Her heels kicked to the side, hyeon sat leaning back, enjoying the nice breeze from the car cruising the quiet evening. The less than 20-minute dinner that had her energy was easily noticed when they walked out of the restaurant. Jae, who didn’t even ask, has chosen the long way to get to his place. He knew her enough to know going to a restaurant wasn't the best option after what he had witnessed. Based on his discovery of how much she loves driving around, he had decided to take so many wrong turns and let her enjoy the nice breeze. Both enjoyed the silence and didn't even notice how they spent 45 minutes driving around before the car pulled into his penthouse, which hyeon had been in enough times where she had memorized all the passwords. As the car halted, she slowly stepped out, leaving her shoes behind. The cold cement provided her some calm the moment her bare feet landed on it. The elevator she held open for the man walking behind her wasn’t what grabbed Jae's attention, but the password she automatically pressed into the machine. The sigh that escaped his lips was hidden behind his right hand. It felt nice to recognize how many times she has been to this house to the point she knows the passwords by heart.

“ I will wash it” she whispered when she noticed his eyes focus on her bare feet.

“ It feels great to feel the floor,” she added, an explanation that wasn’t necessary.

“ I do that all the time,” jae responded, forcing his eyes to leave her legs and return to the elevator doors that opened up. As she said, Hyeon's first destination was the bathroom by the corner. By the time she walked out of the bathroom with her washed and moisturized feet, the first thing that caught her attention was the soft music playing from the right corner of the room, the kitchen.

“ Why did you order so much” the dinner jae had picked up was on the kitchen table. Lost in her thoughts, she didn’t even pay that much attention when jae placed the order or when they pulled into the restaurant and he picked their dinner up. The waiter that handed them the neatly packed dinner was even tipped 100 new bills, which she had noticed as always. The man who doesn’t carry any cash always seems to have new bills somewhere in his car to tip all the service people he interacts with. Usually, the tips were way more than the actual price, and hyeon stopped asking about it.

“ This looks so good” taking a seat, hyeon glanced at the man standing by the kitchen counter.

“ Sorry, I borrowed a shirt. The one I had was too,” she didn’t finish as she just smiled at him, noticing how he didn’t object nor question it. He just glanced her way to see his black T-shirt covering more than half of her body. How casually she had gone through his closet and was wearing his cloth wasn’t even something jae registered. Even hyeon, who questioned everything, didn't waste a second about why it felt normal to go through this man's closet, wear his cloth, and be in his house like this. Her hair was now placed in a ponytail, and the face cleanser she had used to wipe her makeup was noticed when jae finally started walking to the dining. She looks refreshed. His cleanser, body wash, moisturizer ...all his items she had used wasn’t a new occurrence, but it still felt weird to notice how she was okay with smelling like him. His mind immediately played visual memories of how she cuddled herself whenever she wore his cloth. It was all quickly shut down before it made him question why she seemed calm and at ease whenever she was covered by his cloth, in his space, or around him.

“ So who is this Baek-hyun?”

“ Oh my God,” picking up the wine bottle he placed by her glass, hyeon started pouring. From all the wines he has at this place and based on the wine she likes to order, jae had chosen something similar. Compared to her, he chose to stay with a very light bear from himself. He had stopped drinking, but this food requires a little bit of alcohol.

“ He was this idiot in high school that I had a crush on” She filled her glass up.

“ apparently, he is married now” She glanced up at jae, who placed the utensils by her side and went to his seat across from her.

“ and not good enough for you since he's a doctor, you know,” jae added. His sarcasm was noted as both started smiling.

“ you caught that, didn't you” she took her first sip.

“ there's a whole drama between her and I”

“ Ohh,” jae was the first to start his dinner as he sat back, waiting to hear all about it.

“ She had a crush on him, but he didn’t like her. She hated me because we were close”

“it's a whole mess of high school drama” she placed her glass down and started her dinner. From the drama between the three to all the drama between all the girls, their dinner was fully underway as hyeon went on sharing all new stories about her childhood Jae hadn’t heard about before. Every detail of the story he was keeping in his memory, he was beyond attentive to everything she easy saying. Although the questions he wanted to ask were growing in number, he waited until she was halfway through her second glass before Jae brought up the question that had been eating him up.

“ Why do you hang out with them if they make you feel like ?”

“ I don’t know” her glass was placed down as she brushed her hair back.

“ I only see them once or twice a year anyway, so it doesn’t bother me that much,” she added as He sat back, bringing his beer to his lips. Considering how outspoken she was, he would have imagined hyeon to be the last person to sit and tolerate people treating her like they did. Based on his assessment of who the woman he has been hanging out with for the last coupleofn month has bec,ome there was only two reasons that would explain her behavior today. Either he didn’tknowo her that well, before or she really is a broken person now.

“ Even so, they were not nice to you,” he added, hoping she would understand. He could tell how even now, she looked like she was not over what had happened hours ago.

“ I don’t have that many friends, so I can’t keep cutting people off because they say some not-so-nice things” It wasn’t the alcohol that was getting the honesty out of her. It was the safety and the comfort of the weird friendship they had been building for months. The alcohol was the liquid courage, but it never felt this easy to say what she felt in front of him. It felt so easy, so safe to say it out loud. Did he break her to the point she was tolerating this type of treatment from others as long as they were around her, jae was focused on the serious questions that were starting to eat him up.

“ Friendships are hard to form as you grow older”

“ I need to keep people around, so I don’t end up alone” the smile that accompanied her words wasn’t what jae focused on, but the sadness behind her eyes that looked his way before she directed them to the wine glass.

“ You always have people around, so you wouldn’t know” this smile was genuine. Even if it was painful, it was genuine.

“ Just because I have people around me doesn't mean I am not lonely” his vulnerability was always ready to display startled hyeon. Her eyes landed on him as she went on taking a sip. Their eyes as always exchanging words they would never dare to say out loud.

"but I would rather be alone than have people like that around me” unable to handle her gaze, he shifted his to the dinner.

“ Maybe I am not strong enough like you”

“ I was alone. I don’t want that ever again” the smile that accompanied her words was more painful than her words. The moment his eyes looked up at her, she knew to change the conversation before she opened any more doors and let this man who could cause her havoc with just his eyes ruin her night.

“ they are nicer when they are drunk”

“ They would have been all over you if we stayed”

“ Their eyes were already” he chose to let go of the serious and heartbreaking confessions she made and follow her lead to change the conversation light.

“ oh I saw” the sip she took wasn’t enough to prepare her for what he said next

“ I thought that was why you wanted my buttons open and stripped me of my coat” he was expecting her to choke on her wine which she did.

“ You wanted me to be ogled at” he added as he focused his smiling eyes on the napkin; she pulled her lips and covered her coughing.

“ was I distracting enough?”

“ You don’t need to be ed; you are beyond distracting as is” her response got a smile out of both which easily faded away as their eyes interlocked and both recognized the shift in the air. His eyes didn’t need to leave hers to notice her nervous hands that went to her hair and brushed it back as she gave him a smile. No matter how much their minds commanded them to look away, their eyes stayed connected, reminding both of the lingering feelings that are still present right under the surface.

“ sorry for using you,” Hyeon's mind was stranger enough to quickly remind her of what this manhads done to bring her back to reality in an instant.

“ I thought it would be easier to get away from their dinner; that's why they let us go earl.y”

“ Why didn't you just say I was your husband and use me that way”

“ who would believe that ?” her smile was getting bigger as she kept taking more sips.

“ They were that shocked taht i even had a fling . They would immediately know I was lying”

“ Nobody would believe you would marry me,” her glass was placed back on the table she focused her attention on the dinner.

“Oh god, I keep forgetting to give you the engagement ring” she glanced up.

“ I seriously need to start carrying it around”

“ Why wouldn’t they believe it?” he interrupted her talk about the ring she seemed to consider a crushed object she needed to get rid of.

“ and it’s not m; it’s you who wouldn’t marry me” he gave her another reason to forget all about the engagement ring she was focused on.

“ what makes you think I won’t?” he could swear it wasn’t the alcohol but hyeon that was challenging him as jae took in her playful smile that focused on his as she brought the wine glass and took a sip.

“ You are a handsome, rich and decent person. Who wouldn't want to marry you” she added as her sparkling eyeswereconfusedg him to see if behind the sarcasm was some truth to what she was saying.

“ I said yes when you asked, didn’t I” came another smile hidden behind the thin wine glass she brought to her lips. The weird games they have been playing was something Jae has gotten used to by now to know how this will go. As dangerous as it was, it was just as fun to play this tug-of-war of emotions.

“ Then you should just keep the ring and just claim me as your husband”

“I am sure your actually finance would have a lot to say about that” she was quick with her response.

“ I recently learned about who her dad was btw,” she added as she took another sip.

“ Their hotel monopoly might be a great addition to JK” her coy smile were starting to sting.

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