"i like you"

❀

Kai is tired.

If his feet have been running in circles after Suho and Lu Han, then his mind has been on a never-ending roundabout with Minzy. That smile of hers that seems to have lost all sense of hope, her kiss so soft and yearning that it haunted him all the way to Limbo.

Why was leaving so hard this time? The drag of his feet a strenuous effort than it has ever been before? And why did she stand there by her doorstep, not leaving until he vanished from sight?

Why was she awake in the first place?

The press of her gaze almost turned his feet around. Almost.

Fortunately, work overpowered any impulses. Suho hated lateness.

To Kai’s dismay, the week doesn’t turn out any better. Lately, Lu Han had been visiting Suho’s office more than he needs to, giving Kai an acknowledging nod before he heads in with a grim face. There are talks, bits and pieces of rumours of what people claimed to have heard. Though Kai is not for the gossip, it doesn’t escape him. Especially when you have Park Chanyeol around.

As usual, their companionship thrives in a ramen shop that has connections to their operation. It’s in here Chanyeol confirms of what little Kai knows.

“I don’t know,” Chanyeol says. “I don’t think people are happy with our Boss.”

“Well,” Kai plays around with a piece of radish in his bowl. “He does control the whole area.” With bribery, money and everything else horrible.

“Yeah, but what I mean is, now. All this time, no one has said anything but lately, there have been disputes and with other gangs too.”

“Why?”

Chanyeol just shrugs before digging back into his food.

This shouldn’t bother Kai because getting by is that all that mattered, but the day Suho sends him to Lu Han again, he realises whatever the problem is—it’s there.

Forced back to China, he follows Lu Han whose task is to ‘negotiate’ as Suho put it. It’s all very vague for someone who only acts on orders given to him but he does what he must, following Lu Han meeting after meeting, no matter how tense and awkward they get. What Chanyeol told him is proving to be true, if Lu Han’s frowns didn't indicate otherwise.

Things turn eventful in the second week when he and a group of others made to trace a person in the city.

Windows boarded up and doors bolted down, the neighbourhoods they ransack are rundown and miserable as the people they rip out of their houses. But that’s when Kai feels the hollowness return, creeping on the edges, the abominable things they are doing numbing him from inside out. Guarding his superiors are one thing but dealing with people like this is another.

They arrive at a dingy little apartment, a last minute place their intel provided. Grime coats every inch of his skin, sweat curling the strands that are overdue for a trim. Catching a mirror in a bathroom he passes, he looks unrecognisable; no different to these people that he works with.

It’s an unpleasant thought that remorse is almost non-existent when they find their target. He just wants to go home—but nothing has ever been as simple.

Their target is a small man, appearing delicate but defiant in the middle of their intimidating circle. At first, Kai finds everything about him innocuous with the spectacles balancing on his nose and the young boy they ripped from his arms, but those weary eyes. They’ve seen a lot.

“It’ll be okay, Seojun-ah,” he tells the boy they apprehended. “Hyung will be fine.”

It took seconds and it’s within those seconds that Kai hesitates, unprepared by the sound of his mother-tongue before spirals out of control. Mandarin bursts into the air just as their target disarms one of them. Bullets follow in a flash.

Natural to the chaos around him, Kai can’t help himself. He also takes aim and as usual, doesn’t miss.

Bullseye on the leg, the man crumples and the one who takes the finishing shot is their group leader. With a final bang, the man moves no more and it's finally too much.

The next day, he drinks. Lu Han is very pleased with their success, the happiest he has seen him in a while but Kai is the opposite. He lets alcohol raids his system, nicotine to calm his jitters but the image of the man he had killed and the kid they disposed of lingers heavily.

Everything is colourless and Minzy isn’t here.

The flight back is quick and soon enough he’s back in Suho’s office with Lu Han like nothing happened.

“This will be cherry on the top for Jiyong,” Suho says.

Lu Han grins. “Oh? Having a good week, is he?”

“Come by the club this weekend and you’ll see,” is all Suho replies.

Little does Kai know what that really meant.

He shrugs past few weeks off with a quick wash at home. He makes a ritual out of it, scrubbing himself clean of the death he reeks. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. This time, it’s the latter and it’s what pushes him to try his luck.

Today is not Tuesday but he needs to see her.

The notion of Minzy is like a drug he can’t escape. While he knows Minzy is no saint either with her canvas of colours, the pretending she does for them has always been enough. What he didn’t expect was curtains still drawn, the show they put on not ready to be acted.

Minzy’s not shining. She’s not ready. She’s pitiful on the bathroom floor, face buried in her hands. Just like that, the forbidding mood catches up. To demand what’s going on is on the tip of his tongue until an unwelcomed rush overcomes him, spotting an object he vaguely recognises. Unable to help himself, he has to pick it up to be certain and sure enough, the words ‘positive’ and ‘negative’ are there.

Then it all clicks.

If Minzy’s about to say something, he beats her to it, wanting to hear himself say it.

“It’s negative.”

A few hurried steps later, he’s out in the cool air again, rummaging for a hit.

He takes a long drag, wanting to feel as liberated as the city going on below him but nothing is working. Not this cigarette. Not Minzy.

❀❀❀

In the morning when Minzy wakes, it’s to the quietness of the morning, the birds chirping, cars honking in the distance as light prods her eyes. Nothing unusual. That is until she hears a rustle and finds a body on the sofa. The memory of last night is like a punch in the gut.

There are many questions but the only one that echoes then is: why on the sofa? Why not next to her, on the bed that has been implicitly reserved for him and him only?

He’s still mad, is all she could think. And that prompts her to his side, grasping his arm to her chest. Naturally, that wakes him but Minzy doesn’t realise through her frantic breaths, the fear of him leaving taking over and crippling her from within.

She doesn't want him to be angry. Minzy can't take it. Not now.

The arm in her grip comes to life with a pull until another one scoops up to lay her with him. It’s a squeeze on the sofa that Minzy is only too grateful to be in, traces of nicotine slipping past the anguish and filling her with familiarity. She holds tighter.

“Don’t, Kai,” she pleads against his neck. “Don’t.”

He takes his time responding. “It’s fine,” he eventually croaks. “We were never exclusive, anyway.”

Breath caught in , Minzy pulls back and Kai meets her gaze. But his expression is empty, unfathomable under the hood of his eyes. It screws with her head, mouth opening to say something when he grabs hold of her chin and knocks his mouth against hers.

It’s clumsy and it hurts, but Minzy latches to his lips like it is their last.

Nails denting into skin, hard inhales through the nose, they part with a gasp.

“Kai, I had no choice, I—”

“I said it’s fine. No, really,” he says when she prepares to interrupt. “It’s okay. Just sleep. It’s still too early.”

She wants to argue but the security of his arms around her, the cradle of his chest is hard to resist, her lids already falling, breaths calming to the beat of his heart. Not wanting to lose this moment, she obliges.

Kai’s thoughts on the matter remains a mystery. Is he really okay with it? Because he hasn’t even bothered to ask for an