#should i have split this post into two parts to fit it all? | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

leejenowrld · 1 month ago

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back to you — six

pairing - lee jeno x reader

word count - 47k words

genre - smut, fluff, angst, enemies to lovers

synopsis — after the breakup, you throw yourself into silence and strategy, unraveling beneath the weight of secrets you can’t tell and love you can’t forget. jeno spirals in the opposite direction, reckless and numb, chasing anything that doesn’t remind him of you—only to find that everything does. a fantasy boy draft, meant to unify the fractured cheer squad, becomes the excuse that pulls you back into jeno’s bed, and then his arms and then onto his cock, again and again, until you can’t remember what it felt like not to crave him. but love built on a game is still a game, and the rules keep changing.

chapter contents/warnings — college au, small town vibes, explicit language, explicit sexual content(18+), explicit themes, one tree hill inspired, early 2000s vibe, power play, dom reader/sub jeno dynamics (both switches tbh), rough sex, explicit language, insane smut in this, y/n gets with three different guys lool, she’d i gone this chapter all that’s on her mind is cock, fem!receiving oral, throatfucking, missionary, riding, doggy style, wall sex, floor sex, balcony/outdoor sex, mirror sex, breeding kink, creampie, cum play, cockwarming, choking, slapping (face and ass), hair pulling, face fucking, brat/brat-tamer dynamic, lots of switch dynamics, degradation, praise kink, daddy kink, mommy kink, spit kink, possessive sex, jealousy kink, public sex/exhibitionism, voyeurism, semi threesome (mfm), drug use (cocaine), sex on drugs, ass eating, edging, overstimulation, rough sex, emotional sex, angst sex, lots of girl moments this chapter, cheerleader girls have a slumber party, karina and y/n are new besties, areum is being a bit annoying, insane party scenes like always, shotaro has a new girl, nahyun is a loser like always, y/n and yangyang get touchy, yeonjun is back and a weirdo! and y/n moves a bit mad in this one

authors note — part five was meant to be one post but i ended up writing so much it’s turning into three separate ones, so i’ve split them into their own parts. they’re all deeply connected though, especially this one and the next (part seven), which i’m working hard to get out as soon as i can. love you forever, enjoy. <3 pacing might feel sudden in this chapter but remember i do everything for a reason [evil laughs]

listen to 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐏𝐋𝐀𝐘𝐋𝐈𝐒𝐓 whilst reading <3

𝐅𝐈𝐂 𝐌𝐋

The world feels different now, split along a fault line that neither of you saw coming. It is not a clean break. It is jagged, uneven, cruel. The kind that leaves debris scattered in every direction, waiting to cut into whoever dares to walk through it. There is no before and after, no definitive moment where everything fell apart—just the slow unraveling of something that once felt inevitable. One day, there were shared spaces, overlapping schedules, voices that fit together like puzzle pieces. Now, there is only distance, a rift so wide it might as well be measured in light-years.

The separation isn’t just physical. It’s molecular. You exist on different planes now, moving in ways that contradict each other, orbiting the same spaces but never colliding. The absence should be quiet, a simple subtraction. But somehow, it is loud. Somehow, it is everywhere. Somewhere, in the endless sprawl of the universe, stars collapse and planets lose their way. In another life, in another timeline, maybe you were two celestial bodies bound by the same force, drawn together by something cosmic, magnetic, inevitable. But in this one? You are two objects spinning in opposite directions, torn apart by your own gravity, each moving toward a different kind of destruction.

You are the dying sun, collapsing inward, devouring yourself in the relentless pursuit of something—proof, victory, purpose. You are imploding, shedding layers, burning too bright, too fast, swallowing your own brilliance just to keep shining. Your destruction is slow, methodical, inevitable; the kind of death that takes eons but is written in the stars from the beginning. You do not let yourself rest, do not let yourself cool, because stopping means feeling, and feeling means breaking.

Jeno is a rogue planet, flung from its orbit, untethered and spiraling into the unknown. He was never meant to be without you, never meant to drift this far, but now he is ruinous, reckless, swallowing chaos whole because at least chaos is something he can control. He throws himself into the dark, chasing the cold, deliberately avoiding every path that might lead him back to where you are, because the idea of turning around—of feeling the gravity of what was—might be the very thing that shatters him. He keeps moving, keeps running, because stopping means facing the void, and he is not sure which will destroy him first—the emptiness or the unbearable pull of everything he lost.

And yet, even in destruction, you are both moving. You are not stagnant. You are waging wars of different kinds. The last embers of what you were still burn, but they do not burn the same.

You sit in the library long after the lights should have dimmed, surrounded by the weight of papers, graphs, calculations that blur at the edges of your vision. Your fingers ache from typing, from annotating, from making absolutely sure that the data is airtight, bulletproof. The project you started together now belongs to you alone, and if you have to carry it across the finish line by yourself, then so be it. It is not just about proving a point anymore—it is about proving him right, proving that all the work you did together wasn’t in vain, that his absence does not make you weaker, that you can stand even when he is no longer beside you.

But the project is only half of the battle. The rest is a war you have been meticulously crafting, an assault so precise it might as well be a military operation. The Ravens are set to face the Busan Titans in the state championship finals, and you are combing through their statistics with a ruthless, calculated eye—not to manipulate, not to twist the facts, but simply to expose what is already there. Their weaknesses, their inconsistencies, their over-reliance on predictable plays. You are not fabricating anything, merely holding up a mirror and forcing them to confront the cracks they have ignored.

But beneath the surface, this runs deeper than just one game. Eric and Sunwoo were once part of this program, once players who held influence, who had power—until they threw it away for something as reckless as gambling. Their removal left a stain on the team, a shift in leadership, an unspoken instability that lingers even now. And the Titans? They have been riding on that instability, preying on the gaps left behind, using the Ravens’ past turbulence as an opening. That is what you are tearing apart now. Not with deception, not with false claims, but with facts—cold, irrefutable numbers that will make it impossible for them to hide. When the Ravens take the court, they will do so armed with truth, and the Titans will have no choice but to face the reality they never saw coming.

The late nights have turned into something grotesque. You don’t sleep. You don’t stop. You drink too much coffee, then let it turn into something else—something stronger, something that keeps you awake for hours beyond what’s human. The walls of the library warp and bend at the edges of your vision, and there are moments, deep into the night, where the exhaustion laps at the corners of your mind, where you think you hear his voice in the back of your head. You swallow down the thought like a pill and keep working. There is no space for weakness. Not anymore.

Meanwhile Jeno is nowhere, and he is running.

The nights blur together, a revolving door of faces he does not care to remember, music that pulses too loud, drinks that burn in his throat but never quite reach the part of him that aches. He is always moving—from party to party, room to room, letting the neon and the noise drown out the thoughts that refuse to let him rest. If it is something you would hate, he gravitates toward it. Mindless fun, empty conversations, meaningless distractions. He does not want meaning. He wants oblivion.

And when alcohol is not enough, he looks for something stronger. Pills, powder, things passed between hands in dark rooms, the kind of things he never thought he’d touch, the kind of things that make the edges of the world blur just enough to pretend that nothing matters. He doesn’t even like the way it feels, not really. But he keeps chasing it, keeps swallowing it down, keeps trying to lose himself in the high before the comedown crushes him all over again.

He tries to fuck other people. He really tries. Hands on his shoulders, lips at his neck, fingers slipping under fabric, breathless invitations whispered into his ear. He gets as far as he can, as far as his body will allow, but then—nothing. It’s not them. It’s not you. And he hates himself for it, for the fact that even here, even now, his body refuses to forget you. He leaves them behind, leaves them confused, angry, embarrassed. It doesn’t matter. Nothing does.

So he keeps running. He picks fights just to feel something, throws himself into reckless decisions, loses himself in anger that has nowhere to go. He’s been showing up to practice less frequently, letting his game slip, watching as his teammates and coaches look at him with growing disappointment. But he doesn’t care. He cannot let himself care. Because if he stops to think—if he stops at all—he might just feel the full weight of what he has lost.

And maybe that is the worst part. That no matter how fast he moves, no matter how hard he tries to drown it all out, he still sees you. On campus, in passing, in fleeting moments where his gaze finds you before he can stop himself. He never speaks. Never approaches. But his stomach twists all the same.

He doesn’t know what he expects. For you to look at him? For you to ignore him? He hates both options.

You were once a perfect crime—two masterminds moving in tandem, your hands inked with each other’s fingerprints, your every move a counterbalance to the other. You were the precision, the strategy, the steady hand behind the operation. He was the instinct, the risk, the recklessness that made you unstoppable. Together, you were untouchable, a seamless execution of chaos and control.

But now? Now, it’s a botched getaway. You are still inside the burning building, rewriting blueprints, refusing to run. He is miles away, watching the explosion in the rearview mirror, knowing he left behind the only thing that ever made the crime worth committing. Your suffering is a mirror, but it is distorted. You are sharpening your mind into something unbreakable. He is dulling his into something unrecognizable. You are both running—one toward something, one away from everything. You are both haunted. And it is slowly, inevitably, leading to something breaking.

The walk home from campus feels different now. It's not quieter, not softer—if anything, it's louder in its hostility. The looks don’t linger long enough to confront, but they last just long enough to sting. The whispers are low but deliberate, carefully timed to slip into your path like landmines. You’ve stopped flinching. You keep your chin high, shoulders squared, moving through it all like you’re bulletproof, even if most nights you cry in the shower just to get it out of your system. You’re tired, so deeply tired, but you won’t let them see that. You won’t let this campus break you. You’ve given too much to let them take anything more.

You’ve been everywhere lately—everywhere but where it matters. Cheer practice, project meetings, tutoring jeno’s teammates while pretending you don’t flinch at his name. You’ve been organizing, emailing, reworking data, reviewing footage. You’ve sat in on three sessions with Coach to study offensive stats from games you already memorized. Coach Suh, who’s still recovering but slowly finding his rhythm again, has been helping you gather footage and lay quiet traps, subtly pushing Eric and Sunwoo back into their place.

But you haven’t stepped into a music room since that night. The night the bar was packed—standing room only, the entire campus crammed wall to wall—just to watch you play. Just to watch you fall apart instead. It was the day something inside you cracked open and never quite closed. The day the music died. Not all at once, but in slow, splintering ways. Every whisper since then, every glance in a hallway, every half-laughed comment about the girl who used to sing? It’s made your major feel like a joke. And maybe that’s why you haven’t gone back. Maybe you’re not ready to find out if your voice still works.

But today’s meeting isn’t on campus. It’s here, in your apartment. The one you share with Mark. It’s small, not finished, not polished. But it’s warm now. There’s a thick beige rug underfoot that Mark picked out, one you weren’t sure about until you spilled tea on it and realized how soft it was under your knees. There are string lights above the window you both strung up during a thunderstorm. And on the fridge, crooked and peeling at the edges, a polaroid of you and Mark mid-laugh, mouths open, limbs tangled, half-asleep on the couch after a late-night frozen pizza run. It’s home. Or it’s becoming one.

It’s not really a meeting—not officially, anyway. More like a team-building night disguised as something softer. And you don’t know when it happened, exactly, but somewhere along the way you stopped just being on the cheer team and started leading it. It’s not a title you ever asked for. But after late nights staying behind after practice, rewriting parts of the routine when others refused to focus, smoothing over arguments when Karina was too tired to deal with the mess herself—no one really questions your authority anymore. You don’t either.

You and Karina have been working in tandem lately, both driven by different versions of the same urgency. She’s desperate to hold the team together with the championship coming up fast—her leadership is on the line. And you? You’re trying to keep your project from falling apart. A few nights ago, you got a letter—one that’s stayed folded in your back pocket ever since. It confirmed that your research project, the one you started with Jeno, is under consideration for inclusion in the annual sports and science exhibition. The exhibition. The one he took you to on your first date. It’s prestigious. Competitive. The kind of recognition that launches careers and changes lives. And it might actually happen.

You told Karina about the letter a few nights ago—how it arrived folded and official, tucked between overdue assignments and empty takeout containers, how your hands had trembled just holding it. You told her what it meant. That if your project with Jeno met expectations, it wouldn’t just be marked and filed away, it would be exhibited. Publicly. Featured in the same exhibition Jeno took you to on your first date. The same one you lingered in too long after closing hours, fingers brushing over glass displays, sharing quiet, tentative smiles that felt like the beginning of something. So no, this wasn’t just another academic milestone. It was a reckoning, a loop closing in on itself. Karina had known that the moment you said it that she didn’t need the full explanation to understand that this meant everything.

So when you came to her with the idea—a bonding night to fix the rift in the team—she listened. And when she threw in the ‘fantasy boy draft’—some wild cheer tradition she’d sworn by since her first year—you both knew you’d found the perfect distraction. The perfect solution. You offered your apartment without hesitation. Cleaned every surface, fluffed every pillow, scrubbed down the kitchen with something citrus-scented and borderline chemical.

Karina handles the mood, candles flickering in each corner, warm vanilla mixing with eucalyptus, string lights twinkling soft and gold above the couch. You stack glittery hamper boxes by the fireplace—filled with sheet masks, essential oils, sweets, personalised mixtapes, written words of affirmations and polaroids—while Karina slips satin scrunchies and vibrators. You also brought matching pink satin pajamas with each girl's name embroidered across the chest and lined the table with rows of pastel-pink frosted cupcakes, little edible basketballs on top. You also baked thirteen brownie slabs the night before and packed tubs of buttercream frosting, piping tools, heart-shaped sprinkles, gummy letters, mini glitter stars—everything they’d need to decorate a personalised slab for another girl. It was effort disguised as aesthetic. A performance of unity you were determined to make real. Not because you cared about appearances but because you knew this, every inch of it, was part of the bigger picture and that picture was going to be on display.

You did it all because this project needs to work because you need it to work. And because if the team won’t act like one on the mat, then maybe, just maybe, they’ll start to feel like one here. You thought about cutting them out entirely—stripping the cheer squad from the final project and focusing on more cooperative data sets. It would’ve been cleaner, quieter, easier. They hadn’t given you anything but tension and side-eyes, and you were tired of chasing girls who didn’t want to be part of something bigger than themselves. But this—this whole thing you’re building—isn’t about ease or neat conclusions. It’s about truth and the truth is, a star player doesn’t shine alone. He needs a system that pushes him, holds him up, even when it’s fraying at the seams. That includes the messy parts, the jealous ones, the girls who roll their eyes in practice and whisper behind your back because whether they like it or not, they’re part of the structure that builds someone like Jeno. And if they’re broken, it reflects on everything he touches. On what he becomes. On what you’re still trying to prove.

The apartment is already warm and glowing by the time the girls begin arriving. The lights are dimmed low, casting soft halos against the walls, and there’s a sugar-sweet haze in the air from too many candles lit at once—rose, vanilla, something citrusy that makes the whole place smell like a sleepover dream. Cushions are scattered like flower petals across the floor, snacks spilling from heart-shaped bowls, and there’s a soft pink throw blanket draped over every empty seat. Someone laughs from the kitchen. Someone else calls dibs on a spot near the snacks. By the time the seventh voice enters the mix, the room is alive—ribbons and candles and cushions melting into bodies, and every inch of space soaked in vanilla-scented heat.

None of them had really planned to show up—not when it was first mentioned. There were eye-rolls, muttered jokes about forced fun, half-hearted excuses ready to go. But then the photos dropped. Trays of food, custom hampers with their names in cursive, matching satin pajamas folded on every cushion. And word about the fantasy boy draft spread faster than you could send a reminder. The group chat lit up like it never had before. Suddenly, everyone was interested. Suddenly, they all wanted in.

Nahyun’s already critiquing. Her voice cuts through the music, offhand and sharp as she mutters, “Feels like a five-year-old planned this,” nudging a cushion with her foot. “All that’s missing is a princess cake.” She drifts through the room like a guest, arms crossed, smile never quite reaching her eyes. She lingers near the brownie tray, says something to Mia—light, maybe even funny—but Mia doesn’t laugh. Yiren glances over, then looks back at her phone. Aisha shifts the conversation without pause, voice a little too quick. Whatever closeness they once had, it’s quiet now. Faded around the edges.

Mia’s on the rug, leaning back on her elbows, trying to tear open a face mask with her teeth. “Did you put a security tag on these?” she mutters. You hand her scissors without missing a beat. “Try now.” She murmurs a quiet thank you, softer than usual—quieter than usual—and keeps her eyes on the packet. Aisha’s next to her, already reorganizing her hamper like it’s a task list—serums here, snacks there, ribbons pulled taut and retied with sharper corners. “These don’t even match the palette,” she says under her breath, but she doesn’t change them. Yiren hovers around them, phone steady, catching slow pans of the candlelight across glossed lips, the shine of polished nails, the curve of someone’s laugh. “You’ll thank me when it’s all gone,” she says, barely louder than the music. They weren’t eager to come—you remember that. But now they’re sitting in the spaces you’ve carved for them, unwrapping what you planned, moving to a rhythm you designed. No one's said it out loud, but you can feel it. The room’s unfolding exactly the way you set it in motion.

Ningning’s camped by the speaker, phone already plugged in, flipping through hyperpop and house playlists like she’s curating a runway. “Don’t even think about asking for a skip,” she warns, tapping play on something glitchy, bassy, and violently pink. The walls vibrate on cue. Her brownie slab sits in front of her half-decorated, smeared with neon icing and topped with tiny candy letters spelling something definitely unhinged. “If mine doesn’t win, I’m flipping the table,” she says, dead serious, lining the edges with rhinestones like she’s building a shrine.

Giselle’s slouched against the arm of the couch, drink balanced on her knee, legs stretched out like she owns the floor. Her brownie slab’s already finished—thick swirls of dark frosting and, across the top in black icing gel, ‘dump his ass’ written in perfect cursive. She doesn’t look up when someone laughs. “Sorry, Chaewon,” she says, biting back a grin.

Chaewon shrugs from across the room, not even pretending to be offended. “You’re right,” she calls back, lifting her drink. “He’s been on thin ice since Tuesday.”

Areum’s stuck close to Karina all night, never far from her side, but quieter than usual. She hasn’t added much to the conversation, just sips from her drink, nods along, lets Karina speak for both of them. But whenever you talk—whether it’s to pass a plate, explain a game, or just laugh at something someone else says, her eyes find you, sharp and deliberate. She doesn’t bother hiding whatever’s behind them. Not anger, exactly. But something pointed. Something personal.

Yunjin has moved through the room with soft hands and steady warmth. She pauses behind Yeji to adjust a hair clip, then passes out hot towels like a spa hostess. “Relax your jaw,” she tells Mia, tapping her chin. “You’re holding stress.” Her voice cuts through the buzz without needing volume. When she finally sits, it’s beside Yeji, who leans into her with easy familiarity. Yeji’s been floating gently between every corner of the room—helping Yiren adjust her camera angle, handing Aisha another lip balm from the extras pile, whispering something into Giselle’s ear that makes her laugh and nearly spill her drink.

And you—you are everywhere. Not in the way that takes up space, but in the way that dictates how space is used. A refill here. A nudge there. You laugh at just the right volume, make eye contact when it counts, step in before any silence stretches too long. Every pivot in mood, every shift in dynamic—you don’t just notice it, you engineer it. When someone strays, you pull them back in without touching them. When the energy sways, you anchor it. This isn’t about snacks or skincare or curated aesthetics. That’s the cover. The real work is underneath—threading these girls into a shared rhythm, one that begins with sugar and satin and ends with loyalty that can’t be faked on the mat. They think this is bonding. A night off. A bit of fun. But it’s infrastructure. Memory laid down like groundwork. A team built on glitter and inside jokes and the feeling that they were seen. You’re not just giving it to them. You’re making sure they never forget who did.

Mia asks it casually, almost like a dare. “Ryujin—what’s going on with you and Shotaro?”

Ryujin’s already blushing before the question finishes. She hugs her knees, lets her head tilt slightly back like she’s weighing how honest to be. “It’s been good,” she says, quiet but sure. “We hang out after practice. Eat. Talk. Fuck. Then talk more. He listens. Pays attention. He’s always making sure I’m okay. Like... even with the choreo, if his hand’s too low or my back hurts, he stops and adjusts.” Her smile creeps in slow. “And he’s sweet. In a stupid, hot way. Always saying something dorky and then acting shy about it.”

Yeji doesn’t miss a beat. She lifts her head from where she’s curled on the floor and says, too casually, “I was in the practice room with them last lesson, by the way.” She pauses just long enough for the room to quiet. “It was less dancing, more grinding. There’s this move where Ryujin’s supposed to sit on his lap and he’s meant to stay still—keyword, meant.” She grins, eyes flicking to Ryujin. “But he kept grinding up. Every time. And I counted at least three moments where his hand stayed on her ass longer than the beat asked for.”

The room loses it—squeals, laughter, someone hits the floor with a pillow. Ningning yells “Oh my god!” and Yunjin fans herself with a napkin. “You’re corrupting our sweet boy!”

Ryujin just shrugs, unfazed, lips curled into something smug. “I told him to stop,” she says, soft and slow. “He said he couldn’t help it.”

There’s a low chorus of giggles and sighs around the room. Chaewon groans but it’s affectionate. Ningning hides her face behind a cushion. Even you smile, remembering the way Shotaro has been looking these last few weeks after Nahyun wrecked him—shoulders squared, jaw tight, eyes sharper. No more quiet apologies in his walk. No more shrinking back. He’s dressing bolder now, speaking louder. Like someone who finally realized he doesn’t owe softness to the person who broke him.

Then Nahyun speaks, syrup-slick and venomous, like she can’t let the moment breathe without twisting it. “He’s cute now,” she says, voice airy, almost bored. “Wait till he’s inside you and you realize he doesn’t know how to make a girl cum. Can’t fuck for shit—just lies there and hopes you moan enough to cover for it.” It cuts through the warmth like a blade, derailing the laughter, stiffening the air. Not loud, not messy but felt. She ruins it. She always does. She can’t stand when the room forgets to orbit her. The silence after isn’t shocking. It’s quiet, loaded, and disappointing. Everyone knows exactly what she’s doing.

Ryujin doesn’t flinch. “Sex with him’s been great.” Her voice is clean, steady. “He told me his last relationship nearly ruined it for him. Said she didn’t do anything—wouldn’t ride, wouldn’t go down on him, just laid there making sounds like that was enough. Didn’t touch him, didn’t move, didn’t care if he finished. He said half the time he had to fake it just to get it over with. Couldn’t even look him in the eye when she came—probably because she didn’t.”

Yunjin buries her face in a pillow, muffling the secondhand embarrassment vibrating through the room. Someone exhales too loud. Nahyun shifts like she’s ready to bite back, eyes narrowing, lips parting with something sharp already forming. And you step forward before she has the chance. “Alright,” you say, voice louder now—measured, final. “Fantasy boy draft starts now.”

The tension snaps like a rubber band. Heads lift. Spines straighten. The shift is instant—like they’ve all remembered why they came. Voices rise at once, buzzing with sudden energy. You move to the edge of the rug and begin handing out the empty wicker baskets, one by one. Each is lined with soft pink tissue paper, ribbons already curling at the corners. “These are yours,” you announce, voice calm beneath the chaos. “When you pull a name, you’ll fill your basket with whatever you want—snacks, notes, lingerie if you’re bold. Think of it as a seduction starter pack.” There’s laughter, gasps, someone already asking if edible lube counts. “Presentation counts,” you remind them, and the girls giggle louder, suddenly competing before the game’s even begun.

Karina’s already kneeling at the center, pulling the glass punch bowl closer—the one filled with glittery slips of paper, each folded name inked in your handwriting. She gives it a hard mix with her hand, swirling them fast. “No trades,” she says, smirking. “No swaps. No complaints.”

Then her tone dips, slow and heavy, dragging everyone in. “The rules are simple,” Karina says. “Tomorrow night, you spend at least one full hour with the boy you pull. That’s the minimum. If you want to spend the whole night with him—be my guest. Just the two of you. No friends, no interruptions, no backing out. It’s a tradition before big games, especially state championships like this one. Helps ease the nerves. Fuck the stress out of the boys—literally.”

She grins now, all teeth. “If you want to fuck him—fuck him. If you want to tease him the whole time—do that too. Just make sure something happens.” Her smile twists, eyes glittering. “You can suck him off in the car. Ride him in his room. Make him beg and leave. I don’t care how you play it. But whoever gets the furthest—sexually—wins.”

There’s a pause—then chaos. Laughter, shrieks, someone throws a pillow. Ningning screams something about winning before the names are even pulled. Giselle demands clarification on what counts as ‘furthest’ while already opening a lip gloss. The room swells again. And you—you let it happen. Let them shriek and flirt and laugh like it’s just a game. Like it’s not being directed. Like they aren’t moving exactly how you want them to. But your grip never loosens. You’re still setting the pace, still tracking every glance, every flicker of tension. This isn’t about flirting. It’s about leverage. About memory. About which bonds form, which cracks deepen, who follows impulse and who stays calculated. Who reaches first—and who gets chosen back. And the beauty of it is, they think it’s theirs. But you built this stage. You handed them the script.

Karina walks the bowl around slowly, letting each girl pick one by one. It turns giggly quickly—some of them are clasping hands like they’re praying for their favourite name, whispering to the ceiling as if the boy gods are listening. The slips are drawn one by one, each rustle of paper followed by gasps, groans, and shrieks. You watch from where you're sat, knees drawn to your chest, hands cradling your glass, as names are revealed like fate being bargained. It starts light. Silly. And then it shifts.

Areum unfolds hers slowly. Blinks once. Twice. She doesn’t speak, but her thumb presses down hard on the paper, white-knuckling the edge. Her face doesn’t shift. Not a smile, not a wince. But her eyes move. Across the room. Past the flickering candles and half-tied ribbons. Mark’s name might as well have caught fire in her hand. Her eyes land in a blank space like she’s looking through the room instead of at it like she can’t believe what she’s holding. Like she thought she had more time. “I have Mark,” she says finally, so low it barely counts as a whisper. No reaction. Just a fact she has to say aloud to believe. Then she folds the slip again and tucks it between her fingers like it means nothing at all.

Karina pulls her name next, it turns out to be Jaemin. She exhales as soon as she sees it, then mutters, “Of course.” Her voice isn’t bitter, just tight with familiarity. She grabs her basket and starts assembling it immediately, hands sure and practiced. Her fingers curl around a satin bow like muscle memory. "I won't get any action tonight," she says dryly. "Never been his type and he’s never been mine, he’s too quiet and mysterious." She doesn’t sound sad, just factual. But her grip on the scissors is tense. You say nothing. Watch her slice through cellophane with purpose.

When Ningning opens hers, she gasps loud enough to make half the room jump. "Chenle!" she squeals, hugging the paper to her chest. “God always provides.” She scrambles toward her hamper, giggling as she tosses things in without pause—heart-shaped lollipops, flavored lube, candy rings, a pink satin blindfold, and a bottle of edible massage oil labeled “lick here.” She hums while she packs, murmuring something about riding him until the hour’s up, and slips in a pair of crotchless lace panties, folded neatly on top like a final promise.

Yunjin sighs when she gets Jungwoo. She groans, but it’s not disappointment, more like bracing for chaos. “If he tries to teach me the Dougie again I’m gonna scream.”

Ryujin snorts from across the floor. “Last time I got him he brought one of his friends and turned it into a threesome. Didn’t even ask first. Just showed up with a 6’5 surprise.” There’s an eruption of laughter. Yunjin throws a sequin. She rolls her eyes but she’s smiling. “Okay but he is hot and I hope I see this ‘friend.’” She giggles whilst wiggling her eyebrows seductively.

When it's your turn, the room quiets. Not completely, not enough for anyone to notice unless they were watching closely. But you feel it. A soft hush beneath the laughter. Eyes flick toward you, quick and curious. Your name has weight, and everyone knows it. You walk toward the bowl like it's something sacred, like the paper inside might rearrange your entire night. Your fingers hover, dip in, shuffle too long like you’re searching for something specific. Maybe you are. Maybe you’re hoping it’s not him.

Not because you wouldn’t want him. You would. That’s the problem.

You wouldn’t be able to play it cool. You wouldn’t know how to pretend. If it’s Jeno—if it’s Jeno—you’ll lose whatever grip you’ve managed to keep on yourself. If he looks at you soft, you’ll fall. If he looks at you cruel, you’ll break. There’s no version of this where you win. No version where you fuck him and feel fine after. Wanting Jeno has always come with ruin. Always. It’s never been easy. Never been safe. Just blood under your nails and ache between your legs.

You’re not here for that. Not tonight. Not when everything depends on your control.

So when the paper unfolds in your hand and reads San, your breath leaves you quiet and low. Not relief, exactly—but something close enough. You can work with San. You’ve fucked before. Once. Maybe twice. It was good. Clean. No mess. No history. He made you come, made you laugh, didn’t make you think. If you suck him off in a car, it’ll count. It’ll be enough. It won’t be dangerous. That’s what you need. Something you can handle. Something you don’t have to feel.

Then Nahyun opens hers.

She screams. Breathless, high-pitched, vibrating with glee. “Oh my god. I got Jeno!” Her hands are already fumbling for her phone, typing out notes and planning how to spend the night with him, giggling to herself. "He’s going to love this. He even said I give the best head he's ever had. Always cums when I’m on top. He's probably thinking about me right now—"

You suck your teeth, a quiet flick of pressure that doesn’t beg attention. Your tongue settles in your cheek, eyes fixed anywhere but her—because you don’t need to look. She’s already filling the room with her noise, grasping for a spotlight that was never hers to hold. Your expression stays smooth, impassive, perfected over time like muscle memory. But underneath it, there’s the slow curl of amusement, low and easy. Not because you care. Not the way she wants you to. But because it’s funny—laughable, even—the way she keeps reaching, convinced she still matters.

She doesn’t stop. Flushed and breathless, voice high with performance. “He’s already been texting me tonight, actually,” she says, like she’s letting everyone in on a secret. “Said I’d be his first pick even if there wasn’t a draft. We’ve fucked so many times. He always comes back to me. Always wants me.”

You smile—small, measured, just the barest curl of your mouth. Because it’s a lie. Every word. And you know it.You don’t say anything. You don’t need to. Because you know exactly who Jeno messages when he’s high—when the drugs make him bold and stupid. When he’s drunk and desperate and aching to feel something real. The messages he sends you aren’t sweet, aren’t shy, aren’t asking how you’ve been. They’re pure filth, breathless voice notes where he slurs your name like he’s trying to fuck it, like just the syllables taste like you. He sends videos with his hand wrapped tight around his cock, leaking and flushed, every stroke harder than the last, captioned only you get me like this.

You haven’t touched him in weeks, but he hasn’t touched anyone else either—not really. He’s tried. You know he’s tried. You know how he looks at other girls and hopes one of them might make him forget. Might make him come. But they don’t. They never do. The only time he gets off is with your photo on his screen—your pussy spread open for him, your moans playing on repeat, his fist choking his dick while he gasps your name into the dark. He doesn’t fuck anyone else. He fucks memories of you.

Ryujin’s eyes slice across the room and lock onto yours, her expression unreadable for a beat before it sharpens, like she’s catching onto something only you both are in on. Her brow lifts, slow, deliberate as she turns to Nahyun. “You’re saying Jeno’s been fucking you recently?” she asks, voice flat, almost bored.

Nahyun nods. Too quickly. “Yeah, he’s really needy—” she starts, dragging her eyes over to you again, and it’s obvious now she’s not really speaking to Ryujin at all. Her words are laced with sugar and something mean, like she wants to press them directly against your skin, see if they sting. “He said my pussy’s the only thing that makes him cum right now.” The room stills. Not because anyone believes her, but because of the way she says it—like she’s already imagining how it’ll hurt you.

It barely registers on your face—the twitch of your lips, the way they curve at the corners like something bitter-sweet just brushed past. You press your tongue to the inside of your cheek, jaw tightening for half a second before you smooth it away with a breath. No sharpness. No crack. Just control. When you glance toward Ryujin, she’s already looking at you. And when your eyes meet, she smirks, shaking her head a little like she can’t believe what she’s hearing. The two of you share a laugh—quiet, breathless, folded into the space between cushions and candlelight. It’s not loud enough to draw attention as you haven’t bitten back all night, haven’t risen to a single dig, but this—this is just too delicious to ignore.

Then Yeji pipes up. “That’s wild,” she says, leaning forward, elbows on her knees. “I tried to fuck him at that party last week. He said no and told me to go home, he said he hasn’t been in the mood lately. I couldn’t even get him hard when we made out.” Her tone is casual, but the weight of her words lands heavy.

Nahyun stills, like the wind’s been knocked from her. “No, that’s—he—” she fumbles. The room watches her scramble, eyes flicking everywhere but at you. Then she dives for her hamper, hands moving too fast, shoving in a half-open pack of condoms, a bag of crisps, gummy bears, socks that don’t match, a random bottle of spray cologne she hasn’t sniffed, all things that Jeno would hate.

And maybe that’s why Karina rises—not with drama, not with a sound, just an unfazed grace that makes the moment ripple beneath the surface. Her gaze sweeps the room once, slow and calculating, before she steps forward with a kind of stillness that makes everyone pause. She stops in front of you, her eyes flicking to the name in your hand—San—and then to Nahyun’s clenched fingers. And without a word, she snatches the paper from Nahyun’s hands, then yours, and swaps them both. The exchange is swift but heavy.

Nahyun’s breath catches sharp, her voice dragging up fast behind her like she’s chasing the control slipping from her hands. “You—you can’t do that!” she yells, eyes wide. “That’s not fair. I already messaged him—he knows it’s me—”

Karina doesn’t even turn. She’s already back at her hamper, curling pink tissue around a bottle of whipped body oil, fingers precise as scissors slice through glitter ribbon. “I’m the captain,” she says, calm and smooth, voice dipped in glass. “I don’t follow the rules. I set them.” Then, quieter, deadlier—“And you’ve been lying to everyone since the second you pulled that name.”

Nahyun stumbles for words, mouth parting like she has something clever to bite with—but she doesn’t get the chance because your voice slices clean through the room, low and easy, thick with the kind of humor that makes people sit up straighter. “You can keep messaging him if it makes you feel better,” you say. “Just know it’s not going to deliver. He blocked your number.”

Nahyun’s face flames, cheeks red, jaw trembling. “No, he didn’t.”

You tilt your head, eyes soft, almost sympathetic. “Yeah,” you murmur, lips twitching. “He did.”

Her voice sharpens. “How would you even know?”

You don’t blink. You lean back slow, a little smirk curling at the corner of your mouth like you’re offering her the kindness of honesty—because you are. “He blocked you when we were together,” you say, tone silky, matter-of-fact. “Said you wouldn’t stop texting. Said it was getting annoying.”

That’s what makes it land. You don’t need to raise your voice or lean forward. You don’t even shift in your seat. You sit there, drink cradled easily in your hand, legs crossed like this is nothing to you—because it is nothing to you. The truth carries on its own. It doesn’t need your help. It slices clean without volume or venom. Tonight, it hits exactly where it’s supposed to.

The silence that follows doesn’t crack or shatter. It folds in on itself—thick, awkward, and painfully aware. Nahyun doesn’t say another word. Doesn’t scream or pout or argue again. Just huffs, once, loud through her nose like it might keep her dignity intact, then lowers herself slowly back onto the floor. Her face is turned away, but her hands are busy—ripping the ribbon she’d picked out into thinner and thinner strips, like if she keeps doing it long enough, it’ll distract everyone from the fact that no one’s paying her any more attention.

You don’t gloat. You don’t even watch her. You simply return to the task at hand. Quietly, calmly, without flourish, you tip the contents of the basket out onto the rug beside you. One by one, Nahyun’s choices roll out—glitter-stained lollipops, dick-shaped gummies, a cheap silk tie that smells like a department store perfume section. None of it fits. Not for him. It’s all loud and sugary and performative. Not real. Not the kind of thing that will make him pause when he opens it.

You hadn’t planned for this. You’d hoped for something simple—something shallow enough to slip through without feeling a thing. A boy who wouldn’t make your hands shake. Someone who wouldn’t look at you too long or too closely. But now that it’s Jeno, there’s a strange kind of calm that settles in your chest. Not relief. Not fear. Just inevitability. He was always the one who could tip the scale but you’ve learned how to carry that kind of tension, how to wear silence like armor. You’ll hand over the basket—maybe. Or you’ll make Karina do it. Maybe you won’t even stay long enough to see his expression. Maybe he won’t open it in front of you at all. Either way, it won’t matter. You’ll be fine. You always are.

Even as you tell yourself it means nothing, your hands betray you—already moving with purpose, already reaching for the things only you could know. There’s no checklist. No logic. Just instinct and memory guiding your fingers across the table. You start with the peppermint tin, the same one he used to pop open in your car, pressing a mint against your tongue like he owned your mouth. It nestles low in the corner, buried in soft blush tissue. Then you add a strip of worn polaroid film, edges bent, colors soft and fading. It's not even a full photo—just the bottom half of his hand resting on your thigh, the hem of your skirt hitched a little too high, both of you laughing out of frame. He took it by accident once, fumbling with the camera when he was tipsy and reaching for you. You never let him throw it out. You kept it. Now it’s tucked inside the basket like a secret—one only he’ll recognize.

Then you put in a small sachet of your perfume, dabbed onto silk, tied with string. A pair of black silk boxers folded neatly, pressed into the corner. A candle—warm musk and sandalwood, the kind that smells like his skin. You hesitate. Then your fingers move to put in a pack of heat patches for his shoulder. A tiny jar of that muscle rub he likes—eucalyptus and camphor, rubbed in slow under the collarbone when he’d wince and you’d whisper relax. Your lip balm, the same one he used to kiss off in pauses between moans. And the ribbon around it is black. Sleek, silent, final. A knot pulled tight—not pretty, not soft, just done. It doesn’t unravel when touched. It doesn’t ask to be untied. It stays. Like a full stop at the end of a sentence that never needed a reply.

You don’t stop to wonder what any of it means. You just keep moving, hands working faster than your head, each object pulled with unthinking care. Every detail is muscle memory. Like your body remembers something your mouth won’t say. A kind of fluency that only existed with him, still exists now, humming under your skin. The things you add to the basket aren’t grand, but they feel like confessions. Like truths hidden in texture and shape. Your fingers ghost over a pile of polaroids, and for a second you pause. There’s one of you both laughing in bed, sheets tangled, his head half out of frame but smiling anyway. You try not to smile—you really do—but it breaks through, soft and aching.

From beside you, Karina makes a sound under her breath. Her eyes flick to your basket, then to you, narrowed with sharp amusement. “Let’s place bets on who’s getting the furthest tomorrow,” she says, loud enough for everyone to hear. “Mine’s on Jeno and Y/N.” Her voice is light, teasing, but loaded, like she knows exactly what she’s doing. A few girls laugh. You huff, breath caught in your throat, about to deflect with something dry, but Ningning beats you to it.

“Wait, what even happened between you two?” she asks, head tilted. She’s curious, not nosy, but her words land with weight. Like the whole room still remembers that it was once you and him.

You sigh, glance down, voice quiet. “It’s a long story.” You hope that will be enough. You hope no one pushes. Because it is a long story. One lined with bruised trust and burned edges, stitched together with half-kept promises and the soft ache of everything you couldn’t say. It’s a story about how you tried, God, how you tried—and how in the end, love wasn’t the thing that broke you. His father was. A man with too much power and no conscience, who threatened to shatter your world if you didn’t walk away. You didn’t leave because you wanted to. You left because you had to. And now you carry that silence like it’s wedged between your ribs, bleeding every time someone mentions his name like it’s supposed to be simple. Like you weren’t forced to give up the only thing that ever felt like home.

“I hope you guys find your way back,” Ryujin says, smiling gently. “Taro always told me how happy you made each other. He used to talk about you like you were the best thing that had ever happened to Jeno. Said he’d never seen him act like that over anyone.” Her voice is sincere, kind. But it stings.

You give her a small, grateful smile, but it doesn’t quite reach your eyes. “I’m sure you’ll end up together,” Yunjin adds, voice low and hopeful. She offers you a soft glance, warm with quiet understanding. “I think the ‘boy draft’ might bring you closer again.”

You blink once, slowly, as if trying to register the weight of her words. It’s not shock exactly—more confusion. Your voice comes quieter than expected, a little off-guard. “I mean… he has,” you murmur, like you’re still piecing it together. “He’s been around. He hasn’t exactly avoided me. I’ve been the one avoiding him.”

Areum bristles. She adjusts her posture, jaw set. “Look,” she says, voice louder now, aimed at no one and everyone. “I’m really good friends with Jeno. And I just… I didn’t like how you ended things with him. It felt selfish. You broke his heart, simple as that. And now you want to give him this?” She gestures toward your filled basket, lips curled like it’s something rotten.

Your fingers tighten around the ribbon, jaw slack for half a second before it firms. Then your gaze lifts—slow, level—and lands on hers without flinching. “Mind your own business,” you say, voice low, unbothered. “Worry about you and Mark.” You don’t wait for her to speak again. You just go back to folding the edge of the tissue paper, calm and precise, like she hadn’t even opened her mouth in the first place.

Tonight is night of the boy draft. The action—the chaos, the aftermath, the games—was all meant to unfold today. But you wouldn’t be going. The last few days have left your head spinning, body anchored to your desk, mind buried beneath a mountain of strategy and sleepless hours. There have been more pressing concerns than blindfolds and lingerie. More urgent things than seduction.

The night air is thick, almost sluggish, dragging itself against the glass of your window. City traffic hums faintly in the background, a dull drone beneath the soft, lulling instrumental playing from your laptop. The only light in your apartment spills from the screen—white-blue glow flickering over stacks of paper, half-empty mugs, and an untouched bowl of something you meant to eat hours ago. It’s been days of this—pulling threads, cornering contradictions, tightening the noose with every pass. And now, finally, it’s folding. The cracks are wide open. Their story’s breaking apart under your hands, and all you have to do is keep pressing. Just a little more, and it’s done.

The first ring barely registers. You stay hunched over your desk, eyes skimming over a line you’ve already dissected a dozen times. Then it comes again—sharper this time, more insistent, like whoever’s on the other side isn’t planning to wait. You sit back slowly, irritation rising in your chest as you shove your chair away, feet dragging toward the door. You don’t bother fixing your shirt, don’t bother schooling your expression. You’re already ready to snap until the door swings open and Karina’s standing there.

She’s standing in the hallway like the building belongs to her. Like she’s the one who pays your rent. A sleek black dress clings to her body like it was sewn there, the silk catching every flicker of light. Her hair falls in perfect waves down her back, lips painted in a gloss so precise it’s criminal. She doesn’t look like she’s come to visit. She looks like she’s come to collect. And she doesn’t even greet you. Her eyes just sweep you from head to toe, pausing at the oversized shirt you’ve got half-tucked into a pair of shorts.

“What the hell are you wearing?” she scoffs, already brushing past you like she owns the place.

You step aside with a huff. “Pajamas since I'm at home?”

"Did you not get the thousands of messages I sent you? And the ones in the group chat? Not to mention the reminders at practice?" she asks, hands on her hips. Your jaw tightens. Of course you got them. You knew exactly what she was talking about.

Your jaw tightens. You did. You got every single one. You knew exactly what she was talking about. It wasn’t just the boy draft anymore. Jeno had a party planned for tonight—one he announced weeks ago, long before anyone realized how badly everything would start to crack. Karina didn’t care about the party itself. She cared about what it could be: a last-ditch attempt to pull the team into one place, at one time, under one roof. All of the boys would be there. All of the cheerleaders were expected to show up too. Baskets in hand. Smiles on. Unity in motion.

She wasn’t asking anymore, this was the new plan. The gift baskets would be delivered in person during Jeno’s party with each cheerleader showing support for their player, not just to fulfill a stupid tradition—but to remind the squad, the team, and themselves that they were still one unit. Even if it was fake and only lasted a night.

Karina’s voice softens, just barely. “This is the last night we’re going to get before everything starts moving too fast to fix. This is the last time we’ll all be together before the state championships and graduation. You need to come. It won’t be the same without you, and you need to make the night count, to make it worth something.”

Her eyes hold yours for a second longer than necessary. There’s no pressure in her tone, not exactly, but there’s weight in it—heavy, quiet, undeniable. “I know you’re worried about seeing Jeno,” she adds, gentler now. “But this isn’t about him. Not really. It’s about the team. About the work we’ve done. About everything you’ve held together when nobody else could.”

You look down at your desk, at the clipboard Karina handed you a few weeks ago—edges aligned, columns neat, not a single line out of place. You’ve rewritten endless plans and strategies, adjusting to every missed practice, every unexpected injury, every girl who threatened to drop out. You’ve done everything except let yourself think about what it’ll mean to be in the same room as him again. Really be in it. Not across a gym. Not beside a bench. But eye to eye.

Karina exhales, rubbing a hand over her temple like she’s already bracing for impact. “The slumber party helped temporarily but the girls are already falling apart again. You and Areum aren’t speaking. Mia and Ryujin snapped at each other in the locker room. Nahyun’s arguing with everyone.” Her voice dips, just enough for the words to sting. “We need to show up as a unit. No missing players. Especially not you. You’re the most essential piece of this entire thing. I’m not asking you to talk to him, I’m asking you to show up anyway, for the team, for me.”

You could fight her on this. You could argue your way out of it—build the defense line by line, logical and clean, polished enough to sound like conviction. You could say it’s a distraction, say it’s not the time, say you have better things to do than stand in a house full of people pretending not to see him. But beneath it all—beneath the practiced lies and rational excuses—is a truth that slips in quietly and stays like bruised fruit beneath your ribs, soft and sour and impossible to ignore. Wanting him has never been loud. It’s been a quiet ache, a familiar weight, something you carry the way a soldier carries a letter they said they wouldn’t read. You weren’t planning to go to war tonight. But your body’s already moving like you are.

The proof of how desperately you want to go is in the outfit already laid out on your bed, the accessories carefully arranged, the makeup waiting untouched on your desk. You were ready. And then, at the last minute, doubt crept in. Maybe you were waiting for someone to make the choice for you, to pull you from hesitation before it swallowed you whole. Maybe you just needed the push.

Karina follows your gaze, and when she spots the dress on the bed, she smirks. "So you were planning on going. You just needed me to show up and force you into it."

You don’t confirm or deny it. Instead, you cross the room, picking up the dress. The fabric is decadent beneath your fingertips—lace and silk in deep black, whisper-soft yet sinful, designed to sculpt the body into something untouchable and entirely irresistible. It clings where it should, drapes where it needs to, the neckline dipping low enough to draw attention to the swell of your breasts, teasing without giving too much away. The slit is high, a dangerous, calculated detail, designed to offer glimpses of skin with every step. It’s a dress made to be looked at. A dress that turns admiration into hunger. A dress Jeno fucking loves.

Karina watches as you run your fingers over the fabric, her expression unreadable for a moment before she tilts her head. "That’s the one," she murmurs. "That’s your ‘fuck me’ dress." And she’s right. You’re wearing this for a reason. For Jeno.”

It’s a selfish, messy choice—one that has nothing to do with strategy or team morale. It’s about the way you want him to want you, about the way his gaze always darkens when he sees you in this dress, the way his fingers used to trace the lace along your ribs before slipping beneath it. You remember the first time you wore it for him—his hands pressing you against his car outside a party, lips dragging over your throat as he muttered against your skin, “You’re doing this on purpose.” And he was right. You were. You always are.

The dress fits like a second skin, highlighting every curve, every line. You pair it with stilettos that force your posture into confidence, sharp accessories that catch the light, makeup that is both soft and intense—smoky eyes that deepen your stare, lips painted just enough to draw attention, cheeks subtly sculpted to sharpen every expression. Karina does your makeup with practiced ease, her fingers steady, her voice switching effortlessly between teasing and real advice. But none of it really matters. Not the dress, not the heels, not the makeup

The thoughts start slow, like static, like fog, slipping in through the cracks no matter how tightly you try to shut them out. They settle low—behind your navel, under your ribs—warmth that spreads like silk in heat, slow and clinging. Because when he sees you, you want it to happen before he realizes it. You want his eyes to catch on the line of your thigh, the curve of your mouth, the slow drag of your fingers against your glass—and feel it rise, thick and hot, no space left for logic. You want it to pull him without mercy, like gravity, like instinct. Not a decision but a reaction. The kind his body will have even as his mind screams don’t. You want to watch as he shifts in his seat, jaw tight, pulse rising beneath his collar, eyes darkening before he blinks. You won’t touch him. You won’t even look at him but he’ll feel it anyway—the heat, the pull, the undeniable weight of wanting what he can’t have anymore.

Karina lines your waterline with a practised hand, her body warm against yours as she leans in close. She doesn’t say anything at first—just tilts your chin, steadies your head, her fingers light beneath your jaw. When you blink too quickly and make her smudge the corner, she tuts under her breath, low and familiar, then murmurs that if you move again, she’s going to jab the eyeliner straight through your eye. You smile, just a little. It's not a real threat. It's Karina's way of grounding you.

But then her tone shifts, softens so subtly you almost miss it. "What are you gonna do when you see him?" she asks, quiet this time, her words sliding in like silk between heartbeats.

You don’t answer right away, not because you're avoiding it, but because there’s no clear answer. Eventually, your voice comes out low, like it’s been sitting heavy in your chest all night. “I don’t know.” You feel her watching you through the mirror, her touch still gentle as she finishes your eyeliner.

You’re surprised by how patient she sounds when she speaks again, like she’s thought about this more than once. "If it gets too much, just breathe. Don’t let him see you break. If he wants to stare, let him. If he wants to act like you’re not even there, fine. But don’t let him drag you down with him. Stand your ground."

Her thumb brushes beneath your eye, fixing a line you didn’t even realise was uneven. She leans back just enough to meet your gaze in the mirror. "Walk in there like you own the fucking place. You don’t owe him anything—not your voice, not your eyes, nothing. But if you do give him something… make it count."

You nod, lips pressed together. There’s no tremble, no fear. Just quiet understanding. Karina’s still looking at you, though, her features pinched like there’s more sitting behind her teeth. She hesitates for a second, then speaks, barely above a whisper. "There’s something I need to tell you."

You glance up, meet her eyes in the mirror. "Go on."

Karina’s breath hitches so softly and her hands still against your face, her liner pen paused mid-air. Her eyes don’t meet yours in the mirror—not yet. “It’s happened a few times,” she says, voice low, like it costs her something to say it. “Three, maybe four.” Her thumb steadies your chin. The weight of it feels heavier than usual. “Jeno’s… tried,” she continues, quieter now. “He’s tried to kiss me. To fuck me. I let him kiss me once. Maybe twice. His hand was on my thigh, and I didn’t stop him, I let it happen until I didn’t. He always stops and I do too but it shouldn’t have happened at all.”

You say nothing, eyes fixed on the girl in the mirror, lips parted just slightly. There’s a familiar ache crawling up your chest, a pressure that doesn’t quite break the surface. Of course you don’t like it. Of course it hurts. But there’s nothing to say that would make it different now. Her words land heavy, but you stay still, let her finish.

“I’ve been weak around him before,” she says, her hand steady as she traces the liner along the edge of your top lip, knuckles brushing your skin with the kind of ease that only comes from years of practice. “I used to be his rebound. Every time he got hurt, every time he fought with Areum or walked out of her apartment pissed off and cold, he’d come to me. And I’d let him. I got used to it—being his second skin, his distraction. He’d fuck me like he needed to forget she existed. Like he wanted to feel something, anything, even if it wasn’t her.”

She breathes out slow, controlled, but her fingers pause briefly at the corner of your mouth. “But this time… it wasn’t like that. He wasn’t angry. He wasn’t trying to get over someone. He was quiet. Like he was searching for something. He touched me like he was hoping I’d feel like you but I didn’t. I could tell. I could feel it wasn’t me he wanted.” Her voice drops lower, softer, almost intimate. “It was different. You changed something in him. He’s never felt this deep for anyone—not even her. That’s why it scared him. That’s why he stopped. I know Jeno well, I know he’s never been like this before.”

You don’t look at her when you ask, voice low, even. “So… did you tell him to stop? To stop trying to fuck his feelings away with you?”

“I did,” she says, her voice no longer sharp or teasing, but quiet—bare, almost. “I told him he doesn’t get to do that anymore, doesn’t get to crawl back every time it gets too heavy in his own head, like I’m some fix he can reach for whenever he doesn’t want to sit in his own mess. I told him he needs to deal with his own shit, feel it all the way through. Let it sting, let it cut. Not just show up when the silence gets too loud and he can’t handle the weight of it anymore.”

Karina leans back slowly, her eyes trailing over every inch of your face like she’s signing off on something sacred. She doesn’t smile, doesn’t say much—just a quiet, certain nod, her fingers tucking a loose strand of hair behind your ear with practiced care. “You’re ready now,” she says, voice low but sure, like it’s already been decided. Her gaze lingers a beat longer before she adds, “We’ll meet the others outside his apartment. Once we’re all there, we walk in together. And then the boy draft starts.” Her words aren’t dramatic, not even heavy—but they settle over your skin like something inevitable, the beginning of a storm that’s already in motion.

You don’t answer right away. Your eyes remain fixed on your reflection. And for the first time in a long while, you feel beautiful. Not just pretty, not polished but beautiful in a way that feels deliberate. Dangerous. Your lips look pillowy, bitten red and lined with precision. Your eyes hold a heat, a sharpness you usually bury. And your body, wrapped in something that clings and cuts in all the right ways, radiates confidence. You lean in, add the final touches—a touch more highlight on your collarbones, a gloss to your lips that catches the light just right, a setting spray misted like ritual.

Your outfit hugs every inch the right way, dark fabric clinging like intention, the neckline a little lower than necessary, the hem rising every time you move. Your makeup is immaculate—eyes smoky, lips full, highlight catching the light just right. Karina watches from behind, arms folded, head tilted, a small smirk playing on her glossed mouth. She doesn’t say it but you feel it in her silence—this is what power looks like. You add the finishing touches—fingers sliding on your favorite rings, cool metal kissing your knuckles, a chain necklace that sits just above your collarbone, bracelets clinking softly, and then the charm bracelet, the one that’s never left your wrist. The one he gave you, back when things were soft and real and easier.

You look at yourself one last time—not to admire, but to cement. There’s no room for fragility tonight. This version of you is polished, sharp, and ready for whatever comes next. And as Karina nods, satisfied, brushing a stray strand of hair from your shoulder, you take one last breath, shoulders square, chin lifted. The city hums outside like it’s calling your name. And so you answer. Your heels click against the floor as you step through the front door of your apartment, into the heat of a night that refuses to wait.

When you cross the threshold into Jeno’s apartment, it feels like slipping into the mouth of something alive—breathing, buzzing, burning—a low-lit pit of tension stretched tight over lust and liquor. The air tastes expensive and sweet, thick with perfume and cologne and spilled secrets, and the bass-heavy pulse of the music bleeds into your bones. Every flickering shadow, every surface slick with memory—you know this place. You’ve been known in this place. Bent over its furniture. Fucked across its walls. Whispered to behind its doors.

It holds you in a way that burns too close and stretches too far. Like him. Like Jeno. Something you’ve tasted, memorised, ached over, but can’t quite grasp anymore. Not because you let go, but because you were made to. He feels like something that used to be yours in full, now rationed in moments. Fleeting glances, silent rooms, bruises that fade too quickly. The distance was never mutual. It was survival.

You step further in, your heels clicking softly over tile, and behind you the cheerleaders follow like a beautiful, dangerous current—each of them armed with their draft baskets, soft smiles and bright eyes already trying to locate their boys for the night. They scatter like petals, but your gravity keeps the formation intact. You’re the eye of it. The center. And the second you enter, everything halts. Conversations taper off and heads lift. Eyes snap toward you like they’ve been summoned.

You know why, everyone does. You were his for a long time, Jeno’s girl, the one he touched without restraint, kissed like possession, claimed in ways that never needed to be spoken aloud. That kind of history makes people curious, makes them crave, it stains your skin like perfume, impossible to forget. And then there was the bar, that performance, the one where your thighs were bare under dim lights, voice spilling low and sultry from parted lips, every note laced with something too intimate for strangers to hear. They came expecting shame, to watch you strip yourself of dignity, to see you crumble under the weight of it all, and you certainly did, maybe a little of you broke but you didn’t fall, you learned, you swallowed their stares and turned them into fuel. Now they look because they can’t look away, because you sing like a secret and walk like sin, and every inch of you refuses to be made small.

That kind of power? You drink it. You’ve always known how to move through a room like you own it, but now the room moves around you. You don’t just attract attention—you weaponize it. You make eye contact long enough to draw someone in, then turn away before they can get their fill. You don’t need to chase anyone, you’ve already been chased, you’ve already won.

Your walk is intentional, hips swaying with rhythm, the fabric of your dress clinging like it’s painted on. You feel the heat of every stare, the way their eyes drag down the curve of your spine, over the backs of your thighs, across your chest. You’re all soft curves and hard edges—fuckable and untouchable in the same breath. And they don’t know which they want more.

A smile tugs at your lips as you glance across the room. You greet people with half-lidded eyes, a nod here, a knowing glance there, but you’re not really present. You’re searching but he’s not here yet. His absence hangs thick in the air, not empty, but loaded—like smoke that clings to your lungs long after the fire. You feel it in your chest, that slow, aching pressure that only ever means one thing. Jeno. The boy who filled you so full of want he hollowed you out. The boy who ruined you with sweetness. The one who, even now, even gone, manages to tighten the air around you until it hurts to breathe. He had your heart once—maybe he still does—but you couldn’t give it to him freely, not when someone else held their grip around your throat. That’s the part that breaks you. Not the leaving. The not being allowed to stay.

The fantasy boy draft is already in motion. Karina has Jaemin backed against the kitchen counter, basket in one hand, lip gloss in the other, her smile syrupy and slow, dripping down the side of his neck. Jaemin isn’t looking at her—he’s watching the room, watching you. His mouth moves and he says something low but it doesn’t look like interest. Karina doesn't seem fazed, she twirls a strand of her hair around her finger and keeps talking, hips shifting like punctuation.

Ryujin and Shotaro are already dancing despite Shotaro not being a draft since he’s not even in the basketball team but Ryujin evidently does what she wants to do. They’re tucked in a darker corner where the lights pulse slower. She’s grinding against him shamelessly, skirt riding high, arms draped around his neck like they’ve done this a hundred times before. They clearly have. His hands settle low on her hips, eyes half-lidded, lost in the rhythm she’s feeding him. Nahyun stands nearby, glaring openly. Her draft—San—is nowhere in sight but she clearly doesn’t care. Her gaze is locked on Shotaro like she wants to peel Ryujin off him with her bare hands.

Your friends are scattered throughout the room. Donghyuck is mixing drinks and laughter in the kitchen, catching attention from Karina who moves closer to Donghyuck and further away from Jaemin with every passing moment, while Chenle sits on the couch with Ningning on his lap. She’s grinding slowly, languid and unbothered, his hands anchored around her waist as they pass a joint between them. He leans up occasionally to whisper something into her ear, and whatever it is makes her smile with all teeth. Yangyang’s perched beside them, blunt between his fingers, half-listening to some girl’s story but his eyes aren’t on her. They’re locked on you. Or more specifically, your ass. He doesn’t bother hiding it. Mark is beside him, silent, back against the couch, elbows resting on his knees, watching nothing and everything all at once.

And you—you’re the only one who hasn’t gotten started with your boy draft. Not because you don’t want to, not because the game doesn’t thrill you in some small, vicious way, but because you can’t see him. The one you drew. It’s his party, his apartment, his name scrawled on the card you pulled. You can feel him—can feel the tension curling at the base of your spine, the way the air shifts like it’s bracing for him—but you can’t find him. It’s like chasing a shadow, like being haunted by a presence that refuses to take form. He’s everywhere and nowhere, a phenomenon stitched into the walls of this place. And you can’t begin until he does.

You approach your friends slowly, heat licking up your thighs with every step. Mark’s gaze lifts first, and he raises his drink toward you with a lazy nod. “You look pretty,” he says as sweetly as he can muster, and it should mean something—but it doesn’t. Not when his voice is flat, eyes already drifting toward the crowd, toward Areum. His want is obvious, it’s need, the kind that coils in the gut, slow and starving. You can see it in the twitch of his jaw, the way his fingers tighten around the glass. He doesn’t want to be here, wants to be inside of her.

Yangyang doesn’t even bother pretending. The girl next to him keeps talking, laughing too loud, leaning in with bold touches and eager glances, but his attention doesn’t flicker once. His eyes are locked on you—hungry, dark, possessive. They trail over every inch of you like a map he’s memorized, tongue darting out to wet his lips, and when he finally speaks, it’s a moan disguised as a compliment. “You look sexy,” he growls, tilting his head back, and you catch the shift in his lap immediately. He’s hard.

You’re about to shove his shoulder, roll your eyes, say something sharp—Yangyang, move over,—but you don’t get the chance. His arm snakes around your waist in one swift motion, anchoring you down onto his lap like you belong there, like you’ve always belonged there. The girl next to him stutters mid-sentence, confused, then falls silent, watching with wide eyes as Yangyang leans back, attention fully on you.

“Yangyang!” you gasp, surprised laughter slipping out before you can help it. His hands slide down your thighs, firm, grounding, and when you try to wriggle free, you feel the pressure of his cock beneath you—hard, deliberate, shameless. You squirm instinctively, cheeks burning, fingers clutching at his shoulder. “Let me go. Right now.”

He just grins, buzzed and easy, eyes heavy-lidded and dark with something unreadable. “Come on,” he murmurs, voice low and thick like a dare brushed against your skin. “No seat? You always end up here.” His hips shift beneath you, slow and casual, but the pressure is unmistakable—it draws a soft sound from your lips before you can stop it. The reaction is instinct, your thighs tightening without thought, the heat blooming quietly in response. There’s an ease to it, a natural rhythm your body remembers without asking, like this has always been muscle memory. Like it never really left.

Your dress rides up high—too high—so you tug it down with shaky fingers, heart racing, skin flushed. And even though you shift just to readjust, the slow drag of your ass over his lap is instinctual, something your body does without thinking, something that always happens when you sit like this. If it were Jeno, you wouldn’t still be facing forward. He wouldn’t let you. You’d already be turned around, straddling him, dress bunched at your waist, his hands gripping your hips while you bounce on his cock slow and messy, lips parted, breath caught somewhere between a moan and a gasp. Your thighs would burn, your back would arch, his name would fall from your mouth like a habit. But it’s not Jeno. It’s Yangyang. And Yangyang’s laugh is sharp when you feel the shift under you. “Yeah, Yangyang—but that was as friends!” you snap, voice higher now, eyes wide. “You’re hard, you absolute pervert!”

Mark still doesn’t look at you, just swirls the ice in his drink, that same disinterested tone dragging the words out slow. “So let me get this straight—you’ve been bouncing on his lap like that at all the parties? The river court? That shitty bowling alley we used to go to? All those nights I thought, oh, they’re just close friends, and you were out here acting out porn in real time?” His eyes flick up, unimpressed.

Yangyang doesn’t even deny it—he just shrugs with that smug little smirk like he’s already claimed the title.

You whip your head toward Yangyang, scandal flaring in your eyes. “No,” you bite out, like the syllable itself is some desperate spell meant to rewrite every memory. As if denying it now could scrub out all the times you’ve ended up here—perched on his lap, too close, too comfortable, like your body always knew the script before your brain did. But your voice falters, guilty without meaning to be, and your thighs are still draped across his like they belong there. Mark doesn’t say a word. Just hums low, gaze turning elsewhere, like he’s finally letting himself believe what he should’ve seen all along.

You turn toward Yangyang sharply, snatching the joint from his fingers with a glare and the intent to finally get off—but then you pause. His grin doesn’t fade exactly, but it falters. Just for a second. You see the shift before he even speaks. That soft, flickering edge to his gaze. His lashes lower, mouth twitching, shoulders sinking in the way they only do when he’s too high and the world’s starting to feel too real.

“Hey, you okay?” You murmur, voice lower now, softer, threading through the noise like smoke. You lean in so only he can hear, your arm curling around his shoulder, palm pressed lightly to his chest where you feel it stutter beneath your touch. You’d never let yourself get this close—not like this, not anymore—but you’re high and not thinking, or maybe thinking too much, and he looks like he’s seconds from unraveling.

You’ve known Yangyang for years. You know every tell. Every silence. And right now, he’s slipping beneath the noise, beneath the flirtation and bravado, somewhere quieter, sadder. He swallows hard. His eyes meet yours and they’re glassy, glinting with something raw. He shakes his head. “Can we talk later?” he whispers, the words cracked and honest. “It’s important.”

You nod instantly, eyes softening as your fingers curl tighter around his. “Of course we can,” you murmur, voice barely above a breath. You squeeze his hand gently, grounding him, pulling him back to you. “I’ve got you,” you say again, quieter this time, like a promise only meant for him.

It’s only then that you feel it, an unmistakable prickle at the back of your neck, sharp and deliberate, like a live wire strung tight beneath your skin. A gaze so heavy it anchors your spine before you even turn to find it. And when you do, your heart doesn’t leap, it drops. Jeno stands across the room like he’s been there the whole time, waiting for you to notice. He’s backlit by slow-flickering neon, jaw locked, shoulders squared, eyes set on you with a stare so cutting it could flay you open. It’s not curious nor confused, it’s fury carved into bone. His arms are crossed, his posture rigid, like it’s taking every ounce of control not to act. There’s a pulse behind his eyes that doesn’t blink, doesn’t shift, doesn’t soften—not even when Areum shifts beside him, glass in hand, her glare simmering with poorly veiled disgust. He doesn’t even seem to register her voice. His eyes never leave you—not when you shift on Yangyang’s lap, not when your fingers tighten around his shoulders, not when you throw your head back laughing like you’ve forgotten who’s watching.

Yangyang follows the line of your gaze, his smirk flickering for a split second when he catches the way your eyes lock onto Jeno. He leans in closer, voice low but obnoxious, smug curling at the edge of his mouth. There's something storming in his eyes—something that has less to do with jealousy and more to do with pride, heat, the thrill of being the one touching you while someone else can only look. "What, you think he’s gonna do something?" he mutters, cocking his head, eyes narrowing in Jeno’s direction. Then, more immature now, more crude, he adds, “If he wants to watch so bad, why don’t you just start bouncing on me? Bet that’d fuck him up.”

You snap your head toward him, eyes wide, breath catching with a mix of disbelief and irritation. “Yangyang,” you hiss under your breath, sharp, warning. But he just grins wider, like he’s proud of himself. Like he thinks he’s winning. It’s not funny anymore. Not when you can feel the burn of Jeno’s stare, not when your pulse is skipping and your dress feels too tight and your body’s caught in the middle of a war you never agreed to start.

You shift your weight, untangle yourself from Yangyang’s lap without another word. He doesn’t stop you—just leans back with a smug roll of his eyes, arms spread lazily across the couch like he’s made his point. You pull your dress down, every motion stiff, tense, and you turn, intending to put distance between yourself and the attention still licking up your skin, but stop dead in your tracks.

Areum stands in front of you, silent, still. She doesn’t announce herself, doesn’t need to, her eyes doing all the talking, narrowed and bitter, holding something she clearly thinks you’re scared of but you’re not. You don’t even flinch, already knowing exactly why she’s here, knowing nothing good is going to come out of her mouth, and still, you’re unfazed. She’s small, and whatever rage she’s trying to harness reads more like a tantrum than a threat. You’ve seen storms, Areum looks like drizzle. It’s you she should be worried about, you who doesn’t yell to make a point, you who doesn’t need to raise your voice to end a conversation before it starts. If she wants to light a fuse, fine, you’re already holding the match.

She speaks quietly, but her words hit like a slap. "You have some cheek, you know. Some nerve doing all of that with Yangyang when Jeno’s right there. What’s it been—a few weeks since you broke up with him and you’re already onto the next?”

You almost laugh, the sound bubbling up more from disbelief than amusement. “And what was I doing exactly?” you ask, voice sharp with clarity. “He pulled me onto his lap because there was no seat for me, do you think I should’ve just sat on the floor? And who told you I moved on? I literally haven’t. If you’re gonna run your mouth then at least know what you’re talking about.”

That should’ve ended it but it doesn’t. Areum’s breathing shifts. Quickens. Her brows furrow and her lips part—and then the dam breaks. She doesn’t just speak. She spirals. Words tumble from her mouth faster than she can control them. “You didn’t have to sit there,” she snaps, tone clipped, trembling slightly beneath the surface. “You stayed. You laughed. You let him touch you like that and maybe you haven’t moved on but it looked like you wanted to.” Her voice drops lower, bitter, careful. “And you knew Jeno was watching.”

You blink, once, twice, letting her words sit in the silence she leaves behind. Then you exhale, soft but sharp, like you’re choosing not to raise your voice only because she doesn’t deserve it. “Of course I wouldn’t want him to see,” you bite out, voice calm but edged. “But it wouldn’t have mattered if he did because it means nothing to me.”

Areum scoffs, tilting her head, arms still crossed. “Then why’d you stay on his lap so long? Wanted to feel wanted, is that it?” Her voice is sharp, smug, like she thinks she’s hit something real. “Or was it just the closest you could get to being touched by Jeno again?”

You blink once, twice, more stunned by her nerve than her words. You hadn’t expected her to be this mouthy, this bold but you suppose heartbreak does that to people—it strips the softness right out of them and leaves behind nothing but sharp edges and misplaced rage. You know she and Mark broke up, Mark told you himself, quiet and embarrassed, eyes downcast like he didn’t want to admit it. You hadn’t pushed, you didn’t need to because now, watching Areum unravel in front of you, you see everything he didn’t say. Her eyes keep darting to him—over your shoulder, behind your back, flickering to the corner where Mark still stands with your friends. He’s looking over too, jaw tight, arms crossed, eyes locked on Areum with that familiar look that says he’s ready to step in if he needs to. You hold her gaze, but your awareness of him never falters.

She’s not fighting you. Not really. She’s fighting herself and you can tell. You’ve always been able to dissect people, to see the cracks even when they’re trying to be whole. Areum’s voice might be steady but everything else screams chaos—her shoulders tight, her breathing too quick, her fingers twitching like she doesn’t know what to do with them. It’s not anger, it’s guilt, it’s projection. She’s the one who left, she’s the one who gave up Mark and now she’s standing here, trying to act like you’re the problem because it’s easier than admitting she made a mistake. You could laugh. You almost do.

So you let it simmer for a beat. Let her stew in her own silence. Then you speak, slow and measured, every word deliberate. “You’re angry because I sat on someone’s lap, because I laughed. Meanwhile, you’ve been by Jeno’s side all night, pretending you’re not still in love with someone else. Don’t project your guilt onto me, Areum. If you feel bad about what you did to Mark, take it up with yourself. Don’t come for me because you can’t handle the consequences of your choices.”

You don’t blink when her eyes flare with something close to fury, don’t shift even as her stance tightens like she’s bracing for impact. You just stare, unbothered, the way someone does when they’ve already won, arms hanging loose at your sides, posture relaxed—not because you’re calm but because you choose to be, because nothing about her shakes you. Your stillness isn’t silence, it’s power, and it radiates, settling thick in the air between you like heat before lightning. She knows it, sees it in your eyes, in the tilt of your head, in the slight lift of your brow like you’re asking if that’s all, because this is what control looks like and you wear it like skin.

Areum swallows hard, throat bobbing once. “I’m not trying to argue,” she says, voice low and clipped, her gaze darting sideways before settling back on you, something like frustration flickering behind it. “It’s just—he was watching. That’s all.”

You shrug, slow, sharp, like you’re not pressed, like you’ve already run the numbers in your head and come out clean. “Yeah? Well, I’ve seen him with other girls too,” you say, tone cool, edged with something quieter, something that burns lower. “Too close, too friendly, hands where they don’t need to be. Doesn’t matter if he’s not fucking them, he still touches them like I’m not watching.” Your eyes flick back to hers, jaw tight. “So if you’re waiting on me to feel bad, don’t. I’ve already swallowed worse.”

Her expression twists, but it’s not anger this time, not exactly. Something shifts in the silence between you, weightier than anything said so far. She scoffs under her breath, a sound that tries for casual and misses, then mutters, “You’re putting on a show, you know. For someone who made such a fuss over the boy draft, you went all out with his basket. Kinda funny how you haven’t even tried to give it to him tonight. Guess flirting with Yangyang’s the new plan?”

You don’t flinch. You don’t blink. You tilt your head with that same deadpan control, the corners of your lips twitching like you’re seconds from laughter. “If you think that’s me flirting, you really need to get out more.”

Mark gets up quietly but with purpose and the motion itself is enough to shift the tension. You see him from the corner of your eye as he moves across the room, slipping through bodies that have begun to linger, to watch, to whisper. The weight of too many eyes presses down on the space between you and Areum, and it makes the air tight, claustrophobic. The argument, no matter how low your voices were kept, has drawn attention. The murmurs have started, heads are turned, and Mark feels every bit of it.

He stops beside Areum, doesn’t touch her, just stands close enough to make his presence known. Then he looks at you both. His expression is unreadable at first—tired, maybe—but then he shakes his head, once, slowly, and it’s full of something heavier than disappointment. His voice isn’t loud but it’s firm. "This isn’t it," he says, to no one and both of you. "Not like this. Not here."

Mark’s eyes flicker between you and Areum, jaw tight, and you can tell this hurts him. He’s not mad—he’s uncomfortable, unsettled. You’ve known him long enough to know what that look means. Mark Lee doesn’t do conflict like this well, especially not between people he cares about, and right now, that’s what’s killing him. You. Areum. The two people who’ve been constants in different ways, standing across from each other like enemies. It makes his stomach churn.

He exhales, rubs the back of his neck. His gaze lingers a little longer on Areum, softer, knowing. He gets why she’s like this. He knows it’s not really about the lap, or the laugh, or even the draft. It’s about the fact that she cares—still, deeply, maybe too much. He knows it’s coming from a place of protectiveness but it doesn’t make this right.

He looks at you next, and this time, the shake of his head is gentler. Like he’s asking you not to do this. Not now. Not in front of everyone. Not when the night is already hanging by a thread. "You two need to stop," he says, quieter now, just for the three of you. "This is getting out of hand. You both know it."

Areum doesn’t move, but you see her jaw clench. "She started it," she mutters under her breath.

You let out a low laugh, eyes narrowing. "Please, Areum. You came to me."

Mark cuts in before it can spiral again. "I don’t care who started it. I care that it ends here. Now." The heat between you and Areum still simmers like an open flame. Mark’s trying to put it out with water, but neither of you are sure you’re ready to let it die just yet. You and Areum both fall silent, the tension coiled tight between you, and for a moment, it feels like the entire room exhales with him. But before anything else can settle, the spell breaks with a flick of hair and the sound of heels clicking softly on the floor.

Karina appears like she always does—unbothered, glossed up, and halfway through a vodka cranberry. She slides into the tension with zero regard, glancing between you and Areum like you’re both interrupting her night. "I’m so sorry to cut this catfight short," she drawls, eyebrows raised, tone amused but sharp, "but you two—" she points lazily between you and Areum with her cup, "—are the only ones left on the team who haven’t finished your fantasy boy drafts. The night’s basically over. You’ve got, like, twenty minutes. Tops. So chop chop."

She takes a sip, then continues, voice louder now, like she’s announcing to a room that already knows. "Ningning’s still on Chenle’s lap, whispering God knows what into his ear. Yeji has practically claimed Wooyoung like a stray cat. Mia literally sat on Renjun’s shoulders and fed him grapes, Aisha’s in the lead, by the way. She made Hyunjin get down on his knees and bark for her twice." She pauses, tilts her head. "So what’s the hold up? The game doesn’t play itself. And we’re not about to let you ruin our win streak because you’re both too busy throwing daggers at each other with your eyes."

Before either of you can respond, you catch the movement beside you. Areum leans in close to Mark, lips brushing his ear as she whispers something you don’t catch. Whatever it is, it makes his expression change instantly—his shoulders relax, his mouth tilts up just slightly, eyes softening like he’s remembering something he missed. He nods once, and then she grabs his hand, and they disappear through the hallway together, slipping somewhere more private, fingers laced tight like they’ve already made their choice.

And that’s when it hits you. The night’s still going. You look across the room, and Jeno is still there—exactly where he’s been the entire time. His eyes are on you, not wandering, not searching. Fixed. And there’s something in them you haven’t seen in a while. Something softer. Something that makes your chest ache.

You don’t think it’s for you, you’re completely sure it’s for her—Areum. He saw what she did, how she defended him without pause, how she stood in front of you with her hands clenched and her voice shaking because something in her wanted to protect him. That must’ve meant something to him. Maybe they talked after that party, when he found out about her and Mark, after everything burned down. Maybe they made sense of it, quietly, off to the side where no one else could see. Maybe that look in his eyes now is the aftermath of forgiveness.

And you’re glad. Honestly. If there’s one thing you’ve never doubted, it’s that Jeno deserves to be cared for. Not questioned, not doubted, not held at a distance like you’ve had no choice but to do. He deserves someone who chooses him fully. And if that softness can’t come from you—not anymore—then at least it’s coming from somewhere.

Karina’s lips curve, amused, her voice low and laced with mischief. “Stop staring and do something about it. Take him to a room, lock the door, suck his cock, whoever gets the furthest with their boy wins a prize.” She lifts a brow, eyes glinting, fully aware of what she’s doing. She knows you too well. Knows exactly how to bait you, how to turn your competitiveness into movement, especially when Jeno’s involved. One sentence, and she’s already lit the match.

Your heartbeat stutters, quickens—not just from Karina’s words, but from the way his eyes haven’t moved since. Locked on you, steady, unreadable. There’s heat coiling low in your belly, your throat going dry, skin burning beneath the weight of his stare. He hasn’t blinked, hasn’t flinched, just stands there watching you like he already knows what you’re thinking. You’re seconds from crossing the room, ready to face whatever he gives you—his anger, his silence, his mouth telling you to fuck off while his eyes say the opposite—but then something shifts. The air, the room, the mood. And suddenly, you’re not moving toward him at all.

He doesn’t come from any direction. He doesn’t approach. He just appears suddenly, jarringly, like a hand closing around your throat mid-breath. His presence is unpleasant in the way a shadow grows too fast, swallowing space before you realize it’s even there. You don’t see him until he’s already beside you, until his breath hits the curve of your cheek and something inside you tenses without warning.

You’ve never spoken to Yeonjun before, never had a reason to. There was never any overlap, no need, no interest. Everything you know about him comes secondhand, filtered through the sharpness of Jeno’s voice or the tension in Mark’s jaw. You’ve heard his name often enough, always bitter on Jeno’s tongue, spat out like something rotten. You’ve seen his face on ‘Busan Titan’ posters across the city, eyes cocky, smirk carved into his mouth like a promise. That rivalry runs deep, Seoul Ravens versus Titans but what sticks isn’t the competition, it’s the history. It’s what he used to do every time Jeno and Areum were on a break, fucking her like she didn’t matter, like none of it did. Jeno could never stand it, hated the way she’d fall back into Yeonjun’s arms like it was routine, hated how disposable it made everything feel.

Mark hates him too, not just because Jeno does but because Yeonjun has no concept of boundaries. He’d flirt with Areum in front of everyone, even when she was with Mark, sliding in close, saying things loud enough to be heard, smirking like he knew no one would stop him, like rules didn’t apply to him, like respect was optional.

Now he's looking at you, his eyes raking over you slowly, deliberately, like he has every right to take you in like that. There's something predatory in his stare—not urgent, not hungry, but certain. As if the outcome has already been decided and he's just waiting for you to catch up. You feel it before you hear him, the shift, the pressure, the discomfort settling into your shoulders like weight, prickling beneath your skin.

“Hi, pretty—fuck, I’ve been staring at you all night. Little dress hugging every curve, that tight ass—driving me insane.” Every syllable lands like a touch you didn’t consent to—sharp, lingering, wrong. He leans in, breath brushing your cheek, and it takes everything in you not to flinch. He smells like whiskey and cheap cologne, and he looks at you like he already owns the ending. Like this isn’t a threat, but a promise.

“I’ve been meaning to get my hands on you since that bar performance,” he murmurs, voice low like it’s meant to be intimate. “You up there, all lips and legs, singing like you didn’t know you were putting on a show just for me.” You step back on instinct but he steps forward like it’s a game, like he’s enjoying it. His voice is slurred but smug, breath sticky with alcohol, and the way he grins at you, lip caught between his teeth, is the most revolting thing you’ve seen all night. Like he thinks he’s being charming, like he expects you to giggle and blush but your skin crawls.

Your hands curl into fists. He doesn’t stop, his eyes dip again, slower this time, and he murmurs, “Bet you sound even prettier moaning than you do singing. Maybe I should take you backstage, see for myself. Bet that mouth would look so good stretched around my cock.” Yeonjun’s words land like a slap, vulgar and shameless as his fingers graze your wrist. “Wonder how tight that pussy is, bet it’s perfect,” he mutters, low and disgusting, his breath curling hot against your cheek. “Wanna feel it squeezing around me.” His hand lingers too long, then grips—tight, insistent. “Come with me,” he says, but it’s not a question. “Let’s find a room. You want to, don’t you?”

“I wouldn’t go near you if someone paid me,” you say, low and even, every syllable cutting clean. “You think talking like that makes you hot? It makes you pathetic. You’re not charming or attractive. You’re just the guy everyone warns their friends about, the one who doesn’t get told no enough.” Your eyes drag over him, sharp and unimpressed. “I’d rather fuck concrete.”

There’s a beat of silence and then he laughs, not embarrassed, not ashamed but excited. “Oh, you’ve got a mouth on you,” he says, eyes gleaming like he’s just found a new game. “Bet it’d look even better stuffed full. Keep talking like that, and I’m gonna start thinking you want me to ruin you.” His fingers dig in harder. The more you resist, the more he leans in, breathing you in like he’s savoring the fight. He thinks your anger is foreplay. He thinks your disgust is foreplay. He doesn’t care that you hate him—he likes it. But that’s exactly why he’s going to regret ever thinking he had a chance.

Your stomach twists, bile creeping up your throat. The air feels thick, suffocating, tainted by him. You rip your hand out of his grip with force, shoving him back with a sharp press to the chest. Your voice doesn’t waver, doesn’t rise—it cuts, low and lethal, slicing clean through the static of the room. “Don’t fucking touch me again.” You don’t flinch. You don’t blink. “Get the fuck away from me.”

Behind you movement surges, it’s not hesitant, it’s not casual, it’s fast, deliberate, and when you glance back, you see the boys you trust most closing in like a wall. Yangyang’s already in motion, face drawn tight with restrained fury, Donghyuck and Chenle shift forward in sync, no words spoken, just a sharp, mutual understanding passing between them, but it’s Shotaro who anchors the space, who steps out from behind the others, no longer soft-spoken or reserved but entirely transformed.

His eyes are locked on Yeonjun, sharp and unblinking, his jaw clenched so tight the tendons in his neck strain, his hands trembling where they’re fisted at his sides. There’s no smile, no playfulness, none of the gentle softness that usually cushions his presence. This is something else entirely—this is Shotaro seeing red. “That’s enough,” he snaps, and the sound is louder than anything you’ve ever heard from him. The room freezes. You feel it, like a static charge in the air. People glance over, heads turning, murmurs starting to rise. And he doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t shrink. He steps forward, slots himself between you and Yeonjun like a shield, his chest heaving.

The tone in his voice is ragged and unfamiliar, dragged up from someplace deep and rarely touched. “Enough with the bar shit,” he growls, each word deliberate, heavy. “You think just because she sings she’s yours to touch? Yours to talk to like that? Like she’s some kind of fucking show you can buy tickets to and grab after?” Gasps ripple around you, someone even lets out a stunned ‘oh my god.’ You hear a glass clink hard against the table and behind you Ryujin fans herself slowly, eyebrows raised, the grin pulling at her mouth smug and so proud. She mouths finally, and you almost laugh, even now.

Because it means something, this. It means everything. Shotaro, soft-spoken Shotaro, the one who rarely yells, rarely curses, rarely does more than watch with a kind heart and tired smile, he’s the one losing it and it’s for you, in front of everyone. The room is watching. Your heart is racing but all you can feel is safe.

Yeonjun just scoffs, casual, still smug, like none of this phases him, he tips his head back, raises his voice for the crowd that’s already watching. “Come on baby,” he purrs. “You love my attention, stop pretending, I know that you want it just as much as I do.”

But Shotaro doesn’t flinch, he doesn’t let the performance sway him, his shoulders square tighter, body braced like he might lunge. His voice cuts clean through the tension, and it’s not performative, it’s protective, deadly serious. “Say one more fucking word, go on, see what happens.” He doesn’t yell it, he doesn’t need to, the warning hits harder in its calmness.

Behind him, Yangyang shifts closer, eyes locked on Yeonjun like a second hit waiting to land, Chenle’s hands are clenched at his sides, Donghyuck mutters something under his breath that sounds like “fucking creep” but his stare doesn’t leave Yeonjun for a second. None of them are smiling, none of them are performing, this isn’t for show, this is for you.

But still, Yeonjun smirks, he looks past them, straight at you, and that’s when you hear it, snickers, soft at first, then louder. Your eyes flicker to the side. Aisha. Mia, a cluster of cheerleaders leaning by the drink table, laughing behind their hands, elbowing each other, Aisha catches your eye, grins wider, Mia mouths something you don’t bother trying to read. Your stomach sinks, you thought the slumber party worked, you thought your effort, your vulnerability, your hosting, the drinks, the gift baskets, the confessions and the team bonding meant something. You thought it made you safer, that it earned you space. Apparently not.

You don’t notice him at first. Or maybe you do, maybe some part of you always does, not consciously, not clearly but in the way the air changes— denser, heavier, charged like the hush before thunder. The kind of tension that settles into the bones, not the skin. That’s when your spine straightens. That’s when your breath stutters in your throat. That’s when you know he’s coming.

Jeno doesn’t storm in. He doesn’t shove or bark or announce himself like someone desperate to be seen. He doesn’t need to. He arrives, in the truest sense of the word. Each step calculated. Each breath steady. It’s not dramatic, it’s deliberate. He cuts through the crowd with the gravity of something planetary, like the world shifts slightly to make space for him. You don’t see him at first but you feel him like a stormfront, slow-building and inevitable. By the time he’s near, by the time he’s behind you, close enough to graze his knuckles along your spine, it’s like he’s always been there and maybe he has.

He doesn’t speak right away, he doesn’t have to. His hand is already at your waist, guiding, claiming, moving you behind him with a touch that feels both instinctive and intentional. His other hand curls into a fist at his side, the slow tension in his jaw betraying the composure he’s barely holding onto. Then he speaks and it’s not just a voice, it’s a verdict.

“You’ve gotten on my nerves for a long time,” he says, voice low and dangerous, dragging like smoke over flame. “Fucking around with my ex was one thing but now you’re trying to fuck around with what’s mine?” The words hang heavy between them, laced with something deeper, something unspoken but clear. There’s no hesitation, no show of force—he doesn’t need it. His presence is enough. His anger is controlled, precise, locked down tight like a blade unsheathed just enough to flash. “Touch her again,” he murmurs, voice dipped in something dangerous, “and you’re leaving in an ambulance. Try me.”

Yeonjun laughs, a rough, dismissive sound, tossing his head back like this is entertainment. “You’re funny. You didn’t see the way she was sitting on Yangyang’s lap earlier? All sweet and soft like she didn’t know exactly what she was doing and you still think she’s yours? You think she belongs to anyone but herself? Get real.”

His mouth curls, but it’s not a smile. “Yeah, I saw it,” he says flatly. “So what? She’s still mine.” He tilts his head slightly, eyes locked. “You know why? Because she wouldn’t look at you twice if I was in the room.”

He pauses for only a second but in it, he looks at you. Fully, his eyes raking over you in that dress, tight, glossy and sinful and his mouth parts like it steals his breath. His tongue flicks over his bottom lip and he sighs, quiet but audible. Like he knows. Like he knows you wore it for him. Like he’s thinking about what’s under it. Like he’s remembering. You gulp because you are his, the way he’s looking at you makes you feel it in your chest, in your core, in your throat. Your thighs squeeze together and he notices that too. It flashes in his eyes, in the way he drags them up your legs, to your mouth, like he wants it on his you can’t deny how much you want him, can’t ignore the slow throb that builds under his stare.

It’s a reminder of everything he still is to you and that kills you because no matter how much you love him, you can’t be his. Not now. Not when so much of you is still in pieces but the feeling of being his—it obliterates the logic, it makes everything else irrelevant. There’s nothing in the world like that grip he has on you, the way he makes you feel claimed without even touching you. His presence alone, his voice curling through the air, his anger on your behalf all combine into something unbearable, something intimate and sharp, and it makes everything inside you want to give in.

Out of the corner of your eye you catch Yangyang’s gaze, his jaw tight, lips drawn into a grim line. He looks away almost instantly, like it burned to witness, like it hurt in a way he wasn’t prepared for, raw and sudden and sharp enough to leave a mark. But you saw it, clear as day a flicker of envy, the weight of something deeper, darker, the kind of quiet fury that belongs to someone who knows they never had a real shot, not when it’s always been him, not when Jeno was always going to be the center of your gravity, the force you orbit no matter how far you try to drift, even if staying in his pull tears you apart piece by piece.

Yeonjun sneers, head tilting, grin slicing across his face like he knows exactly what nerve to hit. “Oh, I get it now,” he says, voice loud, taunting, meant for the crowd. “What’s the plan, Jeno? You watching or joining? I don’t mind—long as I get to feel your girl’s tight pussy wrapped around me.” His eyes gleam, filthy. “Heard you two like to share, I’ve heard about all your threesomes, isn’t that how it goes?”

Gasps ripple sharp through the crowd, a single line of shock splitting the tension like lightning. The atmosphere shifts, fractures and turns volatile. Jeno doesn’t speak at first, he breathes in slowly and deeply through his nose and lets it go with a calm so eerie it stills the noise around him. He doesn’t yell or flinch, he just raises his hands, smooth and quiet, pushing his sleeves up to his elbows like it’s routine, as if he’s done this before. His jaw tightens, sharp, and the muscle ticks once, then again. He tilts his head just slightly to the side, eyes locked on Yeonjun, unreadable, and then comes the crack of his knuckles—loud in the silence, final, like the sound of something breaking.

The crowd reacts instantly, like animals sensing a predator. Bodies shift, people back up without thinking, clearing a path as instinct kicks in. Phones are already out, lifted into the air like weapons, screens glowing. Whispers ripple like static—fast, sharp, rising in pitch until someone finally says it out loud. Then another. Then a chorus. “Fight.” It rolls through the room like a chant, voices stacking over one another, urgent and hungry. You can feel it in the air, the change, the way everything tilts toward something explosive. This isn’t posturing, this is a threat and it’s real.

“You’ve got one more chance,” Jeno says, voice low and coiled, barely above a whisper but it cuts through everything. “You’ve always been this way. Always slinking around parties, talking like this to girls. You wait until they’re drunk, or alone, or too fucking scared to tell you to fuck off and it works for you, doesn’t it? They don’t know how to make you stop, you count on them being afraid.”

“But I’m not one of them,” he says, every word like iron. “I’m not scared of you, I’m not impressed by you, I’m not gonna let you walk away thinking you’ll do this to someone else.” He lowers his voice further, the kind of quiet that makes your pulse spike. “I’ve seen the way you fold the second someone your size steps in. You’ve always been cocky because no one’s ever shut you the fuck up, right?” He smiles, not kind or calm but slow and sharp, full of something that feels like inevitability as his voice drops lower and he says, “Guess that’s why it has to be me.”

Yeonjun lets out a scoff, loud and dismissive, then shifts his weight, turning his head deliberately toward you. His eyes land on you like a spotlight, dark and invasive, scanning every inch with a hunger that makes your stomach turn. “You must be special then,” he says, voice oily. “Got two men ready to throw punches for you. Makes me wonder what that pussy really feels like.”

His hand moves before you can brace, sliding down the curve of your waist with unwelcome confidence, fingers splaying wide as he grabs a rough handful of your ass, then pulls back just enough to slap it—loud, deliberate, the sound cracking through the air like a spark to dry kindling.

In response, Jeno moves too. Not just moves—unleashes. He growls low, teeth gritted, the sound more beast than man. His entire body coils beside you like a fuse lit too fast, muscles drawn tight across his frame, arms flexing with a fury so raw it hums through the air. His feet plant firm against the floor, every inch of him braced to strike, eyes locked on Yeonjun with a glare sharp enough to split bone. The crowd gasps. The air fractures and for a single breathless heartbeat, time stutters—caught between his rage and the impact you almost expect him to make.

It should be him. Every signal points to it—his locked jaw, the fury carved into his stance, the way his body coils like a wire pulled too tight. He looks ready to snap, to lunge, to land the kind of punch that would knock Yeonjun flat and never let him forget it. The crowd feels it too; phones lift, screens glow, anticipation tightening like a fist around the room. Jeno moves forward, the pressure rising with every step, every breath, every second that passes without a hit.

Except it doesn’t come from him.

The noise doesn’t follow his fist, and the contact isn’t his to claim. The shift is too fast to catch clean, the angle just out of frame, and for a second, everyone blinks, unsure of what just happened—until Yeonjun reels back, stunned and staggering, eyes wide, lips bleeding. All heads turn, not to Jeno but to you.

Your fist hits Yeonjun’s jaw with a force that shocks even you, the crack sharp and satisfying, slicing through the air like a gunshot. Pain explodes through your knuckles, hot and immediate, but it’s nothing compared to the sight of him stumbling backwards, wide-eyed and stunned, crashing down in a graceless sprawl that sends the room into chaos. Gasps ripple out first, followed by laughter, a chorus of cheers, and someone near the back yells loud enough for everyone to hear, “Holy shit—he just got dropped by a girl!” Another voice echoes, cackling, “That’s it, wrap it up! He’s finished!”

Yeonjun scrambles, tripping over his own shoes, one hand covering his bleeding nose, the other reaching blindly for the nearest support. He looks at you like he’s never seen you before, like he can’t comprehend the humiliation washing over him in waves. The cowardice shows in the way he doesn’t speak, doesn’t dare look at Jeno. He just slinks off, face burning, body trembling, too stunned to form words.

You shake out your hand slowly, fingers flexing with the sting, blood smearing red and raw across your knuckle. It burns, sharp and insistent, but you feel steady, taller, anchored by the electricity still rushing through your veins. The ache is hot, heady, almost addictive—the kind of pain that makes you feel alive, makes you feel like something has finally shifted.

Jeno moves without a word, he grabs a tissue from a nearby table and steps in close, closer than anyone else would dare. His fingers are warm as they brush yours, dabbing gently at the bleeding skin with slow, precise pressure. His touch is careful, reverent, like he’s tending to something precious. His eyes never leave your face—not once—and when you finally look up, they’re burning. Dark. Starved. His lip is caught between his teeth, jaw tense, chest rising with shallow breaths. There’s a heat in the space between you now, thick and unbearable, not just from the adrenaline, not just from the violence but from the way he sees you. From the way you feel him seeing you. Strong. Untouchable. His.

You see Karina in the corner of your eye, leaning back against the drink table like she hasn’t got a care in the world. She throws you a dramatic thumbs up and mouths the words boy draft with an exaggerated grin, then follows it with something filthier— “get that cock!” lips shaping around every syllable like a punchline meant just for you. It makes you almost laugh, your chest still heaving from the adrenaline.

He’s waiting for you, not with words but with his body, his hand already curling around your waist, firm and familiar like it belongs there. He tugs you close, just enough for your hips to brush, for the air to shift, heavy and electric between you. There’s heat rolling off him in waves, and the way he looks at you, dark eyes fixed and unwavering, it makes your breath catch. Slowly, his other hand lifts, palm up between you like an unspoken dare. It’s not just a gesture, it’s a command wrapped in tenderness, a question he already knows the answer to. You know exactly what he wants, where he wants you. You can feel it in every line of his body, in the way his fingers twitch like they’re already picturing you in his bed, straddling his lap, buried under his touch. And maybe you don’t know what will happen when the door closes behind you, if he’ll kiss you or break you or just hold you through whatever you’ve been pretending not to feel but it doesn’t matter. You want it. You want him. You’re already leaning in, already giving in, and his grip only tightens.

A brush of pressure lands on your shoulder, not forceful but enough to stir the air around you, enough to pull you out of Jeno’s gravity for half a second. You turn slowly, heart still pounding from the aftermath and there he is. Yangyang. His expression is tight, drawn with urgency, eyes rimmed red like he hasn’t blinked in too long. He doesn’t say your name, just leans in slightly, breath shaky and low, voice cracking on the edge of something raw. “Can we have that talk now?” The words fall too fast, too soft, but the way he looks at you—like he’s hanging off the last thread of something he doesn’t know how to fix—makes your throat go tight.

You blink. Once. Twice. Open your mouth, then close it. Then open it again. “Yangyang—” Jeno hasn’t moved but you feel him shift beside you, the slow pull of tension winding through his body. His arm tightens around your waist, fingers pressing firmer into your side like a silent warning, like a claim. His eyes narrow, sharp and simmering with restrained annoyance, the kind that doesn’t need words to be felt but Yangyang doesn’t step back, he lifts his hands instead, not touching, just outstretching them toward you, open, desperate, trembling at the edges with something unspoken, and the gesture makes your eyes widen, just slightly, because it’s not just what he’s asking. It’s how.

Your voice cracks before your composure does, barely above a whisper, but loaded with everything you can’t make sense of. “You had the entire night.” Your eyes go glassy as you stare at him, blinking too fast, like you’re trying to understand why now. Why this moment, why him and why now, when you were finally about to let yourself go where you actually wanted to be.

“Can’t it wait another time?” you ask, not unkindly, but firm.

Yangyang shakes his head fast, desperate. “No. I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t important. You know that.”

You hesitate, breath caught halfway between your ribs, pulse thudding loud in your ears. You want to go with Jeno. God, you want to. Your body is still humming from the aftershock of it all—his voice, his eyes, the way his fingers grip your waist. Your skin aches for him, your chest tight with the pull to be his again, even just for the night. You want the press of his mouth, the rough drag of his palms, the ache between your legs answered by the weight of him, the stillness, the dark, the undoing. He’s home. He’s gravity. He’s heat, and you’ve never needed it more.

But Yangyang’s gaze cuts through all of it. He looks like he’s unraveling, one breath away from breaking. His eyes are fractured glass—shiny, desperate, on the verge of shattering—and when they lock onto yours, something sharp twists in your gut. He’s not trying to pull you away, he’s trying to hold on before he loses the last thread and you feel it, a terrible, unbearable guilt, like whatever you choose, you’ll still be hurting someone, you’ll still be breaking something that was never supposed to fall apart.

You take a breath that doesn’t settle. One step forward would take you into Jeno, into everything you’ve been aching for since the moment his voice dropped, since the second he stepped in front of you, as if you belonged to him. His hand is still there, wrapped around your waist, his touch hovering in a way that makes you feel tethered and free all at once and it kills you because you don’t want to move. You just stand there, torn open, swallowing the guilt that rises like acid, burning its way up your throat. “I’ll come find you after,” you murmur, but it sounds thin, barely believable, barely anything at all. A promise made too late, too soft.

Jeno doesn’t look at you, his jaw set with a tension that splinters the edges of his expression, his mouth drawn so tightly it looks carved from stone and even though no sound escapes him, you can feel the violence in his silence, can taste it like metal on your tongue, thick and bitter. The room hums with it, a supernatural stillness, a haunting, like some ancient force has been awoken and tethered just barely in place by the thinnest thread of restraint. When he finally turns toward you, it isn’t abrupt, it isn’t soft, it’s deliberate, slow like a noose tightening, like the pause before a verdict is read, his stare not empty but too full, too quiet, holding more than it’s showing.

He doesn’t speak, he doesn’t need to, the silence around him howls and when you take that first step toward Yangyang, when your body leans into the space you carved with your yes, you feel it, the break, the irreversible shift, the ground doesn’t crack it cleaves, clean and devastating, a fault line between then and now, between who he was when he held you and who he’ll be after watching you walk away, you keep moving anyway because you said yes, because you always follow through, because regret is softer than betrayal until it isn’t.

Karina groans, loud and theatrical, tossing her hands in the air. “You are hands down the worst fantasy boy draft player of all time,” she says, voice sharp with mock exasperation. “This is exactly why half the team wants to change the rules next season—so we can steal from girls who can’t close.”

You follow Yangyang across the living room without a word, the air thick and weighted behind you, each step a pull against the heat still clinging to your skin. His hand brushes yours, guiding you toward one of the quieter bedrooms, and you let him, even as your heart stammers. You bite your lip and keep your eyes forward, not daring to glance back because you know if you do, if you meet Jeno’s stare even for a second, you won’t leave at all.

The door clicks shut behind you and Yangyang, quiet but too loud in the stillness, a sound that slices clean through the tension and seals the room around you like a vault, like a secret, like a mistake you haven’t made yet but already regret. Outside the window the party is still pulsing, muffled voices and laughter and music like a heartbeat you’re no longer synced with, but inside it’s deathly quiet, too quiet, the kind of quiet that demands something be broken just to prove you’re still alive. The room smells like Jeno, that clean heat of his cologne soaked into the cushions and it makes your stomach twist because it’s so intimate, so present, like he’s still here even though he’s not.

Yangyang is pacing, not frantically but aimlessly, his movements loose like a marionette cut from its strings, pausing in place only to start again like his thoughts are unspooling faster than he can catch them, his eyes flicking to you then away then back again, and it’s not just nerves, it’s unraveling. You don’t sit. You don’t move. You just watch him, your body still buzzing with the heat Jeno left behind, your skin aching from the way his hand had curled around your waist like it belonged there, like it had always belonged there.

Yangyang finally stills and you think he might speak but he doesn’t, he just looks at you, eyes wide and glassy and fixed, and when he reaches for your hand he doesn’t say anything, just laces his fingers with yours like that alone might keep him from falling apart. His thumb moves over your knuckles, soft and shaky, and his breathing isn’t steady, and the silence drags long between you, taut and full of everything neither of you are saying. You let it hang for a beat before you break it, voice low but not unkind, “You really couldn’t wait until another day” you ask, your words cutting through the quiet as your breath catches, the weight of the almost hanging off your ribs, “I was already leaving with him.”

He shakes his head fast, a hard jerk like denial alone will undo everything that’s unravelled, and you sigh, not because you’re angry but because this is too much, too fast, too late. “Tell me then,” you say, sharper now, because you’re starting to lose patience, “Tell me what’s happened.”

It doesn’t come all at once. He stammers. Starts and stops. His voice gets caught on words that won’t settle and you have to coax it out of him, your tone softer now, trying to untangle whatever’s knotted behind his eyes. You tell him it’s okay, that you’re here, that he can tell you anything and you see the way that gets to him, the way he starts to breathe easier under your voice, how the way you speak to him settles into his spine and drips down like something warm and welcome. He likes this. Likes you like this. It’s in the way his gaze drags across your mouth when you speak, the way he holds your hand tighter when you lean in to reassure him again, saying gently, “Whatever it is, Yang, I’ll help you figure it out. We’ll figure it out together.”

“So here’s what happened,” he says slowly, like he’s bracing himself, like the words are a bruise he’s pressing on just to prove it still hurts, “I didn’t mean for it to get this bad,” he adds quieter, almost like he’s confessing, like it costs something to say it aloud, “I’ve been slipping since the semester started but I kept thinking I could catch up, I was partying too much, missing classes, missing deadlines, skipping lectures but I figured I’d just pull it together like I always do”

His fingers flex at his sides and he looks anywhere but at you, eyes darting from your mouth to the floor to your hand like maybe the right place to rest will make this easier to say. “Then one of my professors, the only one who still gives a shit, offered me this chance, not extra credit exactly but something to prove I could be responsible, he gave me this external port, secured as hell, loaded with confidential shit—student files, departmental records, grading data, all that, I was supposed to bring it back first thing tomorrow”

He takes a shaky breath and you can see it hitch in his chest before he continues, “I didn’t even go home after class, I was in a rush, just shoved it in my bag and came straight here, I thought it’d be fine, I really did, I thought I was being careful, but somewhere between the drinks and the people and the fucking noise—I lost it, or someone took it, I don’t know, I don’t even remember when I stopped holding onto it”

His voice is tighter now, strained, like guilt is closing around his throat and won’t let go. “If I don’t return it, I’m fucked, it’s an academic breach, a serious one. I’m already on probation with the department and if this goes sideways I’m done, I’ll have to resit the whole year or worse.” Finally he lifts his eyes to yours, wide and desperate and glassy like he’s trying to make you feel all of it too, trying to make you understand how bad this is, how scared he is, “I know it’s not fair to ask you but you’re the only person I trust, you’ve always known how to fix things, you have access, you’re respected, you know how to move through stuff like this, you’re good—too good and I don’t have anyone else, just you”

You blink, eyes wide, throat tight with disbelief, "You’re serious," you breathe, more exhale than question.

He nods, voice splintering on the first word, "I know, I know I just—fuck, I didn’t know what else to do," his hands tremble where they cling to yours, "It’s gone, I fucked up and you’re the only person I know who can fix this," his voice cracks again, eyes glassy and desperate, "You have access, you know the systems, they trust you, you’re in every circle that matters, you’re the only one who could get into the right places without raising a single red flag, without getting caught."

Your stare hardens, brows pinch, you feel the shift inside you before your voice follows, low, razor-edged, "You want me to fix this?" You bite out, "you want me to break the rules? Breach the system? You do realize I could get expelled, Yangyang," you pull back slightly, but not far, "You really think I’d risk everything for you?"

He swallows like the words burn, "I think you will," he murmurs, "Because you’re good, because you care, even when you don’t want to, even when you know you shouldn’t, that’s why everyone comes to you, that’s why I came to you, because you always come through, for people you care about," his gaze doesn’t flinch, "You always come through for me."

You hesitate, barely, but it’s there, a glitch in your breath when his fingers twitch and yours don’t let go, like your body already betrayed you before your thoughts caught up. Your skin’s too hot, flushed with something synthetic and shameful, nerves buzzing just beneath the surface, pupils blown, heart jackhammering against your ribs—everything too loud, too close, too much. The drugs make it hard to think straight, harder to feel anything clean, but you feel this—his grip, unrelenting, like he’s scared you’ll vanish if he eases up even a little and maybe that’s why you don’t pull away. Maybe you like it. Maybe that’s worse.

Your brain keeps saying walk away, get it together, breathe, stop, but your hands won’t listen. They stay locked around his like instinct, like punishment, like guilt in motion, echoing the same mistakes you promised yourself you wouldn’t make again. You tip your head forward before you can stop yourself, a breath slipping out that feels too loud, too exposed, and his thumb brushes the edge of your palm, unintentional but careful. The contact short-circuits something inside you. Something thick and sour crawls up your throat, bitter and wrong, and you swallow it back down with the words you’ve said too many times already. You wait a beat longer, like maybe the silence will say what you can’t. “I’ll sort it out,” you whisper, voice unsteady, raw at the edges. “I’ll fix everything. Don’t worry.”

The sound he makes isn’t just relief, it’s release, a broken, breathless sound like something inside him has finally been unchained. He pulls you in, arms sliding around your back with full, urgent force, holding you like his body decided before his mind did. Your chest presses to his, heart to heart, and you feel the stutter in his breathing when your fingers find the back of his neck. You circle your arms around him and stay there, not speaking, not thinking, just breathing, leaning, existing in the quiet that builds between your bodies. When you finally pull back, it’s only enough to see his face—your hands still anchored to his shoulders, his thumb brushing slow, soothing circles into your lower back, like letting go is out of the question. You’re close enough your breath catches on his lips.

He looks down at you, eyes flooded with something deeper than gratitude, something older, heavier. “I always need you,” he says, soft and hoarse, like the words have worn grooves in his throat. “You always know what to do. You always save me. There’s no one else. Not even close. I don’t know what the fuck I’d do without you.”

It should soothe you but it doesn’t. The words hang there between you like steam off pavement, warm and rising, but laced with something else—something that doesn't cool. There’s a pulse beneath his voice that you can’t ignore, something crawling under the surface, darker, hungrier, hotter. It coats the silence like oil. It makes your chest feel tight and your spine feel aware of every place his body presses into yours. There’s relief in what he said, yes—but it’s the kind that comes with fire, not calm. The kind that doesn't settle. The kind that asks for more.

You’re still high. Not gone, not spiraling, but everything’s slowed down and stretched too wide. The world feels submerged, warped at the edges, like you’re moving through water—your pulse uneven, your thoughts lagging behind, each breath caught on delay. Guilt buzzes in the back of your skull like faulty wiring, constant and biting, but beneath it, something darker pushes through. Want. Not soft, not careful—want with claws and heat and a blade-edge sharp enough to draw blood if you get too close. It doesn’t ask permission. It just starts taking. The kind of want that roots in your spine and spreads like venom. It coils hot beneath your skin when you realize what he just said—you’re the only one. You’re the one he ran to. The one he trusts with this. Not just the danger, not just the mess but him. And it’s sick, it’s so fucking twisted, but the sound of him saying that out loud does something to you. Opens you up.

He could’ve gone to anyone. He didn’t. He came to you. Because he knows—only you can fix this. Only you can calm the storm clawing at his ribs. Only you can touch the violence in him without flinching. You feel it in your chest, in your stomach, in the sharp wet heat that builds just from the idea of it. That he needs you. That he chose you. That he’d fall apart without you and has no shame admitting it. It makes your thighs press together. It makes you ache. The ache of being needed. The thrill of being wanted. It’s proof that you matter, that you’re the one he turns to when it all goes to hell. It makes your breath hitch. Makes your jaw tighten. Makes your hands want to stay exactly where they are, because for once, someone sees the wreck in you and still calls it the solution.

He doesn’t speak. He doesn’t move. He just looks at you—unflinching, unreadable—but you feel him. You feel the heat of him pressed low against your stomach, the shape of him already hard, already aching. It’s a question you’re not ready to answer, a hunger that wasn’t supposed to be fed like this. Your hands stay behind his neck, and his breathing brushes your collarbone. His eyes are darker than they were a moment ago. Hungrier. Still soft, but softened like candle wax, not like mercy.

And it’s you—of course it’s you—who breaks the stare first, who swallows, who makes the first wound. “If you’ve always needed me,” you whisper, your voice thinner than you want it to be, your thumb barely brushing the side of his throat, “then why did you disappear the second I started seeing Jeno?” The silence that follows doesn’t offer forgiveness. It waits for blood.

His expression hardens, "What? We still talked."

You shake your head, "You know it wasn’t the same, you disappeared every time I walked into the room, it didn’t feel good."

He laughs, fast, bitter, "And why do you think that is?"

You and Yangyang have always been too close, the kind of close that slipped too easily into bedrooms and backseats, into shared joints and shirts you never returned. It wasn’t romantic—it was routine, something carved into muscle memory. Late nights turned into mornings, your body half-draped over his like it belonged there, like his hands knew the shape of your thighs better than your name. He was comfort, distraction, heat—your safe place when everything else spun too fast. When Jeno entered the picture, he retreated, slowly, sharply, and you noticed every inch he pulled away.

“You just spent too much time with Jeno,” he says, quiet but blunt, like he’s not accusing you—just stating what’s already been obvious. “You didn’t have enough time for me.”

You don’t deny it. You just blink, exhale through your nose, and say, “I know.”

His smirk is slow, bitter at the edges. He leans back slightly, arms crossed, tongue resting against his cheek like he’s holding something mean behind his teeth. “What difference does it make anyway? You were exclusive with him. It’s not like you’d touch me the way you used to.”

You sigh, shake your head once, sharp, like you’re trying to dislodge the weight pressing in behind your eyes. Then your throat tightens, and words slip out before you can stop it. "You’re confusing, when I was with Jeno, you barely looked at me, and tonight? You’ve been everywhere, what am I supposed to think?"

His jaw tightens, and when he speaks, his voice cuts through the air—sharp, raw, cracking at the edges. “What did you expect?” he spits. “You were with Jeno, always draped over him like he was the only thing you needed. You think I could just sit there and watch that? Watch you moan for him, touch him like you used to touch me, like none of it ever meant anything?” He shakes his head once, jaw clenched so tight it trembles. “You really thought I could keep pretending we were fine after that?”

His voice drops lower, tighter, mouth barely moving. “You think I could sit there and watch you give him what you used to give me?”

You pull back a fraction, just enough to clear your head, "It’s been a long time, Yang, we can’t do this, not anymore, it’s not right"

He leans in, close enough for your skin to prickle, "Can’t do what?" his voice lowers to a growl, "All I’m doing is looking at you like you’re still the sexiest fucking thing I’ve ever seen."

His words cracks something in you. A dam you didn’t even know was holding. The tension doesn’t snap—it floods. It spills out in heat, in hunger, in the sharp, sudden ache that spreads from your chest to your thighs like wildfire. It’s not about him. It never was. It’s about you—the way he looks at you like you’re a weapon, a solution, a fix for every hollow in his chest. It hits like a high of its own. Makes your skin tighten and your stomach twist and your breath catch, not because you want him, but because being wanted like this feels too good to walk away from. It’s just sex. It’s just the illusion of power, of control. It’s just someone whispering that you’re needed when everything else feels too far gone to matter.

You fist your hand in his shirt because you can. Because he lets you. Because he’s still here. His hands find your hips with practiced pressure, dragging your body into his, and the contact is instant—hard, hot, real. He grips your ass like he never forgot how, squeezing rough, dragging you back against the thick bulge between his legs, grinding slow until your breath hitches and your thoughts scatter. His lips ghost your neck, never kissing, just letting you feel what he won’t say, and it lights something reckless in you. You don’t even flinch when his fingers push beneath your dress. You just let him. Because it’s easier. Because it’s familiar. Because right now, being touched feels better than being left alone with the ache in your chest.

His voice is wrecked when he mutters into your ear. Filthy. Possessive. You don’t remember the words. Just the heat. Just the pressure. Just the way he touches you like you’re still his favorite sin—even if you were never his to begin with. This is how it used to be with Yangyang. That’s why he was one of the regulars you fucked—often, roughly, always on your terms. You’d pull his hair, whisper orders into his mouth, ride him until he begged without shame. You’d push him down and make him say please and he would, every single time. The memory of it slams into you now, full and hot—his hands gripping your thighs, your name breaking in his throat, the way he’d let you ruin him just to feel wanted. Just to keep you for a little longer.

His hands are rough and certain, fingers digging into your hips like he’s staking a claim, dragging your body flush to his with no space left to breathe. Your back arches under the pressure, ass pressing into the unmistakable bulge straining against his jeans. He breathes into your neck, slow and hot, lips ghosting over your skin but never quite kissing, and the heat of it coils low in your stomach. His palm flattens over your stomach, firm and possessive, holding you still while his other hand slides lower, gripping your ass like he’s starved for it. He squeezes hard, then harder, fingers slipping beneath the hem of your dress to feel how bare you are underneath. A low groan rumbles from his chest when his hand spreads wider, fingertips dragging deliberately over the soft skin where your thighs meet. His hips roll forward, slow and grinding, letting you feel every inch of his arousal as he mutters something filthy into your ear, voice wrecked and shaking. You’re not sure if he’s trying to tease you or ruin you—but either way, he’s getting close.

Your lashes flutter once, twice, eyes heavy as the breath catches in your throat. You look up at him, barely, and the way his gaze pins you there is lethal. Your hips shift against the pressure instinctively, your ass grinding back into the thick, slow drag of him. His grip tightens. Fingers spread wider across your skin like he’s trying to memorize every inch through touch alone.

You lift your hand, slow and deliberate, and trace a finger down his throat, letting it linger over his Adam’s apple just to feel it jump “Already breathing like that?” you whisper, lips brushing his. “And I haven’t even touched your cock.” You smirk. “Pathetic.”

“You drive me fucking insane,” he mutters, the words hot against your jaw. “This dress—this ass—walking around like that, knowing damn well what it does to me. You expect me to just stand there and watch?” He breathes out sharp, grinding harder, slow and deliberate, cock pressing right where you’re warmest. “I’ve been hard since the second I saw you tonight. Couldn’t stop staring. Been thinking about bending you over a table since you walked in—tearing this little thing off you, having you dripping all over me before anyone even realizes you’re gone.”

His teeth graze your ear. You stifle a moan, swallowing it down like it’ll help. It doesn’t. Not when his voice goes lower, darker, desperate. “And now you’re here,” he growls, both hands full of you, “pressing that pretty ass against me like you want me to lose it. You feel what you do to me? Feel how bad I need it?”

His hand slides down, palm flattening against your stomach, pressing firm like he’s reminding your body where he used to live. He groans into your neck, low and broken. “Miss this,” he breathes, dragging his hand lower, thumb brushing just under the waistband of your dress. “Miss feeling me here.”

You moan back, soft but shaky, breath catching as your hips press into his on instinct. The friction makes him hiss through his teeth, grinding once, deliberate. “I miss how tight you were around me,” he mutters, voice wrecked. “Miss being buried so deep you couldn’t speak.” His lips ghost over your jaw, then lower, filth in every breath. “Miss how your ass used to taste. All of it.” He squeezes your ass again, slow and rough. “I’d drop to my knees right now if you let me.”

He smirks, cock already hard against you, hand gripping your ass like he owns it. “What do you say?” He breathes, voice filthy, “let me fuck you loud enough for Jeno to hear, let him know who’s in you now, let him hear how wet you get for someone who actually knows how to fuck you. Make him listen while I ruin this tight little pussy and fuck the memory of him out of you.

It hits you wrong. Jeno. The sound of his name in someone else’s mouth slices clean through the haze, not gently but violently, sharp as impact, cold as blood. It doesn’t matter how high you are, how close you are, how soaked or needy or reckless—that name drags you out of all of it. Your breath stumbles. Your body goes still. Something deep in your chest twists, sour and instant, like whiplash snapping your spine into place. Your throat tightens. Your heart lurches. Not because you’re ashamed, not because you don’t want this but because that name still owns you, still means something when it shouldn’t. Your mouth opens on instinct, shaky and soft. “I need to go to Jen—”

His mouth crashes into yours before you can finish. All tongue, all pressure, all teeth. It’s messy and wet, more heat than precision, all-consuming in the way it tries to tear your attention from what you almost said. Your lips stay frozen beneath his for one beat, two, stiff with hesitation, tension wound so tight you feel it in your thighs but the second your mouth parts, the second your breath catches and the whimper slips free, something in you gives way. Not to him but to the moment, to the heat that’s already spread between your legs, to the ache that’s been building from the second he touched you like he remembered every way you used to make him beg.

You kiss him back because it’s easier than thinking, because lust is louder than guilt because your body is starved for something and his mouth is right there giving it to you. You kiss him back hard, filthy, hips pressing closer, rolling like instinct, like reflex. His hands tighten. Your thighs shift, grinding into him without shame. Your breath comes out in moans against his lips, his tongue licking into your mouth like he owns it. It’s not romantic. It’s not sweet. It’s rough, obscene, a collision of want and impulse and ego and still, under it all, your mind is already screaming his name.

His grip tightens under your thighs as he lifts you with ease, like his body remembers yours, like his hands were made to pull you into this exact shape. You wrap your legs around his waist without hesitation, dress riding higher, panties soaked and sticking to your skin. He stumbles back to the bed with a grunt that sounds more like a moan, his back hitting the mattress, and you’re on him instantly, straddling his lap, thighs spread wide, the heat between your legs pressed right against the hard line of his cock. There’s no hesitation now. Your hips start moving without thought, grinding down into him, slow and nasty, dragging wet friction against the denim of his jeans. Your dress bunched around your waist, your fingers dig into his chest for balance as your body rolls—up, down, forward, back—desperate for pressure, desperate for the edge.

Your breath breaks in ragged moans, thighs clenching around him, your clit catching on the seam of his jeans in a rhythm that makes your eyes flutter shut. He’s cursing under his breath, hands on your ass, guiding your grind like he can’t decide whether he wants to fuck you or watch you fuck yourself on him. You’re not thinking. You’re not even pretending to. You’re chasing it. The heat. The high. It’s not about pleasure, it’s about momentum, about the illusion of control, about convincing yourself this doesn’t mean anything, that it’s just the drugs, just the body, just something to drown the guilt still scraping at the inside of your chest like it wants out.

The moment starts to splinter. Not all at once, not loud or dramatic, just a crack somewhere deep inside your chest, quiet and precise. It slips in between movements, in the soft drag of his jeans against your thighs, in the way his fingers dig harder like he’s trying to memorize the shape of you, like he’s afraid you’ll disappear if he loosens his grip. Your hips are still rolling, slow and searching, catching every ridge of his zipper, slick soaking through the denim between you, but your mind has already stopped. It’s not his breath you want. It’s not his voice. It’s not his hands. The thought lands like gravity—Jeno. The way he murmurs your name when you’re half asleep, how he touches you like you’re something sacred, The way he sees you, loves you.

Your hands begin to tremble, it’s subtle at first, a twitch against his skin but it spreads fast. Your breath hitches, shallow and sharp, and the ache in your chest unfurls like a scream. He leans up for your mouth again, chasing it without hesitation, but you turn your head just enough for him to miss. His lips drag across your cheek, warm but unwelcome, clinging to skin that doesn’t feel like his to kiss anymore.

You press both palms to his chest, firm and shaking. The pressure says what your voice hasn’t yet. You don’t speak. You don’t have to. One breath. Two. Then finally, barely a whisper, cracked and soft and final—“I can’t do this.”

He doesn’t reply. Doesn’t move. You shake your head once, slow, eyes stinging. “I need to go to Jeno.” You lift off his lap like every inch of you regrets how well he still fits. Your thighs brush his jeans on the way down, a last cruel reminder. You tug your dress down with unsteady hands, knuckles brushing your thighs as the fabric slips back into place, the hem dragging slow like it knows it’s too late. Your fingers twitch, fumbling, missing the zipper once before giving up. Your chest lifts hard, like your lungs are trying to catch up with a breath you forgot to take. You keep your eyes on the floor. Not the bed. Not the body behind you. Not the heat you let wrap around you like a second skin.

Your feet move before the rest of you does. One step. Then another. The room feels thicker with every inch you put between you and him, like the air itself is trying to cling to your skin. You feel it everywhere—your lips still damp, your thighs too warm, the curve of his palm stamped across your ass like a bruise that hasn’t surfaced yet. His breath lingers on your neck, phantom-soft. Your skin burns where it shouldn’t and you don’t look back, not even when the door creaks behind you, not even when the silence swells. It’s already done and you can still feel it.

You don’t run but you don’t slow either. Your thighs are still trembling from grinding down on someone you didn’t want and your lips are swollen from a kiss you regret the second you pulled away. Yangyang’s voice is still echoing faintly in your skull, muffled and messy, but it’s nothing compared to the high still pulsing through your bloodstream. You’re already halfway down the hall before the door clicks behind you. You don’t think, you just move. Instinct drags you more than anything rational. Your body already knows where he’ll be.

Karina’s voice cuts into your haze, low and exasperated, trying to catch up beside you. "Wait—where are you going now? You still have to finish the damn fantasy draft. If you don’t go I’ll send Nahyun, she’s been waiting all night."

You don’t speak, don’t even spare her a glance. Your grip tightens around the gift hamper until your knuckles sting and your steps stay locked in rhythm, fast and unwavering, like your body’s already mapped this route in sleep. It’s not defiance. It’s certainty. Jeno’s not in his room—he never is when he’s unraveling like this and whatever Karina’s saying behind you fades into static, because none of it matters if you don’t get to him first.

When you reach the door, it’s already cracked open an inch like the room’s waiting for you, like it’s always been. Like it knows you. The scent hits first—thick, quiet, familiar. Leather soaked in memory, clean wood polish trying to mask something older, something raw. There’s sweat buried in the grain of the walls, adrenaline fossilized into the corners. It smells like skin, like bruises, like breath held too long and never released. There’s a hum beneath all of it, not from the lights but the bones of the room itself, like the walls are still echoing every word that’s ever been whispered or shouted or bitten off between its edges.

It doesn’t just feel haunted—it is. Not by spirits, but by versions of him that never left, that still pace these floors, there’s still ache through the dust and shadows. This isn’t a place that forgets. This is a place that keeps. The air is heavy with him, thick with ghosts of victories that bled, of silence that burned hotter than any noise and it lets you in like you belong to that past too, like you’re another memory waiting to happen.

The lighting glows low from the corners, uneven and deliberate, carving the space into shadows and shine. Each reflection stretches across the floor like the memory of motion, long and distorted. This isn’t a room built for use—it’s built for reverence. Every detail is preserved, a shrine disguised as stillness. The walls don’t decorate, they testify. There are framed jerseys with old numbers, some familiar, some retired. A helmet split along the side, half-hidden behind a signed photo that’s been handled too much. One case holds a mouthguard, still cracked, still red-stained. You spot the medal, ‘first championship,’ tilted inside its frame, the ribbon curled in on itself like a closed fist.

Your eyes catch on the centerpiece, the jersey, torn at the shoulder, hem frayed, stained deep in streaks that speak of dirt and blood and something worse. It’s warped with time and framed like a relic, like it holds weight no words could ever carry. The glass reflects your face in pieces as you look at it, like it knows what this means. You remember the first time he brought you here, how you tried to pretend you weren’t already falling. How his voice softened when he spoke about this one, low and proud, tracing the tear in the fabric like it meant more than pain—like it meant proof. He told you the story with his body close to yours, shoulder grazing yours, and for once, he didn’t make it a joke. “This one was everything,” he said, and you believed him. Because back then, everything was easier. The season was just beginning, and you were still trying to name the ache he left in your chest. It’s still here, still watching, still waiting and so are you.

He’s near the back, half in shadow, as if the room itself is trying to hide him and fail. The glass light catches the glint of his chain, the slope of his brow, the cruel sharpness of his cheekbone. He doesn’t move but the power in his frame hums beneath his skin, arms folded across his chest like he’s holding himself together by force. He’s dressed in black trousers that hang low on his hips, the fabric loose but expensive, and a black tank top that clings to every cut line of muscle across his torso. The cotton stretches tight over his shoulders, clinging like it’s learned the shape of him too well to let go.

His skin is flushed in places, glowing faint with heat, and there’s a shine at the base of his throat that catches the light—sweat, tension, rage, you can’t tell. His chain dips just above his sternum, resting in the dip of muscle like it was made to belong there. His mouth is parted, his jaw locked, his breath shallow, like he’s been holding it this whole time. His eyes have already found you. Maybe they never left. And the way he’s looking at you—sharp, unsparing, starved—makes something deep in your stomach twist hard enough to hurt. There’s no welcome in his silence. Just warning. Just heat. Just that unspeakable charge that rises between two people who know exactly what they could do to each other if they stopped pretending not to.

The last time you were in this room, it was softer. His voice had touched your neck like velvet. Now it’s a blade waiting to be drawn. The trophies around him look less like victory and more like pressure, like they’re watching him with you. You don’t break eye contact as you walk closer to him, your body unreadable—not defensive, not provocative, just ready. You’re ready for whichever version of him is waiting beneath the static. The one who won't speak first. The one who never asks questions he already knows the answers to. He doesn’t say your name, doesn’t even blink, but his silence wraps around the room like a fuse. This isn’t a greeting. It’s a lit match.

He doesn’t look surprised, doesn’t blink, doesn’t move like he’s been standing there too long, like he’s already played this out in his head a hundred different ways. His jaw is locked so tight it ticks when you step closer, eyes dragging over you not with curiosity but calculation, like he’s trying to decide which version of you just walked in—the one who ran or the one who stayed. And when he finally speaks, it’s not loud, not cruel, just low and bitter and so rehearsed it sounds like it’s been chewing through the back of his throat for days, sharp enough to slice right through the quiet without needing to try. “Did he fuck you or did you stop just long enough to come running back to me?”

You don’t rise to it. You don’t flinch. Your voice is steady, sharp. “We didn’t fuck. If I wanted Yangyang, I would’ve fucked him already.” It stops him in his tracks. You follow it up without hesitation. “And you knew about me and Yangyang, I’ve told you about who I used to fuck and you knew it was regular with him. This isn’t news to you. You just hate that it almost happened again, that it could’ve.”

“You really came in here to say that?” he mutters finally, voice low and wrecked, like he’s dragging it out from somewhere deep. “You think I give a fuck that it didn’t happen? You kissed him.” His laugh is short and humorless, more like a bark. “You let him put his hands on you, and now what—you want a medal because you didn’t let him stick his dick in you?”

He steps forward once, slow and heavy. “You think it makes it better that I’ve gotta picture his hands on your waist? His mouth on yours?” His voice drops lower, filthy and furious. “You think I don’t know what the fuck he was trying to do? You let him get hard for you. You let him try. And I’ve gotta live with that?”

You roll your eyes, slow and deliberate, the weight of it cutting deeper than any comeback could. “Don’t act like you haven’t tried to fuck other girls too,” you murmur, voice low but pointed. “I’ve seen it. I've seen you flirt, I’ve seen you try. The point is, neither of us actually did it. And you know why?” You step into him, chin tilted just slightly, your voice sharper now, more grounded. “Because we can't, none of it fucking works.” He doesn't move. His breathing is louder now.

You let the silence stretch, then cut it clean. “If I wanted to fuck Yangyang, I would’ve done it already. I would’ve done it a long time ago.”

He doesn’t argue, doesn’t breathe. The fire behind his eyes flickers, but it doesn’t lash out because he knows. You’ve never been the type to hesitate when you want something. You take. If Yangyang was what you wanted, it would’ve happened a long time ago. The fact that it didn’t says more than either of you want to admit.

Your voice softens, but it doesn’t lose its bite. “It wasn’t about him. It was about me being drunk, high, horny. I wanted to feel something. And I went to the wrong person.”

His breath catches rougher now, his hand curling into a fist by his side. The jealousy is simmering up his throat like bile. Then after the silence that nearly sizzles with heat—he falters, just slightly. His voice shifts, not soft, but quieter, something uncertain bleeding through the cracks. “How did you even know I’d be here?” Not accusatory, not defensive—just asking. His brows furrow like he’s been holding everything in for too long and this is the only question that matters now. He looks around the room like even he didn’t expect to end up here, like he needed to disappear and didn’t think anyone would follow.

Your answer is immediate, instinctual. “I just knew.” It wasn’t logic, it was instinct—like your body had already made the decision before your mind caught up, like your feet carried you here on muscle memory alone, drawn to him without asking for permission. You add, “I know this is where you go when you need a breather.”

Jeno swallows, slow and rough, jaw flexing with the kind of restraint that doesn’t come from rage but recognition. It lands deeper than he expects, the quiet proof that you still know him—intimately, instinctively—down to the parts he’s tried to keep hidden, even from himself. You see through him and he feels it, like heat crawling beneath his skin. You both feel it, that unbearable closeness of someone who once lived inside your skin and still knows how to get under it.

Your fingers tug at the hem of your dress, slow and distracted, twisting the fabric around your knuckles like it’ll hold you steadier than your knees will. “I brought something.” It’s barely louder than a breath, not confident, not rehearsed. It leaves your mouth like you already regret it, like you’re handing him something fragile and expecting him to crush it.

Jeno scoffs, sharp and bitter. “What, a goodbye gift?”

You shake your head, the motion small, almost imperceptible. “No. For the draft.”

He laughs, but there’s no real humor in it. Just disbelief, jagged and unfiltered. “You’ve gotta be kidding me.”

Still, you step forward, slow, deliberate, like one wrong move might splinter everything between you. The basket is clutched to your chest like a secret you shouldn't be carrying, but can’t bear to let go of, and it feels heavier now, heavier than when you packed it, heavier than when you practiced what you’d say. Your fingers are white around the handle, and your other hand keeps smoothing over the edge like you’re trying to make it presentable, like neatness might make up for all the wreckage between you. It’s not just a gift. It’s an apology without the word sorry, a confession without breath. Each item inside chosen like a verse, a memory, a thread back to who you were when things didn’t feel like a battlefield.

The basket itself is woven in navy and gold, the official team color. It’s faded in some corners, like the heat of your hands left a mark, like time itself burned through it. Right beneath the curve of the handle, is his number. 23. It’s not scribbled, pinned or easily torn away but sewn into the fabric like a vow—stitched tight with permanence, like even if everything else unravels, this won’t.

“This is a joke,” he mutters, low and scathing, but his voice doesn’t match the rest of him. His arms are crossed tight over his chest, biceps flexing beneath the stretch of his tank, chain glinting faintly at the hollow of his throat. He doesn’t look at the basket, doesn’t touch it. Just stands there, still and sharp, like a blade pointed down but ready to rise. “You think you can hand me some fucking trail mix and erase the last few weeks?”

You don’t move or flinch. His heat rolls off in waves, equal parts anger and ache, and you let it burn. You know better than to interrupt him when he’s building walls. You wait for the silence. Then you slide your words into it carefully, like they might slice both of you open if you don’t hold them right.

“I know you don’t want it. I know it’s stupid. I just…” Your voice falters, not breaking, but thinning, stretched taut like something about to snap. “I needed to do this. For me and for Karina, too. She’s been on my back about it — you know how she is.”

He doesn’t reply, but you can see it in the way his jaw ticks. The way he blinks like he wants to roll his eyes again but knows it won’t land this time. “I’ll leave after this. I swear,” you continue. “Just let me give it to you. You don’t even have to open it now. Please, Jeno. If you want me gone, I’ll go. Just… let me give you this.”

There’s a beat. Then another. The silence stretches, thick and charged, until he rolls his eyes again but this time, it’s too much, too forced, like he’s trying to scrape back control he’s already lost. “You’re serious about this?” he mutters, the words dull on his tongue, feigned disinterest curling around the edges but his hand betrays him. It moves anyway. Not toward you, not directly, but toward what you’re offering. His fingers graze yours—brief, electric, unmistakable—and it’s enough to make your breath catch. You feel him tense when it happens. He felt it too.

He takes the basket with a care that doesn’t match his tone. Like it’s weighted, not just in mass but in meaning. He sets it down slowly, deliberately, like one wrong move might splinter the moment entirely. Then he just stares at it, unmoving, unreadable. For a second. Maybe more. Maybe longer than he wants to admit.

You watch him move through the basket with a pace that feels almost punishing, like each ribbon and carefully folded edge presses against something raw beneath his skin. The tissue gives beneath his touch with a low, strained crackle, pushed aside too fast, like its softness needles at him in all the wrong places. There’s something restless in the way his hands work—too deliberate, like he’s trying to undo not just the gift but the thought that went into it. Still, he doesn’t stop. His fingers find the first item and pull—peach rings, sealed in a clear cellophane bag tied with a navy ribbon, the same kind you used to slide into the side compartment of his car during those brutal away-game weeks. It catches the light, casting soft colors across his knuckles, and for a second, the contrast is sharp—your softness, his tension, colliding in the sugar and plastic between them.

The sugar inside clings to the plastic like memory, like sweat-slick fingers on a steering wheel, like dust that refuses to be wiped away. He holds the bag up for a moment, it's too late to pretend he doesn’t care. The colors catch in the light—orange and pink, sweet and sharp, the same as sunset bleeding across the dashboard while his hand gripped the wheel and your thigh, knuckles sticky from sugar. You used to watch him eat them one by one, slow and smug, sucking the ring between his lips like a dare, dragging it through his teeth while his eyes locked on yours, waiting to see if you’d break first. He said the sour-sweet balance helped his focus. You think he just liked the attention. You think you did too.

Next come the peanut butter bars, foil glinting gold under his fingers. His thumb drags across the edge of one slowly, like he’s testing its seal, like he’s waiting for it to talk back. He always said they made him feel invincible, like the last thing he needed to taste before a win. They were more than routine—they were ritual. He’d unwrap them with his teeth when his fingers were taped, grin at you like he was about to devour the world. You’d roll your eyes and tell him he was ridiculous. He’d just chew slower, watching you.

You remember how he’d toss the wrapper too far from the bin on purpose, just so you’d bend down to pick it up. Your cheer skirt would ride high, the fabric catching on your thighs, and his palm would meet your ass with a smack before his hand slid lower, fingers sneaking under the hem like they had a right to be there. The laugh he’d let out when you gasped—low and lazy, like he wasn’t doing anything wrong—still echoes somewhere low in your stomach. He sets the bars aside now with a thud, careful but final, like he’s putting them down before he drowns in the taste of you—like he’s already tasted the sweetness of your skin, the memory of it lingering on his tongue, and he knows it won’t be long before he gets lost in it again.

The socks catch his attention, unexpected in their simplicity. Rolled neatly, a crisp white ribbon holding them together, they lie in the basket like a relic, soft and almost untouched. At the cuffs, tiny basketballs are stitched, subtle, but there—like someone believed in the old magic, the kind he once swore by. He runs his fingers over the stitching, slow, as if trying to coax something from the threads, as though the magic still clings to them, waiting to be felt again. The fabric is fresh, unworn—new—but the way the light catches the stitching, the way the material flexes beneath his fingertips, makes him feel like it’s a link to something familiar, something that once mattered. His gaze softens for a moment, and the smallest breath escapes his chest, but he doesn’t pull his hand away. Instead, he just holds them in his grip a little longer, like he’s trying to remember the feeling of them

Next he picks up the tiny black glass bottle, matte and square, it rests cool and heavy in Jeno’s hand—the travel-sized echo of his favorite cologne, spicy and woodsy with that sharp, clean undertone that always lingered in your hoodie long after he’d stopped wearing it. You tucked it carefully into the corner of the basket, nestled between snacks and socks as though it were nothing significant but the truth pulses beneath your skin. You remember slipping the full-sized bottle from his gym bag once, fingers trembling, heart racing, as if you were stealing something more precious than scent alone. It lived in your drawer for weeks after everything fell apart, hidden beneath sweaters and scarves, the cap twisted off whenever the ache became unbearable, just to remind yourself of what it felt like to stand impossibly close to him. Now, as Jeno lifts it carefully, reverently, you’re handing it back in miniature—not because you think he truly needs it but because it’s him. Sweat, swagger, silence—everything you ever wanted to hold onto but couldn’t quite keep. It’s a memory sealed carefully in alcohol and amber, unmistakably yours, even if he never really belonged to you.

Next is the laminated stat card, exact and deliberate, its edges sharp like you measured them twice before making a single cut. Not rushed, not careless but intentional. The plastic sheen catches the light just enough to blur the ink underneath but it doesn’t hide the effort. Every number is written clean, steady, without error, points, rebounds, assists, all laid out with a kind of quiet pride only someone who’s been paying close attention could’ve managed. The sparkly gel pen doesn’t scream here, it glints, framing his scoring average in a soft halo, circling his best performances with thin rings of silver and blue. In the corners, your writing leans small, tidy, folded into the white space with restraint: “Stop fouling, Chenle says you peak at halftime.” Not messy. Not chaotic. Just precise. Personal. The kind of neat that only comes from knowing someone, his stats, his rhythm, his cracks.

Of all the glittered lines and half-joked stats, one number holds the page like gravity—his scoring average, set near the top in unassuming ink, untouched by circles or stars or playful quips. But it isn’t invisible. It hums beneath everything else, louder in silence, louder because you left it alone. You didn’t mark it because you didn’t need to. You both know it’s wrong. Not bad, but wrong—a quiet dip that speaks too loud now, one neither of you have dared to say aloud. You feel it in the way people talk around him instead of to him. In the way questions trail off before they land. In the way the name Eric flares and fades in corners and the weight of Sunwoo’s name leaves behind something that clings like sweat. None of that is written. There’s no “fix this” or “get better” scribbled in purple gel ink beside it. There’s just space. Laminated silence. You sealed the page like maybe that could preserve who he was before all this, like maybe if your handwriting still wrapped around the truth, he’d feel held by something solid again. Maybe it’s a reminder.

Maybe it’s not meant to fix anything. Maybe it’s just your way of saying he’s more than the numbers they tally and the pressure they place on his back. The lamination keeps the ink from smudging, but not the feeling that seeps through every word, every circle and underline. Your handwriting curves around each stat like touch, like the way your fingers used to drag slowly down his spine when he was half-asleep and sore from practice, like the way you used to run them across his ribs just to make him shiver. There’s nothing loud about it—just a quiet insistence, a whisper in glitter pen, that he’s not just a scoring average, a rebound count, a line on a spreadsheet.

It’s not a love letter. It doesn’t need to be. It’s something closer to skin, to memory, to all the parts of him you learned with your hands before you ever tried to write them down. You traced his wins and his wounds, catalogued the rise and fall of his breath against your mouth, learned the weight of his body the way most people learn stats: repetition, obsession, devotion. And this—this is your record of that. A reminder pressed between plastic and hope that no matter how far he strays, how many points he loses or gives away, he was never made to be measured. He was made to be felt—and God, you did. With your mouth, your hands, your thighs parted and trembling, you learned every inch of him like scripture, like sin.

He saves the note for last. He Doesn’t reach for it right away, he lets it sit there, like it’s watching him. The paper is soft, folded once down the center with a precision that feels like restraint. His fingers graze the flame-shaped sticker, the one you sealed it with—red-orange with curled gold edges, like something meant to smolder, not seal. His thumb lingers, the pad tracing its shape slow, reverent, like it might burn him if he presses too hard. The edges of the note are warm from the heat of his palm, and something flickers behind his eyes as he finally breaks the fold open. The sound is quiet, barely more than breath, but it slices through the silence like a secret spilling loose. The ink is dark, sharp, delicate in the way a whisper can be. Just one line: I'm always gonna be proud of you. It lands with the weight of every night you used to fall asleep with your face tucked beneath his jaw, with the memory of your hand resting over the beat of his chest before games, when words couldn’t hold what your silence already said.

His eyes track the handwriting like it’s something alive. Something breathing. The strokes curve in familiar ways, slanting just slightly at the end of each word like you wrote them in a hurry, or like your hand trembled. There’s a smudge near the end where your fingers must’ve pressed too hard, like you couldn’t stop yourself from touching the truth of it one last time. He doesn’t blink. Doesn’t move. The paper crinkles faintly as he folds it again, slow, careful, almost tender. He doesn’t tuck it away. He keeps it in his hand, thumb brushing the edge like he needs the texture of it to keep grounded. Like the heat of your words is the only thing left keeping his skin warm.

He doesn’t say a word when he sets the note down, but it feels louder than anything else. The air between you snaps tight, vibrating with something sharp and dark, something neither of you can name out loud. His eyes are still locked on the basket like it’s laughing at him, mocking him, every careful piece inside it poking at the parts of him he’s tried to keep buried. You can feel it starting to unravel—the silence, the self-control, the version of Jeno that knows how to hold himself back.

When his eyes find yours again, they’re different. Icy, cut deep from something uglier than jealousy. His jaw flexes, one hand curling into a fist before he says it, bitter and precise. “You make one for Yangyang too?” he spits, “Maybe he wants lucky socks. Or a shiny little whistle. Maybe you should go back and sit on his lap.”

“Sure, I’ll throw in a skirt,” you murmur, letting the smile curl slowly at the corners of your mouth, “A cute little skirt that barely covers my ass, it would make it easier to slide right onto his cock without him having to lift a finger.”

He doesn’t give you time to finish the breath behind that smile. The second the last filthy syllable drops off your tongue, he snaps—hands on your hips, back slamming into the nearest wall so hard the trophies on the shelf beside you rattle. His mouth crashes into yours, teeth, heat, hunger all in one brutal collision, the kiss so hard it tastes like punishment. You gasp into him, only for his tongue to swallow the sound, his thigh already wedged between yours, grinding up like he’s trying to erase every inch of space your body ever gave to someone else. His hands grip your waist, drag you down until your cunt grinds against his thigh through your dress, heat building fast and hot and needy.

He pulls back just far enough to growl it against your lips, voice shaking with rage and want, “Is this what you want? Huh? You want to talk about his cock, his hands, while you’re soaking my fucking thigh?” Your only answer is a moan as you rut down harder, grinding shamelessly, hand fisting in the chain at his neck like it’s the only thing keeping you upright. And it is.

You don’t hesitate, don’t flinch, don’t even blink. Your gaze locks on his like a challenge, something darker simmering just beneath the surface—rage, want, something feral and utterly unshakable. Your fingers trail slow down the hem of your dress, nails scratching over skin with just enough pressure to make him watch. You tilt your head slightly, lips parting in a smile that isn’t soft, isn’t sweet—it’s a warning. Then you drag your hand between your thighs, slow, deliberate, eyes never leaving his. You press your palm there, over your soaked panties, and grind down just once, the friction obscene, the sound nearly as filthy as the act itself.

“How many times do I have to tell you?” You murmur, moving forward slowly, letting your hips sway just enough to make his eyes drop before dragging them back up, “if I wanted Yangyang, I wouldn’t just sit on his lap. I’d ride him until he begged. I’d make him come so hard he’d forget his own fucking name.” You lean in, voice brushing his mouth, thick with heat. “But I didn’t. I don’t want Yangyang. I don’t want anyone else.” Your breath ghosts his jaw, deliberate, filthy. “I want you. I want your cock. I want to choke on it. I want to feel it tear me open until I can’t think straight.” You tilt your head, smirk tugging at your mouth. “So don’t fucking talk to me about Yangyang again.”

His jaw tightens like it’s wired shut, but his eyes betray him first—blown wide, black with heat, tracing the curve of your lips like they’re already wrapped around him. His breath leaves in a slow hiss through his teeth, and his fingers twitch at his sides like he’s fighting the urge to grab you and do something. “You talk too fucking much,” he mutters, voice low, ragged, dangerously uneven, “but you don’t fucking lie, do you?”

His hand fists in your hair before you can answer, yanking your head back just enough to bare your throat, to make you feel it. His mouth brushes your ear, not gentle, not sweet, just hot. “You wanna choke on my cock so bad, baby?” he growls, chest pressed tight to yours now, hips already lined up, already hard, “then fucking earn it. Show me you still know how to take it.”

He grips your hips, drags you forward until you feel him, thick and ready through his pants, grinding against your heat like he’s already inside you. “You don’t want anyone else? Prove it.” He’s breathing like he’s trying not to lose it, chest rising too fast, too deep, like restraint is a thread stretched tight enough to snap. His eyes drop to your mouth, then lower—tracing the curve of your hips pressed flush against his. He doesn’t speak. He doesn’t have to. His hands rise slowly, hesitantly at first, but when you don’t stop him, when you tilt your head like you dare him, he touches you.

Fingertips ghost over your waist, just the pads brushing the fabric of your dress, like he’s relearning the shape of you from scratch. His palms smooth over your sides, then down, gripping the backs of your thighs with a pressure that makes your breath catch. He drags you closer, grinding you into the hard line of his cock, and fuck, he’s already throbbing through his pants.

“You think I could even get wet for anyone else? The way you make me wet?” You whisper, breath hot against the edge of his jaw as your lips trail up toward his ear. He doesn’t answer, just fists the hem of your dress and pulls, rough and fast, bunching the fabric at your hips so his hands can slide under. You bite the shell of his ear, hard enough to make him groan, and he pushes his thigh between yours until you’re grinding down onto it, friction and heat sparking sharp and messy through your core.

“You think I’d let him fuck what’s yours?” you whisper again, filthier now, more breath than voice and Jeno growls, low and primal, like you’ve hit something raw. His fingers hook into your panties and tug them aside, knuckles grazing your soaked folds, and when he feels how wet you are, he groans again, forehead dropping to your shoulder as his hips buck forward. Your hand slides between you, palm pressing against the bulge in his jeans, stroking him slow through the fabric. He’s hot. Thick. So fucking hard it makes your mouth water. You feel him twitch under your touch, and when you look up at him, his eyes are hooded, hungry, ruined.

“I pulled back, Jeno,” you say, voice soft but wicked, “because even drunk, high, and fucking aching—I couldn’t stop thinking about your cock. Couldn’t stop thinking about how full it makes me,” you whisper, desperate now, clenching around his fingers like your body’s already chasing the memory of him. “How fucking good you stretch me out. How deep you get. N-no one else feels like that, no one else sounds like you when I squeeze them this tight—”

You whimper when he thrusts harder, faster, your thighs trembling as he fucks you rough with his hand, thumb circling your clit with perfect, punishing pressure. “Thought about riding you till I blacked out,” you breathe, hips grinding down frantically. “Till I couldn’t think anymore. Till I forgot my own name and only remembered yours.”

He groans like it hurts, like the words alone could make him cum. Then his fingers push between your folds, two slipping in at once like he can’t wait, like he needs to feel you stretch around him, and you moan—head falling back, body arching into him, thighs trembling as he fucks you with his fingers, fast and deep and filthy. “You’re soaked,” he mutters, lips grazing your throat like he’s tasting it, voice thick with something close to awe. His fingers thrust harder, deeper, curling up until your legs jerk and a cry bursts from your lips—raw, helpless, cracked open. “All this for me?”

Your answer’s a sound—high-pitched, breathless, halfway between a sob and a moan. Your hips won’t stop moving, fucking yourself on his hand like it’s instinct, like it’s the only thing keeping your lungs working. Your thighs are trembling, slick dripping down onto his palm, soaking his fingers every time he pumps back in. You’re shaking. Mouth parted but slack, lips trembling, eyes glassy and unfocused. One hand claws at his chest, the other buried between his legs, fingers wrapped around the thick bulge in his jeans like it’s your lifeline. You stroke him slow, clumsy, your grip too soft and messy to be deliberate. You’re too gone for rhythm, too far gone to care—your whole body’s chasing the feeling like a drug, jaw slack, breath catching on every whimper you can’t hold back.

His mouth is on your neck, tongue hot, teeth dragging, biting down until your knees buckle. His thumb grinds down on your clit, not gentle, not teasing—demanding. And you jerk forward, hips stuttering, gasping like you’ve been punched. Drool slicks your bottom lip. Your chest heaves. You’re whining now—quiet, desperate sounds spilling from you with every wet thrust of his fingers. No words. Just noise. Your cunt pulses around him, fluttering tight, so sensitive it’s painful, and you’re nodding, nodding, like your body’s answering for you.

He groans when you grind harder, when you roll your hips with frantic, sloppy need. Your thighs clamp around his wrist. Your fingers squeeze his cock through his jeans like you’re trying to feel it through every layer. Your eyes barely stay open. You’re trembling, twitching, coming undone in real time—so far gone you don’t even realize you’re babbling under your breath, half words, nonsense, breathy broken gasps.

“Shit,” he growls, watching you fall apart. “Look at you. Can’t even think, huh?”

You nod again, fucked out, mouth parted, trying to speak but all that escapes is a pitiful little “mmnhh”—a sound so helpless and ruined it makes his breath catch, makes his cock twitch like it feels the desperation pouring off you. Your hips are grinding down on his hand with no rhythm now, just frantic instinct, chasing the friction of his fingers inside you, chasing the stretch, the ache, the promise of his cock—still hard, still waiting, still untouched. You’re soaked, slick dripping down his wrist, cunt fluttering so tightly around his fingers that every thrust feels like a struggle, like your body’s trying to trap him, pull him deeper, keep him there. And that’s when you see it—that flicker. The tension in his jaw. The way his fingers curl with just a little more confidence, just a little more force, like he thinks the tide’s turning, like he thinks you’re too far gone now to stop him. Like he’s going to take control. Like he’s about to flip the dynamic, sink into you and fuck you his way.

Wrong.

You move before the thought can even settle in his brain. Your hand presses hard against his chest, shoving him back with you with a command that doesn’t need words. His body jolts beneath your palm, breath catching, muscles tense as you push him until he’s leaning into the chair behind him, completely off-balance. And the look in your eyes changes—sharp now, glinting, focused like a scalpel. That’s all it takes. One shift. One look. And he knows exactly what’s happening. What’s always happened between you.

He freezes. Bites down on his bottom lip like he’s trying to keep a sound inside, the kind of sound he’d hate himself for making but his body betrays him. His chest rises too fast, too deep, and you feel the twitch of his cock where it rests hot and heavy against your thigh. He doesn’t speak. He doesn’t resist. Because he knows this. He knows you. And fuck, he’s missed it. Missed this so much he’s dizzy from it—this feeling of being undone by you, not gently, not lovingly, but completely. The way you don’t just take control—you own it. The way your voice drops low, syrupy and cruel, right when he’s close to breaking. The way your eyes never leave his face when you use him, when you ride him hard enough to make his vision blur, when you say his name like it’s a threat, like he’s yours.

He listens now. He obeys. Just like he always has. Like he wants to.

Because he’s craved this. He’s starved for the way your pussy clenches when you’re on top, using him for your own pleasure. For the way you look down at him when you sink onto his cock like it belongs to you. For the way you ruin him and make him say thank you for it. He’s dreamt about it, fucked his fist to the memory of it, the echo of your voice calling him a good boy, the sound of your cunt squelching every time you bounce on him, the ache of not being inside you for so long driving him out of his fucking mind. He’s missed being dominated by you. Missed being overwhelmed, overstimulated, bent to your will until he forgets how to speak, until he’s only capable of moaning your name.

So he sits. Doesn’t speak. Doesn’t dare. He drops into the chair like his knees gave out, wide-eyed and breathless, legs falling open with the kind of obedient instinct that only ever belonged to you. His hands clutch the edge of the seat like he’s grounding himself, knuckles pale, chest still heaving like he’s just been chased down and caught. There’s this raw, needy flush blooming across his face—cheeks pink, lips parted, pupils blown—eyes flicking up to you like he’s waiting for a command. Like he needs one. Like he doesn’t know what to do with himself unless you give it to him.

He looks so fucking pretty like that. Messy. Worked up. Trying to be good.

His body remembers you. Every part of him does. The way his legs spread wide, the slight twitch in his thighs, the way his cock is already straining against his stomach, twitching like it knows what’s coming. He’s not trying to hide it—can’t. His chest rises and falls in quick, shallow bursts, sweat clinging to his collarbones, his lashes fluttering every time you move. And he doesn’t take his eyes off you. Not once. He watches you with that soft, ruined awe like you’re something holy, like you’re the only thing that matters right now.

You don’t give him time to adjust. Don’t give him a second to think. You’re already lifting your dress, fingers curling into the hem, dragging it up over your hips and bunching it around your waist like you’ve done this before, like you own this space between you. You don’t care how exposed you are. Don’t care how messy your cunt is—swollen, soaked, dripping onto your thighs with every move you take closer. That’s the point. You want him to see. You want to break him with it and from the way his eyes drop instantly to the slick mess between your legs, the way his mouth falls open wider, chest stuttering on the inhale—you already have.

Your hands are on his waistband next, yanking his trousers down with a sharp, punishing motion, like you’re stripping him of the illusion of control he thought he had. His cock springs free, flushed dark and already leaking, the head slick with your arousal and the cum from before, and he groans—sharp, breathless, eyes fluttering as the air hits him. You drag your thumb over the tip and he jerks beneath you, biting back a moan, his hips twitching like he’s about to thrust up into nothing.

And you’re watching him the whole time, eyes dark and hungry, your fingers wrapping around the base of his cock, feeling how hard he is, how desperate, how he’s throbbing already in your hand. He’s not going to last. You both know that. He’s soaked in your slick, your mess smeared over his skin, and when you drag his length through your folds—slow, deliberate, teasing—you feel his whole body shiver beneath you. He doesn’t grab you. Doesn’t move. He knows better. He just stares, mouth open, eyes locked on the place where your cunt is grinding against him, where his cock is slipping through your folds, getting slicker, messier, harder with every second. He’s trembling. Obedient. Perfect.

And he knows exactly what’s about to happen. Because he’s had it before. And now he’s getting it again.

"Look at that," you murmur, dragging his cock through your folds, teasing him with how wet you are, smearing his tip in everything he gave you. "Look how messy you made me. You want to see how deep I can take it?" You reach down, hold the base tight, and press it to your entrance. And then you drop. All the way down. No warning. No pause. Just an immediate, filthy, wet sink that punches a moan out of both of you so loud it vibrates through the floor. Your walls stretch wide to take him, swallowing his cock in one ruinous descent that leaves you both gasping. Your mouth falls open, head rolling back as the heat of him fills you, overwhelms you. His cock throbs deep inside, thick and twitching like it’s trying to mark its place, your cunt clamping down hard around him like it knows exactly what to do. He whimpers, breath catching, eyes rolling back for a second before they flutter open again just to watch the way your body moves on top of him. You grind once, slow and deliberate, dragging his cock against every soaked, aching inch inside you, and he shakes.

“Good boy,” you purr, voice rich with dark satisfaction, syrupy and sharp as it curls through the air between you. You lean down, hand in his hair, yanking his head back just enough to force him to meet your gaze. “So fucking hard for mommy already. So easy to ruin.” You roll your hips again, grinding down so hard he gasps like it knocks the wind out of him, your cunt flexing tight and greedy. His lips are parted, pupils blown, chest rising like he can’t catch a full breath—completely fucked from how deep you’re sitting on him. You shift your angle and bounce once, sharp and mean, and he yelps. The sound makes you grin. You do it again, harder, faster, your rhythm quickening, pace snapping into something brutal. His cock stretches you open perfectly, every bounce making your tits shake, your ass slap down against his thighs with obscene, wet impact that echoes loud and unapologetic.

You’re soaked. The mess between your legs is shameless—slick and cum smeared everywhere, coating his cock, his lap, running down the insides of your thighs in thick, sticky drips. And you don’t fucking care. You ride him harder, faster, your thighs burning as you slam down on him with brutal rhythm, fucking yourself open like it’s the only thing keeping you alive. “You hear that?” you growl through your moans, bouncing on his cock like it’s a punishment. “That’s your dick ruining me. That’s mommy’s pussy taking you how she wants. Look at what you fucking do to me.” You grind your clit down between bounces, letting the friction send lightning through your whole body, chasing that high, losing your mind on top of him while he just takes it.

He’s gone. Wrecked. Moaning beneath you like he can’t help it, hands shaking where they grip the chair, thighs trembling under your weight. His face is flushed, lips swollen, sweat dripping from his temple down his neck as he tries not to cum from the way you’re milking his cock like your life depends on it. “M-mommy—fuck—please—” he chokes out, voice cracking, head lolling against the chair.

You clench around him just to feel him jolt, his whole body stuttering as he whimpers something close to a sob. “You wanna cum?” you pant, your voice soaked in filth. “Wanna fill mommy up like a good little toy?” He nods so fast it’s pathetic. “Please—please, let me—I’ll be good, I swear, I’ll be so good—just wanna feel you cum on me.”

“Then do it,” you growl, slamming down with everything you have. “Cum. Fucking fill me.” He does. Hard. His whole body arches, mouth falling open as he moans loud and wrecked, cock twitching inside you with every pulse, every shot of cum spilling deep into your cunt. You keep riding him through it, your own orgasm crashing into you like a fucking wave, cunt squeezing so tight around him it forces out one last desperate moan. Your legs are shaking, your whole body jerking as you grind through the pleasure, your voice a breathless mess of ‘fuckfuckfuck’ as your head falls forward against his neck.

When it finally slows, when your hips still and all that’s left is heat and sweat and the overwhelming stretch of him softening inside you, the weight of everything sinks back in like poison behind your ribs. You’re still trembling, cunt fluttering around him in the aftershocks, breath shallow, messy, hot against his mouth as you stay right there—filled, ruined, pressed to his chest like you belong there. You press a kiss to his cheek. Then another, and another, slower this time, soft and almost sweet—his jaw, his temple, the corner of his mouth. Your lips graze his skin like you're trying to memorize it all over again. “Good boy,” you whisper, voice ragged but dripping warmth, your fingers brushing through his hair. “So good for me. Always so good.”

You should’ve pulled away. Should’ve left as soon as you came but you stayed. Sat in his lap with your cum-dripping pussy still wrapped around his cock like you were trying to get stuck there, like you wanted to be trapped in this moment, to rot in it. It’s fucked. You’re fucked. There’s no pretending anymore. You knew this was wrong when you showed up, when you pushed him down, when you let him touch you like no one else ever could but you couldn’t help it, you didn’t want to. You wanted to get messy. You wanted to feel him stretch you open, fill you up, take everything from you again just so you could fall deeper into the wreckage you swore you’d crawl out of. You did this. Not because you were weak but because you were selfish because a part of you likes what this does to you. What it does to him.

You kiss his lips again—slow, soft, gentle—and you feel him melt just a little under it. He’s so quiet for a second it almost feels like peace. His arms are around you. His breath is still uneven, his chest still warm. And then you feel it. The smirk. That tiny twitch of his lips under yours.

He tilts his head lazily, eyes half-lidded, voice cracked and hoarse and smug as he mutters, “Mommy rides me like she’s obsessed…” His fingers flex against your hips, holding you there, like he’s testing the limits again, pushing just enough to see if you’ll break. Then he licks his lips, teeth catching the edge in a little grin. “But I think you missed me more than you wanna admit.” His cock twitches inside you, subtle, deliberate, and he raises a brow. “Still inside me,” he murmurs, eyes dropping to where you’re connected, still warm, still dripping, still full. “Guess that means you’re not ready to let me go yet, huh?”

You don’t get the chance to respond. He doesn’t wait. One second you’re breathless and full and dizzy from the filth in his voice, and the next you’re being spun, repositioned, rearranged like he’s already decided how he wants you. His grip tightens—one hand squeezing your hip hard enough to bruise, the other dragging up your spine, slow and firm. You shiver under his touch, and he sees it, feels it, uses it. That’s when everything shifts. The teasing disappears. The smirk fades. His jaw clenches and in a blur of movement, you’re slammed chest-first into the wall, his cock still buried inside you as your cheek scrapes cold plaster. Your knees almost buckle at the impact, and that’s when his voice hits—rough and wrecked. “You wanna test me?” he growls. “Then take it. Take everything.” His hand lands hard on your ass, a warning and a promise, and your body braces without question. This isn’t play anymore. This is him taking.

He fucks you from behind like he’s got something to prove—like every thrust is a punishment, like every moan you let out just fuels him more. Your palms slam against the wall above your head, fingers scrambling for leverage as the impact drives you up onto your toes. The room is hot, air thick and sticky, the wall rough against your skin while his cock stretches you open from behind. He presses against you, breath loud at your ear, hips slamming into you with force and precision. Every stroke is deep, hard, unrelenting, and your body reacts on instinct—arching back, legs spread wider, wetness dripping down your thighs. A mirror catches the scene across the room and you see it: your mouth open, body swaying with every thrust, mascara smudged and eyes half-lidded. You look wrecked. You are. The music plays somewhere beneath the noise, but it’s drowned out by skin slapping, your gasps, his grunts, the sheer rhythm of ruin.

It started with a command, but now he doesn’t even need to speak. His presence says it all—how his hand snakes around your throat and pulls you into an arch, your back bowing beautifully under his control. You can feel him everywhere—his grip, his cock, the heat of his mouth as he drags his teeth down your shoulder. When he finally speaks, it’s low and filthy. “This pussy missed me, didn’t it?” he murmurs, breath ghosting your skin. “Didn’t even cum for him. But for me?” His hand drops between your thighs, fingers brushing your clit. “You’re fucking soaking. Soaking my cock. Making a mess like the little slut you are.” You whimper, try to nod, but he shoves you forward again, cheek against the wall. “Say it,” he demands, voice sharp. “Say you’re mine.”

Your back hits the wall with a thud, his cock already buried to the base, hand wrapped tight around your throat like a leash he’s never letting go of. No warning, no pause—just brutal, full-throttle fucking, like he’s starving and you’re the only thing that’s ever made him feel full. Every thrust forces you up onto your toes, spine arching, breath caught high, your mouth open in a silent moan as your body bounces with every slam. His teeth drag down your shoulder, his grip never easing, his rhythm violent and desperate—like he’s trying to fuck something out of you, or into you, something that won’t leave when he’s done. It’s too much. The stretch, the pace, the need—and still, you can’t stop taking him. You don’t want to.

The grip on your throat tightens just enough to make your eyes flutter, just enough to make your body arch, offering him more—shoulders pulled back, tits pushed out, cunt stretched wide around his cock. Every thrust lands punishing and precise, timed to your breath like he’s syncing your pulse to the rhythm of his hips. He presses his body closer, crowding you against the wall, dragging his teeth down the slope of your shoulder like he’s claiming territory. “This pussy missed me, didn’t it?” he mutters, voice nothing but gravel and heat. “Didn’t even cum for him. But for me?” His fingers dip between your legs and find you swollen, soaked, already shaking. “Fucking dripping. You were begging before I even touched you.”

You try to nod, try to moan something back, but he slams into you so hard your cheek bounces off the wall with a sharp gasp. His grip on your throat tightens, cutting the sound off halfway—not to silence you but to own it, to remind you that every gasp belongs to him. “Don’t nod,” he snarls, voice cracked and savage. “Fucking say it.” You can’t. Not with the way he’s destroying you—cock punching into your cunt so deep, so fast, it feels like your brain’s leaking out through the mess he’s making between your legs. Your mouth stays open, drooling, glassy-eyed and desperate as he fucks you into a state beyond language. You’re not even sure what you were going to say. Your body doesn’t know how to do anything but take it.

He fists your hair, yanks your head back with no gentleness at all, and drags your face toward the mirror. “Look,” he spits, chest heaving, hips still pounding into you. “You see what you’re doing to me?”

The mirror shows everything. Your body—wrecked, bent, stretched—tits bouncing violently with every slap of his hips, your pussy spread wide around his cock, sloppy and stuffed and leaking down your thighs. His grip on your throat. His cock plunging in and out of you like he’s trying to make it fit deeper, like he’s trying to own every inch of you from the inside out. You blink at the reflection, barely recognizing yourself—your mouth open and wet, your thighs trembling, your whole body glazed in sweat and slick and submission.

“I look…” you whisper, voice trembling, half-cocked and drunk on the stretch, the slap, the choke, the way he feels. “I look used.”

He fucks you harder. Hisses against your skin. “Say it right. Used by who?”

You choke, a moan ripping out of you as your head tips forward again, eyes locked on the mirror. “By you, I look like I was made to take Daddy’s cock.”

He snarls, his whole body jerking like your words snapped something loose inside him. “Fuck,” he groans, slamming into you so deep your legs nearly give out. “Say it again. Say it while I fuck you harder than he ever could.” He fucks you harder, meaner, rutting into you like your body’s his to break.

“You fuck me better than anyone ever could,” you pant, breathless, clenching so tight around him it drags a moan straight from his chest. “Yangyang couldn’t even make me wet. I was bored. I was dry. I felt nothing.” His hand lands hard against your ass, then again, and again, until your skin stings and your pussy flutters even tighter. “But I’m soaked right now,” you hiss, grinding back on him. “And it’s all for you.”

He spits straight down onto your cunt, watches it mix with your slick, then shoves back into you like he’s angry you let anyone else near it. “You feel that?” he growls, palm pressing to the bulge low in your belly. “That’s how deep I am. You take me like you were fucking made for this.” His fingers move to your mouth, pushing between your lips, smearing spit across your chin, then dragging it down to your clit. “You like being used like this?” he asks, already knowing the answer. “Like being pinned and stretched and filled until you can’t think?”

You moan, voice hoarse and breathless, “No one knows how to fuck me like this.” It doesn’t come out sweet or gentle—it leaks out, torn from your throat like a confession, slurred and high, because your body can’t take any more and your brain’s already gone dumb. You feel yourself pulsing around him, your cunt clenching so tight it’s practically drawing him in deeper, and the way his hands tighten on your hips is instinctive, reactive—because it hits him harder than anything else. Knowing that you mean it. That he’s where you come undone. That even now, with your cheek pressed to the wall and your body trembling, you want more. And he gives it.

But the illusion of control shatters when he growls, “But you nearly let Yangyang fuck you like this tonight?” It’s not a question. It’s an accusation, thick with disbelief and something darker. Jealousy. His pace falters for only half a breath, like the weight of the image is too much—and then he slams in harder, rougher, angrier. Like he’s trying to fuck the thought out of both your heads. The sound of skin on skin is harsh, merciless, and the jealousy bleeds through his every motion. The thought of someone else seeing you like this—he can’t stand it. The idea of someone else getting close enough to even imagine it makes his jaw clench and his rhythm vicious.

You laugh through a moan, breath hitching, voice smug and sharp. “You’re so jealous,” you whisper, fluttering your lashes, hips rocking back with intention. “You’re never gonna let it go, huh?” The words drip with challenge, and he knows exactly what you’re doing. You tilt your hips in a slow, dangerous curve, fucking yourself onto him like it’s yourpace, your game. Your tone is all tease, bratty and smug, even when you’re gasping. It’s bait, and he takes it.

He grabs your jaw suddenly, fingers rough, dragging your face toward his mouth. His voice is low and lethal. “You still let him get this close.” He doesn’t yell. He doesn’t need to. That quiet fury is worse. You feel his grip tighten, his hips slam forward with sharp precision, and the look in his eyes as he stares into the mirror in front of you is pure restraint fraying. His jaw flexes. His breathing sharpens. You’ve struck something deep.

“I thought I’d want him,” you breathe, voice catching on the next thrust. “I thought maybe it would feel good. Maybe it’d help me forget you.” Your fingers grip the edge of the wall, knuckles white. “He’s got a big cock, Jeno. He used to fuck me good.” You’re not trying to provoke this time. Not really. It’s the truth and that’s exactly why it cuts so sharp.

The slap lands so hard your moan turns into a gasp. His palm cracks across your ass, a sound that echoes through the room like a warning shot. “That’s exactly what I want to fucking hear,” he spits, but there’s no praise in it. Just venom. He yanks your hair back, makes you stare at your reflection in the mirror. “Say it again. Let me fucking watch you lie to me.” You tremble, cunt fluttering around his cock without meaning to. His spit hits your spine, hot and filthy, sliding between your cheeks, down to mix with your slick. And then—he stills. Doesn’t move. Cock buried so deep, hand tight around your throat, breathing ragged against your shoulder. The silence makes it unbearable. Every inch of you pulses with need, desperate for him to move again, to fuck you or finish you or break you.

You can barely form the words, but you do. You need to. “I don’t come for anyone like I come for you.” Your voice is soaked, broken, needy. “My pussy begs for your cock, Jeno.” You grind your hips back, slow and aching, chasing friction. “I can’t stop thinking about how it fills me—how deep you get. No one else can do that. No one ever has.” Your hand reaches for his wrist, the one still around your throat, and you pull it tighter. “I get wet just thinking about how your cock stretches me. How it ruins me.” You’re shaking now, but it doesn’t matter. “Your cock’s the only thing that makes me feel like this. Like I’m losing my fucking mind.” You gasp, wrecked, nails clawing at the wall. “I love it. I love how you don’t stop. I’m made for it. For you. For this cock.”

It happens fast. One second, he’s deep inside you, breath ragged, hips stuttering as your praise ruins him from the inside out—and the next, his moan shatters through the room like it’s been torn straight from his throat. His arms tremble, grip faltering, and you don’t notice it at first—too cockdrunk, too gone, too focused on the pressure in your gut and the slick slide of his cock holding you open but then his hold slips, your back arches too far, and your body twitches, instinctively grinding down like it needs to stay connected—and that’s what breaks it.

The fall is chaotic, graceless, loud. A sharp gasp, the crash of limbs, your moan tearing through the air as his cock jerks inside you mid-collapse. The thud when your bodies hit the floor is jarring, a mess of skin and heat and tangled limbs. His hands fumble, trying to grab at you, to stabilize, to breathe. “Fuck,” he snarls, winded and breathless, the word punched out of him as your weight settles over his chest, his cock still buried deep in your cunt, twitching. His voice comes hot and cracked against your ear. “Don’t. Fucking. Move.”

But you do. Not to defy him, not to take control. Your body just reacts, hips jerking once, pussy clenching so tight around him it knocks another sound out of him—raw, sharp, needy. His head falls back, mouth open, jaw clenched like he’s hanging on by a thread, and you can feel it—how wrecked he is, how on edge, how close he is to snapping completely if you even breathe wrong again. You’re on top now, legs shaking, thighs twitching, cunt stretched and stuffed so full it aches—but you don’t dare lift off. You can’t. Not when he’s still inside you. Not when it feels this good. Not when he’s gripping your ass like it’s the only thing keeping him from losing his mind.

He hisses through his teeth, his hand clamping down on your hip like a vice, and his eyes find yours—dark, desperate, drenched in hunger, the sharp gleam of sweat lining his throat making him look carved from something molten. His hair is sticking to his forehead, lips parted and red from being bitten raw, and the hard planes of his chest rise and fall beneath you like he’s burning up from the inside out. Every muscle in his body is drawn tight, straining under your weight, cock twitching inside you with helpless tension. He doesn’t need to speak. That look says everything. He’s about to break but you don’t stop. You lean into the threat like it turns you on, because it does.

You don’t listen.

Your lips curl into a slow, filthy smirk as your hands plant firmly on his stomach, and you start to move—not cautious, not soft. You roll your hips in one long drag, feeling the thick stretch of him all the way to your stomach, and then you lift up enough to feel the cool air kiss your slick skin before you slam back down with a squelch that echoes in the room. Again. And again. Your bounce turns frantic, thighs slapping loud and hot against his as you take him over and over, cunt swallowing his cock like it belongs there. You ride him hard, rhythm messy, greedy, riding like your body’s gone feral, like you need to feel every inch of him bruise your insides. Jeno groans beneath you, deep and wrecked, his hands flying up to grab your tits, your waist, trying to hold onto something as your pace wrecks him. “Fucking whore — fuck,” he chokes, eyes wild as he bucks up into you, cock slamming back into you mid-bounce, his abs flexing under your hands as you pin him down.

You feel everything—his sweat-slick skin, the drag of his cock along every sensitive spot inside you, the obscene sounds your bodies make every time you drop down, and you swear he’s throbbing so hard it’s making your whole body pulse with it. You’re not just fucking him—you’re devouring him, fucking him through the floor, milking every inch of his cock like you’ll die if you don’t. And he lets you, jaw slack, eyes glued to where you’re bouncing on his cock, moaning like you’ve never needed anything more.

Each bounce is a declaration, a punishment, a cry for power. His hands grip your ass tight, letting you fuck yourself on his cock until your moans rise in wild, ragged bursts, and his eyes glaze over like you’ve got him undone. But you should’ve known better. His body tenses. And before you can take another breath, he surges up beneath you, his arm locking tight around your waist as he throws you flat to his chest with a snarl. "You think this is your pace?" he grits out, voice splitting at the seams. Then he flips you. Your back hits the cold floor, air knocked from your lungs, wrists pinned, and he drives into you like he’s trying to fuck the arrogance out of your body. No rhythm. Just punishment. Flesh slapping hard against the floor, the sound of your moans colliding with every thrust.

You growl, bucking up under him, nails digging into his sides, and he grits his teeth as your legs wrap around his waist, trying to force him off-balance. You bite his shoulder, sharp and deep, and he hisses in your ear before slamming back in so hard your scream ricochets off the walls. “That all you got, baby?” he taunts, blood on his lip, eyes crazed. You don’t answer. You claw at him, trying to flip him, panting, snarling, slapping his cheek. And when he grabs your throat this time, he means it—squeezes just enough to still you, his thumb pressing your pulse like a trigger. “Try me again,” he growls, body locked, cock snapping into you with violent precision, sweat dripping down his neck as you arch and bare your teeth back.

You shove at his chest, spit clinging to your lips as he snarls and slams your wrists to the floor, one hand caging both above your head while the other grabs your jaw and forces your mouth open. His spit hits your tongue, filthy and slow, and he drags his tongue across your lips like it’s a fucking threat. “Don’t test me, bitch,” he growls, heat pouring off his body like fire. Your pussy clenches at the word, slick walls tightening around his cock like your body’s begging to be ruined, soaking and shameless as you moan against his mouth. Your tits bounce with every grind of his hips, nipples raw and flushed from the drag of his chest, your body sliding against the floor from the force of it.

You're slick, thighs slippery with it, your cunt clenching around him with each brutal thrust like it’s trying to keep him buried. He doesn’t slow. Doesn’t let you catch your breath. His fingers shift to your throat, his grip firm, guiding you down as he fucks up into you so hard your tits jolt and sway between your bodies. The burn of the floor fades beneath the weight of his cock, the slap of skin, the choking heat. You're not just being ruined—you're being owned, every thrust punishing, deep, designed to tear you apart and put you back together the way he wants.

You gasp against his mouth, the words slipping out between kisses like you're spitting venom. “You think making me moan means you’re in charge?” You bite his lip, hard enough to draw a hiss. “I ride you better than you fuck me.”

That’s the switch. His eyes flash, dark and dangerous, his jaw locking as the smirk fades. “Yeah?” he mutters, low and sharp, “Then let me remind you what you sound like with my hand around your throat.” In a blur, his arm coils around your waist, the other fisting your hair. He flips you fast, slams you face-first into the floor, cheek pressed down hard. Then he fucks back in—so deep, so harsh, your whole body jolts. One hand clamps tight around your throat, squeezing just enough to make your breath stutter, your eyes roll. “This pussy,” he grits out, hips snapping, “knows exactly who it belongs to.” You sob into the floor, back arching, tears spilling as he drags more out of you with every punishing thrust. He’s not trying to make you come. He’s trying to break you—until the only sound left is your scream, and it’s all his.

You slam him down, not just to ride but to win. Your knees bruise against the floor, thighs straining as you sink down on his cock with a filthy squelch, your whole body jerking from the force. There’s no rhythm—just chaos. You grind, bounce, twist, chase every reaction like it’s blood in the water. His cock drags against every swollen nerve inside you, slick, thick, soaked in spit and arousal, and every time you slam back down, your ass smacks his thighs with a sound that makes both of you moan. He grips your hips to stabilize the frenzy but you slap his hands away, riding harder, faster, like you want to break him first. Your tits bounce wildly, sweat flinging off your skin, hair sticking to your face. He tries to meet your rhythm, thrusting up mid-bounce, but you plant your hand on his chest and shove him flat again. “Stay down,” you pant, smirking through grit teeth. “Be a good boy.”

That’s what snaps him. He lunges up, throws his arm around your waist, and lifts you off the floor like you weigh nothing. You yelp, but not from fear—from thrill. His cock slips out only to be shoved right back in as he flips you over, your back smacking the floor. You claw at his arms, try to hook your leg around his hip, push and pull and bite his shoulder. He growls—deep, animalistic—and bites your tit in retaliation, lips locking around your nipple and sucking until your back arches, your scream cut off by the slap of his hips. It’s brutal. His hands grip your wrists, pin them above your head.

Your cunt clenches, leaking down your ass, the stretch unbearable, addictive. “You think you can fuck the fight out of me?” you gasp, breath stolen between thrusts. “Try it, daddy.”

He grabs your face, kisses you with teeth, and the fight keeps going—your hips bucking to throw him off, his thrusts pounding so deep you choke. You claw down his back, legs locking around his waist, and he hisses, grabbing your thigh and bending it up to fuck you even deeper. The slap of his balls echoes, slick and sharp. You try to flip him again, muscles burning but he grabs your throat, pushes you down, and spits on your tongue. “Stay,” he snarls, voice broken and wet. You moan, hips grinding up despite the choke, your body responding to every command like it was trained for this. You’re gasping, drooling, begging with your cunt.

When the end comes, it’s not quiet. It’s not clean. You cum first, body spasming, your scream cracking as your cunt pulses around him. He grunts, lets go just long enough to slam deep and stay there, hips twitching, cock buried inside you as he spills. The room’s silent but for the sound of your breath and the drip of slick onto the floor. You're a mess—thighs trembling, skin bruised, hair wild, cum leaking from you both. Still, you’re smiling. “Didn’t think you’d keep up,” you pant, licking his jaw.

He bites your shoulder gently, still inside you. “I wasn’t trying to keep up,” he whispers, dark eyes gleaming. “I was trying to win.”

You grin wider. “Then get ready to lose again.”

You only told him to cool him off—a whispered confession in the dark hallway about where Yangyang said he wanted to fuck you tonight. You thought honesty would settle the simmer in Jeno’s jaw, maybe remind him that you were here with him, not back there saying yes to someone else. But it backfires instantly. The moment he hears which bathroom, the main one near the living room with the short mirror and creaky stall lock, he doesn’t say a word. Just grabs your wrist and drags you there, shoulder shoving the door open.

The music’s shaking the foundations of the house, bass rattling so loud the mirror on the opposite wall trembles. But it’s nothing compared to the way your thighs tremble, the way your body shakes with every drag of Jeno’s tongue across your hole. You’re bent over the metal sink, dress shoved up to your waist, one heel still on, the other kicked off somewhere behind you. Your hands are braced against the stall door, palms sliding every time he licks up—long, filthy swipes that make your knees lock and your spine arch. He’s got your ass spread open wide, cheeks held apart in his bruising grip, nose buried so deep it’s hard to tell where his breath ends and your slick begins. There’s coke residue smeared across the curve of your lower back—his lines laid right on your skin, right where he wants them. He dips to snort off the small of your back, inhales hard, then goes straight back to eating you out like his next breath depends on it.

His tongue is relentless, rough and hot and eager, working in tight, desperate circles around your rim before diving in again, licking so deep you feel it in your stomach. Your body rocks against the metal, hips moving without rhythm, your ass grinding back into his face like it’s instinct. And it is—because the way he groans into you, nose pressed to the mess between your cheeks, the way his fingers sink harder into your thighs every time you moan—it’s addictive. You gasp, voice breaking, “Someone’s gonna hear,” but even that sounds like a moan. And it’s true.

Everyone’s banging on this door because it’s the easiest one to find—the main bathroom just off the first-floor hallway, straight past the entryway. Jeno’s place is huge, too big for anyone who’s not a regular to navigate drunk or high. Most people don’t even know there’s a second bathroom tucked behind the kitchen or a third near the guest rooms upstairs and many more scattered around but you do. You always have. Now the door’s rattling behind you, fists pounding and voices raised, half pissed and half desperate to get in. None of them know why it’s locked. None of them know he’s on his knees, nose pressed between your cheeks, tongue buried in your pussy, one hand gripping your thigh and the other doing lines off the curve of your ass while you try not to scream.

“Make me come before they break the door down,” you whisper, voice soaked in desperation, cocky with it—and he does. Without even pausing, he drags the flat of his tongue across your ass, then pushes it back inside, eating you out with even more determination, licking and groaning and fucking you with his mouth like he wants Yangyang to hear every single sound you make through the door.

He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand, nose still wet with you, jaw slick, eyes dark. The coke still burns in his sinuses, his breath ragged, jaw clenched tight. “You really thought I’d stop with just that?” he mutters, grabbing your wrist before you can catch your breath. You barely manage to stumble upright—thighs trembling, your dress rumpled around your hips—before he’s dragging you out of the stall, pace ruthless. The second the bathroom door swings open behind you, someone hisses, “Finally,” but Jeno doesn’t look back. Doesn’t flinch. His grip doesn’t loosen, doesn’t falter. He hauls you through the winding corridor like a man possessed, past bodies and heat and bass-thick air, up a side staircase even you forgot existed. And then it breaks—the sound, the weight, the heat—as a glass door slams open and you’re pulled into the night.

The balcony is narrow, sky-high, all glass and wind and city stretching endlessly below. The view is surreal—skyscrapers flickering in gold, traffic crawling like stars in motion, distant windows glowing like they’re watching. But you don’t see any of it. Not when your back hits the railing. Not when your dress is yanked up to your ribs. Not when he spits on his palm, fists his cock, and thrusts into you in one cruel, claiming stroke. You cry out, folding forward over the metal edge as he fills you, holds you there, starts to move. Each thrust slams you forward, tits bouncing, cheek pressed to the icy glass. His arm wraps tight around your waist to hold you up, the other hand planted on your hip like he’s anchoring himself inside your cunt. The cold air shocks your skin but the heat between your thighs devours it—every snap of his hips loud, obscene, echoing into the open night like a warning.

His rhythm is brutal. Relentless. He fucks you like he’s trying to leave his name stamped into your cervix, every inch of cock buried so deep you see stars. And still, he doesn’t speak. Doesn’t need to. His groans are rough, close to your ear, teeth dragging down your neck like he wants to mark you all over again. The only thing you can do is stare out into the skyline, moaning, whimpering, eyes glossed and makeup ruined, your mouth falling open on every thrust. It slips out unbidden—a choked whisper soaked in wreckage. "Please... please don't stop." He hears it and snarls, pulling out just to fuck back in harder, sharp enough to make the railing rattle.

“He said he wanted to fuck me here,” you gasp, voice tight and raw, lashes wet. “Said he wanted to make me scream.” You don’t say who. You don’t need to. Jeno knows. The way his hips start to snap faster says it all. “You are screaming,” he growls, the words low, thick, dangerous. “But not for him.” He slaps your ass, once, twice, handprint stinging as your body jerks. The sound cuts through the city night like a gunshot, your cry right behind it. He leans in, hot breath at your neck, cock dragging against every nerve inside you. “Let the whole fucking city hear it,” he snarls. “Let him hear you break for me.” And you do—your mouth opens on a sob as he thrusts harder, rubbing your clit now, wrecking you from both ends until your knees give out completely, until all you can do is scream and shudder and shake. Your cries spill over the edge of the balcony like smoke, swallowed by the night, carried off into the dark until all that’s left is you, clinging to the railing, full of him, ruined in the skyline glow.

You don’t notice him at first, not until something shifts at the edge of your vision, a flicker of movement just past Jeno’s shoulder that doesn’t belong. You blink through the blur of sweat and rhythm and stretch, your body jolting with every punishing thrust, your tits bouncing with the force of it, your hands slipping slightly on the slick of your own skin against the glass. Then your gaze locks onto it—him—standing still, half in the shadows and fully watching. Your brows pull together, lips parting with a breathy laugh that doesn’t quite sound sane. “Juyeon?” It slips out before you can think, soft and stupid, like the moan that should have come out instead.

Jeno hears it, hears a name that’s not his fall from your mouth while he’s buried inside you and his hand flies down so fast it’s instinct, slapping your ass hard enough to sting and echo, to punish you for the blasphemy. You gasp at the impact, your body flinching from it but not pulling away, and Jeno snarls without slowing, “What?” his voice rough and clipped and pissed.

You glance at him from beneath your lashes, half-laughing still, half-daring, then tip your chin back toward the dark, voice low and twisted sweet, “It’s Juyeon. He’s watching us.”

Juyeon was one of the regular guys you and Jeno used to fuck. You remember the first time the three of you fucked—how easy it was, how natural, how Jeno had picked him out from across the room with that look he gets when he wants to ruin something just to prove he can. Juyeon had been cocky at first, all pretty smiles and fast hands but he folded so fast once Jeno took control. You’d ended up sandwiched between them, fucked from both ends, Jeno’s hand in your hair while Juyeon moaned into your cunt like it was holy. Jeno had laughed, low and mean, when Juyeon came too fast the first time, had whispered filthy things about it in your ear while you kept riding him anyway, cock twitching from overstimulation. You liked the way Juyeon listened, how eager he was to touch, to taste, how he waited for permission even when he was begging. But none of it ever stuck after—the kisses, the moans, the mess—except Jeno. He was always the anchor, the gravity. Even then, even while someone else was inside you, it was only ever for him. You’d stare over Juyeon’s shoulder and Jeno would hold your gaze like he owned you, and when he finally pulled you off Juyeon to fuck you himself, it always felt like coming home.

Jeno doesn’t speak for a moment, just turns enough to confirm what you already know—Juyeon’s there, standing in the doorway with his hands at his belt and a cocky glint in his eye, already half-hard. Jeno’s rhythm slows to a deep, deliberate grind that leaves your legs shaking and your pussy aching for more, and even as you whimper at the loss, he tightens his grip around your throat, his mouth brushing the shell of your ear. “Not here,” he mutters, voice low and final, jaw tight with something territorial, something sharp. “We’re fucking in my room.” His palm lands hard on your ass, a warning to stay still as he pulls out, and the emptiness hits you fast and raw. Juyeon blinks, clearly expecting more right there, his trousers halfway down already, but Jeno shoots him a glare and jerks his chin toward the hallway. “Move.” His voice leaves no room to argue. You swallow, breath shallow, legs trembling, and let Jeno haul you up. His arm stays around your waist the entire way there, holding you like he’s staking a claim, while Juyeon trails behind silently, cock in hand, watching the sway of your hips like he’s already imagining his mouth between them again. But even then—walking naked through his house, bruised and leaking—you’re still thinking about Jeno.

As soon as your back hits Jeno’s sheets, there’s no reprieve, no pause, no moment to catch your breath—he pushes you forward until your chest hits the mattress and your knees catch on the edge, arching your back as your spine bows into place, ass high, legs spread, cunt already dripping down your thighs. He doesn’t waste time. He doesn’t ask. He shoves into you like he’s been waiting all night to fill you again, and your head falls forward into the pillows with a sharp cry as your fingers twist in the sheets. Then Juyeon’s there, in front of you, hand curled around his cock, smirking as he brings it to your lips. You open instinctively, tongue out, already spit-slick and desperate, letting him push past your lips until your mouth’s stretched wide. Your cheek is wet, jaw aching, throat working as you suck him, while Jeno pounds you from behind, hips slamming into your ass, one hand gripping the back of your neck to keep you still. You’re trapped between them—one cock stuffed down your throat, the other buried deep in your pussy, your body rocked in rhythm, spine locked in a helpless curve, every hole filled and used.

It builds slowly, almost unnoticeable at first. Your hips twitch every time Jeno drags his cock deep, hitting something inside that makes your legs shake and your moans catch wet around Juyeon’s cock. You’re still sucking him, still stroking him with your mouth like muscle memory but your focus is already warping—your hands slipping from his thighs, your jaw slackening just slightly, eyes fluttering shut each time Jeno grinds in harder. Juyeon leans in, strokes your cheek, murmurs something low you don’t even hear, not with the way Jeno’s fucking you like he owns you, like he’s trying to fuck the shape of him back into your body. Your tongue flattens, movements growing lazier, lips stretched but no longer devoted. When Jeno growls, voice rough in your ear—“You like him watching while I break you open?”—your whole body answers before your mouth can. You choke softly, eyes watering, hips rolling back to meet him harder, deeper.

Jeno’s already buried so deep inside you your legs are shaking, the stretch dizzying, your pussy fluttering around him with every slow drag of his cock but your mouth is still full—Juyeon’s cock thick between your lips, your chin slick with spit, your throat working around him even as your eyes start to glaze. Then, without warning, you lift your hand and shove him back, fingers digging into his hip as his cock slips from your mouth with a wet, ruined sound. “What the fuck—?” he gasps, breath catching, but you’re not looking at him. You don’t even blink in his direction. Your other hand reaches blindly behind you, clutching at Jeno’s hands, and the safe word you and Jeno had, one you rarely used, slips out like instinct. “Red.”

You say the word because you know he’ll stop. Red. It’s your safe word, one you rarely have to use with Jeno. It’s not panic, not overwhelm—it’s a decision, one that only Jeno understands. The moment it slips from your lips, everything about him changes. His hands catch your waist instantly, the edge vanishing from his eyes, the bite gone from his breath. He pulls out gently, careful, his touch reverent as he eases you back into his lap. “Shit, baby,” he whispers, brushing your hair from your face, voice so soft it barely carries. “Was it too much? Are you okay? Talk to me.” You shake your head, slow and calm, eyes still fixed on his. You don’t answer because you don’t need to. You got what you wanted—him. Just him. Your fingers wipe the mess from your mouth, and then you shift, crawling closer, wrapping your arms around his shoulders as you settle into his lap like that’s where you belong. You press your face to his neck and whisper, “Hi, baby,” like it’s a secret only he gets to hear, like it’s the only thing that matters. Then you slide down onto his cock again, slow and warm, breath catching at the stretch you already know by heart, and he groans into your skin like he’s never felt anything better, hands tightening on your waist, grounding you, loving you.

He’s confused for a moment, brows knitting, head tipping back slightly, and you see it. The click behind his eyes as he realizes what just happened—what you really meant. You said the safe word not because it was too much but because it was wrong. Because you wanted him, only him and you needed a way to get there without guilt. You thought you were okay when you came into the room. You thought maybe you could do this again, just like before but your body had already made the decision. Jeno sees it now, you’re not interested in any more threesomes. His hands soften at your waist as you roll your hips slowly, intimately, no rush, no performance. Just him. Just you. He exhales into your hair like he’s been holding it in for years.

Juyeon’s still there. Still hard. Still staring. His face twists like he can’t believe what he’s seeing, like something about the quiet between you and Jeno makes him feel like he was never really in it. “You didn’t even make me cum,” he mutters, frustrated, a little too loud but you don’t flinch or blink. Your body moves against Jeno’s like nothing else exists, slow and lazy, savoring the feeling of him deep inside you. You nuzzle against his cheek, your lips brushing the shell of his ear, and Jeno doesn’t even look at Juyeon. He just tilts his head toward your voice, completely gone for you. You smile, soft and ruined, and finally glance over your shoulder—not at Juyeon, but past him, like he’s already fading.

“Get the fuck out,” Jeno adds, eyes never leaving yours. You’re already moaning again, hips rolling slow, lost in the boy who’s never let go of you, the one who always pulls you back. Juyeon stills for a second, stunned, and then the sound of him grabbing his clothes breaks the silence.

Jeno’s hands are back on you, pulling you closer, his lips brushing your temple. You ride him slow, deep, your pussy clenching with every grind, his cock heavy and thick inside you, warmth blooming through every nerve. The room feels like it holds just you and him now—no past, no mistakes, just now. Just his voice, low in your ear, murmuring, "You're home now, baby. Stay right here."

His cock stays buried inside you, softened now but still refusing to leave as if his body can’t quite bear the emptiness. Your limbs feel heavy and loose with exhaustion, your heartbeat easing into a slow, steady rhythm beneath his gentle touch. His hands wander your skin like he’s trying to soothe every bruise he’s left behind, fingertips tracing softly over your ribs, gliding along the curve of your stomach, brushing tenderly against the sensitive warmth between your thighs. He avoids the spots that ache most, the places where pleasure became pain, caressing you as though he’s afraid you might shatter beneath his touch. His mouth trails quiet kisses, featherlight and careful, over your eyelids, the corner of your lips, your temple, your forehead, each kiss gentle and deliberate, as though he’s silently begging forgiveness for every mark he’s left.

When he finally speaks, his voice is barely louder than a whisper, his breath warm against your cheek as he murmurs softly, “We’re going to be okay.” You exhale shakily, eyes closed, heart clenching at the fragile hope woven into his tone. He repeats himself, stronger now, as though conviction alone could will his promise into reality. “We’re going to be okay,” he says again, and his lips brush yours lightly, lingering, trembling slightly from the weight of those words. You don’t respond, not verbally; instead, you sink into his embrace, allowing him this moment of belief, letting yourself pretend—for just this heartbeat—that maybe he’s right.

His voice softens further when he speaks again, low and intimate, the sound seeping into your skin and settling into the hollow between your shoulder blades. “You’re mine now,” he whispers, lips brushing softly against your back, his breath warm, comforting, possessive in a way that makes your chest ache. “No one else gets to touch you like this again.” His fingers trail down slowly, tenderly, finding the slick heat where his cum drips lazily from your body. He spreads it back inside, his touch unhurried and gentle, reclaiming every drop as if he could keep you this way forever. “It’s all mine,” he murmurs, and his hips move slightly, a delicate rocking motion that speaks less of desire and more of an unwillingness to let go, his cock stirring gently inside you. His lips press another kiss into your neck, lingering softly, desperately. “I don’t wanna do this anymore,” he admits quietly, his voice vulnerable, shaking with an honesty that cuts deeper than any wound he’s left tonight. “I don’t wanna fight, I don’t wanna wonder if you’ll leave—I just want you, baby. Wanting you is the only thing I’ve ever done right.” His hand reaches for yours, fingers threading carefully, gripping tight enough to anchor you both. “Promise me,” he pleads softly, almost broken, “promise me we’ll figure it out together, whatever it takes, that we’ll find a way through it all.”

Your heart clenches painfully, because you can’t promise—there’s no way to give him the words he so desperately needs without shattering the fragile moment you’ve built. The truth sticks painfully in your throat, bitter and sharp, so you silence it the only way you know how. You tilt your face upwards, capturing his lips in a kiss that speaks louder than any whispered lie. You kiss him deeply, fiercely, desperately, as if trying to memorize the shape and taste of his mouth, imprinting this moment to keep long after you’ve gone. Tears slip quietly down your cheeks, mingling with the heat of your shared breath, making everything messy, raw, heartbreakingly honest. Yet he smiles against your mouth, a gentle, relieved curve of his lips, as if you’ve finally given him the hope he’s been craving all along. “God, baby,” he whispers breathlessly between kisses, holding you even tighter, his palms sliding reverently along your spine like he’s afraid you’ll vanish. “I knew you’d come back to me.” And you realize, your chest aching profoundly, that maybe you’ve already left, that the part of you capable of staying behind is lost, no matter how desperately you cling to him now.

The room settles into silence, a fragile quiet punctuated only by the gentle, steady rhythm of your breathing. He cradles you closer, his cock still buried within you, softening slowly, reluctant to part—as if his body believes what his heart desperately wants to. His arms surround you, warm and sure, a sanctuary you’ve tricked yourself into believing you deserve, and just for a heartbeat, you let yourself pretend. Pretend that this isn’t selfish, that you’re not gripping the frayed edges of hope you’ve spun for him, only to unravel them when morning comes. The guilt settles in your chest, dense and suffocating, a stone sinking slowly through the hollow space inside your ribs, drowning out every bruising ache he’s left on your hips, overshadowing the tender sting between your thighs. You’re cruel tonight—not because you hurt him but because you made him believe again, made him think your broken pieces could still fit with his, knowing all along you’d vanish like a phantom at sunrise. Yet he holds you like you’re precious, smiling softly against your temple, murmuring quiet promises into your skin that you can’t bear to hear because they echo truths you can never fulfill. For tonight, you convince yourself you can stay, that the ache in your chest won’t break you both apart, even as you know you’re building him a future made of glass—a fragile illusion, beautiful, shimmering, bound to shatter the moment you slip from his arms.

You don’t leave in the morning, you stay buried in Jeno’s chest like your body’s forgotten how to exist without his, limbs tangled in quiet desperation, the air between you heavy with sleep and something softer. His skin is all heat, his breath slow and even against the nape of your neck and for a few stolen moments you pretend this is your life—that this bed, this man, this hold are yours without condition. Guilt prickles beneath your skin, subtle at first then sharper, blooming like a bruise in the tenderness but you don’t flinch, you don’t let go. You let his arm wrap tighter around your waist when you shift in your sleep, let his lips brush your hair like he still knows how to love you in his dreams. You lie to yourself just long enough to stay still, just long enough to believe. Even if your heart aches with the knowing that it’s a borrowed peace you let yourself take it, all of it, even the seconds that were never meant to be yours.

The memory of what day it is breaks through slow, like sunlight bleeding through blinds, hazy and golden, soft but persistent. The river court. It sinks into your chest not just as a name but a whole world, a ritual stitched into the fabric of your youth. Today’s the meet-up—everyone’s bringing food, old playlists, beat-up speakers and weatherworn basketballs, laughter like muscle memory. The plan is to spend the whole day there, sharing memories and teasing each other over games, lounging in half-shade and slipping back into that easy rhythm only this group knows. It might be the last time you’re all together like this before graduation—the last time you’ll trace the same court lines with your feet, toss the same ball into the same rusting hoop, watch the sun dip below the trees from the same cracked bench. You couldn’t miss it. Not for anything.

Jeno stirs behind you, groaning softly, his arms winding around your middle and pulling you back to him like he’s felt your mind slipping away. His lips find your shoulder in lazy, open-mouthed kisses, tongue brushing your skin with sleepy want, and his hand drifts slow over your waist, fingers slipping beneath the hem of your shirt. He shifts over you, cock pressing firm and warm over your shorts, body draped over yours with the kind of weight that makes you want to stay forever. His mouth finds that spot beneath your jaw that makes you sigh and tilt your head, already pliant, and you giggle through it, breath catching when you push lightly at his chest. “Not now,” you whisper, lips curving, “I have plans.”

He pulls back slightly, face still buried in your neck, and hums against your skin. You tell him, voice low and soft, about the river court gathering, about how important it is. He pauses. You expect the sleepy approval, maybe even a gentle kiss to your cheek. What you don’t expect is him to say, “Mark invited me.” He says it like it’s casual. Like it won’t completely change the shape of the day. You nod, smiling, and try not to let it show. You want to be happy that the two people you care about most are finally in sync, getting along like wildfire and dry leaves, but all it does is twist in your chest.

You both get ready slowly, lazily, the kind of unhurried rhythm that comes when being apart feels impossible. You’re dressed first, in one of your short skirts that he loves, the one that rides up when you sit, exposing just enough to make his hands twitch. Jeno’s eyes follow your every move as he buttons up his shirt, and when you lean down to fix your boot, he pulls you between his legs and into his lap. You settle easily, thigh on either side of him, his hands gripping your legs with soft reverence. Neither of you speaks at first. It’s just you and him, breathing each other in, noses brushing, mouths almost touching. There’s no rush. Just that glowing, suspended feeling that always comes before you leave something behind.

"I have something for you," he murmurs and you hum in response, curious. He reaches over to his nightstand, opens the drawer and your breath catches when you see it—a delicate bracelet, fine crystal beading glinting in the light like it’s been waiting for you. He lifts it slowly like it’s fragile, like it means something, and he meets your eyes before saying, “You gave me so much yesterday, made me feel... fuck, like I was yours again. Like nothing else in the world existed but us. I’ve had this for a while, just been waiting for the right moment.” You bite your lip as he loops it gently around your wrist, the crystals catching sunlight, glittering against your skin like promises you never made out loud. “Don’t say I never gave you anything,” he murmurs, and you laugh softly, swatting at his chest before curling your fingers around his.

“You’ve given me so much,” you say under your breath and you mean it, even if your voice wavers a little. He’s tracing the edge of your tattoo now, fingertips light, reverent. You glance down at your wrist, the new bracelet nestled beside your charm one and it’s too much—it’s all too much. Your chest aches, your stomach twists and you don’t know how to carry it. You lean in before your thoughts betray you, your lips finding his again, soft and lingering. His arms wrap around you tight and you let yourself sink into it because this might be the last time. This might be the last day. He’s so good to you, always has been, even when he shouldn’t be and you have no right to stay. You taste the goodbye between your teeth and hold him closer anyway, guilt clawing behind your ribs as his hands spread wide across your back like he’s scared to let go and when he whispers against your mouth that he doesn’t want this moment to end, you lie and nod, because you do too but it has to.

The river court breathes like something alive. The cracked pavement yawns beneath your feet, lines of weeds pushing through the concrete like the ground’s trying to reclaim what was stolen. The paint is nearly gone, not just faded but scraped raw, like time itself has been clawing at the edges. The hoop still hangs, lopsided and rust-rusted, its net long since torn away by storms or fights or kids that never came back. The sun doesn’t shine gentle here—it sears, casting sharp shadows through the bare branches, turning the surface of the river into a shimmering, blinding mirror. The air carries heat and warning, thick with the scent of something about to shift. Something about to break.

There’s laughter, but it echoes wrong, swallowed too quick by the wind. The trees lean in like they’re listening, branches tense, waiting. You’ve always thought this place belonged to you all—but maybe that was a lie. Maybe it never belonged to anyone. Maybe it was always on the edge of collapse, and now, as you step back into it one last time, it’s holding its breath. The river court doesn’t feel like home. It feels like a graveyard of what was, and a battleground for what might still fall apart. You can almost hear it—cracks splintering deeper beneath your soles, roots tightening, old ghosts rustling awake.

You arrive hand in hand, the walk feeling far too short. The air is thick with familiarity. Shotaro, Karina, Donghyuck, Chenle, Ningning, Mark, and Areum are already there but no Yangyang. His absence is a silence louder than any words. He’s clearly avoiding you, and you don’t blame him. Not after everything, not after the mess that was last night. The looks come quickly, a mix of surprise and tension. Areum won’t meet your eyes. Chenle offers you a small smile. Donghyuck, ever the dramatist, throws his arm out theatrically. “And here they are,” he declares, “the forbidden lovers returned from exile.” It earns a few strained laughs, but the awkwardness still lingers.

Areum speaks first, surprisingly. “So,” she asks, voice cautious, “are you guys back together?”

Jeno’s the one who answers. “Just taking it slow,” he says, with that gentle smile that makes your chest ache.

Areum’s eyes soften. “I’m sorry about yesterday,” she says.

“Don’t worry about it,” you reply, voice even. Jeno doesn’t let you linger in the conversation. He leads you away before anyone else can speak, arm slipping around your waist, body shielding yours from too many stares. You curl up beside him, your head resting on his shoulder, and he presses a kiss to your temple.

The teasing starts immediately. Donghyuck can’t help himself. He grins at Jeno, then at you, tone loaded with mischief. “So the party was… productive?” he quips, voice loud enough for everyone to hear. Laughter ripples through the group, but you can’t bring yourself to lift your head. You bury your face in Jeno’s shoulder, heat creeping up your neck. Your shyness is so unlike you, you’re usually quick with a sharp retort or sly grin but after last night, after the sounds you know carried through the walls and the mess you left behind, you can’t even look your friends in the eye.

Jeno wraps an arm tighter around you, chin resting on your head, voice low but playful. “Alright,” he says with a smirk, “everyone back off, she’s shy now.” That only makes the group laugh harder but there’s warmth in it, a kind of affectionate cruelty that means no harm. Jeno shifts slightly to block more of you from view, hand rubbing slow circles on your back, muttering, “Don’t worry, baby, I’ll protect your honour.” You swat him weakly, finally peeking out just to see Karina holding up five fingers, mouthing ‘five positions?’ and Donghyuck dramatically pretending to faint beside her. You groan, burying yourself back in Jeno’s hoodie, while he just chuckles and kisses your temple, proud and unbothered.

Karina leans in, smirking. “Congrats on winning the draft. Five positions, six rooms, and a threesome? You fucked your way to the top, that’s the best result anyone has ever gotten from the cheer team.” The group breaks into loud laughter. You glance down, cheeks hot, while Jeno stays quiet beside you, but the look in his eyes says everything. He’s smug as hell, not bothering to hide it.

Mark’s reaction is instant. He jerks forward, nearly drops his drink, eyes bulging like the words physically hit him. “Threesome?” he echoes, voice cracking, like he’s trying to make sure he heard right and praying he didn’t.

Karina doesn’t let up—she twists the knife, sweet and cruel. “They used to have them weekly,” she says, tossing her hair over her shoulder, “I joined once, too.”

Mark visibly recoils, mouth falling open in horror. “Oh my god,” he mutters, blinking hard, like he’s trying to erase the image from his brain. “I need bleach. Actual bleach.” He turns away, shaking his head so fast it looks like he might pass out. Jeno doesn’t flinch, just leans back with one arm around you, smug and unbothered, like he’s proud of every second.

The laughter’s still hanging in the air when Chenle steps forward, brushing his hands against his jeans as he walks to the edge of the court. He stops near the dandelion patch just beyond the court, a smile playing on his lips, gaze soft. The breeze lifts his hair slightly as he looks around at everyone, eyes landing on the ones who’ve stood by him since they were kids. “This place,” he starts, voice a little scratchy from laughter and heat and emotion, “this court raised us.” His words settle into the space like ash. “We learned everything here. How to fight, how to lose, how to win, how to stay.” He looks at the dandelions, their delicate heads trembling under the breeze. “It was never just a basketball court. It was a home and it still is. Even when we leave, this place will remember us.”

Before he can go on, Donghyuck snorts. “God, you’re gonna cry again.”

“I might,” Chenle says, unbothered and tries to keep going but the teasing is nowhere near finished.

“You writing a memoir or what?” Mark calls out, cracking a drink open and dropping back onto his elbows, grinning. “Sounds like you’re about to narrate your own biopic.”

“Bet there’s a slow piano track playing in his head,” Shotaro adds, smirking.

Chenle narrows his eyes, pointing. “You’ve been real mouthy lately.”

“Character development,” Shotaro shrugs, smug. “Ryujin says I’m glowing.”

Chenle scoffs, “She also said you were submissive and breedable like two weeks ago.” The laughter that follows cuts through the air clean and easy. The kind of laughter that only happens when nothing really needs to be said. When being here means you’ve already said it all.

Chenle shakes his head and gets back into what he was saying. “We’re doing something different this time. “We’re writing,” he says simply, “dreams, secrets, whatever’s sitting too heavy. Something you want to let go of, or something you still want so bad it hurts. You write it down, fold it up, burn it over the flame, and let it rise. That’s it. Let the smoke carry it out of you.” His voice is calm, certain, almost reverent, like this is the closest thing he believes in. “We don’t keep them, we don’t read them, we just let them go.”

“You’re so sentimental lately,” You tease, giving him a soft smile.

“Must be the impending adulthood,” Chenle quips, holding up a lighter.

Shotaro goes first. He folds his slip with care, then spins on his heel like he’s about to take a shot. He tosses it with perfect aim into the shallow bowl Chenle placed in the center of the court. The flame catches. His eyes don’t leave it. You don’t need him to say what it was. The dance studio he’s always dreamed of building and leading classes in is already etched into the way he carries himself.

Chenle takes his paper last, twirling it once between his fingers like he’s flipping a coin, like the words scribbled inside might decide everything. He kneels by the candle, lights the edge, watches the flame catch and eat its way in. Then, without drawing attention, he lifts his phone and snaps a quick photo—not of the fire but of all of you, bent over your slips of paper, faces serious in the golden light. No one’s looking but the shot is perfect. Everyone’s there. Everyone’s quiet. He smiles to himself, small and private, the kind you tuck away in your chest and keep. “I’ll treasure this one,” he murmurs, mostly to the flame, but it’s real all the same.

Donghyuck presses a kiss to his fingers and flicks them toward the sky before tossing his slip into the flame. He doesn’t say what he wrote, not directly, but you know. It’s the dream job he’s mentioned a hundred times late at night—the one in New York, sports broadcasting, his voice behind the mic while the whole world listens. The paper crackles in the fire, curling fast, and he watches it disappear with a look that’s half pride, half defiance. “If I cry, it’s from the ashes,” he mutters, just loud enough to be heard, his mouth twitching like he dares anyone to tease him for it. No one does.

Karina’s takes longer. She holds the slip of paper like it weighs something real, like it knows how badly she wants that spot in the New York fashion program she’s pinned all her hopes on. Her fingers tighten around it once, twice, and for a second it looks like she might fold but then she steps forward, quiet and composed, and drops it into the flame with a breath so deep you hear it from where you’re standing. The edges curl fast, catching quick, and she doesn’t look away until it’s gone.

Areum’s is smaller, more hesitant. She holds hers like it might burn her before it even meets the fire. Her mouth moves—barely audible—but you think you catch the shape of a city, maybe a whisper of a dream she hasn’t shared yet. Something about photographs, about chasing light across the world. She stares at the flame too long, then finally lets it go, and her lips twitch into something that could almost be a smile. Almost.

Mark lingers behind her, the slip trembling slightly between his fingers, crumpled at the corners from how long he’s been holding it. He leans into Areum before lighting his, presses a kiss to her temple like a silent plea, like she’s the thing keeping him tethered to the earth. His eyes don’t meet anyone else’s—too distant, too deep, fixed on a future he’s scared to speak aloud. You know what it is. You all do. It’s in the way his chest tightens every time the ball leaves his hands, in the way he flinches at every strange rhythm of his heart. His secret is simple, and brutal. That basketball won’t be taken from him. That he’ll live long enough to have a life beyond it. He doesn’t say it, doesn’t have to. You feel it like a pulse in the air. When the flame catches the edge of his paper, he closes his eyes and doesn’t open them until it’s ash.

Jeno’s grip on the pen is firm, knuckles pale, and his posture sharper than usual, like the act of writing carves something out of him. His brow furrows in concentration, jaw tight, lips parted like he’s breathing through it, like the words on that slip of paper weigh more than ink should. When he finally folds it, his movements are methodical, almost reverent. He doesn’t hesitate when he drops it into the flame, doesn’t blink as it curls and burns. He doesn’t even glance at it. His eyes are on you.

You know what he wrote. You don’t need to see it. It’s only ever been two things with him—you, and the NBA. In that exact order. His dream isn’t fame, isn’t legacy, isn’t even redemption. It’s making it, and it’s making it with you by his side. Everything else can burn. Every path that doesn’t lead to those two things can be torched. He’ll carry that dream in blood if he has to. Protect it with teeth bared and fists ready. He’ll bend the world to his will or break trying.

When his mouth meets yours, the kiss is slow, deep, a silent vow shaped by the heat of his lips and the firm reverence of his hands cradling your jaw, as if you were the only sure thing left in his universe. You taste it—the fire and devotion, the hunger and holiness—each lingering caress a testament to something ancient and unbreakable. This devotion feels mythic; he would kneel to no one, would spit defiance at gods, would drag demons into sunlight just to keep you safe. To him, you are scripture and rebellion, his origin and endgame, the reason crowds will chant his name like an anthem through echoing arenas. You are the only prayer he’s ever uttered, fierce and unapologetic, never once begging for mercy.

Your own slip feels heavier than it should, weighted by dreams pressed into paper and ink. On the surface, you write your ambition, your future neatly inscribed. But beneath, in looping letters like whispered incantations or the prayers of priestesses begging ancient gods to free mortal heroes from cruel destinies, you write again and again: Let him be free. Let him be free. Let him be free. From chains forged in his father’s shadow, from the torment he’ll never escape on his own, from a story written by other hands. If he cannot ask for mercy, you’ll plead in his stead.

You taste the bitter edge of your own guilt, sharp and unavoidable because you know the prayers whispered between your lips will never be answered. He would kneel to no god, would challenge fate itself but his rebellion is doomed from the start. Neither of his dreams—freedom from his father’s shadow, or redemption from his silent torment—will ever be granted and you know this truth more clearly than he ever could.

When you finally retreat home, it's like sinking into a warm dream, reality softening at the edges. You and Jeno spend the entire evening wrapped up in one another, existing in a world built solely from gentle touches, whispered promises, and slow, lingering kisses that leave your heart aching sweetly. He holds you as though you're something delicate, his hoodie swallowing you whole, his scent clinging to your skin as fiercely as his embrace. The hours blur, indistinguishable from one tender moment to the next, until you're no longer sure where you end and he begins, his heartbeat thrumming steadily beneath your ear like an unspoken reassurance. But peace never lasts, and too soon, the comforting sanctuary of his arms gives way to harsh reality.

Donghyuck, relentless as ever, drags you both back to the river court, insisting the burnt paper wasn't enough to seal whatever desperate hope he’s chasing. Yangyang is there too, looking as though he's holding back something sharp, something violent, his jaw clenched tight, his eyes darkened with resentment directed unmistakably at Jeno. But Jeno is oblivious or perhaps purposefully indifferent, too consumed by you, the warmth of his hand securely anchored at your waist. Every kiss he steals from you ignites the intensity of Yangyang's glare, an unsettling sensation prickling the back of your neck, making you hyperaware of every breath, every heartbeat. The silence between them is heavy, oppressive, charged with tension that simmers but never breaks, hurting more deeply than outright conflict ever could.

Donghyuck ushers everyone into another round of the ritual, this time lanterns replacing paper, delicate vessels carrying hidden secrets into the vast expanse of the night sky. You write your wishes in careful strokes, afraid that too much weight might drag the fragile glow down to earth. You don't glance at Jeno’s lantern, nor do you ask him what he's written, but when his lips find yours again—slow and sure—just as his lantern ascends, you feel your answer: whatever he's wishing, it's about you. His kiss is an affirmation, an anchor, a fragile promise burned brightly into the darkness.

Yet, peace fractures once more when Mark's voice—angry and unusually harsh—splits through the night. Your heart seizes at the venom in his tone, your body stiffening as he snaps, “What the fuck are they doing here?” Eric and Sunwoo’s arrival shatters the fragile calm, the harsh screech of tires piercing your senses as their car halts aggressively at the edge of the court. Instantly, Jeno moves protectively in front of you, his back straightened, shoulders tense. But your observant eyes catch every crack in his facade. His jaw trembles slightly, his clenched fists betray his fear, and though his posture tries to radiate strength, his stance is brittle, poised to shatter under the slightest pressure.

Eric's mocking laughter fills the tense silence first, bitter and sharp as broken glass, and Sunwoo's eyes glint dangerously as he sneers, "Long time no see, Jeno. Thought you’d forgotten about us."

Jeno's voice, though firm, wavers with concealed dread. "Leave, Eric. This isn't your territory anymore."

Eric steps closer, invading personal space, forcing confrontation. "You don't decide that," he spits viciously, words laced with threats.

“We were just passing by. Funny seeing you here all cozy—did your daddy finally loosen your leash?" Sunwoo snickers cruelly beside him, and Jeno visibly flinches. The jab hits deeper than intended, unraveling Jeno's carefully woven defenses. He swallows heavily, his eyes darting briefly back toward you as if checking you’re still safe, before returning to meet Eric’s unrelenting gaze. The exchange continues in heated, hushed tones, an escalating dance of provocations and barely restrained fury, until finally, Eric smirks coldly, withdrawing as though he's made his point. When they finally drive away, leaving Jeno standing alone, he doesn’t look victorious. He looks small, shaken, vulnerable in a way you've rarely witnessed, and the sight leaves a sour ache deep in your chest.

Your friends cluster together instinctively, their voices dropping into tense, anxious whispers as wary eyes dart toward Eric and Sunwoo. Confusion passes visibly between them—Shotaro’s brow furrowing deeply, Donghyuck exchanging uncertain glances with Yangyang—but nobody speaks loudly enough for clarity. The questions hang in the air, heavy and unresolved, a tangible discomfort settling over everyone present. Yet no one dares to break the unspoken rule of silence, letting speculation remain just beneath the surface, acknowledged only through uneasy looks and half-muted murmurs, an unsettled mystery they collectively agree to leave untouched.

Your anxiety spikes sharply—there's less than a week until state championships and Jeno still isn't cleared. You've been working tirelessly to fix the situation, but progress has stalled, bogged down by circumstances beyond your control. You need to accelerate, to resolve everything immediately, to lift this crushing weight off both your shoulders. Today has become your new deadline, a silent vow made in the frantic recesses of your mind.

While Jeno faces Eric and Sunwoo, Mark’s words slash through you, sharp and brutally honest. "I don’t know what the fuck you're doing," he says, voice low and cutting. You meet his gaze defiantly, defensive already, bracing against the sting of his truth. He continues relentlessly, voice laden with frustration. "Why have you been all over Jeno since yesterday? Making him believe there's still a chance? As long as his father holds that threat over both of you, you will never be with Jeno—not fully, not freely. Don’t lead him on; you’ll only disappoint him again."

Your throat tightens defensively, your voice trembling slightly as you snap back, "Shut up, Mark." Yet, the truth gnaws mercilessly at your heart.

Before Mark can press further, Jeno’s footsteps approach, but you're already moving away, purpose clear and urgent. His voice, confused and tinged with worry, calls out to you, freezing your steps momentarily. "Where are you going?" he asks, confusion laced with quiet desperation.

"I have something I need to do," you reply hastily, already turning away.

His skepticism is clear, eyes narrowing softly. "At 11pm?"

Your breath hitches, panic flickering briefly before you turn sharply, pulling him close. You kiss him urgently, softly, repeatedly, each press of your lips calming the rapid beat of your heart. He sighs gently against your mouth, frustration warring with longing as you whisper your promise. "I’ll come right back to you, promise."

"Promise?" he echoes, vulnerability edging his voice.

Your heart twists painfully as you nod, offering softly, genuinely, "I don't wanna be anywhere else." Your fingers brush his chain, grounding yourself in his presence one final time, voice dropping to a whisper. "Only wanna be with you, baby."

His sigh is heavy, reluctant, tinged with hurt. "I don’t know how I feel about letting you go right now. You always disappear, and then I don’t hear from you for hours." Yet, despite his protests, you pull away, the words unspoken between you thickening the air as you vanish into the darkness, leaving promises behind like fading lanterns in the night sky—beautiful but impossible to grasp. Hours stretch into days, leaving him stranded in your silence.

You find yourself in Coach Suh’s office as quickly as your feet could carry you, the door closing softly behind you, sealing you in familiar shadows and the lingering scent of leather and faded cologne. Silence pulses heavily between you as your eyes lock with his, triggering memories you’d carefully buried deep, ghosts you’d long since refused to acknowledge. You haven’t been alone together in months, not since you forced every heated glance, every stolen breath, every desperate touch firmly into the depths of denial, pretending they’d ceased to haunt you. But now, with his gaze burning into yours, those suppressed moments surge back, fierce and unrelenting, flooding your chest until it aches—each vivid fragment sharper, more alive, more painfully real than before.

You recall nights spent here after classes, muscles sore, skirt bunched carelessly around your waist, bouncing on his cock while he gripped your hips with desperate urgency. You’d ride him rough, ignoring his whispered pleas to be quieter, grinding harder at the risk of discovery, whispering back, “Then let them hear.” The thrill of it always pushed him over the edge too quickly, your name tumbling from his lips like a forbidden prayer. He'd protest weakly when you left marks, but you knew he secretly savored each bruising reminder.

Other times you’d hide beneath his desk during office hours, lips wrapped tight around his cock while he nodded mechanically through mundane meetings. His knuckles turned white gripping the edge of the desk, voice strained, body rigid, his fingers buried in your hair like an affectionate caress rather than guiding your eager mouth. You relished making him falter, humming lightly until he twitched helplessly, whispering “daddy” softly enough only he could hear. His whispered command to behave never held weight; you always left him wanting more.

Standing in front of him now, the heavy silence crackles with charged, unresolved tension. He stares with narrowed eyes, voice cautious yet edged with curiosity. “It’s 11pm.”

“I need your help,” you breathe softly, your voice laden with unspoken promises, the words falling gently into the heavy air between you like embers sparking off neon-lit wires. He holds your gaze for a long, charged moment, eyes burning into yours, a silent collision of past sins and present desperation—desire, guilt, and determination woven together into something dangerously combustible. His jaw tightens imperceptibly, a subtle acknowledgment that pulls the tension taut until the air itself seems to hum.

Without another word, he rises from his chair, the motion fluid yet cautious, as though afraid too sudden a movement might shatter this fragile, perilous truce. You follow him silently, each step echoing with a thousand suppressed memories, fluorescent-bright flashes of nights spent tangled together in reckless abandon. The car ride to his apartment is thick with those very ghosts, desire simmering beneath your skin like a neon sign flickering erratically in a rain-soaked alley, its electric current raw and unstable. Neither of you dares to speak, lest you sever the fragile thread holding back the chaos.

When he opens his apartment door, the quiet creak echoes like a gunshot, your breath catching sharply in your throat. You step inside slowly, your gaze locked onto his, the silent invitation between you blazing fiercely, unapologetically bright—no longer hiding in shadows, but daring you both to face it head-on. And as your eyes meet, understanding settles heavily, achingly clear, raw as an exposed nerve. You know exactly what you’re offering, and he knows exactly what you’re willing to surrender.

Tonight, you’ll burn yourself down if it means securing Jeno’s future. You’ll sink willingly into neon-lit temptation, the aching familiarity of Coach Suh’s hard cock buried deep inside you—surrendering to old patterns and darker pleasures, losing yourself completely in the ruthless heat of his mouth, the bruising grip of fingers that have memorized every desperate inch of your skin. You’ll let him consume you until every boundary shatters, trading each carefully guarded piece of your soul for the raw, electric sensation of his body moving relentlessly against yours, thrusting hard enough to fracture the lingering shadows of your resistance and when it’s over, when you’ve ridden out every burning wave of your sacrifice, all that’ll remain is the scorched, luminous aftermath—glowing in vivid, neon-bright confession against the pitch-black of midnight, unmistakably marking you as his one last time.

taglist — @clblnz @flaminghotyourmom @haesluvr @revlada @kukkurookkoo @euphormiia @cookydream @hyuckshinee @hyuckieismine @fancypeacepersona @minkyuncutie @kiwiiess @outoforbit @lovetaroandtaemin @ungodlyjnz @remgeolli @sof1asdream7 @xuyiyang @tunafishyfishylike @lavnderluv @cheot-salang @second-floors @hyuckkklee @rbf-aceu @pradajaehyun

authors note —

if you've made it this far, thank you so much for reading! it truly means the world to me. i poured so much effort into this, so if you could take just a moment to send an ask or leave a message sharing your thoughts, it would mean everything. your interactions-whether it's sending an ask, your feedback, a comment, or just saying hi gives me so much motivation to keep writing. i'm always so happy to respond to messages, asks and comments so don't be shy! thank you from the bottom of my heart! <3

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egcdeath · 10 months ago

Text

out in the open

pairing: patrick zweig x f!reader

summary: your wedding night doesn’t go as smoothly as you expect it to. succession au - tomshiv adjacent (previous parts: part 1, part 2, part 3)

word count: 8.8k

warnings: failmarriage, fluff in the beginning, cheating, angst, jealousy, hurt/comfort, mentions of alcohol and smoking, suggestive content, insecurity, patrick is kinda the worst in this. he does get better though.

author’s note: full disclaimer things are pretty angsty and they only get angstier from here. cheating is a major plot point from this point forward. there will be a few happier moments but it’s mostly bad vibes and tension from this point on.

i say this with every fic i post in this universe but i truly could not have written this without the help of my succession anon!! weddingnightgate (WNG) is such a big moment in this au and they really helped me get my thoughts in order and helped me world build. i hope you all enjoy the upcoming pain!

When you were young, you always dreamed about your wedding. You fantasized about a huge venue somewhere halfway around the world that would easily fit all of your closest friends and family members and of celebrity guests who would give you well wishes for the marriage and smiled at you in spite of their envy at your beautiful event. You imagined a gorgeous, intricate dress with a train so long that you’d need assistance going down the aisle, a cake the size of your tallest guest, and a groom who was as handsome as he was loving, pressing the promise of True Love’s Kiss onto your lips after he read you his vows.

Maybe your enthusiasm for weddings was fueled by a few too many movies where the princess found her prince charming and lived happily ever after with him, but you still fell in love with the idea of love, and the thought that a wedding should be as beautiful as the love itself was.

You would never forget the first wedding you attended, despite being so young that you shouldn’t have really recalled it. You somehow managed to worm your way into being the flower girl at your aunt’s wedding, skipping excitedly down the aisle of the beachside venue, tossing flowers with reckless abandon. As you watched the rest of the ceremony from the safety of your mother’s hip, you couldn’t help but to imagine yourself being the one to walk down the aisle someday.

Much like your first wedding memory, you also couldn’t forget the first time you learned about divorce. Though you were young, the memory of your best friend crying next to you during recess as she sobbed out the news that her parents were splitting forever stuck out in your mind. You’d been fed the idea that love was strong and everlasting for so long, that the very notion that there were some things that love couldn’t withstand rocked you to your core.

From that point on, you became more grounded in your approach to love. Love was rarely a fairytale, and it was naive for you to assume that your future wedding would be one either.

As the years went by, you grew more realistic about your expectations for the future. You found a boyfriend who you dated throughout the latter half of your undergraduate years and through your time in business school, and fully expected to settle down with him—though you knew you’d be settling in the most literal sense. While he was a stable figure in your life, he was boring, and his aspirations in life for both you and himself didn’t align at all with what you saw yourself doing. He wanted a wife, and you wanted to make a name for yourself doing the work that was meaningful to you.

When he got down on one knee in front of you, you realized that you had two options in front of you: follow your own dreams or follow his.

Naivety be damned, you chose yourself and never looked back.

In your pursuit of making your non-love related aspirations come true, you abandoned all hope that your pipe-dream of a fantasy wedding would ever come to fruition. It occasionally felt like your hopes were incompatible—to be a successful businesswoman meant giving up all prospects of a romantic life. It seemed like everyone you encountered was put off by your lack of work-life balance, or wanted to hunt you for sport and turn you into a trophy wife.

You’d practically given up all hope by the time you met Patrick, fully expecting to be able to use him for a brief fling and a connection to get into his family’s company. What you weren’t expecting was to find someone whose company you genuinely enjoyed, who understood you on a level you hadn’t experienced with anyone else, and a love that occasionally left you wondering if you were a protagonist in the movies you loved watching as a girl.

If someone told you that years after meeting Patrick, that one day you would be gazing into his eyes with tears in yours as you listened to his vows, or telling him that you do take him to be your husband, to have and to hold, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, ‘till death did you two part.

Your wedding ceremony felt straight out of your girlish dreams, with Patrick’s beautiful family castle serving as the venue, paparazzi-worthy guests, a dress that felt like a direct product of your wildest imagination, and a groom that seemed to be as close to a prince charming as reality could get.

You were on cloud nine throughout the ceremony, basking in every single moment. You felt like you were floating by the time you got to the reception, your brain in the clouds as you and your now-husband cut your massive cake and gave toasts.

It was all a blur in the best way possible, your elation making what you thought might be an embarrassing moment of a first dance exciting, and the subsequent socializing with guests substantially more bearable.

What was slightly less bearable was the speed at which you were separated from your husband, the two of you occasionally catching the others eye from across the room, but otherwise being separated from surprisingly demanding guests who wanted to wish you luck on your marriage or excitedly share how amazing they found the ceremony to be.

Occasionally, you were able to squeeze in a brief moment with your spouse, bringing him a flute of champagne and momentarily pulling him away from an exceptionally chatty shareholder, but you seemed to be frequently whisked away from each other.

After what felt like a lifetime apart from each other, you felt the familiar, comforting warmth of Patrick’s hand on your lower back as he approached you from behind. When he announced to the extended family members standing across from you that he needed a moment alone with you, you almost leapt with joy. Nothing seemed more appealing than a private conversation with him after a long night of socializing with friends and colleagues.

It almost felt ironic that during an event that should’ve been focused on the two of you as a pair, you were separated and kept apart by people with business pitches and opposing interests, excited to hop onto whatever opportunity your union might bring them.

Patrick took you by surprise as he led you up the stairs and to your bedroom. It seemed a little early to begin your wedding night festivities, but if he was really that enthusiastic about it, you were certain that you could share some of his excitement.

“Thanks for getting us out of there,” you commented as you shut the door behind you. “So much for not talking about work at the wedding. I guess it’s too much to ask for one day to celebrate you being my husband before talking about the business again.”

You walked over to the vanity, preparing to touch up your makeup. You shot a glance over at your partner, who cautiously sat himself down on your bed, fidgeting with his hands as he did so. Not paying him any mind, you began to reapply your lipstick in the mirror and looked at his reflection, catching that he seemed to be in deep thought, but not thinking too much of it. It was probably something a shareholder told him. Maybe his sister was planning yet another attempt at a hostile takeover of the business.

“Husband. Wow, you’re my husband now. That feels so crazy to say. Husband, husband, husband,” you mused, a ball of excited energy. “Well, husband, what did you pull me in to talk about? Is it Sherry’s dress? It’s really hideous. I can’t believe she would wear something like that to our wedding,” you continued to ramble. “Or do you want a sneak peak of what I’ve got going on under this dress?”

You were shocked to find Patrick mostly unresponsive to your rapid words. He was never one to turn down the opportunity to gossip about his social circle or flirt with you. You pulled your attention away from yourself in the mirror and turned your head back to look at your husband, only to be met with a mostly unreadable expression, apart from the hint of a sad smile on his face.

Suddenly, things didn’t feel so fun. For some unexplained reason, you felt a small pit appear in the depths of your stomach. While you didn’t know exactly what was wrong, something obviously didn’t feel right. There was no reason for your partner to be looking as unsettled as he did on his own wedding night.

“You’re not having second thoughts already, are you?” you stood up and began to approach him from where he was sitting on the bed, making it more apparent to you that his brows were drawn together in what could only be the beginning of a frown.

“Of course not,” he assured you, though guilt was written all over his face. You weren’t sure how you should interpret your husband looking like a child who just broke an expensive vase on your wedding night, but whatever it was, it couldn’t be good. “But I need to tell you something.”

“What?” you laughed nervously, the small pit that appeared in your stomach growing into a slightly larger pit. As much as you wanted to dismiss it as nothing, the heavy tension hanging in the air warned you that the odds of his confession being nothing were growing slimmer and slimmer with each passing moment.

“Uh,” he paused as if he was considering his next words very carefully—almost as if he didn’t want to say them at all. You desperately wanted him to speak, rather than keep you hanging. With your nerves exponentially growing with every passing second, you began to feel like if he didn’t say anything soon, you might throw up all over your reception dress.

“Patrick, please spit it out. You’re kinda scaring me,” you could already feel yourself growing upset, despite the fact that he hadn’t said a single word to indicate what was going on with him. Your heart quickened in your chest as you anticipated his next words, despite not having a clue about what might come out of his mouth.

“We always said that if something happened, we could handle it like adults,” the statement was vague and simple, yet Patrick seemed to be choking it out. His cryptic message rattled around in your brain as you desperately searched for meaning in them. Before you could even begin to ask him what he meant, you registered the dismissive, callous language.

Though he didn’t say it often, he had confused you with those very words before—the verbiage alarmingly reminiscent of what he told you before your bachelorette party, or when you brought up the lack of an infidelity clause in his prenup.

If anything ever happened with anyone else, we could both handle it. We’re adults and we can handle things like adults.

Though his words were curious, you dismissed them at the time, never expecting that to be an issue. Of all of your problems with Patrick—his difficulty expressing his emotions, his complicated relationship with his family, his lack of experience in love—you never expected infidelity to be one of those problems.

You swallowed, your saliva feeling thick and poisonous as it slowly crept down your throat. “Honey, what do you mean?”

Patrick didn’t speak, looking down at the pristinely folded sheets in front of him rather than at you. “I’m sorry,” was all that he managed to get out.

You looked at Patrick blankly, waiting for him to tell you that whatever you were assuming wasn’t true or that he was pulling some sort of cruel prank on you. Instead, all you were met with was the sound of blood urgently rushing through your ears and the faint bassline of whatever song the DJ was playing at your reception.

“You know that love is complicated for me,” he looked in your direction, but couldn’t sustain eye contact with you. “Can we be adults about this?”

Once it became clear to you what exactly Patrick was trying to tell you, your knees gave out on you, the rest of your body overwhelmed with the unfathomable information that your brain was trying to process. Patrick cheated on you—and he was telling you just hours after you got married.

The truth of the situation sucked the air right out of your lungs and the strength right out of your body. Your knees buckled under you, and you desperately seeked out anything you could sit on. You settled on the foot of the bed, across from where your husband nervously sat.

“Fuck,” you dug the palms of your hands into your eyes, surely smudging the makeup on your eyelids as you attempted to collect your thoughts. “Who was it?”

“It didn’t mean anything to me,” he pathetically attempted to explain away. It all sounded like gibberish to you. For all you knew, your husband was speaking a totally different language to you.

Despite your question and Patrick’s non-answer, you somehow felt like you knew exactly who he’d been with. The answer was all over his discomfort when he saw you talking to the woman without him by your side, and the way she sized you up and attempted to psych you out of marrying Patrick not even 24 hours ago.

“Was it Tashi?” you asked, not even listening to his empty words and keeping your face frighteningly neutral. You spoke the words like you were playing a round of Guess Who, calm and even despite the budding feeling of dread in your stomach.

He didn’t respond, but he didn’t need to. His deafening silence was answer enough

“Can I kick her out?” you asked with an alarmingly stable tone, still mostly unable to process this information, but knowing that it wasn’t good.

“Yeah,” he replied quietly, head still hung and unable to make eye contact with you.

As you took in the truly depressing sight in front of you—your husband’s hunched over posture, a shame so strong that he couldn’t even look at you, and his clipped, short answers—you couldn’t deny that you were tempted to comfort him. In any other situation, if Patrick was feeling a fraction of the negative emotion he seemed to be feeling in that moment, you would instantly be at his side, holding his hand reassuringly or holding him close in a way that told him that if no one else was there for him, you would be, but you weren’t sure you could legitimize his bad behavior with such a response.

Instinctually, you reached out to touch him like you’d done a thousand times before, giving him a hug before a big event or spooning him after a family member said something that got under his skin, but you instantly reprimanded yourself. Despite how sad he looked, Patrick was the one who hurt you. You were the one who deserved comfort.

You opted to pat Patrick’s back instead, a strange and impersonal action. For a moment, you felt less like his wife and more like a practically estranged family member, not sure how to greet you after meeting you for the first time three Thanksgivings ago.

Your husband barely reacted to the stiff action, only looking at you wordlessly with glossed-over eyes. You got up from the foot of the bed and left wordlessly and neutrally, a robot whose only orders were to get out of the bedroom and shut the door behind you.

The moment the door closed, the next goal settled into your mind—you couldn’t let Tashi spend another second in the venue, socializing with your family and drinking the wine that your parents so kindly provided to the wedding, as if she hadn’t been partaking in an affair with your husband.

You felt half a bride and half a zombie as you left the confines of the bedroom and wandered the hallways. You were stone faced as you made your way back to the reception, trying to wrap your head and heart around devastating information that was shared with you at the most inopportune time possible.

You made a slow march down the stairs, movement hindered by your dress, and imagined what you might say to Tashi once you saw her. You should’ve known something was off from the start. You should’ve trusted the bad feeling you had when she sized you up at the bar, smirking at you like the cat who got the cream before feeding you anecdotes about how sleazy your husband used to be for no apparent reason. You should’ve trusted that feeling when Patrick rushed over to pull you away.

You wished you paid attention when Patrick faintly smelled of feminine perfume when you surprised him by coming back from a business trip earlier than anticipated, or when you noticed a bracelet that didn’t belong to you sitting on your coffee table, one that disappeared the very next day. It was so easy to write the signs off at the time–the fragrance of your personal chef and the jewelry of one of his sisters–but it no longer felt that simple. Patrick was a lot of things, but you never expected that a cheater was one of those things.

The thought of Patrick with someone else made you nauseous, especially in your own home. You faintly wondered if they’d fucked in your bed or on the couch. If the answer was yes to either, you desperately wanted to burn the pieces of furniture. In fact, that would be the first thing you set out to do when you returned home after your honeymoon. Maybe you would even beg Patrick to move to a new place, one not haunted by the memories of him and another woman.

That was, if your relationship even survived through the honeymoon. Let alone the night. You didn’t have a clue what your next steps would be. Would you be the fool who stays with a man who proved himself to be disloyal? Or would you be the fool who offered herself to the wrath of one of the most powerful families in the world? You would lose your husband, your job, and your livelihood in one fell swoop, surely being banished back to your family home in Minnesota, destined to be a receptionist at your father’s law firm for the rest of your life.

The entire situation felt surreal in the worst possible way. You couldn’t believe that while you were dealing with the aftermath of this information, Tashi was waltzing around at your reception. More than that, you couldn’t believe the information itself: Patrick cheated. Your fiancé cheated. Your husband cheated on you.

The same Patrick who became a groomzilla, laser-focused on giving you your dream wedding, cheated. The same man who confessed that he didn’t know what love felt like before he met you cheated on you. Your husband, who went out of his way to do anything to make you happy, even at the expense of his very powerful family, hadn’t been loyal to you.

None of it made sense. Maybe you would walk back into the room and your guests would jump out from behind tables and reveal that this was all a cruel joke—a little hazing as you officially became a Zweig—their laughter filling up the room at the thought that you would ever believe something as ridiculous as Patrick cheating on you.

You bit back bile as you walked into the room, the party continuing on the same way it had before you left and before you reentered—no prank to be found. The cacophony of loud music and the chatter of your guests filling your ears once more—what felt fun and exciting just moments before, now being far too overstimulating for someone trying to process information that could fundamentally alter the course of their relationship. You did your best to block out all of the extra noise and focus on your goal at hand.

Find Tashi. Send her home.

You weren’t sure what you would actually do when you saw her. Would you yell at her? Slap her for being a homewrecker? Cry at the sight of her? Laugh at the absurdity of your husband telling you that he’d been having an affair with her on your wedding night?

Peripherally, you heard someone call your name excitedly, only slightly pulling you out of your trance. Still, you couldn’t find it in you to acknowledge whatever excited friend or family member as your eyes set on your target. Tashi Duncan, Patrick’s coworker and ex-girlfriend.

Where you admired her beauty and confidence just a day before, you found you now resented every positive aspect about her. As she stood by a table and talked to one of Patrick’s sisters, surely bored out of her mind by the delusional ramblings about his sister someday being the president, she nodded and smiled diplomatically.

As you really began to think about it, you realized that she was the perfect candidate to be Patrick’s wife. She came from a background similar to his, his sisters liked her far more than they liked you—though that didn’t mean much—and physically, she seemed to be exactly your husband’s type.

Part of you wondered if she was feeling as miserable as you were; if she’d spent the day imagining your wedding to be her own, if her own jealousy was blinding her the way that yours currently was blinding you, or if she’d begged Patrick not to marry you during their work meeting the previous night. The other part of you wondered if she thought of you as pathetic as you currently felt—a stupid woman so blinded by her own love that she overlooked every beaming, bright red flag.

Your pace quickened as you walked towards Tashi, heels clicking annoyingly as they marked your pace. As you made your way to the table, you found yourself growing more anxious, the first real feeling you’d felt since Patrick shared with you the truth about his infidelity.

“Hey,” you greeted Tashi and Patrick’s sister, voice surprisingly even for how agitated you were. “Mind if I chat with Tashi?”

“Go ahead,” Cornelia shrugged. “Let’s stay in touch?” she asked Tashi, who politely agreed and watched the other woman walk off.

Tashi opened her mouth to speak to you, presumably to comment on something asinine about the wedding, or to make an observation about your wedding that you’d already heard a thousand times that night. If you weren’t so upset, you would make a bet with yourself on whether she’d tell you how beautiful the wedding was, or how beautiful you and your husband looked at the altar.

“Your housing for the night fell through,” you explained in a very level tone. It wasn’t the best excuse, but it was what came out of your mouth.

“Oh?” she asked, sounding more than a little skeptical, before lifting her drink to her lips. “Do you know where else I might be able to find lodging at this hour?”

“No,” you replied quickly and with ease. “Actually, it’d probably be best if you just went home now.”

“Home like…?” she trailed off and eyed you curiously.

“Like back to New York. I’m sure you can find a flight.”

She laughed in slight disbelief. “You realize this is a work function for me, right? I have work to do.”

“I’m sure you can do that work back home,” you dismissed, not backing down. By now, it was clear that Tashi was putting together the pieces of what you knew. In fact, you could pinpoint the exact moment when it occurred to her why the two of you were having this conversation in the first place.

Maybe it was the lack of your now-husband beside you, or the barely concealed emotion on your face. Regardless of what was your biggest tell on the situation, you continued to stare her down, resenting the way her lips shifted into a small smile, as if she still had the upper hand and knew something that you didn’t. It was almost as if she found the whole ordeal to be a little amusing, which only bothered you more.

“No need to make a scene at your wedding. I’ll be on my way.” She lifted her glass up once again to finish the drink off, but you stopped her.

You returned intense eye contact with her as you took the stemware right out of her hands and put it to your own lips, finishing the drink in a few large gulps. Though your action was impulsive, it felt like somewhat of a necessity. You desperately needed the liquid distraction from your less-than-ideal situation, and you didn’t want to give her an excuse to linger at your party a single moment longer than she needed to.

She continued to stare at you, her expression somewhere in the middle of being impressed and weirded out. “Alright then. Well, congratulations on the wedding.”

“Fuck off,” you spat out, turning on your heel and walking away without bothering to see if she stayed or left.

You made your rounds around the reception, smiling and talking to your guests with a fake smile plastered on your face. The shock of Patrick’s initial confession wore off shortly after you told Tashi off, but you still couldn’t help but feel completely numb to the situation. How else were you supposed to react when you found out the love of your life was sleeping with someone else?

You continued to man the reception on your own, occasionally scanning the room but not catching a glimpse of your husband. You wondered if he was still in your bedroom, head in his hands as he wondered if he just opened a Pandora’s box on your relationship, or if Tashi went to go find him to discuss how poorly you reacted to the information. For all you knew, the two of them could be laughing at you or having sex in your wedding bed at the same time that you attempted to pretend that everything was perfectly fine. You grew faint at the mere thought.

Eventually, you felt a familiar hand on the small of your back, something that typically was a welcome, comforting gesture. Instead, you wanted to flinch away from his hand like it was hot. You couldn’t believe that Patrick had the nerve to touch you like everything was fine after dropping such devastating information on you. Then again, at least he wasn’t hooking up with Tashi one last time.

Still, even under the spell of a sadness that hadn’t quite settled in yet, you leaned into his touch instinctively. Unsurprisingly, it didn’t feel as comfortable as it did a few hours ago.

“Such a beautiful ceremony,” a family friend of Patrick’s gushed to you. “You two have something really special.”

You felt Patrick’s eyes sear into you, desperately pleading for you to look back into them and show him that everything was going to be okay. That what you had was special enough that you’d be able to move past this. Like adults, as he said to you earlier.

You weren’t so sure that you could.

The rest of the night moved painfully slowly. Where the two of you socialized separately before his private conversation with you, he seemed to be attached to your hip now, bringing you apology offers of champagne flutes and hor d'oeuvres.

Though he pleaded with you to handle your situation like adults, you wanted to act more like a petulant child. If you had it your way, you would reject his offerings of food by tossing them onto the floor, or throw a glass of sticky alcohol in his face as if you were a Real Housewife.

If you had it your way, Patrick wouldn’t have cheated on you in the first place, and you’d be celebrating your wedding without the baggage of uncertainty for the future of your relationship.

As you walked through the reception, you weren’t particularly angry or sad, you just felt numb. There was a strange concession in knowing that what happened in the past already happened, and that there was no way for you to change your husband’s behavior. For a moment, you wondered if the numbness was a symptom of the shock that was Patrick’s confession, or you would feel the dull thud of nothingness for the rest of your life.

You let out a breath you hadn’t realized you were holding as you watched the last of your guests filtered out of the venue, relieved to finally drop the façade of being a happy newlywed and to embrace the true feeling of shock that had been biting at you all night.

Somehow managing to break away from your suddenly very clingy spouse, you wasted no time gathering an unopened bottle of wine for yourself, along with a cigarette and a lighter, which you unceremoniously exchanged with a caterer for a Venmo payment. You then headed outside to a balcony that overlooked a beautiful sprawling garden.

You looked out on the neatly trimmed hedges and the bench where you sat with Patrick not even twenty-four hours ago and distantly thought about how perfectly the night should’ve gone. You got married at a beautiful venue, had every detail down to the positioning of napkins meticulously planned, and most importantly, were marrying someone you genuinely loved and couldn’t see yourself living without.

It was all rather devastating now, to see how just a few words managed to ruin what was supposed to be the happiest day of your life.

You took a swig from the bottle, lamenting the fact that his affair partner had been drinking this very wine earlier that night. At the thought of Tashi, you took yet another hefty swig.

Just as you reached for the lighter to light the cigarette you so desperately needed, Patrick burst through the doors of the balcony, slightly out of breath and sweat beading on his forehead. In between his heavy breaths, you swore you caught a sigh of relief.

You couldn’t say that you were pleased to see him—after all, you’d escaped to the balcony to get a little time alone and to think through the night—but as you took in his dramatic entrance and disheveled appearance, it became abundantly clear to you that he’d been urgently looking for you.

“Want some?” you asked, gesturing to the bottle. Your question was more than just an offer for a drink, but a peace treaty, offering Patrick to stay outside with you despite your more complicated feelings towards him.

“Sure,” he agreed, still slightly out of breath. He collected himself as you passed him the bottle, locking eyes with you as he took a swig from the expensive drink. It felt like time moved a little slower as you watched his lips wrap around the opening of the bottle and the way his Adam's apple bobbed while the drink went down.

You suddenly realized that complicated didn’t even begin to cover how you felt towards Patrick. You loved him more than anything, and you were sure that you needed him in your life—but beneath the thick layers of numbness was a reservoir of hurt, far deeper than you ever imagined you could harbor for the man.

He passed the bottle back to you, his hands gently brushing over yours. Momentarily, you felt scandalized by the action, unsure if you should feel your cheeks heating up from the small touch or if you should flinch away from it. By the time the brief moment was over, you hadn’t done either, electing to set your gaze back over the rail instead of at your partner.

Patrick stood silently beside you, not requesting anything more to drink or even attempting to make small talk. It seemed that he was just as aware as you were that he’d changed your entire dynamic with just a few words. You wondered if he realized just how much he’d fucked both of you by fucking someone else.

You shivered in the cold night, your dress not providing you much coverage in the elements. If your wedding night had gone any differently, Patrick would’ve offered you his suit jacket, draping the item over your shoulders and kissing you sweetly. Then again, if the night had gone differently, you likely wouldn’t be shivering on the balcony in the first place.

You squatted to set down the bottle on the ground and rediscovered the cigarette and lighter. Though you weren’t usually one to smoke, you desperately needed it after the shitshow that was your wedding night.

Though you put the stick to your lips, you struggled to light the cigarette, the frigid breeze making everything slightly more difficult. It didn’t help that you hadn’t smoked since you were a teenager, giggling with your friends as you clumsily attempted and failed to light up the stick, the match pinched between your fingertips quickly burning down. The contrast between the silly memory and your far less silly reality felt jarring, to say the least.

“Here, let me,” Patrick said softly, taking the lighter from you and cupping his hand around the tip of the cigarette. You tried not to look at him too closely as you listened to the soft clicking sound of the lighter. Though he should’ve focused on the action so he didn’t burn his finger tips or the palm of his hand blocking the wind, he didn’t seem to be able to look at anything but you. The light of the flame briefly illuminated both of your faces, momentarily giving you a better look at his sad eyes.

You inhaled as the flame touched the tip, and turned your head to exhale the smoke, not wanting to blow it in the face of your partner or have to spend another second under the scrutiny of his intense eye contact.

Even as you looked away and into the garden below, you could feel Patrick’s eyes burning into you. You were sure that if you looked back over at him, you would see him looking particularly downtrodden, lips parted for words that were on the tip of his tongue that he couldn’t quite say yet, and eyebrows drawn together in a way that only seemed to highlight the sadness in his eyes.

Unspoken questions lingered in the air like the smoke from the cigarette dangling from your lips. Though you didn’t care for the smell, you were pretty sure you preferred the smoke to the questions.

Finally, a quiet question was spoken into the air, “Can I?” Patrick asked, his eyes flitting from your eyes to your lips.

“Sure,” you replied noncommittally as you pulled the cigarette away from you and passed it to your husband. Electing to watch him instead of the unchanging garden, you observed as Patrick’s lips closed over the space where yours had just been, covering the hint of a lipstick stain that you’d left on it. After a long drag, he passed the cigarette back to you, his hand brushing softly over yours once more as you did so.

This pattern continued, a heavy silence falling between the two of you as you shared the cigarette, your hands caressing the other’s softly.

“Here,” you murmured as you approached the filter. Instead of passing it back to Patrick, you brought it up to his lips, watching him intently as he breathed in the smoke.

For a moment, all you could see was his face, illuminated by the burning end of the cigarette, pupils blown with something you couldn’t quite place. You weren’t sure if you wanted to ravish him right there on the balcony or push him off of it.

He blew the smoke right back into your face, electing to still share the last of the cigarette with you. You wondered if that meant anything. It probably didn’t.

The two of you stood looking at each other, staring wordlessly as you waited for the other person to move a muscle or say something—anything. For a moment, you considered telling Patrick that you wanted an annulment. But then again, that wasn’t exactly the truth.

“I’m going to bed,” you broke the silence with your announcement. “I need to change out of this dress.”

You wished it were that simple. You desperately wanted to scrub the day off of you and to pinch yourself until you woke up. Surely, this couldn’t be your actual wedding night. Maybe you could wake up in the morning and find that this was all a bad dream—the manifestation of anxiety before your big day.

But, as Patrick trailed behind you in the hallway as if you would disappear if you left his sight, you were pretty sure that this was the reality. You wouldn’t wake up and find that your husband had been loyal to you.

Your return to the room was a silent one. The moment you stepped foot through the door, it felt like you were back in that horrible moment; like Patrick was moments from revealing to you that Tashi was the tip of the iceberg.

Bile rose in your throat once more. You made a beeline to the bathroom, hoping that the change of scenery might halt your thoughts altogether.

You stepped out of the bathroom with an entirely different mindset than what you had as you entered. Sure, your wedding night wasn’t at all what you expected it to be, but it didn’t mean that you couldn’t put it back on the right track. In the bathroom, you slipped on a silky nightie, what you hoped would be a reminder to both of you that this wasn’t any old regular night, but your wedding night. Though, with the day you just had, you weren’t so sure that either of you would be up for a particularly romantic night. You guessed it couldn’t hurt.

You left the bathroom as a woman on a mission, your eyes set on Patrick as you crossed the bedroom floor to get to him. Though he’d been laying on the bed, staring up at the ceiling like it had the secrets to the universe written on it, the sound of your entrance drew his attention over to you. You gently bit your lower lip and hoped that your face said ‘sexy’ rather than ‘so nervous you might be sick.’

His eyes stayed locked on you as you crawled into bed, and you hoped once more that the action of you moving towards him on your hands and knees didn’t appear as desperate as you felt on the inside.

It felt like your evening consisted of one desperate plea after another: Please don’t do this to me. Please just pretend that everything’s fine. Please don’t leave me.

He followed your lead as you trailed your hand up his arm and looked at him as seductively as you could manage before pushing him down onto the bed and straddling his lap. Distantly, you wondered how Tashi imitated things with him—if she did anything that Patrick liked more about her than you. You did your best to push that thought away, but failed miserably.

Mechanically, you ran your hands through his hair and kissed him passionately. You tried to ignore the lump in your throat and reminded yourself that it was just Patrick. Things weren’t all that different, except for the fact that he was your husband now—and that he cheated on you.

You tried once more to push that thought out of your mind as you moved your hips against his lap, but your attempts were in vain. It certainly didn’t help that as you kissed him, you tasted the cigarette you shared earlier in his breath—an unwelcome reminder of the awkward tension that lingered between the two of you after he shared the truth about his infidelity. And surely, it was just your mind, but his lips almost tasted like the chapstick of another woman.

Suddenly, all you could think about was Tashi with your husband. Him and Tashi in your bedroom, or in a hotel room, or on your couch. Did she do anything special that drove him crazy? What did she have that you didn’t?

Your body said one thing, but your brain said something completely different. You did your best to power through the thoughts of your husband being with another woman, but you were beginning to realize that when it came to cheating, you weren’t all that tough. You bit down on Patrick’s lip in what you hoped would be a light nibble, but the taste of iron quickly filled your mouth.

You slowed down your movements as your thoughts sped up before you gave up entirely. You supposed it was a classic case of mind over matter, and your mind was not nearly as strong as any of your physical urges.

You shifted off of Patrick far later than you should’ve, feeling like a complete and utter failure. You couldn’t even do the one thing you should’ve been able to do during your wedding night. No wonder he found solace in someone else’s body.

“I’m sorry,” you said weakly, your voice barely above a whisper. “I can’t do this. I’m sorry.”

It took you rolling off of Patrick to realize that his face was damp, eyes glossy with a thin layer of tears threatening to fall. The pit in your stomach that had been steadily growing since Patrick pulled you aside to tell you something finally came to a head when you realized that your husband was crying.

“Why are you sorry?” he asked, his voice cracking on the last syllable of his question.

A fresh tear rolled down his cheek, which was then followed by a few other droplets. He turned his head away from you and wiped them away quickly so you wouldn’t notice them, but the damage was already done.

You’d never seen Patrick cry before—not when you watched sad movies that left you bawling, not when the two of you watched advertisements for puppies in shelters, not even when he thought his dad might be dying. To see him shed tears over you felt particularly unsettling.

“Patrick?” you said his name softly, like he was delicate and going to break.

“I should be the one who’s sorry,” he looked towards you once more, eyes now rimmed with red. “I ruined everything already. I'm so sorry.”

This was a complete wild card on top of a stack of wild cards. If someone told you that your wedding night would end with your husband telling you he cheated on you, a pathetic failed attempt at sex, then watching your partner cry for the first time in front of you, you would’ve laughed in their face.

His crying continued, becoming slightly more intense as sorrow racked through his body. You’d never been in a situation like this before, so you were completely unsure of what to do.

With all prior restraint to show him physical affection gone, you awkwardly slotted your arms around your husband. He automatically leaned into you, burying his face in your shoulder as he continued to shed quiet tears. Your shoulder quickly grew damp as you threaded your fingers through his curls, the repetitive petting being just as soothing for you as it was for him.

Despite it all, you still felt a general sense of nothing at all. You were beginning to grow concerned, knowing that deep down there were certainly emotions that weren’t ready to approach the surface. You worried about what it might look like once those feelings finally came out, but that was the least of your worries when it came to your weeping husband.

Patrick continued to cry quietly, the only sound in the room being his soft, occasional sniffles. You couldn’t even place how you felt or how long you sat there stone faced as you cradled your husband.

Eventually, the tears on your shoulder dried and the intervals between sniffles grew further and further. Soon, the soft sounds of weeping turned into the long and deep breaths of rest. Between you playing with his hair and holding him, he must’ve fallen asleep. You couldn’t really blame him—given your eventful day, your all-nighter the previous day, and the energy it took for him to cry.

You gently laid Patrick back down on his side of the bed, pulling a blanket over his chest and pushing back the hair on his forehead to press a kiss to him. He stirred slightly against the forehead kiss, but didn’t seem to wake up all the way. Even when your feelings were complicated towards the man, you couldn’t help being affectionate towards him. In some ways, you felt like you needed that affection just as much as he did.

You let out a long sigh as the reality of everything truly began to set in, and you no longer had to be strong for your weeping partner. You couldn’t wrap your head around the sight of Patrick crying for the first time, or the fact that he cheated on you. You flicked off the bedside lamp, the only source of light in your otherwise darkened bedroom.

You rolled over in bed and laid on your back, setting your hands on your stomach and staring up at the ceiling. You traced your eyes over the pattern of the ceiling, though it was dark and not all that clear. You wondered if you looked at it long enough, if you’d be able to make some sense out of it. You glanced over at Patrick and wondered the same thing.

You just couldn’t understand why he’d cheat on you. You’d always been under the impression that he was just as happy in your relationship as you were. Despite his promiscuous past, he never seemed like the type of person to not be loyal to you.

You noticed a teardrop trail down his cheek in his sleep, and you gently thumbed it away. The small movement turned into you tracing a line down his nose and over his lips, then over his eyebrows and back down through the few freckles that dotted his face. Maybe if you watched him long enough, if you learned every detail of his face, someone would reveal to you why he’d done something so illogical and cruel.

You worried about how the two of you could move forward from something like this. Though Patrick always approached the topic of infidelity with a dismissive attitude, cheating had always been a deal breaker for you in your past relationships. It shattered your trust in a way that was so foundational, you couldn’t fathom a world where your relationship with Patrick stayed exactly the same after this.

Part of you knew already that moving forward, you’d constantly wonder if he was genuinely working late or if he was having an affair, or if his eye was wandering at events despite you standing by his side. And that was just trust when it came to relationships—obviously his lie was far deeper than just that. Now, you knew that Patrick had the capacity to hold a secret that massive from you, then share it at the worst possible time.

In fact, his timing felt so terrible that you momentarily wondered if it was some sort of power play. Was Patrick trying to remind you that you weren’t equals in this partnership? Was he trying to manipulate you by only sharing this information to you after you were married to him and couldn’t easily call everything off?

Your stomach turned at the possibility that Patrick wasn’t really who he said he was, and that you’d been baited and switched. You recalled the first time you met Patrick’s family, how he switched on a dime and became far more calculated and cruel to them than you’d ever seen him be with you. Was that the realest version of your husband, and the person he was with you just a façade? Was this some sort of long game he was playing with his family to piss a few people off? Did Patrick even love you?

For the first time in your relationship, you felt like you didn’t know who you were sleeping next to. Surely, this couldn’t be the same Patrick who you set out to have a quick hook up with, and ended up talking to him for hours. It couldn’t be the same Patrick who held you tight at night and gave you kisses every morning in your kitchen. The same Patrick from your vows a few hours ago, whose hands shook as he read from notecards and declared his love for you.

You frowned as you looked over Patrick once more. You resented how he was able to sleep so peacefully after inflicting such hurt on you. Did he even understand how destroyed you were? You couldn’t see yourself sleeping through the night in the foreseeable future, your head too filled with questions about your relationship and questions about his relationship with her. Would they continue the affair? Would they still work together after this, leaving you to wonder for the rest of your life if they were still going behind your back?

You desperately wished the thoughts would stop, but they kept coming, punctuated by the sounds of Patrick’s soft snores behind you.

By the time the sun began to peek through the blinds, your hand was on Patrick’s face once again. You wondered how it was possible for him to hurt someone he loved as much as he loved you, if his definition of love was so skewed by a lifetime of abuse labeled as love from his parents, and siblings who used cruelty as a form of affection.

Maybe you should’ve listened to the warnings everyone gave you, from your parents who warned that your husband and his family may be more than you bargained for, from his sisters who never seemed to be able to fully wrap their head around Patrick committing to someone, let alone you. Maybe you should’ve even listened to Tashi’s coded warning about his inability to commit and stay loyal. It seemed like everyone saw the fate of your relationship coming except you.

With the early morning light illuminating the room, things felt a little clearer for you. Beneath the numbness that protected you the previous night was a more painful undercurrent of hurt that was already beginning to eat away at you.

For the past several years of your life, you hadn’t had to deal with any painful feelings on your own. Patrick was always there beside you to hold you tight and reassure you that everything would be okay. As you laid next to him, you realized that despite all the pain he’d inflicted on you, all you really wanted was to be held by him.

Knowing that he was sleeping peacefully beside you, you opted to hold him, draping your body over his and pulling yourself as close as you could manage to him. You leaned your ear against his back, taking in the warmth he gave you and listening to his heart beat. As the two of your breaths and heartbeats began to match the other’s pace, you lamented that even now, your hearts beat as one.

For the first time that evening, your eye prickled with the threat of tears.

You lost track of how long you held your husband, but it was long enough to notice the pattern of his breath changing. You’d woken up beside him enough times to recognize that he was clearly awake, yet he made no other indication to you that he was awake. He wanted you to hold him. You wondered if he thought this might be the last time you ever do that for him. You wondered if it was the last time you’d ever do that for him.

The two of you pretended to be asleep despite the fact that you were both obviously awake, but no one commented on anything. After your arms began to grow numb, you turned your back to Patrick, hoping that he would return the favor and give you what you really wanted. You were pleased to find that he just as eagerly wrapped his arms around you, holding you tight and breathing quietly in your ear.

The two of you sat in complete silence, pretending you didn’t know what the other person was doing. Somehow, it felt like that was about to become a recurring theme in your relationship.

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