, but it seemingly does its job as your friend only shrugs and takes a sip out of the coffee you all bought when getting to the mall, catching up to the men a few steps in front of you, talking about basketball.

“Well, if you need to talk to anyone about it, you know where to find me,” she says, and joins the discourse with her cousin and the boy she’s been teasing for whatever reason for the last few weeks instead, leaving you to trail behind them like a lost puppy, deep in your thoughts.

It’s been a few weeks since you last talked to Chenle. He tried reaching out to you a few times, sending you texts to ask what you’re doing that day to see if you wanna hang out. It seemed that at first, he didn’t really understand that he upset you. After you continued to ignore him even on graduation day, only greeting him and sparing him a few words, he seemed to get the memo as he let you deal with your emotions by yourself instead. You were never given an apology– and truthfully, knowing Chenle, you didn’t even expect to get one in the first place. But still, it’s been bugging you and you couldn’t get his words out of your brain, because you know you can’t do anything about them– if this is the image he has of you, the opinion he created, you don’t think you can talk it out with him in the first place.

“Everything okay back there?” Chenle asks, looking behind at you. His eyes are big and honest, and you find yourself nodding to his caring question. Sparing him a word seems like too much effort right now, and so when he offers you a tight-lipped smile, you don’t have enough energy to reciprocate it.

“Princess Yizhuo here has sore feet, so we are calling it a day. You wanted anything from the mall? I can stay behind with you and go get it,” he continues, his words jabbing into you only reminding you more of the days you spent ignoring him. Realistically, he should be mad at you for it– maybe you even wanted that to happen so he would ignore you instead, giving you the silent treatment, but this is your childhood friend Zhong Chenle we’re talking about. He talks too much in situations where he should shut up instead, and that’s exactly what’s happening in this very moment as well.

“I’m good,” you note, shrugging as you throw the empty coffee cup into one of the bins on your way, your small group now escaping the mall and getting to the parking lot.

Walking towards Chenle’s Zenvo TS1 parked in the corner of the parking lot, you hear the chatter of the group resonating in your ears, not really engaging in the conversation yourself, but choosing to listen to feel included anyway. It’s not their fault that you’re not in the mood, and frankly, you’re glad they even invited you to the outing in the first place. Everything’s better than being left out in your books, even if it means forcing yourself into social interaction.

“My driver should be here any minute,” Yizhuo smiles, waving at Renjun currently getting into his Porsche Cayenne that he got after you all arrived from his birthday trip to Korea. Watching the boy drive off– while listening to Chenle bitching about his driving (he does have a point though, the poor boy almost crashed into a pole on his way out) – you feel a nudge to your elbow, making you turn to your friend.

“Wanna get back with me, neighbor?” he asks, eyebrows raised in question.

In any other circumstance, you wouldn’t miss a heartbeat before answering. But now, you ponder on the question for a bit– you got to the mall with Yizhuo, having hanged out with her at her place before– but now that she’s getting a drive home, there was no use in you tagging along with her, since you live quite far from her house. Getting a drive home from Chenle is the most logical solution, after all, and that’s why you find yourself nodding.

Jumping to the passenger’s seat, waving at Yizhuo still waiting for her driver to get there– it should take only about 5 more minutes, with the speed her driver can get to when called– you silently gaze out of the window on your way back, not sparing the boy next to you a glance. He seems to not mind, carefully taking turns and waiting at the stop signs and red lights on his way to your neighborhood, humming along under his breath to the songs on the radio instead to fill the silence. You spend the ride chewing on your cheek, nerves eating you up from inside just at the sheer fact of being in his close proximity again, yet still being so painfully hurt at the feelings he expressed the last time you hung out one-on-one.

His car smoothly gets to the parts of the town that feel more rich– houses growing bigger in size, the gates taller in the sky and the lawns mowed more carefully, with more fancy bushes in the yards and pure-blood dogs running around in front of the gates. After a few minutes, your neighborhood appears in front of your eyes, his car driving past your house and into the Zhong property instead, making you furrow your brows in confusion and annoyance.

“You could’ve just stopped in front of my house so I could get out, you know,” you hum, sighing when he turns the engine off.

“I was thinking we could hang out over at ours for a sec,” he shrugs, turning his face to you with a hopeful glint in his eye, which you dismiss with an annoyed huff and a roll of your eyes, reaching towards the door handle to get out and walk over to your house instead.

“Come on, Y/N,” he calls for you, “are you still mad?”

“No,” you snicker, shrugging as you move towards the front gates, his figure quickly catching up to you as he grabs your wrist, halting you in your movements.

“I’m sorry. Let me make it out to you?” he mumbles, looking at you with eyes big and deep like honey, and suddenly, you’re a putty under his touch– just like always, you cave in– as you sigh, following him inside. You don’t miss the victorious pep in his step as he leads you inside, his hand still in contact with your arm, only letting go when you get to his room and he leads you to sit on his bed.

“Wanna play something?” he asks, thrusting a PS5 controller into your hands, not really leaving you much room for disapproval. Grunting and rolling your eyes at him, you watch as he opens up It takes two, your characters running around the split screen trying to figure out the way around.

The silence between the two of you is cruciating, suffocating, even, as neither of you have enough courage to open up the topic again. Tugging at your bottom lip, biting off the dry skin up to the point it bleeds, you sigh and turn to the boy again, putting the controller down. “Is this your way of making it up to me?” you ask.

Cocking his head to you, he shrugs. “I mean, I had a different idea, but that’s up for a discussion…” he mutters, the suggestion of his words making you roll your eyes at him, in disbelief of the fact that he still has the audacity to tease when he knows you’re clearly upset with him.

“Okay, I’m… really sorry, okay?” he says when he registers your mood, sighing to himself and running a hand through his hair. “I kinda fucked up, and I realise that. I didn’t mean to imply that you’re stupid, or anything– come on, I always cheated off you on exams, after all– so, I just- it came off wrong, is what I’m tryna say,” he concludes, looking at you hopefully, his face seemingly in tune with the words coming out of his mouth.

Humming, you shrug, not really knowing what to say. The apology settles a little in you, noting that at least he acknowledged that he fucked up, and so you pick up the controller again and avert your gaze from him. Seeing as his character refuses to move, you look at him from the corner of your eye, raising your brows in question.

“So you forgive me?” he asks, licking his lips in nerves– the action making your eyes travel down to the plump rosiness, involuntarily following his action. His glistening mouth has your gaze wandering around his body, eyes focusing on things you’ve been purposefully ignoring the whole day– the way his forearms show off in his short-sleeved shirt, the way his hair is parted in a way that shows his forehead in the most strangely attractive ways, and also the ever-so casual demeanor of the male. Chuckling to yourself, you shrug, taunting him.

“I dunno,” you mumble, “how can you make it up to me?”

And again, Chenle gets the hint– he’s not stupid, after all.

Slowly lounging himself towards you, making you drop the controller to his sheets, you close your eyes in expectancy of his touch, already so used to the rhythm of his lips against yours. His hand holds your jaw in place, firm kisses pressed to your yearning mouth, you try to remember the way his touch feels– just in case you have to give it up soon again– a selfish action of your body as you thread your fingers through his hair.

Lips ghosting over yours, he snickers against them as he speaks. “You taste of blood,” he notes.

“Shut up,” you mutter, taking matters into your own hands as you lock yourself to him again, pressing shaky, hurried kisses to his lips.

He finds a better place to attach them to, though, as he gently pushes you towards his mattress into a lying position, traveling towards your jaw and your neck. His touch never stays long enough to leave a mark– at least not in places visible for everyone to see, saving you a lot of explaining to your parents and your friends– but the kisses still leave you breathless and yearning for more, hands traveling down his back and humming in pleasure.

“Missed this,” he speaks against your skin, breathless, “so much.”

“Missed my body or me?” you ask, a hint of bitterness on your tongue.

“A bit of both,” he smirks, gently sucking on the skin of your collarbone, leaving you to squirm under the feathery touch. Hands traveling up under your shirt, his fingers trailing across your belly and the curve of your hip, you’re left shivering under the contrast of the heated atmosphere and his stone-cold hands, giggling when he presses an unusually sweet kiss to your cheek in between the more risky ones.

“And which one did you miss more?” you tease, locking eyes with him as he hovers over your body, plopped up by an arm on either side of your head.

His eyes glimmer as he stares you down, cocking his head to the side. “I miss when you didn’t talk,” he says, leaning down again and taking your breath away with a kiss, a displeased grunt meeting his lips as you disapprove of his snarky comment.

In the sheer second where you two break away for air, his hands undress your top, leaving you under him just in your underwear, a position you two have found yourselves in a number of times before. Still, it leaves you shy away under his hungry eyes, only relaxing again when his raven locks tickle the underside of your jaw, lips attaching to every inch of your now exposed body, not afraid of bruising the skin you always keep covered, out of everyone’s eyes. Sometimes, you yearn for him to plant a lovebite to your jaw, to the juncture of your shoulder and your neck, wanting to show them off to everyone and claim the boy as yours– you know you don’t have that power, though, when Zhong Chenle will never be yours and the bruises of desire are always hidden away from everyone, like a dirty little secret; much like what you two have going on in the first place anyway.

“You know,” he mutters against your skin, in between the kisses that have now grown lazier, “I was starting to get a little crazy when you ignored me. That was a first,” he says.

Snickering, hands once again finding their place in his locks, you shrug. “Was the first time you deserved it.”

“Does my opinion really matter to you that much?” he asks, chuckling as he presses another kiss to your skin, to a place a few inches below your collarbone.

“We’ve been friends forever,” you say, “‘course it does.”

“Well, then you should’ve known that as your friend,” he huffs, lips pressed against your skin, “‘m not looking down on you.”

Humming, you let him work his magic as his lazy kisses inch closer to the fabric of your bra, his other hand playing with the fabric of it, twirling the little bow in between your breasts in his fingers as he leans on one of his plopped-up hands, looking at you from the side.

“Guess I was just more curious about what you wanted to do after school, y’know,” you say, the conversation flowing despite his hands all over you, “before you called me a nepo baby, of course.”

He chuckles at your remark, rolling his eyes at you as his finger trails up your side, your skin growing goosebumps under his touch. “Dunno yet. Why do you care?”

“Wanted to see how far we’re gonna be,” you say, the moment suddenly growing more intimate. The relationship you two have was never inclusive– you two had sex sometimes, sure, but you never once told each other this was more than that. You two were just mere fuck buddies, childhood friends that found sexual attraction in each other somewhere along the way, and while that was enough for you for a while, you found yourself growing anxious of the fact that he was never going to be fully yours. And with the growing anxiety– the smallest remainder of your worries that overtake you in the middle of the night sometimes– your throat closes up on itself when you choke out the next words. “Wanted to see how much time we have left together.”

His hand settles on your hip, his eyes bearing into yours with a newly found heaviness in them. Furrowing his brows, he licks his lips in nerves before speaking up. “Well, I’ll always be your neighbor, so you can find me when you come back. Unless we move, y’know…” he jokes, an airy laugh coming out his lungs that doesn’t meet the expected intention of easing the situation.

You chuckle– but there’s not a hint of lightheartedness in the gesture, quite the opposite, really– as you avert your gaze from him, your head lollying to the side when you try to hide your slowly, but surely growing red eyes. “That’s not what I meant.”

The hand on your hip squeezes the skin under it, his figure now fully hovering over you again, eyes desperately wanting to meet yours. A finger gently pressed to your chin makes you turn your head back forward, his worried gaze bearing into you, and for a moment, you two only stare into each other’s eyes, frozen in time.

And again, Zhong Chenle isn’t stupid.

But for a second, he acts like he is.

“What are you talking about?” he chuckles. “You’re scaring me.”

And when you don’t give him an answer, but instead chew on the inside of your cheek– another place to bleed after you bite down too hard from the nerves crushing you from the inside– he seems to finally get the hint, an airy laugh full of disbelief meeting your ears. Having figured it out, still, he speaks it into existence– as if he needed a confirmation; 8 words tormentingly escaping from between his swollen lips.

“You don’t have feelings for me, do you?”

Sniffling, you shut your eyes close at the question, your silence a clear answer to your childhood friend as he peels himself off you, the feeling of cold air on your exposed skin like a painful slap to reality. You stay like that for some time, mentally counting seconds, each hammer of your heart in your chest like a threat to your existence. Finally, the silence is broken by a determined, yet a little weak sentence coming out of Chenle’s mouth.

“I think you have to leave.”

Numb, you follow the orders.

July 25, 2020 – Ning Yizhuo’s room, Shanghai, 6:11 PM

“So I was right all along?” Yizhuo snickers, eating from the bowl of almonds she has settled in the free space between her lap and her crossed legs, staring at you with the hydrating sheet mask on her face. You heave out a sigh at her comment, rolling your eyes as you fall back into her soft mattress, shaking your head in disbelief.

“That’s all you got from this conversation?”

“Almost,” she mumbles, but nudges you with her foot right after, “I’m joking. I was listening, I’m just… shocked that I was actually right and that you were fucking my cousin all along.”

“Yeah, well, that’s not happening anymore, so you don’t have to be disturbed,” you grunt, wondering why you actually told the girl in the first place, regretting the decision perhaps the most right now. Yes, she did bug you for the last few weeks about the reasoning behind your attitude, and the fact that you refused all the invitations to hang out with your friends in fear of seeing Chenle were starting to get a bit suspicious, so you figured you can’t hide it anymore and that Yizhuo was bound to find out either way sooner or later. And still, you think you needed a bit of girl advice too.

“‘m not disturbed,” she mumbles, voice suddenly considerate, “I just- the whole situation is all kinds of weird and fucked up right now.”

“Tell me about it,” you chuckle, the bitter taste on your tongue never leaving despite trying to drown your sorrow down in sweets. “I fucked it up, Yizhuo.”

“Now, that’s just not true,” she sighs, putting the bowl of almonds to her coffee table and laying next to you, reaching for your hand and swinging it around in failed acts of encouragement and affection. “It’s not your fault he freaked out and made it weird.”

“I made it weird!” you mourn, breaking away from her grasp and dragging your hands through your hair in frustration, the feelings bundling in your stomach making you feel like acid is just bound to shoot out of the crevices of your insides, throwing up from the stress and despair. “I’m moving across the world the next month and I won’t see any of you for a long time, since Jun is moving to Korea and you’re gonna work in your parent’s company as well as going to uni here, and instead of spending the last moments of summer break together, I fucked it up and made everything weird and awkward just because I had to fall in love with my childhood best friend. While we’d been fucking. Isn’t that fucking great?” you huff, closing your eyes shut with the tears threatening to fall down your cheeks at your own words falling from between your lips.

“We are spending time together right now, though,” Yizhuo tries to cheer you up, her pout heard in her tone.

“There are millions of different ways you’d love to spend your time with me instead of moping because of your cousin,” you note, sighing, “and I don’t even fucking know what he’s gonna do after summer break, and now, I won’t get to know.”

Yizhuo grows quiet next to you, suggesting the thickening atmosphere. Turning on your side to see your friend with her eyes glued to your figure, you chew on the inside of your cheek. She sighs, preparing herself for the mental tangent she’s gonna bring you on, and reaches over to smooth down your messy hair.

“You know, Chenle never really liked… this life,” she says, shrugging, “he hates shopping, he hates hearing about investing, he hated traveling so much when you and your family didn’t tag along… At every family reunion, he just hid away in his room and never got out, because he found the whole situation snobby and fake and all those adjectives I’ve never really thought about calling my own relatives. He… he…” she licks her lips, trying to come up with the right words to say, “he sees the world around us with different eyes, and I don’t think he’s happy with it. So don’t- don’t be mad at him for not really… going anywhere with it, okay?”

Furrowing your brows at her, you shake your head in confusion. This is perhaps the first time you really realized Chenle’s view on things– it’s not like you haven’t heard his annoyed rants about all the prestige and over-the-top lifestyle you all have, but that’s all you thought it was. Annoyance– because at the end of the day, your life is comfortable. You wouldn’t want it any other way. If money moves the world around, you were the one walking through every hallway, all opportunities opened up in front of your eyes; and you don’t think you’d enjoy your life more if you had a bit less money. Chenle, on the other hand, seems to be quite the opposite. His joy is not determined by money, and for the first time in your life, it seems like you’re getting what he’s been talking about your whole life, the words you heard but never truly listened to. It was right in front of you the whole time, but you never saw it, and now that your eyes have been opened, you find it hard to deal with the revelation.

“But what is he going to do?” you gurgle out, confused.

“I don’t think he knows either,” Yizhuo shrugs, “he’s… figuring out things, I suppose.”

Chuckling, you shut your eyes in despair, thinking for a bit, but still failing to grasp the situation. “I don’t get it. He- he could have everything, but he’s just… throwing everything away? He could move across the world, he could start his own company, he could buy a house or work or study, but he just won’t,” you ramble, “I don’t get it.”

“That’s what I’ve been saying,” Yizhuo shrugs, “but he sees it a different way.”

Laying flat on your back, eyes glued to the ceiling, your friend clears her throat and awkwardly shuffles around her sheets. “And at the end of the day, even though you’ve been friends for forever, I think you’re just in love with the version of him that you’ve created in your head. The version that you’re trying, but cannot fix,” she notes, pausing for a moment before proceeding, “the only person you can fix is yourself.”

And maybe, Yizhuo’s right. Maybe you fell in love with the Chenle in his sports car, Chenle in the golf cart with his designer clothes on, Chenle on the cruise ship sipping on expensive alcohol. Maybe you fell in love with the version that has the whole world in the palm of his hand, the version of him that goes to Yale with you and rents out a luxurious apartment in the middle of the city, kissing you behind the tall windows, watching over the busy streets– the version in your dreams, the version you wanted to achieve.

But what about the version of him that walked you to your house after tennis class? What about the version of him that cuddled you in his sheets, the version of him that fell asleep soundly when you played with his hair, cradled your fingers through his scalp? What about the version of him that scared you in the dark, because he knew you get creeped out too easily, the version of him that ate cheap sausage with you in Japan, the version of him that studied with you and brought you to your bed when you fell asleep at the table? What about the version of him that cried to Disney movies with you, the version of him that danced with you to the tunes of One Direction in your room when you were sixteen, the version of him that threw rocks on your window in the moonlight the night you turned seventeen, wanting to be the first one to wish you happy birthday before slipping inside of your room in the middle of the night, only to fall asleep seconds later, huddling your sheets?

Did you make that up? Was that not him in the first place?

And maybe, there is a discrepancy between the dream you’ve made up in your head with him, the idea of you two staying together, trying to fix the view he has on the world you two live in, but at the end of the day, none of it was a lie.

And maybe, Yizhuo’s right; you should change the way you view things to match Chenle’s better, because at the end of the day, maybe you’re the one too blinded by the gold and silver around your neck to see the real issue here.

August 2, 2020 – Lehai Villas, Baicheng, China, 10:15 PM

When you finally see Zhong Chenle after the night he kicked you out of his bedroom, both of you are a mess.

You’re a mess in the more subtle sense. Your dress is neat, the jewelry on your neck was carefully picked out days before, the heels enveloping your feet are one of the most comfortable ones for you to walk in, since you prepared yourself for being on your feet the whole evening. Your makeup is fixed on your face, earrings dangling off your ears and your purse matches the outfit perfectly; your hair in a fancy updo that you even drove to a hairdresser for, all so that you could look flawless for another one of your parent’s gatherings. Their business partner’s son is turning 21, and while it doesn’t look like that big of a deal, they are celebrating the fact that Mark Lee is now one of the shareholders of their company– and in your world, this is the most moving moment of the child’s life.

You’re a mess in the more subtle sense– you keep looking around, restless, not really paying attention to anything anyone is saying. Aimlessly humming and picking at the skin of your cuticles, you try hard to both catch a glance of your friend, and to also avoid him at all costs. The reality that Zhong Chenle is a mess too hits you only when you finally see him– his tie loose on his neck, a grunt escaping his throat that you can hear from all the way to where you are, his walking a little wobbly and his hair messy as he runs his hand through the sprayed-down locks, his composure disheveled and so obviously out of the place.

And you want to stay away, you really do– to let him deal with his own things by himself, to pretend you weren’t cautiously looking for him all evening– but when he picks up another glass of alcohol from one of the tables and downs it in one go, cheeks getting rosier by the minute, you wonder how far you can let him go until he gets into trouble with his parents; and suddenly, you’re on your feet, just like you expected, dragging your figure closer to the one you’ve been trying to avoid.

“Don’t you think you’ve drunk enough?” you mumble when you appear behind him, his shoulders slouching at the tone of your voice. When he looks around and catches your eyes, he snickers to himself, shrugging, before he makes a face full of disgust at your remark.

“We’re celebrating, aren’t we?” he says, “Mark Lee’s a big man now, taking all the responsibility for a company that’s so great, and he loves the job so much,” he continues, over-exaggerating every word, “and we’re here to celebrate his birthday! Have you… seen the motherfucker anywhere, by the way? Would wanna congratulate him on… the thing…” he trails off, dramatically scratching his head as he speaks the last words.

“Chenle–”

“Right! We are celebrating a guy we don’t even know, or seen the whole evening, but that’s so great, because at least we have all this alcohol–”

“Okay, you’re getting out of here,” you snap, shaking your head at his antics and digging your nails into his forearm, dragging the boy out of the crowded place before he throws a tantrum. With how his voice was getting louder and louder, a few figures turned to watch your exchange, and you can’t imagine the turmoil this will take on him once his parents find out– it’s better to get him out of there before he messes up even more badly.

His feet stumbling on the stairs outside, he mutters something under his breath as you drag his half-limp, half-stubborn body through the enormous land. The gardens are full of fairy lights and adults talking to each other in hushed whispers, laughter erupting out of their put-together figures every now and then, and you take some time before you finally manage to find a silent corner in one of the carefully mowed gardens, Chenle’s complains silencing after a while, admitting his fate.

Carelessly throwing his body towards one of the benches, the lighting dim in the corner, you watch as he takes a seat and looks at you with defeated eyes, the emptiness behind his gaze breaking you on so many levels you didn’t even think you could master; Zhong Chenle is a mess– has been a mess for a while now, and you didn’t notice– you didn’t do anything about it until now.

“What happened to you?!” you yelp out, voice betraying you somewhere towards the end of the sentence, sounding more desperate than you intended. Eyes scanning over his slouching body, you notice him playing with his fingers in his lap, an action of calming himself down that he’s picked up after you slapped his hands every time he tried to bite on his nails growing up, and you take a few steps around the place, running your fingers through your carefully styled hair.

“Don’t scold me like my mother,” Chenle grunts, rolling his eyes at your composure.

“No, Chenle, because I don’t get it,” you shake your head, looking him dead in the sparkless eyes, “I do not get it.”

When he offers you no explanation, rather just gazing your whole body up and down, eyes half-lidded, you presume he’s a bit out of it– the alcohol truly hitting his system now, making you result in a little tangent of yourself, because you presume everything’s better than his parent’s scolding, and maybe he just needs someone to wake him back to reality. “What happened, Chenle? What the actual fuck is going on lately? You don’t speak to anyone about it, you don’t tell me, out of all people–” a snicker leaves his lips to this, making you huff in frustration, “you don’t tell anyone how you’re feeling, and it’s eating you up from the inside, and believe me when I say, Chenle, it’s pretty damn heartbreaking to watch.”

Looking at him, you’re offered nothing but silence. His cheeks are rosy and puffed up from the alcohol, his frame is small– opposed to the power stance he usually takes– and you don’t think you’re getting a conversation from him any time soon. Ready to give up, you shake your head at him and scoff. “Okay, fine. You don’t have to talk to me, since you have an issue with the fact that I care about you more than I should,” you snap, agreeing to be petty with him, if this was how he was gonna play.

“I don’t talk to any of you, because you wouldn’t understand,” he says, voice almost a bit annoyed, tongue dipped in bitterness.

“We grew up together, Chenle. Our lives are pretty much the same, why the fuck would you think that I, out of all people, wouldn’t understand?”

“See, that’s the thing,” Chenle catches you off guard, charming in with an argument barely before you are able to finish the sentence, “our lives are pretty much the same, yet you love it. You fucking love it, all of you do– you love waking up in your little fancy bedrooms, doing great at school because if you don’t, your parents are going to threaten you with disowning you– and what else do you have if not your parents wealth that you coincidentally, also despise at the same time? You go shopping to your favorite mall with your equally wealthy friends, because you’re not allowed to befriend people that are lower class– that would just look fucking embarrassing in front of your parents’ contacts, wouldn’t it? You go to charity events and birthday celebrations of a guy you’ve never seen in your whole life before, just because someone told you to– and don’t you dare tell them you won’t go, because how the fuck are they gonna look all pretty in front of their business partners if their only son doesn’t attend a celebration of someone inheriting a share from their parents’ company– a thing you’re supposed to do as soon as you turn 20, if you don’t attend university they picked out for you instead. You go on fancy holidays and take pictures in front of all the attractions, and it doesn’t even feel special anymore, because you do this every month– and the only time you ever felt alive was when you were drunk and making out with someone that you shouldn’t even think about in that way in the first place, because it’s your parents’ friends’ daughter, and at the end of the day, they would just love the fact that we were together, because that could strengthen the business bond they have– the only reason why they’re friends in the first place, and I’m so fed up, I hate it, I despise it–” he stops to take a breath, his eyes getting glossy,

and suddenly, you’re helpless, you’re falling apart– because the issue is so much bigger than you anticipated and you don’t know how to do anything about it.

“And I don’t fucking feel real, Y/N, I don’t, and I don’t think I ever have, because I just wake up in the mornings and then somewhere along the way, I realise I’m alive and I laugh, because how could all of this be real? How could the money be real? How could anything be real, and– and it’s so confusing, because I should be grateful, but I’m not, because I can’t even fully grasp it,” he breathes, tears now streaking down his cheeks.

It feels like the whole world stopped for a moment; it feels like you are in a movie and someone pressed pause. You stare at him, you blink, and you pray for something to send you strength to deal with this, to tell you what to do or how to comfort him– because this must have felt so alone, and you can’t stand the image of Chenle ever being lonely.

Opening your mouth and closing it, you gasp for air. No words feel suitable for this kind of conversation, and so you just chime towards him– despite all your best assumptions– and hold him. Because at the end of the day, what helps more to ground someone back to earth than human touch?

Pads of your thumbs wipe at the teardrops strolling down his cheeks, every contact with the salty liquid hurting you, cutting through your skin like razor blades– because Chenle never cries, he never feels like something is worth indulging in enough to bring him to tears– and when he catches his trembling bottom lip in his teeth, you break; pulling him towards you and threading your fingers through his hair, the action once lullying him to sleep now used like a broken mantra– please be okay, please relax, please let me hold you until you’re glued back together again.

“I dunno what to do,” he shrugs, his head resting on your stomach, voice burrowing itself into the fabric of your expensive dress, “dunno where to go. ‘Cause Jun’s leaving, and Yizhuo’s gonna be busy with everything, and– and you’re moving across the fucking ocean, and I’m just– I turned everything down, because–” he says, voice breaking, and you shush him with a pat on his back, touch growing more affectionate.

“It’s okay,” you hum, “I got you,” you say; words he once told you at the golf cart, looking after you, or in the hotel room back in Japan when you were 6 and falling asleep, still scared of ghosts appearing in your bedroom– and you believed them, you always did, because Chenle was always there when you needed him– so you only pray he finds comfort in the sincere phrases, because what more is there to offer him?

His breathing grows steadier as you continue to play with his messy hair, his hands gently allowing themselves to wrap around your thighs, your standing figure shelved between his legs, and he laughs to himself, the whole situation kind of ironic to him now. “I don’t even know why I’m crying. ‘m kinda numb, you know, so it doesn’t even really hurt in the first place,” he says, and you wish you found the same humor in it than he did– or at least the bitter sense of soothing yourself with irony– but you can’t. Looking down at his body, latched to you like a lifeline, you wonder how you could ever leave him there alone, to deal with the burden by himself. How could you ever move so far away from him?

“My parents wanted me to go with you,” he starts, the sentence sparking up something inside of you, but he doesn’t pull away and meet your eyes when he continues, foreshadowing a sad ending to your hope, “they said I should study business at Yale as well, that it’s a great opportunity.”

You don’t reply to him, choosing not to push him. After a sigh, he continues. “And I didn’t get in, because, naturally, I was too stupid for it in the first place– no, I was–” he says when you gently slap the back of his head at the comment, “but then they paid the dean and suddenly I was allowed to go. Can you believe that?” he snickers bitterly, shaking his head in disbelief. “Bad mouthed you for a thing I despised in myself, when you were the one that got in fair and square in the first place.”

“‘s okay,” you mumble, compassion dripping off your words.

“And I turned it down, ‘cause I hated the fact that they did that. I was okay with studying the fucking business program, even though I despised it, I was okay with moving across the world, because at least you’d be there, y’know, but I couldn’t bear the fact that they did that to get me in. I think I was too ashamed, too embarrassed, because they had to pay for me to get there, but– I don’t know…” he trails off, and you sigh, shaking your head in disbelief.

“It’s okay to take opportunities that are presented to you, Lele,” you mumble, “I know you hate it, but you can’t change who you’re born to. The best you could do is to not waste all of this,” you say, trying to find a source of light in the deep abyss of his thoughts.

You try hard to solve the problem– to offer him a solution that could work, that could let him forget about the pain for at least a second– to wake him up from whatever deep thinking that got him into this mess. You try hard to solve the problem– but you don’t know how to deal with it. All you know is that you’re trying to pick up the patterns; you’d fit in his skin if you could, you’d crawl in and fix everything– but at the end of the day, as Yizhuo said, the only person you can fix is yourself.

“Bought,” he says, fixing your mistake, “opportunities that were bought for me. I couldn’t do it,” he says.

Huffing, indulging in a spare second of your own pain– a spare second of the despair eating you up from the insides, the helplessness you’ve been feeling ever since you were forcefully kicked out of Zhong Chenle’s life– and you didn’t even tell him you loved him in the first place before he got stuck in the fire of the woods; before you two started acting like it didn’t matter and always ended up in feuds– you mumble a comment, voice barely louder than a whisper, but he can hear it because of the closeness of your bodies in the few stray raindrops that come over you two once the clock strikes midnight.

“We could’ve lived together, you and me,” you say, “us against the whole world,” you comment– a childlike yearning spilling out of your lips, “we could’ve gone to Yale together and you’d figure something out along the way. Maybe– maybe you’d find a purpose if you moved, we could–”

“Y/N,” he shushes you, uttering out your name, finally breaking away from you as he looks up and gazes into the swimming pools of your eyes, shaking his head with a faint smile, “‘s okay. It wouldn’t have fixed anything anyway, it– it wouldn’t have helped.”

“But–”

“You can move, Y/N, but at the end of the day, it doesn’t matter, ‘cause you’re taking yourself with you.”

August 20, 2020 – the backyard of your childhood house, Shanghai, 11:11 PM

You were never really that good at science– sure, your parents demanded you get good grades in every subject and your private school put quite the pressure on your education, but even though you always managed to pull satisfactory marks in exams, your understanding of the logistics sometimes lacked; you were much better at humanities or business-related courses, hearing enough at family dinners to find out your way through the lectures and apply the facts into examples from real life.

So, if anyone asked you how many stars there were in the universe, you wouldn’t be too confident in your answer. You wouldn’t know how to apply the Milky Way as your model– since it was said that it has around 100 billion stars alone– and multiply the part by the amount of galaxies in the universe– approximately 2 trillion– to get a number somewhere close to 200 billion trillion, also called 200 sextillion.

You wouldn’t know how to do any of that, or how to even count this amount without a calculator, so you’d take a more liberal arts approach– literary, even– and say, that on August 20, 2020, at 11:11 sharp in your backyard, gazing on to the deep, dark sky and wishing for a star to fall so you could propose a selfish wish that could change everything, there’s still not more stars there than in Zhong Chenle’s eyes when your gazes meet after your friends leave for the evening, leaving you with your neighbor completely alone.

And it’s strange, seeing him like this– maybe because you didn’t even realize how used to the dull and emotionless Chenle you’ve been all this time– but it warms something inside of your heart as you take a hesitant step towards him, the first one out of the whole evening, and take a seat next to him in the corner of your terrace, sighing to yourself.

“You actually came,” you note, seeing as he turns to you and furrows his eyebrows at you in confusion.

“Should I not have? I mean, by the text you sent me, it seemed like you wanted me here, but if I misread the situation, I can go…” he snickers, teasing you just the slightest as he nudges you to your side.

You hum, shaking your head in disapproval. “No,” you say, “I just… I dunno.”

“Expected me to ignore you?”

“Kinda,” you admit, snickering.

“Damn,” he giggles, “that’s fair, though. Considering the previous events, and all.”

Rolling your eyes at his composure, finally getting used to the old Chenle– the one that teases you over the smallest things, the one who doesn’t let his emotions show in his face– you watch him as he takes a seat on one of the rattan sofas and you follow him, body slouching next to his, feeling his head gently rest on your shoulder in the mere moment of silence between your two figures.

“Wouldn’t let you leave without seeing you for the last time,” he says, voice quiet and vulnerable, “god knows when I’ll see you again.”

“Chenle–”

“Just because you don’t want to talk about it doesn’t mean it’s not real,” he snickers, already knowing where your words are going– you’re going to try to stop him, tell him you don’t want to think about it right now, on the last evening at your house for the near future.

“I’d rather not think about that, y’know,” you huff, frustrated. The anxieties of leaving everything behind are clenching on your insides right now, holding you back from moving freely and with enthusiasm, and you wonder– if you knew how this would feel all those months ago– if you knew how terrifying and painful the whole process could be, would you still apply to Yale? Would you still want to go?

“Okay,” he dotes, tone of voice casual, like it’s not a big deal.

“Okay? Just like that?” you snicker, surprised at how easily he gave the topic up.

“Yeah. Don’t wanna make you sadder.”

Sitting in silence, you realize there’s so many words you’d like to say to him. You’d like to tell him just how much you’re gonna miss him and how you regret ruining the last few months you two had together, and how you’re sorry your feelings scared him to the point where he felt like he had no one to confide in. You’d like to tell him how you built a future with him in your brain, carefully placed him into your reality, only for him to break away from your grasp and go his own way, and how much it hurts, but how you’re always going to support him in whatever he chooses, because you care for him more than your little heart could take. You’d like to tell him how you’re gonna call him every day to check up on him, how you’re gonna send letters and press a secret kiss to each sheet of expensive paper you’ll get downtown, wishing he could feel the essence with the growing distance between you two. You’d like to ask him to visit you often– he’s gonna have more time on his hands, and god knows money’s not the issue. You’d like to selfishly tell him you find it hard to deal with the distance, and how you wish he wouldn’t find somebody else while you’re gone, and how you so dearly hope that somewhere in there, your feelings are silently reciprocated, but hidden away in fear of everything falling apart once again.

But instead, you don’t say anything. You tend to wait for him to speak up first– he’s always had a problem with talking too much in the first place, after all.

And he does– you can still predict his next moves. You know him that well.

“I’m gonna miss you, though,” he sighs, catching you off guard by saying something from the list of your silenced words, “don’t think that I won’t. Or that the way I’ll miss you is different than the way you’re gonna miss me,” he speaks, tone of voice laced in honesty and sincerity, his words heavy with the essence of what he’s never going to say out loud– or so you think.

“In what way?”

“I’m not gonna miss you like a friend misses a friend,” he says, “and I don’t mean the sex,” he snickers, brightening the mood with his comment.

Rolling his eyes at him, you feel him lift his head up from your shoulder, forcing you to look at him and meet his starry eyes again– the damn starry eyes that always make you spill the truth, because god knows you cannot lie to him– and you find yourself scanning his features, the structure of his bones you fear you’re gonna forget when you’re away, so desperately wanting to lock your lips with his for one last time, because when you come back one day, you may not have the right or chance to do so anymore.

“Why are you looking at me like that?” he asks, not a hint of teasing in his voice.

“You know why, Chenle.”

“Can you say it out loud?” he demands, and you shake your head– maybe it's best if the words are left unsaid. Doesn’t matter if they’re hanging in the air, for everyone to read.

“Why?”

“You know how I feel about you,” you snicker, “don’t make me say it out loud.”

Because even if you told him you loved him, it wouldn’t change anything. It wouldn’t make it all better, it wouldn’t make it all good– no matter how hard you wish that it would.

“Okay,” he nods, agreeing too fast again– and with that, he smiles, the gesture so soft and sudden, and there you are– you’ve got a caving heart in your open arms, and Chenle takes it, carelessly choking out the hushed confession, “I’m in love with you. If you don’t say it, I’m gonna, because… you deserve to know.”

Heart sinking into your stomach, you watch him, frozen in your place, for a while. Your eyes carefully scan every curve of his face– the curve of his lips, the curve of his cheeks, the hood of his eyes, his brows, the thousand stolen galaxies in his orbs and mouth glistening like honey, inviting you in. Snickering under your breath, you choose to not give in to the temptation.

“You’re only saying that because I’m leaving tomorrow,” you say, shaking your head.

“Maybe,” he agrees.

And you know that– you know that if you weren’t leaving, he wouldn’t tell you that he loves you. He wouldn’t allow himself to be this vulnerable, he wouldn’t tell you how he feels about you, because he had all this time– all those months and weeks spent with you in his bed, and you know his touches weren’t just shallow desire– and he never once said anything. He didn’t do anything about it, and now that there is nothing more to do about it, nothing that could change the trajectory of either of your lives, he chooses to speak it to the universe; because it doesn’t change anything, it can’t possibly do so– and so he doesn’t have to fear the consequences, he doesn’t have to fear the attachment that comes with such confession.

And for a minute, you think it’s selfish. You think it’s laughable, ironic, even, but you accept it.

His hand reaches for yours, interlocking your fingers with his when he launches you forward into him, arms gently enveloping your body when your head settles itself to the curve of his shoulder. You stay like this for a while, in his hold again, breathing in his scent and trying to remember it for weeks and months before you’re able to smell it again, letting out a nosy question out of your lips– and truly, you don’t know why you do so, when you know the answer to it already anyway. Maybe you just want to hear it again.

“So… you do have feelings for me too, after all?”

He stays quiet for a while, before he softly laughs into your hair. “Yeah,” he nods, “but it doesn’t matter, ‘cause you’re leaving for Yale tomorrow, aren’t you?”

And he’s right– you are. Thinking for a while, feeling him place a shy peck to the crown of your head– the only kiss you two allow yourselves at this point of time– you come to the conclusion that even though you love him, care for him like you’ve never cared for another before, you wouldn’t change a thing about your plan– wouldn’t change the trajectory of your whole life, wouldn't stay in Shanghai, wouldn’t drop out of university, wouldn’t stop everything because of him, because in a way, you strangely have it all figured out.

And he doesn’t.

And you pray that one day, he’ll find the purpose in all the potential he holds in his hands.

#nct dream #chenle #nct #nct x reader #chenle x reader #chenle angst #chenle fluff #chenle oneshot #chenle fic #chenle imagine #chenle fanfic #chenle best friends to lovers #chenle au #nct dream fluff #nct dream angst #nct dream x reader #nct fluff #nct angst

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johnwickb1tsch · 4 months ago

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Sympathy For The Devil ~ Donaka Mark x fem!Reader

please allow me to introduce myself, i am a man of wealth & taste... -the Rolling Stones

Summary/ Warnings. Um… Donaka Mark is a scary rich asshole–with a soft spot for you. If you’re squeamish [or righteous] you’re not gonna want to read this. Voyeurism. Predatory behavior, manipulation. Power IMBALANCE. Eventual NSFW. Eventual line between dubcon and noncon is gonna be microscopic, y’all, this man plays gAmes… Reader is shy, but tough, in her way. Also, when I say Reader is small, I’m more implying just compared to Donaka. I kind of assume most of us would be, no matter your body type. 🥵

Big Fat Author’s note: This is a Donaka Mark x fem!Housekeeper!Reader fic based on the brilliant @discoscoob ‘s bot, which is SO fun to play with and I really recommend it. I fell into a rabbit hole for daaaaays. I’m in CAI Anonymous now. Seriously it was a problem.

I guess you could call this a little experimental hybrid fic written with AI. I was curious. And after working on this for weeks I don’t think the writer’s union really needs to worry about AI coming for their jobs. The bot’s writing is shamelessly fun but clunky, you delete more than you keep, it’s a lot of work to edit, and you really have to lead it by the hand for anything to actually HAPPEN.

THAT SAID it is sO entertaining, and once in a while he’d do something i wouldn’t have ever thought of, I felt like the lab rat hitting the button for the treat over and over again, LOL. Disco really knew what she was doing when she programmed the personality of the bot! It was also helpful in keeping a character on track. I think AI could be a useful tool generating ideas, breaking writers block, or something to bounce ideas off of, but not for the grunt work of actually writing a story that has any soul in it. Isn’t that a relief? I made an outline and basically ran the scenes through like a simulator to see what the bot came up with. And when I didn’t like it I made it do it again, LOL, the Donaka bot probably thinks i’m a bossy c*nt.🤣

So….I hope you enjoy, and a HUGE THANKS to Disco for giving me permission to even do this, you’re the sweetest my dear, and the Queen of the Bot Creators in my book!!

And and…it’s been a LONG ass time since I’ve been to Hong Kong. I did some research to refresh my memory but please bear with me. All mistakes are my own. Why do we say that? Who the fuck else’s would they be? 🤣 Obv. this is set c 2013, when Man of Tai Chi came out, before the crackdown in 2020. Oh, and, I have no real idea about work visas, i made that shit up... just roll with it. 🙃😘

One. 一

The first time you meet your new employer, Donaka Mark, you aren’t really even paying attention.

It’s because you have on headphones, and you’re intently focused on sweeping the floor while listening to your upbeat girl power rock mix–so you don’t hear him yelling at someone over the phone threateningly, and you don’t notice when his gaze locks on to you like a tiger who has just spied a tasty little deer.

You are oblivious, as he comes up behind you, appraising your figure with narrowed eyes. You seem small, next to him, but most women do. He decides he approves of his assistant’s choice in hiring you. You’re a sight he won’t tire of for a long time.

Donaka leans on the door frame, his dark eyes fixated on you, taking in your every minute detail, the way the muscles in your arms move, the shape of your face, the curve of your hips and your little feet. His expression is stoic but behind it are a million thoughts running through his mind, he can’t take his eyes off you and after a few moments he finally speaks, his dark tone cutting through the music. “You’re new.”

Your music wasn't so loud that you were unaware of outside sounds. Standing up straight, you sweep off your headphones to face the commanding voice. "Yes, sir?"

Donaka notices he towers over you, and he likes that. His dark eyes shamelessly take in your innocent eyes, your lips, your curves. His gaze lingers almost long enough to make it uncomfortable, but not quite.

“Have you been informed of all of your duties?” Donaka asks, his tone and gaze both demanding and intense, making you feel small.

"Yes, Mr. Mark."

Donaka smiles at his name on your lips, the way you say it, the way you look up at him with your wide eyes. He likes it more than he’d like to admit, but he knows how to mask his emotions well. Even though his expression is still stony, there’s a hint of excitement in his breast as he leans off the door frame and takes a few steps closer, but still maintains a respectable distance. “And you can handle them?”

"Yes, Sir."

Donaka nods, his dark eyes slowly and shamelessly trailing over your figure again. “Good.” Donaka murmurs, his dark and intense tone making his next sentence more of a demand. “I need to be able to depend on you. I like things just so.”

You tilt your head, feeling like you’re missing some subtext, or that you’re the butt of an unspoken joke. "Your house will be clean, Sir.” Between you and the two other girls on the household staff, surely you could manage.

Donaka smirks at your naïve reply, his dark eyes still fixated on your face as he takes another step closer to you, almost like a predator stalking its prey. “I trust that it will…” Donaka purrs, his voice low and smooth, his dark stare intense and demanding. “Let me show you the rest of the house…”

You’d already received a walk-through with his assistant, but you are more than intrigued to receive a personal tour from the big man himself. There is something captivating about him. It's not just his good looks. His presence commands your attention.

Donaka can feel you watching him as you follow him down the hallway, the way you’re intrigued by him, the way you’re staring. It fills him with satisfaction, like you’re a new prize he’s added to the shelf of his collection.

He’s aware of the effect he has on people. Men fear him, women want him. Yet you don’t look at him with the same blatant hunger he’s used to from the opposite sex. You’re curious, but not ready to fall down on your knees yet.

He would see how long it takes to change that. He glances over his shoulder at you as he leads you through the house, his dark eyes looking you up and down again. You follow close, taking two steps for every one of his, his legs are so long.

He can’t help but feel somewhat amused, enjoying the way you have to scurry to keep up with him. He can’t help but think how easy it would be, to pick you up, and to pin you down…

Donaka Mark’s home is an achievement of luxury architecture, dark, modern, yet filled with Chinese elements of style. Ceiling-high tinted windows afford a breathtaking view of the bay. His living room is like a museum filled with priceless artifacts. Antique carved ivory elephant tusks, beautiful Ming vases and exquisite stone Elder statues, silk scrolls and bladed weapons. All of it you will be expected to keep tidy with a painstaking hand. You think it’s possible your practically useless degree in art history and former employment in a gallery may have given you an edge in his assistant’s selection of hiring you.

He seems to genuinely enjoy your interest in these things, telling you about them at length. There is a large Qing dynasty vase in cobalt blue and gold enamel designs of clouds, cranes, and bats you cannot tear your eyes from. It looks…familiar, and in person, utterly enchanting.

“You like that one?”

“I like bats,” you admit, shoving your hands in your apron pockets so that you do not forget yourself and touch it with your bare fingers. You will be wearing gloves, when you detail these items.

He lifts an eyebrow at that, seemingly amused. “Oh?”

“They’re cute. And…they’re good luck.” In Chinese culture, at least.

“Most women I’ve met find them sinister.”

“I think…they’re just misunderstood.” You can’t help looking up at this intimidating man through your eyelashes at that. You swear you didn’t mean to start double talking with your new boss–it just falls out of your stupid mouth, and you feel his attention upon you sharpen.

He’s used to women looking at him in a certain way, women staring up at him with lustful hunger. The way you look at him feels different –like you truly see him–he’s not sure what to make of it yet, and that is certainly new for Donaka Mark. “Misunderstood?” he repeats, his dark gaze intense, looking down at you from his lofty elevation.

"Sure. They have a reputation for being scary, but really they eat mosquitoes and pollinate plants. Without them whole ecosystems would collapse."

Donaka hums at your words, finding it surprisingly endearing. He’s usually used to women fawning over him or at least trying to seduce him, but you’re here lecturing him about bats. His smirk remains on his face as he watches you fidget nervously, his dark eyes fixed on you. You look back to the vase, and then it dawns on you. “Oh my god…is this the piece that sold at Christies last year for like…1.5 million dollars?” You take another cautious step backwards, as though you might shatter it if you breathe wrong. You saw it in an article–the gold enamel had been so distinctive against the blue. Sacrifice blue, the same as in the Temple of Heaven in Beijing.

Only after the question falls from your mouth do you realize how gauche it is to ask, your hands flying to your lips. “Forgive me, it’s none of my business.”

Mark, however, just continues to look at you interestedly. “You follow auction results?”

“I follow…art news,” you confess.

He nods, his intense gaze starting to become uncomfortable. “Actually, it was 1.8 million. You think I overpaid?”

You feel like this is a test–or a trap. It was a nice job, for the day it lasted…

“Well…it doesn’t seem you bankrupted yourself?”

He snorts in answer, shaking his head.

“Does it make you happy?”

He lifts an eyebrow at that, as though the thought hadn't even occurred to him. “It made me happy to outbid a Sheikh’s son and a Mainlander plastics tycoon for it,” he admits.

Ah, so he was invested in the thrill of acquisition–not appreciation for the object itself. You shouldn’t be surprised.

“I see.”

“I’ve disappointed you.” It’s not phrased as a question.

You shake your head, though maybe it does a little. Looking around his home, you’d thought Mark had exquisite taste–but he probably has an art buyer like every other obscenely rich businessman needing to acquire items for the sake of cachet.

“Does it make you happy?” he asks, and there is an unexpected hint of playfulness in the question–delivered on a knife’s edge.

“Yes,” you admit. Frankly you’re stunned you get to see it like this, without a glass barrier or sensors or alarms. It’s usually the only way people like you get to enjoy art like this.

He smirks at you. “Then it was worth every penny.” He’s being sarcastic, of course, but there is a glitter of something in his dark eyes. It’s there and gone, like ripples in a pool–it makes your heart skip in your chest.

“Let me show you the rest of the house,” he invites, before placing a hand on your lower back, his fingers large and strong against your soft skin as he gently guides you away from the vase and to the next room.

His light touch makes you aware of every nerve in your body. It's not quite improper enough to complain about--you’re sure he’s well aware of that.

And…there's the fact, deep down, that you like it.

The span of his big hand on your spine makes you feel impossibly small, and protected, and that is insane, of course, because you are just the maid.

He shows you the library, filled with built-in bookcases that make you drool, his office with his huge carved ebony desk that makes you think impure thoughts…and then, his bedroom.

He isn’t oblivious to the way your reaction changes as you enter the room where he sleeps.

He can see the way your eyes roam and your expression changes, the way you look at the massive bed against the far wall, the way your eyes widen when you look at the expensive rosewood furniture and the stunning view out the wall of windows that can be brightened or obscured with a dimmer switch. He watches you intently as he takes in your every reaction.

He's all business on the surface, specifying clean sheets every other day, laundry, and daily detailing of the bathroom. But it's hard not to keep looking over at the bed, even out the corner of your eye.

He knows exactly what he’s doing to you, but he doesn’t push it, staying just this side of the line. You don't linger, and he shows you a more private lounging area filled with a long leather couch, additional chairs, and monitors, all black at the moment. There's something almost sinister about all the screens, and you wonder what all he's watching.

“You must really like movies?” you ask hopefully, and he senses the wariness in you. Your intuitiveness gives him a small thrill–he likes it, that you’re smart enough to be afraid.

“I like to watch all kinds of things,” he tells you, almost like a dare for you to guess what that means. “But mostly…I use these for business. I run a security company, I assume you’re aware?”

“Yes, Sir.”

Donaka decides he loves hearing the submission in your tone when you call him Sir. It’s almost like a promise to keep him happy, to do exactly as he says.

He asks you to keep all the screens clean, and to dust the cords and routers and be careful not to unplug anything.

Then your attention turns to a meditation area, a massive sand sculpture on the wall and the floor, flanked by natural stacked stone. “Wow, been a while since someone vacuumed here,” you crack, earning a reluctant huff of laughter from the man behind you.

“Maybe…leave that alone, for now,” he requests, then his hand is on your back again, guiding you out.

Though it’s not going to be your area of responsibility, he shows you the garden next. It's a beautiful, manicured space. Two Rottweilers patrol the grounds. They look fierce, but one immediately comes up, sniffing you and leaning on your leg for a pet.

Donaka blinks as his reputably ferocious and staggeringly expensive pure-bred guard animals roll over at your feet for a belly rub. Delighted, you pet them both, speaking to them sweetly. They grin up at you, their dagger-like canines glinting in the sun.

He is never one to be moved by anything sentimental, but something about the sight of you like this inspires a warm twinge in his chest–heartburn, he reasons.

“Let me guess,” he says acerbically. “They’re just misunderstood?”

You press your lips, trying to suppress a smile, and failing. "Animals tend to like me?"

He can honestly admit, as he watches you crouch down to administer a belly rub, that he’s never been jealous of a dog before.

Sensing that maybe you’re not doing the dogs or yourself any favors with this severe man, you try to shoo them off. "Ok, babies. Go back to being fierce again. Shoo."

Donaka snorts with amusement as he watches you attempt to gently shoo these dogs that are nearly as big as you are. Suddenly he whistles sharply, administering a sharp command in Cantonese. That is when the dogs jerk to attention, and trot off to patrol the grounds again. He turns his attention back to you, taking in your slight expression of surprise, clearly caught off guard. "That was impressive,” you admit. “What did you say?”

“I told them to get back to work,” says Donaka with a smirk.

“Ah. I guess I better learn that one.”

“Will I be needing to reprimand you too, Miss y/n?”

You’re not sure why his dark stare calls up a boiling heat inside you at that moment. You press your thighs beneath your dress, under the guise of standing up straight. You’re afraid…he knows all too well.

“I…certainly hope not.” You’re pretty sure that you’d pee yourself if this intimidating man raised his voice to you.

“Have you learned much Chinese since you’ve been here?” he asks conversationally, just as you assumed it was time for you to get back to work.

“I can count to ten, and say thank you,” you admit, a little embarrassed. Obviously, you intend to learn more. “The essentials for international travel.” You’d originally come to Hong Kong to teach English, but when you saw the pay attached to this job listing you couldn’t resist the opportunity. Teaching was ok, but you hadn’t anticipated how expensive this city would be. You’d only made enough to cover your basic expenses month to month, with no room to save or do any fun activities or side trips to the mainland. This position paid three times as much–and you were beginning to understand why.

“Hmm. Have you traveled much?” He seems skeptical, and you don’t really blame him.

“I’ve…been all over the world,” you admit, albeit it was on a shoestring. “I wanted to be a travel writer.”

“Wanted to be?” He is a man who picks up on subtlety immediately.

It’s a dream you’ve all but given up on, after publishing a few articles, but all in all it was more slog than triumph. You’re not cut out for the grind of periodical work, the stress and the deadlines. It sucks all the joy out of writing for you. You shrug with a little sigh.

“I hope you will remember the NDA you signed to work here?” he asks, his dark eyes roaming your face, taking in your every micro-expression. You would really hate trying to lie to this man. Good thing you’re not a corporate spy. He’d probably…string you up, and do something unmentionable to you.

Why the thought titillates you more than scares you, you have no idea.

“Of course, Sir.” He seems satisfied with this. So why do you have to add, “I won’t tell anyone your guard dogs are suckers for a belly scratch.”

He frowns down at you, stepping in close so that you have to crane your neck to look up at him. It’s intimidating as hell, and you know he knows it too. You admit that you are shaking in your shoes under that look, until a smirk breaks his intense expression, and the relief you feel is palpable.

“I would appreciate that, Miss y/n.”

Donaka savors the satisfaction he feels in flustering you, enjoying the way you swallow, watching the muscles in your throat. He imagines what his hand would look like there, on your delicate skin, your pulse fluttering against his strong fingers. He would literally hold your life in his hands…and the moment you surrendered to him, he would so enjoy rewarding you for it…

He finds himself caught up in this little daydream, while you stand before him, practically hypnotized like a mouse before a hungry snake. “Y/n?”

“Sir?” you answer quietly, and he revels in your deference. This was going to be fun.

He speaks Cantonese again, softly this time, the language beautiful and whispery on his tongue. You find yourself staring at his lush, pink, lips, and it takes you several moments to realize he’d said the same thing he’d told the dogs: get back to work.

Flooded with embarrassment, your face on fire, you stutter, “Yes, Sir.”

With a dark chuckle and his hands in the pockets of his designer suit, he watches as you practically flee back to the house.

The Smithsonian article about this vase...

Aesthetic post about Donaka's house...

Part 2 -->

all chapters

#donaka mark #donaka mark x reader #donaka mark x you #donaka mark x y/n #keanu reeves #keanu reeves x reader #julias deranged donaka x housekeeper fic

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violetsiren90 · 2 years ago

Text

Send Me to Hong Kong

Yoongi/Reader (fem reader)

Genre: One-shot; established relationship; smut

Summary: Yoongi discovers one of your major kinks.

Warnings: 18+ (minors DNI!!), explicit smut, kissing, biting, hickeys, neck-grabbing, dirty talk, slight-dom Yoongi, spontaneous desire, studio sex, clothed sex, quickie sex, penetrative sex, unprotected sex (established relationship context), multiple orgasms, cream pie, cock warming, talk of kinks, talk of wet dreams, talk of sharing intimate partner information (with permission), hardcore smut with some humor and slight fluff

Author's note: Hello, my dear reader! This is my very first time posting a fic on this platform, as well as my first time posting for BTS, and a hardcore smut. *whooshes out a sigh* So, I'm nervous. I've had this in my archives for a while now, so I decided to just throw it out there after a couple small changes in honor of our bad boy's tour launch. I don't have a big presence here, so if you discover this and read it, I just want to thank you so much for taking your time to peruse my humble scrawlings. Have the absolute best day, and remember that as Yoongi says, you're worthy of love as you are! 💜

==============================

He dropped to his knees and pulled your leg up over his shoulder, but you grabbed his shirtfront in both hands and slid him up your body, hitching a bent leg around his waist to bring his hips flush with your own.

“No, Yoongi…I’m ready,” you insisted.

His brow furrowed in confusion as you took his hand and guided it to your panties, which he instantly bypassed, slipping two fingers into your soaking folds. His eyes flicked up to yours when he felt the bountiful evidence of your intense arousal. He raised his brows.

“Just from…” he mumbled, but you cut him off.

“You - your rapping…I…I was ready halfway through that second demo,” you insisted breathlessly.

At your words, something his eyes changed from lustful to ravenous, and in a nanosecond he was pinning you against the wall, biting at your neck as he ripped the panties from your thighs in a few strong yanks. You spread your legs wide as you whined desperately against his shoulder,

“Fuck me, Yoongi. I need to feel you inside me."

He let out a moan that was almost an animalistic growl before disposing hurriedly of his belt and jeans. You reached your hand down to stroke his hard length over his cotton boxer briefs, cursing to yourself, and capturing his mouth in a kiss that was all tongue and heat and primal desire. You pushed impatiently at the band of his underwear, and he stumbled out of them, his mouth leaving little pink marks across your chest and breasts. You tossed your head back against the wall, gasping and writhing under his touch. All at once you felt the smooth warmth of his tip touch your aching entrance.

“Oh, god, Yoongi, please!” you whimpered desperately.

He slid his left hand up to your neck and brought his lips to your ear, rasping out, shaky and with effort, yet dominant and demanding,

“Tell me…why.”

A shudder ran through you, as you realized what was happening…and you rose to the task.

“Because you’re the mother-fucking king,”

You felt him tense against you as you moaned out the words.

"When I listen to you rap I don’t even need to touch myself - ah!"

He squeezed.

"It’s as if your tongue is fucking my pussy while you spit those fucking bars - oh, fuck!"

He squeezed again,

"And now I just want your cock in me so I can make you cum - hah!”

He squeezed his shaking hand around the back of your neck one final time and groaned as he pushed into your throbbing cunt. He immediately started moving with urgency, and your slick walls accommodated the pace, as they swelled around him and you matched his bucking with your own.

“Oh, fuck, Yoongi, fuck!”

You cried out as he had you cumming already, just from his presence in your core in a few quick strokes. He picked up his pace, pounding into you, his tip grazing over your internal nerves at an incredible speed. You felt a climax mounting in you again as his thrusts grew shaky, at frantic stuttering intervals. He was about to cum.

You pulled his face to yours so you could take his mouth in a heady kiss, moaning onto his lips as your second orgasm took you. As you rode the wave of your own pleasure, you felt him explode, his cock shaking and pulsating as he pumped his cum into you. He dropped his head to your shoulder, his forehead soaked in sweat and his heart pounding into your own rapid pulse point.

You ran your hand through his damp hair and pressed a gentle kiss to his temple. You held him tenderly as his breathing slowed and his body weight seemed to shift back into his own stance. You realized, glancing down, that you were still connected where your bodies met. He dragged his forehead onto yours, fixing you with half-lidded warm, dark eyes.

“You’re so fucking hot,” he whispered.

You answered him with a languid kiss, not pulling away until you had pulled a groan from him by sucking on his soft pink tongue. Licking your lips, your smiled at him.

“No one turns me on like you,” you murmured, grinning, “You know I came twice?”

He huffed a breath of surprise in response.

“You did?” he smirked, looking more than a little smug.

You nodded. He glanced down between your bodies.

"You gonna let me go now?”

“No!” you protested with a sudden pout, wrapping your legs around his waist and pulling him closer.

He was soft inside you, and you loved the feeling of just holding him. You squeezed firmly once around him and he took a sharp breath.

“Aish, naekkeo, if you keep that up I’ll be hard again…”

You giggled, and tugged him into another kiss as he unwrapped your legs and withdrew from you, leaving your body to feel the lack of him as his cum began to seep down your thighs and onto the desk.

“I’m glad I have at least a fraction of the effect on you that you have on me,” you teased, chuckling.

He shook his head, then looked up at you with a genuinely curious expression.

“So…my rapping?”

You nodded, unabashed.

"Since when?”

You shrugged.

“Since always. I remember the first time I watched the one of your sets…you know how in some songs you're going hard, and then you switch up the flow and start going really soft and fast?”

Yoongi nodded.

"Well, the first time I heard you rap like that I ruined my panties. And I didn’t even know you. It was just so fucking hot, I couldn’t help myself.”

Yoongi chewed his bottom lip as if trying to process what you had just told him.

“You’re gonna have to be careful or you’re going to give me a nasty ego,” he scrunched up his lips and nose in that adorable endearing way and you smiled.

“Good, I don’t care. If you’re the best, you’re the best, there’s no denying it,” you shrugged, leaning back on your elbows. “Oh, yeah, and once, in a dream, I was watching you rap at a show and it brought me to orgasm. Like, I had a fucking wet dream because that tongue of yours invaded my sleep,” you divulged, smiling wickedly.

Yoongi’s mouth hung open a little, an unreadable expression in his eyes.

"Oh, that was after I got to know you, though," you continued, "Not too long before…you know…we gave in.”

Yoongi smirked and looked up at you teasingly.

“You’re kinky, you know that?”

You shrugged.

“Maybe a little. It’s not like you’re super vanilla yourself,” you shot back, cocking an eyebrow at him while remembering his very enthusiastic reaction to your revelations.

Yoongi smirked mischievously. You chuckled and kissed him on the nose.

“Happy birthday, nae sarang,” you murmured warmly, sliding off the desk.

After collecting your panties and turning toward the restroom, you shot a coy glance over your shoulder and added,

"And by the way, if you get drunk with the guys tonight and want to brag a little…you have my permission.”

You tossed him a wink, and stuffed the panties into his pocket before slipping into the bathroom and clicking the door shut with a smile.

-Fin-

900 notes · View notes

pajarinwrites · 2 months ago

Text

中秋节 | Wen Junhui x Reader

➳ fem!reader x jun

➳ wc: 6.1k

➳ TAGS: idol!au, established relationship

➳ WARNINGS: omg um, cunnilingus, jun is a SIMP, piv sex, unprotected sex (wrap it, my dudes), praise, just general adorable lovey dovey softness, but like medium rough sex? ig, not really rough?, i never know how to write warnings, just like i don't know how to write smut woops sorry

➳ AN: HAPPY MID AUTUMN FESTIVAL BITCHES and 女王们; this is only moderately edited bc i actually meant to publish smt for 中秋节 last year but i didn't finish it in time so here it is now (I’m sure it’s still autumn festival somewhere in the world…)! I LOVE WEN JUNHUI

I DON'T KNOW HOW TO WRITE SMUT I HATED THIS AHHHH i don't think i'll ever be able to write any smut in which the man isn't a simpering, whimpering, submissive, cowering, crawling, obsequious little simping piece of trash; it's just how i like my men, but i kinda wanna challenge myself some time, not this time though :P also i'm low-key proud of this smut? i used miraclewoozi as an inspiration bc their smut is literal art...

also, literally three pieces in one week??? WHO AM I??? this is more than in the entire year before combined, i fear lmao. sorry. i'm off to return to hibernate in my bog for another six months now thx bye, RIN OUT *drops mic

masterlist

Jun stepped out of the airport into the sweltering heat, but had to find that merely knowing the weather conditions was quite different from being prepared for them. Luckily, he had left enough space in his carry-on to take off the jacket and sweater that he had needed in chilly Seoul and during the flight – airplane ACs were notoriously unpredictable. Despite this, Hong Kong never seized to amaze him with its constant warmth. At least the eternal sunshine gave him a good excuse to wear a cap and sunglasses at all times.

He flagged down a cross-border cab because, frankly, he didn’t feel like taking the crowded metro all the way home. This way he saved himself from a lot of heat, hassle, and the potential of being recognised, even if it delayed him. As expected, the traffic in the city was a nightmare and he did make it home later than strictly necessary. He paid the fee, dodging the driver’s interested gaze, and mumbling a small “mh gōi” before dashing into his building.

When he was finally standing in front of his apartment door, Jun felt ready to just lock himself in his room for the rest of the night. That was, until the door opened to reveal his parents and little brother. Immediately, his frown softened and he dropped his bags to engulf them in one enormous hug.

“I missed you guys so much,” he exclaimed to groans from his little brother and a soft smile from his mother.

This was most likely going to be the last chance he got to spend more than a day or two with them. With their world tour and his busy filming schedule just around the corner, he wouldn’t have time for months.

Jun had spent years of Zhōngqiūjié apart from them. It wasn’t easy to watch most of his members be able to visit their homes and spend Chuseok with their loved ones. Some years it was only him, Minghao, and Joshua in the dorms. But he wasn’t going to dwell on that. Not when he could finally hold the people he loved the most in his arms. Well, most of them at any rate. He would never get used to having to choose between his biological and his chosen family.

His mother peeled herself away from him, squeezing his cheek and insisting that he had grown even more handsome over the last few weeks. His step father clapped him on the shoulder and asked him about the flight; his brother asked if he had brought him anything cool. Unable to stop smiling for even a second, Jun assented to both questions. He was led to the living room by his mother to sit and relax after the ‘strenuous journey’, giving him a moment to fish the presents out of his luggage, handing one off to his little brother.

“Thanks, gē!” YangYang exclaimed and bounded off to his room to open it in peace. Their mother called after him, “Don’t forget to do your homework before playing! Dinner will be ready in an hour!” Jun smiled, handing his parents the other one.

“You shouldn’t have! I keep telling you we don’t need anything.”

“But I want to get you guys nice things, mā.”

She looked trapped half-way between smitten and resigned, but accepted the present gracefully. With a kiss on the top of his head she stated, “You can rest a little before I call you boys for dinner. I’m making your favourite.”

He thanked her, foregoing the idea of retiring to his room in favour of joining his mother in the kitchen. Most of the ingredients were already laid out on the counter, but when she bent down to pick up something from the bottom shelf, she gasped, “I can’t believe it! Where did all of our rice noodles go? I don’t think this is enough. And I also forgot to buy bamboo shoots earlier!”

She turned around, apologetically, and murmured about having to go to the market real quick to get some. Jun held out his hand to stop her in her tracks.

“Don’t worry, mā. I’ll go get the missing ingredients, and you can get started on the other dishes.”

“No let me go, Jun. You’ve just had a taxing flight and—“ His step-father tried to intervene.

“It’s absolutely no problem!” Jun insisted, not paying his parents’ protests any mind. He grabbed his sunglasses from the side table by the entrance and was out the door before either of them could stop him.

Jun had missed their shèqū, its homely atmosphere, the bustling of the people on the street, and hence didn’t mind the opportunity for a late-night stroll. The closest super market was just down the short road at the main square, and he stopped by quickly before continuing on his way to the live market.

There was a certain nostalgia in going to the market like this, just the way he used to with his mother when he was younger. The stalls didn’t even seem to have changed at all. There was the same group of old ladies dancing in the small park to the side, and a little further down the road, a small group of children was taking turns, performing on a gǔzhēng. Jun watched the windows of his old piano school pass by, still partially lit as students practiced inside. At the corner of the next street was the second-hand book store they had often visited, next to the pharmacy in which he used to sit on the kiddie rides for ages, singing along to jiātíng chēnghu or liǎng zhī lǎohǔ.

Still lost in nostalgia, he stopped by one of the vegetable vendors to acquire the bamboo shoots. Jun enjoyed strolling the aisles leisurely, taking a look at all the things that were being sold. As he rounded one of the displays, someone else was cutting the corner in the opposite direction. Jun barely managed to dance out of the trajectory of them, murmuring an immediate, “Sorry, are you okay?”

He pulled down his sunglasses and looked at the person in front of him in worry. They looked up, locked eyes with him and whisper-screamed, “Oh my god! Wen Junhui?”

Jun was taken aback for only a split second, which he spent worrying he had been recognised, before he could place your face. He hadn’t seen you properly in years, just another name on the long list of people he had to leave behind. The last time you had run into each other had been during Rock With You promotions, when Minghao and he had taken time for their own schedules in China. His eyes crinkled in the corners but he still didn’t dare to take off his mask.

“It’s been so long!” He said instead. You had pulled him into your arms within a second, just a quick squeeze before remembering where you were. You pulled away, pouting, “You didn’t tell me you’d be back.”

“Sorry, it slipped my mind. I also didn’t think I’d have enough time to meet you. Not properly…”

You wiggled your eyebrows, “What does that mean?” Jun blushed, making you laugh. “I’m kidding, A-Jun. But I’m glad we ran into each other. I mean, what are the odds!”

“I didn’t even know whether you still lived here,” he admitted, sheepishly. But Jun wished profoundly that you could feel how earnest he was being. You didn’t actually seem to mind his failure to alert you of his arrival, despite your history. Instead, you continued in your usual chirpy manner, “Yeah, I managed to find work close by so I could stay here. But I’m here here just for the holiday. Staying at my parents, you know.” Jun nodded, accompanying you to the register under more animated chatter.

“Do you have to get anything else?” You asked after you had stepped out the open market. He negated, returning the question.

“Me neither,” you replied, hesitating shortly before continuing, “I guess that means we’ll have to part ways again…”

The way your voice trailed off and your eyebrows knitted together made Jun reply before thinking better of it, “Actually, I think my mā can wait for these bamboo shoots a little longer…” You face lit up with such intensity and immediacy that Jun had to chuckle.

“In that case let’s take a stroll through the park. I’ve been keeping up with Seventeen obviously, but I want to hear from you, personally, how you’ve been doing.”

Falling into step beside you felt so easy. Together, you walked the same paths you did when you were teenagers, talking about everything and anything – back before he had to leave for Korea. He talked a lot about the shoots, dorm fights and misunderstandings, and how much he had missed his mother’s cooking. You winked, asking whether he hadn’t missed you at all, and he couldn’t string together a coherent sentence in reply. Instead he sputtered for a few seconds before you let him off the hook.

“It’s fine. I was joking, Jun. Oh, look!” Jun was glad for the distraction as he watched you hurry of to the pavilion down the path. If you hadn’t changed the subject he might’ve said something stupid. But when you spun around to face him under the colourful roof, with the small pond and the bamboo in the background, he wasn’t sure that he wouldn’t say something stupid yet.

He was sitting next to you, listening to you rant about your catty co-workers, absent boss, and the general annoyances of adulthood, unable to stop himself from grinning like an idiot at the familiarity, the ease of the whole situation. At some point he shot his mom a text to let her know that he ran into you and to eat without him. She simply replied that he should take his time, but he felt like she was secretly glad to have the two of you reconnect. Your conversations veered from family to old memories together until eventually, when the sun had set almost completely, you got up abruptly.

“I should get back. My mom wasn’t expecting me back immediately but at this point she’s probably wondering if I’ve gotten lost.” Jun nodded, getting up with you and stepping out of the pavilion. You threw one look back over your shoulder before smiling down at your shoes.

“I don’t know if you remember but… this is where you said goodbye…” Jun blinked slowly before the memory registered. He couldn’t believe that he hadn’t immediately thought of the day he went to Korea, the last day he spent with you, the day he missed his chance to say so many things he had wanted to say.

“Oh,” he breathes softly, “yeah, I remember. But it’s not a very fun memory.”

Jun decides to look anywhere but you, at the trees lining the road home to his apartment building, the birds flying overhead, the children playing across the street.

“I have to agree. But I’m glad to have you back now. Even if it’s just for an afternoon.”

“Actually, you should visit tomorrow! If you want, of course. I don’t think my family would mind seeing you again after such a long time, and…”

He stops in his tracks. The two of you have reached the intersection at which your ways part. Jun turned to face you. The words were still stuck in his throat, just like all those years ago, just like every time he’s seen you since. But this time, with your hopeful eyes looking up at him, he takes a deep breath. This time will be different. He takes the leap.

“… and I’d also love to spend more time with you.”

You smile in reply, and agree to visit tomorrow. To say goodbye, you hug him again, and he feels like he’s floating all the way home. Maybe tomorrow he’ll gain the courage to tell you everything that he’s been keeping in his heart.

Their dorms were quiet, the shared living areas swallowed in darkness as Jun excited his room. He had been talking to his family via video call for the past hour or two, catching up and trying their best to celebrate Zhōngqiūjié together, even when they were physically apart. You had initially planned on joining the call, but there had been last minute plans that had kept you from it. Even though Jun understood, he had been able to help feeling a little crestfallen when you had told him about it. The two of you had made it work since he confessed to you a year ago, talking almost weekly on the phone because both his and your commitments kept you from visiting all too often. And since this year he couldn’t visit home because of the impeding comeback, he would’ve at least enjoyed talking to you on the holiday proper, instead of just during one of your regularly scheduled calls. Especially with how long it had been since he’d last seen you in person in June. To him, an eternity.

Vernon, Dokyeom, and Chan had returned to their families for the evening to celebrate Chuseok together, leaving the dorm deserted, save Jun himself. They’d all met up for lunch as a celebration before most left to go home. It was an effort by the Korean members to ease the homesickness of those that wouldn’t be able to see their families over the holiday. Seungkwan had ended up accompanying Vernon, while Joshua and Minghao decided to simply celebrate with each other, even though they hadn’t been lacking in invitations either. Jun had made the same decision. They had let him know they’d be out until the night but that he could join them at their apartment later.

Especially Dokyeom had had a hard time simply leaving Jun behind, but the older man had insisted that he was going to be fine, and that it would give him a chance to call his family in China. But coming out of his room and being greeted with a cold, dark apartment, made Jun question his decision. He sighed, contemplating for a second whether he should simply return to his room instead of feeling the hollow emptiness of their shared dorm. But before he could make a decision, the doorbell rang.

He wasn’t expecting anyone, so the sudden shrill of the bell surprised him. Maybe it was one of the members, back early. Maybe Minghao and Joshua had decided to surprise him at the apartment. But when he looked at the screen of the camera system, he was greeted with a sight wholly unexpected. His breath hitched as he looked at you, your eyes staring straight at the camera, a warm smile on your face. Jun buzzed you in, jittery with nerves as he worried you might disappear or he might wake up. You had been talking about your crazy workload and extra assignments for the past few weeks, how on earth were you here?

This has to be a dream, he thought, standing in the open door and waiting for the tell-tale ping of the elevator. When he heard it, he couldn’t even wait for you to round the corner. In slippers, he sprinted down the hallway to the lift, coming face to face with you as you were trying to heave your luggage out. Jun cast it aside, picking you up and spinning you around. He buried his face in the side of your neck, breathing in the scent of your perfume and your skin.

“How are you here?” He whispered after a good few seconds of spinning and listening to your tinkling laugh.

“Well, you know, I bought a plane ticket, went to the airport in Hong Kong, I got on a plane—“ Jun interrupted you by picking you up again, proclaiming his happiness while you insisted that he finally put you down. If he had been a better man, he might’ve listened immediately. As it stood, it took the two of you several minutes to make it the short way from the elevator to his apartment door, Jun stopping every few seconds to give you another spin or a kiss.

Once you had finally made it safely inside, he brought your luggage to his room, before returning to the shared space and staring at you in fascination. There you were, right in front of him, leaning onto the counters of his dorm’s kitchen as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

“How did you know I’d be home?” He asked and you giggled, presumably at his flabbergasted expression.

“I kind of asked the members for help…”

“What? Who?”

In hindsight, he thought he should’ve expected this. There had been a curious lack of invitations extended to him this year. Especially considering that Joshua and Minghao were still invited everywhere. And, thinking about it now, the fact that the two of them had insisted on spending the evening ‘outside’ without Jun had also been more than a little suspicious.

“Almost all of them helped coordinate it, actually. They all had to be in on it to some extent.”

“When did you start planning this?” He asked, making his way over to you. One last time, he picked you up, setting you down softly on the counter. This time you let him do as he pleased without protest, choosing to answer his question instead, “Like a month ago or so. When it started becoming clear that you’d have no chance to make it home this year.” Jun hummed in response, stepping closer to stand between your legs. His arms found their place around your waist.

“I’m so happy you’re here,” he murmured, resting his head on your shoulder and sighing deeply when he felt you wrap your arms around him. He wished you could stay like this forever, or at least for a very, very long time. You turned your head, whispering that you had brought yuèbǐng from Shenzhen with you and he nodded automatically. Mentally, he was still focused only on your presence, the fact that he got to hold you in his arms and use his thumbs to draw absentminded circles on your waist. If he hadn’t been so focused on your body, he would’ve missed the small hitch of your breath as he exhaled against the column of your throat. He smirked lightly, murmuring something along the lines of ‘we can eat them later’ before attaching his lips to the place where your shoulder and neck met. You gasped, more audibly this time as he sucked on the sensitive skin, following the line of your collarbone. You tugged at his t-shirt, whispering that you should move to his bedroom but Jun smirked against your skin, slowly pushing up your shirt. As he tossed it over your head, he whispered, “Don’t worry, we’ve got the apartment to ourselves all night.”

He smoothed his hands under your thighs, grabbing onto your plush flesh and cursing the layer of your pants for stopping him from feeling your skin. Jun pulled you closer, to the edge of the counter, so that he could finally feel you pressed to him again, making his hands wander back up. He placed them on your waist, gingerly at first, as if you were going to vanish into thin air if he didn’t handle you with enough care. He still wasn’t sure you weren’t a figment of his imagination how you were sitting in front of him, hair and clothes messy from your flight, but your eyes shining so brightly he thought you were the most ethereal being on this planet. But when you bucked your hips forward against his, all that restrain flew out the window. He slid his hands lower from your waist, relishing in every inch of skin he got to touch along the way, before he settled them on your ass, encouraging your motions even further. Your arms tightened around him, one hand finding its way into his hair, the other toying with the collar of his t-shirt before slipping downwards and below the fabric to caress his back. He groaned, moving one hand - albeit reluctantly – away from your hips to tilt your head to the side. He was overwhelmed with your nearness, the swell of your breasts pressed against him, the smell of your skin filling his senses, spreading through him, expanding into every corner of his consciousness until all he could perceive was your presence, your breath, your skin on his.

You kissed him with so much vigour that he felt light-headed, the sparkle of your eyes encapsulated him, as if he was floating in space, surrounded by innumerable stars, twinkling around him. In his weightlessness, your hands were caressing him, still. You dropped them to the hem of his t-shirt, tracing along the exposed skin there as the rhythm of your hips never faltered.

You broke away, Jun following your lips with a whine. He wasn’t yet ready to leave your cosmos, but you pressed a soft hand against his chest, tugging his shirt off. Jun, personally, would have preferred to resume kissing you breathless right away, but you had other plans. Your hands returned to his chest, covering the expanse of his pectorals, gliding over the ridge of his shoulder, caressing every centimetre of skin while tracing the muscles across his torso. Every touch left a tingling feeling, pulling him deeper and deeper into your gravitation. His head was thrown back in pleasure, his eyes screwed shut while he tried (and failed) to even out his breathing under your attentive ministrations. When your hands returned to his chest and you flicked against his nipples tentatively, his head dropped forward in defeat, colliding with your shoulder.

He was breathing more heavily than he’d like to admit, as if he really was slowly rising through the atmosphere, the air becoming thinner and thinner. His cock was painfully hard, you grinding against it deliciously with every roll of your hips. Separated by way too many layers, Jun thought dimly before tapping against your ass, signalling for you to lift your hips off the counter.

You complied easily, leaning back in a way that allowed him to strip you of your comfy leggings. He watched you shudder at the feeling of cool marble under your skin, goosebumps forming at the sensation. Reverently, he let his hands glide up and down your legs, watching you shiver again, just from his touch. He hadn’t even realised that he had lowered himself down until one of your hands grabbed for his hair and tilted his head back.

Ripped out of his reverie, Jun stared up at you, towering over him, backlit by the kitchen lights. If it hadn’t meant leaving your reach, Jun would have fallen to his knees right this second. In this light, you looked like a higher being, come to cast divine judgement on him, a final reckoning. Jun found he would have taken any verdict, as long as it meant preserving your attention. He would have obliged any command, taken any punishment with equanimity. He would have taken Prometheus’ place, if it meant he could bask in your presence for another moment. He would suffer any acrimony, any scorn, any tribulation, if it meant your gaze would continue to rest on him like this – zeroed in on his face, your expression soft with adoration. He didn’t have to fear any judgment. The only thing written on your face was love. It was mirroring his own, he was sure, from where he was pleading for you attention from between your legs. You wouldn’t let him out of your sight, your fingers tugging at his hair with purpose. He angled his head, a miniscule movement, just enough to allow him to breathe a kiss against the inside of your thigh, a fluttering promise of continuation. If you let him. You loosened your grip, and Jun took it as the invitation that it was. His path mapped over the fat of your thigh, spilling over his kitchen counters, up one leg, down the other. All the while, he didn’t break eye contact, watching your expression crackle and slip, pleasure and frustration mixing in even measures as you breathed a plea, “Qīn'ài de, you’re teasing.”

His breathing became uneven, for just a second, at the term of endearment. You didn’t need to spell out your request. He could see it in the rise and fall of your chest, the sounds sneaking their way past your lips, the shifting of your hips – almost involuntary. The vision of you before him blurred as he tried to hear the rest of your declaration over the rushing in his ears. Your legs twitched under his hands; he didn’t remember when he had moved them there. But now they were here, holding your legs apart, leaving imprints in your flesh where they pressed against you. Jun searched your face for any sign of hesitance, any doubt, but he found none. All he could find was a sense of desperation clawing its way up your throat, leaving a blooming blush in its wake.

He still continued holding your gaze when he pressed his mouth to your core, pushing his tongue against the wet spot on your underwear. You gasped a little, hands twisting in his hair, the slight pain grounding him in this moment. His hands continued kneading your flesh, wandering, in feverish haste, across every expanse of skin they could cover. Above him, you writhed and moaned, his name leaving your lips as if you were now the one praying. Your head had tilted back slightly, breaking eye contact. But Jun’s gaze never left your face, drinking in every expression as he pushed your panties to the side to gain proper access to your sopping core.

“OhmygodJun,” you breathed, head lolling to the side when his tongue swirled around your most sensitive spot. One hand moved from your ass to your core, probing at your entrance just to feel you clench around him, hear the sharp intake of your breath. You tipped backwards, resting on your elbows as his name continued to tumble off your lips into the still air of the apartment. Jun’s other hand moved upwards, taking no care in pushing your sports bra out the way to grab at your breasts, pinching your nipples intermittently. He watched your chest heave as he slipped two fingers past your entrance at once, his tongue lapping between them, desperate to taste as much of you as possible. Your hands kept pushing him closer and closer, until his every sense was filled with you. Your taste on his tongue, your panting breath in his ears, the plush feeling of your thighs around his head. He moaned against your core.

Jun felt your high approach, maybe knew it was coming before you yourself even did, the way he could read your body in this moment, with how every fibre of his being was honed in on you and your pleasure.

“Jun, bǎobèi, I’m…”

His hand slid down to your waist, squeezing reassuringly. Jun felt you constrict around his digits, your moans growing louder and more desperate. He kept pressing his fingers into that spot that had you squeeze around him, kept his mouth sucking on your clit, humming at the flavour of you, until you peaked. You came with a cry of his name that made his chest swell with pride. Your thighs shut around his head like a vice, your hand evidently torn between wanting to pull him away and push him closer. Jun remained pressed to your core, lazily lapping at your release until your legs relaxed and he gained enough freedom of movement to lean back and search for your gaze.

Even though he had spent minutes staring at the ethereal picture of you earlier, he was still taken aback by your beauty: your hair even messier, your face blushed, your eyes glazed over in the hazy afterglow. He pressed another kiss to the inside of your thigh.

“How are you feeling, my love?”

It took you a few moments to answer him, calming your breath. A moment of which he took advantage to return to his full height, leaving kisses up your body on his way there. Once he was face to face with you, he brushed your hair out of your face, looking at you with devotion. You smiled back, softly, your arms wrapping around his shoulders and immediately causing a warm shiver to run down the length of his body. There you were, in his arms, gazing at him with love, bestowing him with whatever divine favour slumbered in your presence.

You leaned in closer, letting your breath ghost over his skin for a second before whispering, “I need you.”

Jun was sure he was about to malfunction. The way his body reacted instantly, unbidden, must have been proof of your power. He couldn’t suppress the groan that rose to the surface, betraying his helplessness in the face of you. But you only smiled, sliding off the counter, tossing your bra to the side, and leaning into him.

“I know you need me too, baby,” you susurrated against the shell of his ear, your hand falling to his crotch, smoothing over the outline of his cock against his sweatpants. Jun gasped when you gave his balls a squeeze, trailing your fingers back up, pressing them into his slit, already oozing with precum and staining his pants. He felt like melting, like he was Icarus and you were the sun, with the notable exception that your radiance was warm and welcoming. It didn’t burn him, it only made him feel soft, welcome, malleable. He melted at your touch, moulded himself to the shape of you.

Although Jun felt it was very much stating the obvious, he conceded, “I want you so bad.”

You smiled, discarding your panties in a swift motion, before turning around and bending over the surface.

“Then come get me.”

He only stared, transfixed by the way your muscles moved under your skin, how the warm kitchen light of his home cascaded over you, the way your eyes sparkled with mischief when you turned around to smirk at him. Jun’s mind was still fighting with the fact that you were real, you were here, and you were his. You cocked an eyebrow, watching him like a cat watched its supper. When he still continued to stare, your eyes darkened, beckoning him with intensity. You wiggled your ass at him, pushing it back so it grazed his throbbing dick. As you threatened to pull away again, Jun’s hands flew to your hips. You yelped at the sudden strength with which he gripped you, pulling you back against him once more, grinding down against your ass with such verve that your head dropped forward. A long groan escaped you as Jun crowded you against the counter, pushing you down and leaning over your back.

“You need me, huh?”

You nodded your head enthusiastically while meeting his thrusts, moaning his name again and again, and growing more breathless by the second. Jun wanted to tease you, he really did. He wanted to ask you how bad you needed him. He wanted to force you to be more specific, to hear you say how you needed to feel his cock inside you, hitting that spot over and over again. He wanted to make your pretty lips form all those filthy words, say his name, beg for him. But it had been months since he had seen you in person, it felt like an eternity had passed since his skin was last allowed to touch yours, a lifetime since he heard you whimper and moan and pant for him like this. So, he forewent any more teasing. Instead, Jun simply shoved his sweatpants and underwear down his legs, freeing his cock.

You whined at the sound of it hitting his abs, wiggling your ass again and breathing out his name in that way he would never grow tired of. He grinned, sliding his dick through your slick, nipping its tip against your clit, once, twice, three times. So many times that you whimpered, an indistinguishable string of supplications, whines of baby, please please please leaving your lips. Your forehead was pressed against the counter now, as if the cold, hard surface helped ground you in reality while Jun had his way with you.

When, finally, he slipped into you, both of you sighed. You voices mixing in the air of the kitchen that seemed to have been growing thinner by the second. Jun’s breathing was growing ragged, and he could tell you weren’t faring much better than him. He started moving, slowly at first, testing the waters and, yes, possibly also to rile you up a little more. But when you clenched around him, any self-control was thrown out the window. His hands on your lower back were shoving you down against the ice-cold surface, making you hiss. His hips snapping against your ass as he searched for that spot that would make you drool over the marble countertops.

“Fuck… yes! Baby, right there,” you groaned when he found it.

Jun leaned back down over you, his front pressed against your back, his hot breath by your ear, whispered prayers of your name escaping him. He drove into that spot relentlessly, repeatedly until you lost all function of speech, reduced only to swears and his name. Jun mirrored your vocabulary, one hand sneaking around your body to find your clit again and rub punishing circles. With the added stimulation of his hand, the pressure of his weight, and the way his cock was hitting that spongy part inside you again and again, you felt your pleasure crest alarmingly fast.

“Junjunjunjunjun,” you breathed, but, again, he somehow had known before you what was coming. His groans surrounded you, your perception narrowed to just the feeling and sound of him.

“Hold on a little longer, baby,” he breathed, and you barely registered it. Just nodding for the sake of nodding, praying his own release would find him fast.

“Doing so well, baby. So good for me,” he continued, almost to himself, baiting your release even more.

A few agonising, timeless moments passed until, “That’s it, let go. Come for me, baby. Come with me.”

Immediately, you released a sound somewhere between a groan and a whimper, you head falling forward again as your whole body tensed up. Jun followed your example, his head dropping against your shoulder as he drove his cock into you, prolonging both of your releases as much as possible, until the sensitivity forced him to pull out. He remained folded over you, so close that he could feel his cum drip out of you, landing on the kitchen floor with a small splat. The air felt too thin for any movement, so he remained draped over you, his thumb drew circles on your lower back until you returned to him, mumbling his name.

“Are you alright, qīn'ài de?”

You nodded almost imperceptibly, your hair sticking to the nape of your neck. Jun brushed it to the side, leaving a small peck where it had been.

“Nooo,” you whined, “I’m sweaty.”

“I don’t care,” he replied, matter-of-factly, smoothing his hand down your back one last time before peeling himself off you to get some tissue. His heart tore a little at the weak whine you let out in response to his absence.

“Don’t worry, I’m just trying to take care of you.”

You only whined more when he wiped the rest of your combined release from between your legs before also cleaning the floor. He caught your eyes from over your shoulder, smiling softly, and leaving another kiss on your back. After getting rid of the tissue, he pulled you off the counter, wrapping you up in his arms.

“You were amazing. I love you.”

He could hear the smile in your voice when you replied, “So were you, bǎobèi.”

“I can’t believe you’re really here…”

“I missed you something fierce,” you said by way of explanation.

“Me too. I miss you every day. Every hour.”

To his confusion, you smiled warmly at his pout, one hand caressing along the side of his face until it came to rest on his collarbone. You leaned in, lips ghosting against his in a silent promise, “Then let’s make the most of right now.”

Jun grinned, bending down to pick you up, laughing at the surprised yelp you let out.

“What on earth are you doing, Wen Junhui!”

“I think it’s time for a bath.”

“That is not what I was trying to insinuate!”

He wiggled his eyebrows, feeling his heart sore at your scandalised expression. Resting his forehead against yours, his eyes searched for yours, holding their stare for a few moments. With a smile on his lips and in his voice he murmured, “I don’t care what exactly we do in the bath, as long as we do it together.”

#seventeen x reader #seventeen fan fiction #jun x reader #wen junhui x reader #junhui x reader #junhui smut #jun smut #seventeen smut

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embossross · 1 year ago

Text

From His Mind to Hers

chapter 13 >> Chapter 14>> masterlist

✣ Pairing: Hanma x AFAB fem!Reader

✣ Warning: 18+, minors DNI; unhealthy relationships & dark content

✣ Chapter CW: Processing trauma from abuse and sexual violence (rape aftermath), unhealthy coping mechanisms, revenge porn, slut shaming/misogyny, suicidal ideation (sort of – threats)

✣ Story CWs: patient/doctor relationships; smut (oral, ptv, pta, etc.), degradation, stalking, torture (not of y/n), murder, dubcon & abuse in c13, discussions of trauma and abuse, drug use, and more

✣ Synopsis: Forced into therapy, Hanma expects to waste his time and yours, but you’re not about to let the chance of a high-profile and higher paying patient slip through your grasp. The fact that you’re both attracted to each other doesn’t hurt either.

✣ Word Count: 5.5k+

The janitor deserves a raise.

The floors gleam, pearlescent and buffed to a shine that threatens to serve your reflection back to you. Where you sit, elbows to knees, staring at the floor, you notice every shoe scuff and dropped luggage tag. Fleeting messes that the janitor is quick to erase from existence. A few sweeps of the mop and everything returns to its former state, beautiful and shining.

“Flight NH451 to Okinawa is now boarding,” a crystalline voice announces first in Japanese, then English, then Mandarin.

No one else has time to study the floors. Compared to the bustle of Tokyo-Narita, Haneda Airport is calmer, but all airports in your experience share an atmosphere of restrained anxiety. For many people, it’s the one time they must completely surrender any pretenses of control over their lives and accept that they are subject to the whims of weather, technical failure, fate.

You know a thing or two about that.

Fussy babies burp and cry while their older siblings fare little better. The line for the Hong Kong Express baggage check stretches around the corner, creeping forward at a pace that promises a missed flight for whichever fool arrives with only two hours to make it to their terminal. A group of college-aged girls kneel on the floor, bags spread out as they shuffle the contents around, trying to find the magic formula that will sneak them below the weight limit. Hunched like they’re already exhausted from standing for so long, an elderly couple waits in mute silence, in a place beyond words. Nearly everyone else stares at their phones, willing the minutes to pass. It’s a fair difference from the energy you’d find over in arrivals, where half the passengers are haggard from a long day of international travel and the other half sprint, energized, into the arms of waiting loved ones. It churns your stomach to think about all those people, crying through tears of joy.

It may appear like the line isn’t moving, but it’s like the Argonaut. From where you’ve sat to the side watching for the last four hours, you know an assemblage of new faces will gradually replace these, the line somehow never shorter but its components entirely new.

In all this time, not one person has taken note of the woman rooted to one spot, the perpetual observer of the thousands of people who all have better places to be.

The promise of invisibility is what drew you to the airport this morning. Amid the minutiae and petty concerns of the mob, you may as well be furniture. Surrendering to that invisibility evokes a blissful relief.

It is your natural habitat.

As a child, you mastered the art of being there and not there at the same time. You remember miserable days spent locked in your room whenever you caught so much as a sniffle. Your mother would banish you to the narrow three tatami mat room, terrified that your germs might spread and infect her.

At first, every minute would tick by with the weight of eternity. Staring at the ceiling, phlegm draining back through your sinuses and stomach in a pounding knot, you would count each tile one by one. The trick was to stretch the count as long as possible, to sit and savor each number in your mind’s eye, because you knew when you finished it would be back to one again. No windows opened to the views outside, no toys to distract you. The most the little room offered was its thin walls through which you could hear your mother move about the house, her loud laugh down the receiver of the phone, the hum of the TV. All while you shook from fever, unattended.

Time would pass so slowly in that room. Gradually, impossibly, it would slow even further as your stomach grumbled, your throat spasmed from thirst. Your mother never thought to leave you any food or water to survive those long days in that room.

The thirstier you grew, the less you could ward off the realities of the body, thoughts fixating on each ache and pain, until finally, you learned to stop your thoughts altogether. To be there and not there at once.

Then, time would resume in a sprint, a long blink and night would fall. Once the sounds of your mother’s untroubled life ceased, you would make your move. On sock-covered feet, you would slip from your prison and edge your way to the kitchen, praying for invisibility, for no one to spot your midnight heist. You never dared fetch a glass, mimicking a thief’s caution as you leaned into the sink, mouth closing around the tap, where you would turn it onto a trickle and let the life-giving water permeate your cracked lips. In those moments, you would be there, brilliantly, blindingly there in spirit, but your body remained locked away in that room.

The tricks you learned in those days in that house have served you well over the years. Invisibility sometimes feels like a curse, resigning you forever to the periphery of life, but it also greets you like an old friend when you are most in need of protection.

How traumatizing then to search for it last night and find that old friend missing. When you needed it most, the old detachment abandoned you.

Hyper-present, you suffered every moment of Hanma’s pain and perversion. Countless times, you reached for your invisibility, hoping to slip out of yourself like a specter and leave your body to Hanma’s cruel hands, but you were only left twice as terrified to find yourself trapped inside yourself. Your mind, body, and soul were devastatingly one as you experienced the certainty that Hanma would shoot you dead as he brutalized you, as he held you with the gentleness of a lover, as he…

Your phone vibrates in your pocket. You know it’s him. It must be. His smell still lingers on the fine hairs of your nostrils, singeing them with the stench of bourbon that bled from his pores. In the blue-black dark, you could barely make out his features as he threatened you – a masked intruder hovering above you – but fuck if you couldn’t smell him, stinking up your once safe, sterilized bedroom.

Just thinking about it makes you want to…

With trembling fingers, you hunt through your purse until you find a wad of tissues to wipe the sweat that beads across your brow. It is swelteringly hot in Departures, a mix of the unseasonably warm weather and the heat of hundreds of bodies thronging together, their every exhale warming the room.

Searching through the mass of bodies, you find the janitor still at work, fix on the friendly lines of his face. He gives no indication that he notices the heat, the throngs of people, or anything else but his work. The janitor mops the floors, contented. Like you, he has no designs to go anywhere else.

The line moves several meters forward while you watch the janitor. Eventually, he lifts his head and notices you for the first time. The muscles in your face ache as you summon a smile. The result must be obscene or hostile because he hurriedly returns to mopping, a few half-hearted brushes just for show before he scurries away entirely.

Now, you are alone again.

You put your head between your legs and try to breathe like they suggest people having panic attacks do in the movies. The position does help chase back your rising gorge and settles your rolling stomach. It does nothing for your thoughts.

You remember when Hanma’s long fingers found your clit, how he exploited his knowledge of your body to rub you to a forced little orgasm, like he wouldn’t be content until you were made an active participant in your indignity, his forever accomplice, the Stavrogin to his Fedka.

A thundering accompanies a plane taking off from the tarmac, loud enough to chase away the memories. You watch the massive passenger plane soar north until it becomes a speck on the horizon. It will never cease to amaze you how for the hundreds of people aboard that plane, each knows exactly where they are going and why. Their destination is well and truly decided. Too late to change their minds or second-guess.

Whenever you try to think of where you will go next – because surely you can’t live in the airport departures lounge, surely someone, anyone, will eventually realize the ghost of a woman has made a home there, will recognize that you’ve overstayed your welcome, will chase you out, right? – your brain throws up nothing but roadblocks. You imagine returning to your cold, hostile apartment, and the contents of your stomach dance in protest. Your apartment is no longer a safe space.

Your phone vibrates again, and this time, you don’t have the strength to ignore it. Fished from your pocket, you stare at the characters in Shuji’s name, tracing them one by one. Your finger hovers over the button to answer.

What he did last night – did to you – is unforgivable. You may not know what happened to Haitani, but it doesn’t matter. You did not deserve that.

And that should be that. A definitive break with Hanma is the only logical next step. Everything you built together is decimated, just so much sawdust stamped beneath his paranoid feet.

But where does that leave you? You know there will be no returning to your old life? The apartment will never be safe again now that Hanma’s been inside, not since you invited him inside. It will never be clean after what happened.

And maybe you won’t be either. Something inside you is fundamentally changed. Because even now, some part of you wants to go to him. Perhaps want is the wrong word. Without the old survival tools that carried you through the years, you feel cast adrift, weaker than when Hanma found you.

Eventually, Hanma will escalate from ignored phone calls and, vulnerable as you are, will you be able to say no to his face? Worse, will you lean into him, longing for his protection from the demons he himself unleashed on your life?

You don’t take his call, but you don’t leave the airport either. Nothing can change so long as you stay here, but then again, nothing can hurt you either.

Stuck, your return to staring at the floors.

You choose to take the elevator up to your apartment, spending the better part of the ride convincing yourself that no demons will await you, so all five senses revolt when you find the hallway outside your door laden with cardboard boxes. They’re not taped up like a delivery would be, and besides, you pick your mail up from the mailroom downstairs. Peeking into one box, you see it’s filled with your old textbooks from university, the ones that should be neatly shelved and collecting dust in your bedroom.

Inside, pornographic moaning greets you. Stopped in your tracks, you almost miss the changes: the photographs in the entry hall have been removed, your shoes are missing from the alcove. There is no mess, just gaps where your life should be.

While taking an itemized inventory of what’s missing appeals to you, the lewd sounds coming from the living room force you forward. On the TV, a naked woman rides a man. She carries on like it’s the best damn dick of her life, touching her own body like something sacred as she cries out.

The woman is you, of course you can see that much, but your brain struggles to play catch up and process this baffling, foreign view of yourself. It’s almost harder to comprehend how wanton you appear in the video rather than that such a video exists in the first place.

“I think we can agree there’s no need for a scene.”

Emerging from the bedroom, Takashi’s doesn’t spare the screen a second glance. It would only take one to confirm that the woman in the video is you, and that the man is decidedly not him.

Between self-indulgent rounds of sex with Hanma, you often wondered how you would feel if Takashi discovered your affair. Secretly, you longed for guilt. A great tsunami of devotion to Takashi and the concept of monogamy would rise within you, the tears would fall, and seconds later, apologies would follow. You hoped for a scene out of the soap operas, something normal.

The reality is less fraught as you are too stunned to summon up any response at all. If only Takashi would turn the video off. Then, maybe your brain would work again. There is no room for coherent thought around the wet, slapping sounds intermixed with moans coming from the TV.

“I knew you were sleeping with patients for months now. It never bothered me too much. So, when I saw the videos, I didn’t understand at first why I was so repulsed by it. But then, I put it together. I had figured some fat, rich fuck at work offered you enough money, and I could hardly blame you for that. If a client offered me money to fuck, I’d do it, too. But watching the videos, I realized, you weren’t just fucking this yakuza creep for money, were you? You liked it.”

There is a forcefield around Takashi that repels your gaze. You can test its parameters by starting at the juts of his knees and slowly climbing upward. It’s around his neck, the first bit of exposed skin, that the forcefield kicks into effect, and you find you cannot bring your gaze higher than the hollow of his throat, and even that takes a supreme effort. You turn back to the video playing out on screen.

“So you’re leaving me, then?” you say because it must be said if things are to continue from here.

“Things are busy at work. I don’t see why my life should be disrupted when I’ve done nothing wrong. I’m sure you’ll take responsibility as the offending party and move out without a fuss.”

“That would be sensible,” you agree.

Heady with the realization that this is actually happening – you are truly breaking up with your boyfriend – you force yourself to look at him, one last look to imprint forever in your mind. Immediately, you wish you hadn’t.

Takashi looks past you to the video on screen, where the you of only a few weeks back is loudly and visibly announcing how much she likes every stroke of dick before erupting into a shaking orgasm. Lips curled as if tasting something foul, Takashi regards the woman in the video like something subhuman. You try to watch the video through his eyes, but you can’t break free from the chains of your own perspective, a fuzzy migraine cresting in your temples at the sight of Hanma’s body, memories of this pleasurable tryst weeks ago mixing with last night’s events until you feel like the edges of your brain are collapsing inward.

There is no point to torturing yourself with the video or further conversation. Ignoring the shame in your gut, you follow numbly a step behind Takashi as he finishes packing your things. Most of your meager belongings are already stacked in the hall, but still, there is something stunning about how quickly your life is packed up out of sight. After living together for eight years, you would have left such an indelible mark that only industrial strength tools could strip your essence from the walls of this place. There are a couple overlooked items: the vase of artificial flowers Shuji gifted you, a box of tissues if you care to be petty, the spoons with scalloped edges, but, functionally, your life is stripped, relegated to boxes, and pushed aside within a measly half hour.

All the while, the video plays on. When it finishes, autoplay kicks in and offers up a second to continue your humiliation. The second is slightly preferrable as you make less of a spectacle of your delirious pleasure in it, yet worse because it shows Shuji more clearly, the dragon tattoo on his back flexing as he pounds into your prone body, face crinkling in animal pleasure. You can’t stand to look at him.

These videos…the only explanation for their existence is Shuji. They’re an abomination, something that shouldn’t exist and can’t be allowed to continue to exist. The gall of their existence builds in you until you discover enough anger to break the silence that’s drawn tight between you and Takashi.

“Takashi, if I go quietly, will you please delete these videos?”

“Sure,” he agrees simply, but at their mention, Takashi then looks back to the sex tape on screen, and that same revulsion morphs the contours of his face into something unfamiliar. “I suspected it for months, and then after reading your diary, I knew it for certain, and still…seeing it? When I watched the first one, I debated if it was even real. It had to be some kind of tasteless hoax. Because that’s not you in these. You’re like a stranger. I mean, look at it,” he says, gesturing to the screen. “That’s not you. And that guy…How does touching that criminal freak not disgust you? It’s like watching a pig take a mud bath. Disgusting.”

The shelf where you once stored your medical magazines is barren. Naked. There isn’t much dust though. You had spent a few hours cleaning last Sunday. That’s good, you think, one good thing. Everything Takashi says about you is true. Your lack of fear or righteous hatred of Hanma signals a great moral failing on your part. You are a failure, Monstrous.

Spinning out in self-loathing, you stand mutely for a solid minute before your brain hooks onto a single detail and everything clicks firmly into place.

“Wait, you read my therapy diary?”

“Don’t go crying about privacy now. I could tell you were running around on me and wanted to know,” Takashi snaps.

The finer details of what you recorded in that diary escape you, but you know you frequently wrote about your conversations, encoding but not entirely skipping over references to his business. It was stupid, of course, but the diary was intended for your eyes only, an exercise in self-reflection. The same Takashi who told you he was coming into an unexpected windfall of money at work. The same Takashi who had ripped your bedroom apart, supposedly looking for signs of your infidelity. The same Takashi who had demanded details about your patients. If that same Takashi had read your diary months ago he would have known about the HKJ deal, about Haitani soliciting you, about far too much.

“You weren’t reading my diary because you were jealous. You were paid to spy on me, weren’t you?”

And you know just who paid him as well. Based of your three interactions, you should have predicted that Haitani is not a man who accepts defeat easily. He is like a river. When he can’t force his way through an obstacle, he finds a way around.

“I did what you should have done in the first place,” Takashi sneers.

It is not defensiveness, at least not as far as you can tell, that spurs Takashi to confess. In his mind, you’ve already been reduced to something subhuman, a creature undeserving of consideration let alone sympathy, someone he could justify the worst abuses against, so convinced of his own righteousness. But whatever grievance Takashi may imagine against you, nothing can compare to what Takashi cost you. If he hadn’t betrayed you to Ran, then last night…Hanma…

You think you could gouge Takashi’s eyes out and he still wouldn’t understand the hurt he caused you. Minutes prior, you felt completely extinguished, like your flames had been put out forever, but now a pilot light flickers and it’s enough to bring forth an inferno, a heat you didn’t dare hope you would ever feel again.

“How dare you! You want to lecture me about getting into bed with the yakuza when you’re climbing into the bank with one! What if you had gotten someone hurt or killed? Did you even think about what would happen to me? You’re a slimy, despicable, cowardly –”

Shouting over you as you continue to levy every imaginable invective against him, Takashi spits, “Like you’re some paragon of virtue. Were you thinking about your patients when you started screwing them? Or did you not give a fuck who you hurt? Last time I checked, they don’t let yakuza whores keep their licenses. Speaking of which, you should know I’ve already sent these videos to the Japanese Psychological Association. You can look forward to a call from the ethics board.”

The bomb drop has the desired effect. It collapses the floor beneath your feet, gobbles up the words in your mouth, and implodes the tiny sliver of security that you still clung to. A life gone in a moment.

You are going to lose your license.

No job.

No home.

No friends.

No boyfriend.

No security.

Nothing.

The last box of your things and the vase of flowers are shoved into your hands. They feel weightless in your arms. On autopilot, you accept them and Takashi’s pushing hands on your back as he shepherds you towards the door.

This is the last time you will see this apartment that you called home for so long: the warped wood that’s risen under the heat of the window, the lightbulb in the kitchen that flicks if your run the dishwasher at the same time, the dent no bigger than a thumbprint, or more accurately, a door handle in the wall from where the front door slammed into it with too much force.

You want to press pause, to slow down the moment. You would take a final photo if you could, breathe in the smell of this place and bottle it for a future date. Anything to linger for one second longer before you are cast out into the unforgiving cold.

Takashi does not take mercy on you.

“You should be thankful you don’t have a family to shame,” he hisses.

And then the door slams shut. With you on one side and your life on the other.

Everything you once were is gone forever.

On second look, there are fewer than a dozen boxes stacked in the hall. Such a small life. You thoughtlessly heft a small, light-seeming box onto the bundle already in your arms. Dazedly, you stumble past the rest, leaving them behind with no plan for when or who will come to collect them, and even less of an idea of where you’ll send them.

There is no hurry. Nowhere to go. Yet, you too quickly find yourself pressing through the revolving doors that lead out onto the street and the blinding midday sun, which fittingly leeches the color from the world, so that everything’s cast in long shadows. On instinct, you raise a hand to shield your eyes, dropping the little you own to shatter on the sidewalk. A pitiful relief wells in you as you drop to your knees to retrieve your belongings; it is something to do.

Since Takashi cratered the foundations on which your entire existence rested, the normally persistent voice in your head – the one that would caution you against calling a taxi when a subway ticket cost less than 200 yen or would push you to stay that extra hour in university, the one that essentially kept you alive – has been traitorously silent, and so you know that you ought to figure out a place to stay for the night, to calculate how long your savings will last, and brainstorm a strategy to fight the ethics board, but you can’t keep any one thought in your head long enough to develop something concrete. Each stirring of a thought drips through the cracks between your fingers, like trying to collect water in the cup of your palm. You can’t make a plan. What you can do is kneel on the dirty sidewalk and clean up your mess.

First, you right the little box you scooped up from the hallway. Peeking inside, you see it’s mostly filled with socks and underwear. The second box that Takashi forced into your hands is less useful. Inside are shattered picture frames, the photos inside detailing the lives you shared or, at least, lived in parallel. You can’t tell if they cracked in the fall or if Takashi ritualistically broke each as a parting gift. Even less useful somehow is the vase of fake flowers Hanma gave you, now lying scattered, a collection of jagged ceramic shards.

You herd the broken pieces into a little pile, careful as you do to avoid slicing your fingertips against the sharp edges. As you delicately lift one piece, you feel out something small and round affixed to the inside. With an emotion milder than curiosity, you peel the coin-like anomaly off. Holding it to the light, you puzzle at what looks like a microchip.

And then, all you can do is laugh, as your memory offers up an old spy movie where you saw a device just like this, hidden in a flower vase. It’s a bug.

Of course, he bugged your apartment. Even a gesture as simple as gifting you flowers in apology is warped, twisted into something malicious with Hanma. He’s been laying the foundation for your downfall for months now. Just waiting to crumble you to dust in his hands.

A familiar car pulls up to the curb where you sit, laughing maniacally to yourself. You laugh harder when you spot it. Perfect fucking timing.

The window rolls down, and for one terrible second, you lock eyes with Shuji. Terrible, venomous eyes, the gaze of a viper, hidden away behind glass lenses as if without that layer of protection, he might penetrate you to your core. No, not a viper, a basilisk.

The way he’s dressed, hair perfectly coiffed and in the tailored suit that is his work uniform, offends your sensibilities. From his height advantage, he peers down at you like a scientist watching a bug through a microscope. You feel as small as a mite.

“You can spend the night at my place,” Hanma says, without so much as a greeting because he need not dignify you with niceties. A person needn’t spare a termite a hello before stepping on it.

A plane flies overhead, so low it tricks the eye for a moment, makes you think it’ll crash into the skyscrapers dotting the cityscape. You follow it with your eyes until it’s long out of sight, retracing the chemtrail it leaves in its wake. You almost forget Hanma is here, watching.

Pressed through a sigh, Hanma says your name. His voice, toneless and impossibly deep strikes you like a whip, a thousand times worse than seeing him. It is the charge you need to act.

Bursting to your feet, you leave all but your box of underwear and march determinedly in the other direction. Adrenaline courses through your veins, a jittery but appreciated focuser, and for the first time, you are able to think outside your fugue state. You will find a hotel for the night, something cheap that pays by the hour. If you walk for five minutes, you’re sure to find something.

Anything is better than Hanma’s offer.

“Get in the car.”

You ignore Hanma’s first call and his second, pretending his voice doesn’t make your hands shake so hard you fear you’ll drop the box. The Bentley keeps pace with you to the right. At the first intersection, a redlight stops the Bentley dead.

“For fuck’s sake!”

The curse is a warning before Hanma charges out of the car, arms extended as if to grab you and drag you into the cavern of his Bentley. The dark interior beckons ominously, hinting at a cacophony of horrors. To go into that car is to die.

His fingers don’t so much as graze yours before you start to scream.

Hoarse, guttural screams that turn the necks of every passerby in the area emerge from your bruised throat, a scream that must be tearing your throat apart, but you can’t feel the pain through the adrenaline rush. Heads pop out of nearby shops to see who is making such a ruckus and why. Amid the animal shrieks, the occasional curse takes place, a well-timed “motherfucker” or “waste of space.” To anyone watching, you appear unhinged. A lifetime of pain and rage unleash in one concentrated exhale of agony. If you could bottle the force behind your bellows, they would blow a hole through Hanma’s brain and vaporize what’s left. You scream in his face like you hope to erase him from existence like he did you.

Time holds no meaning now, and you think you might black out or suffer a psychotic break that blacks over just what you say or do in those precious moments of freedom. Whether Hanma is appalled by your behavior, if it makes him want to hurt, fuck, or kill you is irrelevant. Blissfully blank, you become the beast Takashi thinks you are and growl and rage and bare your teeth.

Stunned into stillness by the spectacle, Hanma’s gaze darts between you and the spectators who could intervene, but as no one steps forward to help the crazy woman having a breakdown, Hanma loses his patience.

He slaps a hand over your mouth, muffling your hysterical shrieking. His body is so much larger than yours, something you once craved, but now it crowds and bullies you toward the parked door, where the wide-open passenger door signals your doom. You go silent. You transfer every bit of energy from your throat to your body. Biting and bucking, you fight him with every ounce of strength you possess.

No amount of thrashing could overpower Hanma at full-strength, but he treats you gently with none of last night’s brutality. Kid gloves try to handle you with care as if he would never think to harm you, no not you, his precious, beloved pet. How could you even think such a thing? Unwilling to hurt you, Hanma grapples against your flailing arms for a full minute before backing off, hands tugging at his hair in frustration. He is panting though not half so hard as you are.

“Would you fucking stop!” Hanma snaps. “You should be grateful for what I did. You should –”

Whatever lovely suggestion would have topped off that sentence, you don’t wait to hear, lashing out with a closed fist before he can finish.

You aim for his cheek, but Hanma sees the blow coming, so your fist glances off his neck.

The next punch is somehow more pitiful. Powered by your righteous indignation, you throw your full-body weight behind it, but Hanma bats you aside, so that your shoulder collides into his chest and the punch dies out against the air. Hanma folds the leftover arm behind your body and pins you to his chest, so that all the bucking in the world won’t be enough to break free. He is a titanium wall of muscle and violence, and he has you in his grasp. You think you might vomit.

All the energy in your body evaporates, and you slump into his embrace.

“Finally,” Hanma mutters but without frustration. There is a hint of satisfaction there. A hint of humor at your suffering.

“Let me go,” you whisper.

“Will you behave like a good girl if I do?”

“Let me go.”

Hanma sighs, “Oh, Doc, come on. All this carrying on over limp-dick Takashi? He’s not worth it.”

“Didn’t you hear? While you were eavesdropping, didn’t you hear?” you chuckle a little, a sound strange enough that Hanma eases up on his grip, enough so that he can peer down at your face. You are both equally surprised to discover that you are crying, little matte tears slipping down your cheeks. “I didn’t just lose my boyfriend and my apartment. Oh no! I’m also going to lose my fucking license!”

“What? Why would you lose your license?” Hanma visibly startles, and on any other day, you might have enjoyed one-upping him, but not today. And never again.

“Is this what you wanted from the beginning? To lay me completely low? Did you think that when I was broke and starving, I’d have no choice but to rely on your limited generosity? To let you play with me until you get bored? Because I have nothing left to give, Hanma. I’m not even a human being anymore. I’m nothing.”

“Listen, Doc, relax. This is a panic attack. I’ll take care of Takashi and whatever he did. I’ll make it go away. You just come home with me, and I’ll take care of you and –”

“I may be nothing, but I’d rather be nothing than be with you,” you spit in his face.

His hands slacken for a moment, and you use that moment of weakness to break free.

Once more, Hanma’s hand reaches out as if to grab you, but you turn to him and with every bit of solemnity in your soul, so that the words read with all the gravity of a blood oath, you swear, “If you force me to go anywhere with you, I swear I will find a way to kill myself.”

The fingers on Hanma’s hand flex. The veins pop and strain like his body is rebelling against him, urging him to clutch, grab, cage. But then that hand falls to his side, stills.

This time, when you walk away, he doesn’t follow.

#hanma shuji #hanma x reader #tokyo rev smut #tokyo revengers smut #hanma smut #tokyo revengers x reader smut #tokyo revengers x reader

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the-queen-of-hell-666 · 1 month ago

Text

Too Long

Kinktober 2024 - Day 22

Kink: Stripping

Pairing: CEO!Nick Fowler x Stripper!Fem!Reader

Word Count: 1500+

Summary: Nick is one of your best clients and the only one you let break the rules.

Warnings: explicit language, explicit sexual content (unprotected vaginal sex, vaginal sex, stripping, strip tease, teasing, rough sex, dirty talk, allusions to multiple orgasms, daddy kink, power dynamics), whipped!Nick, fluff, reader's stage name is 'Kitty'

a/n: Here's Day 22! I'm not sure if I'll be able to get tomorrow's fic posted in the morning! It might be later. My job is taking up a lot of my time along with grad school, but I'll do my best!

Banners by @vase-of-lilies

You worked at a very high end Gentlemen’s club in downtown D.C. and you catered to one of the richest and most successful men in the country. Nick Fowler was a regular, always asking for the most luxury room with you, the club’s favorite dancer. He came in once a week, always with two body guards that followed him around and stood outside of the room the whole time he rented it out. But it had been a month or two since Nick had come into the club, and it was pathetic but you were missing him. When you took him to the room, you broke the club’s rules multiple times by letting him touch you, kiss you, fuck you, and it was magical.

Nick had finally finished a business deal in Hong Kong that took way too long to negotiate and fuck, he was missing his own bed, but he was missing you more. He never thought a fucking stripper of all people would capture his heart, but you did. He thought you were beautiful, sexy, and so powerful. He never thought strippers could have that kind of power but when you walked onto stage, everyone went quiet, all eyes were on you as your body glistened with glitter in the spotlight, and how your curves showed in your lacy garments. You looked like a fucking lace clad angel, you were perfect.

He stepped into the club with his bodyguards following a few feet behind as he walked up to the bar. He ordered his usual and asked for you specifically. When you heard that Nick was back and was at the bar, you tried to not make it look too obvious as you rushed over. You were wearing a black and red lace bodysuit, with matching garter belt and thigh high lace tights, and black heels. Nick smirked as he turned to you and regarded you with hungry eyes.

“Hello, kitty. Miss me?” Nick hummed as he sipped his drink.

Your smile widened and you nodded as you bit your lip, “I did, sir. I was beginning to worry.” You purred as you caressed his shoulder and he smirked and took your hand in his warm one. “Your regular, Mr. Fowler?”

His smirk grew and he nodded, “Lead the way, kitty.” He winked and you pulled him along through the hallway of the club towards the room, you two always shared. You pulled him inside and he closed and locked the door. As soon as the door was closed, he pressed you against it and his lips pressed to yours. You moaned against his lips as his tongue invaded your mouth as his hands trailed along your lace clad chest. He pulled away as his eyes took in your body hungrily, “Is this one of the sets I bought you, kitty?” He asked with a growl to his voice and you nodded.

“Mhm, one of my favorites, daddy.” You purred as you batted your eyelashes at him, making him groan softly as he rested his forehead against yours.

He pulled away and sat on the edge of the bed and spread his thighs before taking off his tie, “Give me a dance, pretty kitty. Wanna see all of you.” He grinned wolfishly and you blushed under his gaze and went to the tablet on the table, and choose his usual song. The beginning chords of “Daddy Issues”, by The Neighborhood played through the speakers.

Your eyes locked onto his as your hips gently swayed to the music and you ran your hands down your breasts and over your hips. Nick’s eyes darkened as he sipped his drink while watching you. You sauntered over and straddled his lap and grinded your hips down teasingly on his lap before pulling away. You reached behind you to undo the corset of your body suit and let the straps drop from your shoulders, but your breasts kept the fabric up. You moved through your routine like you do every night but with the exception of letting Nick touch you how he pleased. He had a prominent bulge the entire time, his mind playing back the moments just like this one. He couldn’t wait to take his time with you.

Once the song was over, he scooped you up in his arms and carried you to the bed in the middle of the room, and sat down with you in his lap. “When are you gonna let me take you away from this place?” He hummed as his hands explored your lace clad body.

“I like my job, Nick. You know that.” You shrugged and he pulled the top down to reveal your breasts to him.

“Mm, I know but I want you to myself. I can treat you so well.” He said as his palms groped and squeezed your breasts, grinding his palms against your nipples.

You let out a soft moan at the feeling of his warm hands on your peaked nipples. “Maybe I’ll think about it.” You hummed and leaned into his hands as your hips grinded down on his bulge, pressing your clit against the zipper of his slacks. You moaned and you leaned down to trail soft kisses down his neck, as your hands made quick work of the buttons of his white shirt. You tugged his shirt free from his pants and you purred as you felt down his pecs to his taut stomach.

“It’s been too long since I’ve had you.” He grunted and he flipped you two over so you pressed against the duvet of the bed. He made quick work of your bodysuit, tossing the lace outfit away, leaving you bare except for your garter belt and stockings. He undid his belt and slacks, pulling his hard cock out of his pants, before climbing on top of you.

“I want you, daddy. Please.” You whined as you wrapped your legs around his waist and pulled him closer to your core. He groaned as he felt his tip catch on your entrance and he reached down to line himself up to your weeping hole.

“Have you been good since I’ve been gone?” He smirked as he teased his cock through your soaked folds. You nodded quickly as you tried to grind down on his cock, but a sharp slap to your inner thigh had you settling down. “Patience, kitty. M’not going anywhere. Just want to feel you.” He groaned as he slipped just the tip of his thick cock into your tight cunt.

A fire lit in your lower stomach at the sensation of his cock pressing into you, stretching your walls around his tip. You whined and gripped his shoulders tight, digging his nails into his shoulders, making him groan at the pain of your nails. “Want more, daddy. Please!” You cried as his thumb moved down to circle your clit teasingly.

Your walls pulsed around his tip as he slowly pushed into you deeper before pulling out again, just teasing you with his cock. “Mm, love the noises you make.” He hummed as he leaned down to kiss your breasts softly, taking one of your nipples into his mouth.

He finally slid all the way into your cunt, making your back arch and a loud moan leave your lips, making you thankful for the soundproofed walls. “F-fuck, daddy. Oh my god!” You whined and your thighs shook around his hips as the pleasure coursed through you. Nick pulled away from your chest, resting his forehead against yours, groaning softly as he gave an experimental thrust into your core.

“Fuckin’ hell, kitty. You’re so fucking tight. I can feel you gushing around my cock, your little cunt is sucking me in. So needy.” He grunted as he gripped your hips not as tight as he wanted to but enough so he could pound into your wet cunt.

Your nails dug into his shoulders as a string of moans and whines left your lips as the tip of his cock grinds and presses against your sweet spot. Your thighs tighten around his hips as your hips grind down to meet each thrust of his hips. You wrapped your arms around his shoulders and pulled him down to kiss his lips passionately. He groaned against your lips as your walls pulsed with your impending orgasm, your walls gripping and sucking his cock with each thrust.

He brought you to your first orgasm of the night by slapping your clit with the palm of his hand, which pushed you over the edge. It had you crying his name as you gushed around his cock and your thighs shook around his hips. He grunted with each thrust, helping you through your orgasm.

“Good fucking girl. So wet and warm. Can feel your cunt weeping. You’re so fucking beautiful like this.” He growled as he nuzzled against your neck softly kissing your sensitive skin there till your thighs stopped shaking. “Mm, I’m not done with you yet, kitty. I have two months to make up for. I’m not letting you go till your shift is over.” He smirked and you whined and tugged him close to you.

“Anything you want, daddy.” You whined as your nails dug into his shoulders then he started pounding into you again.

#fanfic #fanfiction #fandom #kinktober #nick fowler x reader #nick fowler #the 355 #nick fowler x female reader

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breakyourrxles · 1 year ago

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『atarashī 』 ; 09—𝐹𝐼𝒩𝒜𝐿

❝ the other side of love ❞ | mlist ｡

student!hongjoong x fem!reader, husband!yeosang x fem!reader — drama, dark romance, mystery, heavy sexual content [6,3k wc] ch cws: smut, the truth, angst, the bad guy doesn't lose i fear.

It's not often that the Akademiya halls find themselves graced by your presence.

Every vibrate of your phone, every receiving of an email or incoming phone call has your stomach in knots even days after you divulging your deepest, ugliest secret to your best friend. Seonghwa swears that he won't tell Yeosang—won't be the one to go behind your back and tell your husband the information that he is deserving of knowing—because it's yours, but it doesn't make the impending stress of it all feel any less suffocating as it hangs on your shoulders.

Nights with Yeosang back home have been quieter; more space created between the two of you since that night approximately a week ago. Home less, or locked away behind closed doors more than he might have usually been. The distance between the two of you feels so much larger than it ever has been. Before, as a result of his career. Now?

As a result of you, most likely.

Hurrying down the halls and towards your destination, you have plans for the early afternoon of today that this particular coming together of colleagues has the potential to impede. Yunho always has picked the worst possible times to ask you to come grab a snack with him, but today especially is doing you no such favors.

You stop in front of the door that brightly hangs his name atop a shiny bronze plaque, knock twice, and are quickly answered to shortly thereafter by the man himself cracking open the door, glancing to see you, and then just as fast ushering you inside and shutting the door behind you once more.

"Long time no see, we don't often meet here," you say, playful.

Yunho doesn't answer though—unlike him, usually just as silly in his banter with you. Instead, he brings himself back around to sit behind his desk, pulls a folder up in his hand and brings your attention to it.

"We should talk."

Equal parts of you know exactly what that is, and the other desperately hoping to pretend that you don't—that you're wrong. Nervousness strikes through you, tingles at your fingers tips as you slowly sit yourself down in one of the large, plush chairs that stand in front of his desk, as if you're a student yourself being reprimanded for one thing or another.

But you don't have it in you to break the ice of this topic. Instead, you wait in silence as Yunho stares you down, something judging but equally compassionate in his gaze towards you; like he knows what you have gotten yourself into, and like you never stood a chance to begin with.

He inhales, long and heavy. "I'm sure you can guess what this is," he says, slowly opening the yellow file and carding through some of the pages. "That student we discussed not too long ago, Kim Hongjoong. It was a bit more difficult than anticipated locating the rest of his sealed files—suspected that he had a pretty close relationship with someone on the admin board back at one of his other schools if he was able to get something of this degree locked behind these kinds of walls."

Something of this degree.

Yunho reaches over to his side, takes his reading glasses between fingers and put them on his face just before looking back up towards you again.

"Wasn't quite expecting this, however."

Silence falls between the two of you then. A part of you—probably the strongest part—doesn't even want to know what it is that your friend has unearthed.

"What has he told you about his stint in Hong Kong?"

You reel at the question, but for two reasons. You ignore the main part of it, the most obvious part, for the thing that underlines it. "Nothing really, why would he tell me anything?"

Yunho glances up at you again, briefly, eyebrow raised.

You continue on. "He just said that it didn't really work out for him, he burnt out and flunked out. Not really anything worth telling I guess."

"Has he ever asked you for anything that may pertain to your status in regards to the Akademiya, Aurelia, or the people that you may know by familial and social association?"

Chest tightening and throat dry, you feel a particular clamminess to your hands that doesn't often find you. Heart beating strong and fast behind your ribcage, but you have no other choice than to attempt to steady yourself—swallow all of these feelings down, quell the tremble in your breath and soon to be your voice.

"No."

It's then that Yunho spins the folder to face you, pushes it across the desk for your reading and sits back against his chair.

"The reason he was removed from the school in Hong Kong was because he was discovered to be engaging in an affair with at least one person on the admin board. I say one because only one admitted to it, but with how tightly sealed his record is in relation to it, my guess is that he ended on good enough terms with someone who was able to lock all of his nasty little secrets away."

You don't really want to see it, and it takes you a good, long while before you're able to collect yourself enough to lean forward and take the papers into your hands.

Yunho continues. "So, I made some calls to that school over the past few weeks to see if I could find out anything else. Of course, it's relatively confidential information in regards to past students so no one really wanted to say much, but I did get a hold of someone who mentioned that one time his computer was confiscated for something wholly unrelated to all of this, his search history was full of names and people. Industry people, mostly women. Women who could probably help him get ahead if he played his cards just right." He shrugs after that. "That's heresy, but it's not exactly difficult to put the very obvious pieces together, if you ask me."

You're different. This is different. What you have, what exists between the two of you, is not at all like whatever this is—whatever this was, has been in the past.

Quickly and with a soft but firm sound, you shut the file. Push it back towards Yunho and away from you, as if its proximity capable of poisoning a truth that you seem so sure of. Yunho's eyes fall upon you instead of the item in question, which you don't like. You don't want to hear this, don't want to be seen in relation to this. Yes, you asked to know, asked to find out, but that was then.

And this is now. None of that matters. None of that carries any relevance to your relationship with Hongjoong now. You catch yourself considering how jealous a woman she must have been to get him expelled for their goings on, but quickly squash that just as fast as it rears its ugly head in your mind.

"Thank you."

Standing, you quickly whirl yourself around and head back towards the door that you've only recently just entered. Yunho allows it, allows you to go without much of a fight, and with a hand on the doorknob you nearly make it free of the prison that his office feels like before he grants you his final words.

"I saw you."

You still, frozen in place as terror creeps up through your bones. No strength to turn and face him, but you can hear him lightly shuffle in his seat as he reaches towards the file across the way.

"A couple of weeks ago, at a cafe down the street—" You know precisely when and where he means, the recent memory of you and Hongjoong giggling in a booth together in public, for anyone to see. "With him. You two appeared...close."

There's nothing to say in response to it. What could you possibly say?

"He's certainly smart, I'll give him that much. You're not technically employed by the Akademiya yet you have everything and probably even more to offer him than someone from the Akademiya would."

"It's not like that," you bite back, cutting. Displeased by the implication of his words.

"It, and what is it, exactly? Your affair?"

The two of you silence, and you crack the door open to leave.

"You need to call this off."

"Or else?"

"It's not a threat," Yunho says, sympathizes in a way that you can hear laden in his tone.

Then don't punish me for it.

You don't wait to find out if there's more, back down the hall and in the direction from which you came prior.

After all, someone is expecting you.

Repeated banging on the wooden door in front of you, seven, eight, nine—it opens relatively calmly halfway through your attempt at the tenth—calm, considering the urgency in which you pound upon it.

Fist stilling in mid-air, you look upon the man standing in front of you; someone that you have grown so fond of in such a short amount of time, a whirlwind romance that has caused you to lose sight of yourself, your morality, the vision that you've always had towards your husband, your marriage, and especially yourself.

Hongjoong leans on the door, cocks his head to the side somewhat expectantly, none surprised by your being there of course but even beyond that, seemingly unbothered by the stress that wears blatantly upon your form.

"You're late," he says, playful in delivery. His hair is messy atop his head, strewn about like he has only just decided to roll out of bed now that you've arrived, and likely anticipating only ending right back there.

You push your way inside with no fight from him, Hongjoong closes the door behind you and you drop your bag in the middle of the floor—pacing a little, back and forth along barely waxed wood flooring that hasn't seen much tender love and care since the man in question has moved in. He watches you as you do, doesn't bother saying anything and likely under the assumption that you very much have something to say to him instead, should he simply wait for it. Not wrong, but how do you go about it? How are you to say it?

"I—" you start, then stop just as quickly.

Hongjoong turns his head slightly, inquisitive. "You?"

But instead of words outright, you rush to close the distance between the two of you. Arms coming up to wrap around his neck, pulling him against you and lips fast and hard finding one another. You can feel the shock laden in his body, though there's no reluctance to be found in the action as he is just as quick to follow through to meet you as he always is—always has been—because he is just as enamored by you as you are for him. Just as obsessed, just as everything. Hongjoong wants you, no, needs you just as urgently as you do him.

And so, you part from his mouth, though only enough to speak against it, still so close that any attempt to look at him renders you crosseyed.

"I'm going to leave my husband," you say with finality. "I want to be with you."

You can feel the switch flip beneath your grasp, the tension in his body at the words as he gently pulls away—creates more space between you where you stand in the middle of his living room.

Hands on your shoulders and quite literally holding you at arms length, Hongjoong inhales with something of a hiss, eyebrows pressing together in thought, in unsureness, certainly not in pleasure.

You feel a little bit as though you're dying at the sight of him like this.

"I don't know if that's such a good idea," he answers, hesitancy deeply embedded in his tone with no room for miscommunication in as much. "I—we never started this thinking that you were going to leave him, that this was going to become something permanent, right? It was just something fun, something for you to do when you're bored and your husband isn't around."

That's not what you've said. That's not what you've implied. The realization of so many things comes crashing down on you like the weight of the ocean, and similarly, you starkly feel the press atop of your chest. Like you're drowning. Suffocating. All of the oxygen having been sucked out of the room in an instant. Just that easy.

"Hey," he says then, reaches out a hand towards yours, pulls you close again so that the other one can lightly press fingertips into the flesh of your neck, your ear. "Don't think about all of that stuff, you came over here for a reason, right?"

Hongjoong's head dips down, warm lips ghosting across your jawline, settling at your neck just below. Your heart still threatens to beat straight out of your chest, fall through and settle on the floor between both of your feet. He doesn't seem to be all too bothered by that fact though.

And with how weak you are rendered by him, even in times like this, suppose neither are you.

Rolling your hips, you sigh out into the open air of his bedroom. Hongjoong's hands sitting tightly settled onto your hip, one on your waist as you grind against him. One tried and true method of forgetting everything else around you that you wish not to acknowledge nor think about—turns out it works even in the case of him, too.

Gazing up at you from below, Hongjoong watches you intently as you work him. Bottom lip pulled up between his teeth and eyes never for a second leaving you, your body, anything about you. Always you, never anything else but you—and still, Yunho's words from earlier set so heavily on your mind in a way that you hadn't quite anticipated them to; the idea that all of this has been so carefully, perfectly orchestrated by Hongjoong, the idea that much of this is a facade.

How much of it has even been real, and since when has it started? Since the first day you met him? Since that evening at the jazz lounge?

Or maybe even before all of that.

How early on in the hunt does a mouse know that it is prey? Perhaps depending on the aptitude of the predator—it never does. Not until it's far, far too late.

Hongjoong pushes his hips up, pulls down down with a perfectly timed grace. Like he knows you're deeply muddled in your thoughts and he's trying to break you out of the trance. It works temporarily, whining and meeting his efforts halfway once you remember where it is that you are, and what it is that you're doing.

"You're in your head," he says, an obvious statement. Hongjoong takes the opportunity to sit up and roll you over so that you lie beneath him instead. Pushes himself back inside with a slow, calculated drive. You wonder if it's part of his plan to always fuck you like this when he feels as though you're getting away from him a bit. Slower, gentler; the deception of love.

You think about the woman back at his school in Hong Kong. The women.

He kisses you, teeth lightly nipping into your lip in just the way that you like—and even still, even now—it brings about the same response. A desire for him, an unbridled want. He's so good at this, whatever this even is, in totality.

"Joong," you whisper against his mouth, he hums in acknowledgment of it. "Do you want to be with me?"

The question is purposeful, and you mean the words that make the sentence up, but even more than that it is a test; a test to see the way that he responds physically. Hongjoong kisses at the corner of your mouth, withdraws only to slowly press his hips forward again—tip to full length. Makes sure that you feel everything, all of him.

It tells you everything.

"The only thing I want is for the both of us to get exactly what it is that we want from the other." A surprisingly honest and thorough reply, all things considered. You can't help but guess that he is catching on to your understanding of things now.

Slipping a hand down and between your bodies, he starts to rub careful circles against you as he fucks you—slightly harder, just a bit faster as if intentionally trying to take you to a place where you're teetering on the edge of release.

And even with the knowledge that you seemingly have, it works. A man that knows you and your body so well, in ways that you've not previously thought possible. Hongjoong has wrapped you tightly around his finger in every possible way, and though you try to bite back the moan that sits strangled in your throat because it's just too easy for him, and perhaps he doesn't even deserve it in the same ways he once has, it's still not enough. Not entirely.

"I know what we both want," he says, airy but sultry as he continues his drives against you. "You, you want a distraction from your utterly boring life. Someone to pay attention to you, someone who makes you feel special, like you're the only one in the whole world."

Your orgasm sits just out of reach, but the words are true and in some ways confirm the suspicion that you've now found yourself contemplating: empty words. A man willing to do and say whatever it is that you want to hear, and you, so pathetic and wanting, thoughtlessly eating it up without a moment of concern. Hongjoong had you in the palm of his hand from the first time he called you his favorite.

Where does that leave him?

When you come, Hongjoong follows shortly thereafter; holds you tightly against him and continues on with the ruse in telling you all of the ways in which you are so special, so perfect, everything to him. When the both of you finish riding the feeling out through each other’s bodies, he brings his face up from the crook of your neck and kisses you deeply and lovingly—just like he always has. As if the walls of the fantasy haven't already come crashing down around you.

"And what I want is to finally catch that big, big break."

Ah.

You lie there beneath him, staring up at the ceiling and through strands of brown hair that don't belong to you. Hongjoong kisses the side of your face, then your jaw once more before pulling himself up and removing himself from your body completely.

"So, this never meant anything to you."

Glancing down to the edge of the bed where he sits, sorting through previously removed clothes, Hongjoong looks back at you from over his shoulder and snorts out a laugh. "Mutually beneficial, has it not been?"

"You lied to get what you wanted from me."

Hongjoong pulls his shirt over his head, lackadaisical. "I gave you exactly what you wanted from me from the start. You wanted me to pay special attention to you, so I did. You wanted me to tell you pretty words that your husband doesn't, so I did. You wanted me to fuck you stupid numerous times a night, make it exciting, an enthralling secret that only the two of us know about...so I did."

You can't help but laugh. Less at him, and more so at yourself. He's not even wrong, and that's the ugliest part about it.

"And you wanted my industry contacts."

He glances back at you again, a beat of silence passing between you before he opts to answer. "I think I more than earned it."

"You're a piece of shit."

Still lying there, Hongjoong stands, pulls his pants up and walks around to the side of the bed—closer to you. Hands you your clothing that he has kindly gathered and extends them nicely.

"All the more reason to be thankful that you're not actually in love with me then."

You snatch them from his grasp, and he makes his way towards the table that holds his glass of water from earlier. Watches you as you dress yourself again, and then the both of your attention drops to your phone as it vibrates with the notification of an incoming call.

It's Seonghwa, and while you're none in the mood to be hearing from him about this, right now, all things considered, it gives you even more of a reason to get out of here—whatever it is that he is requesting from you. Your eyes catch Hongjoong's, and he simply shrugs. None of this matters to him anymore, anyway.

"Yeah."

"Where are you right now? You're not in your office."

You glance up at Hongjoong again who can most definitely hear the man on the other end of the line. He shrugs.

"Why? What's up?" Still can't say it, still can't admit to it even after divulging as much to the man asking.

Seonghwa doesn't reply right away, instead you can hear him engaging in some sort of discussion with another man that appears to be in his presence. Your pulse immediately strengthens, heart leaping into your throat at the thought of who it can be—until a rather distinct verbal tone serves as enough of an indication that it isn't your husband.

It's Yunho.

"Just...can you come down here? There's some stuff that we need to discuss and put to rest once and for all—"

You go to agree, lips parting to speak but before you're able to get anything out, Seonghwa cuts in to give additional instruction for how you are meant to arrive.

"And since I know you're with him... bring Hongjoong."

When the call cuts, Hongjoong puts his glass down and turns on his heel towards the front door—swipes his keys and wallet from the table and begins shoving his feet into chunky black boots.

"Where are you going?" you ask, assuming the worst of him. Assuming an escape.

He looks over to you and down the short hallway.

"Tying up loose ends." He stands, pulling a light jacket down and beginning to shrug it on. "Shall we, then?"

Down the long, carpeted Aurelia halls, students mind themselves along with a handful of staff from the Akademiya meant to oversee the tasks that they are meant to be accomplishing. It feels so disjointed to you, entering the premises like this; less as the groundskeeper of such a place, and more as someone lining up for slaughter at the hands of your best friend and colleague who await your arrival within the confines of your office.

As you make your way, you occasionally and briefly take a glimpse towards the man walking beside you. Hongjoong walks just next to you; hands shoved in pockets and idly gnawing at the inside of his cheek in a way that might suggest a kind of discomfort at what may be waiting for him inside, but to someone who knows him better—to you—you know it to be nothing of the sort. A comical level of blasé, of indifference. Unbothered by the circumstances that have brought him here as a whole.

Because really, why should he? The checkmate has been served, he has already won his hand.

The door is cracked open and waiting for you when the two of you reach it, Seonghwa standing just beside it and peering over once he hears your approach. He pulls it open enough so that you and Hongjoong can slip through, and although your eyes are centered wholly on him, his are instead focused on the man of the hour—the catalyst for your downfall, the method of your treachery.

Inside, Yunho is standing beside your desk with that all too familiar file in hand. Still, Hongjoong is unmoved by it, by the sight of it, despite surely knowing what it is.

Seonghwa locks the four of you inside, and now it feels like a prison. Judging eyes all honing in on you and your grave misdoings. Only one way for this to get any worse, and you're thankful to Seonghwa for that, at least.

"Right then," Yunho starts, clearing his throat and opening the file once more. "I think it's probably best for everyone if we cut straight to the chase."

Yunho is your peer, a colleague of the Akademiya, but in this moment of the time he feels much like an authority figure over you. It's projection, you understand that much; feeling small in the mounting evidence of everything that you've done and everyone that knows about it.

"There are bits of your records that are missing from your file," he says then, questioning. Looking up from it to eye Hongjoong as he stands firmly between you and Seonghwa who appears to be guarding the door. You wonder if he is anticipating a kind of escape from your affair partner. You know him uninterested in doing anything of the sort, perfectly pleased with the outcome of things and no fear of facing the aftermath of them. "Care to elaborate on why that is?"

"Is it necessary?" Hongjoong asks, offering nothing else beyond it.

Yunho sighs, pulls his glasses off from his face and closes the paperwork in hand. "I can hazard a guess. I made a few more calls today to some of the people who handled your expulsion—"

Hongjoong grins, like he's enjoying the verbal chess that he gets to partake in as a result of this. "So, then you know."

"The 'talented college burn-out who can't seem to make it happen for himself' story is certainly a good one, I see it's gotten you far in your endeavors. Getting your permanent record sealed to this degree, getting what you need from other people, avoiding said expulsion altogether."

That makes you reel. With confusion painting your features, you look towards Yunho first—his eyes still glued to the man in question—then to Hongjoong, who takes a moment to meet you at the very least.

"What does that mean?" you ask.

"You weren't really expelled at all, were you?" Yunho says, hardly a question as he cocks his head to the side knowingly. "Rather, you were going to be, but just like you always do, you found a way to leverage that out of the hands of the person intending to cast it down on you."

Silence passes through the room, Yunho cuts through it to speak again. "You always go through life manipulating women to get what you want out of them, or are your efforts best kept in relation to school, and your career?"

Hongjoong laughs at that. "You call it manipulation, I call it equal and fair exchange. Everyone gets what they want, don't they?"

Seonghwa steps forward suddenly, angry in a way that can be seen in every inch of his body.

"You've ruined a marriage, probably ruined lives."

"I've not told her husband, and presumably neither have you. I have no interest in ruining her marriage, or anyone else's. She got what she wanted from me, and I was happy to give it. As many times as she wanted, as often as she wanted. We were all just playing our respective roles."

"We're talking about people’s real lives," Seonghwa says again, another step towards the man in question that dredges up so much rage within him. You've not ever seen him this angry before, and a part of you sits only mildly concerned in relation to Hongjoong's physical well-being. Not that it would be entirely underserved, not that it might not even be somewhat cathartic, too. "You say whatever it is that you have to say, do whatever it is that you have to do to get what you want from the people around you and then have the audacity to call it something akin to equivalent exchange—but you have nothing to lose, now do you?"

Hongjoong shrugs. "We weigh our options everyday in making decisions for ourselves. If you don't take an umbrella out and it ends up raining, whose fault is that? The weather, or yours?" He turns and looks at you then. "If someone knowingly decides to engage in an affair—whose fault is that?"

"The person who took the vows."

This voice—a different voice—comes from the doorway, behind Seonghwa who has since inched further and away from that place. You know it before your eyes settle on the keeper of it, but it doesn't stop you from doing so in the most defeated manner. In some way, and much faster than you ever might have anticipated, it's calming in a sense—to see him standing there, listening, coming into all of this knowledge—because now you are free from the secret.

Now, everything is laid out on the table in front of everyone.

Seonghwa swiftly turns, sees Yeosang and then just as quickly looks to you. There's a sort of compassion in his eyes that you know you aren't deserving of, but is being given to you on account of him caring for you, him being your best friend for so, so many years before now.

Hongjoong doesn't bother replying, his point long since having been made and a quiet understanding among all of you that regardless of how large or little his devious part being played in this has been—he will never admit fault for as much. To Hongjoong, your affair with him is as simple as a kind of bartering system between two people; he gave, and then you gave, and everyone was happy.

Hardly his fault that you are now displeased with the outcome of your own decision making, and for that, you can't even really blame him.

Yeosang steps past Seonghwa, makes his way straight towards you. Ignores your friend, ignores Yunho, and even more shockingly, ignores Hongjoong until he stands himself right in front of you: gaze pointed, judging, full of a kind of hate and resentment that isn't only now beginning its rise, but rather something that has long since been festering and now meeting its spark.

Breath trembling, you slowly reach out for your husband's hand. He allows you to take it into your grasp, though he offers you no reciprocation in the act. Staring. Far from thoughtless, but no words granted to you.

Your resolve crumbles then, a sob choking out loudly into the open air of your office as the people surrounding you watch on. Falling to your knees, you keep hold of Yeosang tightly, the man still willing to give you little more than a disparaging watchfulness.

"How long?" he finally asks, voice firm and plain. You don't have the breath, the capability to answer him, but you're quick to realize that the question is not intended for you when the other half of your betrayal speaks up in your stead.

"Two months or so," Hongjoong replies, hands still lazily shoved into his pockets. "Haven't been keeping count."

"That where you were that night that you didn't come home? Up all night, worried sick, even had your friend lie for you."

"Seonghwa didn't know—" you choke out the best you can. It's the least you can do, not drag him down in your deception like this.

"Spend your days with another man then come home and spend your evenings in bed with me. Did you even love me enough—respect me enough—to use protection?"

You cry harder at that, Hongjoong sucks his teeth at the question before giving the reply that none of you want to hear. "Not once."

Yeosang shakes his hand free of your grip shortly after, takes his leave quietly and without another word. There are no other words spoken within the office where you lie with hands to your face and sobs ripping from your chest. You have no one to blame for this but yourself.

Yunho leaves next, and Seonghwa just thereafter. He offers you a modicum of solace, at least; hand pressing into your shoulder to remind you that he's there, and maybe even that he still cares for you in some way, shape or form. In spite of your flaws. In spite of all of the ways that you have failed everyone that you love. Everyone who has loved you.

Hongjoong leaves last, and his presence above all is suffocatingly felt as he stands in front of you; calm, collected, wholly unconcerned by everything that has just taken place in front of him, and large in part, because of him. It's a last moment shared between the two of you when you finally gather yourself enough to look up at him from where you remain on your knees—through wet eyelashes and stinging red eyes—the two of you meet gazes once more. A reminder of something shared, because really, how could you ever forget?

His lips slowly thin into a line, neither a smile nor a frown, nothing more than an acknowledgement of your being there in front of him. A part of you still feels desperate to have him care for you, because the idea of it never having been real to begin with twists the knife that has long since been carved into you as a result of all of this. Please give me something, please show me that there is tenderness still.

Seconds pass that feel like a lifetime; memories of your time together with him flashing before your eyes like a film reel, someone else's life that you're watching, not your own. Smiles, kisses, touches, words; except it felt so real in the moment, how could it not have been real.

Hongjoong moves from place slightly, stills for another instant as he looks at you—as if thinking about what it is that he wants to do from here on out. You don't know what to expect from him now, because in such a short time you've come to find out that you have never really known him to begin with. A stranger to you, perhaps only now having just met for the first time today.

You watch him carefully, the way a single corner of his lip curves upwards in such a slight way that you think him attempting to fight it back, but unable to. Too pleased with himself, pleased with what he has done.

Victorious in outcome.

When he takes his leave in silence, you're left with nothing else. Hongjoong never offers you any sympathy, nor consolation in the aftermath of a disaster that he had very much been a part of.

Nor does he bother to thank you for everything graciously given to him.

"Can you bring me that box of files, please?"

With the change in weather and the months quickly passing by around the Aurelia Theater, new students come through the halls and make their way in and out of the empty rooms—picking and choosing their favorites, where they wish to spend the most of their time working on their crafts and busying their hands. A man is heart shouting down the way—something about how someone shouldn't be standing on one of the chairs—but you have enough to worry about on your plate, and thankfully, you have help with that.

Said box in hand, Seonghwa pulls around to the side of your desk, plops it on the floor in front of him and straightens himself back up into a standing position, along with feigning the pain of a strained muscle for dramatic effect.

You roll your eyes, seating yourself in your chair and attempting to sort through the immense amount of papers strewn about before you. "You know, you would think by now I'd get all of this shit settled before the new students and staff made their way in for the new semester."

"One would think that, yes. Far from your first rodeo."

"Thanks for coming to help out, by the way. I'll buy dinner tonight, we can go to that expensive place that you like that also sucks."

Seonghwa scoffs. "It doesn't suck, you just don't have a very refined palate. I accept your offer though."

Flicking corners of papers still in search of a particular contract, you rustle through numerous ones and in the flurry of it all, a pen flies from the edge of your desk and onto the floor just beside your feet. You stare at it lying there for far too long—too long for Seonghwa who you're sure wonders what sort of significance this particular item has to you—the sort of thing you can't divulge to him, the sort of thing that is no longer spoken about. Forgotten to the times. Cast out and never to be acknowledged again for as long as the both of you shall live.

You bend down and pick it up, open the desk drawer and shove it inside without a word. Looking up, your eyes meet Seonghwa's somewhat concerned ones, but you take comfort in knowing that he won't dare ask.

"What time should we go?" Changing the subject despite there not really even being one before.

You shrug. "I'm free after four, have to make the rounds with the new students and faculty, sign some more paperwork and then we can meet if you have somewhere to be."

On days like this everything almost feels normal. There are always subtle reminders of the upheaval of your life not long ago, but you're thankful for the forgiveness of your best friend—a man who has always had your back, and even when you're not even really deserving of it.

It doesn't feel as empty as it would otherwise have to, as it probably should. The emptiness resides in your chest, where it feels as though your heart once sat; playing reckless games with people, and never anticipating having met your match.

Sometimes you see him on television, in magazines. You're welcome, you think to yourself as you pass. In those moments, the emptiness on your ring finger sits that much heavier than all of the others.

Equivalent exchange—you made him, and he destroyed you.

a/n: HOI! the end of another big and dramatic story from your neighborhood longfic-infidelity-drama-angst enjoyer! it was a wild ride and i hope yall had fun hehe. some of you guys suspected parts of the ending correctly, here is your retribution! you win [hand shakes] 💗 as always, ask box is open and i look forward to hearing from you :)

#hongjoong smut #hongjoong x y/n #hongjoong x you #hongjoong x reader #hongjoong imagines #hongjoong scenarios #yeosang smut #yeosang x reader #yeosang x y/n #yeosang x you #yeosang imagines #yeosang scenarios #ateez smut #ateez x you #ateez x reader #ateez x y/n #ateez scenarios #ateez imagines

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thedepthsoffandomminds · 9 months ago

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The guest PT 10

Masterlist

Jack Dawkins x fem reader.

The Navigator had been wrapped and placed in a bed on Jack's ward, Belle had fallen asleep, sat in the viewing gallery. You looked up at her, then to Jack who was sliding down to sit against the wall. His deep brown eyes met yours.

"I can tell things are different, the way you looked at her then. That's not how it happened is it?" He says.

"No, not exactly." You walk over to him and sit beside him on the floor.

"At Government House, I heard your sister say that this was your eighth attack. What did she mean by that?" He asked, eyeing you curiously.

"Oh nothing, you know I'm new to all of this, the clothes the air..." you try to laugh it off.

"No, please don't lie to me. I heard Sneed talking to the Professor, he said he had to check you again recently."

You bite down on your bottom lip as he talks.

"Jack I... I'm not well but please you just need to do as I say. I need you to try and love Belle.."

His hand comes up to your face.

"I don't want to. I want to be with you, to look after you."

"Jack."

"Stop lying to me. You're just saying this because you're with Sneed."

"I'm not. Jack he asked me to marry him and I said no. As nice as he can be he isn't a person I would marry." You try to convince him. "He has since set his cap at either of the Fox girls."

"Then why? Why won't you let me kiss you?" He asks and a tear falls from your eye. You take his hand from.your face and turn yourself so your head is resting on his shoulder.

"What the Navigator said, about the sea, did that sound true for you?" You ask. Jack testis his hand so your fingers interlock.

"It was the greatest day of my life when I got promoted to sublieutenant. They gave me my own bed. I'd never had my own bed before. And my own room."

"Must be wonderful to be at sea. Travel the world."

"It was. It was the best and the worst of times. I saw all kinds of things I didn't even think were possible. Wild animals and festivals. In Hong Kong, I saw this giant paper dragon with fifty people under it and as they moved, this dragon appeared to dance and breathe fire. It was quite amazing."

*_*_*_*

"Where the devil is Dawkins?" Sneed bellowed when he saw the navigator lying in the bed. He stomps through the halls to the operating room, where he sees you still sat on the floor, curled around Jack.

"I can scarce believe my eyes." He gawps.

"Sneed?" Belle asks from her place in the gallery. All three of you waking at his voice. You remove yourself from Jack.

"I insist you both return to Government House immediately and we will discuss this later."Sneed growls at you both.

" Or possibly not." Belle quips as you leave. You hear the two men beginning to argue as Belle pulls you away.

"I have always known you to be a reprehensible, arrogant upstart, with no respect for your betters." Sneed growls

"I have enormous respect for my betters. It is just there are none around here." Jack bit back

"You have directly performed an operation I had forbidden you to do. That I specifically said was not a safe operation in the patient's interest."

"And I agree with your diagnosis. A surgeon of your skill level, Sneed, it would have been impossible." Jack quipped angrily .

"I am to be Head Surgeon here in two months."

"Only if you can force one of the Fox's daughters into marriage right? Or y/n?" Jack squares up to the other man.

"I see that is truly what this is about. You will never be good enough for any of them."

"And you think you are? Money you never worked for is not a personality trait, you pompous, overgrown toff. Y/n will never love you."

"When I am head surgeon you will no longer have a role here and I will ensure you have it nowhere else in the country. You can crawl back to your own kind, Dawkins and I will have my pick of the three women."

Jack's fist collided with Sneed's nose before Jack fully knew what he was doing. A trail of blood dripped down Sneed's top lip. He pulled a glove from his pocket and slapped Jack across the face with it.

"Is that how you fight in Mayfair?"

*_*_*_*

Sitting in the carriage around half way back to Belle's house your memory of the show flooded back to you.

"Oh god no. Belle stop the carriage, I have to go back!"

"Y/n what, what is it? What's happened?" Belles asks fearfully.

"Just please stop," you banged on the top of the carriage and hear the driver pulling at the horse's. "Belle go home. You need to.implore your father not to allow any duels." You say to her jumping out of the carriage and running back to the hospital.

You as fast as you can until your chest starts to tighten. Your foot catches on rock and you fall to the ground. Your head smacking down, everything going dark.

@fandomfan-102 @deanstolemydragon @mydeputyghostwagon

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tryingtodotheright-thing · 5 months ago

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Hello, Sunset - 11

AN: This chapter is long overdue, I'm sorry for the long wait. A lot has happened in my personal and work life and I've just not been in the head space to write. Writing is my escape and right now I need it so thank you to everyone who reads this. PAIRING: Seungcheol x fem!reader GENRE: exes to lovers, idol verse, angst WORD COUNT: 5,111 WARNINGS: reader has anxiety and depression, swearing, mentions of alcohol Text in blue is spoken/written in Korean. PREVIOUS / NEXT

The seatbelt sign glared at her as the plane began its descent. She moved her seat upright again and buckled the straps together. Eyes closed again and grasping the seat handles tightly, Y/N tried her best to ignore the nervousness that brushed over her. She waited for the touchdown, anticipating the brunt force of the aircraft’s wheels touching the tarmac and wondering why this part of the journey always felt the longest. She could forget that she was in a metal box in mid-air for hours, sleeping and eating without care, but as soon as it came to the climax of the journey, the fear returned in twofold. The aircraft shook violently for a few seconds, stuttered in its movements before it slowly began to glide to a stop. The captain’s announcement rang through the plane and Y/N took this as a sign to turn her phone back on. She noticed Emma doing the same next to her.

As the device in her hand came back to life, it began to buzz with notifications. Seeing Seungcheol’s name in the list of people who had contacted her in the four hours spent offline brought back the butterflies she thought she would never experience again. She still couldn’t decide if the events of last night were real or not. Was it a dream or would it become a nightmare? Only time would tell. It would be naive of her to not feel apprehensive about giving Seungcheol a second chance. Just because she forgave doesn’t mean that she forgot. She’d told him that last night as they hid away in her hotel room. They held hands with her head on his shoulder, admired the city view from the sofa and watched the night give way to dawn then sunrise.

It’s easier to build a new relationship than fix one that was splintered. It wasn’t to say that they would fail before they even started but to give them both a reality check. It meant learning to love each other all over again, they were different people from when they had first met after all. It meant moving slowly, taking one step at a time to grow the trust that had eroded. It meant patience, because there will be arguments, probably more than the first time around. It meant reassurance, showering each other with love to drown the doubts that were sure to crop up. Until they felt secure in themselves and in each other, until they truly could read each other’s hearts, until their love became a strength that only grew with each obstacle. Let’s work hard for it together, Y/N had said as she handed back the box with two rings, one that told of their past and one that spoke of a future. Give them back to me when we can take pride in our love, she had said.

Seungcheol

Thank you.