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gyuswhore · 6 months ago

Text

Grease (the tragedy)

“Careful, those marks on the floor aren’t just oil and paint.”

jeon wonwoo x reader

word count: 5.8k

warnings: smut [minors DNI], fluff, angst, mechanic!wonu, annoyances to lovers, blind date gone wrong but then gone right, kissing, clit stuff, oral (f. rec), thigh fucking (oop), this all happens at a desk LMAO, title is a what I thought was a funny spin on how people say "grease (the musical)"....has nothing to do with the musical though but lots to do with actual grease!!!

synopsis: In which you have to sit through one of the worst dates of your life, followed by the insistent tug of fate and compulsion that lead you straight back to where you'd sworn you'd never go.

[a/n]: HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO MY WIFE CAMOTHY @highvern everyone go say happy birthday to cam or ill appear in your room at night 🔫 anygays HAVE FUN READING THIS I hope this is all the sexy wonu content you wanted, I cant wait for your reaction hehehhehe

and also bigbigbigbig thank you to jessifer @the-boy-meets-evil for proofing this for me!!! ily heh

and and to everyone reading this who is not cam, I hope you enjoy reading mechanic!wonu as much as I liked writing him heheh PLS REMEMBER TO REBLOG AND TELL ME UR THOTS it could be in the tags, replies, an ask literally anything!!!! id love to hear what you guys think!!!!

masterlist

[You]: do you think he died on the way [Liv]: hes still not there??? [You]: what do you think????? [Liv]: let me ask Amelia [You]: dont bother [You]: he can show up whenever he wants im leaving in 5 [Liv]: you promised you’d sit thru this!! [You]: sit thru what? an empty seat across from me???

Liv doesn’t respond immediately, and you immediately know she’s buggered off to ask her cousin why your date still wasn’t here.

It’s not like you couldn’t have asked him yourself, the sparse textbox sitting just under Liv’s contact. You open it to inspect the contents.

[liv’s cousin’s something]: Amelia gave me your number [liv’s cousin’s something]: friday night at the sage&salt at 7 [liv’s cousin’s something]: is that okay [You]: uh hey [You]: yeah that’s fine

Today 7:20 PM

[You]: im here?

The first thread of texts were enough to make you feel like this was some cold business meeting instead of a date, knowing wherever this would lead would be either the city dump or off a cliff. Liv was hearing none of it, taking the guilt tripping route, saying she’d already committed and her cousin was irritating enough even without a scuffle.

So when Friday evening came around you’d pulled on the first dress your fingers could find, took all of ten minutes fighting with your makeup to make it look like you did something and left the house with zero expectations.

Despite that, as you see a man walk into the establishment dressed like he’d gotten into a fight with a squid and a paper shredder, you feel the stone in your chest tank into the abyss. Zero expectations, and he’s somehow managed to strike out anyway.

The jacket looks like he’s put it on as a weak cover for the grime stains on his shirt and trousers, a couple jet black splatters across the outfit to really pull the whole thing together. It’s not like he looked homeless or anything, his face surprisingly handsome with his hair pushed away from his forehead. Although he remains looking like he’d been playing football in some neighbourhood parking lot before remembering he had an adult appointment too.

You’d never seen the man in your life, but your gut told you this was the shit texter who’d kept you waiting for nearly an hour. He seems to notice too, eyes locking from across the restaurant as the waitress leads him to your table.

“Wonwoo,” you greet with a difficult smile, half sure it came out as a grimace. “Right?”

“Yeah,” he huffs as he practically slams back down on the chair, and you wonder for a moment how the legs didn’t give out. He says your name and you nod. “Sorry I’m late, I got a call in the parking lot.”

He’s been in the parking lot this entire time?!

It’s like you’ve been doused in gasoline and lit on fire, yet somehow needing to give him a shaky reply anyway.

“O–oh, I see.”

The waitress saves you from spitting in his face when she asks if you were ready to order.

Dinner was off the table, as you discussed with Liv who forwarded it to her cousin to her–whoever it was that set up this god awful date–and agreed on dessert and perhaps a drink.

“I’ll have the chocolate cake,” you request in an attempt to make this somewhat better. You consider for a moment before asking for a drink as well, “And a dry gin martini, please.”

“Um,” he staggers as he barely skims the menu, ultimately flipping it closed. “I’ll have the same, I guess.”

Deep voice. You might’ve liked that if you weren’t already so peeved.

The waitress disappears with the menus, leaving you two alone for the first time.

“So,” you start with an exhale. “How do you know Amelia?”

“Her husband.”

“I see.”

Silence.

“How do you know her husband?”

He sighs like this is all inconveniencing him, and it irks you to an irrespective degree. Like you wanted to be here either.

“He brings his car to the workshop alot, became friends somewhere along the line.”

“Workshop?”

He looks a little startled, cocking his head to the side. “I’m a mechanic? Did Olivia–was it–not tell you?”

“No, she didn’t.”

It’s silent yet again as the man across from you refuses to elaborate. You curse as you ask him a follow up question. If there was anything you hated more than shouldering a dead conversation, it was sitting through an awkward silence.

One hour. You’d sit through this for one more hour and then you’d leave.

“What kind of cars do you work on?”

“Expensive ones,” he answers. You might’ve kicked yourself if he’d ended it at that, but he continues with a purse of his lips. “Ones that rich people abuse to an inch of the machine’s life and wonder why the dealership gives up on it. Vintage pieces too.”

“Have I heard of it?”

“The cars?”

“No, I mean,” you let out a breath. “Your workshop.”

“Jeon Motors, just a couple streets down actually.”

You did know what he was talking about, not expecting to recognise it through the empty question, passing by it on multiple occasions in this part of the city.

“Oh, I’ve seen it a few times.”

“Yeah, we’ve been there for a while.”

“Family business?”

“Uh–sort of.”

“Okay,” you sigh in an irritated laugh. This was going to be a very difficult hour. “Keep that to yourself too.”

“Is there a problem?”

Just as you lift your eyes to lock with his, a ready yes, there is actually a problem on your tongue, there’s an intrusion.

“Here are your chocolate cakes,” the waitress places the cakes down, and then the drinks. “And your dry gin martinis. Do you guys need anything else?” By the time the waitress is gone you’ve somewhat forced yourself to put that sudden surge of flames out, to a degree at least.

“Okay,” he sighs, grabbing his glass and downing nearly half the contents. He emerges, wiping a bit of a spill from the corner of his mouth. “Let’s get this out of the way.”

“Hm?” He’s speaking to you with a very weird surge of intensity, and it confuses you.

“Neither of us wanna be here. You’re clearly trying to be hospitable but I’d really rather you not, especially when we’re both doing this to get our respective ticks off our hides.”

There isn’t much you can do but stare at him.

“Have I misjudged your advances?” he asks over his glass, sharp eyes piercing.

“No!” you yelp, reaching for your drink yourself, taking big sips only to emerge sputtering and heaving.

Your date looks like he’s rising out of his chair when you raise a hand to stop him.

“No,” you repeat, less jumpy this time. “I guess we could’ve cleared that out from before.”

Did he…snort?

“Sorry.” Dropping his chin to his chest, he composes himself.

“What?” you ask, remaining annoyed as ever.

“Nothing.”

That does it. You slam your now empty glass down on the table, slipping your fork out of the napkin a little forcefully, the metal glinting in the light of the restaurant. You dig into a corner of the cake and shove it in your mouth.

If he was gonna be rude, you could be too.

“I don’t know about hospitable.” You swallow. “But I assumed not being an ass was kind of an unwritten rule for any situation really. Including the ones you’d rather not be in.”

Wonwoo stares at you with a blank face, his cake untouched. “I’m being an ass. My laugh couldn’t have offended you that much.”

“So you did pick that up,” you comment. “With the way this conversation’s going I would’ve thought it flew right over your engine.”

“I’d argue your laugh was the least offensive thing you’ve done tonight.” You plunge your fork into your cake again. “But clearly we’re in different realms of etiquette.”

Your eyes meet the rough stains on his attire, and then his own that bore into yours like a challenge. The cake isn’t too sweet, rich just the right amount and texturally sound. Maybe something good did come out of this fiasco.

“Okay fine,” he announces, sitting up straighter. “I apologise.”

“For laughing?”

“And for being obscenely late.”

“And?”

“And…” he genuinely looks like he’s struggling to figure it out, but catches your eyes flickering to his tattered and stained outfit. “And for my entirely inappropriate dressing sense. You’ll have to forgive me for that one, oil and grime are my spoils of war.”

“Wear it like a badge, mister mechanic, but perhaps somewhere it’s appreciated.”

Wonwoo has already finished his drink, his cake remaining untouched. “You’re quite adamant on disliking me.”

“And you’re quite adamant on being a horrid conversationalist.”

The corners of his mouth lift the slightest bit. Opening his mouth to respond, you cut him off. “Cars don’t talk? Or perhaps, machines are easier to understand?”

“More like I don’t care to be personable.”

“That can’t be good for business.”

“The cars speak for themselves.”

He’s a weird one. Even more so when he offers to pay the entire bill, promising you he wasn’t lying when he said he was good at what he does, and to “make up for lost personality points.” You manage to pay your half anyway, considering the circumstances.

“Can you at least let me drive you home?” Wonwoo asks as you both step out of the establishment soon after.

“Depends.” You fix the strap of your bag. “Will it fall apart on the highway?”

The blaring white of the restaurant's outdoor lights backlight Wonwoo to make him look like some sad angel. He turns to you, the same slight smirk that seems to be plastered on his face. “Why don’t you find out?”

“What do you mean sell it? I got this thing a year ago!”

There isn’t much you can do but sigh loudly as you listen to Olivia talk about the state of her car, the one that cost too much to justify but she seemed to use and abuse like a very replaceable toy truck.

Leaning against the hood of the darn thing, you talk to her. “The dealership is giving you a shit deal to take it off your hands, you might as well try your luck.”

The look on her face is easy to read as she silences. Not convinced in the slightest, waiting for the conversation to end just so she could figure it out on her own. Sighing loudly, you look back to the dark beauty with a crate of issues that make it spit and sputter to a stop every few weeks.

“How much did you say the repairs cost again?”

“Enough to put me on food stamps,” she whines through her frustration, tears pricking against her eyes as they glisten under the neighbourhood streetlights. “Why are you smirking like that?!”

“It’s just,” you pause as you consider your next words, pressing your lips together. “This is a little bit your fault.”

Lies, it was entirely her fault.

Liv stares like you’ve just offended her, which you’re sure you have.

“Care to share how this possible bankruptcy could be my fault?"

“Because you drive the thing like you have a secret reserve buried somewhere in Tenerife.”

“My apologies for making a habit of not being a public nuisance and going forty on a national highway.”

“Your speed-o-metre is not the issue here.”

“Yes, of course, everything’s my fault.”

“Liv, please!” You groan loudly. “Just…let’s try putting up a listing tomorrow. Consider the prospects and you can decide from there.”

Sagging her shoulders and stretching her neck, Liv decides to simply trudge back indoors in silence. You take it as a begrudging yes, and follow her inside.

That very night, when you were at the very cusp of falling into the dark space of sleep, your brain re-awakens before your eyes do. A jolt as the memory comes back to you of the many months ago, sitting in that restaurant across from a man who was too handsome for the personality he seemed to sire.

“Expensive ones,” he had said. “Ones that rich people abuse to an inch of the machine’s life and wonder why the dealership gives up on it.”

How fitting.

“Are you going to explain or should I explode instead?”

You’d mentally prepared for the bombardment of accusations from Liv, her questioning perfectly right as you yourself cringed at the thought of showing your face here of all places. The one last one that’d officially banned her from ever setting you up with an individual of her choosing ever again.

Hearing only silence as her answer, she appeals; “I thought he was the worst date of your life.”

“Nothing to do with his skills as a mechanic,” you mumble, refusing to make eye contact.

“And everything to do with this being a horrible idea anyway!” Liv stares up at the sign on top of the garage. Jeon Motors. “What makes you think this guy can fix my car?”

What did make you think he could fix Liv’s car? If you’d known you might have given her an answer, but as you stare at the giant signboard that you’ve driven past for longer than you can remember, you can’t help but feel this place has been haunting you. Just a little.

You can’t help but feel the tingle of goosebumps rise on your skin, the hairs across the expanse standing up at the thought of walking inside. There was no way you could differentiate the reaction from plain nerves or from the cringing drills that sound all the way outside the establishment. Regardless, you make an attempt to look confident as you make your strides into the pungent of the workshop.

The first thing you note is how…clean everything is. Cleaner than any other workshop you’ve walked into anyway.

The interior is bigger than it looks from the outside, the ginormous hall hosting about a dozen cars within your eyeshot alone. One side of the great hall holds an array of parked cars in different stages of dismantled and deconstructed, while the other side is lined with contraptions that look like stripped and enlarged elevators.

Once you’ve inhaled a beyond recommended amount of smoke fumes and listened past all of the clanging, banging and sparks, you register the people that are elbow deep in the hoods of the vehicle they’re working on, enough to leave you and Liv standing at the entrance of an establishment that you can barely make sense of.

“Can I help you?” A man in stained beige overalls approaches your wide eyed pair, face half covered in his baseball hat and hands occupied with a rag.

To your slightest dismay, it isn’t the man you’re looking for.

“Uh– is Wonwoo here?” you ask.

“He’s in a meeting right now. Are you a friend?”

No, just a failed love interest.

“He,” you falter. If you weren’t a friend…then what were you? “He gave me his card.”

“Do you need help with your car?”

“Mine, actually,” Liv pipes. “It’s outside if you wanna take a look first.”

With one sweeping look across the warehouse, your eyes land on one of the few doors on the left. You register the plain look of it for barely a moment before joining Liv outside.

By the time her car has been rolled and parked inside for a more thorough inspection, it’s taken you every last grain of your willpower to not stalk back out and wait in your car. For whatever reason, you can’t help but feel a very familiar spasm of irritation spark through you. Here you are, left anxiously waiting for the same man for a second time, merely feet away but remaining occupied with more important things.

At the very least, the multiple hands prodding around the car’s engine were being somewhat of use, attempting to survey the same issues that had been looked at about a dozen times before. You silently promise to be a better person if this trip wouldn’t be for vain.

“Am I late for something again?”

Your throat is suddenly clogged as you open your mouth and no sound graces your presence. The face that meets you has his eyebrows raised as he stares at you in expectation, a ghost of a smile on his face.

“W–Wonwoo, hi, um.” You clear your throat loudly, heat cursing your cheeks. “No, of course not.”

“To what do I owe the pleasure after…four months?” he asks, hands on his hips and his back straightened.

“I…my friend’s car needed to be looked at so…”

“Ah, of course!” He turns to where you’ve motioned, looking at the popped hood of the car his employees are working on. “I’ll take a look at it myself, don’t worry about it.”

He’s already walking away, towards the car and leaving you a ways away from the action. You stare at his back; the overalls tied at the waist and the stained white T-shirt that clings to his form from the humidity.

Wonwoo remains a man of a few words, and you remain at wits end about it all.

A loud honk gives you something to do as you jump at the sound so up close, scrambling to move away from the smack centre as another car pulls into the garage.

“Careful, those marks on the floor aren’t just oil and paint.” Wonwoo snickers from his place hunched over the hood as he cranes his neck to look at you.

You walk over to where he is to get out of the way. “Was that meant to sound like an innuendo?”

“I was talking about the occasional running over someone’s foot,” he answers. “Not sure what you were thinking.”

Ignoring the jab, you note that it was now only you and him crowding the car, “Where’s Olivia?”

“Went to look at spare parts.” You watch him as his gloved hands reach further into the enclave and yank at something hard.

“So you can fix it?”

“The car? It’ll take a couple days but it’s not really an issue.”

Furrowing your brows, you press on, “But the dealership—”

“Dealerships are the spawn of the devil,” he grunts as he finally wrenches out a spare nut or bolt or something that’s covered in oil. “Let me guess, they wanted her to sell it back to them?”

It’s your turn to raise your brows. “Yes. They tried fixing it, but it'd just stop again.”

“Because they’ve been fixing the symptoms.” He raises his eyes to meet yours, hands occupied with rubbing the part in his hands relatively clean with a rag. “They haven’t bothered to do anything about the actual problem.”

“Because that’s gonna cost…?”

“Couple hundred, give or take,” he announces nonchalantly, turning his focus back to the engine.

“But—” That’s it?

“Fifty extra for every question I have to answer after this.” You briefly wonder if Wonwoo’s eyes were always this piercing, boring into your soul like he didn’t need words to know what was going on with you.

“Fine,” you huff, moving to drag a chair over, mostly just so you could have reason to break eye contact, and plop down as you watch him work.

The more you think about it, the more you can find yourself unbothered by his strange behaviour. He wasn’t bleak, but nowhere near one of the more interesting people you’ve met. Taking the opportunity to really scan the man head to toe, you can’t say you find anything truly concrete to be this put off by him.

Not much of a talker, but with the times you’ve prayed for a man that knew when to shut up sometimes, you wonder how much you can actually complain about this boon in particular.

Besides, he was a looker, and you were completely content shutting your trap if it meant you got to shamelessly ogle at him from this close.

“You know, this place looks bigger than it does from the outside.”

Wonwoo stares pointedly.

You raise a shoulder in nonchalance, “Wasn’t a question!”

He simply huffs as he mumbles, “More length than breadth I suppose.”

“What are those things called?” you ask as you watch a sedan get lifted into the on some platform on the other end of the row.

Glancing back, he answers, “Post lift, car lift, whatever you wanna call it.”

“What does it do?”

“Take a wild guess.”

“Touché.”

Glancing back at him, you catch sight of his stained shirt once again. “Is that the same thing you wore to our date?”

Chin to chest, he registers what he’s wearing, hands still working on pulling bolts and boxes out of the hood. “Have about twenty of the same shirt, I can never be too sure.”

“You’re impossible.”

He smirks, “Touché.”

You questioned if this was a mistake.

Olivia could pick up her car herself, so why did you insist to be the one that did it? As you pay the taxi driver, you feel your ankles lock for a moment as you move to slip out of the cab. Frozen, you hear the driver ask you if everything was alright, to which your legs seem to work again, finally foot to gravel in front of the dreaded workshop.

The Jeon Motors sign blares the same as it always has in the afternoon light, glinting as it encourages you to walk in and do one of the stupider things you’ve done in life. Other than the ridiculous outfit you’ve put on, of course.

But alas, as you hand over your slip to one of the many mechanics in the workshop, you find yourself praying he wasn’t here after all, that perhaps you could miss him as you leave and never have to see him again.

Somebody yells out his name, and the dream drifts away like smoke.

Finding the courage, you look up to where the man shouted for him, and immediately wish you hadn’t.

Wonwoo remains in his overalls, the same ones that he had tied to his waist the last time you saw him. His undershirt however…

The tank top is revealing too much for you to pretend you don’t care, his hair remaining pushed back and away from his forehead as he walks over to you in what feels like slow motion. He takes the slip that he does not need, smiling at you as he says his hellos.

“Car’s all fixed up, just need some papers that need signing and you’re all set.”

“Oh, but Liv isn’t here today.”

“That’s alright, you can sign them too,” he reassures, motioning for you to walk with him towards the car. “The car was alright in the test drives, revving hasn’t caused any problems either.”

He halts in front of the now (supposedly) fixed black sedan and pats the hood lightly, “If anything happens tell her to bring it straight here, although it shouldn’t have any more problems.”

“What’s your rate of return on customers?” you ask, a slight smirk on your face.

He thinks for a moment, “Pretty crap. But I guess that means I’m doing something right.”

You consider yourself something of a helicopter parent when it comes to your own car, but perhaps you’d change that if it meant you’d get to come here a little more often.

Goodness, what’s gotten into you.

Wonwoo’s smiling too, and for a brief moment the silence is nearly awkward. A pause before he proposes leaving.

“Shall we go to the office then?”

Nodding eagerly, you trail behind him as he leads you towards the other end of the workshop, passing by even more cars in all their stripped or constructed glory. Glancing in front, you catch sight of Wonwoo’s back, ensnared for a moment before you snap your head away, reciting every curse word you know like a mantra.

“It’s less hot in here too, keep the air on all the time.” Wonwoo stands in front of the plain doors, hands on the handle to wrench it open. You recognise it as the same door you had noted a few days ago. “Would you like anything? Coffee, tea?”

“Um, just water is fine, thanks.”

It’s quite plain, beige and leather against cream walls and unfittingly white lights. There’s a desk on one corner that’s beyond cluttered with more papers than you can register, pens and other office supplies mixed into the disorganised chaos of the large tabletop.

“Sorry about the mess, I can never find time to sort through it.” To your surprise, the light tinge of his cheeks suggest he might actually feel a little embarrassed.

Cute.

There’s cabinets that line on one of the far walls, and you watch him take his gloves off to open it and reach for a cup. The white porcelain emerges stained with an ashy grey as his fingers betray him. He looks flustered, glancing at his hands and back up to the cabinet.

You can’t help but laugh a little, moving forward to help. “It’s alright, let me.”

“Sorry,” he apologised again, with a sheepish look on his face. “I’ll, um, wash this off.”

“Go on, I’m here,” you reassure as you move towards the water dispenser in the corner to fill your clean cup.

He returns with significantly cleaner hands and apologises one last time. “Seems all I do around you is apologise.”

You have the good humour to chuckle, “So I’ve noticed.”

He does well to clear out most of the clutter that’s on his desk, leaving enough room to set down a few pieces of paper as you take a seat on the opposite side.

As you scan through the papers, he attempts to make sober conversation. “You should…bring your car around for inspections if you want.”

“Oh? Even if I ask a million questions?”

“I can make an exception or two,” he grins.

“And if you charge me double?”

“Might not charge you at all.”

“Might?” you question as you lift the pen he’d given you to sign the first space.

“Might.”

“And what’re the conditions for that?”

He doesn’t answer as he ponders and you fill in the second blank. “I’ll have to think about that.”

You snort before you can help it, your last signature coming out a little wonky as your hands shake. Turning the papers over to him, you continue, “Well then, let me know when you figure it out.”

He stares pointedly as he accepts the papers before dropping his eyes again, “Can I?”

“Hm?”

“Can I? Let you know?”

It’s like you’ve been frozen over, the typewriter in your mind jamming as it punches out the implications of what he’s saying.

“It seems, at least to me, that we may have gotten off on the wrong foot,” he continues.

You hesitate. “I think so too.”

“I…I don’t want to put anything like pressure on you but–”

“Would you like to try the new gelato place downtown this week?” you ask finally as you save him from his misery. “If…you’d like.”

He looks stunned for a moment before he’s scrambling, “Oh–of course! Yes, anytime is fine with me.”

“Great,” you smile, lifting from your seat. “It’s a date.”

“I’ll promise to wash my hands this time…and my shirt. And I won’t be late.”

“Let’s not make promises we can’t keep,” you tease.

You’re nearing the door as he follows behind, and just as you’re about to pull down on the handle, you hear him say your name.

Turning around, almost too eagerly, you look up at him in expectation. He’s close, almost right behind you as he looks like he’s debating whether opening his mouth is a good idea.

“Are you doing anything else today?”

“Um,” you stutter for a moment. “I don’t have to drop off the car till later tonight, that’s all really.”

He swallows. “Do you wanna stay? Just a little while. We can stay in here, nobody comes in anyway.”

You aren’t entirely sure why you said yes, because you did actually have dinner plans with Liv later tonight, but the teeny tiny voice in your mind egged you on anyway. Besides, Liv wouldn’t mind, not if you were cancelling for this.

This entailed the very friendly contact of Wonwoo’s tongue in your mouth, and the extremely cordial way it seemed to caress your insides. If somebody asked you how it led to this, you don’t think you’d have an answer. Not that you care, especially when his hands are grabbing your waist and hips like that.

He’s already locked the door, reassuring you that nobody would find their boss and client in the smack dab middle of the devil’s tango. You take his word for it, relishing in the way his hot breath hits your skin below your ears, his mouth sucking under your earlobes as you whimper ever so quietly.

Your hands are on his exposed biceps, feeling him up all to your heart's content. “Do you–Do you always wear stuff like this?”

He emerges, wet lipped and eyes trained. “So I wasn’t imagining it.”

“Imagining what?” you ask as you let him unbuckle your trousers.

“Please. Like you weren’t stripping me with your eyes.”

If you were warm before you, you're boiling up now. Were you being so obvious?

“It’s alright,” he reassures as you feel his fingers make contact with the crotch of your panties, pushing in to put pressure on your clit. “Wouldn’t be here if I hadn’t picked up on it.”

You feel his fingers push the dampening fabric away as his fingers make contact with your hole, coating his fingers in the arousal that’s made itself known. It’s hard to not hiss at the way he begins to circle it, thanking the universe that the loud noises of the workshop outside were masking whatever evidence of the heinous crime you were committing inside.

Back against the couch in his office, you settle into the cushions once you feel him rub at your clit, one hand spreading your lips apart as he continues to massage your own wetness onto your throbbing cunt.

When he retreats you almost cry out, but are smothered when he plunges two fingers into your hole instead, curling them almost immediately inside you. The consistent brush of the tips of his fingers on your walls are making it difficult to keep your eyes open, and absolutely impossible to keep your moans at bay.

“Wonwoo, that’s so good, fuck.”

Through your closed eyes, you don’t note when Wonwoo gets on his knees. But you do feel him yank your trousers off entirely, and you definitely feel him place his wet mouth flush on your lower lips, sucking at your clit as he continues to pump his fingers in and out of you mercilessly.

That’s all it takes for your noises to become increasingly high pitched, hands buried in his beautiful hair as he continues to pleasure you beyond imagination.

“I’m so close, keep going, please, it feels so–”

He somehow buries his face in deeper, sucking harder, licking faster, and it’s enough for you to finally feel yourself collapsing on the inside, your composure dissolving as you moan so loud you’re sure they can hear it outside, even through all the clanging and revs of cars.

There’s no way for you to know how long you lay there slumped against the couch cushions, but when you hear Wonwoo speak to you in your ear, you answer.

“Was that okay?”

“More than okay,” you say as you grab his face and pull his lips to yours, tasting the tang in his mouth from your arousal. “Do you have a condom?”

“I–fuck,” he thinks for a moment. “I don’t think I do.”

You try not to feel too disappointed, but you sigh into his mouth anyway.

“Can I fuck your thighs?” you hear him ask, and you might have just orgasmed again, untouched.

“Fuck, yes you can.”

With a yelp, you feel yourself lifted off the couch as you wrap your arms around Wonwoo’s neck, letting him guide you to his desk. “Wonwoo!”

You hear a loud crash of the desk being stripped of all its inhabitants, and your back hitting the cool of the table top.

Wonwoo unties the arms of his overalls around his waist, letting the legs pool to the floor before slipping his hard cock out of his boxers.

You don’t see it as you feel him lock your knees together and lift both your calves to rest on one of his shoulders. But you do feel it as he pushes the head into the seam of your thighs, watching the indent as the pink of his dick appears before you through the skin of your thighs.

Wonwoo’s face is contorted as he pulls back and pushes back through again, this time brushing against your still sensitive clit. You gasp at contact, and immediately feel him thrusting faster.

“Wonwoo,” you grunt. “Lower.”

He obliges, pushing his dick lower so it can rub flush against your clit as he begins to roughen up his pace.

You moan as you feel his free hand that isn’t holding your legs trail to the ends of your shirt, caressing over your stomach to pull it up and reveal your bra clad tits. He pushes his hands under the nearest cup and begins to grope you so wonderfully with his big, warm hands. Rolling the bud between his fingers, you can only grasp onto his wrists as a handheld to keep you down on earth.

The desk beneath you is rattling with noise, the full drawers making themselves known as Wonwoo pounds into your thighs like he would die if he stopped, mouth coming in contact with whatever skin of your legs he could reach, his breath fanning the side of your knees.

You’re close again, and you know he is too with the way his thrusts are beginning to grow sloppy.

“There,” he pants. “Almost.”

You orgasm for the second time, the throb your clit beyond comprehension as the rough of his dick slides across your clit mercilessly.

“Cum like this, Wonwoo please I need to see you cum.”

And he does, shooting the heft of his load to cover your already wet cunt and thighs, landing on your stomach as he continues to ride out his high between your legs.

The back of your head hits the table as you take in gulps of air through the aftermath of it all. Wonwoo is putting his weight on the back of your thighs, holding onto the table for support.

“Oh, Liv is never gonna let me live this down,” you pant, lolling your head to one side as you register him.

He peers up at you through his hair, the stupid smirk on his face, “Do you care?”

You’re smiling a little too when you answer, “Not really.”

And then your legs are off his shoulders as he nestles between them instead, diving in to lift your head and kiss you.

And you let him, although you wouldn’t really call it too much of a kiss—not when the both of you were smiling like idiots through the clash.

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belovedhoon · 2 months ago

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daydream- p.js

paring: jay x f! reader genre: smut words: 1.8k (short i just NEEDED to get my jay thots out...) fandom: enhypen contains: smut, somnophilia (prior consent), oral (f! & m! rec), unprotected smut (don’t be silly wrap ur willy), creampie (yum), jay should be a warning himself… taglist: @hmusunoo @st1llm0nster @lonelybutterflytae @pshbites A/N: blame the daydream track video for this fic... jay is SO HOT

Synopsis: jay comes back from a long day at work and all he wants to do is fuck his wife…just because you’re sleeping doesn’t mean you can’t have fun right?

fic under cut >>>>>

It was around 11:30 pm when Jay got home, and he hoped that you would still be up. He’s been hard ever since this morning when he woke up to you mouthing at his clothed cock. He can still remember the feeling of your hot breath ghosting over his throbbing cock. As soon as he was coherent enough and realized what was going on, he pushed your head down further on his clothed hard-on and let out a deep groan. Just as you were about to pull his erection from his briefs, his phone rang and Jay let out another groan this time in annoyance. Of course, he’d get a call at this time… Jay reached his hand out to the phone that was ringing annoyingly in his hand and sighed when he realized it was his assistant Jake calling. Leave it to Jake Sim to cockblock him once again.

“What is it, Jake?” Jay answered the phone his tone gruff and annoyed. As soon as Jay uttered those words, Jake started ranting about how things got messed up at the office and Jay was barely paying attention because as Jake was panicking on the phone you had pulled Jay’s cock from his briefs and were now placing wet, open-mouthed kissed all around the shaft. Jay sighed blissfully as you placed his bright red tip in your mouth and began to suck gently.

“Jay! You need to come in like as soon as possible! I don’t know how to fix this!” Jake rushed out. Jay rolled his eyes at Jake’s panicked tone before letting out a gruff “ok” and hanging up the phone. Jay groaned a third time, from both the feeling of your mouth on him and from the fact that he knew he wasn’t going to get to cum because he had to go to the office. He placed a gentle hand on your cheek causing you to look up at him prettily, your mouth full of his throbbing cock and he moaned at the sight of you looking so beautiful with your mouth filled with him. Oh, how he wished he could finish this with you right now.

“Y/N, darling…I’m sorry but I have to go to work.” Jay let out regretfully. You took him out of your mouth with a pop sound then pouted up at him. He sighed at your pout, knowing you were not happy about this. “But Jay–” You started but stopped as you saw Jay’s stern glare.

“Darling, you know I don’t want to but I have to, Jungwon messed up some of the paperwork and I have to go fix it.” Jay said to you, watching as your face fell. He felt bad that he had to leave, but at the same time, he was the CEO and had to go and fix things at his company. You nodded solemnly at his words before tucking him back in his briefs. He smiled thankfully at you and then got up out of bed before opening the door to the ensuite bathroom to take a shower.

After Jay was done with his shower, he walked back into your shared bedroom with just a towel wrapped lowly around his waist. You could feel your mouth water at the sight of Jay’s bare chest, watching as a lone water droplet rolled down his chest and abs down to the plush of the towel. You needed him so badly… Jay turned away from you to rummage through the walk-in closet and dropped the towel and your eyes roamed over his muscular back and down to his toned ass. ‘God he was so hot’ you thought to yourself, you could feel yourself becoming even more wet at the sight of his naked body on display for you.

“I can feel your eyes on me, Darling…” Jay said and you could just hear the smirk in his voice. You nearly moaned at the sound of his cocky voice. “Jay…I need you…I’m so wet for you…” You let out in a sultry tone, hoping to convince him to stay. Jay groaned at your tone and you watched as his hands clenched tightly at his sides. Just as he was about to come over and give you what you both wanted his phone rang again. It was Jake again.

“Jake. I’m on my way relax.” Jay said annoyed then hung up the phone. Jay turned to you and sighed at your disappointed expression, he too was also disappointed at the fact that he has to go to work with a fucking hard-on and that he has to leave you so needy. “Y/N…I promise when I get home, I’ll give you the most mind-blowing head… I’m so sorry I have to leave right now.” Jay said to you. You nodded in agreement at his words.

“What if I’m asleep by the time you get back?” You asked playfully. Jay thought about it for a second before saying, “Well then I guess you’ll wake up with mind-blowing head…if you’re okay with that.” Your eyes widened and you nodded your head enthusiastically. Jay chuckled at your words, telling you that he needs you to use your words, to which you let out a whiney “Yes please Jay” Jay smiled in contentment before kissing you goodbye and leaving.

Now that Jay was home, there was only one thing on his mind, and that was giving you that mind-blowing head he mentioned hours before in the morning. He walked through the dark house noting that the lights were all off, assuming you were in the bedroom reading your book. As he made his way to your shared bedroom, he opened the door and saw you lying on the bed with nothing but his large t-shirt on. He smiled at how peaceful and adorable you looked. He walked to the closet and took his clothes off and then proceeded to go wash up in the bathroom before returning to to the bedroom and smiled when he saw you had turned on your back, making it easier for him to do what he was about to do.

Jay walked over to where you were sleeping on the bed and leaned down to place a soft kiss on your lips before trailing the kisses down your neck and collarbone to the bottom of the shirt you were wearing. He pulled the shirt up and noticed you didn’t have panties on under the shirt and groaned at the information. He spread your thighs and began to leave kisses on the inner parts of them. The whole time he placed kisses on your inner thighs he watched your face to make sure he didn’t wake you up too soon, before the fun could begin. Jay got impatient just wanting to taste you so he placed his mouth on your folds and stuck his tongue bringing it to glide between your folds, moaning at the taste of you. Jay licked from your clit to your entrance which began to quickly become wet at his ministrations. Jay took your clit between his lips and then proceeded to suck harshly on it, watching as you let out a moan in your sleep. He brought two of his fingers to your soaked entrance and teased your hole, before slowly inserting them inside you. He began a steady pace as he sucked on your clit. You began to stir in your sleep finally beginning to wake up, as you woke up your hands immediately fell to Jay’s soft hair and pulled roughly at the feeling of his mouth on you.

“J-Jay…I’m gonna cum…” You let out your voice raspy with sleep. Jay’s eyes shot up to your own, pulling away to murmur, “Go ahead, cum for me darling.” Before placing his lips back on your clit and sucking it into his mouth roughly, moving his fingers at a faster pace. You could feel your high fastly approaching and you let out Jay’s name in a chant before you fell over the edge and cumming hard in his mouth, Jay moaning as your juiced soaked his face. Jay rode you through your high by thrusting his fingers slowly before he stopped as you pushed his head away in overstimulation. Jay crawled up to you hovering above you and kissed you passionately, sliding his tongue into your mouth tangling with your own, letting you taste yourself on his tongue.

“Can you do one more? Can you be good and take me?” Jay asked his voice breathless as he spoke against your lips. You whined out a “Yes Jay please I need you…” Jay smiled at you and pulled away to remove his briefs and crawled back on the bed on top of you. He teased his hard leaking cock against your clit before placing himself at your entrance. He looked up at you for permission one last time to which you nodded and he took that as a sign to enter you. He slowly pushed his thick tip into your entrance, you gasping at the feeling of being stretched so much from just his tip alone. You always struggled to take your husband’s big cock even if you have done this a thousand times with him. Jay moved his hips slowly until he was halfway inside you and groaned at how tight you were around him. He stopped to let you adjust knowing it was a lot for you to take. You whined moving your hips to let him know you needed more and Jay thrusted the last bit of himself into you.

“F-fuck Jay…You’re so big!” You whined out clawing down his back with your manicured nails. Jay cursed at the feeling of you clenching down on him so tightly. “Ah shit Y/N you’re squeezing me so tightly darling…I need you to relax so I can move.” Jay let out gruffly. You sighed and tried to relax at the feeling of Jay’s thickness. Jay began to slowly build up a fast speed and was thrusting into you at a rough pace. You were a whining, moaning mess as Jay pounded into you roughly. You could feel yourself getting higher and higher, almost going over the edge of the cliff, just needing that one push. Jay could tell you were close so he brought his hand down to your clit and began to rub it intensely. That was the push you needed because you quickly felt your release wash over you, clenching down tightly on Jay causing his hips to stutter as he also came, spilling his thick, hot release into you, groaning out your name as he did so. He pushed his hips weakly into you to ride out both of your highs before he stopped. You could tell he was still hard inside you, so you looked up into his eyes in confusion.

“You don’t think we’re done do you?” Jay said smugly, a smirk on his face. You were in for a long night….

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chocoreads · 2 years ago

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OMG MANXY MOO I FINISHED THIS TODAY WAS IT WAS WONDERFUL, EXHILARATING, AND the most bittersweet adventure i've read <3 i love your setup for the story--that prom dress scene at the beginning is flawless!! as expected ur banter is tippy top notch and ur characters are refreshing!! i enjoyed reading their interactions so much (esp the scene at the end awwww my heart couldn't take it!)

some of my fave excerpts:

4 + 4 = 8!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! my breath was fully taken! i had zero breaths!

literally made me choke i loved this sm

OUUU I WAS WINDING UP I REREAD IT MULTIPLE TIMES!!

my eyes were fully reading it!!!!! it's all so palpable and vibrant!!

the pressure throughout this fic is so delicious as someone who thrives off angst and creating a smouldering wildfire of tension this was super satisfying!! you want to keep reading cuz ur on the same edge as the characters, waiting 4 smth to go wrong, knowing the illusion can't go on forever even when it's at its sweetest :(( wanting them to talk so bad but then it all goes up in flames :c

also i attempted to squeeze all my most blaring thoughts into the tags but im pree sure i hit the tag limit JHWFEUKHF

ur my hero this was amazing!!!!!!

when the devil drives.

pairing — jeonghan x fem!reader ft. bestie!joshua

word count — 23.7k

genres — road trip au, exes to friends with benefits to lovers, fighting as flirting, angst, fluff, smut (fingering, vaginal penetration, dirty talk, slight praise, cunnilingus)

warnings — toxic relationships, swearing and threatening language, explicit sexual content, they're both infuriating (yes that needs a warning, trust me)

summary — when your best friend breaks his leg and cancels your summer getaway, jeonghan turns up in his place to take you home from college on what was supposed to be a five hour car ride. except he has other plans, and you end up with more than you bargained for on a week-long road trip to nowhere with the cynical, silvertongued ex-boyfriend whom you're still kinda sorta in love with.

note — it's finally done. the bane of my existence. please enjoy the fic that made me so stressed that it delayed my period by like a week. on a lighter note, there's a playlist. enjoy <3

go to main masterlist | svt masterlist

THREE YEARS EARLIER.

The person in the mirror is not you.

The person in the mirror is beautiful when you’ve only ever felt pretty, mature even though you still feel like an overgrown child, and confident despite the fact that your heart is beating right out of your chest. Despite her makeover skills being limited to being practiced only on fortnightly dates, your mom has actually done an incredible job with you. Long hours of youtube video-watching and swatting you to remind you to sit still have finally paid off.

You trail your lilac-coated fingertips over your bare collar, marveling at the way your skin throws off light. It probably wouldn’t take much to convince your friends that it’s actually makeup instead of sweat doing the job, but it probably isn’t worth it. You stand up, looking down at the ruffled skirt of the purple dress you picked out at the mall weeks ago. Then, glancing back up at the mirror, you lift a hand to your arm, giving it a light pinch.

The yelp leaves your lips right as your mother opens the door to your bedroom, gesturing frantically with a makeup brush. “Honey, he’s here,” she informs you in a rapid hiss, looking as giddy as if it were her final prom night. “Get downstairs, quickly.”

“But my phone, and my purse—”

“They’re downstairs. First drawer of the credenza.” She slams the door shut before you can get a word in, leaving you standing in the middle of the room feeling even more alone than before.

You begin chewing on your bottom lip, and stop when you remember her specific instructions against ruining the lipstick. Smoothing down the ruffles with fluttering hands, you cast one last, yearning glance at the full-length mirror before going to the door, unlocking it gently and stepping outside.

The walk to the edge of the staircase is short, but it feels like more than an hour has passed by the time you get to it. You take a deep breath, clutching the balustrade with trembling fingers, and pause.

The noise had gone unnoticed by you earlier, owing to the anxious clamoring of overlapping thoughts in your head, but now if you pay attention you can hear your father’s stern tones, no doubt questioning your date at the front door. Anxious once more, you take a step back, wringing your hands. You carefully tuck a lock of hair behind your ear, running your hands over your skirt again, letting the texture of the ruffles calm you down. Okay, okay, I can do this, you think, placing the ball of your thumb between your teeth. It’s no big deal.

No big deal at all.

“Dad, quit grilling him,” you call out, and finally step into view. Your father looks up, and so does the poor boy he’s been cross-examining for who knows how long. You feel your face heat up at suddenly being brought into the spotlight, but manage a small smile.

You think you see your dad’s eyes misting over, but then your eyes automatically stray over to the person whose reaction you’ve been anticipating more. Your date is standing there slack-jawed, the top of his slightly-loosened tie visible as the bouquet of roses in his hands droops from inattentiveness.

“Hi,” you say shyly, pleased at his reaction. Then, raising your hands above your dress, you give him a slow twirl. “So,” you say breathlessly, “how do I look?”

Jeonghan’s eyes are bright with fervor, the grip on the plastic cover around the flowers tighter than before, which you can tell by the way the blood has receded from his knuckles.

And he doesn’t say anything at all.

NOW.

“And done,” you say, slapping the end of the packing tape on the side of what you hope is the last carton. Then, still squatting, you place a hand on the side and lean back to examine your handiwork. To your dismay, the end of the tape has already begun to curl. "You think that’ll keep?"

"Absolutely," your roommate, Mina, hums in a way that tells you she isn’t listening. You glance back at her exasperatedly, and she gives you an apologetic grin. “Listen, I’m beyond caring at this point. That was the last of them, right?”

“Checklist.” You point at her, and she sighs, her acrylic nails tapping against the glitzy pink clipboard in her hands.

“Yes, mother.”

Straightening, you place your hands on your hips and survey the area like the captain of a ship sailing into unknown waters. Your shared room, which had once been a safe haven strewn with comforters and fluffy rugs, is now overrun by corrugated cardboard boxes, some bulging and some rattling, almost all sealed unevenly with old dried-up tape. You rub your creased forehead. “I feel like we should’ve gotten professionals to do this work for us. The RA even recommended someone who gives out discounts for people who move before summer.”

“Are you kidding? We did a pretty bang-up job, considering this was all last-minute, and for free too,” Mina exclaims. “Plus, I would never trust a stranger with my ceramic dolls.”

“You wouldn’t trust me with them, and I’ve been holding your hair up while you vomited in the toilet for months,” you complain. “Did we pack everything?”

She hums under her breath again, chewing on her bottom lip as her eyes roll down over the checklist. “I think so. Did you finish packing?”

“Yep.”

Mina looks sideways at one corner of the room, where your lone olive-green suitcase sits flush against the wall. “I still don’t understand how you’re going to survive a whole summer on just that.”

“It’s not a whole summer,” you correct. The thought of leaving fills you with a buzzing excitement, and you have to bite your lip to stop the smile from unfurling like a banner over your face. “Just a couple of weeks out in nature. And maybe a few motels. Neither place really requires much clothing.”

She makes a face, but dismisses the line of conversation with a wave of her hand. “Whatever you say,” she says. "Now, help me push these out into the hallway?"

You groan, but oblige. It’s mostly your fault that the two of you had to pack everything yourselves, since you picked the last possible day to move out before you’d have been thrown out of the dorms. Most of your stuff is already gone, but as a dutiful roommate, you’d promised Mina that you’d help her out before leaving for the summer. So, here you are, running on less than three hours of sleep, having spent most of this morning and the night before squeezing piles of clothes into boxes and folding bubble wrap like splints.

When you’re done, Mina takes the elevator down with you, and the sole suitcase you’re carrying feels even lighter than it is after all the boxes you'd been lugging around. When the metal doors slide open at the ground floor, you let go of a breath you hadn’t realized you’d been holding.

Mina pats your hand. Her clipboard is still tucked under her arm. “Don’t be so worried.”

You let out an uncertain laugh that fades quickly into a grimace, fingers clenched tight around the handle of your suitcase. “Why would I be worried?”

She pries your fingers out of their vice-like grip. “Exactly,” she says, grabbing the handle in your stead and pulling the suitcase out of the elevator, leaving you to awkwardly follow along, not quite knowing what to do with your hands. “After all your unfounded confidence in your packing and planning skills, it would be a shame if you lost faith in them now.” You can’t help but smile a bit at that, but for some reason, you still feel squeamish. “We’re not late, are we?”

Pushing your irrational anxiety aside, you hurriedly check your watch. “Well, um, a little,” you say with a shrug, “but Josh makes it a point never to show up until it’s fifteen minutes past our appointment.”

“So it’s all dandy then,” she says, her voice a bit further away, and when you look up you realize that she’s more than just a few steps ahead of you despite the heels and the suitcase, and you hasten your step. “Just make sure to check your pockets for condoms—”

“Mina.”

“—and your phone and wallet, and pepper spray.” She catches the stern look on your face. “You know, just in case.” She stops suddenly, and you almost trip over your own luggage. You look up at her in exasperation, but stop short upon noting the confusion on her face. “Is that Joshua?”

You follow her gaze across the parking lot, and spot the unmistakable blue Corolla parked a couple spots over. There’s a figure leaning against the side, his stark blonde hair makes the heated air shimmer like a halo over his head. Your first thought is oh, he dyed his hair. Your second is that’s not Joshua.

“What?” Mina looks confused, even as she falls into step beside you as you begin to stalk your way through the lot. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing yet,” you mutter as you reach the car. The blonde looks up, and your heart jumps into your throat. “What the hell are you doing here?”

The boy who is not Joshua tilts his head questioningly. “Why the cold reception?” Jeonghan asks.

You raise your eyebrows, incredulous, and are just about to open your mouth to elaborate on just why he’s getting a cold reception when Mina places a placating hand on your arm. “Hi, I’m Mina,” she says, putting on a bright smile, no doubt to outweigh the dark glare you’ve directed at his face. “The roommate.”

“Jeonghan.” He inclines his head with a neutral yet pleasant smile of his own, glancing at you. His smile falls almost comically upon seeing the expression on your face. “The…”

“You didn’t answer my question,” you interject, relentless. Mina is looking more and more discomfited by the second, but you scarcely notice.

“The ex,” Jeonghan completes. He then turns to you, raising a cool eyebrow. “I thought you knew,” he says.

“Knew what?” You demand.

He straightens, slowly drawing his hands out of his pockets, and you almost regret asking the question. Always the dramatics, you think bitingly. “That there’s been a slight change of plans.”

There was a time you thought you could trust Joshua Hong.

For the major part of your life, he had been the one person you could rely on for (mostly) everything, even when that something involved needing someone to catch you when you snuck out your window at 2 a.m., or knowing you’d always have a clean band-aid to use if you scraped your knee biking through a junkyard.

That time was approximately a minute and twenty seconds ago, when you hadn’t pulled out your phone with its unrepaired crack and checked the unread messages—the most recent of which were from him. It says sorry, and that he’s broken his leg and won’t be able to drive you from your dorm for the planned road trip. The crack lands right over the word sorry.

You know it’s been a minute and twenty seconds because you’ve been counting.

It’s like a bubble has burst inside your chest. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” you mumble softly, clenching your fingers tighter around your poor phone, which might end up with another crack if you squeeze it any further. “And he couldn’t tell me this before.”

“So you’ve been saying,” says the unwelcome replacement Joshua sent in his place. Jeonghan doesn’t have a trace of sympathy on his face as he folds his arms across his chest and checks the time on his watch. “Not to sound like an asshole, but it’s already three o’clock. We were supposed to be in town before dark, and it’s at least five hours from here.”

His voice is flat, utterly unsympathetic to your frustration. You’re still reeling, which is the only reason you don’t snap back immediately. It’s bad enough that your best friend isn’t here after all the work that went into planning and budgeting your trip, but Yoon Jeonghan’s presence is like salt on the wound.

Maybe you’d say something snarky if it hadn’t been eight full months since you’d last talked to him. If the anger from your last conversation hadn’t faded over the long months and turned into something more…malleable. Manageable, as if you could ever have associated the word with him, with the feeling that you were swallowing hot coals every time you looked at him. You still remember the last time you talked to him in painstaking detail, and as you realize that fact, the memory comes rushing back, alongside the feeling that you’re going to throw up.

“So...that’s it?” You don’t know if you’re supposed to be nice to him. Exes have never before been an issue for you because you’ve never really had one before. “Joshua breaks his leg, so he sends you over.” Like nothing ever happened between us, you want to say, but your tongue seems to curl up when you try. “As a stand-in?”

The corner of his mouth twitches, and you can tell he’s holding back some words of his own. “Call it what you want, sweetheart,” he says, and you feel like you’ve been slapped across the face.

Part of you knows that he’s just trying to rile you up, but unfortunately, he’s had a lot of practice at it, so it’s working. You find yourself wishing that you hadn’t sent Mina away with nothing more than a short hug and a few words, but ever since you spotted Jeonghan across the parking lot you’ve been feeling about as steady as a salt shaker. Some support right now would’ve been nice.

Your fingers unclench from around the phone. There’s two ways this could go—the good way, in which both of you pretend that nothing ever happened, or the bad way, and you don’t even know what the worst case scenario could be. Jeonghan has never been a patient person, but right now, even as you stand silently in front of him after months of no contact, he seems unresponsive. Something hurt and hungry rears its head inside you at his hollow indifference, and you taste a familiar venom at the back of your tongue.

But you’re not going to give him the satisfaction.

“Why are you doing this?” you ask instead.

Jeonghan shrugs. You’re not sure if you just imagined the tension going out of his shoulders. “I owed Joshua a favor.”

You raise your eyebrows. “You expect me to believe that?”

His lips thin. “Would you believe me if I said it was a big favor?” he asks casually, but his shoulders are tense again.

You’re aware of the intensity with which you’re watching him, and the fervence with which he’s avoiding your gaze. “No.”

“Figured.” He looks away right before you manage to catch the look in his eyes. “Is that all you’re carrying, or…?”

You look back at your olive green suitcase, the handle still pulled out, lying forgotten a couple of steps away from you. You don’t remember having moved towards Jeonghan during the course of your conversation, and you’re surprised enough by the realization that your chest tightens for a second. “That’s all,” you say numbly, and Jeonghan turns to pull open the car door.

“Well, then, we don’t have all day,” he says, gesturing to the seat. You feel a twinge of irritation again, but say nothing, roughly grabbing the suitcase handle and yanking a door open. Asshole, asshole, asshole, you chant in your head. This is going to be the worst drive of your life.

Even worse, you find it impossible to fall asleep.

Somehow, it’s not the noise. Jeonghan doesn’t whistle, and he doesn’t turn on the radio, or try to make small talk that would make you want to tear your hair out. He remains perfectly silent, not saying a single word to you after starting the car, not even an offer to stop by a corner store or for a drink of water. It’s been some time since the loud city faded into empty, expansive grasslands on either side of the highway, but you’re still wide awake.

Maybe it’s the silence that keeps you up, or whatever it is that it implies. You’re on edge, and your mind is churning, struggling between being mad at Joshua or being mad at Jeonghan or being mad at yourself for giving a shit. You’re still so shaken by Jeonghan’s sudden reappearance that you haven’t even begun to process anything else.

I’m going home, you think numbly, but even that thought evokes only a dull response in you. You think about the weeks building up to the summer, the calls with your dad. Your not-so-meticulously packed suitcase lies in the car’s boot, probably collecting dust if you know anything about the state of Joshua’s car. Much like all your dreams of summer. No beers, and no swimming pools, and certainly no Joshua.

You look over at Jeonghan again, but he doesn’t even seem to notice. You must be in a daze, because for a moment, you think about leaning over and nudging him.

What makes seeing him so much worse is that he looks almost exactly the same as he used to. The same hands, the same eyes, even his hair is still bleached the same silvery-white. The first button of his white shirt is opened, revealing a sliver of tanned skin inside. He always wore pressed shirts and sweater vests—and here a venomous thought enters your mind—when he really should be wearing a straightjacket instead.

When you knew him a year ago, he had been beautiful, but it was a beauty that was yours to possess, to kiss and to touch and to hold. He’s still beautiful, but now it’s the kind of beauty that makes him untouchable. The kind that belongs behind a glass pane, like a fragile display made out of cards or glass or papyrus in a museum exhibit that you would stare at with wonder in your eyes, yearning to reach out but holding yourself back knowing that a single touch could send it crashing to the floor. No, you can’t allow yourself to touch him now.

So you cross your arms, tuck your fingers under your biceps, and turn to glare out the window instead.

You switch with him after the first stop at a gas station.

“I’ll be right back,” Jeonghan had told you before heading in, and you’d taken the opportunity to get out and stretch your legs. When he comes back carrying a plastic bag from the convenience store, it takes him a few minutes before he notices standing forlornly in front of a tree.

“What?” he asks, only half curious. It’s a tall three, thick-trunked, with segmented branches that end in spiky gray-green leaves that make it look like a high school rocker with too much hairspray.

“It’s a Joshua tree,” you reply mournfully.

“Oh my god,” he mutters, and you turn to him with an evil look in your eye as you begin the walk back to the car. “He broke his leg, not his neck.”

“Of course it’s all the same to you,” you fire back. Jeonghan unlocks the Corolla with short, sharp movements that show his exasperation, and tosses the keys to you. You catch them, going around to the driver’s seat, as he leans in and pushes against the lumpy plastic bag, trying to make space for it on the dashboard. “A broken leg is pretty painful.”

“More painful for you than him, apparently,” Jeonghan grunts. With a final push, he manages to make the bag stay, and climbs into the car, shutting the door behind him before pulling on the seatbelt. He turns to look at you with his forehead furrowed as the car starts rolling forward. “I thought you wouldn’t want to drive.”

“Why, because you think I’m sulking?” you ask, offense creeping into your voice. Your neck is already coated in sweat, and you’re not sure if it’s because of the weather or just a bodily reaction to your feelings.

“I’d say it’s normal to be upset about your best friend being hurt.” Jeonghan shrugs.

“I’m not upset about that,” you snap.

“You’re not upset about your best friend being hurt?”

“I am. I just mean—” You break off, irritated. The sweat is now drying because of the hot air coming in through the open tops of the windows, making your skin itch. You just twist your shoulder backwards, unwilling to let go of the steering wheel because if you do, you might just sock Jeonghan in the mouth. “It kind of brings things to a halt. For both him and me.”

Jeonghan leans against the side. “I wouldn’t call one canceled trip bringing your life to a halt.”

Your head is beginning to hurt. “You’re right,” you say testily. “It’s just really fucking inconvenient.”

“Inconvenient?” he echoes. “You get to go home to sweet Joshua. Nurse him through his grievously traumatic injury. It could be a bonding experience, unless you’re bent on calling the poor incapacitated boy an inconvenience.”

“I never—” You grit your teeth, forcing down your rising anger. The heat has begun to crawl like a swarm of fire ants, up your neck and down your back. “I’m surprised he only broke his leg,” you say savagely. “Considering that he thought of sending you in his place, instead of literally anyone else, I wonder how he didn’t get a concussion instead.”

Jeonghan laughs. “All this anger over a little road trip? What exactly were the two of you planning to do, pray tell? I feel like I’m missing out.”

You kiss your teeth, thinking better of responding with another biting comment. Your skin is sweaty and itchy and hot and there’s still a good four hours before you get home. Going at it with him isn’t going to help your mood. You tell yourself that it’s been eight months, you’ve grown, you’ve become a better person. You’re not going to fall for his bait.

Then Jeonghan says, “You could always tour his bedroom.”

In your head, you slam on the brakes, bringing the car to an immediate halt for dramatic effect. In real life, however, you’re painfully aware of how Jeonghan’s lack of a seatbelt would send him flying into the windshield, so you slow down before coming to a rolling stop at the side of the road. Your throat feels like hot lava.

“Really?” the perpetrator asks, raising an eyebrow. “It’s the witless bedroom comment that gets you?”

You clench and unclench your jaw a couple of times, trying to bring your temper down, but to no avail. Your hands on the wheel are unusually tight, as if trying to close into complete fists around it, so you have to forcefully pry your fingers apart before you unlock the door and step out of the car.

Jeonghan copies your movements, getting out of his seat to lean over the hood of the car, his posture suggesting curiosity rather than sympathy. His lips part, no doubt in preparation to say something to push you over the proverbial edge, and warning bells go off inside your head.

“Shut up,” you snap, and he recoils, blinking in surprise.

“I didn’t—”

“Shut up,” you repeat decisively, turning to level your gaze at him like the tip of a sword. “I didn’t ask for you to be an ideal travelling companion, but the least you could do is shut the fuck up.”

Jeonghan says nothing, but his eyes stay on your face, intent and oddly unnerving. You force yourself to look away lest you give away some kind of weakness in your expression—being civil is your best bet to last the duration of the ride, but this is still a push-and-pull. With him, it always is.

“This was supposed to be the last summer we had before graduating and getting jobs and moving to different parts of the country,” you say through clenched teeth. “It wasn’t even going to be that big of a deal—just being on the road for a few weeks with each other for company, having no responsibilities, no destinations, and no deadlines. And then he had to go and fuck himself over, and fuck me over in the process, and now it’s weeks and weeks of work gone to waste, and all I’ve been looking forward to is dust. And on top of that, you had to come in and do what you do best, which is twist everything I say and make me feel like shit about it like it's your god-given right to ruin my life. So, yeah, it’s the fucking—”

The anger seems to have gone out of you somewhere towards the end, and you feel yourself deflate like a pricked balloon. “And it’s so fucking hot, too,” you mumble, burying your face in your hands. Then, face still covered, you laugh, feeling ridiculous and petulant like a child after throwing a temper tantrum about a broken toy. “Sorry. I’m sorry. It’s not your fault for having to drive me, and it’s not Joshua’s fault for getting his goddamned leg broken. I’m just…” You struggle to find the right words to express your frustration, but ultimately give up. “It’s so hot,” you whisper.

Your face burns, and you’re no longer sure if it’s from anger or embarrassment. It’s unusual for you to lose your composure, but you must have been more affected by this than you had imagined. Or maybe it’s just Jeonghan bringing out the violence in your emotions again.

Speak of the devil. Jeonghan steps around the front of the car and comes to a stop in front of you, hands very still at his sides, yet tensed as if they’re about to move. Suddenly you feel very tired, and very, very small.

“Let me drive the rest of the way.” His tone is gentler than you expected, but you’re still not brave enough to meet his eyes. He hesitates, like he’s about to say something else, but then his lips press into a thin, concerned line. You remember that expression from years ago, his eyes warm, a hand reaching over to curl around yours. Now, it just feels alien.

“Get some rest,” he finally says, and you don’t have the heart to fight back.

It’s been half an hour, and you still haven’t said a word to each other. Whatever pretense of cordiality you thought could be preserved is gone—if it had even existed in the first place—and the tension in the air is thick enough that you could carve something out of it. You’re beginning to get a little tired of the silence, now that the noise in your head has begun to quiet down just enough so you can actually think.

At least he’s turned the air conditioner on, which is a small mercy. You don’t know how you forgot about it before, but it probably had something to do with your rising irritation and the complete lack of awareness due to your blinding rage. Maybe if you’d just retained enough sense to turn the stupid freaking air conditioner on, you wouldn’t have had a loud, embarrassing breakdown in the middle of the freeway.

“I can hear your internal monologue from all the way over here,” Jeonghan says, making you start. It’s almost as if he actually can hear every single one of your thoughts—which shouldn’t be so surprising, considering your history. Your heart’s startled palpitations turn into a painful squeeze. “Stop thinking so hard and get some sleep.”

“It’s not like I’m not trying,” you mutter. “I’m just…restless.”

“Can’t wait to get home?”

You scoff. “Yep,” you say, dragging the syllable sarcastically. “Can’t wait to get home.”

Jeonghan catches your eye in the rearview mirror. There’s something quietly thoughtful brimming behind his eyes, and although you can’t quite put your finger on why, it makes you sit a bit more easily. It could be that you’re glad he isn’t too mad at you—people pleaser that you are—but it’s more likely that the look is…familiar. Familiar enough that relaxing in reaction to it is an instinct your body hasn’t gotten rid of just yet. Fucking biology. “We don’t have to go home if you don’t want to,” he says with pretend nonchalance, looking away.

You laugh, a little sadly, and uncross your arms to rub your hands down your biceps. “Where else am I supposed to go?”

It’s quiet for another moment. This time, it’s you who can almost hear the gears turning in Jeonghan’s head. You can’t help but anticipate what he’s going to say. “I don’t know,” he says, voice so muted that you have to look at his mouth to make sure you can correctly make out what he’s saying. “Where were you planning to go with Joshua?”

Your breath catches in your throat. “No,” you say firmly right as he asks the question, your voice a little rough and more than a little hoarse. You’re sitting stock-still now, like you touched a live wire and have been electrified in place. “Don’t even think of going there.”

He shrugs, and you can see the slightest hint of tension in his neck muscles when they flex with the movement. “If we take the highway, there’s a motel about half an hour from—”

“Don’t,” you say through your teeth. He’s still not looking at you. “Jeonghan, stop it.”

“Two days,” he says, unrelenting. His eyes finally flicker to yours, and you feel something stutter in your heart when you see the first hint of genuine emotion in his expression. The first time in eight months. “If we take the U-turn up ahead and keep going, it takes two days to lead up to the bay. Just two days. We could stay in a bed-and-breakfast, and if you still want to go back after that, I’ll take you home. No stops.”

You swallow back the dry patch in your throat. It feels wrong to see him like this, so eager when he greeted you with all the warmth of an icicle just a couple hours ago in the parking lot behind your apartment building. You know some part of it is because of your unintended meltdown in the middle of the road an hour ago, but the whole proposal reeks of pity.

“Not funny,” you say shakily.

“I’m not joking,” comes the simple reply.

“What’s the catch?” you ask sharply. “Not even half an hour ago you were letting me know exactly what you thought of road trips and risks. Why the sudden change of heart, huh, Jeonghan? If you tell me it’s because you feel guilty, I swear to god I’ll punch you.”

“Well,” he starts, lifting a single shoulder, “I don’t really have anything better to do. And if I take you home right now your mom will definitely make me stay for dinner, which would be awkward for both of us.” He shrugs. “And…maybe I want to spite Joshua. For breaking his leg playing soccer with little kids, and making me come all this way just to pick up an ungrateful little alley cat who could’ve just taken the bus.”

You lapse into silence for a few moments. Then: “He really broke his leg playing soccer with little kids?”

“Yes,” Jeonghan replies, but not without an eye roll to accompany it. He looks at you then. “So what will it be, sweetheart?”

You know in your heart that there’s only one right answer to that question, and it’s a resounding no.

But then, if you’d been sensible enough to listen to your heart, you probably wouldn’t have ended up five hours away from home in a shitty old college majoring in fucking math of all things. So of course you tell him to turn the car around.

Jeonghan has always been an ass with apologies.

Which is ironic, because ever since you first met him, you’d known that he had the gift of the gab (for lack of a better phrase). His talents had always been in lying and talking and picking exactly the right quote from a classic text to make himself sound smart—which, admittedly, he is. He went from making people pay him to write their college essays and down the natural pipeline to majoring in literature at a fancy place. He’s always been good at making you angry, but you don’t think he’s ever figured out how to make things right. Or care enough to work for it.

So when Jeonghan knocks on the door and you open it to find him with a beer bottle in his hand, you’re only slightly surprised to see it.

When he comes in, his eyes go straight to the double bed. He steps inside the room (at the first motel you’d seen which advertised running hot water, which makes no damn sense anyway because it’s over a hundred degrees outside and neither of you is taking a hot bath anytime soon, but whatever). The blades of the ceiling fan spin lazily, barely even disturbing his hair.

“The speed for the fan doesn’t go beyond three, and the air conditioner only works between seven and seven,” you inform him as you sit back on the bed, your suitcase open on the mattress in front of you.

Jeonghan nods, and you have to bite your lip to stop yourself from laughing. He’s probably not used to this kind of place at all, but if you’re going on the road with him, you’re not pulling your punches. You’re happy enough with the arrangements yourself, being accustomed to living in even worse conditions. His description of you as an ungrateful little alley cat wasn’t far from the mark. It could always be worse, but you don’t tell him that.

You’d decided against calling your parents—or Joshua—to inform them about your change in plans, and had instead chosen a few simple texts to convey the information. They trust you enough to deal with your last-minute changes, but you know that there’s going to be a lot of questions about your choice of companion when you get back. Those questions, however, you can confidently avoid thinking about at least until you get back. And as for Joshua—he should’ve known better, you think primly.

“I’m sorry,” Jeonghan says suddenly, breaking you out of your reverie. The beer bottle sits guilty in his grip. Gotcha, you think. “For riling you up in the car. Being around you kind of triggers my fight or flight instinct, and I’ve never been much of a runner. Heaven knows my dad tried, though.”

You half smile in acknowledgement. His expression is awkward, which makes your smile widen. The apology in no way makes up for your history, but now that you're already halfway through your decision, you decide to put him out of his misery and call a truce.

Leaning forward, you take the beer he offers you, raising it in his direction like a salute. “You’re good enough with words to make up for your lack of athletic ability,” you say, making the corners of his lips curl up. “And the pen is mightier than the sword, as they say. Care for a sip?”

He shakes his head no. “Can’t blame you,” you say, nodding sagely as you casually uncap the bottle with your teeth. “Beer does taste like piss when warm.”

“Or cold. Or room temperature,” he says. “I don’t know how you manage to keep it down.”

“Needs must.” You grin, patting the empty space on the mattress next to you, and he indulges your request. “So, I was thinking about what you said,” you start, taking a square of paper from between folded clothes and books in your unzipped suitcase, and unfolding it. “I’ve been going over the route Josh and I picked out for the trip, but I thought of making some changes.” You run your fingertips over a squiggly blue line marked on the map, and tap a spot outside it. “We could visit the museum. Take a meandering route, make a few stops here-and-there before we actually get to the bay.”

Jeonghan peers over your shoulder. “That’s about eight hours from here.”

“Mhm,” you say, putting the lip of the bottle to your mouth and taking a gulp. You make a face as you swallow. “Damn. I thought it was kind of clichéd, but warm beer really does taste like piss.”

“I did warn you.” He’s stiffened a bit. You sniff the air, wondering if something stinks.

“Well, uh,” you mutter under your breath, and bring the bottle back up to your lips with slow, careful motions. “We could make a few pit stops over here, and go to the shore later. Then there’s the wharf.” Your fingertip moves over the map.

Jeonghan looks at the spot you’re pointing at. His gaze shifts to your hand, then up over your arm, all the way to your bared shoulder—which you realize is mere inches from his face.

He’s stopping breathing, as if afraid to exhale on your skin. You open your mouth to make a joke, but it dies in your throat. Your mouth remains open, no words coming out. Jeonghan lifts his eyes up to yours, and you feel your heart jump. The scent of green apple shampoo envelopes you.

Something thumps on the roof above. Jeonghan looks up, and you take the opportunity to nimbly shift away. “Do you think that was a rat or a person?” you wonder aloud.

“I’m not sure which I’d rather have it be,” he answers, getting to his feet. You look up at him, the beer bottle in your hand barely empty, but you’re already feeling lightheaded. “Dinner?”

Dinner is uneventful. You usually hate forcing pointless conversations, but now you find yourself broaching all kinds of topics from the weather to the food to the ketchup stain on the waiter’s apron.

Jeonghan is polite, laughing at the right moments and nodding along when you need him to listen, but you feel fidgety on the worn leather seat that you normally would have sunk comfortably into. The long-drawn conversation makes you feel like you’re talking to a stranger, not someone you’ve known for the most part of your life. Not for the first time, you mourn a friendship that has seemingly dissolved after your break-up.

By the time the two of you walk back, it’s almost ten. You pass under more than a few flickering streetlights, but they are more than made up for by the neon signs that begin to light up after dark.

When you get back to the room, all you can think about is the double bed. How convenient, you think to yourself, more than a little miserably when you think back to the tiny moment you shared while looking over the map. While you’ve moved on from Jeonghan, your body clearly hasn’t, if the way it reacted to his scent is anything to go by. And you have moved on. Why else would you be so comfortable basically running away with him?

“I hope the lock works,” Jeonghan mutters to himself as he locks the door for the night. You’re less confident, so you zip your bag back up and push it flush against the white door, propping the handle against the top.

Your phone rings, and you take it out, checking the caller ID. Joshua. You look up, and find Jeonghan looking at you, his face blank. Feeling unsettled, you reject the call, and put your phone away.

Now that it’s just the two of you with no dinners or strangers or ketchup stains to distract your conversations, the two of you fall into a pregnant silence. Jeonghan thumbs the collar of his shirt idly, looking at the bed with a glazed-over expression. You sidle by the bed and place a pillow in the middle, then stand back to survey your work.

“It looks like a face,” Jeonghan says.

“We can share the blanket,” you allow. For all the burning heat of the mid-afternoon sun, you know that the nights in the desert are cruelly cold, especially so within the paper-thin walls of the motel room. “Do you want to keep the fan on?”

“I’m good.” For some reason, Jeonghan looks ill. “You know…I just realized I don’t have a single change of clothes.”

You take a good look at his current attire, and it’s definitely not an excuse to stare. He’s wearing a plain white shirt, as you noted before. It’s fitted but billows faintly about his frame, making him look like a prince of old. His hair falls in soft blonde waves down to his neck, brushing the very top of his collar, and a few stray strands frame his face. Even though the harsh fluorescent lights draw the color from his face, the sheen of sweat over his cheekbones make them shine. You watch, transfixed, as Jeonghan’s fingers slip from the collar to the undone button, the pad of his thumb shaping the outline of it.

And he’s also wearing jeans. The jeans are reusable, you think, blinking yourself out of your stupor. Get a hold on yourself. But you can already pick out the stained collar of his shirt with ease. “We can go shopping tomorrow,” you suggest, clearing away the thickness of your voice. “Restock your supply of Walmart t-shirts.”

He looks at you with narrowed eyes, and you allow yourself a smile.

When all the blinds are all drawn and the lights turn off, you’re the first under the blankets. The pillow you’d ceremoniously placed down as a barrier between the two of you is flush against your back as you curl into yourself. You feel the mattress dip and the bed frame creak as Jeonghan gets into bed. It feels strange to have him in the same bed again, something you used to yearn for, now something so strange and troubling.

“Neighbors are loud,” he states, his voice muffled. You curl your fingers into the bedspread, and sigh silently before turning on your side so you’re facing him. Sure enough, now that you’re paying attention you can hear party music bleeding in from the room next to yours.

Jeonghan is nothing more than a dark outline against the sparing light that seeps in from under the door. “G’night,” you say softly. Softer than you intended, anyway. You bite your lip and duck your head under the blanket, feeling inexplicably schoolgirlish.

With the way your heart beats in your chest, it sounds almost as loud as the music coming from next door. You’re almost worried about him hearing it, but if he does, he doesn’t betray a thought. There’s no way I’m falling asleep like this, you think to yourself, but it doesn’t take more than a few minutes before you’re at the soft edges of sleep.

“Good night,” Jeonghan whispers back, just as you begin to drift off.

True to your word, the first place you put on your list of shopping locations is the local Walmart.

“You know I intend to wear these newly-acquired clothes outside of this trip, right?” Jeonghan complains as you browse a rack of t-shirts that advertise themselves as being up to fifty percent off! “You’re wasting your time if you think I’m going to spend my well-earned money on anything here.”

“May I remind you, mister, that this whole trip thing was your idea?" you ask, pulling out a tie-dyed shirt that’s a swirl of shades of peach and baby blue, and holding it up in front of his frame with an appreciative hum. “Plus, don’t you feel gross in your sweaty old underwear? This could be the splash of color your wardrobe so desperately needs.”

Jeonghan looks unimpressed. He pushes the tie-dye down, looking over it at you with a shake of his head. “I know better than to trust your choices, even those made with good intentions. And your intentions at the moment are clearly not good,” he emphasizes. “Anyway, this is not the underwear section.”

You raise your eyebrows, and look behind you pointedly at what is, actually, the underwear section. Jeonghan follows your gaze to the display of Fruit of the Loom underwear. “No, nope,” he murmurs. “Don’t even think about it.”

“Too good for Walmart underwear, are we?” You wrinkle your nose, but don't press the issue, moving instead towards another part of the t-shirts section. The tie-dye stays in your hand, though.

“With underwear, I always believe that what you get is what you pay for,” Jeonghan says, then frowns. “What are you doing?”

You look up, innocent. “These crewnecks are on sale too.”

“That’s because it’s the peak of blistering summer,” he says, exasperated. “No one’s wearing crewnecks.”

“At night, though.”

“I’m not wearing a crewneck to bed.”

You’re about to crack a joke about going on long walks by the beach, but think better of it. Jeonghan looks confused by your sudden surrender, but you’re too busy looking in every other direction possible as a prickly heat crawls up your neck. “You really are a snob,” you mumble.

“I’m not a snob.” He rolls his eyes. “Can we go somewhere else? Anywhere else?”

You glance back, coy. “Anywhere?”

He grimaces. “I take that back.”

“Your wish is my command.” You wave the blue-and-coral tie-dye in the air. “We’re buying this one though. Don’t think for a second I’m gonna let you walk out of here empty-handed.”

For once, Jeonghan doesn’t complain, but he does purse his lips to make his feelings clear. “I guess I could make use of it when I have no clean clothes left.”

“Come on, it’s not that bad.”

He still pays for it—and some clean, much-needed underwear, despite his many complaints—at the counter, and you’re honestly surprised at how civil he's being. You'd thought that it would require a lot more effort to make this whole thing as smooth as possible after the fiasco in the car, but he's been on his beat behavior since then.

Despite your outburst and Jeonghan’s subsequent apology, you’re aware that neither of you have actually broached the reason for this tension. It’s much easier to just not think about the break-up, and act like it never happened, because that’s a whole can of worms right there that you do not wish to open.

You wish you could unscrew the top of your head and bring your brain out. Give it a good shake to dust off all the stray thoughts you keep having about Jeonghan and your self-control and your relationship, and just let yourself enjoy the ride. Unfortunately, it doesn't work that way.

“We could go thrifting,” you suggest once you’re in the car, and for once, Jeonghan doesn’t seem too opposed to the idea.

The first thrift store you find on the GPS is small and plain-looking, but upon entering the dilapidated, run-down looking building you quickly learn not to judge the book by its cover. Inside, Jeonghan picks up a fluffy hot pink scarf with a wince, and you can’t help but laugh.

“You should try that one on, actually. It matches your mean girl vibe,” you point out, digging through the bin where he found the scarf in question.

“I like mean girl better than snob.” He slings the scarf around his neck. He'd decided to trade in his white button-up for the tie-dye you got from Walmart, but not before proclaiming that it was only because he needed clean clothes to wear. “It sounds more like a phase that way.”

“It doesn’t fit as well though,” you say, bringing out a sequined shirt. “Ooh, try this one. The disco vibes would make you a hit at the local club.”

“Thirty years ago, maybe,” he grumbles, but adds it to the cart. “Can’t you look for something more…”

“Boring?”

“Classy,” he finishes with a pointed look.

You grin. “As my lord pleases,” you announce, and hold up a plain brown t-shirt. Jeonghan arches his eyebrows, looking mildly surprised and skeptical, until you turn it around to reveal the Twilight logo with the faces of the main trio plastered below it. “Doth thou find this to thy liking, good sir?”

There’s an expression of part disgust, part enjoyment (and is that a glimpse of fondness you catch in his eye?) on his face. “Verily, fair maiden. It is to my utmost satisfaction,” he replies, a smile playing on his lips. “And it would be dost, not doth.”

“Very well.” You drop the shirt into the cart and straighten, grin unwavering. “Let us look around.”

He offers you his arm, and you hesitate only a millisecond before taking it. “Shall we?”

You nod, keeping the smile in place. “We shall.”

The two of you end up staying in the store until it closes, losing track of time as Jeonghan models different outfits you throw together—“This one has a dick drawn on the back.” “I know, right?”—and bring to him in the changing rooms. It’s not entirely a waste—he actually ends up finding some decent clothes, which you make him pack into a hello kitty backpack, and you buy the heart-shaped sunglasses that manage to catch your attention. By the time you come out and agree to get an unhealthy dinner from a McDonald’s drive-thru, it’s almost nine, but you’re on a dopamine high that you know is going to keep you up for a long while.

Also, you kind of don’t want to go to sleep. Going to sleep means finding a cheap place to stay, with vacancies, during tourist season, which means you’re probably only going to find a single bed. After all you’ve done to keep an invisible barrier between the two of you today (which is to say: not much) you don’t trust yourself enough to try to risk sleeping in the same bed again.

Jeonghan seems to have had the same idea, so you end up taking mini naps while switching with him to drive all night to the next destination. Most of the night, at least. It’s about four in the morning when you realize you’re beginning to nod off in the driver’s seat, so you pull over and nudge Jeonghan awake.

“I don’t think going on is good for our health,” you tell him seriously.

He’s still half-asleep, but he bestirs himself at your words, rubbing his eyes with the knuckles of a closed fist. “Uh, okay,” he mutters, opening his eyes wide and blinking the sleep out of them. “Why?”

“It’s irresponsible,” you insist. “You know, from a road safety perspective. Also, I almost drove us into a tree.”

That wakes him up quick. “What do you suggest, then?” he asks, sitting up. “Sleeping in the car?”

“Well,” you begin, unsure, “yeah?”

“Are you crazy? We’ll freeze to death.”

“No we won’t,” you whisper back, then clear your throat, not sure why you’re whispering. “Body heat.”

Jeonghan puts his face in his hands for a few seconds, then exhales deeply. “Okay,” he mutters savagely, dragging his fingers down his face. He looks up at you, and there’s a languid sharpness in his eyes that makes you squirm in your seat. “Four hours,” he says. “Don’t complain later if you can’t take it.”

You try for a scoff to hide your discomposure, but end up yawning instead. “Whatever,” you murmur, putting your forearm against the wheel and leaning your face against it. It’s still dark out, and you are freezing a little bit, but the dull orange light that lights up the interior of the car makes it feel slightly warmer. “It’s not like we have anything worth stealing.”

Jeonghan lounges against the passenger seat. He’s still wearing the stupid tie-dye, and the orange of the interior lights have washed out the peach in his shirt. The rest of him is bathed in the same color, making his skin look like it’s been licked by fire. You watch him undo the seatbelt buckle with hooded eyes, curling your fingers around the steering wheel to contain yourself. Even as he climbs into the backseat, you don’t move, eyes still fixed on him.

Would you have reached for him if you didn’t remember every word he said that day? Maybe you should talk about what happened, to clear the air at least. You try to think of how that would go. Jeonghan, you would start, about what happened—

“Are you coming or not?” Jeonghan asks. He leans forward, beckoning you with a crooked finger, and your gaze glides over the collarbone that peeks out from just below his neck. His voice is breathy and low, making something twang in your gut. You pull yourself up quickly, and follow him before you can change your mind. Jeonghan pulls out a few of his clothes from the backpack to cushion the seat. The space is small, cramped, and smells like cheese, but you think about none of those things except the heat of his body against yours. This is, undoubtedly, the most terrible idea you’ve had so far.

“This is a terrible idea,” you voice, as he pulls an oversized shirt over your legs and leans back. You’re not half as sleepy as you were mere moments ago. The comfort is so deeply unsettling that you feel like you’d rather nap in a bush.

“As I said,” he murmurs, gaze darting to your lips for a millisecond. You gulp. He looks like he’s made of honey and marmalade. “Do you want to turn off the light?”

“So passer-bys don’t think we’re fucking in the back of the car?” A nervous laugh bubbles up your throat like an uncorked Coke bottle, the regret following the words as soon as they come out. You glance up at him, pulse jumping, but his eyes are already closed. “Oh. Um. I’ll turn them off.”

It doesn’t take long for Jeonghan’s breaths to even out, but you lie awake for a long time, listening to your own heartbeat. It’s long past ten a.m. before either of you wakes up.

You spend the next few days doing what you do best—wasting time. This was what you’d planned originally, doing absolutely nothing and deciding destinations on the road, but it was supposed to be with someone who knew you well. While you have no doubt that Jeonghan had managed to puzzle out every part of you before, you're no longer the same pedantic, rule-abiding perfectionist that he probably remembers. You think you’ve changed a lot since you last saw him, and since a major part of that owes itself to him not being in your life any more, you don’t know how to adjust your relationship to that change.

There’s a day you spend most of at a microbrewery, where you manage to snag a guided tour to the home brewing process and Jeonghan develops a taste for fruit beers. Another where you trek up the mountains at a national park just to watch the sunset, sitting on a rock with your sore legs and sharing an artisanal. Once you spend the whole day at the pier.

“There.” You point at a highway, licking the side of your strawberry ice cream (Jeonghan takes the mint). “That’s the road I took while following this stupid underground band on their tour. Didn’t even like them that much, but these guys convinced me, and it turned out to be kind of fun. Sort of like a grown-up camping trip.”

Jeonghan squints at where you’re pointing, then shakes his head. “So that’s why you were so confident about sleeping overnight in a car in the desert.”

“S’not that bad.” You shrug. “I thought it would be like a new experience, you know, and that’s where I got this idea about the road trip in the first place. I don’t think Joshua expected me to suggest something so…careless.”

He’s silent for a long moment. You glance at him sideways, and clutch the bear plushie you won at the ring toss. “Do you ever miss it?” he asks at length.

“Never,” you reply quietly. Maybe you haven’t changed as much as you thought.

Every location is fun at first before your not-relationship gets in the way, slowly chipping away at your sanity like a heavy-handed ax. You swear you’ve barely touched alcohol, but soon the days begin to blur together, and by the time you get anywhere near the beach you don’t even know what day it is.

Saturday, your phone says.

You swipe ignore on Joshua’s sixteenth call in the past few days, this time not even bothering to shoot him a text in its stead. It’s late in the afternoon, and you’re lying on your stomach on an extremely soft mattress in a fancy hotel, ankles crossed in the air as you read an old copy of Gone Girl that you borrowed from Mina in case you got bored.

Or you were reading it. You press your lips together as you finish reading the same paragraph for the seventh time without actually absorbing any of it, and sigh. Jeonghan reaches over and flicks the cover before leaning back. “Female rage, huh?” he asks, settling back against the pillows. “Should I be concerned?”

The colors of the sunset seep in through the slits between the blinds. You look up at him, noting his watchful gaze, the controlled set of his mouth. Somehow you feel more resentful than wary. “I don’t know.” You roll onto your back and jut your chin out, looking at him upside down. “Should you?”

He doesn’t give up. “Are you angry?”

Your fingers coil more tightly around the book. You match his stare for another second before propping yourself up on your elbow and going back to the text. “No,” you reply after a second, still with your back to him.

“I think you are.”

You throw your head back, irritated, and set the book back down on the bed. “Why would I be angry?” you ask, turning your face in his direction. “I’m just tired. That’s all. It’s too hot to do anything anyway, we can just go out after the sun goes down.”

Jeonghan doesn’t seem convinced, but he doesn’t push you on the subject, and you’re relieved. The truth is that you’ve been feeling irritated and guilty and rash ever since you woke up, but don’t want to give yourself the chance to do something stupid.

“Where do you want to go today?” he asks instead.

You frown, squeezing the bridge of your nose between a forefinger and thumb. “I don’t know,” you repeat. “Maybe nowhere. Do nothing.”

He cocks an eyebrow. “What were you planning to do with Joshua?”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, all of that went out the window the second he broke his damned leg,” you snap. Then you pull back with a wince. “Shit. Sorry. I think I’m getting a headache.”

He doesn’t say anything, only offers you a glass of water, which you accept with a quiet thanks. It’s not going to help, though, you know that; your headache has deeper roots than that. The water is lukewarm, and you gulp the water down, spilling half of it over your mouth and down your shirt. “Maybe we can go somewhere you want,” you say, pursing your lips into the best smile you can muster. “You know, this was for the both of us.”

“I know,” Jeonghan replies, monotonous. “You’re getting a nosebleed.”

“What? Oh, fuck.” You hurriedly put the glass down on a side table and head to the washroom. Sure enough, when you look into the mirror, your upper lip is coated in crimson.

“Fuck,” you whisper to yourself again, and bend over the basin. The sound of running water almost drowns out Jeonghan’s footsteps, so you jump a bit when you hear his voice.

“Let’s go to a club,” he says. You straighten, holding a napkin to your nose, and glance back at him. He’s leaning against the doorframe, arms folded over his chest. “Sounds like you need to get drunk,” he says, shrugging.

Your lips part. “Okay.” You turn and grab another napkin. “Sure, yeah, let’s go.”

The teeming throngs of people seem to envelope you, like a piece of paper folded over and over. The air in the nightclub is stale but cold, with undercurrents of sour sweat and sweet coke syrup. You wouldn’t call yourself a stranger to this scene, but for some reason, it feels foreign.

You weave your way through the crowd on the dance floor, an untouched glass in your hand. Although the whole ordeal had been Jeonghan’s idea, he’d disappeared less than ten minutes after you came, no doubt off buying pretty girls drinks. Being seen with you would probably ruin his night, but at least someone’s living their single life to the fullest.

You, on the other hand, have not been having fun at all. It’s not entirely unexpected, since the whole reason you’d said yes to the idea was because you’d felt bad about snapping at him. Usually, you go drinking to unwind after a stressful week, but today you just can’t seem to get into it. You suspect it’s because you’re alone. The music is loud and heavy and while you remember noting that it’s one of your favorite songs, all you can hear right now is the bass. You feel it in your skull and your teeth and jarring all up your sciatic nerve, sending little jolts through your spine. If you didn’t have a headache before, you’re definitely close to getting one now.

Someone brushes past you, and you almost spill the drink in your hand all over the dress. Annoyed, you turn to snap, but they’re already gone by the time you’ve turned around. You sigh, massaging your temple with your free hand, and sit down at the first table you see, placing the glass with the red drink sloshing around inside. The pulsating lights make the surface of the liquid flash, turning it orange and pink and even green. You don’t even remember what it is supposed to be.

With a deep sigh, you pull the glass off the table and nurse it in your lap, head dropping from exhaustion. Maybe if you had someone to dance with you, but your choleric disposition has a habit of chasing people away, and tonight you’ve dialed it up by about a hundred.

A shadow looms over you, blocking the lights, and the color winks out of the drink in your lap. You look up with a glower, ready to chastise what is undoubtedly another hopelessly drunk guy looking to hit on single girls, but falter when you manage to make out the man’s features.

Jeonghan’s blonde hair looks lilac in the lighting. His hands are in his pockets, and he’s got that white shirt on again, but the lights have bled into it like with your drink, turning it different colors. For a moment, neither of you move, him looking down at you and you matching his stare from the seat.

“Are you drunk?”

You shake your head mutely.

If he doubts your honesty, he doesn’t show it. “Wanna get out of here?”

It’s stupid, but you feel bad. You’ve never known him to be into the whole party scene, but maybe he’s gotten different hobbies since you split up, and you feel like you’re taking that away from him. “Don’t you want to stay?” you ask, setting the glass on the small table. “I know the way back.”

He offers you a small smile. “You know how I feel about places like this,” he answers as you prepare to leave. Then why did you suggest it in the first place? you want to ask, but dare not utter a word. “Well then—” He offers you a hand, the smile softening— “my lady?”

His voice is low, but you hear it like an arrow singing through the noise. “As my lord pleases,” you murmur with an incline of your head, a smile creeping onto your lips as you take his hand.

Jeonghan tugs you through the crowd, his grip gentle yet firm. You pull yourself closer to him, marveling at how the sea of people seems to part before him, like he’s a warm knife going through butter. “You should’ve told me if you didn’t want to come,” he yells back at you.

“It’s not that I didn’t want to,” you explain, wrapping an arm around yourself as the two of you step out into the night air. It’s much colder outside even with the crowd, and you barely manage to suppress a shiver. “I thought it might be—fun.”

“But it wasn’t?”

You shake your head stiffly, shoulders raised against the late night chill. It’s only then that you realize your right hand is still intertwined with his, with you almost hanging off his arm. Flushing, you extract it quickly, folding your arms across your chest. “Let’s just go back to the hotel.”

You can’t see his face, but you imagine him burning holes into the side of your face. But he only nods.

Back at the hotel, you lean against the basin in the washroom, staring at yourself in the foggy mirror. Your face looks back at you from the parts where you wiped off the mist with the heel of your palm, smokey-eyed, your makeup smudged. The cold ceramic seems to cut into your hands, but you’re grateful for it.

With the bathroom door left ajar, you can hear Jeonghan in the connecting room. “Sorry about ruining your night,” you offer with the most apologetic tone you can summon, but your heart feels as numb as your fingertips. “I don’t know what’s gotten into me.”

“Don’t worry about it,” you hear him say, his voice feeling like it’s coming from a tunnel. You know exactly what’s gotten into you though.

You swallow against the hard knot of dryness that has lodged itself in your throat. Your head is pounding, and you feel like something is splitting you apart from the inside, like a block of ice in your chest that refuses to melt. Am I really that cold inside? Throughout this trip, you’ve found yourself wishing multiple times that the distance between you and Jeonghan didn’t feel so great, but now the thought overwhelms you, washing over you like a riptide, and you feel like you’s gotten into you to sea.

You think about just giving in, but you want to preserve some semblance to self respect. Although none of your concerns feel grounded—Jeonghan’s been the perfect gentleman since after you broke down on him. The memory of your last argument eight—now nine—months ago, his harsh words cutting you down, they all feel so far away. So unreal. You wonder if you imagined breaking up.

“I shouldn’t act so immature, right?” you wonder aloud, and spin around to face him. Jeonghan’s standing just outside the bathroom, fiddling with the cuff of his shirt, and blinks at your question. “I mean, we’re not in high school anymore.”

His brow twitches, like he’s about to frown. “You’re not acting immature.”

You feel slightly hysterical. There’s exactly one thing you want from him—a reaction. Even though you know it’s only going to make things worse. “You don’t think so?” you ask, very quietly.

The frown finally manifested itself on his face. “Are you drunk?” he asks again, enunciating each word slowly and carefully.

“Jesus fucking Christ, Jeonghan.” There’s a wild edge to your voice that has him tilting his head. “Why are you so—so—” Blank. Unaffected. Maddening. “Calm?”

The frown flickers away, and once again, he goes back to looking as unemotional as an alabaster statue. Just as beautiful, driving you insane with a feeling that you can’t quite put into words. “What would you rather have me be?”

One second you’re leaning against the doorframe, fingernails gouging into the wood, and the next second you’re on him, reaching out like you’re about to claw his face off. Before you know it, you’re kissing Jeonghan with all the viciousness of a bite.

Your hands grip his shoulders, then slide up to his neck and down to his upper back. You can feel his shirt creasing where your nails dig into it, so desperately that you think they might leave crescent-shaped scars. “What do you think?” you hiss into his ear as he stumbles, stepping back to steady himself, his hands coming to your hips. You lean into him, returning to his lips, and then he’s kissing you back.

Jeonghan slides his hand over the diaphanous material of your dress, reaching up to slide into your hair, deepening the kiss. His other hand grips your waist, pulling you as close to himself as humanly possible. His arm crushes you against himself as his lips part against yours, kissing you like he was breathing from you, as desperate as if he were drowning.

It’s as if he’s come alive under your touch, so different from the unemotional front he’d displayed just seconds earlier. His hands roam your body, exploring, tracing, remembering. You open yourself to him, letting every doubt and second thought be washed away by the tide of emotion that rages inside you. Jeonghan tastes like strawberries, his lips soft and sweet, and you feel like putty in his hands, but you still manage to push him into the bed. You’re in his lap now, legs on either side of him, slowly and teasingly tracing the roof of his mouth with the tip of your tongue.

Jeonghan’s hands travel up your waist to your breasts, and you press your lips to the junction of his jaw and neck, right over the pulse. He moans into your mouth, and you feel hot all over—the good kind of hot, the kind that makes you feel like you’re standing in his fire, sweating harder to feel more keenly the wind against your skin. It starts in the pit of your stomach and spreads to your core, your chest that’s flush against his, your hands as you pin his shoulders to the mattress. You kiss him again, hands moving to his chest as you start to unbutton his shirt.

“Wait, wait, wait,” Jeonghan breathes, covering your hands with his. You make an impatient noise at the back of your throat, but pause, pushing yourself up so you’re straddling him. “You’re not drunk.”

You give him a black look.

“Okay, okay.” His breaths are coming in pants, each as ragged as the last. “I…I don’t have a condom—”

“I do,” you cut him off in the middle. He gives you a questioning look, and you huff. “I was going to get laid, okay? One way or another.”

His lips part, and for a long moment, no sound comes out of them. “Are you sure?” he asks lamely.

You stare at him, flabbergasted. “What do you think?” you demand again. He’s such a sight under you, with a half-unbuttoned shirt and swollen lips, that you’re having trouble stringing words together. “Jeonghan—I don’t know what it is that’s holding you back, or—or if you just don’t want to have sex with me, but—”

“Not like this,” he interrupts. There’s a softness to his voice, even as he looks up at you with heavy-lidded eyes. Your hand twitches where it’s lying on his chest. “I mean. You’re not in the right state of mind—”

You’re incredulous. “It doesn’t have to mean anything, Jeonghan,” you say, petulance creeping into your voice as you struggle to maintain your composure. “I’m upset and frustrated and I really need this, okay?” Your voice cracks just slightly, but it’s enough for the air to get knocked out of him.

Some part of you tells you not to do this. To apologize, maybe laugh it off with a shitty joke about getting rid of the tension, act like you don’t want to open him up and climb into him. Sex has never been the solution to your problems. But you’re on a mean bad decision streak, so you just bite down on your lip, swallowing your feelings.

“Please touch me,” you whimper, and Jeonghan takes in a sharp breath, briefly closing his eyes before moving to oblige.

His hands go back to your waist, but this time he flips your positions. He grasps the hem of your dress, and you stretch your arms, letting him tug it up and off your frame. You watch as his eyes rove over you, and his pupils darken, swallowing the warm brown of his eyes. Jeonghan leans down next to your ear, and you feel the dent in the mattress next to your head where his palm presses into it. “Remember,” he says, as your stomach flutters weakly, “you asked for this.”

Jeonghan’s knee nudges yours to part your thighs, and the next thing you feel is two of his fingers pressing against the already-damped seat of your panties. “Didn’t expect to be so wet already,” he murmurs, and your face heats up like he toom a match to it. “Is that what you meant by frustrated?” Wordlessly, you arch against him, eager. “Hips,” he commands, and you raise your hips to allow him to pull your panties down your legs, where you agitatedly kick them off your ankles.

You suck in an anticipatory breath as his fingers push against your unclothed core. He doesn’t even need to look for your clit—the pad of his thumb is pressed against the bundle of nerves a second later, rubbing circles into it. You screw your eyes shut and throw your head back, clenching your thighs around his arm. “Oh god,” you gasp. “Oh god oh fuck—”

You cut yourself off with a sharp inhale to grab his forearm, digging your fingers into it as he flicks a finger against your clit. “You’re so sensitive,” Jeonghan remarks, a smug smirk painted on his face. “Always were. That’s what made playing with you so much fun.”

You open your eyes just to narrow them at him, panting. “Oh, finally, there he is,” you drawl breathlessly. “The resident devil of—Jeonghan!”

He has the gall to laugh as your entire body jerks in response to his middle finger pushing past your folds and into your heat. “Admit it. You like me better that way,” he counters, adding another finger inside you. You arch your back, sucking his fingers deeper inside your cunt as he curls the digits in your core.

“I did admit it,” you breathe. It’s astounding, how quickly the two of you fall back into the familiar play, trading words back and forth like you’ve been doing this all your life. His thumb swipes down against your slit, collecting your wetness and massaging it back into your clit. You buck against his hand, mewling. “Fuck, Jeonghan, pleasepleaseplease—”

Watching him like this, you suddenly remember that no matter how mild-mannered he may seem to the untrained eye, Jeonghan is neither calm nor reserved. He is sanguine, a hunter in the night, smelling blood from a mile away. And you've always been his favorite plaything.

“There’s a good girl,” he praises, but his fingers pull away a second later. You bemoan the loss of the friction, desperately rubbing your aching thighs together for any sort of relief. Jeonghan’s fingers dig into the inside of your thighs, prying them apart firmly. You begin to protest, but he quells you with a look. “But I can’t let you have it just yet.”

You’re panting. “Fuck you.”

He only smiles. “Condom.”

You gesture towards the bedside table with a tilt of your chin. “Second drawer,” you choke out, feeling like someone’s set a fire to the base of your brain, cutting off your ability to form coherent thoughts. Jeonghan retrieves it, waving the small square packet in the air as if to further provoke you. You settle back onto the sheets, waiting for him to put it on, but instead he leans his weight back against you, playfully nipping at your collarbone. You grit your teeth, grabbing the front of his shirt.

“You can be such an asshole sometimes, you know that?” You hiss, and start unbuttoning his shirt hastily.

“Well, I tried being nice, and you hated that,” he murmurs against the base of your throat, sending vibrations through your sternum. You fling open his shirt, and he takes it off fully, balling it up and throwing it to some dark corner of the room. “Aren’t you hurrying too much?” he says, but when you roll down against his hips, the bulge straining against the seat of his pants is unmistakable.

“Aren’t you talking too much?” you fire back, and he chuckles. You hear the sound of the packet tearing and the subsequent unzipping of his pants. Jeonghan rubs the head of his cock against your slick heat, almost making you sob, and pushes it in.

Your fingers claw against his back when he slowly rolls his hips into yours, sending a wave of pleasure through your body. “I forgot how good you felt,” he rasps, sidling his hands under your arms and pulling them off him. The heel of his palms skims your forearm, reaching up to meet your wrist. When he presses his fingertips against the palm of your hand, you open up to him like a flower in bloom, letting him twine your fingers with his in a slow, decisive motion.

The head of his cock brushes against your sweet spot, and your mind goes blank with bliss. Jeonghan says your name like a prayer as he pushes deeper into you, harder, and the feeling of hot-and-cold pleasure stirs in your abdomen. His pace quickens, hips snapping faster against yours, and you begin to feel dizzy and delirious.

You gasp his name, and he shudders as he breathes out, all but falling against you. His fingers tighten around yours as he moves, the tip of your nose nudging his, his forehead cool and damp with sweat where it meets yours. He draws your orgasm out, still fucking into you as you reach your climax. You call out his name as you ride out your high, and his face twists with desire so devastating that it looks almost like pain. He thrusts into you once, twice, only a few more times before he comes, almost collapsing on top of you when he finishes. The pent-up frustration is gone, you realize as you lie in bed and stare up at the ceiling, along with the misery and confusion and anger.

You clean yourself off in the bathroom in silence, as he wipes off your makeup with a gentleness that you’d almost forgotten. Neither of you speak, but the silence is heavy and comfortable like a winter blanket. A voice at the back of your head is screaming at you about consequences, but it’s small and tin-like and easy enough to tune out in the face of Jeonghan’s lips brushing against your temple.

Plenty of time for regret in the morning.

And, oh boy, does the regret hit like a fucking truck.

You’re the first one up, waking to the feeling of soft blankets on your bare skin and Jeonghan’s sleeping face just inches from yours. Startled, you sit up, the strap of your bra slipping off one shoulder.

Then you’re slipping off the covers and making a beeline for the bathroom, stopping only to grab your phone off the bedside table before locking the door behind you. You lean against it heavily as your legs seem to give out, breathing hard as if you just woke up from a nightmare.

You slept with your ex last night. The one thing your friends with active dating lives told you never to do. And it was all your idea.

Fuck.

Still trying to steady yourself, you sit down heavily on the edge of the toilet seat, placing your head in your hands. It was a stupid decision, and you know that—hell, you’d known that going into it—but now it’s time to deal with the aftermath. Jeonghan himself is going to wake up in no time, and you don’t even want to think about how he’s going to react.

You try to think of someone smarter than you, but after your actions last night, the bar proves to be pretty low. Your first thought is Joshua, but you feel even more like shit when you think of calling him, so reject that option out of hand. Someone who’d know what to do, you think to yourself as you shakily dial the number on your phone, fingers trembling.

She picks up on the fourth ring. “Hey, girliepop,” Mina greets in a bright, peppy voice, as your shoulders sag with relief. “I feel like I haven’t heard from you in ages. What’s up? How’s home?”

You don’t waste a second. “I did something really, really bad.”

A pause. “Do you need help hiding a body?”

“What? No. I slept with Jeonghan.” You cover your mouth, briefly closing your eyes. Saying it out loud makes it sound even worse. “I’m so screwed.”

“The hot ex-boyfriend? Oh, honey, don’t worry, that’s a mistake we all make at least once in our lives,” she says sympathetically. “Were you drunk?”

You squint. “No…”

“Okay,” she says slowly, and you wince. “Do you…want to do it again?”

At that, you pause. Do you want to do it again? You hadn’t even thought of it before this. “I mean…” You trail off, doubtful. “The sex was pretty great, but…”

You can imagine her twirling a lollipop stick between her fingers, sucking thoughtfully on the candy. “I don’t know, I’m gonna need a lot more context,” she asks finally. “Why did you guys break up? How long were you together? What kind of person is he? It depends on a lot of things.” Another pause, and you can almost see her raising her eyebrows at you, like, well? “You gotta give me something to go on here.”

You try to think of an answer, but every thought feels muddled, like you’ve reached peak brain capacity. “Um,” you start, haltingly, “we have a lot of history, I guess.”

She hums, which sounds like a muted buzz through the line. “Like what? Childhood best friend type of history? On-and-off kind of history?”

You close your eyes, focusing intently. “Um…well…we have known each other since we were in grade school. And we dated for most of high school, and almost two years after that. Then we…we broke up in October, last year.”

“Why?”

That’s a loaded question. You pass a hand over your face, trying to think of how you can explain it. You remember there being so many reasons for it, but now that you’re trying to remember them, not a single coherent-sounding explanation presents itself. “It’s complicated?”

Mina tuts. “I get it if you don’t want to talk about it, but I can’t help you if I don’t know what the problem is, babe.”

“I’m so confused,” you lament, biting your lip. You try to explain the situation as best as you can, how you decided to ditch your plans and go on a fuckass road trip with your ex. Everything comes out like a barrage: all the doubts you’ve had about your relationship with Jeonghan, the constant second-guessing yourself, all your worries about his inconsistent behavior. By the time you’re done, Mina’s gone silent on the other side.

She doesn’t say anything for a long time, so you listen to the soft crackling of her breathing mixing with the sounds of traffic coming in through the tiny window on the opposing wall. “Oh, honey,” comes her fizzy voice from the speaker finally. “Now I wish I’d convinced you to go on that blind date.”

You laugh softly. “Yeah. It’s just… Every sensible bone in my body is telling me I’ve made some kind of mistake, that I’ve crossed some invisible line, but it was so easy,” you tell her. “Last night, when we—it felt like old times. As if nothing had ever happened. And now I’m wondering if that’s what I’ve wanted all this time.”

“I almost wish you’d come to me with a murder to cover up, because at least I’d be able to help you then,” she replies. “But if you think that maybe this is what you want, and if he wants the same thing, then you can still work it out, you know? You’re a smart girl. You can figure out what you want.”

A smile tugs at the corner of your lips. “I wouldn’t be so sure,” you murmur, using your pinky to trace a crescent into your bare knee. “But thanks.”

Her grin is crystal-clear in your mind. “I’ve got faith in you.”

“That makes one of us,” you quip, and she laughs as you hang up.

The call didn’t help much, but you’re glad to have gotten some things off your chest. The narrow walls of the bathroom don't feel so suffocating anymore. All right. You pull your knees up decisively, straightening your spine. It’s my problem to fix now, you think. Even if you don’t feel calm, you have to at least act like you are.

Taking a deep breath, you unlatch the door and step outside, closing it slowly behind yourself. As you’d thought, Jeonghan is already up and dressed. Well, kind of. He has his boxers on, and the shirt from last night, crumpled and still unbuttoned. You stare, frozen in place, as he turns and notices you. A beaming smile spreads across his face.

“I went ahead and ordered room service,” he says by way of greeting. “Considering it’s past twelve and absolutely boiling outside, I thought we might stay in for brunch instead. I hope you like pasta, ” he says, shrugging. Then he notices the look on your face. “Is something wrong?”

You blink slowly, as if coming out of a daze. “Something wrong?” you echo, wondering if you sound as bewildered as you feel. “Something…Jeonghan.”

His eyebrows arch. “Yeah?”

“We had sex,” you say slowly.

“We—yes.” He nods, slowly at first, but then more rapidly, until he looks like a bobblehead. “Yeah, but—I mean, we used protection, and we talked about it before, kind of, and I thought it was fine, you know, because—” He’s rambling. You’re beginning to realize he’s not as nonchalant as he appeared a moment ago. “At least we didn’t have sex very publicly in, in the motel, or the car, or—”

It’s like a strange tranquility has descended over you. Jeonghan swallows, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down, and he looks anxious. You haven’t seen him anxious in so long.

It feels like the roles have been flipped. You know that’s not quite true, and your poise is only temporary, but at least he’s not giving you unreadable looks every time you try to show vulnerability, tripping you up on your own words. You just hope you’re not going to use this opportunity to do something stupid again.

“Jeonghan,” you interrupt. Mina hadn’t really given you any clear-cut counsel, but it seems her reassurance had been all you needed. “If we’re going to do this, we need to set some ground rules.”

‘No strings attached’ sounds weightless in your mouth, but the words seem to sink like stones into your mind.

Still, now that at least the sexual tension is out of the way, you feel as unburdened as those girls in sanitary pad ads. Jeonghan’s inner navigator must be in touch with his good-for-nothing side, because he turns out to be absolute magic with finding amazing out-of-the-way places. The two of you go off-road for a while, but get lost so you decide to stick to what you could identify on the map. There’s another day spent walking around at a doll museum and pointing out dolls that you thought looked like people you both know.

It feels a bit silly, running around with Jeonghan all the time, but it’s the happiest you’ve been in months. You take baths together, and sometimes you go out for ice cream, and despite some of the lewd activities involved, it feels as sweet and innocent as kids playing house.

After the first time your motel room neighbor bangs on your shared wall to ask you to be quieter during sex, you decide that sticking to places with reliably thick walls is the way to go. That’s how you find out that Jeonghan has developed a taste for long baths.

You’re rummaging around inside your suitcase, looking for the paperback you borrowed from your roommate, untouched since the day you stopped reading it right in the middle. “Jeonghan!” you call, overturning a pair of pajamas. Even in a thin robe, you can feel the heat almost radiating off the floor. “Did you see my book? I’m kind of worried that I left it somewhere.”

No response.

Frowning, you stand, looking at the cream-painted door on the opposing wall. It’s firmly shut, and has been that way for the past hour or so, not a sound escaping from inside. You cross the room and check the handle, not too surprised when it swings open.

One glance inside gives it away. Jeonghan looks at you with displeasure, only his head poking out from behind the side of the bathtub. Well, that and the copy of Gone Girl you’ve been looking for the past half-hour, clasped in a long-fingered hand, his elbow propped against the lip of the porcelain tub. “Do you mind?” the perpetrator asks.

You place your hands on your hips, giving him an unimpressed look. “You’ve been in here for over an hour,” you tell him. “At this rate your body is going to turn into an overripe raisin. Also, that’s my book.”

He turns the book over to regard it. “I thought you weren’t reading it.”

“I wasn’t. Emphasis on was.” You rest your hand on the door handle. “There are other people who want to take a bath, you know.”

“Aw, I was just looking for some entertainment.” He flashes a grin at you. “But if you have a better idea…”

You roll your eyes, but unfasten the robe anyway. Jeonghan’s eyes follow your every move, pupils blown wide. He places a cheek on his arm, eyes half-mast as you slip the robe off your shoulders, letting it pool on the floor at your feet.

“Nothing underneath, huh?” he muses. “Have I been out-maneuvered?”

You ignore that. “Move over,” you say shortly.

“Don’t need to ask me twice.”

(Later, when you’re lying on the bed after having managed to wrestle the book away from him, Jeonghan brushes his fingers against the sliver of exposed skin under your shirt. “Don’t even try,” you warn him, after smacking his hand with the spine of the book.

“I thought you wanted to do something ‘wild’,” he says, making air quotes with his hands. You smack him again.

“Not everything is about sex,” you remind him, not really meaning it.

“‘Everything in the world is about sex except sex.’” he quotes. “‘Sex is about power.’”

You roll onto your side, letting the book fall shut as your forearm hits the mattress. “You’re so full of shit, Yoon Jeonghan,” you tell him, getting a razor-sharp grin in response. But you still let him kiss you a moment later.)

By the time you finally reach the ocean, the air conditioner has been broken for two days, so when you feel the fingers of the first evening breeze sneak in through the lowered top of the window and run themselves through your hair, you almost stop the car there and then.

Jeonghan stops you, reminding you that if you get off you’ll have to walk a pretty long time before you actually get to the beach. You stay put, but when you do get to the beach you’re the first out of the car, standing spreadeagle against the flow to feel the wind on each and every inch of your skin, plastering your clothes to your frame.

“This is so much better than that stupid air conditioner,” you sigh. Jeonghan’s still fishing out that Hello Kitty backpack that contains your towels and sunscreen, so you deign to wait for him instead of going off on your own.

Something pink and plasticky covers your vision. “Here.” He grins, settling the heart-shaped sunglasses on your face. “Now you can finally use these,” he says, and turns to head off.

You fix the sunglasses before following after him. The sand is soft under your feet, shifting to accommodate the shape of your feet as you step over it. You pull your sandals off, tucking your fingers under the bands and opting to carry them at your side so you can feel the grains on your soles.

“I thought there would be more people here,” your not-boyfriend comments.

You look around. A kid is building a sandcastle near a couple that looks over him, turning over buckets to deposit clumps of wet sand to shape them into towers. A bit further away, a head wearing sunglasses pokes out of the ground as its giggling companion packs more sand over the body. Jeonghan’s right; the crowd is tamer than you expected, but it’s probably because it’s getting late and the weather is about to turn icy in no time.

“I haven’t been to the beach in ages,” he says as you reach the shore. The wind tousles his hair, flapping his shirt around his torso, and he squints against the saline breeze. “Kind of forgot what it feels like.”

You hum contentedly, watching the tiny waves lap at your feet. “When I was a kid, my mom told me I had to dig my feet in before the tide came in, or else I would be carried away by the waves.”

He snorts. “I know. Your mom told me the same thing.”

“Right,” you smile.

Jeonghan bends to place his hands in the sand in front of him, letting the water wash over them. “Cold,” he says.

“You know, I did almost get washed out to sea once,” you remember. “Swam too far. There was salty water in my mouth and ears and the ground felt like it was made of hands, trying to drag me down further. My uncle told me that when they finally fished me out, my head was wrapped in kelp. He thought that telling me that would traumatize me, but I just kept swimming out again and again.”

“Stubborn and proud,” he observes. “That sounds like you.”

“Does it?” You grin, bending to scoop some of the water into your palms, and sling it off your fingertips to splash it into his face before he can realize what you’re doing. Jeonghan sputters, stumbling in the sand, and comes up with an indignant hey!

Laughing, you turn to run, and glance back to see him discarding the Hello Kitty bag to chase after you. “It’s the beach, cut me some slack!” you yell back at him. He doesn’t respond, but when he does catch you, it’s around the middle, and his tackle flings both of you into the water, you still laughing. You wrestle unsuccessfully with him for another second before coming up for air, his arms still wrapped securely around your waist.

“No fair,” you complain, but the smile that splits your face is as bright as the sun.

“No fair?” he repeats, expression indignant. “You started it.”

“Okay, but now we’re both wet.” You spit some water out of your mouth. Sure enough, your clothes are drenched, and so are his. Jeonghan staggers to his feet, pulling you up with him. His pale blonde hair is plastered to his forehead, darker where it’s wet, curling at the back of his neck. “And not in the fun way.”

“Who says this way isn’t fun?” He kicks some water at you, and you raise your arms to shield your face. Offering only a glare in retaliation, you turn, wading a little further out so the water is up to your waist. “Are you planning to get washed out again?”

“Hilarious,” you call back without turning. The sun is low in the sky, turning the ocean the colors of fire. Jeonghan comes up behind you and you close your eyes, breathing it all in.

The water tickles your waist where your shirt billows up, and the breeze cuts deliciously sharp on your damp skin, but you only shiver when Jeonghan traces a map on the exposed skin of your back.

You don’t stay in the water for long, dragging yourselves up to the shoreline to make sure you mostly dry off when the sun is still up. Jeonghan’s hair slowly curls as it dries, and he tries to comb the sand out with his fingers to no avail.

“I’m gonna need a nice hot bath after this,” he complains, carding a hand through his hair. “It’s all fun and games going to the beach until you’re digging sand out of your body for the next three weeks.”

“You take a nice hot bath at every opportunity you get,” you remind him, but you share the sentiment. The retrieved backpack swings off one shoulder, slapping against your side with every step. “That was so much fun, though. I wish we’d just come here in the beginning and stayed.”

“Nothing beats hiking for hours up a mountain just to see a yellow ball come up in the sky. You made me wake up at an ungodly hour for that, too.”

“And I’m not gonna apologize.” You stand back in the final rays of the sun, watching it sink into the horizon. Strips of gold glimmer in the blue-green of the water, shimmering like the surface of a polished jewel. “Sometimes I look at the sun on a regular day and wonder how it can do that.”

Jeonghan hums under his breath. His stance is unhurried, shoulders relaxed, hands in his pockets. You lick your lips, feeling the salt sting the raw patches where you’ve managed to break the skin by constantly worrying at it with your teeth.

Now that your mind is beginning to quiet, it’s turning to thoughts of the real world instead. For the last few days, you’ve successfully ignored every single warm tingle or stomach butterfly, every warning sign that came up when you looked at Jeonghan, but casting them aside has only made them weigh heavier on your shoulders.

It doesn’t have to mean anything, you’d told him, but that had felt more like an excuse. Under the guise of only using each other for sex, you’ve been indulging yourself in far more than that, and it’s plain as day for you to see.

“Jeonghan,” you venture in a hushed voice, and he turns to you quizzically. “Do you ever wonder—do you ever think that you’ve made a mistake?”

Instead of answering, he offers you a lopsided smile and extracts his hand from his pocket, letting it hang in the air next to yours. It’s only your knuckles that brush the back of his hand, but you feel the heat all over—on the backs of your shoulders, north of your abdomen, as a constricting circle around your throat.

“I try not to think too much,” he says, catching your fingers lightly when they graze his. You hesitate, but choose not to pull away. “But I know that’s not your strong suit.”

The sky has gone dark. One by one, the artificial lights switch on, bathing the sand in a pale glow. With his tanned skin and platinum hair, Jeonghan looks like a tallow angel in the light, his mouth a soft rosy line curved into a smile like you’re sharing an inside joke. The breeze flows over the water, lifting his shirt up a shade.

Your heart lurches in your chest, but you manage a smile back. He’s probably right and you’re probably overthinking, but you are as helpless in the face of that knowledge as you were without it. As you murmur and you think too little with numb lips, you can't help but wonder what he’s really thinking.

Jeonghan thinks this bar is going to be the death of him.

The Shipwreck Tavern must take its name quite seriously, because it smells exactly like how he imagines the interior of a shipwreck must smell—like fish and rotten wood. The place is filled with tough-looking old people, and the bartender must be a wrestler’s grandma, because her arms are as big as his head. Everything inside the pub looks old and feels old, except the new-looking TV that adorns a wall adjacent to the bar, playing a soccer game that seems like the local pastime, judging from the attention it garners among the tavern’s patrons.

There are probably better places the two of you could’ve gone to, but this was the nearest place he’d been able to find with an outdoor shower, and he could’ve sworn he felt a crab in his pants before. Instead of bothering to look for a place to eat, you’d suggested staying at the same place, and he hadn’t known better than to comply.

Jeonghan takes the drinks he ordered from the bar with a nod of acknowledgement, fighting to keep the smile on his face until it’s out of the bartender’s view. As soon as the old lady with the anchor tattoo on her forearm turns her back, he makes a face, turning away from a fellow customer who frowns disapprovingly at his expression. Jeonghan gives him a helpless look, and begins making his way through the crowd to a pool table in the corner.

He knows that you think he’s the more sociable out of the two of you, but he begs to disagree, and the fact that you’re already laughing along with a mean-looking guy with a shaved head is only more proof. You turn slightly to let your eyes glide over the crowd searchingly, stopping when they spot him coming towards you. Something in his chest clenches when he sees your face light up upon seeing him. You wave him over to the table, and he raises the drinks in response.

“You might wanna go slow on these. I think I saw something wiggling in the bottle she poured these drinks from,” he warns as you take the glass from him. You grin, but pay no heed to his warnings, tossing the whole thing back like it’s a regular Tuesday.

“How bad could it be?” Shrugging, you put the drink down and smooth down the front of your skirt, briefly playing with the corner where the slit ends. “Maybe it was like an eel or something.”

“Well, you’re certainly something,” he mutters to himself, raising a disbelieving eyebrow. “Why don’t you go ahead and drink mine too, if you’re so fearless? Might find a shark fin in there.”

“Those are too big to fit in a bottle, silly.” You roll your eyes, taking a cue stick leaning against a corner. “Now let’s get this party started,” you purr, bringing the stick up and across the table and positioning yourself behind it.

Jeonghan shakes his head, but doesn’t try to push down the smile that appears on his face. “Okay,” he sighs, coming around the table to your side, leaning so his face is level with yours. “So you want to keep the stick aligned with your line of sight, and try to aim for the easy pockets first.”

You lick your lips, screwing one eye shut to aim. “You underestimating me?”

“No, it’s just to keep your mood up. Now choose your shot.” You survey the layout of the table once before deciding on a target, arranging your stance to aim accordingly. Jeonghan nods. “Okay, good. Line up, and be careful about the angle.”

Placing the stick’s tip near the cue ball, you bend again. “Like this?”

He reaches over, rearranging your hand that’s splayed against the table so your first two fingers make a bridge. “Balance the cue on top of that,” he says, curling an arm around your waist. His fingertips press against the elbow of your cueing arm, stabilizing it. You shiver slightly as if a cool breeze had just blown through, making his own stomach flutter. “That’s it, like that,” he whispers in your ear, enjoying your reaction as you squirm. “Steady, steady…now try.”

Taking a deep breath, you shoot. The cue ball cuts across the dull green surface, bumping into the black ball and sending it rolling into a corner hole. Grinning, you straighten, pumping a fist in the air. “Nice!”

“Yeah, pretty nice.” Jeonghan nods. “Except we’re playing 8-ball pool, which means if you pocket the 8 ball before all the stripes and solids are gone, you lose.”

A despondent boo erupts from the audience watching the soccer match, exactly in sync with your face as it falls. “You didn’t tell me that before,” you say accusingly. “That’s cheating.”

“Good try though,” he acknowledges, taking a sip of his drink. It tastes just as bad as he’s expected. “And I didn’t cheat, I just withheld information.”

“That’s lying.”

“Tomato-tomato.”

You bring up the cue stick, pointing the polished end at his chest. “I’m about to demolish you,” you challenge.

He grins and takes a stick of his own, tapping it against yours. “Bring it on.”

Jeonghan had intended on leaving the second you were done with your food, but you end up staying for more than a few hours as you keep asking for extra rounds despite continually losing. When you finally agree to leave, it’s way past two, and you walk with a giggly, faintly tipsy stupor so he has to support you all the way to the hotel.

Instead of falling into bed immediately upon entering the room, you pull him into the bathroom, crashing your lips against his before he has the chance to let a question pass them. Jeonghan closes his eyes, holding you against him as you wrap your arms around his neck, almost dragging him down the floor as you go limp in his arms. Your back hits the wall with a loud thump, but you still don’t let up. “Someone’s eager,” he says as you press kisses along the line of his jaw, settling his hands on your hips.

You let out a soft breath, bunching up his shirt under your fingers. He leans in to kiss you, but you step back, holding him in place. “I was—do you think we should—”

Someone bangs against the other side of the bathroom wall, making both of you jump. “Message received, damn,” Jeonghan mumbles, turning his attention back to you. “Sorry, you were saying?”

You fumble with your words for a second before seemingly giving up, instead smiling brightly. “Nothing. Never mind.”

“Nothing, is it?” He kisses your jaw, and you let out a soft sigh. Your hand drops to his pants, moving to unfasten it, but he stops you. “Shh,” he whispers, brushing his thumb against your lips. “Walls have ears, remember?” he murmurs, as his warm breath fans your face.

You tuck your bottom lip under your teeth, blinking up at him so sweetly that he almost groans. He dips his head, nuzzling his face into the crook of your neck, the ghost of his smile against your skin. “We have to be quiet,” he says, lips touching the shell of your ear. “If you behave, I’ll make sure you’re well compensated for your efforts.”

Your breath hitches, and you turn your face away, letting out a choking laugh. “Oh yeah? And how are you planning to do that?”

Maintaining eye contact, he sinks to one knee, and slides his hands down from your hips to the back of your thighs. You steady yourself by placing your hands on his shoulders, and he tugs your skirt up, warm palms skimming the cool skin of your thighs.

“Well, for starters,” he says in a low voice, watching your eyes as they darken, and slips a cold finger just inside the top of the slit in your skirt. “I’m going to make you come on my tongue.”

You watch him with wide eyes, still as a statue. Jeonghan licks a warm line up the inside of your leg, which twitches in response. “Remember, not a sound,” he warns, teeth nipping at your skin.

“You’re an ass,” you tell him, taking a deep, shuddering breath.

He smiles, and taps at your knee to indicate to you to move it. You swing a leg over his shoulder, adjusting your stance to stabilize yourself. He hooks a thumb into the underside of your panties and pulls it aside, revealing your glistening core in its full glory.

The sight makes his breath catch in his throat. Jeonghan licks his lips, experimentally swiping the tip of his finger along your cunt, and you squeeze his shoulder. “Ticklish?” he asks, and you slide a hand through his hair, giving it an impatient tug. “Always so sensitive,” he tuts, even though the sensation sends a bolt of arousal straight to his dick. “Always had a bite, too.”

“Shut up,” you growl, impatiently pulling his face closer to your core.

“Patience, grasshopper,” he admonishes. He slips the finger between your folds, massaging lazy circles into it, and your grasp on his hair tightens. “Ask me nicely, and maybe I’ll give it to you.”

You grit your teeth, but the pause tells him you’re actually considering it. Your giving up so easily would take all the fun out of it, he decides, and without warning, he tilts his head up and closes his lips around your nub, flicking it with the tip of his tongue.

Your whole body seems to spasm in response, like a puppet that just had its strings pulled taut. Jeonghan grins into your cunt, and increases the pressure on your clit. You whine, rolling your hips against his face, but he holds you in place.

“Not so fast, honey bunny,” he murmurs against your arousal, which only has you straining harder against his hold. “You like that, huh?” he asks, and sinks his index and middle fingers into your hole knuckle-deep. “All those times you called me a silver-tongued devil—how d’you feel about this tongue now?”

As if to prove his point, he laves his tongue leisurely along the entire length of your pussy, making you cry out. “Jeonghan, please,” you moan, and his heartbeat stutters at your desperate pleading. The moment you start begging, he’s a goner. “More—ah—”

He doesn’t even remember that he asked you to be quiet. “Fuck,” Jeonghan snarls, “you know I can’t say no to you, don’t you?” He pulls his fingers out almost entirely, coated in your juices, before thrusting them back inside. He proceeds to bury his face back into your heated cunt, sucking on your swollen clit and finger-fucking you at the same time. You throw your head back, scraping your fingernails against his scalp as he eats you out like a starved man. “No.” he says, pulling away momentarily. “Keep your eyes on me.”

“Ngh—please—” Your words come out in broken moans, but Jeonghan scarcely hears them. He scissors you ruthlessly, stretching you out with his fingers, the other hand leaving dents in your skin where it digs into the soft skin of your thigh. Your orgasm is drawing near, he can tell by the way your walls are spasming around him, so he speeds up his pace, licking and suckling in quick succession, pushing you far past the point of satisfaction. “Jeonghan!”

You come with a cry, your eyes rolling back into your head, back arched against the wall. Jeonghan unlatches his lips from yours unwillingly, pulling back to admire the look on your face, hazy with desire.

“Fuck,” you breathe once you’ve come down from the high, chest heaving. You let the back of your head fall against the wall with a light thump. “Where did you learn to do that?”

He shrugs with faked nonchalance, grazing your skin with his teeth as he slips your leg from his shoulder. A glint of satisfaction shines in his eye like an ember sparking in a dead bonfire as he gets to his feet. “I’ve been practicing.”

Your shoulders stiffen, and Jeonghan stops in his tracks. “Right,” you murmur, as alarm bells go off in his head. He regrets the words instantly, and moves to take a step towards you, but you’re already turning away and out of his reach, leaning towards your phone that rests precariously on the basin’s edge. “Oh, wow, it’s getting pretty late. I think we should head to bed.”

Jeonghan bites his lip. “Yeah,” he says softly, stepping back to allow you to slip past him and out the door. Stupid, he thinks, licking the remains of your cum from his lips. “I guess so.”

The next morning, after you finished locking the doors behind yourself, you’d come down to the lobby to find Jeonghan flirting with the receptionist.

He had both his elbows on the table, leaning his weight against it as he gave her his best smile, chuckling at some shitty joke he probably cracked himself. She’s pretty, you’d thought as you saw her smile, flushing as she tucked a lock of dark hair behind her ear. He said something else to her, and she giggled, but it had died out quickly when she’d spotted you approaching.

To his credit, Jeonghan dropped his smile as soon as he saw you. You’d deposited the keys, thanking the receptionist with the nicest smile you could manage, but even that wasn’t very nice. He hadn’t said anything as you got to the car, and you feel like shit even though you know he doesn’t owe you an explanation.

Stupid, you think to yourself. Stupid of you to forget that this whole thing was going to be over soon, stupid for caring so much and getting hurt despite yourself, stupid for thinking that Jeonghan would share your concerns. And let’s not forget angry: angry for getting so carried away, especially when you pride yourself on being so careful all the time.

The car hasn’t stopped in hours, not even for a gas refill, and you haven’t had a proper conversation since the drive started except for when Jeonghan tried to offer you a soda.

You’re glad you’re driving, because it gives you an excuse to be silent. Focus on the road. Jeonghan has sensed something off with your mood, but he hasn’t tried to ask you about it, and you don’t know whether to be grateful for him respecting your boundaries or mad for not trying hard enough.

Now that it’s June the skies have begun to turn an angry, burning orange-red before six o’clock instead of remaining a softer bruised purple. You’ve been in the same position for a while although your neck started to hurt some time ago. It’s getting chilly, but not cold enough to roll the window back up, and you’re determined to fill the silence with the whistling wind for as long as you can.

You must’ve jinxed yourself, though, because the silence is broken in seconds. “Just so you know,” Jeonghan starts, tone light and conversational, “I wasn’t flirting with her.”

You tighten your hands around the wheel, staring so hard at the windshield that you’re surprised it hasn’t melted into a puddle of plastic yet. “I don’t care if you did,” you say tersely, trying and failing to sound normal. “It’s none of my business.”

“I was just asking her if she knew any places we could stay nearby,” he continues, instead of giving up. “And as it turns out, there’s this really great—”

“Actually, I think we should go home.” You cut him off demurely, not taking your eyes off the road in front of you, even though there isn’t another vehicle in sight. “My parents are probably worried about where I’ve run off to, and I’ve been kind of a shit friend to Joshua recently.”

Jeonghan’s mouth flattens into a thin line. “That was a choice you made.”

You scoff, rounding on him with a scornful look on your face. “Oh, so you want to talk about choices now?” you ask, voice full of strife. “Remind me again in case I’ve forgotten—it was your choice to have us break up in the first place, wasn’t it?”

The muscles in his jaw tighten, standing out under his skin where they flex. “Oh, come on. You’re just mad about last night and instead of acknowledging that, you’re changing the topic.”

“Okay, yeah, I’m mad,” you admit, “but that’s not why I’m bringing this up, and you know it. I believed you the first time you said anything. We can’t just never talk about what happened nine months ago—you can’t just sweep something that big under the rug and expect things to be fine and fucking dandy.”

“Who cares about something that happened months ago?” he asks angrily.

“Are you serious?” you ask, laughing disbelievingly. A chill is beginning to settle over your skin even as the air simmers at a hundred degrees.

He tugs an opposing sleeve, and throws the other hand up in exasperation. “I don’t see how it matters anymore.”

You stop the car.

Jeonghan opens his mouth, and closes it again. "You know, this whole stopping the car in the middle of the road thing is getting old," he says with a hint of exasperation in his voice.

“You don’t see how it matters?” You whip around to look him in the eye, and he shrinks back just a bit. “Jeonghan, you said getting into this relationship was a fucking mistake!”

He stares back at you, unyielding.

“And now you want to act like that never happened?” you press on. “How did you expect this to turn out? That we would be on the road forever, always going nowhere? That you could get away with never addressing all the things you said, just because I never brought it up?” You scoff. “Did you ever give a shit, or was this whole thing just a way to get into my pants?”

Your eyes are burning, and not just from the heat. Jeonghan’s hands are balled up around the seatbelt, the skin around his mouth pulled tight. You don’t dare to look away, hoping against hope for him to finally say something, anything, even though you’ve been in a dozen arguments like this that all ended the same way. This time, you pray with bated breath, this time it has to be different.

“I guess it was just a bad idea,” he says finally, quietly.

Every tensed muscle in your body goes limp, and you’re pulling yourself out of the suffocating car before your mind has even formed a coherent thought, dying to get away from him. The asphalt seems to sizzle, and you wonder in a daze if the road is just a mirage and you’ve actually been standing in one spot this entire time.

You’re standing in the heat, the warm wind making your skin sting with sweat, and even with your hands covering your face you can still sense Jeonghan’s presence behind you. When you turn, there he is, standing still in front of the car. The sun’s rays reflect off of the hood of the car and into your eyes, and you blink back against the stinging brought on by the forceful brightness. For a second you can’t see the expression on his face as he shifts, his silhouette outlined in shadow by the glaring sun, but then your eyes adjust to the light and the look on his face makes something crack and split apart in your chest.

You know then that he will not say anything. He will watch you walk away, again and again and again, with that stoic set of his shoulders and the proud line of his mouth, but he will not say a word. You want to grab him and shake him, scream at him to say something, but you know that his words, in all their vehemence and vitality, are reserved only for him. And you’re going to stay outside, forgotten in the sun, where he hung you out to dry all those months ago.

You wrap your arms around yourself, feeling a twinge of pain against the side of your ribs where his fingers dug into your skin last night. For a moment, you can almost feel his hot breath on your neck, his teeth on your thighs, but you blink, and suddenly the distance between you feels too great. Jeonghan’s eyes bore into yours, the heels of his palms braced against the hood of the car he leans on, and even in the sweltering heat you have to suppress a shiver.

“I knew this was a bad idea,” you whisper. “Even when I didn’t have a choice.”

A muscle in his neck pulls taut, but all he does is lift one corner of his mouth in a lazy, sardonic smile. You watch him pretend not to notice as his grip turns white-knuckle-tight.

“Needs must when the devil drives, sweetheart,” is all he says.

You have no response to that. “Right,” you whisper. Your fingers are trembling, and you’re definitely in no state to drive, but you’re suddenly seized with the desire to get away from it all. Away from him. “Take me home, Jeonghan.”

Peonies have always been Joshua’s favorite.

Even though you’ve never been big on elaborate apologies, the guilt you feel after having ignored your injured best friend for the past couple of weeks is strong enough that you end up buying a whole bouquet for him. Joshua’s mom’s face lights up when she sees you, and you give her a shy, apologetic smile right before she sweeps you up into a bone-crushing hug.

Your eyes widen, but you wrap your arms around her anyway, feeling stupidly emotional at the warm reception. “Oh, sweetheart, I haven’t seen you in so long!” she gushes, and you ignore the painful squeeze of your heart upon hearing the endearment. “If Josh had told me that you were coming, I would’ve made your favorite cherry brownies.”

“No problem, ma’am, I’ll be sticking around for a while,” you tell her with a warm smile.

“Oh, you must be looking for him,” she says, “Poor kid’s been cooped up for weeks, he misses you so much. I think he’s in the backyard, or I would’ve called for him.”

The backyard? You wonder what a guy with a broken leg is doing in the backyard—definitely not sunning himself in this weather—but you thank her anyway. Gripping your bouquet, you head to the back of the house, pushing past the screen door and stepping into the uncut grass of the Hongs’ backyard.

And stop short.

“What the fuck?” you sputter.

Joshua almost trips over the black-and-white football, steadying himself last minute to look up at you with wide eyes. Your grip on the flowers has tightened even further as you imagine it to be the boy’s throat. “Hey, ____,” he says with a strained grin. “I didn’t know you were coming! This is such a lovely surprise. And are those flowers? For me? Aw, you shouldn’t have!”

You stare him down, unrelenting. “I didn’t realize broken bones could heal themselves in less than three weeks,” you say pleasantly, a contrast to the death glare that pins him in place. “Shouldn’t you be resting, sweet Joshua?”

“Oh, um, the doctors were pretty surprised too. Miracle recovery, they called it.” He lets out a forced laugh as you cock an eyebrow menacingly. Joshua sighs, dropping the facade. “Okay, that’s not working, huh.”

“No,” you tell him. “But I can break your leg right now to make it all true, because I know how much you hate lying to your best friend.”

He puts his hands up placatingly, taking a careful step back. “Hey, hey, hey, I can explain,” he says, sweating. “Why don’t we go back inside and get you something to drink, and then I can tell you why I lied,” he suggests with a nervous smile. “You must be parched.”

You give him a dirty look. “For blood, yeah,” you mutter. “This better be fucking good, Hong, or I’m going to break both your legs.”

Back in his room, you opt to stand near the doorway in case he tries to bolt. You’d tried to upend the peonies into the bin, but he’d grabbed them before you could, saying that the poor flowers weren’t to blame. Joshua sits on the edge of his bed, hugging the bouquet to his chest, and you fold your arms threateningly across your chest. “Alright,” you say waspishly. “Explain yourself.”

He looks down at his shoes, see-sawing the heels of his cleats back and forth. “Before you get mad,” he starts, “you gotta remember one thing. I did it for you.”

Your lips curl downwards into an unimpressed frown. “Let me get this straight. You lied to me about your leg being broken, sending my ex-boyfriend in your place to take me home, for my sake?”

Joshua winces. “That sounds pretty terrible when you put it like that,” he confesses. “But, yeah, I did.” You unfold your arms, making as if to step towards him, and he yelps, putting his hands up again. “Let me explain!”

“You’ve explained plenty,” you tell him.

“No, I still have stuff left!” he pleads. “Listen, after you broke up with that guy, you weren’t the one who had to deal with him afterwards. While you went back to college, I had to stay here and be there for him while he was moping all over the place.”

You roll your eyes. “I would hardly call you and Jeonghan friends. There’s no reason he would come to you for comfort.”

“I mean, yeah, he didn’t,” he admits, “but this is a small town. Do you know how hard it is to escape the news of one break-up, especially one as high-profile as yours.”

“High profile?”

“You know what I mean,” he chides. “The point is, you didn’t see him afterwards. He was really torn up about it, you know?” You purse your lips as Joshua leans forward, his expression turning serious. “I didn’t have any sympathy for him in the beginning, because of what you told me, but the more I saw of him the more difficult it became to match up the idea of the Jeonghan I knew and the Jeonghan you said told you all those things.”

Scoffing, you look away, unable to stand the sight of Joshua’s imploring eyes. “Just because you couldn’t make sense of it doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.”

He sighs. “Look, I’m not defending him. What he said to you—about not seeing the point in putting in effort, that you were just playing at charades, and the thing about your relationship being a childish mistake—”

You grit your teeth. “I get it. I was there, remember?”

“Yeah.” Joshua scratches his head, a thin line appearing between his brows. “He had no right to say any of that to you, but I still felt like there was something I was missing, so I went to talk to him.”

Defeated, you throw your hands up. “Of course you did.”

“And I don’t think he meant any of that. I mean, he still shouldn’t have said that shit, but…” Your eyes narrow to snakelike slits, and he shakes his head hastily. “Haven’t you ever gotten the feeling that despite all his bravado, the guy just doesn’t know how to express his feelings without getting defensive about them?”

You hesitate, biting your lip. Joshua sees the shift in your mood, and persists. “I might be wrong, and maybe breaking up with him was the best thing that ever happened to you,” he says, “but if there was the slightest chance of miscommunication, I would be a shitty best friend if I allowed you to let him go without a chance to set things right.” He tilts his head, sitting back. “So I faked a broken leg and kind of tricked him into thinking I was doing him a favor by letting him go get you in my place.”

“You tricked Jeonghan.” You can’t lie, you’re impressed. “Wow, you’re insane.”

“Um, I would say talented,” he argues. “Anyway, he was happy to do it. I think he was secretly looking for a chance to talk to you, so I thought a five hour drive might give him enough courage to tell you how he really felt. Then when you came back, I thought I’d surprise you, and we’d get to go on that trip after all. And then you texted me that you were eloping with him—”

“That’s not what it was.”

“—and I thought that my idea had worked. But then…” he trails off, and looks down at the flowers in his hands.

“But what?” you prompt.

“I don’t know, you tell me,” he says. “Something clearly went wrong.”

You sigh, and walk over to sit down heavily beside him. “It was going fine in the beginning,” you tell him. “But we didn’t actually talk about the argument, and after a point, I didn’t know how to bring it up. Then we sort of…” You wince.

Joshua frowns. “What?”

You think about all the different times the two of you fucked instead of talking about your feelings. “We kissed,” you finally speak, and Joshua shakes his head disappointedly. “A few times.”

“I’m getting the feeling that’s not all you did.”

You shush him. “And then it sort of reached a boiling point, and we argued. Again.” Your heart hurts as you remember the argument from only hours ago. “And he said some messed up things. Again.”

Joshua is silent for a few moments. Then he slings an arm over your shoulders, squeezing you against him in an incredibly comforting side hug. “I’m sorry,” he mumbles into your hair, and you blink back tears.

“I missed you.” You reach up to wrap your hands around his shoulders. Joshua’s hugs are as comforting and as restrictive for your breathing as his mom’s. “I had the worst fucking time, but it was also the best fucking time,” you sniffle into the crook of his neck. Then you spot a gleaming trophy on his ledge. “Oh, so you guys did end up winning the playoffs.”

Joshua looks back, and nods. “Oh, yeah, the second half was absolutely insane. Remind me to tell you about it.”

You tuck your chin into his shoulder. “I still can’t believe I threw a whole tantrum about not getting to go on a trip,” you say, “when I could’ve just come back and done it anyway.”

“Don’t worry, we still have weeks to make up for that.” Joshua rubs your back comfortingly. “He’s an idiot.”

“Yeah, he is,” you mumble, speech slightly obstructed by your cheek squished against Joshua’s shoulder. “I just thought things might be different this time.”

“Me too,” he whispers.

You press your face back into his neck. "You're not off the hook, by the way."

Joshua sighs.

Joshua’s mom insists on throwing you a welcome back party that night, and despite being both emotionally and physically exhausted, you can’t find it in yourself to say no. She makes you your favorite cherry brownies, as promised, which are the only thing you eat before your appetite runs out.

You sit alone at the table after everyone is done eating and the guests have dispersed around the house, dragging your spin around the empty hollow of your bowl. Your shoulders feel heavy with the weight of all the mistakes you’ve made. As you sit there idly, you keep running your last conversation with Jeonghan over and over in your head, wondering what you could’ve said to make it go differently.

You close your eyes, and for a moment you’re back to last October, standing on the ice-slicked ground outside the diner where you’ve celebrated every birthday with Jeonghan since eighth grade. His eyes are vacant and vicious and there’s ice trapped around your ribs that seems to be getting harder and sharper with every breath, and you’re screaming at each other until your throat is raw and your tears freeze in the cold.

There’s no point in crying over spilt milk, you suppose, and you’ve always been a hothead. You and Jeonghan together are about as mild as an active volcano.

Sighing, you get to your feet, the table cover rustling over your knees. You’ve stayed for about as long as you could have, and now you just want to sleep. I’m just gonna tell her I’m tired, you think, and head towards the backyard in hopes to catch Joshua’s mom conversing with someone there.

You step outside into the dark to find a single person sitting on the rickety old swing. Frowning, you move closer to figure out if it’s her, but the frame is too tall and masculine to be the person you’re looking for. “Sorry, I thought you were someone else,” you tell them as they raise their head, taking a step back.

“No. Stay.” A hand reaches out to wrap around your wrist, tugging it towards the swing. It’s then that you notice the silvery-blond hair, lit up by the smattering of light that shines out past the half-open screen door. Jeonghan gets to his feet, and you freeze. “Please.”

“I didn’t realize you were invited,” you say stiffly.

“I wasn’t. I just came to look for you,” he says. There’s an earnest touch to his voice, giving you pause. “To apologize.”

You bite the inside of your cheek, feeling your hackles rise. “What could you possibly have to say now?” You free your hand from his grasp, taking another step back. “You’ve made it sufficiently clear that this never meant anything to you.”

“Of course it meant something!” he yells. He takes a deep breath, chest still rising and falling. “I never wanted to hurt you. I was—I was scared.”

The notion sounds so ridiculous that you want to laugh in his face. But his eyes are still on yours, voice is gravelly and somber, and you feel like you’re rooted to the spot.

“Scared of what?” you whisper.

“Scared to repeat history,” he replies. “Scared to let my pride get the best of me again, say things I don’t mean. Lot of good that did me, since trying to avoid talking about it just led me to making the same mistakes.”

Your throat constricts painfully, like it’s being choked from the inside. “You really hurt me, you know,” you say hoarsely. “I never wanted to see your face again.”

A small, sad smile touches his lips. “I know,” he says. “Knowing that you didn’t want to see me made everything so much scarier. What if you just refused to come back with me? What if you’d rather just stay back or actually take the bus?” He seems to struggle with his words for a second. “When you agreed to come on that stupid road trip, I felt like I had struck the lottery.”

Your vision is blurry, and you blink rapidly against the oncoming tears. “Thank you,” you whisper, choking back the emotion that surges up your throat, “for telling me that. But,”

He waits.

“That’s not enough,” you complete tiredly. “I’m sorry.”

“Why?” Jeonghan asks, eyes blazing. He looks just as tired as you are. “Is it because of what I said? Because—I don’t know how to make you believe this, but I didn’t mean any of what I said.”

“No.” It feels like the only reason you’re standing still is because every cell in your body has had the energy sucked out of it, leaving you bone-weary. “It’s because you never say anything. And I’m sick of it, Jeonghan.” Your face twists as you try not to start sobbing like a little kid. “I can’t live knowing that you can go back to pretending to be that wooden, unfeeling shell of a person every time I rip myself to shreds in front of you. I hate that you never say a word, that you’re willing to watch me walk away rather than choke back that damn pride of yours. I’m fucking sick of it.”

His eyes soften. “I’m not the same person I used to be, sweetheart. Losing you taught me that,” he says quietly. “Even if I forget that at times myself. Please, just let me show you.”

“I'm not a girl anymore, Jeonghan,” you say tightly. “I don’t know how many second chances I have left in me.”

“That's what I'm afraid of.” He moves towards you, cupping your face. “Because you still feel like a girl to me… and I still feel like a boy around you. I'm afraid that you're growing up and away and out of me. That’s how I felt last October, when you came back so different, and I didn’t know what to do with myself. I thought you wouldn’t need me anymore.”

“Then why didn't you say that?” you demand, lungs burning. “All this time, I've been—” You finally let the tears flow. “I’ve been so…”

“Because I'm still seventeen," he breathes, "every time I look at you, choking on my words as you come down the stairs in your prom dress. I might be a devil, but when it comes to you, words still fail me."

There’s a barbed wire wrapped around your spine, a spike stabbing into each vertebrae, that tightens and tightens with every word that comes out of his mouth. He laughs under his breath, as if remembering something. “You see,” he says, “being around you kind of activates my fight or flight instinct.”

A broken laugh bubbles to your lips, and you blink against the tears that seem to make everything brighter around you. “You suck,” you tell him honestly, making him smile as if you’d just told him he was the most perfect man on earth. Standing straighter, you school your features into an expression of formality, and clear your throat. “So how are you planning on not making the same mistakes again?”

“Well,” he says, “I’m gonna try really, really hard.”

You cast your eyes heavenward. “You’re really lucky I’m hopelessly in love with you.”

“I know.” Jeonghan takes your face between his cold hands and pulls you in for a firm kiss. You clutch the hem of his t-shirt, feeling warmth spread down to your toes when he smiles into the kiss. “I’m hopelessly in love with you, too.”

“Oh, look at you, all grown up,” Joshua gushes as you lug your olive green suitcase down the front steps of your porch. “Going off to college for the first day of her final year. I feel like we should take a photo to remember this moment.”

“Joshua, shut up,” Jeonghan grunts as he lifts the bag. “If you have the time to take a photo, you have the time to help me out with the luggage.”

“Um, aren’t you forgetting something?” Your best friend points exaggeratedly at the plaster cast that covers his foot. “I’m a bit disabled at the moment.”

Karma had come full circle for him when he’d tried to take over the neighboring eleven-year-old’s trampoline, and had ended up breaking his leg for real. Everyone thinks he deserved it except Joshua himself, who’d warmed up to the idea anyway when he’d realized that he could get people to sign cool stuff on his cast.

“You’re acting like I’m going for my first day at kindergarten or something.” You roll your eyes.

“Yeah, you’re a real grown-up,” he leans over to pat your arm, withdrawing it hastily when you threaten to kick his broken leg. “Jeez, calm your tits.”

“I am calm.”

“Totally.” Jeonghan slams the boot of the Corolla, making a cloud of dust puff up. He reaches over to press a chaste kiss to your lips. “You ready to go?”

“I really think we should take a picture,” Joshua interjects.

Both of you turn to glare at him, and he shrinks into the wheelchair. “Sensing some hostility,” he mutters. “So ungrateful, considering that I’m the whole reason you’re together in the first place.”

“Exaggeration,” you say, and turn to Jeonghan. “I’ll just be a moment, okay?”

He nods, and you give him a tiny smile before running back inside the house. Joshua shakes his head curiously at Jeonghan, who only shrugs in response, just as mystified. They wait for a few more seconds, and Joshua pulls out the marker and begins doodling inside the D of your signature on his cast, which is a sweet, short message: Dick.

“Okay!” You command the attention back to yourself with a clap of your hands as you emerge from the door, this time with the plastic pink heart-shaped sunglasses adoring your face. “How do I look?” you ask, propping them up on the top of your head, and giving them a little twirl.

“Like an idiot,” your best friend says, deadpan. You smack the back of his head as you pass him. “Also, don’t forget your Hello Kitty backpack. They go with your glasses.”

“That’s mine, actually,” Jeonghan says pointedly, and turns to you with a heart-melting smile. “And you look gorgeous as always.”

“Disgusting,” Joshua comments.

You flip him off. “I’m ready to go now.”

“Well, then,” your boyfriend says breezily, patting the hood of the car, which causes another cloud of dust to billow into the air. “Get in. We don’t have all day.”

taglist: @fragmentof-indifference @sadgirlroo @joonsytip @odetoyoon @sstarrysshit @lockburn-castle @chocosvt @ohgeezitsbreadgenie @outrologist @ishireads @ti--red

#my thots charted throughout:#so if you haven't read the fic then IGNORE cuz obvious spoilers oh em gee #JEONGHAN IS HER PROM DATE awwwwwww <3 #not the slight change of plans i don't know why they're ex's yet but i'm on reader's side #:3 #me when joshua doesn't grab a hot glue gun and some staples to diy his leg back tgth :/ like stop being fake #omg yeah i feel so bad for reader and all that planning / coordinating she did w joshua going down the drain :_(#i understand her frustration i feel like trying to level w someone who is so calm but instigating would make me throw up #i used to work fashion at walmart and some of the shirts that came threw made me choke laughing #like jeonghan wym u don't want that I PAUSED MY GAME TO BE HERE t-shirt it compliments ur eyes babe #'you asked for this'#i just fainted down a well and hit my head on the water bucket #'plenty of time to regret it in the morning'#me when i smile with tears in my eyes #the spice scene was written soo beautifully it was like silk in my brain #NOO THE REGRET HITS LIKE A TRUCK #oh look at him now mr. VULNERABILITY doesn't it make you throw up??#'unburdened as those girls in sanitary pad ads' PLSSSS HAHAHA #omg the beach scene :( literally so pretty and fresh and now i want beach plz #omg the angst has exploded yessssssss BUT IT'S SO SAD and like gawd damn i feel like jeonghan himself is also too prideful #he'd rather just not say anything at all bc maybe he fears it'll just dig the situation deeper?? hmmm i'm not sure #cue is it better to speak or to die #OMFG JOSHUA THAT LYING B1TCH!#HE HAS GLASS BONES AND PAPER SKIN!!#okay so we get a bit more clarity in the joshua scene it seems like reader and jeonghan just clash in their similarities #and it kinda spurs the other so they never get the chance to rly communicate there's always a roadblock #'i'm still svt seeing u in ur prom dress' KMSSSSSSSSS #yeah like i think jeonghan was letting her walk away cuz he knew if i match her hostility or wtv we'll be back in the same place #but then it still didn't work out :(#THE 11 YEAR OLDS TRAMPOLINE IM PSISING MYSELF

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omega-e123 · 1 month ago

Note

Dude I’ve been having thots,, I must share them with you and get ur opinion or reaction especially since a lot of ur shadow smuts revolve around a certain hedgy having a breeding kink. Imagine if you’re on birth control tablets and he sees you taking them one day and you tell him what they’re for, I feel like he’d either get all grumpy and sad because oh boy does he have a massive breeding kink even if he knew rationally you probably were on some sort of contraception (that’s even if it could happen) or he’d get all gloomy n sad but would refuse to tell you because he thinks it’s silly and immature to feel that way especially if you’ve been together for a while, but I feel like he’d probably let it slip when you’re both getting freaky afterwards because it would mix in with his dirty talk about how hes gonna fuck the birth control out of you 💀

!! NSFW !!

This is in the time he’s not ready to be a father, but has the kink.

Shadow seems like the type of person to have discussed safety and methods prior along with whether or not if it’s even possible. He’s not going to take that risk, especially at your expense.

During the season, sometimes Shadow magically forgets. Absolutely fixated on you. Remembering causes him to get frustrated. The hell are you on pills for? You should be wanting a child just as mush as he does!

“Hmph. Do what you want. I won’t let something minor such as a pill get in my way. ”

Oh boy, if it moves on to sulking. The rush of emotions Shadow gets are definitely being internalized until it’s time to get down and dirty 100%. Like a balloon bursting as it slowly gets filled up with air. Those are rough sessions. Your poor legs won’t be working for a while.

Outside of rutting season, he rationally knows you’re on birth control pills. It still doesn’t lessen the embarrassment after Shadow’s hormones have calmed. His cheeks are going to match his gay highlights.

If the first time was spontaneous and he found out later down the line after multiple attempts, Shadow would absolutely be upset and annoyed. A pouty hedgehog is in your hands.

Grabbing you by the hips, Shadow leans in close. His breath tickling your lips, “You’re telling me all this effort attempting to put a baby in you was a waste of time?” A yelp is forced out of you when his hand slid down to firmly grab your ass. “Or perhaps, I need to try harder?”

Shadow struggling even more to keep his distance away from you, now knowing you’re on birth control. The pill is 99% effective and he is desperately trying to convince himself that 1% chance of it failing. Even then, that’s only if you’re taking them perfectly. Typical use is 91% effective. Odds are stacked against him, but Shadow is the ultimate life form goddamnit!

“Seven out of a hundred get pregnant on the pill… I’m determined to make you one of them.”

#I am SEVERELY sleep deprived LOL #it’s 8am I’m sorry if this was over the place #BUT GRUMPY HEDGY!!#Cue him huffing and puffing #arms crossed like a child and shaking his head in disappointment #shadow the hedgehog #shadow the hedgehog x reader #shadow x reader #➺ inbox #➺ anon #shadow smut #shadow x reader smut #➺ inbox imagines

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almostempty · 1 month ago

Text

Something in your mouth

(joel miller x f!reader)

The third installment of Never made it as a wise man aka creed!joel

WC: 8.4k | Part 1 | Part 2 | Other fics | Rating: 18+

Summary: post hand job and phone sex; it’s the leadup and part 1 of these horny bishes goin’ on a date

Note: heyyyyy it’s me and i’m back on my bs . i know i promised the fuckening, but that was summer me and now it’s winter me.. so instead of hiding and never updating, i remembered i have free will so u get the full week lead-up and the first half of the date.. and then i’ll brb with the fuckfest okay? i promise. (also it’s actually almost done this time so it won’t take months). again, i am still merely a vessel for the spirit of buttrock joel. hopefully this part 3 is girthy enough to sate your appetite a lil bit

Tags: au no outbreak modern joel, divorced dad rock dilf joel x f!reader, picks up right where pt 2 ended, alternating pov, dirty talk, horny yearning, blowjob in the truck, still crackish, but i am still dead serious about it being hot so idc, mistakes are all mine

Thanks to Nickelback for having non stop horny bangerz to quote such as Something in your mouth

major thanks to @hoelaris for this moodboard that made me weep tears of joy bc is it so perfect

thanks to @magneticecstasy for date joel thots to be ft in this pt and the next, @auteurdelabre for telling me to let them have their happy ending so i can get back to the paris boys faster, to @syd-djarin for support, horny thots, song suggestions etc, and @itwasntimethatdidit40 for the nickelback pedro tiktok edit inspo

it really takes a village or whatever they say <3

*if u forgot what this is bc i took so long give Part 1 and Part 2 a read for a refresh <3

*if i missed ur tag or u want off this ride lemme know

okay, it's starting now:

You wake up in Joel’s shirt. It smells more like you than him already, but it still makes you grin devilishly just the same. You go about your day, a few errands and some chores, the whole time with a little more energy than usual.

When you’re back home and settled in to have a lazy afternoon, you get a little restless. Itchy fingers. It’s hard not to pick up your phone and check your messages again and again. You’re drawn to looking at the picture he sent, the pictures you took, and you can’t help wondering…

Did he wake up thinking of you? Hard, aching, and leaking at the memory of your voice.

Did he dream of all the nasty things he said he wanted to do to you? Waking up throbbing and frustrated, grinding his cock into the mattress as if you were beneath him.

Did he wake up and check his phone to confirm you were real? Making it all the way to the shower before surrendering, wishing it was your soft cunt he was fucking instead of his fist.

You know you’re fucked when just thinking about him thinking about you has you so turned on. It’s so tempting to send him something else. Another picture? An audio message? A thinking of you 😘 text?

No. No, no, no.

You can wait him out. Make him work for it a little. He’s a full-grown man. You’ve already given him enough to work with. Plus, you wanna know what he’s gonna come up with next. Right?

The lazy Sunday ends all too soon and before you know it you’re back to work. Dragging ass into the office with the biggest iced coffee you could buy. You deserve a treat to get through your Monday anyway.

A little warning bell chimes in the back of your mind as you drop your things on your desk. Ellie grumbles a good morning that matches your enthusiasm for fluorescent lights at 8 am. A little seed of guilt sprouts within you.

Is it fucked up of you to mess around with Joel? It’s not like it’s something serious. Or, does that make it even worse? There’s no way he would say anything to her about it.

“Heard you saw Joel again,” she says before you’ve even sat down. Great.

“Uh, yeah,” you reply, “Still didn’t feel right that he wouldn’t accept anything for helping with my car.” You sink into your chair, hesitating to say more. It’s too early to have a good poker face.

“So you made him a lasagna?” She questions, staring you down.

“Men love my meat sauce,” you say with a shrug.

“Gross,” Ellie grimaces at that, “please, don’t ever say that again.”

You buy her off with the rest of the cookies you had baked. She’s happy to take the entire container from you and happier to enjoy them all immediately. If she’s suspicious she’s either good at hiding it or you really don’t know how to read her.

You carry on with your morning catching up on mindless tasks, swirling your coffee around as the ice starts to melt, and trying to stay focused. Ellie turns on her music and you can’t help thinking of Joel again. It’s like he’s infected your mind and every shitty 2000s post-grunge alt-rock song conjures him up.

You can’t help wondering what exactly he would’ve told Ellie about your surprise visit. Would he have asked about you? Implied anything? You can’t stop yourself from asking.

“What did he say?”

Ellie’s head swivels towards you immediately.

“Who?”

Instantly you know you messed up. You didn’t realize how much time had passed. You shouldn’t still be thinking of him. She prods you about what you said and what you meant. Not accepting a nothing or a never mind. An uncomfortable wave of embarrassment twists in your stomach, heat blooms in your cheeks, and your hands are fidgety.

You shouldn’t have brought it up, you shouldn't be so defensive. Shouldn’t, shouldn’t, shouldn’t.

Ellie is sharp–cutthroat–reading your every move. You stare at the empty Tupperware on her desk, hoping it will reveal some sort of escape plan. A strategy to deflect. It’s too late. Her eyes narrow just the slightest bit and she follows your gaze. It clicks.

“Oh, you meant Joel?”

You’re so busted. “I..uh,” you don’t know how to finish that thought.

“Why?” She gives you such a blank-faced look that it’s unsettling. You’re an adult. Why does this feel like you got caught sneaking out to see a boy on a school night?

You try to brush it off, but it sounds more defensive, making it worse. You focus on cracking your knuckles and trying to feign a more casual air. For some reason that means you keep talking. Broken sentences pouring out of you and trailing off into a stiff laugh.

Mercifully, Ellie cuts you off. Tells you it was Tommy who mentioned it.

So, he was the one who showed up while you had your legs spread open on Joel’s kitchen counter. The catalyst to your shirt heist and hasty getaway. That makes your face hot for a different reason.

“Oh. Gross.” Ellie groans.

“What?”

“You’ve got that look on your face.”

You snort at that. Only slightly horrified that she’s so adept at picking up the tells on your face. “What look?”

You suck down the last of your iced coffee, stalling, until you’re just sucking in air. You toss it in the tiny trash bin between the two of you and decide to be honest no matter what she says. You’d rather get ahead of it.

“Was it a sex lasagna?” Her mouth is pulled into a look of disgust.

You snort at that before shaking your head, preparing to get it all out.

“Okay, look. It was a thank-you lasagna.” You pause, trying to figure out exactly how much to share. “I didn’t plan the rest of it. It just…happened. And, fuck, it was so hot.”

Her face wrinkles with confusion, then disgust, then laughter. It makes your heart rate speed up.

“I’m sorry,” your words come out like a waterfall. “I don’t want to make things weird. I want us to be friends. I wasn’t thinking. I’m sure it wasn’t serious. I’ll tell you whatever you want. It was my fault. I showed up without letting him know. I made the first move—”

“You fold quick,” Ellie notes, interrupting you. She throws her hands up and you shut your mouth, “Look, you’re both adults, I don’t care what you do. Just, please, don’t tell me any of the sex details.”

“Do you really not care? Or like, you say I don’t care and then treat me like Cheryl in the front office?” you ask.

“No. I genuinely don’t give a shit. Well, I mean, if you break his heart I’ll have to kill you.”

“Naturally,” you agree with a solemn nod.

“But,” she pauses to take a breath, tilting her head before continuing, “it would probably be good for him, don’t think he’s had a real date in a while. But don’t come back to me broken-hearted if he’s a dick—that’s just his face.”

“A date?” you echo.

She groans and rolls her eyes at you, but it’s too late.

Your mind starts to wander. With Ellie’s blessing, you don’t have a reason not to give it a shot.

The harps are already strumming as you float off into your cloud of dissociation. Your favorite daydream flickers into focus as your eyes glaze over and a dazed grin curls on your face. It’s always that same slo-mo Baywatch-style memory. That one where you caught Joel wiping the sweat off his forehead with the bottom of his t-shirt. The original temptation that led you back to him.

Somehow, every time it replays, there’s a new easter egg just for you. The ghost of a knowing smirk or a sparkly-eyed wink when he catches your eye, like a wicked little tease to pull you deeper into the dream world.

Sometimes it’s all too visceral. In the privacy of your mind, you’re free to direct the scene how you’d like. Slowly panning over the peek of soft skin and the trail of hair you can see. You can still feel the warmth on your fingertips from when you slipped your hand beneath the waistband of those navy blue boxers.

Sometimes, you create something new. You’d like to take one of his sun-faded plastic green lawn chairs, drag it to the front porch, and sit yourself down for a show. You wanna watch him mow the grass in the evening heat.

You can see the sweat beads dotted along his neck and the contour of his marble-sculpted arms as he serpentines along your fantasy world front lawn.

You can smell the fresh-cut grass and the specific blend of sweaty man pheromones that Aphrodite concocted just for you.

Your chest swells, lungs expanding, as you breathe slowly and deeply. The illusory scents fill your lungs until you release a deep, yearnful sigh. The imaginary lawn mower almost drowns out the imaginary Fred Durst bellering, It’s just one of those days, from that little stereo on the workbench.

Before you can transition into another scenario—something bounces off your face, and you flinch with a loud yelp.

“That was your warning,” Ellie glares at you. “Next time I’m throwing something sharp.”

“Okay, okay, message received.” You offer a sheepish smile, and she turns around. It seems the Limp Bizkit song was very much not a figment of your imagination. Ellie mutters along to the lyrics behind you, barely audible, as you spin in your chair to get back to work.

It’s not even five minutes later when you swivel in your chair again with another question for Ellie.

There’s nothing like having a crush on a man you barely know to truly make you delusional. You know you’ve got it bad, but it’s unfortunately just so much fun to daydream and let your mind run wild with the very limited info you know about the man.

You don’t want to worry about anything that could go wrong.

Except for, well, everything.

You still fret over texting him first or waiting. Should you send another picture with no context? Should you call? Should you wait another day?

When you notice your chest feeling tight you give yourself a reality check. It’s Monday morning. You’re at work. He’s probably at work. You can figure it out later. A future you problem.

Joel’s text comes through late in the evening.

Joel: You wearing my shirt to bed again?

You’re grinning immediately. At hearing from him first and because he fucking clocked you. You snap a quick photo. Despite being on the spot, it’s thoughtfully crafted. Just enough to show the logo and only your mouth, not your face, no extra skin, no sexy tease. Just a confirmation. You send it off, and his reply buzzes seconds later.

Joel: More

You try to bite back the grin still stuck on your face as your fingers dance across the screen. You want to tell him off for being so blunt, but for some reason, it feels like such a compliment. You’ve definitely got it bad if a thirsty one-word text feels like high praise.

You aren’t going to give in this time. You’ve still got Ellie’s words echoing in your mind. A date. You type back one line.

You: Gonna have to earn it if you want more

Your phone rings shortly after your message is delivered. Joel’s name flashes on the screen and your stomach flips. You thought maybe he’d send another dick pic, but now he’s calling you? It does check out that he wouldn’t be the texting type, to be fair.

“Hey,” you answer, voice soft, a little tentative.

“You’re gonna make me work for it, huh?” His drawl is low, rough around the edges and so stupidly sexy it makes your nipples hard. You can just tell he’s already on edge. Delight floods your veins at the idea of him thinking of you all day.

“You could use a lesson in patience,” your voice is remarkably steady, despite the way your body is lit up. You chew at your lower lip. “Thought I told you that last time we were on the phone,” you chide.

A deep chuckle rumbles through the phone. “Patience,” he repeats. There’s a pause that has you holding your breath. “I don’t think you’re playin’ fair, baby. Knowing you’re in bed with my shirt on, teasin’ me with another picture.” His voice takes on a husky, knowing tone. “Don’t think it’s patience you’re lookin’ for. Bet I know what you really want.”

Your breath catches, loud enough he wouldn’t miss it even with his busted phone. You weren’t prepared to be so affected by just the timbre of his voice. It’s fucked up the way he’s got you breathless for no damn good reason.

You can picture him in his bed. The trademark navy blue sheets. Is he fresh out of the shower? Damp hair and the overpowering scent of whatever 10 in 1 man soap was on sale at the grocery store—

“Okay. Enlighten me then. What do I want?” you finally reply.

“You want to hear it,” he continues, smooth and smug, radiating a cocky smirk right through the phone that makes your skin tingle. “You want to hear how you’ve got me hard, sittin’ here thinkin’ about you,” Joel growls, his voice thick with heat. “Thinkin’ about you wearing just my shirt.”

You bite down on your lip to stay quiet. Maybe he’s not in bed at all. Maybe he’s still out in his shop, locked in the office, a couple beers down before he dared to text you. His hair a mess from running his fingers through it, in those faded jeans that cling to him perfectly.

Either way, it seems almost cruel to stop him with a mouth like that.

“Thinking about what I’d do if you were here,” he carries on. “You look good in my shirt.” His voice drops even lower. “You’d let me push it up though, wouldn’t you? Just enough so I can see how wet you are for me.”

You can’t help pressing your thighs together at that thought. If he hears how turned on you are already, you’re definitely going to end up acting out his fantasy over the phone.

“Fuck.” he mutters, his voice breaking. “You’d let me take my time. Get my hands on those perfect tits again. Soak my fingers with that sweet pussy. Have you so worked up you’d be begging for my cock.”

He says it like it’s a fact, as if he could come over right now and you’d drag him straight to your bed—or no, like you’d be on him before he could shut the front door.

It’s so filthy, so confident. You’re so tempted to keep him going, but you pull yourself together. Biting back the whimper stuck in your throat.

“Well, damn, Joel,” you swallow down the urge to ask for more details. “Guess you’ve got me all figured out then,” you tease with a heavy dash of sarcasm in your tone.

“Not all of you,” he replies, with a suggestive edge. “Not yet.”

You let out a breath you were holding. “Look, you can’t just get your dick out on the phone, tell me how you wanna touch me, and get your way,” you manage, steady and a little sharp. “Not this time.”

“Not this time?” he echoes, half-laughing, clearly amused. “Alright. Sure. What do you want then?”

There’s a flicker of nervousness that tightens in your chest. You don’t want him to think you’re rejecting him, don’t want to risk losing the momentum of whatever this is. “I’m saying…I do want you. But, if you want more you’re going to have to do more. Show me you mean it. Like…a date.”

He doesn’t answer immediately, and your heart skips as you imagine his reaction. He’s quiet, but you can hear his breathing—measured, like he’s weighing something.

“Shit. You’re serious?” he asks, and there’s a softness now, laced with just enough curiosity to make you think he’s intrigued.

“Dead serious,” you say, adding, “But if you’re not interested in me like that—”

“Oh, I’m interested.” The words come quick, a little sharper than you expect, and they make you beam. “Fine. A date,” he says, like he’s letting the word settle on his tongue. “Friday?”

“Friday.” You confirm and stretch your neck. Your muscles are tense. Shoulders tight. All from his filthy words getting you worked up in half a second and the anxiety of your demand. “Come up with something good,” you tease, your voice slipping into something sultrier, “and maybe we’ll both get what we want.”

There’s a low growl on the other end of the line, tinged with frustration and desire. It makes your pulse throb in your clit. You almost wish you had let him talk you through it before suggesting the date. Hear how worked up he’s been over you.

“Jesus,” he grumbles.

Oh, you would’ve turned into a mess and completely forgotten to bring it up. Now you’ve essentially cock blocked yourself until the end of the week. Ugh.

“You’re gonna drive me mad.” He says. But there’s no animosity in it. Instead, there’s something new in his voice that gives you butterflies.

“Yep.”

You’re the one who hangs up first before you can hear anything else that might tempt you to stray from your plan.

……..

It’s late morning when your phone buzzes on your desk the next day, interrupting your excellent cosplay of a ‘productive employee’. You glance at the screen and your heart trips when you see Joel’s name.

You answer, trying to sound casual despite the fluttery feeling in your chest. “Calling me during business hours, Mr. Miller? You’re going to get me in trouble.”

Joel snorts softly. “Think we both know you’re the one that likes causin’ trouble.”

“I don’t know what you’re referring to.”

His voice drops lower, quieter. “You need a reminder? Cause I’ve been replaying exactly how much trouble you caused in my kitchen…”

“Don’t.” You nearly hiss into the phone, trying to cut him off before he starts with any graphic retellings. You spin in your chair, grateful when you confirm Ellie has headphones on for once.

“Right.” His voice is back to a slightly less devastatingly erotic tone. “Wouldn’t want to get carried away while you’re at work.

“Well,” he drawls, the grin evident in his voice now. “You said you wanted a date, so I was thinking.”

You hum, leaning into the teasing tone. “If it’s a chain restaurant I’m canceling right now.”

“Do I seem like the kind of guy who’d take you to Applebee’s?”

“Do you want me to answer that honestly?” you quip, laughing at the soft groan he makes in response. “No Applebee’s, no Chili’s, and if you’re thinking about taking me to whatever the fanciest Italian place is in this town, don’t. I’m not going on a first date where you used to take your ex-wife for anniversary dinners.”

There’s a beat of silence, then a grumbled, “It was Valentine’s, actually.”

You cackle, delighted at your guess. He huffs. “You’re impossible.”

“You’re predictable,” you shoot back, grinning as you cross your legs under your desk. “Or maybe it’s just ‘cause nobody has been challenging you.”

“S’that what you are?” he asks, “A challenge?”

You shift in your chair, the grin on your face is going to make your cheeks burn if he keeps this up. You soften the teasing as you admit. “Maybe a little.”

“Mm,” he grunts, clearly not convinced.

“If you’re up for it,” you add. Nerves flutter in your stomach now. Maybe he doesn’t want a challenge at all. It’s not like you’ve been hard to get. The silence stretches just long enough to make you wonder if you’ve pushed too far.

His exasperated sigh crackles through the phone, but it’s laced with something warmer. “Yeah.” But then he exhales, soft and almost self-conscious. “Ain’t a bad thing.”

The words are simple, but they settle somewhere deep, curling warm in your chest. For a moment, the flirty defense falls, and you catch the subtle weight in his voice.

“You’re full of surprises, Joel,” you say finally, your tone gentle.

“Guess you’ll find out,” he murmurs, the words quiet like he’s not sure he’s meant to say them.

Your stomach flutters at the unexpected softness. You knew there was more to him than his bold mouth when his dick is hard or the stoic lone wolf look he wears in his garage. You weren’t expecting him to be…whatever this is now.

The line goes quiet again, his breathing soft on the other end. “Friday at seven,” he says after a moment, his voice steady but quieter than before. “There’s a brewery that Tommy suggested. I’ll pick you up.”

“That sounds nice,” you reply, smiling into the phone.

“Alright,” he mutters. There’s a brief pause, like he’s hesitating, before he says, “See you then.”

He hangs up before you can say anything else, and for a moment, you’re left staring at your phone like an idiot. A grin stuck on your face. Possibly permanently.

It’s not just the idea of the date. It’s the thought of Joel making a plan, asking for recommendations, and thinking of what you might like. You figured it’d be fun to give him a hard time and all, but you didn’t have real expectations.

The week stretches on and you’re not sure if it’s moving too fast or too slow. Having a crush is wicked enough, but having a date planned makes you feel slightly insane. It’s like you’re in a cartoon where the world is suddenly brighter and the birds sing just for you.

You find yourself constantly daydreaming at work. Every Creed song Ellie plays somehow sends you into a fugue state. Snippets of Joel’s voice replay in your head.

There’s something about the way he said, “Ain’t a bad thing,” that keeps sneaking up on you when you least expect it. It wasn’t even what he said—it was how he said it. Quiet, like he wasn’t used to admitting something like that out loud. It makes you smile like a fool every time you think about it.

The worst is the evenings. At home in your room. Nothing to distract you. Alone with his t-shirt. Re-reading your brief texts. Lingering wistfully over the dick pic he sent like it’s a letter from your long-distance lover. You’ve got to get it together.

And Joel? He’s just as distracted, though he’d never admit it. At least not to anyone but you.

At work, his usual rhythm is thrown completely out of whack. He catches himself staring at the same invoice three times before finally filing it away. Tommy catches him with his Breaking Benjamin t-shirt inside out.

You’re in his head and it’s driving him nuts. He tried to minimize it. Deciding it was just the impulsive way you crashed into his world. You spread like a wildfire in his mind. The kindness in you to deliver a homemade meal. The audaciousness you have to go after what you want.

He goes weak for a confident woman and you’re so sharp and quick with him. It’s a rush, but not just because of the sexual chemistry. Not just because you’re a novelty or a break in his routine.

It’s you. It’s the way you’ve got the passion and sharpness with your words, but you’re still soft on the edges. He thinks about the way your voice had dipped when you said, “If you’re up for it,” like you weren’t just teasing but testing something, seeing if he’d push you away.

He’s not used to this. Not the nerves, not the anticipation, and definitely not the way he’s spending too much time wondering what to wear on Friday. Not that he’d ever admit it, but he even dug through the back of his closet, holding up a button-down shirt Ellie had bought him last Christmas like it might bite him. He ends up tossing it back in favor of flannel—it’s still a step up from a faded band t-shirt.

By Thursday you’re nearly useless. You drive Ellie crazy all morning, spacing out and jumping when she asks you a question. To be respectful, you haven’t mentioned the date and she hasn’t asked. Would Joel have told her? Does she know you’re losing your mind over a man who probably has holes in his sweatpants? Are you equally as pathetic?

You’re still stuck on that thought when she kicks your chair, startling you back to reality. “Come on,” she demands. “We’re outta here and you’re coming to the Main Street with me. I’ll buy.”

Turns out you’re a cheap date. The dive bar has strong cocktails and a very limited menu of fried foods to choose from. You sit outside at a picnic table enjoying the warmth of the early summer evening.

Ellie is easy to get along with. Talking animatedly about her friends. Sharing the hot goss about Cheryl and her divorce. Trying to recruit you to join the company rec league kickball team. It’s all a welcome distraction even though you still have Joel on the brain.

You do your best not to bring him up but when she mentions him you know you perk up like a heart-eyed fool. Begrudgingly, but with sincerity, Ellie asks if the date is what’s got you so distracted.

“How did you know?”

“You’re both worse than teenagers.” She rolls her eyes. “Thought bringing you here might take your mind off it.”

You snap to attention at her choice of words. “Both?”

“Don’t.”

She’s a good friend. You did need the distraction. You’re still smiling about that thought as you check yourself out in the mirror in the bathroom at the bar. There’s a poster taped to the paper towel dispenser for the cover band that plays Saturday nights that catches your eye before you slip your phone out of your pocket.

You’d blame it on the drinks but the truth is only had one. You hover over the messages. Wondering if he’s really as nervous as you. Fuck it, you decide before sending what you’ve been wondering.

You: You been thinking about me?

His message comes through so fast it’s more revealing than the words he typed.

Joel: Maybe

Fuck, why does one word have you feeling giddy already?

Joel: Have you?

He asks shortly after. You wonder if he’s second guessing himself. Is Joel nervous?

You: A little

You figure you’ll give him the same treatment.

Joel: Haven’t been able to stop, if I’m honest baby

Heat floods your face as you stare at the screen, and his next message comes before you can respond.

Joel: Friday’s been feeling real far away

That has you shaking your head.

You: Patience is a virtue

He’s quick to respond again.

Joel: Never claimed to be a saintly man

That makes you genuinely laugh.

You: Good

……

By the time Friday night rolls around, you’ve fully spiraled into a mess of anxiety and excitement. You’re not really the type to overthink a date, but there’s something about the whole scenario that feels different. It’s not just because Joel’s hot—hotter than he has any right to be—but he’s trying. For you. It’s disarming in a way you weren’t expecting.

You know that the worst-case scenario for the night isn’t bad. You know how to have a good time wherever you are and you are confident that he’s a horny bastard that will put out even if you actively try to sabotage the date. It’s that flickering sensation in your chest that hopes for more. That’s what makes you nervous.

You’re startled when Joel knocks at your front door. You check your reflection one last time before heading to the door. You figure it’s casual enough for a first date at a brewery.

Despite everything inside of you that screamed to put your tits on display again—you couldn’t resist wearing the Creed shirt. You tied it up in the front so it accentuates your figure and paired it with a faux leather skirt with a matching black lace set underneath.

It’s gotta be enough to play at the alt-rock vibe he’s still living in. You look good. Really good.

But when you open the door he isn’t the only one who’s world gets rocked. Joel stands in front of you like he was plucked from your fantasy. Freshly showered, his damp curls just starting to dry in soft waves. A plaid button-down shirt, with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows, showing off those strong, tan forearms. His dark jeans are markedly not as worn down as the last pair you saw him in, yet the effect on you is just as dastardly.

It’s unfair, really, how good he looks. You’re left blinking as your mouth goes a little dry while you drink him in. Who’s idea was it to have a date? In public? Fuck. He shifts, a sly smile growing on his face as he rests his hip against the door jam.

“Hi,” you mumble, still ogling him.

“You look… real nice,” he says, voice so low and velvety it should be registered as a weapon.

You know you had a smart-ass remark about the shirt on the tip of your tongue, but it’s gone. Gone… along with your morals. All you’ve got left is the intense, primal desire to do something inappropriate with his arms? Yes! Yes! Yes! The horny gremlins like your idea despite having no logistics or master plan.

They seem to have no coherent plan of attack at all, to be honest. Bite! Lick! Suck! All you know is that you need him in your mouth until your jaw is sore.

Joel huffs softly. Amused that you seem speechless. “Didn’t think flannel was all that special baby, you alright?”

“It’s not the flannel,” you mutter under your breath, but you don't let him hear the rest of that thought: Arms! Arms! Arms!

You grab your bag and follow him out to the truck, stealing glances at him as he walks ahead of you. You can’t help it. He’s so…solid. Sturdy. Sure of himself. Even when he’s out of his comfort zone. It’s doing something sinful to you.

The inside of the truck smells faintly like a Black Ice air freshener, a Home Depot on a Sunday morning, and Armor All. The distinctly Joel aesthetic lives up to your imagination. It’s lived in. Comfortable.

There’s the catchall cupholder of change, receipts, and literal nuts and bolts. The caseless CDs in the storage divider strapped to the sun visor—you recognize a couple like Seether and Three Days Grace.

Before you can take in every detail though, you’re distracted by just the sight of him driving. It’s absurd, but why does he look this good just driving? Most people can manage to operate a vehicle, but most people don’t look as fuckable as Joel does, one hand on the wheel, the other resting on his thigh. Hand! Thigh! Neck! Fingers!

You’re reduced to only being able to name anatomical features when you’re this close to him, apparently. Like an alien learning about a man for the first time. An extraterrestrial explorer propelled by the most curious desire to taste and touch every part of Joel—for research.

You’re so caught up that it takes a while to register the song that’s playing. Of course, it’s more Nickelback.

You're so much cooler

When you never pull it out

Cause you look so much cuter

With something in your mouth

It breaks the spell he has on you and you laugh, really laugh. Joel looks slightly horrified, having no idea what led to your outburst. When you’ve recovered enough, you let him in on it.

“Nice first date song. You really know how to set the mood.”

He rolls his eyes but doesn’t change the song, and you let yourself glance at him again as he drives. His profile glows in the evening sun, and you can’t help thinking how easy it would be to reach over and drag your hand down his chest, and make him pull over so you could climb into his lap. The thought has you pressing your thighs together, your pulse thrumming in your ears. At this rate you’re not going to make it through the night.

…..

The brewery is trendy. Joel hopes it’s something you like. He tries to focus on the menu, but feels like his brain is short-circuiting. It’s not the overpriced burgers or the craft beers with descriptors that don’t sound like flavors. It’s the way you're leaning forward on your elbows, chin resting in your hand, smile tugging at your lips.

The shirt is unfair. The way you’ve got it tied, hugging your body in ways that make his palms itch. Knowing you were touching yourself in the same shirt to the sound of his voice. He’s trying not to stare, trying to be polite, but it’s damn near impossible with you sitting across from him like that.

“How about this one?” you say, pointing to an option on the menu. “Probably the closest thing to what you’ve got stocked in the shop fridge.” He’d wonder how you knew what he had in the fridge, but his eyes are glued to your finger pointing at the menu and it’s consuming all of his thoughts.

You ramble on about a few other choices but he doesn’t hear the words. He’s still stuck on your hand. He swears he can still feel the ghost of your touch from the kitchen last week. Shit. His jeans are already feeling tighter than they should.

He clears his throat, trying to pull it together. “I’ll trust you.”

You smile wide at that. He’s so fucked. “You know a lot about fancy beer.” Yikes. “You got a favorite on here?” Get it together, he begs himself.

“Nah, I don’t really like beer,” you say casually. You give him a shrug and point out a cider you’re thinking about trying. His stomach twists.

“You don’t like beer,” he repeats. “But, you let me take you to a brewery?” His chest feels tight, and he shifts uncomfortably.

“They have food, too.” you counter.

“Right.” Why does he feel like he’s so out of his element? He’s been second-guessing everything about this date. He feels his gaze drifting as his eyes shift out of focus, his fingers toy with his bottom lip as he gets lost in his head.

He knows he can get you worked up just as bad as him over the phone, knows he can make you sing for him with just his fingers, but this? He doesn’t know what you want from him now. Is the date some kind of test? He knows he’s overthinking all of it.

“Hey.” Your voice brings him back, pulling him out of his thoughts. “I like that you planned something.”

It seems genuine. The way you look at him with bright eyes and a smirk like you’ve got something to tease him about on the tip of your tongue. “Now ask me a boring first date question,” you instruct with a nod like you’re giving him some kind of permission.

“What’s your favorite color?”

You snort laughing at him. If you’re half as nervous as him you don’t show it.

….

It works. Mostly. Your drinks arrive. The conversation flows more easily. He still gets tripped up here and there but doesn’t disappear on you again. He asks about your job, your family, about where you moved from, and you give him enough to keep things light but still playfully dodge some of his questions.

Every time he gets flustered, you catch yourself smiling, a little surprised at how much you’re enjoying this. It’s the way he watches you like he’s trying to figure you out. The way he tries. He seems to relax a little and for a moment, you think he might settle into the evening.

Then he reaches for his water, and it all goes sideways. The dangerously full glass wobbles, tilting just enough to spill halfway across the table. Joel jerks back, cursing dejectedly under his breath as he grabs a napkin to clean it up.

You can’t help it. The words are out of your mouth before you can stop them. Just loud enough for him to hear. “Trying to get me wet already?”

His eyes snap to yours. You grin, adding, “Don’t worry, been dripping for you since you showed up at my front door.”

He makes a sound between a cough and a choke. Stunned. The faintest blush creeps up his neck, reaching all the way to his ears. For a second, he looks like he might say something, but all he manages to get out is a gruff, “Jesus.”

You lean back in your chair, grinning triumphantly. You didn’t expect him to get so rattled by your comment. Not with how vulgar he’s been on the phone or when he had his hand between your legs. It’s an ego boost to know you’ve got the upper hand at first.

“Relax,” you purr.

Then you catch the way he discreetly tries to adjust himself under the table. Clearly unable to relieve the pressure. Knowing the effect you have on him is more intoxicating than the alcohol. An idea strikes you. You know exactly how to get him to relax.

“Do you have cash?” you ask.

“What? Yeah.” He looks at you confused.

You nod like he proved a point by saying yes. That confuses him further, a deep line forming between his brows.

“‘Course you do. That’s like, Dad 101 ‘carry cash in case of emergency’.

You stand and grab your bag. “We’re not staying,” you say simply.

“What?” He frowns, sitting up straighter.

You flash him a smile. “I’ve got a better idea. Come on. You said you trust me.”

“To choose a beer,” he grumbles, dropping enough cash for a generous tip on the table before letting you lead. He doesn’t argue as you walk back to the truck, just trying to catch up with your words. He opens the passenger door for you, his hand brushing yours briefly as you climb into the truck. It’s a small thing, but the innocence makes your pulse skip all the same.

Once he’s in the driver’s seat, the tension between you shifts. The silence isn’t uncomfortable, but it’s charged. You glance at him, taking in the way his hands grip the steering wheel so tightly, the muscles in his forearms flexing as he shifts.

The truck rumbles to life and another one of the horniest Nickelback songs plays—barely loud enough to recognize.

I’m loving what you wanna wear

I wonder what’s up under there

Wonder if I’ll ever have it under my tongue

You bite back another laugh as the vocals float through the cab, perfectly at odds with the vibe of the place you just left. Joel shifts, mouth twitching like he knows how ridiculous it is. “You wanna tell me where we’re headed?” he asks, voice cutting through your thoughts.

You tell him where to drive and settle back in your seat. Again your thoughts drift. Infatuated with his fingers curling and uncurling like he’s trying to distract himself. He hasn’t said much since you’ve left, but you can feel the tension radiating off him. Heavy and thick.

You catch his gaze flicker to you for the third time in as many minutes. His eyes trail over the curve of your thighs where your skirt has ridden up. It’s subtle, but enough to make you feel bold.

You smirk, pulling the visor down to check your reflection in the mirror. Fishing a lip gloss out from your bag, you swipe it over your lips, smoothing the edges with your fingertip. Joel doesn’t say anything, but you don’t miss the deep steadying breath that fills his lungs or the crack of his knuckles.

Satisfied with your lips, you tug lightly at the t-shirt, adjusting the knot, shifting the fabric to lay how you like and slipping a hand beneath it to adjust your tits in your lacy bra. You hear Joel exhale sharply, a low, throaty sound that makes heat curl low in your stomach.

“You okay?” you ask, glancing at him out of the corner of your eye. Your voice is softer now, more knowing, and when he doesn’t answer right away, you grin. “You seem tense.”

Joel mutters something under his breath. His jaw tightens. Finally, he glances at you, his eyes dark. “You keep doin’ that, and we’re gonna have a problem, baby.”

“Doing what?” you ask, your voice all innocence, though his threat gives you a prickly rush.

Joel huffs a laugh, low and rough. “You know damn well.” His voice dips, a rasp of heat that whips down your spine. “The lips and the shirt, just messin’ with me like you want me to lose my fuckin’ mind.”

Your grin widens as you meet his gaze. “And what if I do?”

“Jesus,” he mutters, his voice strained, his hand flexing against the wheel. “Trying to get me to crash into a ditch or something?”

The tension between you is unbearable now, the air thick and buzzing. Joel’s jaw is clenched tightly. You unabashedly linger on the way his hips press forward slightly like he’s trying to relieve the ache between his legs. It shouldn’t drive you fucking wild with need, but you’re gripped mind, pussy, and soul.

“Pull over,” you say suddenly, your tone steady.

Joel’s head snaps toward you, incredulous.

“Pull over,” you repeat, your voice softer now, more insistent. “Please.”

He hesitates for only a second before caving, steering the truck onto the shoulder. The tires crunch against the gravel as he shifts into park, the engine idling low as he turns to look at you. His eyes are dark, his breathing uneven, and the sight of him—wrecked and barely holding it together—makes you rabid.

“You’re gonna kill me,” his voice is rough and quiet. Infused with lust and awe.

“Maybe,” you murmur, leaning closer. “But you’ll enjoy it.”

Joel groans softly, his hand flying to your thigh, the heat of his palm searing against your skin. “Torturing me,” he mutters, his voice a low growl. “Sitting there lookin’ like that, knowing damn well what you’re doin’ to me.”

“Yeah?” you ask, your breath hitching as his fingers slide higher. “What am I doing to you, Joel?”

He exhales sharply, his grip on your thigh tightening. Why are his hands that big? Like, how are you supposed to know what they feel like and ever leave his grasp?

Your heart is pounding now, the heat in your veins making it hard to think straight. Joel’s voice drops lower, his hand sliding further up your thigh as he leans closer.

“Can’t stop thinkin’ about it,” he mutters, his lips ghosting over your jaw. “The way you’d taste, the way you’d sound, begging me to fuck you harder, deeper—”

“Joel,” you whisper, cutting him off. Your voice is shaky, your hands gripping his arm as you try to ground yourself. “Please.”

He groans again, the sound rough and desperate, and his hand moves higher, his fingers brushing the edge of your underwear. “Yeah, baby,” he murmurs, his voice thick with satisfaction. “That’s what I wanna hear.”

It makes you shudder. You feel him smile at your body's obvious responses, as his nose grazes your skin just below your ear.

“You’re so fuckin’ perfect,” he murmurs into your neck. “Been thinkin’ about you all damn week. Every time I close my eyes, it’s you.”

His words hit like a match to dry kindling, and your breath stutters as his fingers trace the seam of your panties.

“You know how hard it was to sit there at that table?” he mutters, his voice turning darker. “With you looking like this, wearing my clothes, teasin’ me.”

“We didn’t even make it to the actual dinner part,” you giggle as you trail off.

His fingers press more firmly, dragging slowly over the thin fabric, and you can’t stop the gasp that escapes your lips. Joel groans at the sound, his free hand gripping your thigh to hold you steady.

“Fuck, baby,” he rasps, his voice thick with heat. “You’re already soaked. Bet I could make you come like this, right here, without even tryin’.”

Your hips shift instinctively, grinding against his hand as he works you with deliberate precision. The friction is maddening, just enough to keep you on edge, but not enough to send you over. Every filthy word he says in your ear has you burning up.

“Jesus, you’re gonna sound so fuckin’ sweet for me,” he says, more to himself. “Can’t wait to bury my face between your legs, make you scream my name until your throat’s raw.”

“Joel,” you whisper, your voice shaky, your hand flying to his wrist as his fingers dip lower, brushing just beneath the edge of your panties. “Wait.”

He freezes instantly, his brow furrowing as he looks at you. “What’s wrong?”

You shake your head, your cheeks flushed, your body still trembling under his touch. “Not now,” you assert, your voice soft but steady. “Let me take care of you.”

Joel blinks, his pupils blown wide as your words sink in. His mouth parts to say something but the words disappear. You don’t let him argue.

Sliding your hand down to his belt, you undo it hastily, fingers working open the button of his jeans before he can protest. It’s for him. You want to do this for him. Help him relax so you can enjoy the rest of your date.

But, fuck, it’s also for you. You’ve been riding a high just from a shoddy dick pic and your muscle memory, but you’ve been patient long enough. You’ve got to see it in person and you need it in your mouth, asap. You deserve that much, right?

You slide down the zipper and fuss with the waistband until you get what you wanted. His breath catches as you free his cock. It’s heavy and hard against your palm. Radiating heat and weeping for you.

“Oh, fuck,” he starts, his voice breaking.

You hum softly, pleased, leaning in to kiss him as your hand strokes him slowly, deliberately. Joel groans against your mouth, his hips jerking slightly into your hand.

“You’ve been thinking about this,” you murmur against his lips. “All week.”

“Yeah,” he rasps, voice raw with want. “Can’t stop thinking about you. How you’d feel, how you’d look, how you’d sound.”

“Show me,” you whisper, lowering your head to taste for yourself. You like a hot stripe from the base of his cock to the tip, swirling your tongue around the head.

Joel’s breath stutters, his hand flying to the back of your head as he watches you. “You’re so fucking good, baby. Like a fucking dream.”

You hollow your cheeks, tongue gliding along his length as you take him into the heat of your mouth. You have to use your hands to work the rest of him, still slowly and deliberately. Every sound he makes, every twitch against your tongue, every flex of his core, and tightening of his fingers, it all drives you wild.

It has you moaning with need around him. Your cunt soaked and pulsing, begging for attention between your legs as you focus all on him. It’s just as much for you as it is for him.

His head tips back against the seat, a rumbling grown spilling from his lips as his hips shift beneath you.

“Shit.” he pants, voice cracking. “You’re gonna make come so fuckin’ hard. Bet you’d look so pretty with my come on your tongue.”

The sheer filth of his words spurs you on, your movements quickening as you savor every groan, curse, and sharp inhale from him. “Fuck—just like that.” He encourages you, adding firm pressure to the back of your head as his hips jerk and he loses control.

“You want it?” he asks desperately as you moan in affirmation. You’re voice is still vibrating through him as he starts to come, hot and heavy on your tongue. You don’t stop until his body goes slack beneath you, his chest heaving as you finally pull back.

He looks wrecked, mouth hanging open, sweat on his brow. You give him a devilish smile before opening your mouth to show him. He stares at you, eyes dark and hazy, before cupping your jaw in his palm as you swallow.

“Told you,” he huffs, “so fucking pretty with my come on your tongue.” A bright, satisfied smile spreads on your face at his praise. He pulls you in closer for a kiss. When you pull back a frown pulls at your mouth.

“What’s wrong?” Joel asks hurriedly.

“I didn’t get to see,” you muse. “Will you take a picture next time?”

“Fuck,” he looks at you with awe and pride. “Yeah, baby, of course.”

“Good,” you nod, readjusting and settling back into your seat. “You think you can relax a little now?” you ask, tone teasing.

Joel lets out a breathless laugh. He drags his hand down his face. “You’re unreal,” he mutters, voice still hoarse. The phrase makes you beam with pride. It’s the same remark he made over the phone last week…right before he said ‘got me shooting loads like a fucking teenager’.”

The gratification just from seeing him this wrecked is like a drug. He’s every bit as enticing and addicting as you hoped and feared. You squeeze your thighs together once more and take a deep breath. Committed to the rest of your idea for saving your first date with the divorced DILF of your dreams.

“Back on the road. We’ve got places to be.”

Joel blinks at you, still trying to catch his breath. “You’re serious?”

“Yep,” you smile lazily, tugging gently at his arm. “Drive.”

He shakes his head, muttering something under his breath about you being the death of him, but he shifts the truck into gear, his hand lingering on your thigh as he pulls back onto the road.

THANK YOU FOR READING PLEASE TELL ME IF YOU ENJOYED OR HATED ANY OF IT <3

dividers by @/cyberangel-graphics

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