#i didn't cry this time | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

hwanghyunjinenthusiast · 1 year ago

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Pretend It's Someone That Came for You (18+)

pairing: coworker!wonwoo x fem!touch-starved!reader

genre: coworker au, office au, strangers to lovers, angst w a happy ending, smut (MDNI!!), fluffy fluffy fluff fluff

description: you're lonely. you're so lonely you think it might actually kill you. but when wonwoo transfers to your office, he might just change that fact.

warnings: unprotected sex (do NOT pls my babes), soft dom!wonwoo, sub!reader, v loving sex, praise (f. receiving), confession of love, riding, fingering (f. receiving), pussy rubbing tihi, pet names (pretty girl, good girl, baby, darling, etc), VERY angsty beginning, yn is truly v sad so DO NOT READ THIS if u fear it will make u sad!!, they say i love u unrealistically fast but i had to do it, yn uses sex to feel less lonely/ends up feeling more lonely, relatable yn frs, slightly dramatized symptoms of touch-starvation (?), kinda boring plot but idc bc its CUTE AF

quotes from my creative director (@joshibambi): "finally!!" (she was fed tf up), "stanley is the most stanley man ever. i hate him but i love him.", (more r coming she actually didnt have time 2 read this and i didnt want to wait with posting.)

wordcount: 10.0k

a/n: this story was supposed 2 have more angst, like it was supposed to have this whole misunderstanding, but it just didnt feel right, it made me sad, so instead this is a short n sweet love story xx

Sometimes you think that the loneliness might kill you.

You weren’t always like this. You remember being a sociable, joyful child; half-broken bikes and teddy bears and booster seats. You remember pigtails and popsicle sticks and Power Rangers, and what came after that? Being a moody teenager, became being a moody adult. High school became college, and college became an office job that served to keep you alive, even if it didn’t feel like being alive. College wasn’t that bad, you remember, so at what point had you mistaken isolation for privilege? And at what point had you gone too far into that tunnel-hole to turn back?

You must’ve been cursed, you think, putting on your outfit for work in the deadly still apartment. Dust dares not move, dares not give you hope that you are not alone.

You must’ve been cursed, you think, coming into work to a string of half-hearted, mumbled greetings. Your office is off-white and black and gray and everyone inhabiting it is also off-white and black and gray, and their skin is faintly oily and sickly and their faces are dragging down as if the very earth was reclaiming them and you think that you fit in here better than anywhere else.

You must’ve been cursed, you think, when you spend your day writing emails and organizing documents of information into different formats to send to huge corporations. Sometimes you fantasize about the other end of the transaction. Maybe their office is warm and brown with an accent of blue, and maybe people put hands on each other's shoulders, when they tell one another they’ve done a good job.

Yes, there’s no other explanation, you think, and can’t even muster the energy to feel bad when you blame some old hag from your hometown. You think she must’ve conjured up the worst ingredients, something cartoonishly evil, and a spell befell you, sunk into the crevices of your skin and dug into your pores.

You lie on your couch with a glass of wine and the television going, but you’re not really listening. You don’t think anyone has touched you in six months. You’re not even sure you’re real anymore. You swear, you could live with no one hearing you out, because you’re not sure you’d have anything worthwhile to say, but you just needed someone to touch you. To reach out a hand and confirm, you’re real, you’re right underneath my fingertips, and I’m squeezing your shoulder, and I see you, and I feel you right here.

Sometimes you think that the loneliness might kill you.

Lying physically very still, you still feel like you’re scrambling, fighting the clutch of the curse, and tugging on metal chains. Maybe that’s where all your energy goes.

What do normal people do when they feel this bad?

Sometimes you leave open the window, and when the wind tugs at your door, you pretend it’s someone that came for you.

Tug, tug, tug. The door rattles against its hinges when the fatally empty sky brings to you, in outstretched palms, the wind interlaced with glimmers of hope.

There’s never anyone at the door. _____________________________

This particular day starts like any other. You wake to your alarm and you put on clothes and you get ready and brush your teeth. Then you trample down to the bus stop. The sky is smothered by a duvet of heavy rain clouds. The rain hasn't come yet, but you know it will. Your fingers become stiff and hard, where they adhere to the polyester strap of your bag, massaging it. The bag is cold and dead.

The bus ride is by far the greatest part of your day. It’s quiet - early enough that you’re only accompanied by a few other souls. You rest your head on the window, vibrating gently against the curve of your forehead, and watch the people in the street.

The bus hums a gentle tune and snakes down the streets. Then you’re there, and whatever solace that it offers you under artificial light and mediocre, felted seats is gone.

Your office building is maybe the most depressing place on earth. It’s no glamorous feat of architecture. It is but a large, orange-y, puke-y, brick square, and the building is shared between yours and the Forester company. You don’t talk to the Foresters, but you know they eat cream cheese bagels on their breaks and throw birthday parties and once you saw the branch manager squeezing a salesman’s shoulder and telling him he had done a good job. His fingers squeezed down and the movement of the fabric revealed a shoulder pad built into the suit. You remember thinking it was a shame that it blocked the real touch.

Today, you walk up the stairs with heavy steps and you idle into the office building, eyes cast down to the dirty, gray carpet. You begin the long trek into the back of the building where your desk is located.

“Morning, Y/n,” mumbles Tina.

“Morning, Tina,” you mumble back.

“Morning, Y/n,” mumbles Gerard.

“Morning, Gerard,” you mumble back.

“Morning.”

“M-”

Wait a minute.

Your greeting falls short. You don’t recognize that voice. Stopping in your tracks, your shoes scratch on the rough carpet, and lift your head to see him.

The first thing you notice is that he’s the most gorgeous man you’ve ever seen. He looks like he jumped out of an underwear commercial; he’s all strong jawline, sharp eyes, round glasses on his pretty nose, neatly trimmed, short dark hair stretching down the planes of his face. He’s wearing a button up (usually you wouldn’t even register the clothing your coworkers adorned, but something about how he wore it was noteworthy), a tie draping over the dress shirt, and formal slacks hugging his thighs.

He smiles at you sheepishly, hands nervously smoothing down his thighs.

“I’m Wonwoo” he says curtly, nodding to you. “Just transferred from the Wallingset branch.”

You nod. “Right. Wallingset,” you nod more. “Nice to meet you. I’m Y/n.”

“Nice to meet you too, Y/n.”

Something about your name on his lips makes your heart flutter. It’s pathetic, you know, but his peregrine being in his office chair, spilling your name from his pink lips makes you feel a little more real. You look at him and then you nod again-again, kicking your legs into gear again and walking the last stretch to your desk.

You can see the back of his head from your orange-wood desk. Papers and sticky notes are scattered among the desktop. The monitor watches you accusingly, all big and square and black, waiting for you to open it up and begin working. Your eyes linger on him for a moment. Then you work.

A few hours pass on emails and translating information from a company into a comprehensive sheet. However, today you’re having a hard time focusing on work.

This is not new.

Sometimes you briefly talk to a man at the grocery store, and your mind will wander to him for next week, wondering if he’s thinking about you too, imagining yourself cuddling with him, watching movies, imagining him telling you it’ll all be okay. Sometimes you briefly talk to a man on the street, sometimes it’s even a date, but whatever the case you obsess and you dream and you always end up alone.

Today the victim of your depraved mind is Wonwoo. The guilt is easy to push away. You feel sorry for yourself. You think you deserve this. You think you can’t survive without this. And so you imagine him hugging you, stroking your hair, and you imagine him falling in love with you, and you imagine not being alone. Your fingers rest on your keyboard. It’s old and mechanical. You think it’s from a yard sale, probably an old woman whose children moved away. It’s plastic, and it curves inwards underneath the pads of your fingertips. The keys are cold and dead.

You fully zone out, eyes blearing into the back of his head, but you don’t really see it, your mind has traveled elsewhere. You guiltily imagine his hand between your legs, on your chest, straddling him, kissing him. And it’s not rough, it’s loving, because in this world he loves you, and he’d do anything for you, and you don’t have to be alone again.

You don’t love Wonwoo. It’s not some magical love at first sight, it’s not a romance book, it’s real life. You’re lonely. You need this to survive.

“Hey, Y/n?”

You snap your head up. Maybe you were still daydreaming. But you recognized the voice well and true, and it was Wonwoo, leaned over your desk, hands in his pockets.

“Oh, uhm, hey-” your voice is shaky and you quickly rush to compose yourself, hands moving frantically and uselessly to glide papers over one another and, then, realizing that there was no point to your movements, stilling and looking up at him, cheeks flushed. “Hey.”

Wonwoo smiles gently. “Uh, you know, I was wondering,” he looks around the office, as if surveying the area. “If you knew where to get a good lunch? I don’t know this area at all, so..”

He trails off, looking at you expectantly for an answer. Now that he’s standing before you, it’s much harder to ignore the guilt you feel. You wanna gnaw at your nails until they’re nubs, you want to crawl under your desk and cover your eyes. Does he see how red your cheeks are?

“Uhm- well- I don’t- I eat a packed lunch, so I’m-”

“Oh.”

“Yeah, I’m, uh, no expert,” you giggle awkwardly and watch his gentle smile drop into pursed lips. “But! Uh- I hear the- the hot dog stand, uh, just a little down the street is good!”

“Really? Maybe I should try it,” he contemplates, smile returning to his lips. “Would you mind showing me this mysterious hot dog stand?”

“Uh-”

Just seconds before you were thinking of his fingers in your pussy, and his hands caressing you, and him making you feel loved. He’s standing before you and he’s a totally normal guy, and you feel like shit. You feel like shit for using this fake image of him to comfort yourself. You can’t be around him, can’t convince yourself that maybe this’ll turn into something more - not when you always end up alone. Your brows furrow in determination.

“Actually, I have to, uh, get this done, so-” you gesture vaguely to your monitor.

“Right! Yeah,” Wonwoo seems embarrassed, biting his lips and nodding. “It’s, uh, just down the street?”

“Yeah, to the right when you walk out the building.”

“For sure. Thanks,” he doesn’t even look at you then, just waves you off half-heartedly and starts trailing down the office. His shoulders are incredibly broad and his belt wraps tightly around his small waist.

You feel like shit. _____________________________

Why is no one else cursed?

You look out of the window, lying on your bed after work. Everything is very still and unmoving - your whole apartment feels like it’s knotted in strings, tightened until everything is snapped into place, and if you move the wrong muscles, the invisible hands will let go and everything will fly and hurdle through your home, and you can almost hear the sound, like the hard, empty sound of throwing a bowling ball and getting a strike.

No one else is cursed. People crowd the streets with friends, family, partners, and they’re talking and laughing. You rest your head in the windowsill, a lone spectator in the window. The glass cuts you off from the streets.

The afternoon after daydreaming the way you did about Wonwoo is always hard. Your apartment seems intent on suffocating you. Your daydreams serve as a reminder that you’re alone, that you truly have no one, and the act itself is so humiliating, you sulk into a glass of red wine and sometimes you cry. What do normal people do when they feel this bad, you wonder again, sobbing in your bed and spilling wine on your nightie.

Nighttime falls early while you’re crying. You weep on and off, hug your knees, eat a microwave dinner and watch TV, light casting onto your pathetic form on the couch.

And in your most vulnerable state is when you most easily slip into your old habits.

You press an old contact in your phone, one you’d tried to steer away from recently. You wipe mascara from your reddened cheeks, you wear pretty lingerie, and you lie, completely empty, void of any warmth, on your bed, awaiting.

It’s the first time he touches you in months. When his hand finds your shoulder, you shudder terribly. Sorry, he says, and he seems taken aback. Just ignore it, you plead, just ignore it. He does so, unsurely, and every time his hand grazes over your body you shudder and sob and every time he hesitates, asking if you’re okay, you cry at him to continue.

It feels good while it’s happening. Skin beneath your fingertips, hands on you, a face close to yours. You and him are the only thing moving in the apartment, synergizing on your bed, conjoining and writhing, and for just a moment, you don’t feel so alone.

When you’re done the anonymous man stands back up, sliding on his pants in the late hour. He says it was great and you hum. But then he looks around, hesitating on every old piece of furniture, on every photo on the walls, and lastly on you.

“What?” you ask, lying naked in your bed. He grimaces at you, as if signaling that he can’t quite figure it out himself.

“I don’t know,” he says slowly, hands on his newly-clothed hips and surveying the corners of the room, where shadows pool. “It feels haunted in here.”

He leaves.

When the warmth is gone, the bile rises in your throat. Old habits die hard, you think, and you feel totally empty. You couldn’t go on like this. It was nights like these you began to feel like a martyr - sacrificing yourself for a brief escape. Because when the door is closed with a click and you’re alone again, you feel yourself trembling and your heart is glowing red in the empty astral plane. Brief, easy forms of pleasure are often the most harmful.

It feels haunted in here. You remember his words, and before you finally fall asleep, you wonder one thing. You wonder if you’re already dead. _____________________________

The next day is a pain to overcome. You’re slightly hungover, slightly sore, and very uncomfortable. But you comply with your routine, and you enjoy the bus ride, and when you get to the office everyone greets you.

“Morning, Y/n,” mumbles Tina.

“Morning, Tina,” you mumble back.

“Morning, Y/n,” mumbles Gerard.

“Morning, Gerard,” you mumble back.

“Morning, Y/n,” Wonwoo says. You look up from the carpet carefully, flashing him an apologetic smile. You hope he can read its intention: Sorry about being weird yesterday. You think he got it.

“Morning, Wonwoo.”

And then you’re landing yourself at your own desk and beginning work once more. It’s boring, but today you ward off the daydreams and you focus, and you’re getting an exceptional amount done.

The clock on the wall (off-white, but yellowing near the top) reads 12:28 when your boss, Stan, approaches your table. He’s half bald, and his suit is much too loose, and he has a ladder of wrinkles climbing his larger-than-life forehead.

“Hey, N/n!” he calls, so loud that a couple of heads turn at the commotion. You’ve asked him several times not to call you that.

“Stanley,” you breathe, tapping a stack of papers on your desk to neaten the pile. You wonder if you were in trouble, but if his smile is anything to go by, you’d guess not.

“My favorite woman in accounting!”

“Hehe,” you laugh half-heartedly. You catch the eye of Wonwoo, glancing over his shoulder with a small, teasing smile. You smile back.

“I have a big- oh wait, wait, new guy, uhh, Jeon? Come over here real quick!” Suddenly his solid fingers waft the now scared Wonwoo over. The spectacled man’s shoulders hunch up as he moves off the chair, nodding respectfully. Wonwoo stands beside Stanley at your desk, and you focus your attention on Stanley, hoping to not get too lost in the idea of Wonwoo again - you were doing so good today.

“I have a big job for you, and I thought you could work with Wonwoo on it,” Stan moves his hand up to cup the side of his mouth, as if telling you a big secret, “seeing as he was a bit of a star over in Wallingset.”

Shit. The guy you were daydreaming about was working with you? Wonwoo laughs, embarrassed, but you hardly have time to catch it. You can’t do this. Yesterday you were thinking about him fingering you while looking at you lovingly!

“We have a massive, new client! Just dropped a big competitor of ours, and they want us to do their six month report!” Stanley seems genuinely excited about this, so you can’t help feeling a little guilty that you’ll be a gobbering, slobbering mess, sitting beside Wonwoo on this.

“That’s great-”

“I know! So, my two star members in accountancy, I’ll hand this off to you. The data should be coming into your emails soon,” without letting either of you react, Stanley hunches over, like a coach does before a little-league baseball game, wrapping his arms around both of you and Wonwoo. “You got this, troopers!”

Stanley claps his hands on both of your backs, so hard you jerk forward at the movement, and then he bounces off to the elevator at the far end of the room. You sigh heavily from the interaction. It’s quiet for a moment, while you fiddle with the papers in front of you.

“What a guy,” Wonwoo muses finally, thin fingers resting on the edge of your desk. You giggle, unable to look him in the eye for fear that you might remember how you’d thought about starting a family with him. “Yeah.”

You and Wonwoo settle into an unoccupied meeting room, and it’s all very professional. Markers and post-its, trying to find the best way to structure the report, excel sheets to categorize and overlook data, double check numbers.

However bad you think it’s going to be, you’re wrong. Wonwoo is easy to talk to - he’s quiet, but he’s intelligent, and he understands how to bring on conversation, even when you fold in on yourself like a used napkin.

“Yeah, we used to steal signs from our neighborhood,” Wonwoo admits halfway into a conversation about your hometowns. “I don’t think that’s gonna fly anymore.”

“Why stop now? You’re letting societal rules hold you back,” you joke, and the two of you laugh, and it’s so pathetic, you’re certain you haven’t laughed this much in years, and the conversation has lasted maybe 20 minutes.

“Well, I could show you the craft, you know, it’s a delicate process-”

While Wonwoo talks your phone buzzes and you absent-mindedly pick it up, reviewing the notification.

Your grin drops. Faintly, you hear Wonwoo stop talking. He tilts his head to study the way you frown at the screen. “What’s up?” he asks.

It’s the guy from last night and he’s asking if you’ll be available again tonight.

Maybe it’s how you could almost forget it - how you let yourself into positions that would hurt you, just to feel seen and heard and touched. Maybe it’s the dichotomy of that encounter and now, talking to Wonwoo, and having the laughter steal away the loneliness. But you’re reminded so terribly of your position. You’re reminded that this, too, will end, and that the loneliness will return. You’re reminded that once the shift ends, you’re alone again.

Suddenly you’re a thousand daggers all pointing out. You shield yourself.

“Uh,” you trail off, putting the phone down again. “Just some guy.”

Wonwoo’s eyebrows raise. “Boyfriend?”

“No!” you say quickly. “No, he’s, uh. Just some guy.”

A pause.

“Okay,” Wonwoo says. You don’t even remember where you left off the conversation. You bite your lip because everything is all agony. The table is cold and dead beneath your hand.

“I’m thinking we group these together,” you say, eyes now tuned to your screen and fully submerged back into your work. Work. That was all that could cover your beaten down, cursed self.

The rest of the shift you feel Wonwoo looking at you carefully, as if he’s trying to read you. You don’t talk about yourselves anymore, no more banter, no more witty comments. You structure the report, and try to ignore how his eyes laser you open. You don’t like it. You feel like he can tell you’re a pathetic, lonely woman and that you have nothing and no one. You feel like he can sense the curse upon you.

This would be torture. _____________________________

It is not torture.

The next day, to your surprise, Wonwoo is nowhere to be seen. You wait 5, 10, then 15 minutes in the meeting room you’d camped in, before you begin working on your own. It’s slower without him, but you manage.

You can’t help but slightly worry about him. It feels stupid. You know you’re putting too much emotion into a person you’d known for two days, but you can’t help it. You wonder if he’s gotten hurt or injured, or if maybe he hates you and has transferred back. You think even Excel finds you pathetic.

You sit there for three hours, among the ruins of paperwork and your open laptop, running your hand through your hair and typing in sentences that mean nothing, and the wallpaper is off-white and yellowing at the top, and the blinds are closed to the meeting room.

Around 1 PM the door to the meeting room is opened, wood smacking against the glass that surrounds it, and Wonwoo stands in the doorway, slightly out of breath. You snap your head up to him, like the jerk of a lifeless doll, suddenly interrupted from a very disorganized Excel sheet.

“Hi, shit, sorry,” he gasps, slinging his bag off of his shoulder to sit down next to you.

“Are you okay?” you ask immediately, and Wonwoo nods blindly, pulling his laptop out of his bag. “Yeah,” he says, cheeks slightly flushed and licking his lips. “My cat- my cat needed surgery, she got sick last night, it was an emergency.”

You nod in understanding, “it’s okay-”

You can hardly get the words out before Wonwoo rolls his chair back, wheels resounding hollowly on the floor, so he can look at you clearly. “I’m really sorry about this, it was not nice of me to leave you alone with this.” He gestures vaguely to the scattered papers, and you shake your head.

“It’s okay, Wonwoo, I get it,” you say reassuringly, peering up at him through your lashes. “You don’t need to worry about it. You’re here now.”

Wonwoo seems less intent on personal conversations today - it’s probably because he was so late, and now is trying to make up the time. But it’s okay, in fact you’re somewhat relieved, because it dampens the false hope that blooms in your chest, whenever he asks you about your life.

Even if you and Wonwoo work hard and quietly, you slip into the late hours of the night in an attempt to keep on track for your schedule. Outside the windows that separate you from real life, the sky turns orange, and then dark, muted blue, and stars begin dotting its impressive stretches. People begin to leave around five, and by the time you and Wonwoo finish all your work, you’re the last ones left on your floor of the office.

Wonwoo lets out a loud sigh when he finally finishes the second segment of your report, and the both of you slump back in your seats.

“It’s so fucking late,” Wonwoo limply throws his hand in the direction of the window. You smile a little, looking out. Smaller buildings spawn geometrically from the ground, and every once in a while someone walks by with their dog, spotlighted by the stretch of street lamps that stand outside the parking lot. “I really am sorry about this, you know. Really ruined your night,” he says quietly.

You shake your head. “It’s fine, I had nothing to come home to anyway.”

There’s a pause.

Wonwoo looks at you intensely. Oh shit, you realize, was that too obvious? Was that too pathetic? Has it just clicked that you’re a loser that no one wants? You nervously look back at him, but there’s no malice in his eyes. A totally unreadable expression adorns his features, where he’s leaned back in his leather chair, legs spread invitingly. You look away, feeling dumb.

“At least we followed our schedule!” you say. Wonwoo snorts.

“Yeah, thanks to you. If you hadn’t completed so much before I got here, it would’ve been hopeless.”

Now it’s your turn to scoff, blushing lightly and looking at the linoleum flooring. “I don’t know about tha-”

“Seriously, Y/n, just take the compliment,” Wonwoo reaches a hand over, and you watch its movement.

It’s like time slows down, not like the movies, no, like you can stop time with the heavy weight of your gaze, pinning his muscles in place. But you can’t, and it lands on your shoulder with a soft thud. Fuck. His hand is warm and alive on you.

“You did so well today, I-” Wonwoo cuts himself off, because suddenly you’re trembling.

He feels your body shuddering and jerking under his hand, like the wind rattles your door when you leave it open, and he can’t see your face behind a curtain of hair, but he hears you gasp, and, fuck, you look like you’re sobbing.

The man from last night had become so hesitant when you reacted this way. When your body trembled and shook and when you cried, but Wonwoo seems to understand. He peers at you from above the rims of his glasses, and his hand stays put right there on your shoulder.

“Y/n,” he whispers, so sincere it causes a pathetic squeak to escape you. What must he think of you? The thoughts spiral and you can’t control a single one of them, they dance like freed souls in your head, and you can’t stop the spasming of your muscles, and you know you look so pathetic beside him right. “Y/n, look at me.”

You don’t. You can’t. You can’t because there are tears spilling from the rims of your eyes, and rolling down your cheeks, wet and glossy. Besides, you’re an ugly crier.

“Look at me,” he says seriously, finger tightening on your shoulder. You try to steady your breath and calm your tears, before you obey and begin to turn your chair. The simple motion requires so much effort - it’s like the air has become so thick, that the friction against your leather seat slows you down.

Finally you turn to him, eyes first resting on his knees, then, carefully, traveling up to his face. He’s frowning.

Your face is reddened and your eyes are puffy, your cheeks are shiny and you chew your bottom lip in a futile attempt to keep the tears at bay.

Wonwoo looks genuinely devastated. The hand on your shoulder softens its grasp, then begins petting your arm, rubbing up and down. The action has you choking out gasps, trembling even more in his hold, and Wonwoo feels the need to roll his chair closer to you, so his other hand can grab yours. His thumb rubs over the back of it, and he lowers his head to look at you.

“Shh, relax, relax, Y/n,” he whispers, and you try to nod, but it’s so overwhelming; being touched, being seen, being heard, all at once. For months, maybe years, no one has touched you like this - as if they care. Now the feeling is foreign, so scorching hot on your arm and your hand, your body can’t take it anymore. You’re stuck between wanting to lean into his hands, wanting to feel how real you are, and how physically true your existence is, and wanting to shy away. What must he think of you?

“Y/n,” he says, squeezing his eyes shut to banish the sigh of your sobbing. “When was the last time someone touched you?”

You hiccup painfully. “Uhm- I- I don’t, ” your eyes are bleary and your lashes are wet. Your lip trembles and your whole body shakes when you try to breathe.

Apparently this was enough of an answer for Wonwoo, because he suddenly stands, somewhat harshly tugging you into a standing position too, and pulls you directly into the harbor of his arms.

Instinctively, you wrap your arms around his torso. His chest is pressed flat against yours, so, so warm, when he nudges your head into the crook of his neck, and presses his face against its side, sighing softly into you, and breathing warm air onto your hair. His palms push you into him, soothing your trembling body, and holding you like an anker. One hand travels up to your hair.

“W-Wonwoo, you don’t have to-”

“Shh,” he quiets you immediately, voice the softest wind of a peach tree. “Just let me take care of you.”

You do. Wonwoo holds you until you stop crying, and though it must’ve been twenty minutes or so, it feels like no time at all. Standing in his space, breathing in his dark cologne, and letting his heat thaw your dead heart is a totally timeless act. Joy and serenity flows from the places where your bodies touch. When you stop crying, Wonwoo holds you for longer.

Eventually, he lets you go.

You step back sheepishly, now much calmer and the red in your face faded. You wipe your tired eyes shyly with your sleeve.

“Thank you, Wonwoo,” you mumble, voice thick and garbled. When you look up at him, he smiles softly, although it doesn’t quite reach his eyes.

“Don’t worry about it,” he says softly, arm extending one last time to squeeze your forearm. Then it falls limp again.

“I, uh, I’ll see you tomorrow, yeah?”

“Of course.”

When you return home, you’re buzzing. Your entire apartment buzzes along with you, things seem to clatter and beam along with the bright, glowing of your heart. You snuggle into bed and nothing is still and even when you’re drifting into sleep, your nerve endings spin in joyful circles, and your feet are a static hum. Suddenly you are very, very real. _____________________________

You’d think the next day would be tense and awkward, and maybe it is at first, but soon enough you’re talking again, more intimately than before even.

This is Wonwoo’s doing - you know this. You know he’s smart and you know he doesn’t want you to feel bad, so he makes conversation and builds trust between the two of you. You know he hopes you don’t feel insecure. Every word he says and every flick of his eyes is riddled with it.

The conversation decidedly slows down your progress, so Wonwoo once more suggests staying overtime. You look at him for a moment before agreeing.

You can’t tell what his end goal is. A chamber of your heart has been revived and rebirthed, and you’re more chipper, more bouncy, but the rest of your heart insists: you’re still cursed - eventually it’ll go back to how it should be. You listen. You try not to get your hopes up that Wonwoo really cares about you. Why should he, really?

Although when you’re done for the day, about an hour after your usual 5 PM, you stand up and begin to pack your things, laptop sliding into your bag and clustering pens in your hand. It’s gray outside, but the sun comes in a single strand through a gap in the smog and the clouds. The wind hoots by the windows, and it smells like the indian you ordered for lunch together.

You stop your packing, feeling a set of eyes in your back. You twist your head to see him.

Wonwoo is sitting completely still in his chair, slack-covered legs spread open, and he makes no move to collect his own things. He just stares.

“What’s up?” you quip. You’re slightly nervous. Just before it was all silly childhood stories, college and weed and life before the dead-end job. Now Wonwoo has that unreadable expression on his face again.

He slowly lifts his hands from the armrest, eyes locked with yours, and claps his palms on the tops of his thighs.

Your eyebrows furrow.

“Wha-”

“Come here,” he says simply. When you stand completely still, like a deer in the headlights, Wonwoo scoffs and rolls his eyes. “What? You think you’re cured because someone hugged you once?”

“Cured?”

“You’re touch-starved, Y/n,” Wonwoo states matter-of-factly, “you need to be touched.”

“Touch-starved?” you echo, a bewildered expression on your face.

“We can also just hug, like yesterday,” he suggests calmly. You envy his collectedness. “I just don’t want you to feel bad. So please. Come sit.”

To emphasize, Wonwoo pats his thighs again, patiently. You step away from your bag with hesitating steps, pursing your lips. Your cheeks blaze when you look at his thighs again - they’re so long, and the folds in his slacks stretch down and centralize on his crotch and- You’re being a pervert.

“Okay,” you squeak and Wonwoo tuts. Why is that hot, you think, why the hell is that hot?

“We can just hug if you-”

You feel bold.

Without letting him finish, you swing your leg over his, and plop down, straddling halfway down his thighs. You thank God you put pants on this morning instead of a skirt, when you look down at where you rest on top of him.

Wonwoo is a little taken aback, but when you’ve settled on him, his hands find your waist and he looks up at you with a hum. Your breathing is a little shaky. Once again his hands provide a pumping of golden joy into your body, and more of you comes alive and becomes real, and you smile.

What had Wonwoo been talking about? Touch-starved?

“What’s, um-” your question is cut off with a gasp, when Wonwoo uses his hands on your middle to tug you closer. You rest on the highest point of thighs that you can without sitting on his dick. Cheeks red and eyes squeezed shut, you hear how Wonwoo hums, pleased. “What were you talking about? Touch-starved?” you whisper, keeping your eyes shut.

Wonwoo sighs, and once more, like the movement is entirely replayed, his hand finds your hair and pushes your face into the crook of his neck. You sigh against it, enjoying how his arms protect you and hide you from the evil of the world.

“If you don’t touch anyone,” Wonwoo begins, his voice low bass in your ear, “you become touch-starved. That’s why you reacted the way you did yesterday.”

His hands run up and down your sides.

“But- but I’m not crying today,” you say quietly into his neck. Wonwoo hums.

“No, that’s good,” he says. “We can stop if you really want, I just wa-”

“No!” your voice squeaks immediately, and, as if he were running from you, you fist his shirt to keep him close.

“Okay,” there’s a smile in Wonwoo’s voice. You can’t see it but you can imagine it.

Comfortable silence. Wonwoo traces patterns on your back and you breathe deeply against the skin of his neck. The two of you function as one living thing, the only living thing left in the office. Chairs are turned halfway, a couple lights are left on. The desks betray the past presence of humans.

“Wonwoo,” you pip.

“Mhm?”

“You don’t have to do this, you know? I don’t want you to do it if you- if it’s just.. Pity.”

Wonwoo sighs, and you feel the way his torso deflates underneath you. He trails his hand up from your back to tap your cheek. You move back and look at him.

Your faces are very close, you can feel how your exhales collide and then scatter, hell, you think you could count each of his eyelashes from here.

“I already told you. I’m doing this because I don’t want you to feel bad. I-” he hesitates for a moment, pursing his lips. “I’ve been there. So I know what it’s like.”

The thought of Wonwoo feeling like this, like you, is sickening. Genuinely sickening, you feel your insides turn to rot and mold and you frown so deeply, you think your lips might forever lock in that position.

“I’m okay now,” he reassures, reading you immediately. His hand finds your cheek and he almost cries out at the way you lean into it blindly.

“How did you-.. I- I always thought it was, like, a lifelong curse,” you say.

“A curse?” Wonwoo grins, thumb stroking over the skin of your cheek. It makes you happy, it makes you feel like your heart will burst.

“Yeah. I guess I just blamed some old woman from my hometown,” you giggle, blushing a little because, yes, it did sound stupid when you weren’t just echoing the theory to yourself, like playing a team sport alone.

“You’re not cursed,” Wonwoo promises, tucking your head into his chest. “I’ll help you, don’t worry. I’ll take care of you from now on.”

He does take care of you.

Every day you work overtime, and every day when you’re done with work, Wonwoo slides you into his lap and holds you, while you curl up in his chest. Then you talk and you laugh, and you listen to each other's music. His hands run warm up your back and in your hair and on your hips, gentle caresses, deeply intimate. For two weeks you and Wonwoo indulge in this nighttime ritual.

You have not felt lonely since that night. And Wonwoo can tell. Your skin is warmer and brighter, you smile wider, your eyes twinkle, and there’s energy in every movement. Your body thaws under his warm hands every night, and sometimes when you smile, he gets so happy he could kiss you.

You realize you like Wonwoo one particular night when you’re falling asleep in your bed and you can still feel the ghost of his arms around you and it lulls you into a deep, dreamless sleep, and when you wake up you smell a little bit like his cologne. That’s how you realize. You like how considerate and how gentle he is, you like how sweet he is to you, you like how he looks when he smiles and when he laughs and you like how much he loves his cat. You like how his arms feel wrapped around you.

And you like him, and suddenly your apartment is a song that you dance in, and every photo on your walls is smiling and your bed is always warm and so is your heart.

There’s nothing dead in here, you think, when you cook a delicious meal on the stovetop, sauce bubbling in a stainless steel pan. Nothing haunted about your home or your heart. _____________________________

“We’re almost done.”

“Mhm.”

“I can’t believe we’re almost done!”

Wonwoo looks up, bemused, lips made small and pointed. You’re staring at the almost-done document, scrolling up and down through long and arduous paragraphs. It’s nighttime again - not that you had to stay late today, it was a choice - and the city glimmers brilliantly in the coolness. You and Wonwoo wear sweaters to keep warm.

“Feels like a lifetime,” Wonwoo murmurs, same smile upon his beautiful face. His cheekbones point out from beneath his skin.

“Yeah,” you breathe, leaning back. You won’t put your fingers back on the keyboard. Not when it could be done so soon. You look at him, all snuggled up in a brown sweater. “What if..”

A pause. He tilts his head.

“Well, are we still gonna talk?” you chew your lip dejectedly, feeling a little sad and desperate, but Wonwoo only laughs. It’s a beautiful sound, it’s one you associate with joy.

“Of course,” he says, as his laughter quiets down. “If you want to.”

A shy smile forms on your lips. You turn to look back at the computer, but you hear the now-familiar sound of Wonwoo patting his thighs. You flit your eyes back to him, teasingly scolding.

“We’re not done.”

“We don’t have to be done now,” he shrugs, an equally teasing smile on his lips. You roll your eyes, but, unsurprisingly, you shift over to him, sitting down in his lap. He immediately tugs you closer, fingers searching for stimulation on the seams of your jeans. There’s something different about Wonwoo today, you realize, his touch is more feverish, his fingers dig deeper into the fat of your hips and he looks up at you like you’re a diamond-encrusted chandelier, hanging from the ceiling, all glittering jewels.

“What’s up?” you giggle nervously. It’s becoming hard to breathe with the way he paws at your hips.

There’s something in the air between you, but maybe you’re imagining it. Maybe it’s your mind playing tricks on you, concocting the magnetic pull that lingers between you, the thicker, heavier air, that urges you closer.

He sighs heavily, as if he was dreading this. All of a sudden composed, cool, icy Wonwoo is chewing his lip and avoiding your eyes, looking instead down where your fat gives way for his needy fingers.

“I, uh, I really like you, Y/n,” his voice shakes. “Would you. Maybe. Want to go out some time?”

At the last syllable his gaze locks on to yours, and you watch him visibly relax, because you’re fucking grinning.

Not maliciously, not crudely, not a dime or a dab of evil, only genuine joy.

“I-I would like that,” you control your smile, pointing your lips in the same way that Wonwoo does and blushing all over. Wonwoo grins too and it’s unbearably boyish.

“Okay,” he says, as if he can’t believe it. “Okay. Great.”

The window slams shut, the spell is undone by his hand, the dead defy their only law to bow to his necromancy. Wonwoo is alive and warm underneath you, and you are alive and warm on top of him, thighs pushed up against his and tugging at the fabric of his shirt. Your balloon of heart pops in your chest, and the bone-cage of your chest is filled with helium, that has you floating. Rosy and shiny, your heart beats at twice its normal speed.

There’s a lull in the conversation. It would’ve been a more comfortable silence, if you couldn’t see by how Wonwoo looks down and purses his lips, that he’s itching to say more.

Sparked by his confession, you confidently snake your hand up to tap his cheek lazily. He turns to you with a loafy smile. “What is it?”

He breathes out unsteadily.

“You’re-” he closes his eyes. “There’s so much I like about you. It- It makes me feel really bad that you weren’t feeling well, so I-”

He cringes at himself, one hand pushing away his glasses to rub the eyes underneath them.

“Can I make you feel better?” he asks vaguely.

You huff out a laugh. “Are you trying to ask if I want to have sex?”

He laughs too, behind his big hand. “No. It’s not the same, I want it to be about you!”

You laugh more, and Wonwoo’s face reappears as he lowers his hand. He looks up at you adoringly, dotingly. He’s smiling.

“I’m being serious,” he says quietly, when you finish. He seems less embarrassed now, more so smug. “I want to make you feel good.”

He’s paying an awful lot of attention to your hips, which he has not let up massaging and squeezing roughly.

“Can I..?” he begins, eyes fixed on your hips in his lap. “Can I make you cum?”

Then, slowly, Wonwoo lifts his hands and gently places them around on your face. His touch is always as soft as a hope-laced wind. He’s warm and he’s alive and he’s holding onto you, and you see it in his eyes: you’re real, you’re right underneath my fingertips.

“Please.”

That’s all he needs, before he presses his lips against yours.

The kiss is everything you want it to be; because it’s loving. It’s slow, it’s deep, it’s gentle, there’s no tongue, just the soft, warm, real, alive flows of his lips against your own. His hands on both of your cheeks caress your cheekbones gently, and warm air is spilled in the small space between you. He pulls away, panting.

“I don’t understand it,” he mumbles, before he’s pressing his lips back to yours hungrily. You let out a confused hum, and you have to gently push at his shoulder to back him off again. “What do you mean?” you ask.

“Why you were so alone,” he breathes, transfixed on your lips. “I want to be with you all the time.”

Before you can respond, Wonwoo grips the underside of your thighs, lifting you and himself from the chair and placing you on the desk. You gasp at the impact when the glass table meets your bottom, and Wonwoo is standing over you, suddenly so tall and so broad, and slimming at the waist. His narrow eyes become hooded behind the reflection of his glasses. His head is tilted down to meet yours.

“Can I take off your clothes, pretty?”

You don’t answer, only grip the edge of your shirt, tugging it over your head, so your bra-clad chest is exposed to him. He groans at the sight.

“You’re so beautiful,” he mumbles, nimble fingers dancing across your back to unclip the bra, sucking in a harsh breath the fabric becomes loose, sliding down your arms. “Such a pretty girl.”

“Stop,” you whisper, face warm and red. Your heart has never beat this way. It’s utterly unbearable and addicting at the same time, it’s without rhythm or class, it’s wild. And it’s because he’s looking at you and it’s not just lust. It’s adoration. There are deeper strings to the make-up of his eyes, there are lines connected to his heart, and he’s all flushed.

“What?” he asks. “I’m just telling you the truth.”

Wonwoo throws your bra on the floor next to him, hands finding the hem of your pants. “Can I take your pants off?”

You nod, still so shy and abashed, because Wonwoo’s eyes feel like a pink spotlight, and you are bathed in its warmth. He unbuttons your pants and you gently slide off the table to work them off your legs.

“Your panties are cute,” Wonwoo remarks (it should feel lewd, but he has a hand on your hip, that brushes the bone and he smiles at it). “Thank you,” you breathe, before you’re taking them off too.

Wonwoo doesn’t need to, but he still insists on gently lifting you back onto the table, and he kisses your nose when you’re sitting before him. He’s standing in between your legs, and then he’s looking down at where wetness drips onto the glass table.

His hand slides down your stomach, resting on the fat of it. He’s smiling, he’s so gorgeous, because he’s smiling the most gentle smile at how wet you are and how it leaks onto the table and his hand is so warm on your stomach, doing nothing, yet turning you on even more than you’d ever been before.

He sighs like he’s carrying the greatest burden on his broad back. “You’re so pretty,” he says, almost exasperated by it. He pinches some of the fat of your stomach between his fingers lovingly. “I can’t believe I get to have you like this.”

Then the hand on your stomach slides down further. His large, veiny hand cups your pussy, the tips of his fingers just barely teasing your hole. You whimper against him, hands finding his biceps for support. Wonwoo studies you, craning his neck down to peer at your face, while his fingers begin swaddling your folds.

“You’re so wet, baby,” he mumbles, trying to catch your eye where you bury into his chest. One finger dips into your hole, penetrating slowly and settling knuckle-deep.

“Wonnie!” you cry out, squeezing your eyes shut.

“Mmm, clenching down on Wonnie’s finger so hard. My beautiful girl.”

He begins pushing his finger in and out of you, pace slow and torturous. His other hand slides up and down your body, squeezing your waist then your thigh, then coming right back up to fondle your chest. He pushes your back flat against the glass, so you’re all splayed out for him and you watch him from there, eyes hooded and legs spread to accommodate him. He breathes in shakily at the sight of you.

“Shit, Y/n. What were you doing hiding all this from me?” His finger picks up the pace, as another finger slips in alongside it. You’re moaning and panting, lips red and hair mussed, unable to focus on his words, when his fingers curl against that spongy spot inside you. Apparently Wonwoo expects an answer though, because he speaks again, voice lower and rougher. “Hm? You didn’t want to go have lunch? What, was it that guy?”

“W-What?”

“Just some guy,” Wonwoo echoes your past words, emphasizing with a harsh thrust of his fingers.

“N-No, I- Hng!” you cry out, when Wonwoo’s thumb presses onto your clit. He rubs it torturously. “I-I was embarrassed because I- I was thinking about you!”

“Oh?” this catches Wonwoo’s attention, as he diligently works his hand within you, staring down at your naked form, fully clothed and tall. “Tell me what you were thinking about, baby.”

“This!” you cry out, too high off the pleasure to really feel embarrassed about it.

“Pretty, sweet, dumb baby. You were thinking about you whimpering and writhing while I fuck you with my hand, hm?”

“N-No,” you mumble, cheeks aflame. “W-Was thinking about you l-liking me.”

At this Wonwoo hastily leans over you, pressing his lips onto yours again, and this time his tongue pries open your mouth, wet and warm in the cavern of your mouth. You moan into the kiss, hips canting into his hand. There’s something so desperate about him then, something so eager in the way he crooks his fingers, and how he kisses you, panting and covering your face in warm air. You feel a tight knot in your stomach.

“Cum on my fingers, please, pretty, sweet, baby, darling,” he mumbles into your mouth, rushing out the words before he’s sealing your lips again.

“God, I think I might fall in love with you.”

That makes you cum. You cum so fucking hard, clenching around his fingers like an air-tight seal, and your cum spills onto his fingers and his name spills into his mouth. The curse comes out with it, escaping like the air that spills out from an ancient, rediscovered chamber, and dissipating into the night. Your heart is beating and you’re breathing into his mouth, nose brushing his.

“Good girl,” he breathes, finally releasing your lips and letting his lips fall heavy and wet on your cheek.

He pulls out his fingers, unbearably wet and slick, and you think for a second that he’ll let you calm down and then maybe he’ll put his dick in you, but as soon as the fingers are out of you, they’re settling back on to your clit, rubbing heavy-handed circles.

You whine, arching your back off the table and wiggling your hips at the overstimulation. His other hand catches your hip and he shushes your cries softly.

“You can cum again, can’t you, baby? You can take it,” he says, so nonchalantly, while his slick fingers rub you. You cry out. Your legs are shaking. “Think you can cum again from just this?”

“Y-Yes,” you sigh and when you look down, his entire hand covers your pussy, as he pets your clit in circles. He smiles at your words, pinching your clit teasingly. It causes a squeak to escape you, hips struggling against his hold, where he pins you to the table.

“Good girl,” he praises, purring. “Letting me use your pretty pussy like this, letting me make you feel good.”

His body in front of you prevents your legs from closing, but, God, do they try, knees pinching his thin waist, and hair bunching up on the glass when your face scrunches up in pleasure.

“A-a-ah!” you cry out. Your hips involuntarily begin to inch away from him, but Wonwoo pulls you back with one strong hand, tutting.

“Don’t do that,” he mutters, pouting. “You need to be touched, remember?”

The whole thing is so heart-achingly intimate. The way he stands, still fully clothed and with a huge fucking tent in his pants, simply rubbing your pussy and looking at you with heart-eyes. Seriously, eyes swimming with adoration for you, teasing words slipping from his mouth unable to mask the genuine wonder he feels, at how you gasp and you arch and you clean and you jerk from the simplest of his movements. And your pussy is so warm and wet under his hand, and his body between your legs is so warm, and you cum again from just that; from how much love he looks at you with, and from the fingers crooking to pinch your clit again, wet and swollen underneath his glistening fingertips.

“W-Wonwoo!” you cry out, cumming again, and your body convulses around his, when it oozes out of your hole. Wonwoo’s fingers gently work you through it. His gaze on you is so intent, so careful and insistent, you can’t bear it, the way he sees you totally lost in the pleasure he brings you.

“There you go,” he whispers gently, fingers letting up and disappearing from your pulsating pussy.

“Wonwoo,” you mewl tiredly, pushing yourself onto your elbows to look up at him. He looks at you, so sweetly, so attentively, hands immediately finding your back to stabilize you. “Can I please have your cock now?”

“We don’t have to-”

“I want to!” you interrupt him, brows furrowed and lips in a pout. Wonwoo grins at that and though he may deny it, you don’t miss the red that twinges his cheeks.

“It’s just if you were too tired..-”

“I’m not,” you say decidedly, and Wonwoo nods.

“Okay. C’mere then.”

You’re confused when Wonwoo sits back down in the office chair, fingers working his slacks open. He doesn’t answer to your grimace though, only manages his pants unzipped and in one lift of his hips, peel both them and his boxers down.

His cock springs free, and your confused grimace is replaced with one of awe. It’s pale and veiny, the head is red and thin, white liquid oozes from it, like melted candle wax. And it’s huge.

You’re too slow to mask your amazement, it seems, because when your eyes return to his face, he’s already looking at you, smiling smugly.

“Come ride me, baby.”

You don’t need to be told twice. You slide off the table eagerly, lumbering over to where he’s relaxed against the back of the chair. He looks up at you, all naked and pretty, with a grin.

The top buttons of his dress shirt are unbuttoned, but he must’ve given up halfway. Either way, the milky plates of his chest are exposed, shining gloriously in the warm office light, and he discards his glasses, face fully exposed to you. He’s beautiful, and you think to tell him.

“You’re beautiful,” you whisper, planting each leg around his, so you’re straddling him. Like your ritual, Wonwoo grips your middle and pulls you closer, but this time it’s even closer than normal. Your stomach meets his dick, all heavy and hot on your skin, and your breath hitches at the sensation.

“You’re beautiful,” he teases, looking up at you. You smile.

“Can I put it in?” you ask.

“As if the answer was ever gonna be no?”

You snort out a laugh, raising yourself by your thighs and gripping the base of his dick to steer him inside. He hisses at the feeling of your hand grappling with his impressive size, and he hisses once more when the head of his cock buries into your heat.

His hands on your waist anchor himself while you slowly sink down, until he’s so fully sheathed in you, you think the tip of his cock must be brushing your heart, because it feels like it’s swinging in your chest.

“You’re so big,” you whimper, clutching his broad shoulders, and scrunching the fabric on top of them.

“Don’t say shit like that, I’m gonna cum, babe,” he grits out, fingers bruising your waist. You mewl, clutching his shirt. Then you begin to bounce.

Your thighs flex on either side of him as you heave up and down his cock, the both of you gasping into each other, and clutching each other for stability.

“Shit,” he pants out, genuinely out of breath. “Fuck, you’re the loveliest girl in the world.”

You cry out, pressure already welling in your stomach and burying yourself in his neck like you’ve always done, and it’s so intimate and he’s warm, and, fuck, he wants you. You can feel it in his grip, in his cock, in his words; he wants you more than anything. The thought makes you wanna cum.

Wonwoo is not quiet at all. He grunts and whines and his words are strangled and garbled, but frequent, showering you in affection and praise, while you bounce eagerly on his huge cock.

“You’re so pretty, baby.”

“Your tits are so perfect, shit.”

“Pretty girl.”

“Loveliest, prettiest, sweetest girl, bouncing on my cock, fuck.”

Praises spill from his lips in purrs, one after another, and when you cum you can’t help but return it tenfold.

“Wonwoo, Wonwoo, Wonnie, fuck! Gonna- fucking cum, I think I’m- f-falling in love with you”

You and Wonwoo come alive. Cum spurts from his cock and into your pussy, and you both cry out, entangled and completing one another in the space where you meet.

And it’s true, falling in love with him is so easy. And falling in love with you is easy too, you realize, because the second he’s spilled his cum in you, he pulls you from his neck to kiss you so deeply, so thoroughly, you think your lips might never unpuff from his hasty, bitten kisses.

His cock, now soft, still inside you, his warm chest against yours, his nose nudging yours, his eyelashes fluttering against your skin, the kiss is totally perfect, and you’re warm, and the windows are all closed and fogged up and there’s no curse other than the most fatal and most perfectly tantalizing of them all: love.

You are not alone. You’re sitting in his lap and you think if you give it a day or two more, you might want to spend the rest of your life with him.

You catch your breaths.

“You’re really good at that,” you say finally. He grins again, perfectly undone, hair tousled and cheeks flushed. “Yeah?” he asks. You hum.

After some minutes of keeping him inside you, kissing lazily, running your hands over his pretty chest and arms, you pull back, beginning to flex your legs to pull him out of you.

“What are you doing?” he asks, hands wafting to still your movements. You furrow your brows, confused.

“Am getting your dick out of me?”

His hands sink down on your hips heavily, fully encompassing his dick again. You sigh at the feeling.

“Don’t do that, silly. You’re touch-starved, remember?”

He tilts his head teasingly.

“So why don’t you just sit snug on my cock, so you can get all the closeness you need?”