#ps; all the love to you anonie 😽💕💕

[moonlightjongin]

Can we get a crumb of chapter 15 🥺 P.S. I love you

I’m giving a few snippets (this chapter covers two destinations; Varanasi and Santorini and a lot goes down), there’s a big trigger warning on the Soomin snippet, so I’ll put that one under a ‘keep reading’. And keep in mind that even with these snippets a lot more happens 😩. Also unedited, will be nicer in the actual chapter.

(This snippet is cut short). Though he agreed to this, to sitting between the two of you on the jet, as he watches the way Taemin sends surreptitious glances at you, suddenly the jet feels smaller than it is, as though it's closing in on him. He doesn't like this feeling, doesn't want to be watching these secret glances take place, watching himself be a second late in response when you make a sound of fear or are in need of something. Taemin's always on it, instantly, like it's second nature to him. No matter what took place between the two of you last night, unaware as Taemin may be, somehow, there's this echo ringing in the back of Jongin's mind, though his brother doesn't actually say anything, it sounds an awful lot like: I held her first, I knew her first. No matter how well you read her, how close you've gotten, she still trusts me more, I still know her better. I always will.

No one other than Jongin and yourself knows what took place between the two of you last night, no one other than him knows how you cocooned yourself around him as you slept, how you murmured his name sleepily when you felt him move, as if you were worried he'd slip through your fingers and not be there in the morning. He thinks it's jealousy, at least in some form, and he doesn't like it; you're not his, he has no right to feel this way, there's no rhyme or reason to this feeling, besides having to accept a slightly harrowing conclusion of liking you more than he'd originally planned.  

###

'Luhan' has a placard that reads: Junmyeon. 'Chanyeol' has a placard that reads: Min-seo. 'Sehun' has a placard that reads: Kyungsoo. 'Hyeojin' has a placard that reads: Taemin. Which makes you blink. 'Baekhyun' has a placard that has your name on it and 'Bomi'* has a placard reading: Jongin. Good luck to him, you think. Not only does she look like she'd eat him alive, she looks like she'd eat you alive, and if you do say so yourself, you think that's quite a feat. 

~

(Kyungsoo and Min-seo get a heart-to-heart with Jongin; the Jongin/Min-seo scene is very much cut short in this snippet).

"I know you and ____ aren't real, Jongin. I know that she's a great person and the last thing she expects is that I'd be in here, attempting what I'm attempting. I also know you like her. A lot. And I know I don't have a lot of time until things change, for real. So it's not like I have any other choice here." "Change?" "I don't think the two of you can keep the proximity you're keeping, and not develop feelings for each other. I also don't think you've ever been understood the way she understands you, have you?" 

"I--" Never, actually. It's a harrowing realization to be struck with. [cut short; he has a lot of Harrowing Realizations this chapter and LaMeNtS a many]. ~ 

The scent of Min-seo's shampoo, sweet and comforting as it is, it doesn't smell like yours. [Oscar Wilde voice: this is a fault -- also a paragraph cut short]. "At least so you think. I might not say it, any of it, but I know you too. Maybe I don't challenge you in all the ways she can but..."

~

"The very last thing you should be to a person is an option. The last thing you should present yourself to someone is as an option, Min-seo." Min-seo nods. "But around you... I do it. So easily. I could live happily beside you just knowing I was there, that you saw me, even if I weren't the only one on your mind, isn't that terrible?" "Yes." She wipes at her eyes. "The first time I tried to confess you said that you were my rebellion in the only way I knew how. You told me that these feelings I'd been feeling were just excitement, a fascination I'd merely mistook as love because I'd never had chance at anything else with my family, with everything they have planned for me... but as hard as I try, as far away from you as I go, nothing changes. Has that outlook changed with what I've just told you -- or is it time to accept the possibility that you're just afraid of someone loving you, Jongin?" He's the one to close his eyes in pain this time. When he opens them, Min-seo's closer. Her hair falls in soft waves, those gentle eyes flowing with tears yet to shed. "It's so hard being your friend," she whispers. Though her hands shakes, she shuffles even closer, meeting his gaze head on. It's been an age since they were alone, and forever since they'd been this close. She'd only ever run her hands through his hair in her dreams, pressed her lips against his for a fraction of a second for a middle-school play. They hadn't even practised. "I think you could feel something for me, if we tried." Her eyes flutter closed and it's that same pain -- a pain that translates so clearly and viscerally through Jongin's own chest. "Eventually." She pauses for a moment, and Jongin lets her build up the courage to say what she's trying to. "I know there's always something in the way, someone, but I think I'll regret this for the rest of my life if I don't at least try." The breath he takes in is as heavy as her own. "Min-seo--" "Don't you want security, Jongin?" In its ways, of course. He's spent half his life fighting for his safety and security, trying to guard everyone he's been close to, too. But in love... isn't he seeking anything but? "No," he finally admits.

###

Like the sting of a wasp, with Soomin, once is never enough, you're never given time to process what's happening before being stung again. "There's someone that's always going to matter more to him than you, than anyone," Narae manages to choke out. But fighting back is what Soomin hates most, and if she feels she's allowed to talk at length about Jongin, all the ways she wishes to hurt him, Narae won't allow herself to be beaten so deeply into submission to fold to the prospect of Taemin ever becoming anything like his mother, regardless of her delusions on the matter.   She nods, fully aware of this. "The friend. The lust of man is... it's their detriment. He's been smart, he hasn't given in to whatever it is he feels for her just yet, but I'm no fool, I know there'll come a day where that changes. It's almost upsetting, the simpleness of a man. They always want they can't have."

The vice-like grip Soomin takes of Narae's wrist stings like any other time, the array of scratches she's embedded there don't easily heal when there's another one scratched on top of it by the morning. She doesn't cry out, she's had much worse take place since being locked up here, and neither does she put up a fight as the vicious blonde drags her to the middle of the room, where one tattered seat lay. The overhead light is blinding and Soomin smirks when Narae can't hold off the wince.

~

"Is she too damaged to carry another?" The man asks, eyes trailing down Narae's nearly-emaciated form, the holes in her tattered clothing, her bleeding fingernails. The answer is anything but yes, but he asks anyway. "Nothing would break Taewon more than that, would it?" "I don't need to give her another reason to live right now," Soomin hisses.  "Neck up, only. You do as I say and you don't speak out of turn, you horny pig." "Guess you don't want to share me," he drawls, missing the way Soomin shivers in disgust at the feeling of his hand against her waist. "You know it," she says in the faux-saccharine sweet tone Narae knows all too well, as she forces herself to lean up and kiss the bodyguard. Narae averts her eyes.   ~ As if knowing she won’t have the strength to do it herself, Soomin tilts Narae’s chin up with her hand, one perfectly manicured nail digging into the skin there. "When you reunite, convince Taewon you're in love with that beast of a man and Jongin won't be harmed."