“What are you doing here, Jaehyun?” his name comes out softer, slightly broken and she plays off that she isn’t cold from the sudden draft of her open front door, with the vague shape of a leaning man in the doorway.

 

“I miss you,” it comes out so heartbrokenly honest, despite the night making it impossible to see his face, she can hear the redness of his eyes, feel the sheen of sweat from a too packed bar, the hand shakes he gets when he’s drunk one too many shots.

 

“I’m not.. I’m not yours to miss,” she wants to say it firmly, with conviction but the place inside that’s always left a crack for him to slip in refuses to shut. So she’ll just have to shut the door as precaution.

 

“Don’t-” Jaehyun puts his hand on the outside doorknob, he shifts just enough in the dim lights of the living room and moonlight that she can see the skin of his cheeks and moist mouth, opened to say anything he can think of next. “That’s not yours to decide. I miss you.”

 

It comes out harder, owned, unable to be redirected or redefined. Not by her, who wouldn’t be able to know. How could she know how he feels when she never gives him a chance to feel anything fully? When it’s always been one night to one day, isolated events of his hands on her hips and her hands in his hair. When she refuses to call it a mistake that turned into a trend that turned into a habit that could be a lot more.

 

“You’re making it worse,” she dismisses, fingers absently crawling towards his hand. Just to pull it from the door, she swears.

 

“You’re not letting me make it better.”

 

The door widens as she reaches for the doorknob, giving a clear view of his eyes, tired with the thinnest layer of water, just enough to make his eyes shine and remind her of the times they've caught each other laughing and staring. She can almost imagine they shone for a good reason and not from crying.

 

When her skin grazes Jaehyun’s, it takes everything to pretend the gasps aren’t audible. That he doesn’t feel like silk and fire and knowing. That she isn’t hit with the immediate prophecy of being pushed into bed gently, straddled, taken care of.

 

“You can makeup all your bull reasons why we can’t see each other, but you can’t make up that," he says pointedly. "Even if you’re older, even if you say you know better, you can’t lie to yourself."

 

He twists his hand to grab hers.

 

“You can’t hide your heartbeat from me. Not when I’ve already heard it.”

 

The door seems to open by itself, wind blowing him in.

 

What can she say to that?

 

She never believed in lying. She couldn’t say he was wrong but wasn’t there a way for them to both be right?

 

That she did react this way, that her heart was honest as much as her mind that said she shouldn’t be playing around with someone 7 years younger.

 

She keeps his steady eye contact when he closes the door behind him, not looking back, and returns a hand to hers, pulling gently until her bathrobe is brushing the front of his white dress shirt, ed far enough to show the bare sweet spot between his clavicle, a landmark known for her closed mouth kisses.

 

When she doesn’t reject his small advances, Jaehyun wraps his arms around her back, rubbing his hands gently on her arms. Nose filling up with familiar smell of warm cinnamon, the lamps from behind illuminating the outline of her dark tightly coiled curls.

 

They breathe slowly and she watches him trace her with his eyes. Up, down, side to side, head tilting for different angles.

 

“What are you doing?” she asks, curiously, finding her hands have rested them at the bottom of his chest.

 

“Looking at you,” he catches her eyes and it feels like he should’ve used another word for look. More like caressing, more like undressing, something spiritual. It wasn’t ual… just… deeper.

 

“You’re not here to do anything else?” she doesn’t mean it to sound so presumptuous, but she knows how these types of nights usually end. When one party shows up late at another’s house, when they get in, they don’t leave without making a point.

 

“Not particularly… Not unless you want me to,” Jaehyun adds in consideration, the tips of his ears turning light pink.

 

It was crazy that they both knew what he was capable of but he could still be shy at the mere verbal mention of it. She wasn’t fooled by the blush, cheeks that also turned red from kissing her too long in various areas.

 

“You make me feel so stupid,” she sighs, lifting fingers to run through his hair, combing it away from his forehead. “Like I’m making a big deal out of nothing.”

 

They don’t say anything for a moment. Just the brush of thumbs on her back, too quiet to hear.

 

“It’s just us two. And it’s quiet,” he states, head leaning back into the door, eyes staring into the ceiling.

 

“It’s meditative. The quiet.”

 

He carefully breaks down each point so she can’t miss the answer.

 

“We are living in the rare moment where you allow your mind to not think and the rest of you to know.”

 

He looks down into her eyes again.

 

“And you know there’s nothing wrong about us.”

 

It’s that looking again, straight to something in her she’s only ever found with conscious effort, staring in a mirror for far too long to feel normal anymore. When she sees pass the day’s mistakes and finds the core of a girl that knew things could be simple and didn’t assign flaws to carry. Her weightless, uncomplicated, version. The one she ran from during the day, admidst too many people and opinions and noises.

 

Their blinking is slow and tired. Air ringing with the question of “what’s next?” now that they’ve both established the so-called “problem” of age difference is nothing. That there’s a bed for sleeping in just around the corner and a weekend of no plans.

 

She leans in, landing on his with the pure intention of breathing him in, capturing whatever mystery he is to always say the right things and to feel so right. She wants to be that. To tranquilize all thoughts into extinction.

 

She feels Jaehyun’s lips rub against her, pulling her top lip in before releasing it just as quick.

 

“Let’s go sleep,” he says, walking forward and guiding her backwards.

 

“We’ll do other stuff tomorrow,” she can’t tell if his eyelids are that tired or if she caught a wink. “Like nurse my hangover.”

 

“Which you totally won’t blame on me,” she an eyebrow.

 

He shrugs, pulling the tie of her bathrobe and letting it fall to the floor. Letting her stand alone in a creamy lace set while he s the rest of his shirt.

 

“Sometimes you make me feel stupid too,” he says, reflecting on his latest alcohol binge.

 

She pulls the covers over the bed so they can slip in. Feeling the heat of his chest follow her back.

 

“You’re not stupid! You’re just inexperienced… Youthful, young,” she teases. “I was when I was 21 too-”

 

He breaks her off with a pressured kiss.

 

“Goodnight, noona~” Jaehyun whispers, cheekily, folding his arms around her navel in a solid hold from behind so she can’t squirm or swat him for the honorifics.