TITLE: Lacking Heart

CHARACTERS: Wonwoo | Mingyu | Reader

WORD COUNT: 2,626

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Wonwoo sat on the couch immediately after both of you entered his apartment while you followed from behind.

He took a seat, looking pensive. That look on his face always made you anxious, the feeling bordering fear. It was an expression you were very familiar with but never came close to understanding as every single time it showed on his delicately sculpted face, it meant something different. It was the least thing you wanted to see considering the events that preceded the present situation. You stood behind the couch across him, not able to say anything, the silence weighing down on both of you as tension rose until he broke the silence.

“When exactly will I be truly able to call you mine?” he asked, eyes intent on the glass table in front of him, his legs outstretched and his shoulders slumped. He appeared helpless and desperate at the same time. Although he knew that none of the events that happened earlier were your fault, he can’t shake the feeling of jealousy off, not where Mingyu was concerned.

You looked at him, your gaze intense but you refused to argue with him. “What brought this on?” you asked, not really wanting to broach the subject so you pretended not to know what he was talking about.

Wonwoo glared at you but the fierceness was lacking. He looked more sorrowful than angry. “You’re asking me?”

You sat down on the smaller couch, suddenly feeling a fresh sense of frustration invading your mind. “I thought we agreed to…Why are we discussing this? So much for not talking about it anymore, Wonwoo.”

He buried his face in his palms, leaning forward to bend down. He groaned softly and began to shake his head. “I don’t know what to think anymore. When you finally agreed to be in this relationship, I thought…” He sighed. “Never mind, Y/N. I guess it’s my bad to have even dared to ask you to be with me.” He looked up and straightened on his seat. “I’m sorry. I guess this would be a good time for you to tell me if we’re going to go on with this. It’s up to you.”

You stood up from the couch. Wonwoo was giving you the chance to get it over with but you felt hurt ading your chest. You couldn’t explain why but the pain was too crippling that the only solution you could think of to relieve yourself was to be near him and so, you walked up to him.

The moment you came closer, he diverted his gaze. “You don’t have to force yourself. I’ll be fine.”

“But Iwon’t be.” Without thinking twice, you eased nearer to him, making him face you. “Look at me.”

Wonwoo refused. “You don’t have to.”

“God damn it, Jeon Wonwoo, I said look at me.” Your tone was at odds to your words. Instead of sounding angry, you sounded amused which made him meet your gaze. “Good.” You placed each of your legs on either side of his lap, holding onto his shoulder as you drew nearer. “Are you jealous?”

“Shouldn’t I be?” he mumbled.

“Yes or no, Wonwoo.”

He saw no point in lying. “Yes.” He diverted his gaze again.

You took him by the side of the face and made him face you again. “I said look at me.”
 

“What are you –”
 

“You don’t have to feel that way,” you cut him short. “What do you take me for? When I said yes to you I meant yes. Not otherwise.”

He didn’t speak.

“Do you understand what I’m saying?”
 

“Yes but –”

Before he could finish what he wanted to say, you leaned forward, swiftly claiming his lips with your own with such fervency that he could not help but to respond. You wound your arms around his nape, pulling him closer and running your fingers through his hair. Wonwoo, on the other hand, wrapped his arms possessively around your waist, responding in kind with as much potency and fervency as you were kissing him.

At times as such, he would gladly forget everything he’s seen and heard about you, turn a blind eye and just be with you like that, freeze time if he could and own you. However, he was still too tense, too affected and too hurt to just leave it at that.

You pulled away, cupping his face with both of your hands. “Did that feel like I’m forcing myself?’

When he didn’t answer immediately, still too dazed, you dipped your luscious mouth back down to mingle with his in a brief yet intense lip lock before pulling away again. “How about now?”

“No,” he breathed out against your lips. “But you’re making me feel something else.” With a mischievous grin, he locked you into place, slightly bucking his hip against yours to show you what he meant.

You chuckled. “Don’t even think about it.”

As if he didn’t hear you speak, he slowly reached over and ed two of the buttons of your shirt, burying his face on the crook of your neck. You gasped slightly, of his lap when you felt him leaving open-mouthed kisses on the columns of your throat, nibbling on your collarbones and on your jaw line. Wonwoo, having sensed it, pulled you back over to him, holding on tightly to the small of your back while he twisted strands of your long hair around his fingers. He drew you closer so you were chest to chest, his free hand coaxing your arm to wind around him. A soft moan escaped your mouth when he slightly bit on your now exposed shoulder, eventually feeling his mouth curving upwards in a smirk. He slowed down noticeably, just leaving lithe kisses all over your neck.

You snickered slightly. “What do you think you’re doing?”

“Stop teasing me,” he replied, laughing shakily as he left one final kiss on your jaw line. He held onto your nape and pulled your close, making sure you were looking straight into his eyes, dark and drowning you in their depths. “I want you.”

You smiled at Wonwoo’s words, leaning your forehead against his. Wonwoo may behave like the rebellious son he is, act like he doesn’t give a damn about anything, be childish when he wanted to be, but you sensed what a sensitive guy he really is. It wasn’t just in times as such. He always showed you how much he cared, tried to forget what and who you were when everyone else would point it out. Wonwoo was patient, dealt with your issues as gently as he could and always put your feelings, which didn’t seem to exist, before his.

You are trying to reciprocate his affection towards you but as it turns out, everything you do just seems to hurt him. He sacrificed himself for your, tried to defend you at every turn while you caused more trouble for him and for yourself, and you knew that all he’d want in exchange for everything was your heart, the heart that was long gone, was probably never there to begin with and will never be found because it was with someone else: Kim Mingyu.

The man was the only one your heart ever beat for. Your relationship with him evolved from indifference to each other’s existence to the profound love that blossomed under layers of your hatred towards him, that hate being due to your jealousy for the fact that you were so the same yet he was much stronger than you, a twisted type of supposed admiration and a selfish whim to covet him for your own while also torturing him with your psychopathic love. Still, being the warm and loving person he is, Mingyu returned it with a love so pure and genuine, accepted you for what you were, because he’s good like that, but then, you were not fit to be with him lest you ruined him, and you soon realized that he deserved so much better.

He showed up that day after being gone for a while, and it shattered all the resolve you had in you not to see him again…love him again; shook the world that Wonwoo has known with you, but you’ve made up your mind and by his side you will stay. You’re going to stand your ground, Mingyu or no Mingyu. He sustained the sickness in you with his love without any wish to change you despite the cancer that you were, while Wonwoo picked up the pieces of what you used to be, put you back together and made you better.

You ran a smooth hand against the skin of his neck, lightly planting a lingering kiss onto his waiting lips.

“Why is that, Wonwoo?” you asked breathily before starting to pepper his lips, cheeks, forehead, nose with ephemeral touches. Your relationship with Wonwoo was a passionate one. You wanted him around, almost always that you couldn’t start to imagine going back to when he wasn’t there. You found it odd not to see him even just within a span of 24 hours. To put it baldly, you missed him whenever he was not around or within reach, however, everything about Wonwoo that you have learned to get accustomed to seems to fade away whenever Mingyu was around and it made you realize how things with the former ironically lacked heart.

Despite admitting to choosing Wonwoo, there was something about the other male’s presence that made you feel complete, a different and a deeper sense of desire to be where he was. You had affection for Wonwoo, probably more than you can imagine, but not as strongly as you felt for Mingyu back then. Wonwoo may be your choice, your betrothed but unlike Mingyu, whom you shared deeper things with despite all your arguments and frustrations with each other in the past, the former can’t make you forget time, space and consequence. Especially consequence. It hovers over you despite being with Wonwoo who tries his very best to make you comfortable, safe and at ease.

Safety was probably something you could use a lot of, however. Your life isn’t being threatened, not in the way everyone thinks so, but there are things that could harm and subdue you, triggered by mere words and simple things that remind you of the past.

Wonwoo can physically protect you, but Mingyu provided more than that. He knew and understood where you were coming from, well enough to see and know how he should deal with you. Mingyu understood you more than anyone else, probably more than your own brother, Chan, could.You had a rough start but you trusted Mingyu more than you could have trusted anyone else, trusted him without having to be afraid of being judged. On the other hand, you still had reservations about saying anything deep to Wonwoo despite knowing he would be there any other way. You hated yourself for being masochistic and thinking about things that way, weighing the past with the present.

Still, despite your gravitation towards Mingyu, the boy who was in as much pain as you were, you made your decision and that is to be with Wonwoo who was right in front of you at that very moment.

“The answer to that is easy, isn’t it?” he spoke, twining his hand with yours.

You pulled back. “Not for me, it isn’t.”

Wonwoo smiled at you, that kind of smile you were very fond of, pure and childlike surfacing under layers of facades, trusting and unguarded. He took your hand and started planting kisses over your knuckles and fingers, his eyes remaining fixated on you. “I love you, that’s why.”He breathed out. “It’s why I am happy and sad at the same time, why I am frustrated about you all the time, why I am jealous despite not wanting to be and despite having you for the taking. It’s why even if you keep giving me reasons to step away without looking back, I still do and choose to stay by you.” He swallowed hard, eyed intently fixed on yours.“No matter what I do I will always keep coming back. It’s without regard to the degree of pain you will put me through or Iwill for that matter. It doesn’t even matter to me if you will never return the favor. I don’t even care if your affection and trust for someone else would surpass your feelings towards me. I’m in love with you…irrevocably so. Heck I’ll follow you to hell if I have to.”

You were stunned. You didn’t even know what to say to Wonwoo for his evidently heartfelt confession. He laid everything out in such simple words, didn’t plan for anything
grand. In fact, it was just a simple situation and yet it brought out in the open what should be. Jeon Wonwoo just bared himself in front of you without even caring if your reaction to it would hurt him.

Wonwoo sure was your ally and you never imagined he would feel the way he did for you. Your relationship was something you saw as, first, a game, second, something that never would surpass the physical aspect, third, an alliance to protect what you cared for in the  person of Chan and his older sister. Nothing has ever been related to love but he dropped it anyway, mind, heart and soul while you did not have any reason but to take it all in, hook, line and sinker.

Wonwoo and you…you’ve always thought that instead of lovers, you were allies. Not friends but associates. You were each other’s pain killer, not each other’s high. Wonwoo and you, a handsome pair, not of romantic lovers, but of business partners. That’s what you were from the start but the rules of your little game just changed with a few choice words coming from him who turns out not to have the same goals and views as you do. He had other plans in mind and you were not ready for it.

However, being yourself, you said, “Well aren’t you just pathetic?”

Your statement gave him a start and it was obvious how much your response hurt him. “'You don’t have to –”

He was silenced when you suddenly wrapped your arms around him in what appeared to be the warmest hug he’s ever gotten from you, the ice queen with a heart made of titanium, not stone.
 

“I will not say it back, Wonwoo. I may be the devil incarnate to everyone, but because I care enough to hurt when you are, I will not say it just for the sake of saying.”

As expected you always mean what comes out of , like every word was thought out and deliberated. Wonwoo was not expecting you to say anything but you did anyway and it was more than he could have hoped for.

“I won’t lie and tell you I do because as of now, I just care a hell lot about you, Wonwoo. I will not give you hope when it isn’t there for you to hold on to, but know this.” You leaned forward. “I’m willing to consider and…” You smiled. It was both of your cues. You knew you were at least ready to give in this way to Wonwoo. “I want you, too.” A chuckle escaped your mouth. “Probably more than you’d ever thought I would but –”

Wonwoo needed no further words. Grabbing you by your arms, he made you hold onto him. When he succeeded with that, he took hold of your thighs and stood up, carrying you towards his bedroom before you could react  or change your mind.