[title song: fine line by harry styles]
[4700w]

11.

The house is nothing short of a disaster. It all registered in her head as if she was on the outside looking in, with numb fingers and a numb heart and this distinct feeling that if they hadn’t managed to escape, there would be bits and pieces of them scattered amongst the damage, over broken glass and broken doors, overturned mattresses and strewn clothes.

A wave of revulsion, fear, and this strange urge to curl up in a ball and hide hits her like a speeding truck, all at once and hard. The crunching of glass under her feet, the way her room has been torn apart, makes her realize just how much these people wanted them and how intent they were on hurting them. Things that didn’t need to be broken were broken—picture frames, the little vanity mirror she uses to do makeup, hangers. Her clothes are strewn on the floor—shirts, pants, her favorite dress, even her underwear—and that triggers something else entirely. What if they had gotten their hands on her last night? What would have happened to her? To Seulgi?

“Oh, God.” She whispers. She glances at Seulgi’s bedroom and can tell it’s significantly worse. She doesn’t want to go in. She doesn’t even want to pack up her own clothes, because she keeps thinking about how strangers had gone through her clothes, touched everything, and it’s just—she’s horrified that she’s been made to feel unsafe in her own home. It’s not even the first time, and she’s afraid it most certainly will not be the last time.

Baekhyun isn’t here. He’s somewhere else in the house, probably trying to figure out which one of his gang’s presumably many enemies had ransacked her house. She’s glad he isn’t here to watch her panic—she thinks he’s seen her panic enough to last a lifetime.

Her heart is beating fast and her fingers are shaking, but she takes a deep breath and tries to pull herself together. She’s okay, she’s okay. She’s safe now, she tells herself, as she pulls open one of the drawers that hadn’t been completely raided, pulling out clothes from the back. She’s going to be okay. Even if Suho doesn’t necessarily care about her or her safety, he cares about Seulgi’s. She will be safe in that house.

(She thinks if she tells herself otherwise, she might absolutely lose her mind more than she already has.)

She stuffs clothes, skincare, shampoo, conditioner, and her toothbrush into a backpack. Her hands are still shaking, but she thinks the urge to curl up in a ball has left her.

She treks her way back to the living room and Baekhyun is leaning against one of the walls, seemingly unfazed by the chaos around him, busy texting on his phone. He looks up when she enters. His glasses are beginning to slip down his nose. He tosses something at her, out of nowhere, and she yelps as she fumbles for it.

“I found it under the table.” He says.

It’s her phone. She blinks at it, relief washing through her.

“Thanks.” She says. Baekhyun is still looking at her—right in the eye, as if he can see into her soul. She shoulders the backpack and continues, “Let’s get out of here.”

Her eyes flicker to the broken picture frame on the floor—it’s the one she and Seulgi took on their post-graduation trip to Jeju Island. The picture makes the hairs at the back of her neck stand on end; how have things changed so drastically in such a short time? She looks up and Baekhyun is still looking at her.

She breaks eye contact first, brushing past him as she heads out the door. She hears Baekhyun snort, loudly. She ignores it.

~.~.~.~.~

She goes back to work the next day. Suho assigned eyes on them.

(“Why?” Seulgi grimaces.

Suho scoffs, rolling his eyes. “They know where you live. What makes you think they don’t know where you work?”

“I work at a hospital. Security there would be enough.”

“I’m not risking it.” Suho says, with a nonchalant shrug, grinning when Seulgi’s glare deepens. “Unless you can prove to me that you won’t reveal under duress, I’m not allowing either of you out without eyes.”

Sunhee is the one to frown, brows furrowed, “Under duress…?”

Suho addresses Sunhee for the first time that night, his brow cocking in amusement. “Torture, sweetheart. They’ll probably want to torture information out of you. Or use you as bait.”

Sunhee can see it in the way Suho rolls his eyes at his last sentence that if she were to be taken and used as bait, she doubts Suho would fall for it. Maybe if Seulgi insisted, but otherwise, no.

(A part of her wonders if Baekhyun would go out of his way to save her either. Another part of her wonders why the she’s even thinking about such a possibility. She’d rather than die than be used as bait, or as anything else, by a gang. She’s rather die fighting. Still, the thought of torture sends dread down her spine.)

Seulgi crosses her arms over her chest, “Do I get to choose who my bodyguard is?”

Annoyance drips from her tone. Suho gives her a sharp grin, “Why? Don’t think you can handle my company, sweetheart?”

Seulgi rolls her eyes. Sunhee grimaces—she’s practically invisible—and slips out and back to her bedroom.)

She can sense someone watching her while she heads to work and it drives her crazy.

When she gets to work, Sanha is already there, chewing on the back of a pen nervously as he keeps glancing at the door. When she walks in, he makes eye contact, blinks three times, before he glances back down at his computer.

Awkward tension was never something she liked to deal with, especially not with Sanha, so not even five minutes pass before she’s balling up a piece of paper and tossing it at him. Three balls of paper hit Sanha in the head before he finally looks at her, eyes wide with exasperation.

She tries for a smile—she’s always been so black and white with her morals and she thinks the version of her before all this gang business might have angrily cut Sanha out of her life immediately just because of his association to a gang, but now she knows that isn’t fair. She doesn’t know Sanha or Jinwoo’s circumstances. She knows Sanha isn’t the one in a gang. Besides, if she were to cut Sanha out, she’d only have two friends left. She cringes internally at that last thought. She just doesn’t think it’s right to remain so self-righteous about her moral views—not everything is black and white. Besides, Sanha has never treated her badly.

Sanha blinks at her.

After a moment, he whispers, “What’s wrong with your face?”

She frowns, touching her face, “Nothing.”

“You look constipated.” He tacks on. “Are you trying to….smile? Terrifying.”

She glares at him. He smiles, a cute smile he perfected for the sole purpose of getting out of trouble. She throws another balled-up piece of paper at him and Sanha lets out a bellowing laugh. She thinks they’re fine.

After that, they both make it a point not to mention what happened. Even though she knows the eyes Suho assigned to her belong to Jinwoo. Even though she knows Sanha is relatively aware that Jinwoo has been watching her, as well—how could he not when Jinwoo had blatantly offered her a ride home on multiple occasions?

Still, she thinks they’ll be all right.

~.~.~.~.~

Living in a gang house is like living in a college dormitory, except sometimes people come home bloody, there are important meetings that she is not allowed to be present for, so she’s told to stay in her room for hours at a time, and there are a multitude of weapons just lying out in the open.

She’s gotten used to some of it, though she does not think she’ll ever get used to the times she’d get up to pee in the middle of the night and stumble onto someone being dragged into Seulgi’s room, beaten and bloody. She doesn’t think she’ll get used to seeing boys like the one Seulgi had patched up the first time—Rocky—or Moonbin or Eunwoo casually loading a gun in the kitchen while trying to steal bits of her dinner when she wasn’t looking. Especially because these boys looked so young. Rocky reminded her very much of Sanha and she thinks they may be around the same age. She still flinches when she hears the click of the gun after it’s been loaded.

(One time, D.O. had thrown open her bedroom door in the middle of the night, eyes wild, shouting for Seulgi. He had been desperate, rambling on and on, indecipherable, and she hadn’t been able to stop staring at the gun in his hands, the way he had been waving it around.

Baekhyun had shown up, putting himself between D.O. and her, hands curling around D.O.’s shoulder as he talked him down, and Sunhee’s heart had been in , even as Baekhyun carefully maneuvered D.O. out of her bedroom.

That night had been terrifying—she could hear yelling down the hall, could hear crying, banging, a gunshot.

She had just wanted to go home, back to her bed, back to security.

Around four in the morning, in the midst of the chaos she could still hear through the thin walls, there had been a soft knock at her door, and it had taken every last bit of her sanity in her to raise her voice and call out a casual, unbothered, “Come in.”

And the door had inched open, Baekhyun slipping through before shutting it behind him, before he had just leaned back against the door, before he had eventually slid down the door and plopped down onto the floor. In the dim light of the night light humidifier Moonbin had gifted her randomly (for the food, he had said, before adding, and it must be ty living here, so maybe this will help) she could see the way Baekhyun’s pretty fingers were curled into fists at his sides, the shadows under his eyes, the slight hallow look in his eyes.

She had made a move to get up, but he shook his head, gesturing her to go back to sleep. She couldn’t, so she remained curled up on her side under the blankets, staring at Baekhyun, watching as he dropped his head back against the door, throat bared.

All he had said that night was, “Sorry. I just…I need to take a break. Is this okay?”

She had nodded, hadn’t pushed further.

She wasn’t sure when she fell asleep, but by the time her alarm went off and she was startled awake, he was gone, as if he had never even been there.

D.O. never apologized, but she had seen him lingering in the kitchen while she brewed her morning coffee, eyes rimmed red. She never asked. Seulgi never told her what happened, but Sunhee didn’t miss her red eyes either.)

And Seulgi.

Sunhee barely sees her. She knows Seulgi is now basically their in-house doctor. She sees Seulgi often, but Kai is always there—when they’d eat dinner together, when they’d go out to eat, just to get out of that house—Kai is always there. Sometimes, Sunhee walks into Seulgi’s room with Kai lounging on her bed. Sometimes, she can hear Seulgi giggling from down the hall. Sometimes, Sunhee sees Suho frowning at Kai and Seulgi and she hates that there is a moment where she relates to Suho.

Most of all, she feels like she is alone in this house, even with Seulgi so present in her life.

Most of all, she is sad.

There are meetings where she is told not to come out of her room, but she knows Seulgi can be present. During those meetings, Sunhee just lays in her bed and stares up at the ceiling, and a sadness she hasn’t felt in a very, very long time settles over her. It scares her a little, how sad and dejected she is becoming, how lonely, despite the amount of people who come and go through this house and even interact with her. Gang members, she finds, are either extremely friendly or immensely foreboding and mean—it’s always the two extremes.

(A gang member Baekhyun seems to be good friends with—Chen—is the former, while Chanyeol—who Baekhyun is also good friends with—is the latter. She isn’t sure she’s equipped to handle either of them, the extremity of their personalities is overwhelming for her.)

As the weeks go by, her sadness only becomes worse. She isn’t sure if Seulgi ever wants to go back to the house. Their landlord still hasn’t seemed to notice their absence; honestly, it would be strange if they did.

She hates it. Because Seulgi still spends time with her, still asks after her, and she hates that there is anger burning under her skin, hates that this hatred only turns into guilt. Hates how confused and upset she has become. Hates that she can’t sleep properly at night anymore, even if she locks her bedroom door.

~.~.~.~.~

“I have to get some work done first.” Baekhyun places a hand at the center of Sunhee’s back. He’s looking her directly in the eye as he says, “I’ll meet up with you once I’m done, okay?”

She makes a face, glancing behind him, where Chen and Chanyeol are having a quiet conversation while they lean against Baekhyun’s car. Chanyeol is smoking a cigarette, his eyes glowing slightly as he observes Sunhee and Baekhyun, a small smirk playing on his lips.

Baekhyun drums his fingers against her back and she brings her attention back on him. She mutters, “You’re really going to leave me with them?”

Even if Chen, at least, is nice, he’s still just as mischievous as Baekhyun. Besides, she’s still not entirely comfortable with them, since she’s only met them in passing since she’s moved into that house.

Baekhyun gives her a boxy grin, “They’re not that bad. I’m much, much worse, trust me.”

She scoffs and he rubs her back, the touch soothing.

(She tries not to think about how he hasn’t been hesitating to touch her like he used to anymore. The way he treats her has changed slightly since that night he slipped into her room and just sat there. She does not focus on that, instead focusing on the reason why she asked to go out with him tonight. She needs a distraction, a reason to feel alive, and she thinks a high-end club will do just the trick. She’s sick of feeling sad and numb and anxious and she would genuinely love to just dance the night away and get drunk as hell. She doesn’t want to think about how Seulgi turned down her invite because she was going out with Kai. Sunhee doesn’t want to think about how it’s her birthday soon and Seulgi probably hasn’t realized, due to everything going on.)

“I’ll see you soon.” He gently pushes her towards his friends and says, “Have fun.”

Chanyeol pushes off the car, towering over her. He has the audacity to laugh, his voice deep and low, before he puts an arm around her shoulders. “Let’s go get ed up.” He says, with a guffawing laugh.

She ducks out from under his arm, swatting at him.

Chen just laughs and she catches the blatant look the two of them exchange. She figures she was wrong. Chen is not the nice one.

~.~.~.~.~

“Damn, slow down a little.” Chen tilts his head, watching as she downs her fifth shot.

“No, thanks.” She shakes her head—her whole world teeters back and forth for a split second.

Chanyeol leans in towards them, his arms around their shoulders, pulling both Chen and Sunhee into a headlock of sorts—she’s starting to think Chanyeol has a tendency to do that, because Chen’s arm had automatically gone up to protect himself from being choked out (he could have warned her)—and he says, “If Baek’s friend wants to get faced, we’ve gotta help, Jongdae.”

Chen throws Chanyeol a sharp look. Chanyeol just laughs, tugging both of them closer by their necks. Sunhee reaches up, attempting and failing to pull out of his grip. Eventually she gives up, instead, glancing sideways at Chen—Jongdae must be his real name—and stage-whispering, “Don’t worry, I’m great at keeping secrets. Your name is safe with me.”

Chanyeol orders another round of shots. Jongdae scowls up at him, before meeting Sunhee’s eyes, “You know a lot of secrets, Shin?”

Sunhee nods, hums, “Mmhmm.”

She’s drunk as hell and currently trapped in a headlock by a boy who is one hundred eighty something centimeters and not as mean as she thought him to be, but she’s somehow more content than she had been in ages. Jongdae raises a brow, though, and she says, “Like, this girl in my science class in high school told me she had a big crush on her best friend’s brother and they’ve hooked up but—oh , I’m not supposed to tell you any of this.”

Chanyeol laughs, finally letting go of them as he pulls back, “Jongdae’s angelic face does that to people.”

Jongdae smacks Chanyeol in the chest. Chanyeol dramatically clutches at his chest, feigning a wounded expression. Jongdae says, “That’s not a spicy secret. Tell me something fun.”

She downs the shot Chanyeol pushes into her hands and she shrugs. The world isn’t quite spinning, but she feels like she is floating. She can’t stop smiling. She says, “It’s my birthday tomorrow. Is that fun?”

Jongdae’s eyes widen slightly, as if she caught him off guard, but Chanyeol shouts, “Bro, no way. Now you need to get faced. And laid.”

Jongdae rolls his eyes, “Probably not laid.”

Chanyeol blinks, “Why not?”

Sunhee nods in absolute agreement, “Yeah, why not?”

Jongdae’s brows furrow together, “Aren’t you and—, ow, Chanyeol, what the .”

Sunhee watches as Jongdae jumps in place, holding his leg, and Chanyeol just casually leans in and loudly informs the waiter to give the birthday girl some of the good stuff.

The good stuff is just very expensive whiskey and Sunhee deems Jongdae and Chanyeol as maybe-sort-of-friends, especially when Chanyeol drags her onto the dance floor and flails all over the place. Jongdae is drunk enough to get low and Chanyeol hypes him up so loudly, Sunhee’s cheeks hurt from laughing. She’s happy, she thinks.

Time passes so quickly and things start to blur—she holds Chanyeol’s hand a lot and he doesn’t seem to mind, she dances with Jongdae, she misses Seulgi, she asks where Baekhyun is, she makes out with a very pretty girl, she dances and dances until someone is shoving water into her hands, she is vaguely aware that there are other people trying to talk to her, but surprisingly, they leave her alone when she shakes her head at them—but she is happier than she has been a while.

She is happier.

~.~.~.~.~

The night dwindles out from the club and to a twenty-four-hour McDonald’s where she’s sharing fries with Chanyeol, her head resting on his shoulder while she watches Jongdae and Baekhyun carry over a tray of food.

Wait.

“Baekhyun?” She blinks, surprised, sitting up, “Where were you?”

“Got held up with work.” Baekhyun says as he slides into the booth across from her. His eyes flicker over her, a grin dancing on his pretty lips, “Did you have fun?”

She nods, “Maybe your friends aren’t that bad.”

Jongdae whines and Chanyeol grins.

Baekhyun laughs, says, “Good. I’m glad.”

She just sits there, eating her fries and chicken nuggets and listening to Chanyeol, Jongdae, and Baekhyun talk.

She is content.

She is happy, even as Baekhyun drops off Jongdae and Chanyeol first—Jongdae kisses her on the cheek and Chanyeol gives her a big hug—at their apartment. She is happy, despite the nagging thoughts of Seulgi settled at the back of her head.

But, the closer they get to that house, the more antsy she feels. The less content she feels.

When Baekhyun parks in front of the building, her heart flips.

(The distraction is over and now she’s back to reality, back to living in a gang headquarters and being acutely aware that her best friend is becoming anything but and it’s not even Seulgi’s fault because she doesn’t know how Sunhee feels, so how is it fair for Sunhee to blame her.)

Baekhyun breaks the silence first when he says, “Do you need help getting home?”

She shakes her head, doesn’t know how she’s supposed to say she doesn’t want to go back, doesn’t know how to say that these days she feels like she has no home.

She opens the car door, clambering out. He still gets out the car, still joins her at her side, holding out a hand for her to take. She threads her fingers through his and decides she likes holding his hand. She giggles when she stumbles over her own two feet and he says, “I should have warned you that Chanyeol likes to get people trashed.”

She shrugs, “That was the plan, anyway. So, it worked out.”

Baekhyun purses his lips, “Was it really?”

“My birthday’s tomorrow.” Baekhyun glances down at her. She can feel his eyes burning a hole into the top of her head while she focuses on putting in the passcode. The door beeps, clicking open. The house is dark and dreary, seemingly empty. She rubs her neck, awkward under his gaze, “Or, I guess it’s today. It’s past midnight.”

She makes a move to pull her hand out of his, but he doesn’t let go. She meets his gaze and his eyes have a softness to them she doesn’t think she’ll ever get used to. She reddens, gesturing awkwardly towards her bedroom. “I should, uh, get going. Thanks for tonight. I’ll just, um, I—woah.”

She’s startled when Baekhyun shuts the door behind him, toeing off his shoes as he lets go of her hand. His jaw is clenched, and he looks almost angry.

She blinks, confused and a little anxious; why is he angry?

He glances down at her heels, says, “You need help getting those off?”

His voice is a lot softer, kinder, than the clench in his jaw.

“What…oh, no, I got it.” She fumbles over her words, reaching down to unbuckle her heels. He reaches out and holds her steady by the elbow. It takes her much too long to get her heels off and she blames it on the alcohol still lingering in her system.

She straightens up, blinking at him, confused mostly, but eventually she turns on her heels and heads to her room. She leaves the door open. He follows, shutting it quietly behind her.

She plops down on her bed, bouncing slightly, and his eyes are sweet as he observes her. His gaze flickers over her form—she must look like a mess, dress bunched up, hair messy, eyeliner smudged, but she doesn’t feel awkward or embarrassed, surprisingly, her cheeks just feel warm—and she says, “Are you just going to stand there?”

She pats the spot next to her on the bed.

He plops down beside her and the awkwardness quickly dissipates when he makes himself comfortable. “Happy birthday.” He says, after a moment.

She turns to face him, raising a brow. She says, “Is that why you decided to come in? To wish me a happy birthday?”

He nods, smiling slightly. His voice is low, soft, as he says, “Is there anything you want?”

“To get laid.” She giggles, repeating what Chanyeol had said.

Baekhyun laughs. A comfortable silence fills the room, one she feels almost at home in.

She doesn’t want to bring down the mood, but it’s so quiet and she is a little buzzed still and Baekhyun seems to be waiting for her to say something.

“To get over Seulgi.” Her words settle into the stillness of the room and she wants to snatch them back the moment they leave .

There’s a stretch of silence, long too long. She turns slightly to gauge Baekhyun’s expression. He looks contemplative, thoughtful.

“I could help you with that.” He says, finally.

Her eyes flicker over his face, down to his pink lips, the way his tongue darts out. Her eyes shoot back up to his eyes, wide now, She thinks about Baekhyun that way and her cheeks redden inexplicably.

He snorts, clearly noticing the direction of her thoughts. “I was thinking along the lines of a bunch of day trips, you ert.” Baekhyun clutches his chest in mock horror.

She scowls, makes a move to kick him, and he easily grabs her bare ankle, laughing quietly now. His fingers are on her calf, drawing circles, and the way her stomach flips is indescribable. moves on its own accord as she says, “A distraction.” She says it quietly, “I just want a distraction.”

She knows she’s thinking of one thing, of Baekhyun’s fingers on her bare skin, of the way his tongue his lips, but day trips also sound appealing. She thinks she’ll do anything to forget about how much she ing loves Seulgi. Anything to forget that it’s her first birthday in years where Seulgi wasn’t the first to tell her happy birthday.

Maybe, she’s still entirely too drunk. Maybe, she’s being selfish.

It’s quiet for too long, much too long, and she is hyperaware of the way Baekhyun’s hand trails up her calf, how he massages tiny circles up, up, up and to the back of her knee. She is hyperaware of the way his sweet, kind eyes have darkened, how he tilts his head and his bottom lip is caught between his teeth.

He leans in, so close, and she blinks, startled by his proximity. She holds her breath. He smiles, a mischievous twinkle playing in his eyes. He breathes, “A day at the beach isn’t a good enough distraction?”

She blinks, owlish, her heart pounding in her chest. She manages to nod slightly, respond, “It’s fine. Perfect, actually.”

“What about Lotte World?” His breath fans her face and she’s distracted by his lips, by the way his fingers inch up the back of her thigh now, by how close he’s getting.

“I, uh, yes.” She hates the way her voice goes up a whole octave.

“Hiking?” He murmurs, his mouth just centimeters from hers.

She thinks she’s going to die. He must see it on her face because he grins before he leans in and leaves a peck on her forehead. She blinks up at him as he scoots back, dropping his hand, and gets to his feet. Her eyes are wide. She kind of wants to scream as she flops on the bed.

He says, “We’ll do all that and more.”

“I…um…what the , Baekhyun.” She stares at him, propped up on her elbows.

Baekhyun’s grin is so wide, she gets another urge to kick him. She’s drunk so she goes through with it. He easily grabs her ankle, again, and gently places her leg on the bed. Baekhyun grabs the end of the blanket and tosses it over her legs before he points out, “You’re drunk.”

“Yeah, but I…you…oh my god.” She groans, flopping back on her bed to stare at the ceiling.

Baekhyun leans over her and pats her cheek. He says, “Happy Birthday, Sunhee. I’ll see you later today.”

“Can you stay, at least?” She asks, quietly. She doesn’t know why she’s saying these kinds of things, why seems to have a mind of its own, but she is not in a state to care.

“As long as you keep your hands to yourself.” He says.

She rolls her eyes and he snickers.

a/n: not gonna lie, this chapter was projected to end differently, but I felt like this suited it better. As always, please let me know what you think about pacing, etc, and I love you all sooooooooo much thank you for supporting me kdjfnfdj