She didn’t know how to stuff her feelings down and not think about Jongin, so she just drove away, without a real destination in mind, letting her hands take familiar turns without even realizing. And before she knew, Yiseo found herself in front of Jongin’s house.

“I’m the idiot,” she sighed deeply. She had to leave before someone saw her car and recognized her. But the knock in the passenger’s window proved that she was already too late.

“Junmyeon! What brings you to this neighborhood?”

“I could ask the same thing,” he fired back. “Come on, I’ll drive,” he offered, seeing her knuckles turned white around the steer-wheel.

“You don’t have to.” But he was already opening the driver’s door for her. There was no rush in the way he took her hand and led her to the passenger’s side, no secrecy in his fingers lingering around hers. “It’s alright to cry,” he said after putting on her seatbelt, right before closing the door.

And cry she did. There were so many tears she had swallowed, refused to cry that they all started cascading out of her eyes, tumbling down her cheeks and ruining her make-up. She was so tired of everything, so sad about how her life turned out to be that she didn’t even notice that Junmyeon had stopped the car or that it was already dark outside. Only when Junmyeon opened the passenger’s door for her Yiseo finally saw where he had brought her. Home.

“There’s no shame in being sad, Yiseo,” he bent to meet her eyes while he wiped away her tears with both his hands. “I don’t know why you keep doing this to yourself.”

“I wish I knew.” If there were anyone she could acknowledge her weakness to, that was Junmyeon. Because compared to her, he was perfect. Or at least closer to perfection than she were.

“Come now, go change your clothes and I’ll take you somewhere nice. I’ll wait here,” he said with a smile.

“Do you want to come in?” She fumbled with the strap of her purse, her mind still not in the right place.

“I’ll wait in the car.” Junmyeon always seemed to know a bit more than she did, so she let him have his way. “Yiseo?” She heard him call as she was pushing in the access code. “Take your time.”

* * *

Taking off her clothes was like peeling off her own skin until there was nothing else left than just her skeleton. But even there Jongin was everywhere, wrapped around her bones like a poisonous snake, leaving dark spots behind his touch. She tried to scrub him off in the shower, in hopes that the hot water would at least dilute the potency of his touches, but once out she could still feel his touches creeping back on her skin. So, she chose clothes she was sure Jongin would hate, clothes which would have reminded him too much of his past dressed-in-soft-wool self and make-up that made her look glowy and soft.

“It took me too long to find the perfect purse,” she apologized while running towards where Junmyeon was waiting, leaning against the car. “What?”

“You look like someone I used to know,” he just smiled, opening the door for her. “You look like yourself.”

“Do you mean I didn’t look like myself before?” Yiseo laughed back as the engine roared. “Where are we going by the way?”

“Somewhere nice and quiet.”

It didn’t take them long to reach the tall building of the W Hotel, which made her hesitant to get out of her car, despite Junmyeon offering his hand.

“What are you trying to pull here, Junmyeon?” She asked, suspicious of his motives. She had been h