lxi. Deadly Attraction

TMSG.

The text message you received ten minutes to midnight.

You replied quickly, fingers tapping at a keyboard you’d been using for over twenty minutes straight. Bang Minah hadn’t replied to a single call or message you had sent her since yesterday morning. Jung Daeryong hadn’t texted you in over a month. You deemed responding to the latter more important that chasing after the tail of the former.

Nothing to report currently. Will keep you updated on any changes.

The two sentences you sent off, mimicking the winking face that followed them.

An expression that effectively kept you from thinking about the red thermos sitting on the kitchen counter for a single second longer. Staring you down in a game of chicken it was winning. Your heart beating hard in your chest as you locked gazes with it once more, your reflection tall and wide on its shining tin.

Hyosung had delivered as promised. It would be a waste to not go through with it. A statement you had been trying to convince yourself of for hours now. After all, Hyosung had already delivered as promised. 

As midnight rolled in as quietly as any other hour, you steeled yourself to it.

It smelt like a face full of grass. It tasted like bitter tea. It settled at the pit of your stomach rather easily. And for more than a single second, you felt fine. 

But it was the seconds that followed had you wishing you were dead.

“I’ve threatened to bury others six feet under for less than this.”

“Like you haven’t barged into my house at the wee hours of the morning almost every day for the past two months?”

Minah pushed past him, entering the large home as though it were her own. Donning an old tee shirt, exercise shorts, not a speck of makeup, and a ponytail, she acted like a queen returning to her palace. Bypassing the cozy living room and recently restocked kitchen, she began to climb the stairs with a purpose. She was halfway up by the time Sungjong caught up to her.

“Where do you think you’re going, Bang?”

“Your room.”

Her bluntness had him retracting back, stunned by her indignant manner. At a loss of how to respond, he could only follow her down the quiet, second floor hallway. Whispering, “here,” when she reached the last door on the right. Taking his silence as an absence of resistance, she walked right in.

“Smaller than I thought.” 

Were Minah’s first words as she ducked to the left, avoiding bumping her head against the wooden paneled ceiling that slanted from left to right. Based on Sungjong’s feminine appearance, she expected his room to be filled with pastel colors. Baby this, soft that. Instead, his comforter was dark beige and gray. There was little to no decoration besides the cactus plant on his windowsill. All illuminated by a single metal-crafted lamp casting deep shadows across the triangular bedroom. 

A far cry from what she expected.

Mocking his simplicity, she laughed, “Did you get the short end of the stick when you first moved here?”

And yet, as she sat on his bed, fingers curling into black sheets, the absence of mystery comforted her.

Resisting at long last, Sungjong climbed back into bed, kicking at her imposing presence every chance he got, “It’s midnight, Bang.” He informed her as though she didn’t know. As though that would somehow convince her to leave. To turn around and walk back down the long hallway and set of steps she’d steeled herself to the bone to conquer.

“Is it bedtime?”

“Even good-looking guys like me need their beauty sleep.”

“I think I almost gagged a little.”

“Keep your bodily fluids to yourself, Bang.”

“Why do you call me that?” 

“What?” He questioned, train of thought crashing on impact, “Bang?”

She nodded firmly, not willing to walk away from the wolf’s den for an easy answer. 

“Nicknames are a form of endearment.” 

The answer Sungjong came up with with the intent to protect himself — just like his previous sarcastic responses. After his initial uncommitted shrug, he realized the implications of his statement. In an attempt to play the “cool” guy, he had admitted to holding feelings of endearment towards her. Feelings of things like “affection” and “love.”

“No!” He yelled, uncool to the core, upon seeing her expression change.

From hardened to soft. From woman to girl. From the gaze of an acquaintance to something more than a friend.

“No!” He yelled again, his real answer seemingly the farthest from easy, “I mean, it’s easier. For others, it’s that. For me, it’s easier.” Meeting her eyes then was equivalent to signing his death wish. “What? You want to complain about it?”

“Do you like me, Sungjong?”

“No.” 

He rejected the accusation just as he had two days prior. Without realizing what was possible as long as he committed to it, he willed things to stay the same. He forced her into a corner because he was scared of the ever present threat of “change.” Not knowing what it felt like to be chased after, Sungjong wasn’t ready to be swept off his feet by his princess charming quite yet. 

His simplicity something she could get used to, Minah decided to do what she did best: wait.

Mocking her own simplicity, she laughed again, “One-sided love , you know that?” 

She left after that, leaving him alone to quietly choke on his own uncoolness. 

“Faster!”

Her arms wrapped around his neck, fingers tugging at the lapel of his jacket. He could feel his heart pounding, his lungs gasping for air, as he pushed himself to the limit. It didn’t take much for her to throw her head back, laughter echoing into the night air. Pleasing her was simpler than he thought it would be. 

The very notion that he’d even thought about doing so had scared him at first.

It wasn’t a question of whether he trusted Kim Sunggyu’s decision. It was the fact that her intentions towards him could be easily misinterpreted. 

By himself, primarily.

Could he believe in her affection for him?

Only a handful of months ago, she would have gladly put a bullet in his spine. Now, almost two seasons later, she let him whisk her through the forest as fast as his legs could carry her. 

There was something dangerous about the entire affair. 

He stopped when they reached the lake at her request. She didn’t want to venture too far from home. The attraction of a little bit of danger aside, she was of the firm belief that no alliance protected her from those who called her “traitor.” He respected her decision, wanting to live a bit longer himself.

Especially when she climbed down from his back, smiling as she stumbled, disoriented, before hitting the ground. Saying how much she liked this. Them. Tugging at his hand for him to join her where she sat. Scooting closer when he did without a second thought.

And he couldn’t help but ask, “What the hell are we doing, Zinger?”

“Call me Hana.” She corrected. Laying her head on his shoulder. Looking out across the lake with a faraway gaze. Listening to the crickets sing their summer songs.

Taeil decided to play along, blissful ignorance too tempting to resist — no matter how dangerous it was. 

The two spent the rest of the night there. Wordlessly enveloped by their affair. Leaving interpretation up to the orchestra surrounding them. Voices too insignificant to hear over the gasping of their lips and the pounding of their hearts.

“Whatcha waitin’ for?” 

Zico’s muffled voice slurred from the inside of the fridge. He hadn’t eaten a single thing after sparring with Sungjong and Woohyun this afternoon. The youngest male was thoroughly distracted by the questionable text he received from a certain mayor’s daughter. The other never did take things seriously when it counted. 

When it mattered the most.

Though Zico wouldn’t argue he was exactly the same.

“When you’re waiting for something, time flows so much shorter, doesn’t it?” 

Hyosung mused out loud, putting down her cell phone to stretch out onto the cool surface of the kitchen island. Arriving earlier with her blond-haired friend, Zinger, she made herself right at home when this same friend ditched her at the prospect of enjoying an evening stroll with a special someone. She didn’t blame her though. She was sure the short werewolf had his own charms.

It was Jieun and Sunhwa she was worried about.

Though Hyosung wouldn’t disagree impulsivity felt good.

Undeniably so.

“You didn’t answer my question.” Zico rose from the fridge, gracing her with his gaze as he bit down into an apple. 

She shrugged, “I didn’t intend to.”

He shrugged right back.

“When you dismiss me like that, every single one of my worries seem petty and simple.” Sighing as she reached forward, fingers extending across the tiled countertop, she dreamily confessed, “I like that about you.”

“So you’re worrying about something?” He took another bite of his midnight snack, reminding himself to raid Sunggyu’s house in the morning — the scarcity of food in his own pack’s kitchen pitifully dismal.

Hyosung sat up suddenly, the scarce nature of Zico's reaction towards her the epitome of disappointing. “What exactly could I do to make you angry with me?” She pushed even further. “How far would I have to go, Jiho?” And when she got nothing, she herself grew mad. “Are you just going to stare at me all day?”

Zico bit into his apple once more, speaking only after he swallowed, “You won’t answer my questions. I won’t answer yours.”

“A fair exchange of give and take. I like that about you, too.” For standing by her even as she spouted such bold words, for just standing there nonchalantly eating as though he’d only be worried about her if she didn’t profess her love for him at least ten times every day, she decided to throw the wolf a bone. “I’ve recently struck a deal that was the farthest from fair.”

But he wasn’t buying it so easily. “What do you gain from joining us?”

She didn’t attempt to hide her disappointment this time, a frown marring her face. “This conversation has derailed itself quite quickly.”

“I figure that as long as we’re in the business of not talking while talking, I’d bring up some other things we won’t talk about.” A smiling painting his face, he laughed, “Because why the hell not?”

“I’ve never liked him.” She answered even though she didn’t have to. “The leader of the Hunter Faction.” She didn’t have to do anything for Zico. “He’s a brat with an ego that won’t quit.”

“Sounds like your type.”

“He’s much too old for me.” But she wanted to. She wanted to help him somehow. Some way. Telling him outright wouldn’t be like her though, would it? He wouldn’t believe her if she just said it though, would he? “Hopefully, he’ll kick the bucket sooner rather than later.” Of course not. “Where are you going?”

He stopped mid-stride, not interested in the game she called her reality. A sick game of life she’d played too long to know how to stop. “I’m tired of all this silence.”

“Secrets don’t come cheap, Woo Jiho.” She watched him walk away, yelling after him even if it meant the entire world could hear her trembling voice. Her dangerous feelings she didn’t know how else to handle if not with sarcasm and a smile. “The best kept ones are the kind people die to keep hidden!”

Whether he heard her or not, he yelled back, “Let’s hope you won’t be dying anytime soon!”

Sunggyu’s timing was borderline disastrous. 

On the other hand, the perfect confession didn’t exist. 

When the words are chosen precisely and recited beautifully. When the boy can give up his ego and the girl will gladly piece it together again. When the moment is right and the feelings can’t be righter. 

There was no avoiding the awkward stumbling of his feet as he climbed your front porch as though he was taking his first set of steps. Clearing his throat as though all the right and the wrong words were stuck in a jumbled knot. Knocking a stuttering number of three times because he was much too eager.

Sunggyu’s timing could have been better.

“Hyunjoo?”

There was no answer. 

He knocked again.

“Hyunjoo?”

There was only silence. 

He reached down to force it open, his protective disposition getting the better of him. Imagining all the things that could have happened to you. Thinking about all the ways he could solve whatever problem found you this time. Retreating back as the door opened before he could even start to worry once more.

You were there.

Eyes bloodshot. Cheeks flushed. Lips swollen.

Neck covered in raw skin. Fingernails stained red.

Whispering a plea of his name.

His phone began to ring in his jean pocket. 

But, in that moment, he chose you.

A/N: Click.