— Next day —

.

The sound of an unfamiliar alarm takes me out of my peaceful sleep when the darkness is still pretty present in the room, but I do not move, only the one in my arms is doing it to put an end to this awful noise. She does not come back into my embrace, so I open my sleepy eyes and snuggle up against her to ask for her to stay with me a little longer. "Good first morning with me," I smile and press a kiss on her ear, speaking in a husky voice, and I get her to hug me. "Good morning," she gives me a kiss back, and we both hold each other a little more tightly.

"Did you sleep well?" I hide my face in the crook of her neck, and she nods. "Hm. I did, and you? Did you sleep like a baby with me?" she grins, her cheek rising against mine. "I did. Best night I've ever had," I do not tell a lie but let her know how good I feel with her, and she runs her fingers through my hair. "I'm happy you feel the same way I do."

I smile without saying anything, feeling peaceful, almost like if I was dreaming and having an amazing moment in heaven. This feeling you get when you are cuddling the one you love, the one who makes you feel as much love as you give them, is too powerful to even be defined with words. This is a feeling you do not want to forget but always have.

"I love you," I whisper in her ear, rubbing my hand up and down her back. "I love you too," she kisses my jawline and moves her head back, so I open my eyes, but she rests her hand on my cheek and holds my jawline. We do not say a word but stare at each other, into the eyes, deeply.

I can still remember what she told me last night, what happened, and what I felt, but the night we had, and this moment right now, they both make me forget about how awful it was to go through that. The thoughts, the fears, the assumptions that ate me up, they disappeared, and I cannot figure out how easy it is for her to erase those negative emotions from me.

Love plays a part, but still, she has such a good effect on me that it could be addicting.

Her thumb caressing my cheek as we are both swimming in the ocean that our souls turned into, we make one with eye contact only, and as if we could feel each other's emotions through it, we both smile at the same time but do not even know exactly why.

Wanting some more closeness between us, I lean in and pull her in to have my body fully against hers, and I nuzzle the tip of her nose with mine. Her smile never fades away. This is what matters to me, I want to make her feel like that, good, happy, and safe.

I wish the small fight, argument of last night did not happen because of all the stress it made me feel, but if it did not, we would not be here, holding each other and showing sincere love to reassure one another.

Her touch is so relaxing for my body that I just want to close my eyes and go back to sleep, but I also do not want to sleep so that I can enjoy this to the full and always feel her close to me.

The temptation being too irresistible, I move forth and kiss her lips, and she smiles but hides her face in my chest. "I gotta get ready, I take a lot of time in the morning."

"As long as you wanna take a lot of time with me this morning, I'm fine with it," I send her hints, wondering if she would be okay with doing everything with me. "I do want to. Let's take a lot of time together," she traces her fingers over my chest, so I drop a kiss on her temple and look at her features that she is concealing. "Show me your cute morning face a little more," I mumble against her cheek and skim it with my lips, but it rises under the effect of her delight, and she rolls on her back to gaze up into my eyes and give me what I want, but she still acts a bit shy and fiddles with her lips in front of me, concealing her smile behind her fingers.

"Can I play with them too?" I rest my arm on her breasts to touch her chin, and she giggles. "I'm gonna play with yours then."

"Do it," I shrug, and once she brings her fingers to my mouth, I lift mine up to her soft and rosy lips, and I pass my thumb over them. They feel so tasteful, and I can feel their touch on mine without even kissing her. Feeling her gentle caresses on my lips, I part them to trap her finger between my teeth, and I give a peck to the tip of it, both reveling in this moment and not caring about anything else but how nice it feels for us.

Our eyes never leaving each other's sparkling ones, her other hand goes down to mine, and she intertwines our fingers with my longer ones, so I apply some more pressure on her bottom lip and graze it, but she does not touch mine anymore to be able to hold my hand with both of hers, and she heaves it up between us to hold it against her chest and let me feel her heart beat against it.

This is like a drug. It calms me down, it spreads all the feelings that a human wants to get in big amounts. I just do not want it to fade or go away. I love what it does to me.

"Let's slowly get ready," she tells me, obviously not doing it but only suggesting it. I agree with her but do not move either, I stay in bed, under this blanket that keeps our bodies warm together. Her hands still holding mine, I stroke the back of one with my thumb and run my other hand through her hair to lean in and rest my forehead on hers. I close my eyes, and she cuddles up to wrap her arms around my waist and get me to put mine around hers.

•••

I get out of y/n's room with her after I waited on her bed while she was putting makeup on, and we both hold each other's hands to walk down the stairs and head outside.

The last thing I want to see today is the guy I might kill if I ever come across him, so he better not try to talk to me, approach me, y/n, or Hojun, or I will make it quick for him to understand he must get out of our sight and get into his head that he is not our friend anymore.

Once we step out, I look for Hojun but see him sitting on a bench, not doing anything but staring into space, we join him, and I sir by his side but take y/n between my thighs. "Hey."

"Hey," he smiles at us both. "Had a good night?" he mentions the first thing that comes to his mind since he knows we spent it together, and I chuckle at how straightforward he is. "Yeah. What about you though? How's your nose doing?" I ask at the sight of the new band-aid he put over it, and he touches it. "Fine. I just had a headache but took a pill, and I woke up with no pain."

"Hm, I still feel guilty as fuck though," I cannot help but hate how responsible I am for this. "Shut up," he rolls his eyes, not taking it seriously as always. "I love your band-aid," y/n focuses on something different, the soft girl she is not resisting to the desire to let him know how cute the teddy bears are on it. "They're the only ones I had left...I'll give you them if you want."

"Really?" she happily reacts to it, making us both smile. "Yeah, I have a bunch of cute designs I thought I'll keep to myself and never show to anyone, so I'll show them to you, and you'll keep the ones you want."

"I'm going to use them for literally every little injury I get if I have cute ones like that," she laughs, but I know she is not joking. I am pretty sure she could wear them even with no injury on her body. He giggles but relates to her since he is the same. "Anyway," he stops moving his finger over his band-aid, and he sets his eyes on us. "How are you both feeling?"

"Good," I answer but check on y/n, and she shakes her head up and down once. "Good too, and you?" she pulls on the sleeves of her fluffy jacket to hide her hands in some warmth, meaning that she is cold. "Same. I just feel lazy as heck today, for some reason."

"Yeah, just today, like if you're not lazy every day," I remark to bug him, but he does not get offended and understands that I am joking. "Well...you have a point."

He does not say anything more, the three of us not knowing whether there is tension because of last night or not and behaving weirdly. Y/n suddenly moves away from me to stand up. "I gotta go to the restroom," she warns me and walks away, so I check where she is going and only glances away once she passes by the door she has to.

This feels uncomfortable between us all, I can feel that we are not talking as thoughtlessly as usual together.

I exhale sharply and peek down at my hands, my black painted nails looking bad since I have not removed the polish yet.

"Have you talked to Kimoon again?" Hojun brings this topic up. I am not surprised, I knew he would, we did not get to do it that much last night. "No. I'll never do it again."

He does not respond to agree with me and share my opinion, so I turn my head in his direction and read his facial expression. "Have you?"

"He came up to me at night," he tells me what I did not know about. "He was crying. He told me that he never meant to hide this from us to hurt you, to be dishonest, or anything like that, but he's just not comfortable about that topic. He even told me that if his relationship had ended in a different way with her, he'd have told you, but that it was just more complicated since want happened between them and that he still feels horrible and guilty for what he's done."

"He's an asshole, you're not gonna forgive him, right?" I ask him, hoping for him to not give me an answer that I will not appreciate from him. As soon as I see him muse and not get a word out, I understand that he is not certain.

"Hojun, this fucking piece of shit fooled us this whole damn time and acted like nothing was wrong, so he lied to us, and on top of that, he did something horrible to y/n. I don't give a fuck if it's because he was drunk and that he feels guilty for it, he was eighteen when that happened so he knew that he shouldn't have done that," I do not let him doubt or think about giving another chance to this guy, but he shrugs and breathes out. "I know...I just..." his body language exposes all his anxiety concerning this.

I knew it. I knew he would feel that way only because this asshole cried and showed some fake emotions to have our empathy. This just does not work with me.

"I'm not saying he's not an asshole for what he did...but I'm trying to understand why he hid this from us. He feels ashamed of what he did to y/n, and he regrets his mistakes, he's always been a good friend until now, he was always there for us, he was also there to defend her when it was needed...he helped you both get together...so...I don't know...I hate this situation..." he sighs and uses his heart more than his brain. I am not going to get mad at him for letting his emotions and sensitivity take control on this one, but he needs to stop feeling pity for people who do not deserve it.

That is how he gets manipulated so easily.

"Hojun, stop this. You know he doesn't fucking deserve a second chance, just because he cried doesn't mean you have to feel pity for him. He knew that if he was going up to you, in tears, that you'd feel that way," I set him straight, trying my best to get him out of those thoughts that cause him pain. He keeps his eyes fixed on his hands and fiddle with his fingers, and I stare at his face, feeling like he is getting overwhelmed by what is happening in his head.

"Hojun," I pronounce his name to snap him out of it, but he does not look at me, he nibbles on his inner cheek and cannot stop nervously toying with his fingers. I do not look away, noticing in his behavior that he is lost and more affected by this than he should. "Why do you feel that way?" I ask for him to talk.

"I don't know," his voice changes of tone, turning quieter, and he sniffles, so I lean forth to have a better sight of his eyes but see some glisten in them. "I don't like this..."

"Did you have a talk with him that made you feel like this?" I do not sound like I am forcing him to do anything but comprehend his feelings. I personally must feel that way because y/n is my girlfriend and that I was already mad at him for eyeing her up last weekend, so this might be the reason it is so easy for me to not give a shit about him anymore since my jealousy and possessiveness can take the upper hand on the rest, but here, I know that Hojun is in a different situation.

"I didn't," he shakes his head. "He wanted to, but I told him that I couldn't because of how you felt, and he told me that he understands, but I saw that he was crying even more when he went back to his room, and he's not even here this morning...I'm scared to be a bad person..." his voice trembles, and the tears that he was able to maintain in his eyes now roll down his cheeks. "I don't want to hurt him, but I don't want you to be disappointed in me either, and I feel like talking to him would mean that I disregard what he did to y/n too," he brings a sleeve up to his face to dry the wetness on his skin, but y/n already comes back.

I glance up at her and stand up. "Can you wait here for a minute, please? I need to talk to him," I do not tell her more but notice that it is worrying her, her eyes checking up on Hojun nonstop. "I...yeah," she nods, and I press a kiss on her lips. "Thank you, it won't take too long. Don't be worried," I put her mind at rest and step aside. "Come with me," I grab Hojun's wrist and lead him behind a wall to be away from everyone.