#this is my fifteen minutes of fame

[1mlostnow]

Gang I can’t even see my real notifs bc I finally made a banger post

[lanarchive]

just went bowling with my parents and was making fun of my dad for choking only for him to say "like arsenal" under his breath and when i tell u that shut me up so fast

[glossdebut]

study break | MYG

✧ PAIRING: yoongi x fem!reader

✧ SUMMARY: Yoongi was an extremely effective tutor, until he wasn’t. As it turns out, dating the person who is singlehandedly responsible for bringing up your Fundamentals of Music Theory grade isn’t the smartest move in the world. 

✧ TAGS: college au, smut, fluff

✧ WARNINGS: oral (f. receiving), vaginal fingering, slight overstimulation

✧ AUTHOR'S NOTE: okay, so this is NOT price of fame chapter two, nor is it the seokjin fic that i’ve been teasing for weeks. this is instead a secret third thing, inspired by my own post that has been living rent free in my brain for the past couple of days. i promise POF2 and the seokjin fic are both coming, but i had to get this out before i lost my damn mind. not beta read, so feel free to inform me of any mistakes i missed. P.S. i know the header isn’t debut yoongi, don’t fucking @ me about it!! i had this photo on hand ):

✧ WORDCOUNT: 2.2k words

Yoongi was an extremely effective tutor, until he wasn’t.

As it turns out, dating the person who is singlehandedly responsible for bringing up your Fundamentals of Music Theory grade isn’t the smartest move in the world. 

Things were so much easier when you—wrongfully—assumed he was an asshole. At least then, the arrangement was clear: you met him in the library, tried not to get annoyed at what a know-it-all he seemed to be for an hour, and then went back to your dorm with a slightly easier method of memorizing the circle of fifths under your belt. It went on like that for weeks. Quick and effective, mostly painless.

But then, when awkward small talk developed into genuine interest, you got to know him.

You learned that the reason he never takes notes in class is because he doesn’t have to. He taught himself all of the basics of music theory years ago, could’ve tested out and moved on to a more advanced class, but he wanted an easy A in his course load. You learned that he’s a classical piano major. He likes it just fine, but it’s really a means to an end. You learned that he writes his own raps, performs them at underground shows with a group of friends some weekends, that that’s what he really wants to do. You learned that he’s not an asshole and he’s just shy, that he’s been working up the courage to ask you out all semester.

You learned even more about him on your first date.

Such as: he’s the self-proclaimed master of grilling meat, and he’ll load up your plate for you before he even thinks of feeding himself. He may act like he’s not interested in going to the noraebang, but with just the slightest bit of insistence from you he’ll fold like a piece of paper. He thinks it’s cute when you snatch his snapback right off of his head and put it on your own. Even cuter when you fumble through a verse of Epik High’s ‘Love Love Love,’ squealing happily when he joins in. 

And: he kisses like he’s got something to prove. Knows all the right ways to use his tongue. Makes a low noise in the back of his throat when you do something he likes. Isn’t the slightest bit shy about pulling you into his lap, nor about slipping his hand into your panties right there, Epik High forgotten in favor of making you cum around his skilled fingers. 

So. Yeah.

Yoongi is no longer an effective tutor, because instead he is a fucking distraction.

You’re supposed to be studying. You had been studying, both of you putting up a valiant effort for a full hour and a half. But just as you’d gotten a firm grasp on the seven musical modes—Ionian, Dorian, Phrygian, Lydian, Mixolydian, Aeolian, Locrian—-Yoongi was whining, insisting on taking a break. You tried to put up a fight, but you’re especially weak when Yoongi gets all sulky, soft pink lips pulled into a pout.

Notecards tossed aside, your fifteen minute study break quickly devolves into half an hour of making out on Yoongi’s bed. As soft music filters into his dorm room from his laptop, you lose track of time with his tongue sliding against yours, the occasional sting of his teeth on your bottom lip because he knows you like it. When you feel his erection pressed against your hip it quickly becomes very clear that you’re both done studying for the time being.

The way Yoongi kisses you never fails to make you crazy. His lips on yours are gentle but commanding at the same time, his hands in your hair holding your head exactly where he wants it as he licks into your mouth like he owns it. When he pulls away, you barely have a chance to catch your breath before he’s trailing hot, open-mouthed kisses down your neck. Your hips rock up against his, desperate for friction. 

“Baby,” Yoongi murmurs against your skin. His hands slide down from your hair to gently tug at the waistband of your jeans, an index finger circling teasingly around the button. “Wanna eat you out. You want that?”

“Yeah,” you breathe, gasping when he nips at the underside of your jaw. Your voice is high, needy, foreign to your own ears. He’s good at that—at pulling sounds out of you that you didn’t know you could make.

He wastes no time in peeling your jeans down your legs, tossing them off the bed and out of his way. Yoongi likes to have as much space as possible when he eats you out, you’ve learned. He likes to take his time, spread you out as much as he can on his shitty dorm-provided twin size mattress. Just because he can make you cum in record time—and he can—doesn’t mean he likes to. Not when he’d much rather drag it out, savor you in every imaginable way until you can’t take it anymore. 

You know you’re in for it when he doesn’t take your panties off right away. Instead, when he settles between your thighs, all he does is look for a moment, his gaze laser-focused on the growing wetness seeping through the cotton. 

It lasts long enough that you start to squirm, his eyes flicking up to meet yours at the sudden movement.

“A-are you…?” you start, but you trail off, suddenly feeling way too fucking shy for something you’ve done with him more times than you can count at this point. 

“Yeah,” he hums, looking up at you with an amused smirk. “Yeah, I’m getting to it, sweetness. I just wanted to look at you for a second. Is that okay?”

You shiver, swallowing thickly as you nod.

“You sure?” he teases, pressing a soft kiss to the inside of your thigh, so close to where you want him. “You don’t have anywhere better to be?”

“Shut up, Yoongi,” you complain, sitting up for a moment to flick him on the forehead.

“Yah, so disrespectful,” he admonishes with a bite right where he’d just kissed. “I’m just playing. I know you don’t wanna be anywhere else.”

Your eyes narrow at him. “I don’t,” you agree, suspicious. He’s up to something.

“No, you don’t,” Yoongi hums knowingly, holding your gaze as he presses a kiss right to your clit. It makes your breath hitch, even with your panties subduing the feeling. “Because you love the way I eat this pussy, don’t you, baby?”

The answer is yes, of course. Yoongi always makes you feel so good no matter what he’s doing, but eating you out is definitely where he excels. But something about how cocky he’s being makes something stir inside of you—-makes you feel a little bold, a little mean. 

“When you actually get around to it, yeah.”

Yoongi chuckles darkly, snapping the waistband of your panties against your hip. When he lifts his head his eyes are all pupil. “It’s like that, huh?” he asks, his tongue running over his teeth.

“Maybe,” you say, goading.

He clicks his tongue, dipping down to lick a broad stripe over your pussy without any warning. When he reaches your clothed clit, he wraps his lips around it and sucks hard, tearing a surprised moan from you.

“F-fuck!” Your fingers tangle in his hair, desperate for something to hold on to, but the overwhelming pleasure is gone as quickly as it came.

“Such a brat,” Yoongi mumbles, sinking his teeth into the softness of your inner thigh again, harder this time. “Just wanted to take my time, treat you nice. But if you want it like this, fine.”

Mercifully, his fingers hook into the waistband of your panties. He roughly drags them down your legs until they’re thrown onto the floor, out of sight just like your jeans.

You gasp when his fingers instantly slide over your slippery cunt, making you gasp. “You get this wet just from pissing me off?” he scoffs, and you shake your head. 

“N-no,” you whimper.

“No?” Yoongi asks, tilting his head at you with a smirk. You feel like you’re going to die when his fingers find your clit, rubbing in punishing little circles. “Tell me what gets you this wet, then, baby.”

“You!” you moan. It feels embarrassingly fast, but you’re close. You’re gonna cum before he even gets his mouth on you properly. Maybe that’s his goal. “You, fuck, Yoongi.”

“That’s right,” he purrs. “You gonna cum already, pretty girl? Before I even get to taste you?”

Oh, he knows exactly what he’s doing. Motherfucker. 

You wouldn’t be able to protest even if you wanted to, your brain already succumbing to the pleasant buzz of your impending orgasm. All you can do is squirm and rock up against Yoongi’s fingertips, completely at his mercy.

“That’s okay,” Yoongi continues, unbothered as you shake and moan in front of him. “I know you can give me another one. Go ahead, sweetness. Cum for me.”

Your release tears through you, sudden and intense and all-consuming. You’re sure there are words coming out of your mouth, but between the heat spreading through your body and the static buzzing in your ears, you honestly have no idea what they could be. Yoongi’s fingers keep rubbing at your abused clit until you’re trembling, gasping for breath between moans.

“Filthy girl,” he hums. Whatever you said must’ve been good, because he sounds almost proud of you as he runs his hands over your thighs. “You gonna let me take my time now?”

“Yes,” you gasp, still reeling from your orgasm. Yoongi taking his time is exactly what you need right now, or else you’ll go into complete overdrive. Absently, you think that was his plan all along, but that thought melts away as soon as Yoongi dips down and delves his tongue into your cunt, slow and thorough. 

Your brain? Empty. Brain so fucking empty.

“Shit,” he groans against you, his voice so low and gravelly you can feel the vibration of his words against your pussy. “You always taste so fucking good after you cum for me.”

You thread your fingers through his hair again, moaning long and low as he spreads you apart with his thumbs and dives back in. His nose nudges just slightly against your clit as he licks into you, the barely-there contact making your eyes roll back in your head.

“Yoongiiii,” you moan, earning an appreciative moan from him as he dips his tongue into your entrance.

Your first orgasm took you by surprise, but you can tell already that this one is going to be a slow burn, tendrils of heat that never really got a chance to fade spreading through your body, adagio.

As promised, Yoongi takes his sweet time. He sets an agonizing rhythm: licking into you, dragging his tongue up your pussy, gently sucking your clit into his mouth, over and over again until you’re practically a puddle on his mattress.

“Feels so fuckin’ good,” you mewl, your thighs shaking around his head. You’d blush at the sounds he’s producing between your legs, slurping and sucking at you, if you weren’t so fucked out. Instead, all it does is turn you on even more, make you even wetter for him. 

Yoongi pulls back, huffing a laugh through his nose. “I know, baby,” he murmurs soothingly. “You ready to cum again?”

Wordlessly, you nod, squeezing your eyes shut. Two fingers tease at your entrance, getting nice and wet before Yoongi slides them in, and just like that, you’re ready to burst.

“Nnngh—fuck, ‘m so fucking close,” you slur, grasping at his hair as he pumps his fingers into you.

“Give it to me,” he says, before sucking your clit into his mouth again and making stars burst behind your eyelids.

His fingers curl just right, and then you’re moaning brokenly, bucking up against his fingers and mouth as you cum again.

It feels like it lasts forever. Yoongi moans around your clit as you clench around his fingers, squeezing tight tight tight as heat crashes over you in waves. You feel his fingers withdraw, and then his tongue is fucking into you again, licking every last drop he’s earned from you.

He only breaks away when you’re pushing at his head, overstimulated and spent.

“God, you’re so sexy,” he rumbles, climbing up the bed so he’s on top of you, bracing himself on his elbows. He’s one to talk. He always looks so good like this—swollen lips and dark eyes, the bottom half of his face slick from eating you out so fucking well. “You can just cum and cum for me, can’t you?”

“You are insane,” you breathe, grasping at the strings of his sweatshirt to pull him in for a kiss, tasting yourself on his lips. 

Yoongi chuckles, pulling away just to press his forehead against yours. “You like it,” he says.

“I like you,” you correct, closing your eyes. “Even though I’m going to fail my final because of you.”

That earns a real laugh from Yoongi, his nose scrunching. “You’re not gonna fail.”

“I am,” you say, nodding sagely. “But it’ll be worth it.”

“That so?” He presses another kiss to your lips, nuzzling his nose against yours.

“Mhmm,” you hum. “Besides, I’ll just find a better tutor next semester when I have to retake.”

That earns you a sharp jab of Yoongi’s fingers to your side, but he’s got one of those gummy smiles on his face as you squeal under him, so no harm done.

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[rmadridcore]

When You’re Here

Pairing: Jude Bellingham x Reader

Requested

Summary: Jude, missing you deeply, is overwhelmed with joy and love when you surprise him by showing up at the Bernabéu to watch him play.

Word Count: 3.1K

Author’s note: I had this in my requests for a while, sorry for the delay, hope you love it anon! 🤍

Jude’s typical training day demeanor was straightforward: laser-focused. On any other day, he’d immerse himself fully in the drills and exercises, cracking a joke here and there during breaks but tuning everything else out when it came time to work. Today, though? Today was different. Yesterday was the same. In fact, he hadn’t been himself for weeks — ever since you left for that work trip.

Normally, Jude could handle brief separations. He was no stranger to them, away games you couldn’t attend or your quick business trips that lasted a week, tops. But this time was different. You had been gone for almost a month, and Jude was on the verge of losing it.

Sure, you two FaceTimed every night before bed. You called whenever you had a spare moment. You texted back and forth throughout the day, as much as your schedules allowed. But none of it felt like enough for Jude. He wanted you there with him — not just virtually, but physically. He needed to feel the warmth of your presence, to hold you, to have you by his side. The emptiness of your absence seemed to grow louder with every passing day.

“This is probably the 20th time you’ve checked your phone, bro,” Camavinga teased, breaking Jude out of his spiraling thoughts. Jude wiped the sweat from his face with a towel, phone in hand for what felt like the millionth time today, scanning for a reply that still hadn’t come.

Jude sighed, tossing the towel aside. “I texted her, and she hasn’t responded,” he muttered, his frustration slipping out in his tone.

Camavinga chuckled. “She’s probably busy, man.”

Jude nodded half-heartedly, his shoulders slumping. “Yeah, maybe,” he admitted, though the crease in his brow remained.

“How long’s it been since you texted her?” Vini chimed in.

Jude blinked, glancing back at his phone to check. His teammates knew you well. They’d met you often at team dinners and events, where you were always effortlessly charming, seamlessly blending into their lively banter. They also knew how hopelessly smitten Jude was with you — and, admittedly, they’d been enduring his constant moping and wistful sighs for weeks now.

“Fifteen minutes,” Jude declared, as if that was an eternity, his voice tinged with irritation. He tossed his phone onto the bench with a thud.

The boys exchanged amused glances before bursting into uncontrollable laughter.

Jude shook his head, his lips twitching in reluctant amusement. “You lot are useless,” he muttered, though a soft chuckle escaped him.

He sat down next to them, stretching his legs and trying, and failing, to shift his focus back to training. He knew logically that you weren’t ignoring him. You had a demanding job that kept you busy, and the rational part of him understood that you’d reply the moment you had a free moment. But logic wasn’t winning against the ache of missing you.

The truth was, Jude wasn’t just annoyed or impatient, he felt incomplete without you. Over time, he’d come to realize how deeply you’d become woven into his life. You weren’t just his partner; you were his peace in the chaos, his constant in the mess of fame and football. You made him laugh when nothing else could, listened when he needed to vent, and brought a light into his life that felt irreplaceable.

And now, without you here, that light felt dimmer. He was counting the hours, the minutes, until he could have you back in his arms.

After working out for a while, Jude decided to take a break. He grabbed his phone again, and this time, relief washed over him as he saw your name lighting up his screen with a new message. His face lit up instantly, the weight of his frustration and sadness dissolving in an instant. A humongous smile spread across his face as he eagerly opened the message and began typing a reply.

For those few minutes, he felt like himself again. Chatting with you, even briefly, was enough to lift his spirits and give him the boost he desperately needed. But all too soon, he had to return to training. Reluctantly, he said goodbye, promising to talk later.

As Jude put his phone back and glanced up, he caught a reflection in the mirror that made him pause. Rodrygo was mimicking him with an exaggerated, love-struck grin, pretending to text on an invisible phone. Vini, standing beside him, was silently cracking up, his shoulders shaking with barely contained laughter.

Jude grabbed his towel and tossed it at the pair, hitting Rodrygo square in the chest. “Idiots,” he muttered with a half-smile, shaking his head. Their laughter only grew louder, echoing through the training area.

The rest of the session passed uneventfully, but Jude’s mood was noticeably lighter after talking to you. Once training wrapped up, he showered and headed back to his room at Valdebebas. The exhaustion from the day caught up with him, and he longed to be home in his own bed. But more than that, he wished you were there beside him.

Lying in bed, Jude grabbed his phone to FaceTime you, a nightly ritual whenever the two of you were apart. Truthfully, he missed home more when you weren’t there, mainly because when you weren’t around, he found himself hugging your pillow as he slept. It was a habit he wouldn’t dare admit to anyone, not even you.

When your face appeared on his screen, it was as if the entire world shifted back into focus. “Hi, baby,” you greeted him with your sweet voice, and the stress that had been weighing on his chest dissipated instantly.

“Hey, my love. How was your day?” he asked, propping himself up against the pillows.

You started talking about your day, how busy and tiring it had been, but also how much you missed him. Jude sighed as he listened, nodding along with a soft smile, though the longing in his heart grew with every word.

“How are you feeling about tomorrow’s game?” you asked, noticing the subtle tension in his expression as he rubbed his face, clearly trying to shake off his frustration.

“Fine, I guess,” he replied, his voice low and filled with fatigue. “We should do well. I just wish you were here.”

Your heart ached at the way his voice softened when he said that. “Aww, Jude. I miss you so much. I wish I could be there too,” you admitted, your voice laden with emotion. You missed everything about him — his scent, his warm hugs, the way he’d kiss your forehead, the silly songs he’d hum, even the soft snoring you used to tease him about.

“I always play better when you’re here supporting me,” he said, his words carrying the weight of truth. It was something he’d told you many times before, and he meant every word. When you were in the stands, cheering him on, he felt like he could conquer anything.

“You will be watching, though, right?” he asked, a hopeful glimmer in his eyes. He knew you never missed his games, even when you were busy, and the thought of you not being there, even virtually, dampened his spirits.

You hesitated, biting your lip. You didn’t want to lie to him, but you had to for the sake of the surprise. “I’ll try my best to watch, baby. I have a meeting at the same time as the match, but I’ll do everything I can to catch some of it,” you said apologetically.

Jude’s face fell slightly, and the sight of his disappointment tugged at your heartstrings. “Okay,” he said quietly, trying to mask his sadness.

“I’ll be supporting you from afar, love. You know I love you so much,” you said, hoping to cheer him up.

“I love you too. More than anything,” he replied, his voice firm despite his obvious exhaustion.

“Get some rest now, okay? You need to be ready for tomorrow,” you reminded him gently. You could see the sleepiness in his eyes, but you knew he’d never be the one to end the call first. Jude loved hearing your voice so much that he’d rather fall asleep mid-conversation than hang up.

“Goodnight, my love,” he murmured, his eyelids growing heavier.

“Goodnight, Jude. Sweet dreams,” you whispered, watching as he slowly drifted off, still clutching the phone.

Match days for Jude had always been a rollercoaster of emotions, but not in the way most people might think. While he naturally felt a bit of anxiety before stepping onto the pitch, the dominant emotions coursing through him were always motivation and determination. Jude was fiercely dedicated, a player who thrived on focus and precision, never allowing his nerves to get the better of him.

As part of his pre-match ritual, Jude strolled onto the pitch long before the stadium filled with roaring fans. With his headphones on, he stepped onto the pristine grass, taking a slow walk around the grounds. It was his way of grounding himself, visualizing the game ahead, and soaking in the calm before the storm. The music in his ears created a protective bubble, letting him zone in on the task at hand.

Lost in his thoughts, he almost missed the vibration of his phone in his pocket. Pulling it out, he glanced at the screen and saw your name flashing with an incoming FaceTime call. A small frown formed on his face as he answered — it wasn’t like you to call so close to your big meeting.

“Hey, gorgeous,” your voice greeted him, warm and teasing, immediately cutting through the hum of pre-match nerves.

“Hey,” he replied, slipping one hand into his pocket as he cradled the phone in the other. “How’s it going halfway across the world?”

You smirked, tilting the camera just enough to give him a better view of your face. “Work’s been good, but I wouldn’t say I’m quite halfway across the world anymore.”

Jude squinted at the screen, his brows furrowing. Something about the background behind you seemed… familiar. He also noticed the collar of the shirt you were wearing, it looked suspiciously like a Real Madrid jersey.

“Wait… where are you?” he asked, his voice tinged with suspicion.

“What do you mean?” you replied with an innocent tone, though the twitch of your lips betrayed your amusement.

“That—” He leaned closer to the screen, narrowing his eyes. “That looks like a stadium behind you.”

Feigning confusion, you turned the camera slightly, revealing a glimpse of the unmistakable seats of the Bernabéu. “Oh, this place? Yeah, it’s kinda cool. Thought I’d check it out.”

Jude froze, his jaw going slack as the realization hit him. “No way. Are you—? You’re here?!”

“Surprise!” you exclaimed, flipping the camera to fully reveal yourself standing by the edge of the pitch, already decked out in his jersey.

He ran a hand on his face, his heart skipping a beat. Quickly, he glanced around the stadium, which was still mostly empty since the game was hours away. When his eyes found you, waving at him from the sidelines and blowing him a kiss, his entire face lit up. If it weren’t for the cameras and a few teammates milling around, he might have jumped up and down like an overexcited kid. Instead, he settled for a wide, uncontrollable grin.

“Are you serious? You didn’t tell me? When did you get here?” His gaze flicked back to his phone, needing to see your face up close.

“This morning,” you replied with a playful shrug. “I wanted to see that priceless look on your face.”

Jude shook his head, his grin so wide it almost hurt. His chest felt impossibly full, his heart pounding in a way no pre-match ritual could replicate. “You’re unreal,” he murmured, his voice brimming with disbelief and affection.

“You’re welcome,” you teased, leaning casually against the railing. “Now go out there and show me why I flew all this way.”

He chuckled, shaking his head again. “I don’t know what I did to deserve you.”

“You scored a few goals, I guess,” you replied with a wink, making him laugh.

“I’ll score ten tonight if it means you’ll keep surprising me like this.” His tone softened, a rare vulnerability slipping through. “Thank you for being here. It means everything.”

“Always,” you said, your voice tender and sincere. “Now go win us that game.”

With one last look, he ended the call, his chest swelling with newfound energy. He felt unstoppable.

The game began with Real Madrid dominating right from the first whistle. The team controlled the pace effortlessly, holding possession, creating chances, and putting pressure on the opposition. Jude was a maestro on the pitch, gliding with the ball as if it were an extension of himself. His mind occasionally flickered to you, sitting somewhere in the stands, watching him. The thought of you there, cheering for him, filled him with an unmatched drive.

The match was electric. Vinícius scored the opening goal with a stunning strike, followed by Rodrygo slotting one in with finesse. Jude orchestrated the midfield, dictating the flow of the game, and his every move seemed to hum with purpose. Victory felt inevitable, and the energy in the stadium was palpable.

In moments of brief stillness on the pitch, Jude would glance toward the stands, knowing you were there, proud and beaming. It pushed him to play harder, better, with every passing minute.

The atmosphere at the Bernabéu was electric, as always. The fans roared with passion, their energy pulsating through the stadium. The game had been going spectacularly well, but Jude had one thing on his mind — a goal. His performance had been stellar, commanding the midfield with his usual elegance and precision. But scoring in front of you after so long felt essential. You hadn’t watched him play in person in what felt like forever, and he wanted this goal to be just for you.

As the minutes ticked down, Jude's focus sharpened. While directing the game from midfield, he kept scanning for spaces to exploit, calculating every opportunity to find the net. And then, as if fate had aligned perfectly, the ball came flying toward him off a cross. He surged forward, meeting it with a powerful header that sailed past the keeper and into the back of the net.

The stadium erupted. The cheers were deafening, a symphony of celebration as his teammates rushed to embrace him. Jude stood there, soaking it all in, arms wide open in his iconic celebration. Yet, despite the roaring applause and the love from tens of thousands of fans, all he could think about was you. He imagined your radiant smile, your eyes shining with pride. In that moment, nothing else mattered.

He kissed the badge on his chest, but as he waved to the crowd, his gaze flickered up toward the VIP section. He knew you were watching, and the thought filled him with an unmatched sense of accomplishment. Taking a deep breath, he let the adrenaline rush through him, knowing the game, and his night, couldn’t have gone any better.

The final whistle blew, sealing the victory. The Bernabéu buzzed with excitement, the fans still chanting his name long after the match ended. But Jude’s thoughts weren’t on the post-match celebrations or the cameras following his every move. His focus was singular: you.

In the tunnel, his teammates teased him mercilessly. “In a rush, mate?” one of them quipped. “Someone special waiting for you?”

Jude only laughed, brushing off the comments as he hurried through his post-match routine. A quick change, a few celebratory high fives with his teammates, and a rapid cleanup later, he was finally free. Emerging near the VIP area, his eyes scanned the space eagerly until they landed on you.

You stood by the railing, his jersey hanging slightly oversized on your frame, a grin lighting up your face as your eyes met his. Jude didn’t think — he moved. Jogging straight toward you, he ignored the curious glances from onlookers, his entire world narrowing down to the sight of you.

“You,” he murmured as he reached you, pulling you into his arms without hesitation. His hands slid around your waist, lifting you off the ground slightly as he buried his face in your neck. The familiar scent of your perfume washed over him, and in that moment, it felt like coming home. Holding you after so long filled the emptiness that had grown inside him.

“You were incredible,” you whispered, your arms tightening around his shoulders. “Man of the match, Mr. Bellingham.”

He pulled back just enough to look at you, his cheeks flushed from the game and the overwhelming joy of having you there. “You don’t know how much it meant to see you up there tonight,” he said, his voice soft. His eyes held that familiar twinkle you adored, a warmth that only appeared when he looked at you.

“Seeing you score was worth every minute of the flight,” you teased, your fingers brushing gently against his cheek. “Not bad for someone who’s been pouting over FaceTime all month.”

He laughed, the sound rich and unrestrained. “I wasn’t pouting.”

“Sure, keep telling yourself that,” you replied with a grin, your fingers playing with the hem of his jersey.

Jude leaned closer, his voice dropping low so only you could hear. “You know, I was planning to dedicate that goal to you. But I figured kissing the badge was slightly less obvious than blowing a kiss to the VIP box.”

“Smooth,” you quipped, your eyes sparkling. “Guess I’ll take it.”

“Take this too,” he said, leaning in to press a lingering kiss to your lips. Though quick, it was impossibly tender, a moment that conveyed everything he felt for you. Jude had a way of making even the simplest gestures feel like declarations of love, and this was no exception.

The world around you blurred. Despite the residual chaos of the stadium, the two of you stood in a little bubble of intimacy, your connection shutting out everything else.

“You’re coming home with me, right?” he asked, his voice tinged with hope.

“Where else would I go?” you replied, taking his hand in yours.

“Good,” he said, intertwining your fingers with his. “Because after tonight, you’re not allowed to leave again.”

You rolled your eyes playfully, though the smile on your lips betrayed your amusement. “We’ll see about that, superstar.”

“Oh, it’s not up for debate,” Jude replied confidently, squeezing your hand as he led you toward the exit.

And with that, the night belonged to the two of you — a perfect ending to a perfect day.

[seat-safety-switch]

"Do you want the regular treatment, or do you want ad-supported?" asked the cheery front-desk attendant.

What's the difference, I asked. The difference, they said with a perky lilt to their voice, is that the ad-supported is cheaper. It's streamed, and vendors buy ads on it. I had already stopped listening by the time they said it was cheaper.

Like many similar occasions in my life, I should have asked more questions. It turns out that my proctologist was in fact live-streaming my haemorrhoid surgery. The ads were just to support his Porsche habit. Every so often, he would look up at the screen, read the incoming chat messages, and reply with a catchphrase. Every time someone subscribed, or spent some of the show currency ("holes,") an airhorn would go off.

Even so, I saved a lot of money on having my butt inspected. After things got going, I actually started to fall under the sway of celebrity, too. My ass was becoming a movie star, getting its fifteen minutes of fame in a way that would be horrifying to ancient, less evolved, civilizations. Sure, it did get weird once the Doc broke out his vtuber and then accidentally set the character to "maximum cleavage" while reaching for the cauterizer, but waving the top-heavy blonde catgirl around did make him like a quick thousand dollars in tips that fateful evening. Lots of in-joke chanting about that one, too, all emitted through a demented-sounding voice synthesizer running on a speaker in the corner of the office. I think it's still on VOD, you can go look it up any time you want.

As I walked out of the clinic very slowly and gingerly, I thought about the nature of celebrity today. How remarkable it is that two complete strangers can meet during a medical procedure, and both of them would become instant luminaries of entertainment, if only for the thirty or forty minutes the stream lasted. When I got home, there was an offer waiting in my in-box from Amazon to run a butt-centric talk show. Their algorithms had seen something they liked.

[a-shot-of-the-strange]

time to make one last post about neil gaiman

if you had told me a year and a half ago we’d be here i would never have believed you. my fifteen minutes of internet fame could never have been caused by a monster. yet here we are.

let me make one thing extremely clear: neil gaiman is a serial rapist. he is not a ‘creep’ or a ‘bad guy’, he is a serial rapist. call him what he is. do not downplay his monstrosities.

the weird part about all of this is i grew up with him. and i’m the same age as one of his victims. i read his books as a child and i am the same age as one of his victims.

do not forgive him. do not forgive amanda palmer. do not forgive anyone remotely involved with these horrific acts.

and one more thing: in my mind, good omens belongs to sir terry pratchett. and it should to you too. may he rest in peace separate from this hell.

support the victims. say their names. do not forget them.

[elleandstufff]

Let's Play a Game -`✮´- Part 1

Young and in the club scene due to the family business, you meet an up-and-coming rapper who calls himself Thanos. As the two of you become deeply embedded in the dark world of fame, money, and drugs, you begin to wonder if you can make it out alive. Pre-games, during the games, and post-games Thanos/Choi Su-bong x fem!reader

Series Note: This story contains explicit descriptions of substance abuse (party drugs and alcohol) by both Thanos/Su-bong and reader. This story is emotional!!! Like seriously, they are going through it! I wanted to experiment with what Thanos was like before the drugs/fame. This series is going to be a long one so buckle up!

Chapter Warnings: Small age gap (6 years), mostly fluff, club setting, moderate alcohol consumption, sweet but persistent!Thanos, brief discussion of anxiety and depression, grinding/dancing, pet names (my princess, good girl, baby, etc), dialogue spoken in English is written in bold italics, 3k words

ˑ . 𖥔 . ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁ˑ . 𖥔 . ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁ˑ . 𖥔 . ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁ˑ . 𖥔 . ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁ˑ . 𖥔 . ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁ˑ . 𖥔 . ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁ˑ . 𖥔 . ݁₊

The club always looks weird with the lights on, but you’re used to it. Most days you come here before open to do inventory, mingle with that night’s entertainers, or supervise in general. You like the atmosphere of the club–lights on or off–and you feel that helping out is the least you can do to thank your father for allowing you to live a lavish party lifestyle. As far as you know, you’re the only person in all of Seoul that owns the title of only daughter of Korea’s biggest club mogul. 

“Hi, Princess!” Your father descends the nearest staircase and meets you by the bar. “Do you think you can hold things down tonight?”

“Of course, Appa, but what’s wrong?” Despite still being young, you had managed the club many times before when your father was unable to. 

“Baek-hyeon is not feeling well. I am going to head to the Incheon club to manage it tonight. You know I much prefer trusting myself or one of my children to be in charge.”

You bid him safe travels and sent a get well soon text to your eldest brother before getting to work. You had planned on partying the night away, not managing a 5,000 square feet nightclub, but trying to make your father proud is one of the only things you have left. After checking in with all the bartenders, security, and main entertainers, you finally allow yourself to sit down for a quick drink. 

You sit at the empty bar and sip on your drink until you feel a presence sit in the seat beside you. There are two dozen open seats, yet the man chooses to sit directly next to you. As he orders his drink you try to subtly inspect him. He’s here before opening so you assume he is a stage crew member for one of the performers. He has typical dark hair and dark eyes, but there’s something that stands out about him. Maybe it’s how soft his hair looks or that sparkle in his eye-

“Man, this place is nice!” The man swivels the seat to face you, a bright smile on his face. “I’m so lucky to get this gig.”

You look at him oddly. He’s a performer? You already knew all the main performers as they had been playing here for years. 

He sees your confusion and speaks up again. “I’m Choi Su-bong, but everybody is soon going to know me as Thanos. I’m an up-and-coming rapper. I sent an audio demo into this place not expecting anything, but I guess the owner was so impressed by my talents that he gave me a fifteen minute spot at opening time. Those fifteen minutes are going to make Thanos a star.”

His smile is so infectious that you can’t help but smile back. This was the guy whose audio had blown you away. You introduce yourself using only your first name. You like to coax people into realizing that you are the owner's daughter without outright telling them. 

“You know, the owner doesn’t review and select performers. His daughter does.”

“Could you pass along my thanks to her?”

“Why not thank her yourself?” You ask, gesturing to yourself with a bemused expression. 

Su-bong’s eyes widen. He gives you a once over, but he doesn’t change his tone or straighten himself up like everyone else does when they find out who your father is. For once, it seems that someone sees you for you, rather than as your father’s daughter. 

“Well, in that case…” Su-bong drops to his knees and takes hold of your left hand. He peppers several kisses across your skin while he professes his gratitude. “Thank you, my dear, for giving Thanos a chance.”

You have to look away to hide your blush and smile. “I’m not calling you Thanos, though.”

He gets back to his feet and throws you a wink. “You can call me whatever you want as long as you call me.”

The bartender finally hands over his drink. It’s one of the bar’s specialty drinks–one of the most complex and priciest items on the menu. But you can’t blame him; getting the fanciest drink the only time you’ll visit somewhere is a smart choice. 

He reaches to hand his card to the bartender, but you quickly force him to lower his hand. “On the house,” you tell the bartender, who nods and walks away. 

“Thank you again, my princess.” He takes a big sip from the straw, then leans forward and offers you the straw. Neither of you breaking intense eye contact, you take the straw between your lips and suck down a mouthful of the liquid. It burns as it glides down your throat and into your chest. The Social has always been well known for its strong drinks. 

“You should get ready,” you tell him as you turn away. “We open soon.”

You can still feel his eyes on you as you walk away.

ˑ . 𖥔 . ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁ˑ . 𖥔 . ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁ˑ . 𖥔 . ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁ˑ . 𖥔 . ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁ˑ . 𖥔 . ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁ˑ . 𖥔 . ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁ˑ . 𖥔 . ݁₊

Thanos the Great–as he calls himself–exits the stage after his fifteen minutes. Shortly after opening, the place is not nearly as packed as it will be in a couple of hours. Most of the people that are here at this time are more concerned with getting plastered than listening to some underground rapper, but a decent crowd did gather. The crowd that was present was very lively and seemed to enjoy the short performance. 

Su-bong makes his way toward you, and you turn in the opposite direction. You had already been distracted enough tonight, and you need to focus. He manages to jump directly in your path. 

“Do you usually watch performances from the front row?” He asks, a giant grin on his face. 

“Yes,” you lie. You usually focus on something else or watch from toward the back. You tried to convince yourself that your interest in his performance was because he was a new entertainer, but really you just wanted to see more of him. Something about him is eating you alive–his deep voice, his talent, his smile–but you could never let him know that. 

“I think that’s a lie,” he says, hastily walking to keep up with you. “I think you like Thanos the Great-”

“I told you I wasn’t going to call you that.” You stop to pick up a few menus left abandoned at a table. 

“And I told you I don’t care what you call me.” 

One of the menus slips from your hands and falls to the ground. You both drop to the ground to pick it up, and his large hands end up over yours. You pull away quickly, turning on your heel to drop the menus off at the bar. 

“I got seven new followers from my performance. You could follow me, too.”

“Maybe later,” you say. Your mind is distracted right now as you stand on your tiptoes to try and monitor the crowd as the space fills up more. “Sorry, I just have to work right now. This is a very busy time.”

“I’ll just wait until you aren’t busy then.” With a shit-eating grin he plops himself down on one of the black leather couches in the corner. 

“I’m not coming back,” you say, unsure if you are trying to convince him or yourself. 

“Yes, you will, good girl.”

You roll your eyes and walk away from him. You’ve played these games before. Every other week some guy shows up and tries to woo you for free drinks or guaranteed admittance to the club. You know that in an hour he’ll give up on you and have some other girl on his lap. 

Nearly two hours later you finally decide to take a break. Your feet are killing you and the black go-go boots you decided to wear tonight feel as if they weigh twenty pounds. You know this Su-bong guy isn’t waiting for you anymore, but for some reason you decide to stop at the bar and get a drink for yourself and a drink for him just in case. It would be rude to show up empty handed. Worst case scenario, you can end up giving a free drink to some unsuspecting patron. 

The club is at full capacity now, making your visibility extremely low. As you squeeze past numerous dancing bodies, you find yourself shocked to see Su-bong sitting in the same spot scrolling on his phone. Nearby, several groups angrily eye him, annoyed that he is taking up an entire table for just himself. 

As you approach, he notices you and slams his phone down. “I knew you’d be back, good girl!”

“You seriously waited two hours on me?” You slide into the both, leaving about a foot of space between you two. 

“I said I would, didn’t I?” He slides himself closer to you, knocking your knees together. 

“What have you been doing this whole time?” 

He shrugs and drinks from the new drink you brought him. “Waiting on you, thinking about you, scrolling on my phone, telling people this table is taken… What about you? What did you do?”

“I made sure everything is going okay all over the club. It’s very tiring. My feet are killing me.”

He surprises you by pulling your legs out from underneath the table and draping them across his lap. His hands firmly grasp your calves, keeping them in place and subtly massaging them. 

“What the fuck you are you doing?”

He looks innocently at you with his big brown eyes. “Letting you stretch your legs, of course.”

You relax into the couch. Stretching your legs does help, and his fingers are working magic on your calves. “Okay, but remember I’m on a break. I can’t sit here with you all night.”

“Of course, busy girl.”

For a few minutes you relax your anxious mind, listening to the loud bass beats reverberating throughout the club. You even let your eyes close for a minute, only to open them and find Su-bong’s eyes mere inches away from yours. You nearly jump backward, but he still has a grip on your legs. 

“Are you sleepy?”

“No.” You sip from your drink. “Just anxious.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know, I just am.”

“And you’re sad, too?”

“And why do you say that?” What is this guy’s deal?

“Real eyes, realize,” he quotes the cheesy American saying to you. 

“Are you saying you’re sad too?” 

“Yellow is such a unique color,” he states, completely ignoring your question to instead take your hands in his again. He admires your yellow painted nails. 

“Yellow is my mom’s favorite color.” Yellow was your mom’s favorite color–you should say–but you don’t bother to correct yourself. You don’t find yourself pulling your hands away, either. Instead, your finger absentmindedly traces his line tattoo from his middle finger until it becomes hidden underneath his jacket sleeve. You suddenly realize what you’re doing and stop, shaking your head as Su-bong smiles. 

“You like my tattoos, baby? I got them when I got done with my military service a couple months ago.”

“They’re nice line work,” you lie. He doesn't need to know that his choice of tattoos were an amazing addition to his already insanely hot hands, nor does he need to know that you secretly wish you could see what other tattoos are lurking under his jacket. What the hell are you thinking? You need to finish your drink and get back to work. 

“Do you have any tattoos?”

“No, my dad would kill me.”

“Do you usually work every night for your father?” he asks at the mention of your dad. 

“No, I usually party every night,” you say, then backtrack when you realize how spoiled you sound. “I mean, I always try to help out as much as I can.”

“So you’re a spoiled girl?”

“Yes.” You can’t lie to yourself. “I’m the only girl in my family with my father and four older brothers. I was a bit of an accident.”

“I bet they are protective of you,” he says with a smirk, knowing fully well that the current positioning of you two would anger your father and brothers. With your legs still splayed across his lap, his fingers inch upward, until they rest lazily on your lower thigh. 

“When they pay attention to me, yes.” You regret the words the second they leave your mouth. 

“Who wouldn’t want to pay attention to you, pretty girl?” 

“My father is just busy, and my brothers are so much older that they have their own lives. This was nice, but I should get going…”

You attempt to reclaim your legs and scoot yourself out of the booth, but Su-bong’s arm blocks you from exiting. “Dance with me,” he says, somewhere between a question and a demand. 

You worriedly glance around the packed club. You hardly ever take up dance offers from guys, partially because of your father’s disapproval and partially because you don’t trust the guys who come through here. “I don’t really dance with guys. Everyone would stare.” 

He scoots himself closer to you so that you’re both sitting at the edge of the booth. “Good, let them stare.” 

You look at his pleading, big brown eyes and instantly know that you have to accept. “Fine. One dance.”

His huge grin calms your nerves slightly, so you take his outstretched hand. He leads you to the closest dance floor and the two of you find a spot near the wall. You can barely move your body before the people around you start staring at the uncommon sight. You start to get cold feet, but Su-bong pulls you close to him. “Don’t focus on them, focus on me.” 

Shakily, you began to dance with him. Within minutes, your nerves calm, and you feel like you and him are the only ones here tonight. Once the song finishes you tell yourself just one more. Then two songs, turns to three, and three to four. Before long, your night turns into a sweaty blur of his hands on your waist, your back against his torso, your ass against his crotch, his face buried in the crook of your neck. 

“Miss? Miss Social?!” 

Someone yelling the nickname you got when you started coming to the club three years ago snaps you back to reality. Your eyes snap open and you try to distance yourself, but Su-bong’s grip on your waist stays firm so your back remains pressed against him. 

The person in front of you is one of the security guards. You panic, unsure of what is going on and how long you’ve been distracted. 

“We have a couple of tourists that were being disruptive at the bar. I tried to explain that they need to leave tonight, but they’re not in trouble. They can’t understand me.” 

“O-of course,” you say. “Take me to them.” 

The guard leads you through the club and up the stairs to a waiting area. Halfway up the stairs you notice that Su-bong is following closely behind you, but you don’t have the energy to say anything to him. Before you talk to the first tourist, you turn to Su-bong. “Hey, sometimes these things take a while… You don’t have to wait for me.”

You take the first tourist into a room and explain to him the situation in English. You spoke English the most fluently out of any of the staff members, so you had been translating for tourists since your dad started letting you come here at sixteen. Luckily, this guy isn’t too combative, but he is pretty drunk. After a while, you finally get through to him that he’s not in trouble but he has to leave for the night. 

Out in the hallway, you realize that you need to pee really bad after the few drinks you had tonight. “I need the bathroom, I’ll be back for the other one in a minute.” 

You rush to the bathroom and rush back only to find the other tourist gone and a smiling Su-bong in his place. 

“Where the hell did he go?” 

“I let him know the deal. He left.” 

“You speak English?” 

“Yeah, baby,” he says proudly. “My dad made me start learning when I was little. He wanted me to be a fancy business man, but then- but then that didn’t happen.” 

Clearly something happened either between him and his father or to Su-bong himself, but you don’t pry. Instead, you shrug. “Fancy business men are not that fun–like my dad–they just work all the time.”

He gives you a little smile, but this one seems sad. 

“It’s almost close…” You are bummed that the night has to end, but you have a feeling that you will be seeing him again. 

“I need your phone number, Princess.” He puts his phone in the palm of your hand, softly patting your skin. 

You type your name into the contact information but leave the phone number blank. If this guy is serious about you, he’ll be able to wait for you. “You can get the rest of it next time.” 

“So hard to get, I love it!” 

His goofy grin is the last thing you see as you disappear into the dwindling crowd. 

Part 2 Masterlist

[lost-romantique]

Which was the better I.M.P Mission this season?

You know, what's strange is the fact that I actually don't hate Unhappy Campers the same way most of the Fandom does.

What I enjoyed about that episode is the fact that, for the first time it portrayed Millie and Moxxie’s relationship, not as perfect and impenetrable as we're initially led to believe.

Moxxie gets stuck in his own head and Millie has to drag him out of his rut. Moxxie accuses Millie of having had the fame gone to her head, when it actuality, she was just genuinely happy to be appreciated in her efforts for once. And Millie is hurt, genuinely hurt, that her husband could not support her the same way she supported him and dealt with his bullshit.

The problem Unhappy Campers presents is that it heightens Moxxie’s desperation to prove himself to everyone around him, and turns it into a form of patheticism to be correct. The fact that Millie and Blitz both go out of their way to tell him that he wasted a whole week of his and everyone's time just so he could do things his way, and not consider Millie's opinion in the matter at all, means something.

Another problem is the fact that it relegated Blitzø’s emotional reunion with his sister, as a three minute side piece that they couldn't have to themselves because we needed a two minute talent show presentation of Millie versus more Blitz lore.

What I loved about Ghostfuckers is that it essentially takes the same premise of Unhappy Campers, Millie having to pull one of the boys out of their rut, but only instead of Moxxie, it's Blitz that Millie essentially has to save and get through.

And getting through to your husband who simply got too caught up into his ideals is a lot more easier to achieve, than getting through to your boss, who has spent the last fifteen years of his life suppressing every major traumatic event and emotion he has ever experienced inside his head.

The stakes are higher in Ghostfuckers, and if Millie was unable to get through to Blitz, if MIllie was unable to genuinely and sincerely help him with all her might...

Forget about I.M.P, what's going to happen to Blitz?

In every sense of the word, Apology Tour destroyed Blitz. Don't get me wrong, that episode was extremely important for Blitz to grow as a character. However, Apology Tour decided to grab a shovel and mercilessly beat its message into his skull, giving him no form of comfort and hope by the end of the episode.

Can you imagine what would have happened to Blitz if he didn't have Millie to help him? To save him? To comfort him?

What would have happened to Blitz if he was all alone, trapped in a spooky hotel, forced to relive every single traumatic moment of his life on repeat like a video player? Despite his resilience, the man would eventually break and be beyond saving.

But Millie saved him, and told him everything that Blitz needed to hear at that moment...

When the entire world is against you... I want you to know that you helped me, you saved me, you being unapologetically yourself is what inspired me to be more than what I initially thought I could be.

"He gave me so much... A career, a husband, a future. And now he's my best friend."

You gave me everything.

"Look, what I said earlier... you've just been so unbothered by everything. Almost bulletproof and, I guess I never realized how much I depended on that."

I always looked up to you as a pillar of support, an impenetrable wall that's almost unbeatable.

"I didn't know how to react to you being reduced to... Bethany."

Seeing someone I value do everything they can to negate their entire existence hurt me.

"But I should have respected you like you always do for me. I'm sorry."

I'm sorry it took me long to realize just how much you were hurting.

There's more to Ghostfuckers that make it a masterpiece, miles above Unhappy Campers, but I'll leave it at that for now.

[nouearth]

breaking news.

bruce wayne x male reader headcanon.

summary: bruce has been making national headlines once again, but this time, you're caught up in it.

warnings: bale!bruce, panicked!reader, media frenzy surrounding relationship with bruce!

dating bruce wayne in public included explosive media coverage when the news of your relationship first leaked. for weeks upon weeks, it was all every news outlet and the public could talk about—gossip about. people couldn't flip through their tv, or scroll through their phone without seeing:

THIS JUST IN: BRUCE WAYNE, MULTI-BILLIONAIRE PHILANTHROPIST AND PLAYBOY, CAUGHT IN ROMANTIC RENDEZVOUS WITH... A MAN?

it all started with a photo; a voyeuristic shot that framed you and bruce sitting in one of the restaurants that he'd invested in, holding hands and laughing by the candle light. it was one of the many dates where he closed business for the night for privacy reasons—to keep you safe from the public's eye. and judging from the angle, it was evident that it was one of the employees that had managed to stay back in the building.

to be honest, it was tasteful. nothing scandalous or even remotely explicit, especially if you had to compare to the scandals of men of bruce's status. as much as you felt like your privacy was invaded, you couldn't help but feel relieved when you saw bruce's smile in the photo. the way he looked at you with such doting eyes, his thumb caressing over the bridge between your index and thumb, the plates of food left cold because you were addicted to his company, and vice versa.

it was an intimate moment that was ruined by selfishness—greed.

for a brief moment, you felt... scared. the windows in your apartment were immediately shut and blinded by curtains; the locks in your doors were triple-checked; your passwords were immediately changed to new ones you'd probably forget in the future. you felt eyes on your back, pierced through the walls, watching your every move even if they hadn't.

and as much as you teased bruce about leaving him after your fifteen minutes of fame, you needed him more than ever.

"bruce, what do i—what's happening?""alfred's coming, you're at home, right? i'm talking with my security team right now and—"

it wouldn't be long until people found out who the 'mysterious man' in question was.

in less than an hour, your social media presence had a tenfold increase. photos on your feed received more comments and likes you could ever count. many of them ran with the narrative that you were simply an object of bruce's undisclosed desire for men, his boy toy. and before you knew it, the news outlet began reporting the same, including their own findings of your life.

dating bruce wayne in public included him hugging you as soon as you arrived to his manor. it was a protective instinct that had been brewing since he heard how panicked—how afraid you were—on the phone. while multiple phones rang off the hook, bruce took the time to let you breathe into you, to find a sense of peace as he held you, comforted you with affectionate words in your ear, affectionate touches that rendered you calm and ultimately safe again.

dating bruce wayne in public included bruce addressing his relationship with you in a press conference. it was silly that it had come to this point, but he made sure his feelings regarding how the news outlets had turned a relationship between two men into a media frenzy were known.

"yes, i am in a loving relationship with (M/N)." "no, i am not dating a man for relevancy." "who wears the pants—really? security, let's escort him out, please?" "no, my fiancé is not what those rumors have suggested." "and yes, (M/N) is my fiancé. be kinder, and i ever so might have the fleeting thought to invite you all to my wedding."

dating bruce wayne in public meant that you were advised to keep your answers as vague as possible when you were approached by paparazzis. there were few times where you could escape, but they came in massive groups, bombarding you, and the security team that bruce had hired to protect you, with questions that would guarantee the tabloids massive engagement, but you wouldn't falter.

"ah... yes—he's doing very well, thank you." "oh? my coat? bruce gifted it to me on my birthday a few years ago!" "what do i like... uh, cooking! i make a mean burger—ask bruce yourself!"

and as the public began to know you more, through your timid answers, to the wary and tired smile that only emphasized the dark circles on your face, you were rather... charming? compared to bruce, they've quickly fallen in love with how personal you could be at times. where bruce was always stoic and formal in his answers, you stuttered and answered with a laugh, unexpectedly cracking a joke in between.

it didn't take much interaction before the public realized what made bruce fall in love with a man like you.

dating bruce wayne in public included you becoming quite of a celebrity yourself. alongside bruce's, your day was documented from the very minute you stepped onto a sidewalk and started your day. what was your order at the local coffee shop? what did you like having for lunch? your favorite movie? your favorite thing about bruce?

you were a hot commodity and everyone wanted a piece of you.

though, that never stopped your weekly dates with him. golfing, swimming, hiking, eating; you'd hear the clicks of photos being taken from the shadows, and it was bruce who always held you closer, by the shoulders or by the hand to remind you that you were safe with him.

"they'll get tired of us eventually.""hopefully..."

with him by your side, it wasn't so bad that the camera flashes never failed to blind you whenever you two shared a sweet kiss.

nouearth. please do not repost, plagiarize, or translate my works. andif you like this story, please reblog and leave a like!

[annabelle--cane]

does the tma tumblr fandom know about the madness that seized the tma tiktok fandom (specifically the cosplay side) in the ~month after the finale released? I can't remember the exact order of events, but it went something like

week leading up to the finale: lots of oliver banks cosplays. makes sense, with The End and all that.

the day of the finale: people must have been sitting there already in costume with their cameras and lighting set up to listen to mag 200 when it dropped cause there were some really quite spectacular videos set to dialogue from it within about fifteen minutes.

the next week: cursed cosplays. I think it started with another resurgence of catboy elias (always a favorite), then something Happened to everyone because it immediately moved on to things like the calliope, ex altiora, the daedalus space station, jon's rib, the billboard from mag 74, the metal pipe, jane prentiss's ashes, the blanket (of "never did anything" fame), the homophobic vase, the bag of teeth, the beetle wife, and, my personal favorite, the man upon the stair who wasn't there. most of these were extremely detailed and high quality.

for maybe 18 hours: in-universe in-character avatar discourse. arguments about whether people should reveal that they were avatars in the apocalypse on the first date. it immediately got out of hand, people started satirizing certain kinds of prejudices that it was Not their place to, and almost everyone deleted their videos about it by the following morning so it vanished like a collective fever dream.

three weeks post-finale: the magnus carchives au. they work at a car dealership now.

[visualbutterflysworld]

Forgive me? | Vhackerr

When reader and Vinnie get into a bad argument things seem to take a turn for the worse when vinnie says something he shouldn’t. Could this be the end or could this just become the beginning of a true relationship?

I low key had a dream about this type of scenario like years ago and randomly thought of it so :P also probably sloppy writing

“That’s so fucking stupid!” Vinnie screams at me. Vinnie and I had been dating for about 5 months now. We usually don’t fight. I mean not like this. We were fighting about us and what we were. If I said me and him were just friends he’d flip but if I’d ask to post about us he’d deflect.

“It’s not! You should understand about how I feel! I just want the world to know about us! That’s it!” I scream. “Yeah, because you want your fifteen minutes of fame! Such a fucking leach like everyone else!” Vinnie yelled back. I stand there with disbelief. He for real just said that.

Vinnie huffs before he realizes what he has said. “Y/n-” “No, fuck you, Vincent! You think I’m with you because you’re some fucking celebrity?! I’m with you because I love you! Because I love you more than I love myself! More than life itself! I was willing to wait till you were ready but I’m sick of waiting! I’m sick of feeling like I’m some fucking monster that you have to keep hidden from the world but, you know what, since you think that poorly on my character then we shouldn’t let the world know! We shouldn’t let the world know that we had any sorta of connection because we’re fucking done!” I scream at him. I quickly grab the rest of my stuff before heading towards the door.

“I’ll have somebody come get the rest of my shit. Please fuck off you entitled dick!” Is the last thing I shout before slamming the door. The rest is a blur. One minute I’m in the hallway of his building and next I’m sitting on my bathroom floor crying my heart out to my mom.

“Honey, I’m sure he didn’t mean it. I’ve seen the way he looks at you. I’m sure right then and there he would’ve said I love you too.” My mother says as I sob quietly. I told that asshole I loved him. Can you believe that? I’m not sure I meant it but my heart is telling me I did. I told him we were over but, I don’t want it to be over. I get a notification from my phone.

Instagram

Vinnie Hacker has posted on their story

“Yeah, I got to go mom. I’ll talk to you later.” I said and quickly hang up. It takes all my will power not to click on it immediately but my hands seem to have a mind of its own. I click on his story.

My hand instantly goes to my mouth. He posted me. He called me his girl. That asshole. I hear my doorbell ring and I know who it is. I quickly get onto my feet and go to my door. I open it and there he is. My favorite flowers and food in hand. I look up at him and he seems like he can’t maintain eye contact but he does anyways.

“I’m so so so sorry that I hurt you. I’m sorry that I called you that. That was wrong. Very wrong of me. I don’t assume that you’re with me because I’m well me. I know that. I’ve been known that..just I fucked up because that’s what I do. I fuck up anything good in my life because I’m afraid of being hurt. You’re too good for me and I honestly don’t deserve you but, I posted you on my story so now you’re like kinda force to be with me anyways. I mean I’ll grovel if you want but, fuck I can’t let you go! I’m sorry and I love you! I mean…I think I love you more than you love me but-”

“Vincent!”

He blinks for the first time in 3 minutes. “Yeah?” “You should probably come inside before my food gets cold.” I smile softly at him. He lights up instantly and quickly makes his way inside. He sets the flowers and food down before turning to me. “I’m really sorry! We can go slow! We can start over and pretend this fight never happened like now we’re officially dating or something!” I run up and hug him. “Vinnie, we’re okay.” I kiss him quickly and his face follows mine as I lean away. “I mean…you’re gonna have to do some major groveling if you want to be my boyfriend again but I think we’re still dating.”

He smirks, “that’s fine by me.”

This was so trash but I’m sick and wanted to post something so :P

[cosmopretty]

Tough Loss

Caroline Harvey x Fem

Synopsis: You go to support your girlfriend KK’s hockey game just to comfort her after a hard loss

The games 32-47 Wisconsin badgers loosing by fifteen points, with anger fueling her Caroline throws her hockey stick on the ground.

“You know that was a foul what the hell” she yells at the ref grabbing her stick and skating back to her team. You watch from the stands her jersey covering your whole outfit, her name on your back.

“Harvey” her coach yelled across the ice, reprimanding her. Caroline huffs and Laila skates up to her holding her shoulders in her patted hands “Relax KK before they send you to the penalty box” she tells her before skating back to goal. Even though you couldn’t see Caroline’s face you could tell from how she played and her body language on how frustrated she was.

You loved watching KK play, there was something about the way she moved on the ice, how good she played. With her new up and coming fame she always took it personal when the game went south, even if it wasn’t her fault. The referee blows the whistle starting the game back up once again.

“Come on Ref what the hell” Caroline yells , huffing when another player on the other team hit her and the refs did nothing.

“Come on KK don’t get frustrated it’s alright” Ava tells her skating beside her. Your girlfriend chooses to ignore her though and skates up to the ref “I know you saw that” she tells the ref before he blows his whistle sending her to the penalty box for a few minutes.

The game goes by fast Badgers still losing Caroline groans seeing there’s only 5 minutes left in the game and they’re still down. Caroline looks up at you in the stands for a moment before focusing back at the game at hand.

Badgers lost 41-53 the first loss of the season, despite the best efforts of the team. The numbers on the score board mock KK as she skates off the ice without a word to anyone and goes straight to the locker room ignoring everything around her.

The rest of the team piles into the locker room a few moments after, her coach trying to convince her it wasn’t her fault the team lost. Everything her teammates and coach told her went through one ear and out the other. She blamed herself for the loss, she was annoyed and furious most of all disappointed in herself.

You move your way through the people and wait for her outside of the locker room. Soon enough the girls walk out without KK, you look up at Laila confused “She’s inside go talk to her she’s going through it” the taller girl says disappointed in the outcome of the game. You nod at her words and hug the girl for a second “Hey I think you did great and next game you will do better” Laila smiles at your words and nudges you inside before walking back to the dorms with the rest of the girls.

Opening the door slowly Caroline’s head snaps up watching you walk in and sit right next to her. She shakes her head no “I messed up it’s my fault” her voice cracks at the end. Her head lays down on your shoulder and you turn your body straddling the bench to hug her.

Hearing her sniffle you rub her back up and down whispering soft nothing in her ear as you let her let all her feelings out.

Caroline pulls away from you not daring to make eye contact “Thank you” she whispers not looking at you, instead finding the lockers across you both very interesting.

Your hands cup her cheeks pulling her head to face you “Thanks for what baby” you ask her your thumbs wiping her tears. She shrugs “For everything you’re always there for me always” a smile forms on your face at her words.

Pulling her closer to you, you kiss her lips softly eyes closing for a moment. You pull away form the kiss and KK leans towards for more her eyes still closed, you put your finger on her lips “I’ll always be there for you Caroline no matter what I promise” you tell her, her eyes opening staring at you. She smiles slightly “Always?” she asks, you nod your head “Forever and Always” you promise her grabbing her hand and kissing her knuckles.

“Forever and always I love you baby” Caroline repeats getting up and pulling you with her off of the bench. Her hand moves to the back of your head pulling you into a kiss once again. Your lips clash together and her hand moves down to your neck, putting pressure on it causing you to gasp. She takes that as a way to lick your bottom lip, her tongue moving in your mouth pushing for dominance.

The moment between you two gets rudely interrupted when Laila walks into the locker room groaning. You pull away from her squealing “Why is it always me to walk in on you guys damn get a room” Laila complains grabbing her jersey and running out of the room before either of you can respond to her. You laugh dropping your head on Caroline’s shoulder “I feel bad for Laila she’s seen way too much” you mumble as KK moves over you grabbing her bag. She grabs your hand interlocking your finger together before leading you out of the locker room through the fans and people, to make it to her car. She opens the passenger door for you before going to the back throwing her hockey stick and bag in the back before getting in the drivers seat.

Driving back to the dorms KK’s hand stays on your thigh the whole time rubbing back and forth.

Soon enough the you guys get back to the dorms Caroline going straight to the shower to relax. You stay in the kitchen pulling ingredients together trying to make chocolate chip cookies for the girl hoping it would cheer her up in a way. Mixing the batter together before laying the balls of batter on a platter then into the oven to cook. You sit on the kitchen counter legs swinging side to side scrolling through instagram.

Caroline walks in the kitchen her hair wet and dripping “What smells so good baby?” she asks you walking up to you. Her hands land on your thighs as she looks up at you “I made you some cookies jus’ want you to feel better” you tell her running a hand through her wet hair. She smiles at you moving her hands to your waist squeezing “Your the best you know that” you nod “I know I am” you respond to her cockily jumping off the counter grabbing her hand. You drag her down to the couch pushing her on it before climbing on top of her straddling her waist.

Your arms wrap around her neck and you kiss her all over her face, hands moving to hold each side of her neck. KK laughs pulling you back softly “I love you my girl” you tell her holding her face delicately in your hands as if it would break. She smiles and rubs your waist “I love you more” she whispers looking down at your lips before leaning in. Right when her lips are about to touch yours you get up abruptly strolling back to the kitchen to get the cookies. Caroline groan dropping her head back “Your such a tease” she complains getting up and following you to the kitchen.

Grabbing the cookies out of the oven you place them on the counter before pulling the gloves off. KK walks in and goes straight for the cookies; you slap her hand “No no wait for them to cool now go choose a movie to watch and relax I’ll bring them to you” she smiles at your words and kisses your forehead before running back into the living room.

The both of you lay together on the couch watching Bones and All. Her head lays on your chest arms wrapped around you “You always know how to make me feel better” Caroline’s says lifting her head to look at you.

“I just want you to be happy” you tell her grabbing her cheek with your hand rubbing back and forth. She smiles at you “I know but thank you for everything I’m gonna marry you one day” she says looking into your eyes.

You gasp “Marriage now that’s new” you joke with her not taking her words seriously. Caroline shakes her head “I mean it your the woman I want with me forever I’m gonna make you my wife one day I promise” she tells you her big hand coming to your face caressing your cheek softly.

Blushing you while you look at her you nod your head up and down “I can’t wait to marry you” you whisper pulling her into a kiss.

[hxlda-hxlda]

“Of course not, Sirius, we’ve been married for years.” 

famous interview au oneshot thingy inspired by @sebbianas post which you can find here!!!! read the idea and could NOT get it out of my head until she was sitting in a google doc, and now here. enjoy:

“Now, since you came out in that viral Instagram post…” 

Sirius sighs, doing nothing to hide his exhaustion for what he knows is to come. 

The original intention behind the whole fucking thing was to stop the constant questions. The:  

‘Sirius, you wore a skirt to that event so who are you dating because, clearly, the two have to be correlated?’, ‘Sirius, you’ve always been a bit different’, ‘Sirius!’, Sirius–’, ‘Sirius…’ 

He’d hoped—stupidly, naively—that to get rid of the ambiguity would get rid of the incessant wondering. Sure, he fucked men, yes, he wore eyeliner and skirts, no the two weren’t really related, now can we please move the fuck on? 

No. No, we apparently cannot move the fuck on. The questions and the speculation and, and, and; it’s all still fucking there. 

“Sirius, there’s been talk of a relationship with bass player Remus Lupin for a while now. New rumours are sparking since the two of you have been spotted together a lot lately.” 

They’re both thinking of those pap pictures leaving the bar last month. 

“We were wondering if you could give us the inside scoop?” Greg is staring at him like he’s asking something new, like Sirius is actually very eager to share with the world the complexities of his relationships, as if it has anything to do with his modelling. It doesn’t, if you were wondering. Fucking men has nothing to do with a runway, either, actually. “Really, what is going on between the two of you?”

Sirius has been given press training many, many times, to field these kinds of questions. His agent, Gideon, had him memorise all the correct responses back to front, upside down. Curveball questions, sneaky implications, you name it; Sirius knows how he should respond to this. Hell, it’s on a fucking flash card.

His gut response, the thing Sirius is suddenly incredibly eager to do, is definitely not on a flash card.

However. But, but, and hear him out:

By fucking god, he was bored.

Greg had asked the same ten questions every other interviewer of the last year had asked with the same glint in his eyes as every other interviewer of the last year. Fame was great, but nobody told him it would be this goddamn boring. Repetitive. So many 'yes's and 'no's and 'wouldn't you like to know's.

So, Sirius proceeds, entirely disobeying those oh-so-holy flash cards.

“It would be an honour to give you the scoop, Greg, my dear,” Sirius says with a grin, shoving his hand into his back pocket. 

The interviewer’s eyes light up over his mic. 

“So-” When Sirius pulls out his phone, the glint is dimmed by confusion. “What-” 

“Why don’t we ask him right now?” 

There were strict rules about this, phones when live, phones during interviews, etcetera, etcetera, blah, blah. Sirius knew them all as well (see: a different set of flash cards). Sorry Gideon, Sirius thinks as he goes straight to his Favourites. He isn’t sorry. 

“Ask… who?” 

Sirius just winks. The call is already on its second ring. 

On the fourth, Sirius is almost worried Remus won’t actually pick up, but not really. Remus always picks up. 

Well, he always picks up when Sirius rings. Once, Marlene had called fifteen times in five minutes before Remus had responded two hours later with a ‘what?’ text. The man stuck true to his self-proclaimed Luddism, after all. 

On the fifth ring Greg is looking sceptical. Sirius knows Remus is also working right now. He’d mentioned a meeting with some producer. He remains confident nonethless. 

On the sixth ring, the call clicks as it is answered. A beat. And then: 

“What?” 

Remus sounds entirely unenthused to be answering a call at this moment, voice sullen. Sirius grins anyway, thrilled he’s picked up at all. As if he wouldn’t. As if he doesn’t always. 

“And hello to you, too.” 

“Aren’t you meant to be on that radio thing right now?” 

“We are, in fact, live at this very moment.” Sirius glances back to Greg who, despite being the host, has immediately lost all of his perceived-control. He’s watching Sirius blankly, only vaguely piecing together the fact that it is famed, award winning, world’s greatest (not that Sirius is at all biassed) bass player Remus Lupin’s voice coming through Sirius’ phone. Sirius smirks amusedly at Greg before turning back to the conversation at hand. One that finally fucking matters. “Good to know you’re listening in and supporting me, as always.” 

“Believe it or not, I have better things to do right now.” 

“You wound me, Moons.” 

That nickname did wonders on Twitter when it first became known, Sirius having slipped and referred to Remus as Moony in some other interview some other time. There's a ship name now. There are fanfictions. Sirius reads them aloud as dramatically as he can muster (which is, believe him, very) at the most inopportune times. Usually when Remus is busy, just to watch that cute little frown line in his forehead appear. 

“Is there a point to you interrupting my work, and also national radio, with this call?” 

“What if I just wanted to speak to you?” 

“I will hang up right now.” 

A lie. He never hangs up first. 

Sirius sighs again, another exhausted thing. “They want to know if we’re dating.” 

“Who?” 

“They. Everyone. The world. Greg.”

Sirius shoots the host another look, whose look of momentary shock has dissolved into interest. Hunger. This is the scoop, apparently. Like the both of them, Sirius and Remus, haven’t already been asked this question to death. 

“Greg?”

“Y’know, the guy with the grating voice on the station that plays the same five pop songs on repeat.” Gideon is going to kill him for that one. Sirius sends another silent apology he does not mean. 

“Ah, Greg.” 

Greg is frowning now. Sirius grins again. 

“So? C’mon Moons, tell us. They’re all waiting eagerly. They want to know,” he repeats.

“They always want to know,” Remus replies bluntly. 

“They’re in an extra persistent mood today.” 

When Sirius cuts his third look at Greg, he has the audacity to look entirely unapologetic, as if Sirius’ public life as a model translates to that of his private life. As if it makes total sense to badger him for months—no, scratch that, years—on who Sirius is and isn’t fucking, and whether or not, god forbid, they aren’t a female. 

“You can’t tell them yourself?” Remus’ voice distracts him from his angry spiral of thoughts. 

He could, of course. He has, a million fucking times, given an answer. Sirius even has his flash cards, for fuck’s sake. But this is much more fun. 

“Just answer the damn question, Lupin.” 

“You didn’t ask a question, Black.” 

Sirius rolls his eyes, incredibly aware this is dragging through the interview’s very minimal time slot. Good. 

“Are we dating, Remus?” he asks seriously (ha). 

A moment of silence. Sirius holds the phone closer to the mic, closer to his own ear. He can’t help himself, he wants to know how Moony will handle this as well. Then: 

“Of course not, Sirius, we’ve been married for years.” 

Greg’s eyes widen to saucers. Sirius keeps his face neutral, an impressive feat that would rival even Regulus’ own acting skills, if he says so himself, and Reg won a Tony last year. 

“Ah, how could I forget?” Sirius says instead of breaking into the laughter that he so desperately wants to roll into a heap with. “My husband.” 

“Truly, how could you? Should we consider divorce now?” Remus replies, voice as indistinguishably sullen as always. Sirius knows he’s smiling with his eyes, he can hear it. 

“Now that would make the papers.” 

“Certainly… Is that all?” 

“Yes, yes, go do your music-y things now.” 

Sirius can hear the eye roll as well. “Fine.” 

Sirius hangs up. He tucks the phone back into his pocket, taking his time. Then, then, he looks back up at Greg. The interviewer is a picture of shock, maybe a touch of confusion; wide eyes, jaw loose with a mouth that hangs, equally wide. 

“Well, Greg, how was that for a scoop?” Sirius raises a single, manicured eyebrow. 

“Wa– Was he being serious?” the man all but splutters. 

“What? No, of course not, I’m Sirius, silly.” 

“That’s not–” 

“Greg! I’m offended! Do you forget the names of all your guests? We’ve been talking for almost an hour now!” 

The longest fucking hour of Sirius’ life, mind you. But the rest of it goes by much faster and much more pleasantly, as Greg struggles to move on from that little show. It makes the dressing down from Gid all the more worth it. 

And by the time Sirius manages to check his phone again, emerging from hell (or Studio C, call it what you want) hours later, #wolfstar is already trending on Twitter. He screenshots it, sends it to Remus. 

pads !!!!!!!!!   

look what uve done  u menace 

MOONY ❤️‍🔥😍🌕

Fake news.  Lily and I are planning to run away together, actually.  

Sirius huffs a laugh. Sure, fake news.

[nnight-dances]

CHERRY-FLAVOURED

PAIRING: choi seungcheol x f!reader (ft. kwon soonyoung & kim mingyu)

GENRE: fluff, angst

TROPES: small town au!, exes to lovers, jealousy, idiots in love, fake dating (w/ soonyoung), you own a small bookstore and i never mention what seungcheol does (but just know he's rich).

RECOMMENDED: reading ADORABLY, YOURS before this, since this is the same seungcheol and i make a few references to what happened there.

"Oh, did you hear? Seungcheol's back in town!" Nayeon calls out with a lopsided smile she thinks is inconspicuous. You think it's obnoxious. 

But you don't let her know how much the news bothers you, pretending to instead by absorbed in currently trying to get your hair to sit right in a ponytail. "Sure," you reply, not breaking eye-contact with yourself in the mirror. 

Your roommate quickly catches though because she appears by your shoulder in the mirror, eyes narrowing. "Right. And you're fine with it?"

"Why wouldn't I be?" you mutter, devoting every fibre of your being to make your tone stay flat.

"I don't know, the way you've been working on this ponytail for the past fifteen minutes had me thinking otherwise," she shrugs, "And the fact that it still looks like shit from the back."

You scoff in offense, "All my baby hair makes it real hard to do this, okay!" But Nayeon's already making her way back to the kitchen to finish her breakfast with a teasing giggle and you watch her in dismay, wondering if not only your hairstyle but also your acting had really been that bad.

And as you spin around to face your reflection, you figure that the general bad-ness of your life might have something to with Seungcheol's return to town after all. Not that you would ever admit it, for many reasons. But mainly because of the fact that he's your ex-boyfriend. 

You liked to think you'd ended things with him on a good note– there hadn't been too many tears or screams and you still would catch up with him whenever you ran into him, an occurrence that was basically inevitable given how small your town was. But ever since he'd left on trip to visit his much-famed best friend, Jeonghan, you'd finally gotten around to thinking about why you were still single despite having left a long-term relationship for over a month.  

…Which led to a series of messy first dates with the few tolerable men in town who would otherwise have you cringing at the thought of talking to them. And well, actually going out with them convinced you your first impressions were always right and your intuition was all-knowing. 

– 

Meet Soonyoung, the man who would almost unmistakably come around asking for gum in your store. Your bookstore. 

You couldn't figure out if it was a honest fault of his personality or if he was doing it to annoy you– until one afternoon you found it was something much worse: he was flirting with you.

"Y/N, your hair looks cute today," he's telling you through a grin right now. You look away from the computer screen where you've been logging the new stock of books in, ready to tell him thanks and that you needed to hear that since your beloved roomate insulted you this morning. You don't get around to saying all that because you spot a figure entering the store behind Soonyoung, where he's leaning on the counter with his hands under his chin. He thinks he's slick but you know it's so he can show off his arms. 

You've forgotten all about Hoshi and his boyish charms because you notice the new customer is none other than the recent arrival to town, Seungcheol. 

You hate the way you can feel your heart skip a beat at the revelation so you quickly turn your head back to your screen. "Thanks, Soonyoung."

Thankfully, Hoshi doesn't seem to notice the stiffness of your clipped response and instead is distracted by a stack of plastic-wrapped books. 

"Wow, you sure have a lot of new stock coming in these days, huh?" 

You nod, still not looking away from the screen. "Yeah, I've been working on keep the shelves up to date with the new releases. I'm sick of people using the feedback box to curse me out for still placing the classics out front."

You hear a snort then and you immediately recognize it as not Soonyoung's. 

"You'd think that's how the feedback works, no?" 

Slowly you turn to look at him in the eyes, unsettled by the playful glint you find there. "...Can I help you?" you ask quietly, keeping your tone cordial but not too warm. Hoshi stands up straight with Seungcheol next to him, earning him a glance from the man. 

"Oh, did you finally hire a part-timer?" he asks. You consider throwing the stack of new books in your ex's face. And then you remember how much they cost. So instead, you settle on shaking your head. 

"No–" Hoshi cuts you off, though, much to your chagrin. 

"No, I'm just here giving Y/N company," he's saying and you really wish he wouldn't speak, but he goes on, "She's been pretty stressed out these days and last week–"

"Soonyoung," you look at him warningly, "do you think you could help me double-check if there's a delivery out front? I keep getting tracking updates that it's close."

"Of course!" he responds already reaching for the glass doors, "Be right back, Y/N!"

With Soonyoung gone, Seungcheol finally breaks into the guffaw you know he's been keeping in for the past five minutes. "What's that all about?"

"It's none of your business, Seungcheol," you inform him as you busy yourself with tidying up the stray pieces of gum wrapper Soonyoung had conveniently forgotten. 

"Oh, so you do remember who I am, after all?" You hate how much you like listening his voice turn slighly soft at the sound of his name on your lips. And the how your breath's a little uneven when he slides to invade your line of vision, big hands tapping at the counter to get your attention. As if you could possibly be thinking about anything else right now. 

"Why are you here, anyway?" you ask him, training your gaze on him. "Because I know, for a fact, you don't read." 

"I'm hurt, Y/N," Seungcheol gasps with a hand to his chest. His unbelievably firm chest. "And after I worked so hard to read that boring poem book for you?"

You almost seethe at the way he calls it a poem book but contain it with a grimace. "Can we get to the point here? I have a store to run, dude."

"I'm serious! I came here to find a book. Considering picking that poem book again, figure out what the big deal is for once and for all."

You stay still, unresponsive to his ridiculous excuse. Seungcheol waits a few beats, eyes locked with yours before giving in. "Fine. I was in town and wanted to see how you were doing." 

Never mind, you think you preferred to hear the ridiculous lies because the way your ex-boyfriend's gaze drops to your fists by your side has you immediately unfolding your grasp. Stupid Seungcheol and his ability to fuck up a perfectly okay daily routine. 

"Ugh," you sigh out after a moment, "Come on. I'll help you find the chapbook. But you have to promise to never call it a poem book ever again. Or I'm blacklisting you." 

You don't see it but when you spin around to march into the bookstore, expecting Seungcheol to follow you, he's all smiles, his own fists unravelling at the way your tone lost its cold somewhere along the way of this encounter. He skips behind you with a noise of excitement. 

"Okayyyy," you hum as you crouch by the poetry section, fingers expertly running through the spines of the thin books there. Seungcheol crouches by you, a little too close because his arm brushes against you, almost throwing you off-balance. 

You're about to tell him off for surprising you but he suddenly smiles, dimples so delicious in the soft glow of the light of the bookstore filtering through the bookshelves. "Your hair looks different," he comments, voice low and his gaze slowly follows the trail of your low ponytail, the thin grey band that holds the strands together clearly very worn-out. "Looks pretty." 

And where Seungcheol's wondering when you started wearing your hair up, you're incredibly flustered by his compliment. You stand up too quick, knee joints popping, and you think you must really be growing old when your vision blacks out a little. 

You steady yourself with a hand on the shelf, quietly scolding Seungcheol, "You're in the way." He joins you on his feet, making way with an exaggerated wave of his arm, not missing the way your ears are turning redder by the second.

You're gifted a good solid five minutes of peace as you inspect the shelves, wondering how you lost track of the chapbook, when Seungcheol speaks up again. "Um, so seriously, what's the deal with you and Soonyoung? You… seeing him?" 

For all his attempts at maintaining an air of nonchalance, Seungcheol can't help how irked he was when he walked into your bookstore to the sight of Soonyoung making conversation to you. Irksome especially more so because he'd heard you say that you hated having people around you while you did the boring but imperative computer-related stuff at work, something about wanting to get the misery out of the way as soon as possible. Yet, there Soonyoung had been, distracting you with all his airhead being. 

"I can't seem to locate the book right now for some reason," you start, doing nothing to ease Seungcheol's worries, "And I also can't seem to comprehend why my dating life is a point of discussion between us… anymore."

And wow, does your comment hurt. It hurts Seungcheol but also you, even as you're the one saying it because you can practically feel his mood dampening at your words. But the rational part of you is praising you for doing the right thing and setting your boundaries before you get any more carried away by your ex-boyfriend's ways. 

That afternoon Seungcheol leaves your bookstore, very empty-handed and extremely heart-broken, because as he exits, he can already hear Soonyoung asking if you wanted get lunch with him. 

– 

Speaking of lunch, enter Mingyu because eating out with someone, more often than not, meant making a trip to his humble but bustling restaurant. It was everything right with your small town: a simple menu that remained consistently mind-blowing no matter how many times you visited.

Wish you could say your friendship with Mingyu had maintained the same level of consistency as his culinary competence. 

And in your defense, you didn't know how much longer you could've gone ignoring the way Mingyu would take every opportunity to make you extra sides that you didn't order and send you specially curated handmade dinner-sets when he heard you were sick or too busy to eat. You hated it, crossing the friendzone you had so carefully placed him in, but one late night, when he showed up at your door in the rain just so he could deliver your food before it went cold, you caved and invited him in. 

So while you legally have no choice but to politely turn down Soonyoung's offer for lunch, you can't help that you find yourself walking to Mingyu's Kitchen on Saturday morning for some brunch because as much as you loved improvising with the two ingredients in your fridge, nothing beat the ramyeon he cooks. 

You're still groggy when you enter the cozy shop but the familiar scent iss already warming you up from the chilly air outside. Except you make eye-contact with the man as you step foot into the place. 

The man being Seungcheol, of course, because where you could handle fielding Mingyu's puppy eyes on you, a reminder that you hadn't texted him back yet– Seungcheol's intense glare fixed on you has you shaking in your boots. Literally. 

"...actually, I think I'll just eat here," you hear him call out as you approach the counter to place your order. Your head hurts already so you don't think too hard about Seungcheol's request to Sakura who nods with a smile. 

"Y/N!" Mingyu materializes in front of you with a beam to greet you and you think sunglasses might've been the way to go this morning. 

"Hey," you drag out the greeting, flinching at your own hoarse voice, "What's up, Gyu?"

"Nothin' much, just dealing with the usual Saturday morning rush, y'know? Maroon 5 should write a song about that instead of crying over Sunday mornings, don't you think?"

You're busy processing the tall man's chaotic train of thoughts when you hear Seungcheol laughing faintly. You glance at him, frowning when he's standing closer to you than you remember and then look back at Mingyu. "Ha, sorry it's so busy," you mumble.

"You don't sound so good. Did you catch something?" Mingyu inquires, brows furrowing and you genuinely love the man for his observance but dread its consequences nevertheless.

"Ahh, I mean, it's fine. Just a little cold from the wind," you clear your throat in an effort to sound better, "But I'll have a ramyeon for that very reason." You try to punctuate your sentence with a light-hearted chuckle but with your condition, it just kind of sounds like you're dying so you shut yourself up. 

"Feeling under the weather?" 

You look up from your phone screen, where you've been fixating all your attention so you can ignore the way Seungcheol's seated himself on the table right next to yours. This was the problem with eating out alone. The danger of your ex-boyfriend tailing you. You swear you're dragging Nayeon out after you next time, her fucked-up sleep schedule be damned. 

You shrug in response to his question, "I'm fine. Thanks for the concern."

"You're very welcome," comes his teasing reply, "But seriously, you've got to wear more layers than that if you want to make it to winter."

You look down at your long-sleeved top with a frown, "I think this attire is perfectly appropriate for the fall, actually." You tug at the sleeves so they cover your wrists as if to prove a point. 

Seungcheol raises a brow, "It would be a perfectly appropriate attire for someone who doesn't have the immune system of a rat."

Gasping, you shoot back, "Rude! I don't see why I have to stand this slander even when we're not together."

There it is. The words slip out your tongue before you have a minute to filter your thoughts and though things between you and Seungcheol are more chill than most former lovers, your sudden comment has the atmosphere turn ever so awkward, with his smile falling and your own turning sour. 

You sigh in relief when Sakura brings out a tray to Seungcheol's table that very moment, saving you just a little embarassment. "Enjoy your meal!" she smiles at him and then at you, "Your food will be out soon!" 

You nod, swallowing against your dry throat and watch as Seungcheol stares at his food wordlessly. You really had a way with words for someone who sold books for a living. Eventually, you go back to distracting yourself with your phone and he starts eating, suddenly laser-focused on his food. 

You're thankful for the space, until you see Mingyu making his way to your table with your tray in his hands. You don't know why he does that, bringing you your food despite being the head chef and owner of the place. Well, you do know why but you didn't have the energy to deal with the reasons today. 

Not with Seungcheol sitting right there, eyes on Mingyu's back as he places your food in front of you, grin intact. You're about to thank the man and hopefully, cut any conversation short but he beats you to it. 

"Here's your food, Y/N!" his voice borders on cracking but he goes on, "I made you some yuja-cha as well for your throat. And make sure you eat a lot of kimchi, okay? Let me know if you need anything else."

Slowly you nod, thanking him under your breath as he takes off and now it's your turn to stare at your food in silence while Seungcheol's shooting daggers your way. 

If he thought he was upset by your thing with Soonyoung, the way Mingyu was just all up in your space with his stupidly sweet gestures has Seungcheol… a lot more upset. 

"I thought Mingyu and you were just friends," he's voicing before he can help it. 

Your head snaps up in surprise but really, you should've seen this coming. You compose yourself, averting your eyes back to the warm food in your plate. "And I thought I made it clear that my dating life is none of your business."

"It's not my business," Seungcheol says, unconvincing to his own hears, "But it would be a problem if you were, you know, two-timing." 

Now you know Seungcheol is trying to get on your nerves because he knows how much you hate dishonesty and to accuse you of being disloyal is a low blow, really. But it works because you finally look back at him with eyes wide, "Of course I'm not. I slept with him like once!"

Where the news has Seungcheol feeling conflicted because where it was good to know that nothing was serious, it was also not fun to hear that you'd slept with him. But while he tried hard to not dwell on Mingyu's impressive physique, you were busy catching up with your own loss of control.

Because even despite your unintended confession that you hope you weren't too loud about, you quickly supply in a quiet voice, "...well, it was technically a date that led to sleeping– but it had nothing to do with Soonyoung— I don't even know why I'm telling you this!" 

You spend the rest of your brunch focusing on finishing your food and appropriately thanking Mingyu for the food, a little apologetic for many many reasons, so you can leave the same room as your ex-boyfriend faster. 

But he makes it real hard, because just as you step out of the restaurant and take a deep breath of the fresh September air to settle your nerves, you hear his voice calling you out. You stuff your hands into the pockets of your pants to brace yourself as you turn around, already starting to say something about how he needs to leave you alone and forget you said anything. 

"You left your phone behind!" he cuts you off, holding out the device for you to see. You curse under your breath, feeling incredibly ridiculous as you reach for it. 

"Thanks–"

And then he dodges your grasp, leaving you flailing around like an idiot while he looks on with an amused half-smile. Half a smile because he knows you would kill him and then yourself if he straight-out laughed at you. 

"I'll give it back if you unblock me."

Your shoulders slump and a groan leaves your lungs. "Seungcheol."

But his smile only widens because you may be glaring at him but you did just say his name. And a win is a win. 

"Seriously? You're holding my phone hostage just so you can blackmail me over something so petty? Come on!" 

"I'm sorry, do you know how many seal memes you've been missing out on since you blocked me? This is no laughing matter."

"I'm not the one laughing," you snap and then cross your arms in exasperation, "Don't be a child, dude, and just give me my phone."

"Why did you block me anyway?"

You raise your brows at him as if to say really? but he maintains his smile and you groan again. You hate him for knowing that you hadn't blocked him right after the breakup thanks to someone's insistence on thinking seal memes were funny and that the real resaon you'd blocked him was–

"–Siri kept recommending your contact every single time I would go to make a phone call! Heck, I couldn't even text Nayeon to get me a towel in the shower because the messages app would automatically redirect to you."

Seungcheol watches in awe as he connects the dots in his head and mutters, "You still had me saved as kkmua's dad?" You look away but your silence is enough of an answer. 

It doesn't take a genius to figure out that the reason your phone confused Seungcheol with Nayeon because he was kkuma's dad and she was kookeu's mom– an idea a drunk you had found incredibly hilarous. The similarity in their spelling had your algorithm all fooled every time you typed in one or the other's name in a rush. Still, you wish Seungcheol was a little dumber sometimes. 

Now as you look at Seungcheol you can see he's thinking of something. Most likely considering the question: Why didn't you change it? 

"I was too lazy to change it back, okay? Blocking you was obviously the easier choice."

"I didn't say anything," he tells you with an easy smile, clearly pleased to see you flushed. "For what it's worth, you're still promising young woman in my contacts. And I didn't even have to block you."

It's probably because you've seen Seungcheol so much more than the past two months in the past two days, but you find yourself moved by his words. They're not that meaningful really, he's just bringing up a past inside joke in that reassuring tone of his. But you can't help but smile. 

"I hate you," you breathe out and in the context of the conversation, it makes enough sense. But Seungcheol's dimples deepen because in the context of your history with him, the words are a consolation. 

He only becomes certain of it later that night when he's washed up and throws himself into his sheets to find his phone lighting up in the darkness. It's you. 

promising young woman sent you a link 

promising young woman: rats actually have a great immune system so joke's on u 

And that's all it takes for Seungcheol to go back to his lovesick self, squeaking into his pillow as he reads your text over and over until he can comprehend that not only have you unblocked him of your own accord (debatable) but were also texting him first. 

– 

The next time you run into Seungcheol, it really brings his contact name to life. But before that, enter Soobin, a shy blonde who's recently moved to the town. 

"You like Lamp, huh?" 

Soobin jumps around, eyes flailing around as if you'd caught him red-handed. And you might as well have, what with how he'd been humming and swaying to the music leaking out of the speakers in your bookstore. You'd enjoyed watching the younger man visit the store more frequently the past few weeks, always in the evening hours when you would finally break open your playlists, a luxury you only allowed near closing time. 

"Ha," he nervous laughs, "Y-Yeah… Sorry, I didn't think you were still here."

"I run the place, Soobin. It'd be a bit of a problem if I just took off." You smile at his flustered sigh and move past him to shelf a book you'd taken out to review earlier. "Anyway, we're closing soon. You buying anything today or…?" 

Soobin looks at the thick book in his hands and you recognize it as a new arrival but then he flips it around, a little unsure. "Umm, I'm not– this seems cool but also scary so probably not?"

"I'll take it off your hands then?" you offer with an understanding shrug. But he shakes his head eagerly, "No, no, don't worry. I remember where I took this from. I don't want to get in your way."

"...All right," you reply after a pause. Then, brushing your hands against your pants, "Let me know if you need help, anyway." 

But Soobin's far from one to bother you as he leaves wordleslly, not without assisting you relocate some heavy boxes to the store before you lock up for the day. You're calling out goodbye after him as he takes off into the night when you hear soft barks closing in on you, 

For a beat, you freeze because the sound is excruciatingly nostalgic and you genuinely think you must've time travelled when you turn around to see Seungcheol running toward you with a very excited Kkuma leading the way. You're already dropping to a squat when the dog scurries to your feet, licking at your ankle before you get your hands on her.

You let out an undignified coo at the white ball of fur, "Kkuma, my baby. Aww, baby, you're so sweet. Look at you!" You go on for a little bit, fussing over her as she rolls over for some belly rubs before you come to and become aware of the way Seungcheol stands by, patiently watching. 

You slowly rise to your feet with an awkward smile. 

"I'm convinced she still loves you more than me," the man starts with a pout, "And it's still so unfair. Kkuma, I'm your dad. I pay for your meals and grooming, you know?"

You laugh at the way he scolds his dog in a small voice as you retort, "Maybe she's in her rebellious years. Let her be."

Seungcheol's soft gaze lands on you with a huffed chuckle. And then he looks at something behind you. "Who was that, by the way? New conquest?"

You throw your hands up in the air. "Come on, man. You can't keep doing this!"

"Doing what?"

"Snooping around in my business! And also making me sound like some kind of a player." 

Seungcheol looks down like he's reflecting. Kkuma paws at his leg with a whine and you look between them before letting out a cough.

"That was Soobin. If you must know." You look away as you say this, like it was no big deal, reporting on your customers to your ex-boyfriend because he still got all whiny when he saw you with another man. Neither of you is ready to address the meaning of your actions toward each other quite yet. So you both pretend it's normal when Seungcheol lights up a little when you speak up. 

"Soobin…? Haven't hear that name before."

"Yeah, he moved in a few weeks ago. Shy guy but very smart," you say, "And I think he wants to work part-time at the bookstore." 

"Woah," Seungcheol's ears perk up, "That's great, Y/N! You could totally use the help."

You turn to face him, arms crossed yet again, with a suspecting look on your face. "Hmm, I guess you could say that. I haven't popped the question yet though so don't go around spreading rumors." 

"Aww, you know I would never snitch on you like that! Unless he makes a move on you, of course, because that would be a very different story–"

"Seungcheol." 

Nice. That would be three points to Seungcheol if he was keeping count of how many times you'd said in his name in that grave voice of yours, indicating that you were mad but also couldn't cover up the laughter that bled into your tone anyway. And he was. 

– 

"What about you? You were gone a while."

Seungcheol counts his blessings every minute you spend with him, even if a lot of it was you pushing him away. But you couldn't stay consistent with your cold demeanour for much longer, not with him making sure he ran into you just as you closed your store. With Kkuma scurrying for love and his innocent blush whenever you greeted him, it wasn't long before you were letting your walls down. 

So it's no surprise that you find yourself curious of what he'd been upto in the month-long visit he'd paid to his best friend. 

Initially, Seungcheol's giddy ove your question, like you were on a first date all over again and not just walking along the dim grass fields like you so often did. "You know how it is with Jeonghannie. I meant to be there for a week but… one thing led to another and I was there for a while."

You fall silent, trying to imagine what it must've been like for him. "He still lives near that college, doesn't he?"

"Yeah. He's a strange fellow."

"Not that strange. College towns are like cities," you chuckle, "but with less crime and cranky people."

"I don't know, college students are pretty cranky too. Maybe even worse than the average city person." You raise a brow at Seungcheol's grimace.

"What, did Jeonghan force you to fraternize with college kids or what?"

Okay, now Seungcheol's getting a little worried when he realizes where this is going. And even though everything's in the past for him, he can't help but hesitate to tell you what exactly he'd been up to.

"...Yeah, I mean, most of his friends are college seniors. He knows them from his time there so it's pretty chill."

A few more questions from you have Seungcheol pulling out his phone to supply you with some visuals for some of the events he's mentioning and the way you softly laugh into his shoulder at the sight of the chaotic night parties has him getting a little careless. 

"Wait, wait, who was that?" you stop Seungcheol's now excited swiping with a cold hand to his forearm. He freezes, more because he realizes what you're trying to see than the temperature of your body against his. 

"Um, oh–" he watches dumbly as you go back a few photos to a selfie of him and a girl. They're grinning in the photo, teeth on display and cheeks clearly red from intoxication. 

"Ohh, is she one of his college friends? She's cute–" You interrupt your own musings over the stranger when you go back another photo in his gallery. This time it's a photo of the girl kissing Seungcheol on the cheek, his eyes closed with a shy smile. 

"That's–" Seungcheol barely opens his mouth to explain but trails off when you abruptly pull away from him. "She's– A friend… Um, goes to college in the place and she's–" He stops talking with a groan because great, all his stuttering has you side-eyeing him, no doubt recognizing the guilt swimming in his eyes.

Your voice is so small when you finally speak up, pace increasing. "That's cute," is all you say.

"Wait, Y/N, you don't understand. I know what I sound like but–"

"Just to be clear," you stop your brisk walking to hold up a hand in between you and him as if to symbolize the space there. "You don't have to explain anything to me. It's all cool, Seungcheol." 

And the way you murmur his name transports him back a couple months, a similar breezy night. One where you'd pulled him away from a group dinner with your friends and looked down at your feet the whole time but your words had pierced right through his heart anyway. Even back then, you said his name softly, without any malice, but even that might've been merciful. Because what's worse is the way you uttered his name like goodbye, sincere enough to bring tears to his eyes, even now, as he watches your forlorn back disappear into the night. 

Zero points to Seungcheol. 

– 

"Y/N, you in there?"

It takes a good minute of Nayeon repeating her questioning in increasing volume for you to finally hear her knocks over the sound of the music playing through your headphones. You frown as you uncover one ear and call out, "Nayeon? What happened?" The door to your room slowly creaks up, revealing your roommate standing there with her hands occupied, each holding up a bottle of soju invitingly.

"Wanna talk about it?" 

You're already tearing up when she asks you that and by the time you've both drunk your way through the bottles, your eyes feel numb. You interrupt your own worrying over how swollen they were bound to be tomorrow when you point a finger at Nayeon and question, "I really needed this today. How'd you know?"

She smiles, "Of course I did. You ignored my text about eating at Mingyu's Kitchen and my offer to pay. Plus, you didn't do the thing you usually do where you come in and complain about your ex."

You pout, "I'm sorry. I must be so annoying."

"You are," Nayeon shrugs, "And I like it. But you know what I would like more? If you would just make up with him already."

"No."

"Is this about that one photo of some girl kissing him on the cheek? You know how petty it is to get jealous over something like that?"

"She was seriously pretty, Nayeon!" you defend yourself, "And I'm not jealous, just– just upset because he didn't tell me earlier. I feel so stupid."

"I'm sorry, babe," she mutters, rubbing your back, "He's an idiot for not just coming clean."

"I know! Even after he went sticking his nose in my business and who I slept with while he was gone!"

You sniffle, "Maybe I should just call him and tell him to never ever talk to me again. And that he's a jerk. And that I still love him."

"Wait a second," Nayeon pulls you back onto your butt on the floor, "Maybe, let's reconsider that last part?"

You're clearly more drunk than you let on because you look genuinely confused by her interjection. "What? About me hating him?"

– 

When you drag yourself into work on Monday, you expect a lot of things. You see the headache coming, from last night's drinking and this morning's lack of hot water. You also know it's going to rain the whole day so it's only harder to put one foot after another to move. And where you also expect to pestered by a man: the desperate pleas don't come from Seungcheol like you'd secretly hoped.

"Soonyoung?"

The man, who'd been impatiently pacing by the entrance to your store, stops at the sound of your voice and spins around, nearly slipping over thanks to the wet ground. He throws the daunting hood covering his eyes with a bright smile as you run over and hastily unlock the store.

"Why're you out here in the rain?" 

Soonyoung sighs in relief once he's inside brushing his damp pants off with a quick hand. Then, he looks up with a shy expression, "Well, I… need to ask you something."

And given his past mooning over you, when he says that with a nervous laugh, you're stiffening up because you think you know where this is going. But then, Soonyoung defies your expectations for the second time yet again. 

Because where you'd expected to have to turn him down with an incompetent attempt at kindness, the next hour finds you grappling with all the information he's throwing at you.

For starters, he does ask you out. But– "It's fake. Dont worry, I'm not actually into you like that," he quickly adds with a dry laugh. 

As it turns out, he's asking you to help him make a move on a girl he only recently realized he liked. Her name's Chaewon and the only thing you know about her is that she owns a strawberry farm and can sing on ocassion. So you're easily worried by this proposition, "Soonyoung, why would you pretend to be with someone else? Shouldn't you be asking her out?" 

The boy heaves a sigh, "Y/N, I hate it to break it to you but nobody does that anymore. Keep up with the times, won't you? Jealousy is the new I like you."

"I'm pretty sure that's not true," you scoff out, refusing to let Soonyoung peg you as old-fashioned. Your stomach swims at his words anyway, ming wandering to your own… jealousy issues with a certain someone.

"Anyway, there's an open observatory night or something at her farm tonight with complementary dinner after. And I need you to come with me and make her jealous." 

"I don't like how serious you are about this," you complain, "And I don't think I want to be a part of this evil scheme."

"Please, Y/N, you're the only one I can rely on! And you're basically a celebrity around here, when it comes to dating."

You frown, finally looking away from the shelf you'd been re-ogranizing, "What do you mean?"

Soonyoung bites his lip, clearly having said something he shouldn't have. You poke at his arm urgently with a glare. He groans, giving in, "Well, it's just… your break-up with Seungcheol was the only thing anyone could talk about last month! And then the gossip only resurfaced when he came back to town."

"What kind of gossip?" you press with narrow eyes. 

"I– can't say."

"Soonyoung," you warn him, "Tell me. Or I won't pretend to be your girlfriend."

"Oh, come on! This is blackmail!"

"I thought you really wanted to be with Chaewon, no?" you question with inordinate amounts of innonence in your smile, "Makes you want to paint flowers onto the sky for her, doesn't she?"

"Fine, I'll tell you but only because this side of you is scary," the boy sighs out, "People think the reason you broke up with him was because he cheated on you. And now he's back in town so he can apologize and make up with you… or whatever." 

"That's ridiculous!" you cough out, "Who's been spewing this nonsense? I'm gonna have to–"

He holds your arm in an attempt to ground you, "Nobody really thinks it's true though! And remember how you promised to not tell a soul about a word I told you today?"

"I don't because I never said that–!"

"Seungcheol's gonna be there tonight, too, if that helps?"

Soonyoung's clearly much more devious than you last remember him being but when he explains that this could be a win-win situation for both of you– where he makes Chaewon realize her feelings for him, you also make Seungcheol jealous with your little act. 

And while you're sure to curse the him out for his assumption that you would want to get back with Seungcheol at all to begin with, the idea does leave an impression on you. Your mind's gears are working really hard, not just because you're trying to figure out a new spread for the monthly display at the front of your bookstore, but also because you keep finding loopholes in Soonyoung's grand plan.

"But is pretending to be together for one dinner really going to convince anyone? I mean, no offense, but nobody I know will believe that."

Soonyoung shrugs, "It's not just for one night. We're obviously going to do other stuff." You scrunch your nose up in disgust. "But think of tonight as the opening night. What we do tonight determines how the rest of our lives will pan out. We could end up lonely and dreadful if one of us messes up."

– 

For all of your criticism of Soonyoung's hyperbolic description of a dubious scheme, that evening finds you making double-takes in the front camera of your phone every other minute. Yep, turns out your nose was still on your face.

"Y/N, you look great," Soonyoung calls out finally, having watched you the whole ride to the venue. It was part of his plan, of course, to make things seem more official in his words. "So can you stop?"

"Are you sure you don't like me?"

As it often happens, your own question catches you more off-guard than it does Soonyoung. Your nerves have succesfully taken over your bodily functions. 

"I don't, Y/N," he responds with an easy smile, "I don't know why you keep asking me that. Do you like me or something?"

You sigh. "Sorry. It just seemed like that for a while. But I'm glad you don't, it makes things a lot easier."

"Good," he hums and then, after a beat passes, "By the way, when all of this over and both of us are hopefully happily in love with our respective partners–"

"I'm not in love with Seung–"

"And after you're done denying your feelings– Maybe we can be friends?"

You nod with a thoughtful hum, "Sure. That sounds fine. Except I thought we were already friends?"

Conversation with Soonyoung becomes a lot less tiresome when you've both established the purely platonic basis of your relationship. Which is ironic because fifteen minutes later, he's whispering in your ear to smile as he reaches for your hand. But his presence is still comforting and you find yourself wondering why you hadn't always found it this easy to be friends with him. The thought keeps you distracted momentarily and then, you lock eyes with Seungcheol. 

You were standing next to Soonyoung when it happened, hand in his as he caught up with friends and purposefully showed off his new relationship. The news was as unexpected to them as it was to you this morning and keeps conversation busy enough to allow you to be completely zoned out. And then you spot Seungcheol across the room, his eyes fixed on you in the distance and his mouth set in an intimidating line.

You look away with a cough, feeling your neck grow warmer. Soonyoung senses the change in your mood and when he asks if you're okay, you lean into his ear and complain, "Fuck, I just made eye-contact with him." 

He breaks into a grin at your indirect admission to still liking your ex. If Seungcheol knew the context to your arrangement with Soonyoung, he would find this entire exchange heart-warming, losing it over how shy you've gotten. But he doesn't know.

So in his eyes, it just looks like you've just whispered an inside joke into another man's ear and his chuckles are out of fondness. And that's why attributes your shy flush to Soonyoung's response to you, and not the eye-contact you'd made with him seconds ago.  

Seungcheol spends the rest of the night lurking. He skirts your surroundings, his eyes in disbelief every time you don't pull away from Soonyoung's hand on you. He's confused and jealous. The combination has him malfunctioning in a corner when he spots you breaking away from Soonyoung's side for the first time that evening. 

He doesn't even spare a thought to his actions when he springs forth, trailing you to the refreshments. You're trying to refill your lemonade even though you don't really have the desire to drink it anymore, mainly because Soonyoung had approached Chaewon and it seemed like his plan was working because you'd never felt so invisible in a conversation before. 

You can feel the act tiring you out though because you don't notice it when Seungcheol sneaks up to your side, breathing down your neck and staring seriously even when you spin around and almost spill your drink all over yourself in surprise. 

"S-Seungcheol!" you groan out, flustered but relieved your dress didn't have to suffer the consequences of your weakness around him. But your heart certainly did, especially when the man stepped closer, voice few octaves lower than usual.

"What are you doing with him?"

You go silent, knowing that you should feel unsettled by the absence of friendliness in his tone but only feel yourself enjoy the way he's so obvious about his jealousy. You look back at him, trying to seem innocent but immediately hate the way his eyes have reddened. "I'm… helping Soonyoung out."

Seungcheol's expression is a big question mark at that. A big angry question mark followed by an exclamation point, if you will. "...by following him around on his arm all night?" 

"Um… yeah," you look over his shoulder to make sure Soonyoung's still occupied by Chaewon and the momentary lack of attention is already pissing your ex-boyfriend even more. You hate lying but you convince yourself that right now, you're simply witholding information from someone. 

"I don't get it, Y/N," he says, "Did I lose my chance with you?"

The question catches you completely off-guard, leaving you gaping at Seungcheol. You were used to his short-temper and his incessant questions but this was new: the solemn setting of his lips and his downcast eyes as he asked you if he still stood a chance with you. He was being vulnerable, you realized, in a way that he never was during your relationship. The change is dizzying, it really is, and you can only think of all the other ways Seungcheol's been changed since he returned.

And all the ways he's stayed the same.

You swallow against the lump in your throat, "Come with me." 

You lead him to a slightly more secluded part of the observatory, a dimly lit corner that's orchestrated by more crickets and the lack of chatter is a welcome relief to your already crowded senses. "I'm not actually with Soonyoung," you breathe out, the truth weighing heavily on your tongue even though you'd only pretended for the one night, "I'm pretending to, because he asked me to." 

Seungcheol's eyes widen, "What? You're fake-dating that guy? Why?"

"He likes Chaewon," you point them out for him over his shoulder but Seungcheol only stares at your face with a serious expression. You retract your pointer with a flushed face, "And they were apparently getting nowhere, despite both liking each other. So he figured he needed some intervention."

You point to yourself this time with a half-smile and then remember the unimpressed look on Seungcheol's face. You watch his face carefully but he remains still for over a minute. 

"Well, I'm only telling you because you asked so nicely," you clear your throat, feeling a little stupid now that he's gone mute, "Do with that what you will. I'm gonna go back…"

You pat your dress down and exhale heavily, trying to steel yourself against both the disappointment and the cold night-air. You've already rejoined the noisy crowd, only a few steps away when you pick up on Seungcheol's voice. 

"--meant nothing…" is all you can pick up so you turn around to find him at an arm's length, muttering something, too low for it to be audible. You say, "What did you say?"

"I said that the photo you saw that day meant nothing. She's Jeonghan's girlfriend and I slept with her once. I also pretended to be into her but only so I could forget about you."

More than anything, you're shocked by the way he emphasizes you, the word coming out stronger than the rest of his explanation, one that does more to soothe your nerves than you realize. But you also don't know what to with this new information, because your brain can't keep up with how much more context there might be to it– Why did he sleep with her if she's with Jeonghan? And why did he look so happy in the photo if it meant nothing?

But tonight isn't about you, it's about Soonyoung and you've made a promise to him. So you tell Seungcheol, "I've gotta get back, Cheol–" the nickname slips out before you've censored yourself. Your face burns but you turn away quickly. "I- See you later."

The crowd is so close to you, just another step or two and you could be lost in the sea of half-familiar faces and probably get caught up in catching up with someone or the other. But if the crowd is close, then Seungcheol is closer to you. 

His hands are on your shoulders, warm heat invading your exposed arms pleasantly when he holds you back with that pained look of his. At this point, you're only partly grounded in your body, floating around when you hear Seungcheol's words to you. "I'm still in love with you, Y/N. Never stopped loving you, to be honest." 

That brings you back to earth with a jerk and you blink at him slowly. "I–" you start and then trail off. Then you start again, now that reality's starting to set again. "I feel the same. Obviously. I tried to move on but– ugh, I still love you." You feel Seungcheol's arm slide down to your elbows and then to find your hands, intertwining your fingers with his like he'd imagined doing ever since he got back to town.

"So we're good?" Seungcheol asks you, licking his lips with a small smile.

"Um, well, what do you mean by that because if– I mean, if we're friends–" You're trying to think of a way to state your thoughts in a self-respectful way when he leans in, lips brushing against your with a soft sigh. Your own breath hitches, especially when Seungcheol's hands come up to cup your face with a gentleness you forgot he could muster. He kisses you, sweet and soft, and when you pull away it's with a stupid grin.

He matches your grin, "Does that make things clear? We're not friends. I want to kiss your face and it would be great if you stopped pretending to date other men–"

The mention of fake-dating has you gasping loudly as you push Seungcheol away hastily, "Fuck, I'm supposed to be with–" You turn around and no doubt, everyone rushes to look away but you know the damage has been done when you hear scattered applause and whistles. The sight is heart-warming to you in a universe where you haven't just fucked up a plan. 

"I messed up big-time," you tell Seungcheol with an exasperated groan. 

The man regards you with thinly-concealed glee, "We kiss and make up but you're complaining because…?"

"Soonyoung! I was supposed to–"

Seungcheol doesn't do anything to help when he leans in to peck your lips again. You scowl at him, "What was that for?"

"Sorry, I just forgot what I was to you for a moment there, what with you going on about another man–"

"Cheol, I just confessed my love to you," you scold him but your ears turn pink, "And you're my boyfriend. So don't forget that. But right now, I need to go find my fake-boyfriend or I'll have blood on my hands–"

You're rushing to spot Soonyoung's head in the crowd when he suddenly appears, much closer than you'd anticipated, probably because he's heading right at you. You start to feel the guilt build up in your throat but then you see the grin he's sporting and the way he's skipping toward you. 

"Soonyoung," you call out, "I'm sorry–" you gesture toward Seungcheol vaguely, "I got a little caught up."

"Ahh, don't worry about it!" the boy chuckles lightly and then crosses his arms like he does when he has something to tell you, "I'm– The plan worked!"

"What?! It did? But I thought–?"

"Yeah, well, one part of the plan was to get you and Seungcheol together?" Soonyoung reminds you with a sly smile. You feel Seungcheol's arm around you as he pipes up, "It was???" You ignore how excited he sounds and narrow your eyes at Soonyoung, "Okay, but we clearly just ruined the whole act! What about–"

"Chaewon got jealous. And then when we spotted you and Seungcheol kissing, she was about to be really mad at you but I explained things to her… and then, she was mad at me but then… um, well, we, you know, kissed it out."

"Soonyoung!" you exclaim, clapping your hands together in relief, "That's great! We don't have to date anymore!" 

Soonyoung laughs at your phrasing but you're busy being wooed by the smitten smile on Seungcheol's face when squeezes your hand, muttering, "You all mine now?" 

– 

Cue star-gazing with Seungcheol. 

It was his idea, one he'd suggested out loud to you over the dinner that was also his idea, the candle between you flickering with your breathless agreement. You were in love with Seungcheol like you'd been for as long as you remember. The break-up, creeping up into your mind thanks to a combination of a lull in your relationship with him and doubts of whether there might be someone else for both of you, seemed like a faraway event already when you resumed your life with him.

"The stars are pretty, aren't they?"

You hum in agreement to Seungcheol, fiddling with his fingers. His laughter bleeds into your body, "You're not even looking up at the sky, baby."

You shift to lay down next to him. "I was!" you defend, "But then I got scared. The stars just make me feel so insignificant. And temporary." Your voice breaks a little, "I don't want temporary."

Seungcheol wraps around you, bringing your face up to his and watching you blink the tears out of yours. "Oh, doll, you're so precious," he huffs out, running a thumb under your eyes, "I love you. Fuck being temporary, okay? I'm going to be with you forever."

"You can't guarantee that though," you mumble out.

"I know I can't. Because I could die before you or like be abducted by the aliens when they inevitably come colonize us. We all know I'd be their first pick."

"You know that's not what I meant."

"Y/N, we're still together, even after we broke up," he kisses your cheek to emphasize your togetherness, "We're in love, despite it all. And that seems solid enough to me, you know? The scariest part of going into a relationship is the possibility of separating. But if we've done it before, how bad can it be?"

"What if we break up again?"

"Then we'll figure something out," Seungcheol says, "I know we will. It might not be the same as always but I promise I'll always be a part of your life for as long as I can." 

You sniffle into his shoulder, "I love you. Can you please beg the aliens to take me with you?" 

Seungcheol's laughter resounds through you yet again, a hand brushing your hair lovingly. You were finally wearing your hair down again, and it might've something to do with the way he would find a way to slip the hairtie out of its place. It sits around his wrist now, worn-out but incredibly dear to him. 

"Of course, love, anything for you." 

–  

AUTHOR'S NOTE:

the seungcheol brainrot never stops <3 i hope i've done this seungcheol justice, given what he went through in jeonghan's fic lol... anyway, i'm thinking of writing another part where jeongcheol catch up or something?? may be an interesting collision of worlds... we'll see.

[chiasaaa]

— the night is yours

itoshi sae x f! reader

summary: your niece from belgium visits you in madrid to interview your boyfriend for her academic paper.

warning: english is not my first language. apologies for any grammatical or spelling errors.

— when you told sae to vacate his saturday for you, he expected something planned for both of you is up in play. true enough, there is a plan. it’s just far from what he expected it to be.

he sits on the single recliner in your shared living room, distant eyes staring right through the soul of your poor cowering niece. sae always despised interviews—always viewed it as people trying to dissect the information they want to manipulate for themselves right out of his system. it’s uncanny.

sae already bears with the fame by giving short single responses whenever a match ends and he’s declared the most valuable player of his time (which happens all the time), and he absolutely despises every second of it. it’s every second wasted when he could be celebrating his win with you instead. he had no idea how you managed to convince him to participate in your niece’s little project, yet there he was.

maybe the tea you coaxed him with proved effective, after all. that, and a little something you promised him for when the interview’s finished and you have your home alone for yourselves.

he must love you very much, is what goes on in his mind as he watched your niece scramble through the sheets of paper she had prepared for this day.

“hey,” he called out to her softly, causing her to pause from her anxious squirming. “it’s alright. take your time.”

though it was nothing special, he saw how his assurance helped her relax. she nods by a tad bit, then stacked her papers together neatly. unbeknownst to the two, you’ve been watching through the corner of your eyes as you face them sideways on the counter stool, pretending to work on the designs your team had previously come up with for approval.

your niece isn’t that far from your age, currently 15 years old. a gap of three years has always been quite weird as it stands between ‘we’re old enough to view life differently’ and ‘but we’re young enough to get along well’. for someone like sae, however, it’s a completely different story. he’s like an old man stuck in a young player’s body. people normally find it hard to get along with him. and you know that he gives zero fucks about anyone.

however, one thing you love about him is that he tries. he will always try if it means being closer to your family. quite the awkward fellow he can be, but it becomes a part of his charm at some point. even your father, who had long been against you dating, grew fond of him. now that you see him trying his best to make your niece comfortable with him, you could only quietly fawn over the sight.

he always gives you reasons to fall in love everyday—not like he still has to.

you have already loved him for him.

you have never been so lucky.

“as an athlete, of course it’s important for us to maintain a healthy balanced diet because—“ you snapped out of your own world when sae’s voice penetrated through your ears in a gentle tone. your eyes glided back to his direction, finding him talking through a clipped mic on his shirt. they finally proceeded with the interview proper after fifteen minutes of preparing, and he’s as collected as ever.

though, this is the first time you’ve ever heard him respond to an interview so coherently. as if he made an effort to put his answers together well enough for your niece to extract useful information. and as he was going through with the interview, he caught a glance of you watching.

you smiled, so sweetly and gratefully that it had him pause for a moment as well. sae knew what you were telling him through your honey-dipped eyes. he didn’t need you to tell him, just as much as you didn’t need him to tell you when he sent the faintest smile back.

when the interview was over, you and sae walked your niece out the porch.

“thank you for today, auntie!” she hugged you tight, grateful for making the interview possible in the first place. she was only ever able to pursue the topic she wanted because of you connections, after all.

“no worries, hija. tell your mom to drop you off again same time tomorrow, yeah? sae and i plan to take you around the city before you fly back home.”

“really? thank you!” she then turns to sae. “thank you too, uncle sae! i’ll see you guys tomorrow!”

and so she runs off to the taxi cab where her mother waits, taking them home as soon as she enters. you and sae stay by the porch until they’re out of sight, with sae still stunned that your niece finally called him uncle for the first time in the three years you’ve acquainted them.

“looks like you’re promoted, uncle sae.” you tease, smirking as he closed the door after you entered. “does this call for a congratulations?”

he rolls his eyes. of course, the ever so teasing you will make a big deal out of it. though, he can’t blame you. he has to admit that it had him a little excited to feel part of your family.

“maybe it does,” he comes forward and gently tugged you close by the waist, “don’t act like i forgot about your promise to me, hermosa.”

chuckling, you wrapped your arms loosely around his neck and teased him with a peck on his lips. “oh, i didn’t.” you leaned closer until your lips hovered by his ear. “and you have permission to do what you want with me for the rest of the night, mi guapo.”

that was all he needed to hear, and you’re in for yet another sleepless night filled with blissful memories.

[gimmehyuck]

try again | j.jh

summary. jaehyun remembers the night he met you, and even after that one night he often thought of you and wished things would have been different, but by a weird twist of fate he gets to see you again, except this time... you're not alone.

or alternatively:

jaehyun gets to try again, for real this time.

pairing. idol!jaehyun x teacher!yn

words. 19.8k-ish

genre. somewhat of a second chance romance? lots of cute things going on, and it wouldn't be a gimmehyuck fic if i didn't have something angsty

warnings. there's not much to warn about tbh? jaehyun not believing in love at first sight but then essentially does, there's a one night stand (nothing explicit), and also a child (gasp i know), alcohol is mentioned as well as pineapple on pizza, a wild blue haired haechan makes an appearance, johnmark being the best, jaehyun is generally unhappy with being an idol at this stage of his life, idk but y'all can thank my friend ruby for this getting finished, she was on my ass about it... happy late birthday jaehyun lmao

.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.

this was completely and utterly unlike himself, jaehyun thought over and over as he laid in your bed listening to you breathe. he wasn’t a one-night stand kind of man, he was too busy to let himself fall into these kind of temptations. he was a man, he told himself, and yeah, he liked sex, but the middle of tour? he shook his head at himself as he stared at the ceiling.

his mouth spoke on his own when he saw you, your beauty catching him entirely off guard. dinner at 6 with johnny was only supposed to be a quick get-out-of-the-hotel-for-a-bit thing, forty-five minutes tops. but the second you walked up and asked if you could start them off with any waters, or if they preferred beer, he was enamored. forty-five minutes turned into double that and johnny could only smile at himself at the very obvious flirtatious exchanges and when you wrote your number on the receipt you had placed on the table with a scribbled note that said ‘i get off at 11, call me if you want :)’, johnny was more than supportive.

“man, just live a little.” johnny had told him in the taxi to the hotel, and jaehyun was still on the fence about it but when it was 10:53 and he still couldn’t get your smiling face out of his head, his fingers moved entirely on their own. you responded to him at 11 exactly, and even though he had just ate and wasn’t hungry, he agreed when you asked if he’d be up to get something to eat with you. twenty minutes later he found himself in your presence again, baseball hat tugged as far down as it would go and a mask tugged slightly down to rest on his chin and he couldn’t help but listen to things about yourself and he realized he wanted to know more and more with each laugh you let out.

he wasn’t a love at first sight kind of man, but he could understand that thought behind it because, damn, you were funny and kind and absolutely beautiful.

“sorry, i’ve been going on too much about myself, haven’t i?” you asked, face turning a little sheepish when you realized he hadn’t said much of a word the last fifteen minutes but you noticed his smile never fell from his face. he shook his head in answer and picked up a fry from the shared pile on the table, “no, i’m enjoying hearing all about you.”

“well, let’s change it up some, tell me about yourself. you from around here?” you asked, copying his movements and munching on a fry yourself.

“mmm,” he thought for a moment. he didn’t want to be secretive, but he wasn’t comfortable turning the conversation into a long winded one about his group and his fame and although he was thankful for all of that, he noticed it had slowly started to wear him down. no, he genuinely was enjoying just being himself with you, not having to be anyone else. “i’m from seoul, and i work… in entertainment.” he finally decided on.

not a lie, not exactly.

“oh, that sounds really exciting! do you get to meet a lot of famous people doing that?” you asked tilting your head slightly as you did so, genuine curiosity on your face.

his smile grew, oh if only you knew. “i have here and there, they’re just people even if they’re famous.”

you nodded in response to that and your lips twisted slightly in a frown, “i always feel a little bad for celebrities in that sense. i can’t imagine worrying about how my next sentence will be dissected and twisted into something else.”

the more you spoke, the more you surprised him. no one really thought about them in that way, usually jumping directly to the misconstruing of his words or actions as something else entirely.

“yeah, i imagine that’s pretty difficult.” he agreed with you knowingly, then asked, “so do you enjoy being a waitress?”

your smile faltered a little, and you sighed, “i mean, yeah. i like meeting new people but i’m only doing it for another semester and then i’ve got my degree. it took me longer than i’d like to admit, since i’m almost twenty-four now but i had to work enough to make the money to pay for my tuition and well, yeah. so i’ll have my bachelors in a few months’ time and then i’ll be done with the restaurant.”

“oh?” jaehyun asked, reaching again for more fries. “what are you getting your degree in?”

“teaching!” you said with a brilliant smile on your face. “i want to teach, but lately i’ve been leaning towards teaching english overseas and i think you were my sign to do just that. i’ve been debating between korea and japan.”

jaehyun laughed a little at that, “well not to be biased but i can vouch for korea. it’s a really beautiful place.”

and the conversation continued like that, asking questions back and forth. you answering him honestly and jaehyun answering you as honestly as he could without turning the conversation into the direction he didn’t want it to go. the food was gone and the conversation was still going but you had invited him to your place which wasn’t that far away and jaehyun thought he’d hesitate to say yes but his answer was so immediate it startled him a bit. the constant back and forth went on even still at your apartment and he felt like he had known you for a long time, much longer than just a few hours at least, he felt at ease and comfortable and it was a feeling he didn’t realize he was missing. when you suddenly kissed him midsentence he froze, his entire face blank as his brain processed what had just happened, unsure how to exactly to proceed next and you blushed brightly at him, your confidence unwavering.

“sorry,” you giggled a little nervously at the way his face was in shock, “i don’t have any expectations of tonight, but i wanted to kiss you at least once. you’re so cute, especially your dimples. i’m sorry if i made you uncomf – mmph!” his lips effectively silencing you in the same manner yours had him.

except he didn’t pull away, and you wrapped your arms around him and the night carried on, each kiss leading into a touch, and then a gasp. you led him into your room and kicked the door shut with your foot, hands frantically removing clothing in a trail to the bed. small giggles were shared between gasping breaths within the breaks of kissing and the gasps slowly transformed into sounds of pleasure and while you fell asleep against him after, jaehyun couldn’t turn his racing mind off.

he didn’t regret anything, he didn’t regret his actions. he didn’t regret you.

he regretted that he couldn’t stay.

and so when he knew you were fully asleep, when your breathing was the deepest, he got up from your bed and slowly replaced his clothes one by one, dragging out the moments he had in your presence. his hat was the last thing he found on the floor and he tugged it on, sighing softly to himself, pulling out his phone to read that it was 5:20 am, and with one last glance over his shoulder he left you there in the bed sound asleep. a deep guilt he couldn’t shake making a home for itself in his chest.

.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.

                              aug 9

9:33 am you: hey! everything ok?

9:35 am you: wanna go get breakfast? :)

12:42 pm dimples: i’m sorry, i just saw this. i had work things to take care of. how did you sleep?

3:30 pm you: that’s ok! i slept alright :)

3:31 pm you: are you busy tonight? wanna get food?

4:45 pm dimples: if i get off in time, sure. i’ll let you know.

7:02 pm you: you alright?

7:28 pm dimples: i’m sorry, again. work is kicking my ass, how did your day go?

7:32 pm you: it was fine! started working on an essay i had due, you know. the fun stuff, how about you? busy?

7:45 pm dimples: you have no idea haha

7:49 pm you: you can tell me about it if you want? believe it or not, i’m a great listener

                                       read 10:45 pm

                           aug 13

2:43 pm you: sent attachment

2:43 pm you: saw this and remembered how you

2:43 pm you: sorry, thumb hit send lol. you mentioned you liked this band, and i thought of you

2:44 pm you: hope you’re ok

                           read 12:01 am

                           aug 19

11:01 pm you: y’know, i’m not mad at you or anything i did say i had no expectations lol. just kinda hoped this would have been different, you know? it kinda felt different to me…

11:02 pm you: but that’s alright lol i hope you’re ok

                                     delivered

                          aug 31

7:49 am you: jaehyun

7:50 am you: look, i need you to respond

7:50 am you: please

7:51 am you: i’m freaking out

7:51 am you: idk what to do, and i’m scared

                                                 not delivered

7:53 am you: what the fuck??

                                               not delivered

7:55 am you: fuck. you. jaehyun.

                                               not delivered

.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.

five years later.

although the years had passed for jaehyun, it was all so quick that the night with you still felt fresh to him. he often thought of you and how you were, often thought of if you graduated and were teaching. if you got to do everything you had confessed to him that night in the extended lengths of the conversations had.

he often thought if you were here in korea with him like you had planned and he just had no clue.

if you were, you hated him, he was sure.

his manager had caught him checking his phone that night with an unsaved number on it, had sneakily read your messages over his shoulder and absolutely lost it on him. he went on and on about his idol image, his career, his future and repeated ‘what if this got out? what if dispatch found it?’ and jaehyun couldn’t say anything back but ‘okay’. the feeling he had when talking to you, the small feeling of being himself again, smothered in an instant.

when you had sent him a picture of a vinyl record of one of his favorite bands, he wanted so badly to respond to you. he had even typed out a response when he finally was able to read it, but he knew it wouldn’t help anything at all if he did. he really did think it was better to let it lie, and so he turned off his read receipts.

the last message he saw from you, made him gnaw on his bottom lip, and the next day he left the country going back to korea and his number was changed.

he wanted to be different for you, he had barely met you but he knew you, it wasn’t a coincidence to him. but what kind of life would a long-distance relationship be with someone who would be so busy some days or even weeks that he couldn’t respond? he knew you’d always be worried, or hurt when communication was so small. he thought of it a lot. and he was thinking of all those things, when he was sure, he had ultimately decided, that you probably didn’t actually want to be with him.

he would have just… liked it if you had.

maybe if he weren’t famous he would have dated you.

maybe it would have been like one of the cheesy romance movies taeyong liked to watch, maybe he even would have fallen in love.

and maybe… maybe he would have even married you if his daydream let him get that far, if his life would have followed the cliché movie plot, but that was all a what if to him now. something he liked to sit and think about if only just to make sure the guilt never left him.

“jaehyun?” his name being called pulled him out of his memories and his head jerked up to look at who had called him. his manager was staring at him with drawn eyebrows, and at jaehyun’s confused expression he breathed deeply out of his nose.

“what do you think?” this time it was the PR manager asking, the person who had asked him, johnny, and mark to come to the conference room to go over their schedules for the next couple of days.

“about what? sorry, i was…” jaehyun trailed off.

“he thinks it’s a great idea.” mark answered for him, giving jaehyun a concerned look. “he loves kids.”

“okay, then it’s set. the kids are unaware they’re meeting you all, and they probably won’t really realize you’re famous but it will be filmed for content with permission from the schools principal already. It’ll be good for the groups image, everyone loved the last time you guys sat with kids.” and with that the meeting was done, it wasn’t really to ask them if they wanted to participate but to tell them what they would be doing. jaehyun didn’t mind this that much because it was true. he did love kids.

once the managers had left the room, johnny turned in his chair to give jaehyun a scrupulous look.

“dude, why were you spacing out so bad?” mark asked, slouching in his chair as his chin saw in his palm and his elbow rested on the table. to this date, johnny was the only other person who knew about you and his night he had spent with you. johnny nodded at the quick eye contact, understanding immediately.

“dunno, i think i’m just tired. i didn’t sleep much last night.” jaehyun brushed off mark’s question with a shrug and mark sighed at that.

“well, you better get some rest tonight. those kids aren’t going to chill out just because you’re tired.” mark said as he stood, his hands shoved into the pockets of his sweats, shooting one last look at jaehyun before leaving the room.

“you know, it’s been a few years but maybe she’s thinking of you too. why not try reaching out?” johnny whispered to him, and jaehyun gave johnny a not-quite-there smile that was really just a grimace.

“nah, it’s fine. she’s probably changed her number since then, and besides, even if she didn’t she definitely hates me now. i know i would.” johnny frowned then as his friend got up and left the room, the big glass door swinging closed softly behind him.

something had changed in jaehyun that night when he came back, it wasn’t a huge, drastic change but johnny noticed it nonetheless. he wasn’t always distracted by his guilty thoughts of you, but on several occasions jaehyun had gotten drunk with him and started talking about you and everything about you that he knew.

by this point johnny felt he knew you just as well as jaehyun had.

and about sixty percent of those occasions, johnny had to console him and reassure him that you probably didn’t hate him but would probably just be upset at him, and that he was sure you’d forgive jaehyun if he explained the situation.

johnny was never confident in that though. five years is a long time to go on thinking about someone you spent one night with.

and, johnny often thought, five years was a long time to dwell on all the anger left from waking up alone from someone you spent one night with.

and although if it was only supposed to be just one night… even johnny knew it was more than that.

.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.

mark was bouncing on the balls of his feet, his hands contained in his pockets but jaehyun couldn’t help the smile that grew at the younger mans energy. there was always something about children that brought out the kid side of the younger members and that was always contagious and within minutes, jaehyun was smiling just as brightly as mark had been.

they were told to wait until given the signal to come out, as all the kids were now sitting in different circles in the room. the four-year-old class wasn’t very large, and they had come to the SM building to take a tour.

in recent years SM had opened its doors to field trips for younger kids, usually it was elementary ages but after some strings were pulled, they allowed the class going in to kindergarten to be included if they would allow them to be part of the youtube series SM had going on of ‘idols with kids’.

this wasn’t the group’s first event with kids, the group was large at this time and they had rotated out and didn’t have to do it often, but it was their turn and it was a nice break, jaehyun thought.

certainly better than another photoshoot.

johnny tapped jaehyun on the shoulder, the signal had been given and the three men entered the room full of energetic children. there were only about twelve of them total, and jaehyun noticed the teachers stood off to the side, two women leaning against the wall with their masks up and covering their face.

jaehyun paid them very little attention as he went to his assigned table to sit down with the kids. he took his place at the circle table and folded his legs underneath him, sitting as the kids were.

the kids grew quiet at the presence of the adult man at their table, and he noticed his table had two girls and two boys. the little girl that sat closest to him had big bright eyes and her little hands brushed her bangs away from her eyes.

he noticed her little pigtails had little fuzzy clips in them that matched her dress and his heart melted at how adorable she was. she seemed to be the boldest of the group as she was the only one to look him in the eyes.

“hi everyone, my name is jaehyun.” he said kindly, trying to make the kids feel at ease.

“hello, mister.” the cute girl with pigtails said and when she spoke, small dimples formed at the corners of her mouth and he was intrigued at how much they looked like his.

“hello, miss.” jaehyun nodded and replied easily and the little girls smile grew as did her dimples. and then a thought visibly appeared across her face and she turned to her other friends at the table.

“it’s rude to not say hi,” her lips were in a pouty frown as she looked at them. she was a bossy little thing, he noticed but her friends immediately chimed in with quiet hello’s. that seemed to make her happy and she nodded dramatically. jaehyun knew the only thing they had to do while they were here was color with them, and talk to them for the camera’s sake, and so he did just that.

the little girl next to him asked him which page he wanted to color first, and he reached forward to slide a piece of paper with the outline of a bunny holding a carrot and then she asked her friends which ones they wanted. he noticed she chose last and his heart melted even more at how utterly sweet the little exchange was.

“what are your names?” he asked the table as a whole, putting on his gentlest smile, which wasn’t hard for him to find. the little boy to his left spoke up this time, starting to get comfortable with jaehyun’s presence.

“my name in jiwon, and he’s seojun… she’s heeyoung, and,” he said pointing out each person one by one dramatically as he finally landed on the little girl who sat beside him. “her name is yeoruem.”

“oh you all have pretty names,” jaehyun commented and the boys seemed to swell with a sense of pride by being told they had nice names from a stranger. he noticed the kids start talking a little bit, but they mostly focused on their coloring. yeoreum sat beside him, a crayon gripped tightly in her hand and her tongue stuck between her lips and she concentrated on her page, she had chosen a big teddy bear and she was coloring it purple.

she was getting a little frustrated he could tell with how she kept huffing and puffing and finally she put her crayon down and put her cheek in her tiny hand dramatically, and the cute pout made jaehyun chuckle softly.

“what’s the matter, yeoreum?” he cooed at her gently.

“i like to stay in the lines and i messed up.”

“well let’s see if we can fix it, hmm?” and he picked up her crayon and offered it to her. she took it in her hand again and he proceeded to point at a small spot, his arms wrapping around her and helping her hand move just right and she took his direction with a grin. when she finally got it she pushed his hand away.

“thank you mister jaehyun, i want to try and do it now myself.” and jaehyun held up his hands in surrender.

“you’re a very independent little girl, yeoreum.” jaehyun commented to her as he went back to coloring on his bunny, picking up an orange crayon to fill in the carrot.

“thank you!” she beamed, not taking her eyes off of her teddy bear. “my mommy says the same thing.”

“your mommy is a very smart lady,” jaehyun replied and she looked up then. her face twisting in an scowl that was too cute to be remotely threatening considering she was four.

“no,” she argued, greatly offended. “my mommy is the smartest lady. and she’s one of my teachers too, she’s right over there.”

and it was in that moment that several things happened simultaneously.

yeoreum pointed at the wall to one of the women jaehyun had barely taken notice of when he walked in. his eyes looked up in the direction that her tiny hand pointed in and as he looked up, the woman turned her face away from him to say something to the other teacher so he couldn’t see her face but at the same time one of the kids from johnny’s table screamed dramatically.

“miss y/n!” the little boy wailed, and jaehyun felt his heart leap to his throat, and his stomach plummeted as if he were on a rollercoaster while he watched as the same lady who had turned away rush forward to see what the little boy needed, but jaehyun couldn’t even focus on that. he felt his world around him slow to a grinding halt, his eyes solely focused on you. on the small parts of your face he could visibly see due to the mask you wore.

but he was unsure how he had missed you when he walked in. yours was the face that he dreamt of, and he was sure his jaw was dropped. his eyes drifted slightly from your face to johnny whose expression probably matched his own, his eyes flickering between you and jaehyun.

jaehyun felt his mouth go dry in the next second as another realization hit him. he whipped his head to look down at the little girl next to him and she was intently focused on where her mom stood at the other table. jaehyun tried three times to swallow before he was successful.

“yeoreum?” he asked, voice shaking slightly.

she tore her eyes from you and looked up to make eye contact with jaehyun. “yes, mister jaehyun?”

“miss y/n is your mother?” he asked, face searching this little girls who, the more he looked, the more he found himself staring back.

“no, she’s my mommy.” she answered smartly.

“ah, yes. she’s your mommy…” he trailed off, eyes flickering back up to see you standing back with the other woman and you were pointedly avoiding eye contact with him, instead staring at yeoreum who was still looking at him.

“and yeoreum, how – when is your birthday?”

“may first,” she chirped and he dragged his eyes away from you to look down at the little girl and his face drained of all color entirely.

“um… mister jaehyun? you look like you don’t feel so good.” she said worriedly, and he gulped again, trying to calm his nerves. his mental math couldn’t be that wrong, could it? there’s no way, was there? no, those dimples were undeniable evidence.

someone somewhere had pity on him, because right when he felt that he may pass out or throw up or do a combination of both, their manager came out and called the session with the idols to an end, the cameras folding up then and were put away and the other teacher called everyone to come stand with you and her.

yeoreum stood up and patted her dress, and she reached down and pulled on jaehyun’s hand to have him stand up with her.

“c’mon mister jaehyun, i want you to meet my mommy so you can see that she’s the smartest lady in the whole world,” and as jaehyun slowly stood to his feet, yeoreum waved her hand to have him bend down to her level so she could whisper conspiratorially in his ear. “but don’t tell miss jisoo, she may get upset.”

jaehyun could only nod as she pulled him over to the other kids and you, and he braced himself for disaster.

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you had fought tooth and nail with the principal of your center about going to SM. you knew the chances of jaehyun being one of the idols to work with would be slim but you didn’t want to take that chance. however when she had asked you the reason why you were so adamant against going to the entertainment company’s headquarters, you couldn’t very well give her the reason that your child’s clueless father works there. it would open up more questions and you had done well the past five years keeping it under wraps that no one knew who yeoreum’s father was, not even your mother.

you had realized after he had blocked your number of who he was when you did a google search of ‘jaehyun korea entertainment’ to see page after page of his face, and you realized he was a common name in korea. it made a little more sense then as to why he suddenly started ignoring you.

you thought he may have been different based on the hours of conversations you both shared, but since he was a celebrity, you assumed you were just another person on his list of hookups throughout his tour stops.

and so when you saw him walk in with two of his other members, you felt your heart jump. and then when you saw he sat at your daughter’s table your heart immediately sank and you felt your body get hot, the same feeling you felt when you found out you were pregnant.

you stood at the back with your co-teacher, hiding in plain sight. you were thankful that you had made it to the end, the interaction between them going well even if he didn’t know.

he seemed to almost have an instant attachment to her and you couldn’t help the way your heart swooped when he bent around her to help her with her coloring. it was a few moments after that that she noticed yeoreum point her tiny finger in your direction and you almost cursed aloud.

you quickly turned your head to look at jisoo, trying to find any random question to ask her to start a conversation to avoid his eye contact but when you heard one of your students, a little boy named yunho, screaming for you across the room you only allowed yourself three seconds to panic before you crossed the room to see what was the matter.

you briefly made eye contact with the man, you had learned his name was johnny after researching jaehyun’s group, and he looked like a deer caught in the headlights. you ignored him after that, understanding that he must have known about you and that somehow both angered and embarrassed you.

“what’s wrong, yunho?” you asked as you crouched next to the crying boy.

“min-minhee,” he hiccupped, big alligator tears falling down his face. “minhee took my crayon and i was still using it!” and you patted the young boy’s head affectionately.

“minhee…” you started, voice slightly scolding and the other boy mentioned was purposefully looking away from you. “is that true?”

minhee turned his head further away from you and you couldn’t help but laugh slightly, “minhee, you know that isn’t nice.” after a few seconds, and another glance up at johnny who was now looking at the table behind you, eyes wide.

minhee finally turned around and gave yunho back his crayon and apologized after you prompted him to do so. crisis averted, you took a deep breath and stood up, purposefully avoiding the table your daughter sat at but when you reached the wall, you felt his eyes on you but instead you noticed how your daughter stared up at him, eyes already full of adoration.

the cameras were put away and jisoo called everyone’s attention. you were focused on the other children gathering up, doing headcounts one by one until you heard a soft, “mommy?” from behind you.

“what is it, baby?” you asked turning around, expecting to see your daughter but instead came face to face with jaehyun who your daughter had in tow.

“this is mister jaehyun, and i wanted him to meet you so i could show him how sma – show him my teacher.” she fumbled over her sentence and you furrowed your brows at her choice of words.

“hello miss y/n,” jaehyun choked out, and you noticed his face was very pale. you wanted to laugh and tell him that it served him right, but you wanted to pretend that you didn’t know him, even though you clearly did.

“hello,” you greeted, overly formal as if to create distance between you two.

“yeoreum… yeoreum tells me her birthday is in may. is that true?” were the first words to tumble out of his mouth. you noticed jisoo had rounded up the kids and started to lead them out of the room.

“yeoreum, sweetheart, go stand with miss jisoo, okay? i’ll be right there.” you said as you looked down, cupping your little girls cheek sweetly and she smiled up at you.

“okay mommy!” she said, running off to walk with the class who was leaving the room.

you felt the presence of two more people walking up and you glanced to see johnny and another man, mark you thought his name was, walk up to stand awkwardly a few feet away. johnny definitely seemed to know, but mark looked clueless as to why they were there.

“is that true?” jaehyun pressed again, and you turned your full attention to him now, ignoring the other two men in your vicinity.

“yes, her birthday is may first.” you replied, voice a little sharp and you saw jaehyun visibly wince at the tone.

jaehyun didn’t even care that mark was here now, listening in. his mind was racing with so many questions and he just wanted to know the answers to them regardless of who was around.

“that’s nine months…” he trailed off then.

“yes, it is.” the same tone didn’t falter.

“i… i… is she mine?” he finally asked then, heart bracing for the answer but then you laughed and it was a cold laugh, much different from the happy ones he recalled in his dreams, and he recoiled slightly.

“you’re not on the birth certificate,” your lips were flat, turning pale from the pressure of keeping your anger at bay.

“that’s not – no, please, y/n. is she mine?” he pressed, his hands ready to beg you for an answer.

“is she your daughter? yes.” you answered him in an angry whisper. “but she’s not yours, she’s mine.” and jaehyun flinched again at how harsh your words were.

jaehyun was silent for a long moment and you scoffed, turning away from him then to go meet up with your class.

“have you told anyone?” he asked, and he wasn’t sure why he even asked that question because he knew if you had, it would have made headlines. you froze then, and he could have sworn you were visibly shaking. you turned and glared at him, such an angry look he didn’t know it was possible to feel so small from just a single expression.

“no, jaehyun, i haven’t.” you spat, your anger making your skin flush in how hard you tried to control your voice and your temper. “so don’t worry, you can go back to living your golden life without any responsibilities. i won’t be asking you for money, i won’t be coming back here, and i won’t be going to the press. but not for your sake, oh no, i couldn’t give a fuck. only for hers.” you turned and walked away, your hand stilling on the doorknob when you heard him call to you.

“no, wait! y/n that’s – that’s not what i meant, please. can – can i meet her? spend time with her?” you didn’t turn around, your hand on the knob tightening its grip for a moment, you lifted your head to stare at the ceiling and you sighed, the anger draining from you and just leaving you exhausted.

“you just did, and i think that was enough, don’t you? i don’t want you to decide the next morning that she’s not worth your time.”

.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.

the door closed behind you as you left and all three men were stunned into silence at what had transpired. jaehyun had known you’d hate him if you saw him again, he knew that, he really did. he would have never pushed you to spend time with him after the way everything went down but now it was different.

he was a father now, or well, he had been a father the past four years and had no clue but now he was aware and he couldn’t just not try and be one. this had changed his world, how could he go about pretending that this hadn’t happened?

“dude… i am so confused right now. what the actual hell just happened?” mark finally spoke up, eyes darting between the two men standing with him. johnny didn’t look away from jaehyun to answer his question, nothing but extreme concern for his friend who looked like he had his whole world shaken up.

well, johnny thought almost comically, he did.

“i, um…” jaehyun started, eyes still not drifting away from the door you had just left from. “when we were on tours four years ago, um… johnny and i went to dinner, i don’t know if you remember? we had asked you if you wanted to go too, but you were already going with haechan and taeil.” jaehyun finally broke his trance he had on the door and turned to make eye contact with mark, who still sported the look of someone utterly bewildered. mark answered with a nod, not daring to open his mouth so he could listen to the rest of what jaehyun had to say.

“well, we went. just us two. and she was our waitress and she was, she is, so beautiful and she was flirting with me and so when she put her number on our receipt, johnny told me to go for it and… and i did. we talked for hours, and – and one thing led to another, and fuck.” jaehyun breathed out and then let out a humorless laugh at his word choice. he ran his hand through his hair roughly, the newly dyed blonde locks, tugging on them as he did so. “i left. i mean, i couldn’t have actually stayed with her, we had a show in another city and we had to leave and so i left. i tried to keep talking to her but… i stopped.”

mark blew out a hard breath at jaehyun’s explanation. “well, did you let her know? that you had to leave and that’s why?”

jaehyun shook his head, and johnny spoke up for him then. “our manager saw and lost it, he couldn’t reply to her because he was scared since it had been so long and then we left and our manager had his number changed when we got back.”

“did you still have her number though?” mark questioned, eyebrows coming together. jaehyun nodded hesitantly.

“dude, that’s so fucked. you should have explained to her then, she would have understood.” jaehyun hung his head, he was used to johnny consoling him in the assumption that he’d never have to see you again. he wasn’t used to his mistakes being so openly berated.

“poor y/n,” mark said then, turning to look at the door you had left out of. “having to raise a baby on her own like that, i don’t blame her for being as angry as she was. and then for you to ask –.”

“god, mark, yes. i know. i know i fucked up. but i have a kid… i have a daughter. i don’t want to be one of those dads, i don’t…” he trailed off, the way he felt sick dissipating, slowly being replaced with the dread of having his daughter grow up and have to tell people her dad was just absent when he knew about her now.

“then don’t.” johnny’s reply was simple. both jaehyun and mark turned to look at him. johnny shrugged as if it were easy.

“but she doesn’t –.” jaehyun went to say but johnny shook his head, the look he gave him shutting him up instantly.

“then don’t, jaehyun. you’re an adult. you made a mistake but it’s not eighteen years too late to try and fix it, just five. if chen can do this and end up just fine, you have just the same amount of chance that he does. you don’t wanna be a deadbeat dad? then don’t. easy as that. y/n isn’t going to like it at first but, she’ll come around if. you. make. an. effort.” mark was smiling at johnny’s answer, nodding along as he spoke and jaehyun stared open mouthed at him.

“you think it’ll work?”

“it doesn’t hurt to try,” mark chimed in. “plus, i saw the way she was watching you earlier, i kinda thought for a second she was going to be one of those weird stalkers but this makes so much more sense now.”

“how can i do this though? i don’t have her number or anything,” jaehyun asked, and he wanted so badly to get to know yeoreum, and to get to know you again. he wanted to see if things were that different, or if it was the years of anger building up. he couldn’t blame you at all for the things you said and for the way you reacted. he can imagine he’d do the same.

“am i gonna have to do everything myself?” johnny joked and jaehyun gave him a confused look.

“she works at the school that was just here. we have the principals contact information. therefore, we have her information. and if nothing else, we know where she works. you show up, you make a genuine effort, and you keep making an effort until she knows you’re serious. and you keep trying because that’s your daughter. you literally can’t deny her, she looks exactly like you.” jaehyun nodded, absorbing all the information that johnny had readily available in his brain. he hoped it was because he was an outsider looking in in this situation and not that jaehyun was just that dumb. maybe it was a bit of both.

“guys? come on, we have another schedule to meet in forty-five minutes,” their manager called, his head momentarily visible from the doorway. the three men made their way to exit, jaehyun’s mind reeling with what he was going to do and how he was going to do.

he had a daughter.

he was a father.

that thought alone was enough to make a grin slowly grow on his face.

“also,” mark spoke up suddenly, turning around to look at his friends. “do i need to have a talk with everyone about the importance of condoms?”

johnny snorted out a laugh, and jaehyun groaned loudly.

“yeah… i think i’m gonna at least text the dreamies. maybe ‘wrap it before you tap it’ or something like that. god, can you imagine jisung with a child?” mark’s face looked horrified, but his joke effectively broke the tense feeling jaehyun had held for the past twenty minutes and johnny laughed, clapping mark on the shoulder as he and jaehyun exited the door.

“jisung is an adult, mark. he’s a grown ass man. they don’t need ‘the talk’.”

“yes they do, they can be forty and they’re still going to be children to me!” mark yelled as he followed them out.

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jaehyun couldn’t remember the last time he had butterflies this bad since maybe his debut. his heart hadn’t stopped racing since johnny handed him a slip of paper discreetly at practice later that night, and when jaehyun unfolded the paper he saw an address and a phone number scrawled in small letters.

“maybe go to her work, instead of calling first.” johnny had whispered to him rather conspicuously in the far corner of the room.

“wouldn’t it be better to give her a heads up though? i don’t want to ruin this before i even really get the chance to get to know yeoreum.” jaehyun said, the desperation for this to work out evident on his face. he wasn’t sure when he had ever wanted something so badly, but his thoughts had been consumed by this little girl that he had no idea existed until twelve hours ago.

“sure, it might seem a little creepy but this way she can physically see you’re serious and won’t block you immediately out of spite,” johnny shrugged at his friend. “i know i'd block you.”

jaehyun gave him a deadpan look, “that’s very comforting, thanks.”

a sudden pair of arms throwing themselves around jaehyun’s shoulders made his eyes grow wide but seeing johnny unconcerned made him relax a little.

“so who is blocking jaehyun hyung immediately?” haechan asked from over jaehyun’s shoulder.

jaehyun fished for a response, trying to think of an answer and johnny beat him to it with the most basic of answers.

“your mom.” johnny said, a wide grin growing on his face at the offended look on haechan’s face that jaehyun couldn’t see.

“you better not be texting my mom!” haechan argued, voice rising an octave directly in jaehyun’s ear making the man wince sharply. “she’s married and i don’t want a step-dad this late in my life.”

johnny pushed away from the wall and jaehyun was thankful for johnny’s distraction, because as he walked away haechan moved to follow him, arguing with the taller man even if it started out as a joke.

this gave jaehyun the time to stare down at the folded piece of paper that had been crumpled in his hand, he memorized the number on it like the paper would disintegrate if he didn’t and as he moved on to the address he attempted to formulate a plan.

the plan may have been half-assed in hindsight, jaehyun realized as he stood out in front of the pre-school you worked at, staying out of sight of any passerby who may recognize him. he was sure he wouldn’t be noticed that easily as his hood was up, mask secured over his nose but he was so nervous of someone saying something to ruin his one shot at getting you to listen to him.

he distracted himself with scrolling through his phone, flipping between different social medias while he waited, and his heart skipped a beat when he heard your voice calling a goodbye to your coworkers as you exited the building.

“mommy, can we go get some ice cream? i got a green smiley on my report today from miss jisoo, you know i was good today!” he heard yeoreum ask cutely, and you turned the corner to walk in his direction and he watched as you looked down at her. you held her hand and your smile was so gentle he couldn’t help but get lost in it for a moment.

you were going to respond but you noticed his presence at that moment, looking up and staring harshly at him, he could see you bristle. you didn’t immediately recognize him, jaehyun noticed with the way you tugged yeoreum to stand behind you and jaehyun raised his hands in surrender, tugging his mask down so you could see his face and you released a breath, relaxing instantly.

“mister jaehyun!” yeoreum cheered from behind you, bouncing forward with her hands holding on to the straps of her little yellow backpack. jaehyun crouched to be level with her, his elbows resting on his knees and his dimpled smile was an exact replica of hers.

“hi yeoreum, i heard you say you were good today in school. if your mommy is okay with it, do you think i get you that ice cream you wanted?” jaehyun asked the little girl, but his eyes were looking up at you and your mouth was pressed in a firm line. yeoreum whirled on the spot to look up at you.

“oh please, mommy? mister jaehyun will pay for it so it’s free!” yeoreum pleaded, adding information that wasn’t exactly given yet and jaehyun couldn’t help but laugh at that detail. you clearly debated on it for a moment, but the hopeful look on your daughters face was already giving you an answer.

“sure, sweetie.” you said softly, eyes cutting up to glance at jaehyun, trying to figure out what he was getting at. yeoreum pulled you by the hand, and then she boldly grabbed jaehyun’s hand as well, leading the way to the convenience store you often made stops to on the way home from school.

you didn’t say a word as you walked, jaehyun keeping a conversation going with yeoreum, asking her about the things in school she liked and it went on like that for a few minutes until you entered the store and you greeted the elderly woman who ran it politely. yeoreum darted to the ice cream section and you finally had a moment without her present.

“what are you trying to do here, jaehyun?” you asked coldly, and his smile never wavered, his mood too high to allow it to come down.

“i’m trying to get to know my daughter that i didn’t know existed until yesterday.” he answered you, his voice hushed as to keep the store owner from eavesdropping, but you didn’t detect any obvious lies in his statement.

“i told you –.” you started, and he cut you off.

“i know what you said, believe me. i heard you loud and clear, but please y/n,” and your eyes widened at the sincerity in his voice, he was seconds away from begging dramatically. “please just give me one chance. i want to be in her life, i want to be there for her.”

yeoreum skipped over, holding three ice cream bars in her arms.

“look mommy, i got your favorite. and mister jaehyun, i got you my favorite. you’ll like it because it’s the best!” she said with such confidence that jaehyun chuckled at her as she walked right up to the counter.

“well you’re in luck because that just so happens to be my favorite, too.” jaehyun offered and the girl beamed at him.

“mommy likes this flavor,” she pointed to the only one that was different as the elderly woman scanned the three items. she motioned for him to come to her level, and when he bent down she cupped her hands cutely to whisper in jaehyun’s ear. “and don’t tell her but it’s really yucky.”

the more time jaehyun spent around this little girl the more he felt himself getting wrapped around her finger. he brought a finger to his lips conspiratorially and he turned to make eye contact with you and your eyebrows raised.

“hey, what’s with the secrets?” you frowned in confusion, head tilting slightly and at the motion jaehyun felt his heart skip a beat. he recalled the same exact motion five years ago, and he had to swallow hard to pull himself out of the memory.

“oh, nothing. yeoreum just told me a funny joke.” he answered, giving yeoreum a wink and she giggled at the secret that they now had, her hand coming up to cover her mouth as she laughed.

“hmmm,” you responded, accepting the ice cream bars and thanking the woman as you exited. the park was only a short distance away and that’s where you headed, sitting down on a bench as you opened yeoreum’s ice cream and she dove in immediately.

you allowed them to talk easily, and you felt your resolve slowly chipping away with every smile they shared with each other. you recalled one of the many conversations you had had with friends, one most recently being your coworker and friend jisoo. she had suggested for the umpteenth time that you should reach out to the father and give him the option to be in yeoreum’s life.

“i don’t want him to get tired of her, it would be devastating for her, and me too.” you had argued then and jisoo’s look was unamused.

“you haven’t even given him the chance, you have no clue if he’d even do that. you can’t make that assumption, time changes people.”

you were realizing she was right as you watched her giggle over him dripping ice cream on his shoes, yeoreum commenting how it’s not that hard to not be messy and jaehyun laughed at her disappointed sigh.

you had made up your mind by then, the ice cream finished and you noticed the time was getting a little late, knowing you’d have to get her ready for bed.

“come on, ‘reum. we gotta get ready for bed soon.” you said softly, interrupting their conversation and yeoreum nodded, hopping off of the bench she sat on with jaehyun. she walked over to stand beside you but she turned to jaehyun.

“mister jaehyun, will i see you again?” she asked and her voice was so hopeful that jaehyun looked to you for an answer.

“one chance,” you mouthed to him seriously, holding up one finger to emphasize your point over yeoreum’s head and jaehyun’s eyes shone with relief as he made eye contact with yeoreum.

“i’d love to, i’ll come see you anytime.” jaehyun nodded and yeoreum clapped excitedly, turning to look at you as she did so and you couldn’t help the answering smile that crossed your face. you took her small hand in yours and you began to walk in the direction of your home and she paused, turning around and waving enthusiastically goodbye to jaehyun who was still seated on the wooden park bench.

“see you soon, mister jaehyun!” she called and then she was pulling you away; jaehyun watching you both leave and he felt at peace knowing this plan went so much better than he could have ever hoped it would.

.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.

you had just put yeoruem to sleep in her little princess bed, she had talked nonstop the entire way home, all through dinner, and then during her bath until you finally got her to sleep, about mister jaehyun.

the idea of her getting to know him brought on two strong emotions and they teetered back and forth in your mind, an eerily well-balanced scale.

on one hand, you were excited for her to get to know her father, she deserved to have both parents who loved her.

on the other hand, you were terrified of how this would play out fully. would he leave once people found out? would he pretend she didn’t exist?

your thoughts ran in circles over and over, and you didn’t get anywhere productive. the only thing you had settled on was that until you knew for sure where this would go, you would make sure jaehyun wouldn’t mention a word of being her dad.

you didn’t want to have to pick up the pieces of her small heart if he shattered it.

your phone dinged and it pulled you out of your thoughts, you paused the show you had barely been paying attention to so you could focus.

9:31 pm unknown: hello… do you have plans tomorrow?

9:32 pm you: depends on who’s asking...?

9:33 pm unknown: oh, yeah my bad. this is jaehyun, johnny got me your number from your boss

9:34 pm you: ok… that’s not weird at all… but no. no plans besides work and yeoruem. why?

9:35 pm he who must not be named 💀:  how do you feel about coming over? i can cook for you both, or maybe order pizza. whatever yeoreum wants to eat haha

9:37 pm you: she’s not picky, but i guess i won’t mind. will your members mind?

9:38 pm he who must not be named 💀: ah, right. well, see i’m telling them tomorrow so they won’t really have a choice.

9:40 pm you: … don’t make this weird for us, jaehyun.

9:42 pm he who must not be named 💀: i’m not! i won’t, i’ll send someone for you tomorrow at 6?

9:47 pm you: we can get there, just give me the address and i’ll see you then

9:48 pm he who must not be named 💀: [current location]

you audibly sighed, staring at the phone showing the address, you clicked it to see that he didn’t live too far from you and you just shook your head, you were going to leave it at that, but your thought from earlier hit you again and you typed a response.

9:55 pm you: i have a request for you

10:01 pm he who must not be named 💀: ask

10:02 pm you: i’m not going to keep you from getting to know her, because it makes her happy and she deserves that. but i don’t want you to mention anything to her about you being her dad

10:05 pm he who must not be named 💀: and that’s because…?

10:06 pm you: i just wanna be sure. i’d rather you be some cool man she spent time with if you decide differently

10:07 pm he who must not be named 💀: okay and when you see that i’m not gonna ghost my own daughter, is there a statute of limitations on this or what?

10:08 pm you: i’ll let you know

.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.

jaehyun paced back and forth in the living room, he hadn’t heard from you since you assured him you’d be coming by at 6 like agreed. he had went a little overboard on the pizza, considering there were now five different boxes on the counter and he may have went on a shopping spree at a small children’s toy store.

now all eight of his members sat in different spots in the too large living room as he walked back and forth, stopping to check on his phone and then once he saw there wasn’t a notification from you, he went back to his path he had made.

“you’re gonna wear a hole through the floor,” johnny deadpanned and jaehyun ignored him.

“hyung?” it was haechan this time trying to get jaehyun to stop moving and jaehyun did, looking up to see what the youngest wanted.

“this isn’t your first time meeting her, right?” haechan seemed genuinely confused.

“no, this is the second, technically third time now.” he answered, forgetting about his phone in his pocket for a moment.

“okay, then why are you freaking out?” haechan asked, resting his chin in his palm.

“well…” jaehyun was at a brief loss for words. “y/n is unsure about me being around her already, so i guess i’m worried she’s going to… stop.”

“stop what?” taeyong asked from the other side of the room and jaehyun turned on the spot to face him.

“stop letting me see her, stop responding to me, just, stop altogether.” jaehyun looked crestfallen as he waved his hands around but a snort from his left made him glare at yuta.

“what? like you did to her?” yuta smirked at the stressed man, and jaehyun threw his arms up, throwing his head back as he stared at the ceiling for a long moment.

he hadn’t expected this kind of reaction at all when he called a group meeting in the living room hours earlier; he had told mark and johnny he planned to tell everyone because he had wanted you and yeoreum to come to the house and they had only nodded and helped him gather everyone. mark and johnny purposely sat on the couch in the corner of the room so they could watch it all unfold.

jaehyun had started the whole thing by clearing his throat three times before he even opened his mouth.

“i-,” he began but yuta narrowed his eyes at him and twisted his lips for a second.

“you got some girl pregnant, didn’t you?” his question was so blunt it took everyone off guard, mark almost falling out of his seat on the couch entirely. haechan, who sat on the arm of yuta’s chair, shoved his shoulder roughly. jaehyun, however, was stunned into silence, mouth agape and yuta laughed at his reaction.

“jaehyun, he’s joking. now why did you call us all here?” taeyong said, shooting a stern look at yuta before turning his full attention to the man who stood in the center of the room. keeping the peace like he always did, but jaehyun was so much more nervous now after yuta’s comment, regardless of how correct it was.

“okay, so,” jaehyun began and went through the entire story again. something he had kept to himself all these years, and he was finally letting everyone in on his tiny, but impactful, moment of freedom he had with you.

“and so when we filmed our content for the youtube segment, the one with kids, you know?” and when everyone nodded, all but three mouths were hanging in stunned silence. “this little girl was at my table, and she was adorable and smart and highly independent but like, some kids are like that. until she pointed out her mother to me, and –.”

jungwoo gasped dramatically, leaning so far forward in his chair as he listened to jaehyun that he was practically on the floor. “no fucking way!”

“yes, way.” mark answered for him, and jaehyun continued.

“y/n, yeah. y/n was her mother, and yeoreum was born exactly nine months after, and yeah. i… i have a daughter that i had no clue existed but i want to be her dad, i haven’t wanted something this bad since we debuted, and… yeah.”

“okay… okay…” taeyong repeated, seemingly in shock as he processed everything that was just said.

“okay?” jaehyun asked, wanting someone to say something.

“okay.” taeyong replied, making eye contact with him. “well, we’re not going to let you be a shitty father.”

“anymore.” haechan said under his breath and yuta snickered with him.

“i had no clue!” jaehyun argued in defense of himself.

“how do you even know she’s actually yours?” taeil asked, his posture was relaxed in his chair, recovering from the shock of the news more quickly than the others had.

“she -.” he started but doyoung butted in then.

“how do you know she’s not using you as a way to get money? she could have slept with someone else.” doyoung seemed even less convinced than taeil was.

���oh no, wait til you see her,” mark said from his spot in the room. “he can’t deny her even if he tried.”

“what? i won’t believe it until i see the test results.” doyoung said, and taeil nodded.

“she hasn’t asked me for anything,” jaehyun argued, feeling a little defensive over you then.

“yet.” taeil murmured, and johnny chose then to speak up.

“you weren’t there in the room, neither of you. she didn’t want anything to do with jaehyun, and she very, very clearly stated that she didn’t even want him around her.”

“and she asked me to refrain from even mentioning that i was her dad.” jaehyun tacked on, and taeil didn’t seem convinced nor did doyoung. silence stretched on for a moment.

“so when do we get to meet yeoreum?” haechan asked then, and jaehyun checked his watch.

“in about three hours,” he replied and everyone jumped as if they had been startled.

“what?!” came at him from all directions of the room.

“nothing in here is childproof!” taeyong exclaimed, jumping to his feet.

“she’s five, not two, she’s not going to go stick her finger in light sockets,” mark chuckled and taeyong relaxed slightly.

“she’s four, but yeah, same thing applies,” johnny corrected him and then silence fell over the room again.

“i will say, i can’t blame y/n,” yuta spoke up then, his eyes trained on the floor for a long moment. “if i were her, i wouldn’t have even given you the option. she’s a lot more forgiving than i would be if you knocked me up, ghosted me and then suddenly by a coincidence showed up again.”

“well that’s because you’re a scorpio,” jungwoo said. “and it feels kinda like fate to me.”

“that’s exactly what i said!” mark laughed, pointing at jungwoo animatedly.

and the conversation carried on like that up until he started pacing, jaehyun had been grateful that they all, well almost all, took it in stride and were supportive. but the jabs from yuta were making him even more anxious, and no matter how many times taeyong glared at yuta and told him to shut up, he couldn’t relax.

and then his phone buzzed in his hand.

6:15 pm pizza hut: um, sorry we’re a bit late, the train was delayed but uh… security guy won’t let us in

“shit,” jaehyun whispered, and he was halfway towards the door when your next text came through.

6:16 pm pizza hut: and it’s raining, so we can go home it’s not a big deal

his panic he felt while pacing came back full force and taeyong called to him.

“what’s going on?”

“security guard won’t let her in,” jaehyun rambled quickly.

“that’s all?” he replied, and taeyong pulled out his phone, pressed a few buttons on the screen and had his phone to his ear in seconds.

“hi, mr. choi? yes, can you please escort our guests to the elevators. yes, we were expecting her. no, don’t leave them out in the rain any longer. yes… thank you. have a goodnight.”

taeyong hung up the phone, and gestured to the door, “she’s in the elevator on their way up.”

jaehyun exhaled deeply, for the first time since he woke up that morning. and while he could breathe easily, the entire room held their breath at the sound of a gentle knock against the door.

jaehyun all but lunged at the door and opened it wide. the other eight men in the living room didn’t move a muscle.

“mister jaehyun!” yeoreum squealed excitedly when she saw him filling the entrance and their smiles were exact replicas of each other and jaehyun gestured you both inside.

“yeoreum, shoes baby.” you said softly, and the members had yet to see any faces, but smiles broke out on their faces as they heard a quick, “right! sorry mommy!”

jaehyun led you both out of the foyer and into the living room and you froze when you saw eight men staring at you both when you entered the room. you had prepared for this, expecting it to be awkward but being this… intense wasn’t exactly how you pictured it.  

yeoreum stepped in between you and jaehyun and you looked down to see her bow to the room.

“hello, my name is yeoreum and i’m four years old.” and you peeked up to see the intense stares break out into wide grins.

yeoreum stood up straight and then tugged on your pants.

“mommy, you said it’s rude to not introduce yourself to people who you don’t know.” she said it so seriously, but you and several others in the room chuckled at her respect for manners. at least she paid attention to you when you spoke.

you didn’t bow as yeoreum had, simply dipping your head as you introduced yourself.

“happy?” you said to yeoreum, poking her in the nose and she giggled in response. you heard faint gasps from deeper in the room but you ignored it as your daughter stared into the room and the men must have realized that her comment applied to them as well.

the first one to cross the room was a face you faintly recognized. he knelt down to be on her level and his smile was gentle.

“hi yeoreum, i’m mister jaehyun’s friend. my name is taeil.” and yeoreum nodded, and she smiled at every one who introduced themselves to her and you. she recognized johnny and even gave mark a high five. the last one was haechan, and he was the most energetic of all to meet her.

“hi!” he chirped to her, and she parroted back to him the same exact way, and he continued, his voice filled with a joking kind of pride. “my name is haechan, and i’m the coolest one here.”

“is that why your hair is blue?” yeoreum asked, tilting her head to the side cutely.

“yep, only the coolest have blue hair.” he replied, shaking his head playfully and yeoreum’s laugh filled the room again.

“also, do you wanna see all the cool stuff mister jaehyun got you?” haechan asked, and finally gestured to the couch that held different plushies and toys that the older lady at the shop had suggested for kids her age. yeoreum stared at all the toys then turned around to stare up at jaehyun.

“all of that is mine?” and even you were in shock and the sheer amount of toys piled on the couch.

“yep, all yours.” jaehyun replied, crouching down to be on the same level as yeoreum and haechan.

“but that’s… so much.” she whispered loudly, peeking again at all the toys.

“if you don’t like them all that’s okay, i just wanted to get you something,” his smile was gentle and reassuring. she looked at you for permission and when you nodded at her, she went to the couch and looked at all the plushies. she looked at them, and then at everyone in the room, then back at the toys staring intently.

and one by one, she pulled a different stuffed animal from the pile and handed it to each man in the room. she started by giving haechan a blue teddy bear, and continued on until every grown man was holding a small soft plushie, and she beamed with happiness.

you knew they couldn’t say no and jaehyun could see their wariness melting with each toy she gave. and even though he knew he probably had no right to feel it, he felt a sense of pride in her generosity and he knew she could have only learned that from you. he was the last one to receive a toy and it was a fluffy orange cat.

“thank you, yeoreum. that’s very sweet of you.” he told her sincerely and she blinked at him as if it weren’t something out of the ordinary.

“there’s a lot to share,” she replied and then she remembered something and it lit up her entire face, her voice raising in her excitement. “mommy said you got pizza!”

“yep,” he answered her question that wasn’t a question. “i didn’t know which kind you liked so you have a lot of choices.”

yeoreum picked the same pizza to eat that jaehyun had, which didn’t go unnoticed by everyone in the room as he was the only one to actually like pineapple on pizza. she had made herself at home easily, not missing a beat to pull half of the men into the living room to play with her and the toys jaehyun had gotten for her.

you had been there for a total of thirty minutes before you had been made to feel somewhat welcome. you enjoyed watching the members spend time with yeoreum, as she didn’t have many men in her life to really associate with, and the boys in her class didn’t really count.

you had to bite back a smile at the conversation you had overhead moments before.

“yeoreum is a pretty name, it’s unique too.” mark said, sitting cross-legged where she had instructed him to sit.

“thank you, mommy said she did it so it would be easy because my english name is summer.” yeoreum replied somewhat distractedly in english, causing all eyes to blink slowly at the sudden change in language.

“but she was born in may?” jaehyun looked at you, and you shrugged.

“i was on drugs and in pain, i at least had the right idea.” which caused a few laughs to echo around the room.

after that, you seemed to be fairly content with just observing. you leaned against the kitchen counter, chewing slowly on a piece of pizza as you watched her try to win a tickle fight with mark and succeeding with the way his laughter didn’t come out as forced.

you didn’t speak much with the other members, mostly enjoying being a presence in the room, that is until you felt a body move close to your side and you turned to face the new person, remembering his name was doyoung. when he didn’t say anything to you, you turned away and went back to watching how the tickle fight was absolutely being lost by mark then.

“i have reservations about this,” doyoung said to you then, his voice hardly above a whisper.

you turned again to face him but he looked forward, eyes trained on the guys sitting around enjoying the little girls antics. realizing he wasn’t going to face you for this conversation you went back to your previous position, this time bringing the pizza to your mouth again.

“and?” you asked him, voice matching his tone and doyoung shifted forward to rest his forearms against the counter. he waited until your mouth was full of pizza before he spoke again.

“and jaehyun’s so excited about this, he went on and on about it and he doesn’t even know if she’s actually his.” doyoung’s blunt words made you defensive, even though you had expected something like this, it still made you react, but doyoung continued before you could swallow.

“i think he needs to get a dna test before he gets too attached.” doyoung said, finally turning to face you and you narrowed your eyes at him as he did so.

“what? you think i’m lying?” you said through gritted teeth, but doyoung’s stance didn’t change.

“i’m not going to judge you, i don’t know anything about you. i’m just trying to protect one of my best friends. especially if you decide to rip this whole ‘being a father’ thing out from under him.”

“exactly, you don’t know anything about me.” you said shortly, your temper’s fuse quickly reaching its end. you pushed yourself away from the counter then before you continued. “and there’s nothing to protect him from, i don’t want anything from him. he tracked me down after i told him to leave me alone. he asked to see her, not me. we will be just as we were before he made his grand appearance, should he decide the father life isn’t for him.”

doyoung searched your face while you spoke, but you abruptly changed the conversation when you asked him where the bathroom was. doyoung gestured down the hall and watched as you left, when the shadows in the hall swallowed you he turned his attention back to watch the scene unfold.

haechan and mark were getting to be children again as they played some sort of mock game of house with yeoreum, using the plushies she had gifted them.

jaehyun was sitting next to her, his back against the couch as she made him in charge of holding the rest of the plushies, doyoung heard her mention that he was the house and so he had to be really, really still.

“where’s your dad?” haechan asked, his voice exaggeratingly deep for his character his bear was playing.

“i don’t have one,” yeoreum said, and she moved her plushie away from haechan’s but every man in the room froze. doyoung’s eyes darted to jaehyun’s face to judge his face, but he couldn’t quite read it.

“wh-what do you mean, yeo?” mark asked using his little lion to carry on the game for her.

“mommy said daddy is a really busy man,” she said matter-of-factly, she didn’t notice how all the eyes in the room were trained on her, and how the air seemed to still in preparation for her answer. “she said he’s a busy business man who flies all over the world and she said that a lot of daddies and mommies do that and that it’s okay!”

she was still happy as she spoke, still involved in her game of house she had roped them into playing with her.

“it really is okay,” mark said softly, forgetting his role for a moment.

“yep! it’s super okay because my mommy is really strong and she got so strong so she could take care of me all by herself.” yeoreum’s tiny body puffed up in all the pride a four year old could muster.

“but don’t you miss your dad?” haechan’s bear asked yeoreum’s little white fluffy bear.

“well yeah, all the other kids dads come and pick them up from school but mommy says that just because my daddy has a lot of stuff he has to do first, it doesn’t mean he doesn’t love me.” and then, for the first time, yeoreum’s voice became a bit quieter. “i don’t know my daddy, but i hope mommy’s right.”  

doyoung’s eyes had danced back and forth between her and jaehyun, noticing the more she spoke, the more jaehyun’s face seemed to fall and it wasn’t long before doyoung though he saw the man tearing up.

“of course your mommy’s right, ‘reum,” jaehyun said softly behind her. she twisted around in her spot on the floor, looking up at him and she tilted her head at him when she saw his tears spill over, confused on why he was so sad. she shuffled forward to get closer to him and she frowned, bringing her arms to wrap around his neck tightly and jaehyun felt the tears hit him harder and he didn’t even care that everyone else in the room was witnessing this. his arms wrapped tightly around her little body, and he used his palm to try and wipe away some of the tears from his cheek.

“mommy said it’s okay to cry, and that hugs are a good bandaid,” yeoreum said, voice taking a knowing tone.

jaehyun nodded against her head, his eyes drifting to the hallway where he could see you standing there. your expression was unreadable to him, but your lips were pursed tightly.

 “your mommy is right,” he repeated again, pulling her small hands away from his face then. “about the hugs and that your daddy was really busy but he definitely loves you.”

“do you know him?” she asked, pulling away from his neck to look at him earnestly, and jaehyun’s eyes crinkled at the edges, pulling away from your form in the hallway to look at his daughter again.

“i do, yeah,” jaheyun answered, “and he missed you so much.”

“can you tell him i miss him too? can you tell him that he can come pick me up from school?” she said excitedly and you chose that moment to interrupt. you couldn’t be sure where the rest of the conversation was going, you didn’t know if jaehyun would keep his word about not saying he was her dad and you could see her getting her hopes up too high, and you knew you had to be the bad guy.

“yeoruem, baby. it’s time we go home now, we have school in the morning.” you called softly, walking over to your little girl and she pouted up at you, but she didn’t argue, she just slowly got to her feet, hugging her teddy bear tightly to her chest.

“say thank you, they were very nice to play with you,” you nudged her softly and she did as she was told, genuinely happy to have been able to play with her new friends. you both started walking to the door and she turned suddenly, running to hug jaehyun once more before she left.

you saw she had whispered something to him as she pulled away and you saw jaehyun break out into a smile again.

“i will,” he said to her and with a happy nod yeoreum was back with you again.

with yeoreum’s shoes finally on, you both exited the door and were halfway to the elevator when you heard a door close and footsteps thumping towards you. you were both surprised and… not at all surprised to see jaehyun behind you, a new gleam in his eye as he tugged on his hood and put a mask into place over his nose.

“i would feel more comfortable if i took you home since it’s late.” he said nonchalantly. “i can drive us, if you want.”

“i don’t have a car seat for yeoreum,” you replied and jaehyun shrugged easily. “walking you home it is then.”

you were going to protest but yeoreum had already put her stuffed animal in your hand before grabbing your other one and one of jaehyun’s, tugging you both towards the elevator.

she had started chatting away about something you couldn’t even pay attention to, too entirely focused on the way jaehyun’s hand enveloped hers, your eyes trailing from his hand to his face and you weren’t sure what it was about it. maybe it was all the moments pulled together, primarily the past hour alone, but you felt an unmistakable skip of your heartbeat at the way he smiled down at your excited little girl.

you were too busy gazing up at jaehyun to even noticed the eight heads poking out of the doorway almost comically as they watched you three enter the elevator, being led by a headstrong four year old.

“they make a cute little family,” jungwoo mentioned, only pulling his head inside once he heard the elevator doors close; the members immediately talking animatedly about the new niece they seemed to automatically claim as their own.

no one noticed doyoung walking to his room, the tiny cup that yeoreum had used in his hand.

.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.°.

it took all of three minutes into the walk home for yeoreum to yawn loudly and rub her eyes sleepily.

“did you get tired from playing with everyone?” you asked her and she nodded, all the cheerful excitement ebbing away from her slowly. you went to pick her up to carry her the rest of the way but jaehyun stopped you, eyes asking permission before he made a move and after a brief hesitation, you nodded to him with a smile.

“i got you, ‘reum, come here,” he said soothingly, picking her up and holding her close. she instantly laid her head down on his shoulder and you snorted at how quickly she closed her eyes. you cooed at how sweet she was, and jaehyun visibly glowed at how she seemed to relax with him instantly.

“you know you don’t have to do all of this,” you said to him after a few moments of yeoreum’s slow breathing. and jaehyun sighed deeply.

“look i know you think i’m this really shitty person who just ditched you, and i know that that’s how you must have felt but it wasn’t my intention. my manager saw our messages, you know. and even though I was still an adult then, we didn’t have nearly as much freedom as we do now. he yelled at me for an hour about being reckless with my career and all that. even though it doesn’t change anything, i didn’t do any of it on purpose or maliciously. and i’m sorry you had to do this alone.” he said, looking down at you the entire time he had been talking, wanting to see your face through his shortened explanation.

“it was really hard, at first, and i’ve been angry for awhile.” you said, voice soft and vulnerable after you thought a moment before deciding to give him honesty. “i had no clue what to tell any of my friends, and when i googled you i almost threw up, but i think that was from the pregnancy and not the news of you being famous. it made sense then to me what all had happened, but i couldn’t tell my parents the truth and so i had to say i didn’t know who the dad was. mortifying, really. my parents still haven’t spoken to me since then. and i love yeoreum more than anything, but i really… i think i hated you this whole time.” you don’t make eye contact as you confess to him a snippet of what had happened, a glimpse into how you felt.

jaehyun was stunned at all he had learned about you, he knew you probably had hated him, and he was right on that. he was horrified to learn that you really, truly had been alone through all of this. he didn’t know why but he had assumed, since he had learned of this at least, you would have had your parents to help support you, and it made his stomach turn knowing it was the opposite.

“but i don’t hate you now,” you admitted softly, looking ahead at the crosswalk sign, waiting for it to give you the okay to cross.

“oh? one day was all it took?” jaehyun asked a bit hopefully with a playful smile, his heart leaping in his chest at the statement, and he couldn’t quite place his finger on why it made him so excited to hear those words. you didn’t respond right away only rolling your eyes, and pulling a set of keys from your pocket and jaehyun realized you must be close to your place.

“but don’t get too excited, the statute has only been bumped up, not removed entirely,” you teased, and you unlocked the door that sat in the wall surrounding your house, entering the front yard that came with your house. it was small, but jaehyun noticed it was just enough for the two of you to live in and it seemed cozy.

you closed the door behind you, it automatically locking and you led the way to the front door of the house, unlocking it and kicking off your shoes. jaehyun shuffled nervously a bit, not knowing what he needed to do but toed off his shoes anyway just to be courteous.

“would you like to tuck her in?” you asked him after switching on a light in the room, and jaehyun blinked as his eyes adjusted. “if you don’t want to, that’s okay, i can.” and you reached for yeoreum but jaehyun tightened his hold on the sleeping girl.

“i can do it,” he stressed and you grinned, holding up your hands in surrender.

“okay then, ‘mister jaehyun’,” you joked, motioning for him to follow you down the hall into the room he could only assume was yeoreum’s if the little moon nightlight glowing and the soft peach paint on the wall were anything to go by.

he noticed she didn’t have an overabundance of toys, maybe a handful of plushies on her bed but he realized it was because she had a little table in the corner stacked with coloring books, crayons and markers. he could see her wanting to be an artist when she grew up, she had told him that already. as he was taking in the room, you had already folded back her blankets and you were waiting for him expectantly.

he very gently tucked yeoreum in after taking off her shoes and gave her the plushie he had gifted her and she cuddled into it immediately. it caused his heart to ache looking at her, realizing he had missed so many things. jaehyun followed you out of her room and you closed her door until it was just a crack.

“um…” jaehyun went to ask, not knowing how to really phrase the question he wanted.

“are you thirsty?” you asked him instead as you headed into your kitchen and he hovered in the entrance.

“not really, thank you, but i was wondering, if you’d be okay with it…” he trailed off, and your eyes darted to see him looking somewhat nervous.

“with what?”

“do you… maybe have pictures you could show me? or videos? i just know i’ve missed a lot and if you were okay with it, i’d like to see the moments i wasn’t there for.” your heart softened, as did your smile.

“yeah, i think i can do that for you.”

so jaehyun stayed with you until late that night, sitting at the kitchen table as you showed him pictures and videos of yeoreum. moments like her first steps, and her first words, which you were pouting when you told him wasn’t “mama”, but instead was “no”. he got to experience your laughter as yeoreum had brought a frog inside the house, and her subsequent scream as it jumped out of her hand then chased her. he got to see pictures of her and he felt like he could have been there.

should have been there.

and as he flipped through picture after picture, he noticed that his heart picked up in speed each time he came across a picture of you in it. he watched as you spoke about each picture, the excitement in the nostalgia as you flipped through each one and you explained to him what was going on.

he felt like he was back in your apartment five years ago, he felt at peace with you here.

he missed all of this, and he was going to make sure he wouldn’t miss anything else.

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New Tweet notifications for NCT 127

NCT 127 @NCTsmtown_127 [idols with kids] episode 11 with JOHNNY, JAEHYUN, and MARK

🖍️😺🍑🦁🖍️

#NCT127 #NCT127_IDOLSWITHKIDS #IDOLSWITHKIDS

@lovej43 replied to NCTsmtown_127

i can’t with jaehyun smiling at that little girl like that :(

@127valentines replied to lovej43

right??? she looks a lot like him too, so cute

@markinmiami replied to NCTsmtown_127

mark accidentally breaking his crayon ㅠㅠ the kid gave him a mean look

@bananasoutforjohn replied to NCTsmtown_127

dude looked FLABBERGASTED when the kid started crying

@myloveforjae replied to @127valentines

no ur right tho, she resembles him a lot more than just the dimples 🤨

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you knew that sm would post the video to their youtube channel, but you didn’t realize how anxious reading the comments would make you.

you weren’t aware that the video had posted until jisoo showed you that yeoreum was trending on twitter because of her interactions with jaehyun, and then you went to youtube to read the comments there and every time you read one that mentioned their resemblance it made your stomach flip uncomfortably.

you had a little under a month to prepare for that moment and yet, it still surprised you. you were just pleased that the overall theme for reactions was how cute your daughter was and that made your heart rest just a bit easier.

while reading the comments on your phone, your eyes instantly darted to the text notification that popped up.

3:43 pm he who might be named 😶‍🌫️: did you see they posted the video? everyone is commenting about how cute ‘reum is

3:44 pm you: yeah, and they’re also saying how much you look alike…

3:46 pm he who might be named 😶‍🌫️: well, she’s my daughter so i’d hope so

3:47 pm you: i don’t think you get what i mean

3:48 pm he who might be named 😶‍🌫️: you mean that she also gets her looks from you? i agree

your eyebrows rose at that comment, he had been mildly flirtatious for the past week but now it was becoming blatantly obvious.

3:50 pm you: i mean yes, but that wasn’t what i meant

3:51 pm he who might be named 😶‍🌫️: if it’s not that, then enlighten me

3:52 pm you: aren’t you concerned people will figure it out?

3:54 pm he who might be named 😶‍🌫️: i don’t think they’ll be able to figure it out from just a twenty minute video on youtube

3:55 pm he who might be named 😶‍🌫️: besides, they’d probably doubt it considering how beautiful you are

you simultaneously blushed at his very obvious flirting and sighed at his nonchalance. you were growing accustomed to jaehyun’s presence in your life, and you were finding yourself looking forward to seeing him and spending time with him. it made you feel as if you three were a family but the overwhelming dark cloud of the public finding out loomed over you and shadowed the fluttery feeling you felt in your chest when you talked to him.

you didn’t want to let this get to you but it was turning into somewhat of a fear for you, and it wasn’t really that people would find out.

it was the aftermath; the most negative version being the source of your fear.

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jaehyun stared at his phone waiting for a response from you a bit longer than he should have, but when he felt a shadow hovering to his left he quickly locked his phone. his shoulders instantly relaxed when he saw it was doyoung, but the look on doyoung’s face made jaehyun instantly concerned.

doyoung refused eye contact with him, shifting uncomfortably as he leaned against the mirrored wall of the practice room. everyone else was sat in various spots on around the room and although jaehyun didn’t mind doyoung deciding to spend his break with him, his awkward behavior made jaehyun tense.

“i’ve been putting off talking to you for a week now.” doyoung said to the ground, his arms crossing over his chest.

“what about?”

“i…” doyoung started then stopped, he waited a few seconds then began again. “look, just remember i did it to protect you, you know, just in case.”

he was purposefully being vague and jaehyun pushed off the wall, turning his body to really face doyoung. “what did you do?”

“it’s – i – when y/n came over the first time, even though you were convinced, i wasn’t. so… i had a dna test done.” doyoung’s response made jaehyun’s skin grow hot, he wasn’t why sure anger was the first emotion that bubbled up first but it came on strong enough to surprise even him.

“why would you do that?” he said from between gritted teeth. the idea that yeoreum might not be his never crossed his mind, he had been so sure from the moment he saw you near her.

he just knew.

“you didn’t know, you were just going off of y/n’s word alone. i wanted to give you proof.”

“no, you wanted to rub it in my face that she had lied. you wanted to be right.” jaehyun couldn’t hear how his voice was raising, he could only hear the blood rushing in his ears.

“you would have went your whole life possibly raising someone else’s kid if i hadn’t had the test done!” doyoung was defensive now, and he couldn’t understand why jaehyun would have just blindly believed you like he did.

“i wouldn’t have cared either way!” jaehyun hadn’t realized he had gotten closer to doyoung until a hand came to push against his chest, pulling him back and away from him.

“keep it down unless you want the whole building to know your business,” johnny said lowly to jaehyun, eyes darting to the choreographer across the room, who seemed to be mostly unaware of the situation since he had headphones on.

“he went behind my back and had a dna test done, without asking me first!” jaehyun argued back, angry eyes not leaving the apologetic ones of doyoung.

“if it makes you feel better, she’s yours.” doyoung said, guilt apparent in his face even if he was trying to maintain his stance that he had done nothing wrong.

“i knew that already!” jaehyun actually yelled that time, and he went to take a step forward – to do what he wasn’t sure but johnny’s palm held him firmly in place.

his phone choosing that moment to vibrate, pulling him away from the moment; he had an incoming call from you. he took a moment to shoot doyoung a seething glare, then took a calming breath before turning away to answer.

“hi,” he breathed, his anger slowly dissipating.

“hello,” you replied, but your voice was a bit strained and he picked up on it right away.

“everything okay?” he questioned instantly.

“yeah,” you said and he heard you pull away to speak to someone else before coming back to the phone. “my friend and coworker, jisoo? she was there that day with me, she got injured at work and i’m the only one able to take her to the hospital. will you…” another quick word to someone else. “i need you to be there to pick up yeoreum from school, please.”

jaehyun’s mind was racing thinking of his schedule for the day, he had practice for another few hours, and he told you as such.

“i know you’re busy, but this is something that comes with being a parent. you make adjustments.” you said, and your voice was panicked as you heard someone call for you, and he heard you address the doctor.

“please jae, she has a key on her backpack. you get to pick her up from school and be her dad. this is what you asked for… and what she has always wanted.”

“i’ll be there.” he answered, his mind made up before you even had started to speak. “what time does she get out for school?”

“5, thank you so much, jae. i really appreciate it.” and when someone called your name again you sounded rushed once more. “coming! bye jae, i’ll see you later.”

you hung up the phone, and even though jaehyun was still feeling angry towards doyoung, he couldn’t help the smile that grew on his face at the opportunity you gave him.

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jaehyun was thankful that the lady at the front counter seemed to be too old to stay in tune with media as she didn’t even bat an eyelash when he gave his name to her and told her that he was there to pick up yeoreum. he refrained from saying the term ‘my daughter’ aloud but your rules couldn’t stop him from thinking it.

when the lady called over the system to tell the teacher that it was time for yeoreum to go home, jaehyun leaned casually against the wall while he waited.

he wasn’t thinking about how he had lied to get out of the last few hours of practice. he wasn’t thinking about the argument yet to be resolved with doyoung.

he wasn’t thinking about the other parents coming in and seeing him, recognizing him.

all he could think about how long the minutes seemed too stretch on for yeoreum to be released from her class… and he wouldn’t lie and say he wasn’t also thinking about you. specifically, the last time he saw you, which was three days before.

you had invited him over on sunday night, stating that yeoreum had asked about him and if she could one day make cookies for mister jaehyun. you had told him it was so out of the blue for her to ask that and when you had questioned her on it, her simple response was ‘if cookies makes santa come, maybe it will work for mister jaehyun too’.

you didn’t have the heart to tell her no, which led to the phone call. jaehyun was there in twenty minutes, knocking on the door to which you answered with flour splattered across your face, with a giggling four-year-old right behind you sporting flour in her hair. jaehyun’s grin was painful for his cheeks as he took in the scene, and he couldn’t help but laugh with you both before even saying hello.

“are you supposed to be wearing the ingredients?” jaehyun asked as he stepped inside your house, following you both as you made your way into the kitchen.

“mommy started it!” and you feigned a gasp, a floured hand on your chest.

“i did not!” and she giggled once more, waving her tiny hands for jaehyun to bend down so she could whisper in his ear. jaehyun’s dimples were deep as he listened to her and your thoughts straying to how handsome he was running through your mind before you even registered. jaehyun turned his head to nod excitedly with yeoreum and you narrowed your eyes at them both.

“you better have told him how you threw first,” you warned playfully.

“oh she did,” jaehyun agreed, moving slightly to the left and it didn’t click that he was suspiciously close to the bag of flour. “she also said we should be on a team.”

“wha – oh don’t you dare!” but it was too late, as jaehyun had already pinched some flour and flicked it at you, and as you stood there with a shocked look on your face and flour now decorating your hair, jaehyun and yeoreum shared a giggly high five. you crossed your arms childishly and stomped your foot, turning away from them both dramatically, taking a page directly out of your daughter’s book.

“oh no, ‘reum… we’ve made your mommy upset.” jaehyun theatrically whispered and you had to bite back a laugh.

“i know what will cheer her up!” yeoreum whispered back, and they were both suspiciously silent and then you heard feet shuffling behind you; yeoreum popping up in front of you suddenly, and then there were not one, but two sets of arms wrapping around you in a tight squeeze, yeoreum’s head resting on your stomach and you froze at the feeling of jaehyun’s cheek resting on top of your head.

you felt the heat rise up your neck and the butterflies were back; you couldn’t tell if this was part of the joke or if he meant the hug the way it felt to you but you quickly pushed that train of thought to the side, giving yourself two more seconds in the embrace of them both before you broke the moment by clearing your throat.

“so, did we still want to make mister jaehyun cookies?” yeoreum blinked up at you cutely and nodded her head, you ran your hand through her hair gently, still very aware of jaehyun at your back and you tried to ignore it but failed.

jaehyun noticed it took only five minutes of trying to cook for yeoreum to get bored and ask if she can go color instead, so it left only you and him in the kitchen, and the first few minutes were spent trying to fill the awkward silence with comments and small laughter.

you had just started to mix up the ingredients when you heard him move, his feet shuffling just a bit.

jaehyun leaned a little closer into your space, feeling his body heat on your back; his hand braced against the counter to the left of your hip and you weren’t sure if your heart raced or slowed, but all you knew was that you were hyper aware of his presence as you were minutes before when he had hugged you.

“do you need help with that?” he asked lowly, his voice near your ear and you could almost feel his breath on your cheek. you turned your head and he was as close to you as you had thought he was, and it made you take a slight step away. you knew he could see the rising blush on your cheeks and a smirk made its way to his lips.

“no, i got it,” you said, but then realized that his close proximity allowed you to get a little revenge. “i am capable, thank you very much.” it was your turn to flick flour at his face, and he only blinked at you in shock, his expression comical and you wished you could take a picture of it.

a small gasp at the entrance of the kitchen made you jump away from each other as if you had been caught doing something wrong, and you both had quickly fumbled with an excuse, neither of which had made any sense but you had seemingly gotten away with it.

the memory brought a smile to his face and that look was the first thing yeoreum saw as she walked through the door to see him waiting for her.

“mister jaehyun!” she exclaimed, running up to him and hugging him around his legs and god, he loved this little girl. when she let go, he bent down and went in for a proper hug, picking her up in the process and they left the building.

yeoreum spoke to him animatedly, telling him about her favorite part of her day and then she asked him about his favorite part, his answer being an immediate, “getting to see you, of course.” which only made her beam at him in a childlike sense of pride.

“what about mommy?” she asked innocently, and he blinked.

“well, of course you and her both are my favorite part.” yeoreum’s loud giggle made him smile but she shook her head.

“no, i mean where’s mommy?” and it dawned on him that he had told on himself to a very observant child.

“oh, she had to take her friend to the doctor. she isn’t your teacher, too?” jaehyun asked, playing it off in a way he thought was smooth enough. the question sparking another conversation about how she gets to change classrooms like she’s in real school but not a whole lot just sometimes and it’s definitely really fun, and jaehyun could only nod as she chattered away, finally arriving at the front gate to your home and yeoreum wiggled her way out of his arms so she could get her key.

“i wanna do it, mommy lets me!” and jaehyun nodded as he let her lead the way, really just letting himself enjoy being a parent solo, and after hours of dinner, bath, and then bed, he realized it was fairly exhausting and he told himself to remind you when you got home how impressive he thought you were.

jaehyun sat on the edge of her bed, she had requested him to tuck her in and he had but then she had started crying and he was on the verge of panicking.

“’reum, what’s the matter baby?” he said, taking a tip he got from you and running his hand through her hair to try and soothe her, she wasn’t hysterical but she clutched the plushie that he had gotten her tightly, big tears rolling down her cheeks as her bottom lip quivered.

“mommy always sings me a song and kisses me goodnight every night… when is she coming home?” she sniffed, and jaehyun’s eyebrows furrowed in concern. the last text update he had gotten was an hour ago when you had said that jisoo was going back for x-rays and that it shouldn’t be too much longer.

“she’ll be here soon but i can do that, too.” he offered her gently and her eyes looked a little less sad at his offer. “what song does she sing?”

“i don’t know the name,” her lip wobbled again and fresh tears sprung in her eyes.

“that’s okay,” he assured her soothingly, “can you hum it for me?”

yeoreum sniffed twice before humming the tune of a song jaehyun knew well, and it made a small smile tug at the corner of his mouth. as she hummed, he did the same right along with her until he started to sing softly to her, his hand continuing the motions from before, gently moving through her hair.

“so whenever you ask me again, how i feel… please remember…” and yeoreum wasn’t humming anymore, her small voice drifting away as she watched jaehyun, completely entranced by his voice, her young mind in awe at how he knew the song her mommy would sing to her.

“my answer if you,” jaehyun continued to sing, his finger tapping on her nose gently which finally earned him a small laugh. a sound he missed, and while he was glad to be present for even the times she was upset, he preferred her happy and smiling.

yeoreum didn’t say anything for a long second, and then in a small and unsure voice asked, “mister jaehyun?”

“yes, miss yeoreum?”

“if… if my daddy doesn’t ever come back from his business trips, if he’s still too busy for me…” jaehyun’s heart broke at the mention of that, his smile slowly disappearing from his face. “do you think you could be my daddy instead?”

“oh yeoreum…” he started and he saw a bit of panic welling up in her eyes, and she scrambled to sit up.

“i’m really good, i promise! mommy says so and santa does too, i get presents every year.” she pleaded, her eyebrows so furrowed they were nearly touching, and jaehyun’s eyes softened.

“yeoreum, sweetheart. i am y-.”

“”’reum, i’m home.” jaehyun nearly jumped at the sound of your voice, his head whipping around to find you staring at him in the doorway. he couldn’t quite place the emotion there; it wasn’t necessarily anger but you didn’t seem happy in the slightest.

“mommy!” yeoreum called, her tears forgotten at the sight of you in her room. you walked over to kneel at the edge of her bed, motioning for her to lay down again and pulling the blankets up to her chin.

“did you have fun with mister jaehyun?” you asked her, brushing her hair back away from her face. you heard everything said, and the feeling that you were letting her down sat heavy on your chest.

“i did, we had lots of fun,” she replied, finally letting out a long overdue yawn – the worry of you not being home the main thing that kept her awake.

“tell him goodnight, okay?”

“goodnight, mister jaehyun.” she murmured sleepily and you stood up then, motioning for jaehyun to follow you as you closed her door behind you. you moved away from the door, heading into the kitchen and jaehyun couldn’t help the feeling that he was in trouble somehow.

“i thought we had a deal,” you finally said, turning to face him as you leaned against the kitchen counter.

“what?” jaehyun was a little confused, he was trying to figure out where this conversation was going before it even started.

“the statute of limitations weren’t up yet, i still don’t want you to tell her you’re her father.” your voice was stiff, and you didn’t make eye contact with him as you spoke.

“i wasn’t going to…”

“i heard everything, jae. she already loves you so much, and if you decide to walk out it’s going to wreck her and i’ll be left to try and fix what you broke.”

jaehyun wasn’t sure why, but he felt the telltale sign of his anger rising. he felt it on the back of his neck, and the way his teeth ground together.

“i thought i made myself clear that i wasn’t going anywhere.” his voice wasn’t curt, but you still heard the tone.

“you did, but that’s when things are relatively easy. who’s to say-?” and he cut you off.

“say about what? what could anyone possibly say to make me leave?”

“me, when i say i think it’s best you kept your distance for a little while. you’ve made things complicated for me.” and to say jaehyun was shocked speechless would be an understatement.

“how?” was his only response, he was biting on the inside of his cheek to keep from getting really upset.

“we were fine,” you started, crossing your arms in front of your chest. “we were fine on our own, and then you waltzed in our lives and shook everything up and now i don’t know which way is up and which way is down. i think you’re confusing yeoreum… and me and… and i don’t know how to feel about any of this.”

“this was fate and you know it.” and your answering scoff only spurned him on. “i don’t believe in coincidences and neither did you last i checked. you moved here so she could learn about her heritage, and of the millions of people in korea you still manage to run into me, she still found me.”

“yes… well we had our life just fine on our own – just me and yeoreum. what right-.”

“i’m her father!” his voice raised just enough to make you finally look at him, to see the hurt in his eyes as he spoke. “that’s what right. you’ve given me this… this incredible gift, something i didn’t even know i needed until a month ago and i refuse to let you take it away from me. i thought you and i were getting closer, but if you want to continue to hate me that’s fine, but i want to be in my daughter’s life and you can’t keep me from doing that.”

his eyes were glassy, as if he was keeping himself from crying over the situation as a whole and his breathing was heavy. you broke the eye contact you held with him, instead focusing on the rise and fall of his chest.

his response was answer enough for you.

answer for this entire thing you had been fighting off for the past month while you got to know each other again, while you got to spend time together as a family. you saw yeoreum smiling and laughing, jaehyun usually the cause of it. their dimples coming out in the exact same manner, and it was like within the month you felt your heart warm up in a way it hadn’t in years at the idea of it, the idea of him.

you realized you were happier around him too, and although you really were trying to protect yeoreum, you realized in that moment that you were also trying to protect yourself.

and that wasn’t fair to yeoreum, jaehyun… or you.

“i don’t.” you said softly, finally giving him a response he found cryptic.

“what?”

“i don’t hate you.” you clarified for him and he inhaled deeply.

“then why are you acting as if i’m an asshole when i’ve done nothing but try and prove to you that i’m not… that i care about you both.” his hands were thrown out at his sides in exasperation, finally realizing that it wasn’t anger he was feeling but fear.

“because it won’t just be her heart you’ll break if you decide to leave.” you gnawed at your lip, unsure of how he was going to respond to this.

“what do you…” he asked and his voice was softer now, taking a small step towards you.

“you’ll be breaking mine, too.” you said, and you finally made eye contact with him again and he could see it there.

the fear.

of rejection, of being hurt, of being left alone after becoming so quickly used to having another person be there with you. he understood then.

he closed the gap in a few steps, and he stood in front of you, his hands hesitating before he allowed them to rest on your arms.

“i know… i know this hasn’t been easy for you. that you’ve had terrible things said to you because i wasn’t there, and i can’t guarantee that when people find out, more things won’t be said. but the difference is that i’m here now. i’m here and i’m not going anywhere, and…” he trailed off for a moment, eyes searching yours before he finally continued. “i know there were no expectations five years ago, but i have them now. i know you feel this too, i know you do. and if i have to convince you every day that i’m not going anywhere, then i will.”

you didn’t realize you had started to cry until your tears started to burn your eyes and you wiped them away with a watery laugh.

“oh come on, i can’t have both my girls crying in one night.” and jaehyun swore his heart stopped when you looked up at him like that.

“then don’t say sweet things to make me cry.” you said, tone a little pouty.

“well if that’s what it takes,” jaehyun shrugged easily.

“yeah but,” your sentence was then interrupted by jaehyun’s phone vibrating incessantly in his pocket. he dug it out, ready to ignore the phone call but the name that popped up made him hit accept instead. you didn’t hear any of the other side of the conversation, only jaehyun’s.

“oh, really?” followed by a, “yes, that’s true.” and then, “not to be disrespectful, but i don’t care.” his eyes then jumping back to yours when he said, “then we’ll figure it out, this is more important to me.” before saying, “okay, i’ll see you tomorrow.” and finally hung up.

“what was that about?” you asked tilting your head to the side, your curiosity getting the better of you.

“that… was everyone finding out.” he said easily and your eyebrows shot up over widened eyes, “and as you heard me say – i don’t care. we’ll figure it out one way or another, all i know is that you, yeoreum… this family is far more impor – mmph!” and you didn’t give him the chance to finish his sentence because you threw your arms around his neck and kissed him.

the action familiar to you, recalling the way jaehyun had done the same all those years ago. jaehyun wasn’t one to miss an opportunity and so he kissed you back, his arms wrapping around you tightly and pulling you closer to him. the moment was one he had been wanting for weeks now, ever since he sat with you at the table and you showed him all the pictures.

and he didn’t waste a second, kissing you until you were both breathless and you finally pulled away.

“i’m sorry, i just…” you trailed off, finally seeing that happiness in his eyes again.

“don’t be, because i’m about to do it again.” he said with a smirk before closing the distance once more, this kiss much sweeter than the first. his palm flat against the small of your back, his other hand resting on your hip and everything about that moment with him felt right.

his lips, his warmth, his smile that you felt against your lips that fully interrupted the kiss.

“what is it?” you huffed playfully, and his smile turned into a small laugh.

“i just remembered something.” he said, his dimples appearing then.

“and that is…?”

“try again, huh?” he joked before planting a quick kiss to your lips, muffling your groan.

“it was the only thing that would stop her from crying as a baby.” you defended weakly.

“that’s my girl.” he said, nothing but pride in his voice, and you smacked him gently on the chest.

“our girl.” you corrected him easily, and the smile that lit up his face was breathtaking.

“our girl.”

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[b side: epilogue]

a year or so later…

a family outing is what jaehyun had called it when he woke up one morning asking if you wanted to go to the gardens that had a christmas lights display and you didn’t even get the chance to decide because yeoreum overheard as she stood at your doorway and was immediately excited.

“that settles that then,” you teased.

“as if you ever had a choice,” he said to you with a wink, calling a good morning to the sleepy girl who jumped into bed and cuddled with you both.

your little family had a lazy day in bed before you all finally rolled out of it to get ready for the lights, making sure that yeoreum – who was adamant that she didn’t need help picking out clothes anymore – bundled herself up in her puffy jacket, you pocketing her gloves that she had forgotten. jaehyun purposefully matched jackets with her, and you sighed knowing you had to do the same.

“we look like a little marshmallow family,” you commented as you walked through the gardens, the lights reflecting off of your face.

“yes but a cute one,” jaehyun retorted, teasing being his way of flirting and something you noticed never slacked off even after you had officially started dating him.

you hadn’t realized you had walked ahead of them and then you noticed neither of them were right behind you, you turned around to see jaehyun smiling brightly as he kneeled to whisper suspiciously to yeoreum, something that had been their thing ever since the beginning.

“really?!” yeoreum gasped aloud, eyes pleading with him to not be joking. you narrowed your eyes at them, desperately hoping jaehyun wasn’t telling her they would get the hamster she had been begging for. when jaehyun nodded in answer to her question, her entire body radiated with excitement and then his eyes pointedly looked from her to you a few times and yeoreum giggled.

she turned on her heel and skipped over to you, motioning for you to bend down so she could whisper in your ear – letting you in on the secret. as she whispered, your eyes widened slightly, and they softened as they easily found his.

you could feel yours slowly starting to tear up and you held them at bay for as long as you could. instead of saying anything aloud, you kept with the spirit of their game, their thing they shared, you whispered to yeoreum. you figured she’d skip back over to jaehyun to give him your response but instead she jumped up and down, turning to face jaehyun.

“she said yes!” she exclaimed loudly with her hands cupping around her mouth, squealing with enthusiasm. looking at jaehyun’s soft smile, eyes full of love for you and for the little girl you shared, the answer was obvious.

as if you could have possibly said no.