Awkward. That’s probably the one and only word Kyungha could think of to describe the situation. Sehun found her bikini top stuck on the side of one of the rocks near the cove. She’d made him turn around, so she could put it on again.

He’d laughed at her, which made sense. But she was embarrassed.

When she got back onshore, she was still twitchy—Kyungha had never wanted relief so badly in her life. She craves it, but she’s afraid that even her cute battery-operated toy won’t be able to satiate herself. Kyungha tries not to look at Sehun. To her annoyance, she does look at him. Often. And to an even bigger extent, he’d seemed fine.

Completely fine. Smiling like always. Like he wasn’t affected whatsoever.

This made Kyungha feel pathetic. She didn’t want to be the only one missing his touch again. She definitely didn’t want to be the only one reliving the moment over and over again. She couldn’t shut off her brain and at times like these, she’d wish she could actually stab her brain—somehow shut off these thoughts.

Because she couldn’t figure out how to handle her sudden arousal, she’d resorted to avoiding him. Sehun probably sensed her discomfort, but he didn’t pry. That made her feel a surprising pang of loneliness. What the hell? Did Kyungha hit her head? She’d hoped that was the case. The alternative was too terrifying to consider.

“Did you all have fun?” Her mom asks, greeting them at her door.

Kyungsoo smiles, exhaustion laying heavy on his face. “Lots. I’m just going to take a quick nap before tonight.”

Everyone seems to disperse in different directions. Jungkook, Soleil, and Taeyong were standing on wobbly feet, so Kyungha assumes they were going to nap as well.

Sehun crashes the minute he gets to her room. She’d watched him collapse on her bed and within five minutes, he was passed out. Kyungha finishes changing into new clothes speedily. She’d decided to shower at the end of the night since it was kind of pointless to shower twice. There’d be residual smell from charcoal later anyway.

She throws her hair into a quick bun, peering over him. He looks so innocent and boyish, which is an odd observation, considering the fact that they were eating each other’s faces off in the middle of the sea just a couple of hours ago.

Kyungha ghosts her fingers over his lips. Unwanted images pass through her mind almost immediately. She jerks her hand back, her heart racing.

She stands to leave abruptly. Kyungha imagines crumpling up the memories. Then, she closes her eyes, taking a deep breath, and imagines chucking it far away. She was going to forget and that was the best way for everything to go back to normal.

She’d tried to convince herself that everything could go back to normal, but frankly, it was useless. Because Kyungha wanted it again. She’d wanted to go back to the sea—no, she needed to feel his lips again—and kiss him until she felt like it was enough. But she wasn’t an idiot. It would never be enough.

The yearning in her tummy. The squeezing in her chest. She was afraid that if she came to her conclusion, she’d be stuck with the fact that he was the only one she’d wanted to share a kiss with—to share a hug with, to cuddle, to do mushy things that she’d otherwise never consider.

Kyungha and her mom prepare for the July 4th barbecue in her yard. Kyungsoo got up an hour later and helped start the grill. Around evening, her mom introduces them to her boyfriend who insisted they called him Henry instead of Mr. Park.

He was a nice man, a few inches taller than her mom. He had an eloquent air to him like he was from money, but it didn’t seem to matter between him and her mom. They both seemed happy, and that was all Kyungha really cared about.

Her mom assigned her to the task of waking up the sleepyheads. By the time she was inside, Taeyong and Jungkook were already up and messing around.

“Where’s Sol?” Kyungha questions them.

Taeyong answers, “noona’s in the bathroom,” before going back to screaming and charging at a terrified Jungkook.

Kyungha sends Jungkook a meaningful glance before leaving to wake Sehun, who is still passed out dead. She leans over him, shaking him by his shoulders.

He groans but doesn’t wake. She moves to straddle him. “Hello? Is anyone in there?” She asks, knocking on his head lightly.

His eyes flutter open, and his eyes immediately crinkle when he sees her. “I like that the first thing I see when I wake up is you in my lap.”

Kyungha snorts but doesn’t get off. Instead, she does something completely out of her character. It doesn’t only surprise her, but him too. She isn’t sure if it’s a good thing that he’s personally affected her actions and thoughts.

Still straddling him, she bends over, snuggling her head between the crook of his neck. She inhales his smell—her favorite smell. But she’d never tell him that. For obvious reasons that involved his already big ego. Kyungha’s fingers curl around his t-shirt, squeezing.

He chuckles, his warm laughter brushing across her ears, sending shivers down her spine and warm tingly zaps throughout her body. Sehun runs his hands up from her thighs to her side—up her back until he wraps them over her upper back, pulling her tighter against him. She exhales with gratification.

Simply because she appreciates how good he feels pressed against her. And maybe also the fact that he wasn’t teasing her about this—otherwise, she wouldn’t be able to live with herself anymore.

“Did you miss me that much?” He jokes.

Kyungha answers honestly, “yeah.”

Sehun grows quiet. “We should talk about what happened.”

She feels the racing of the panic and anxiety course through her bloodstream. Kyungha immediately deflects, “it was just a spur of the moment. It was nothing.”

Regret. Immediate regret slaps her across the face. She can physically feel the distance grow between them as soon as the words had left . Sehun stiffens, and then she stiffens. Kyungha jerks back, his grip already loose like he’s resigned, so it was easier than she expected. Quite frankly, she was disappointed by how easy it was. How easy it was for her to lose him.

She was never guaranteed anything in the first place. Not his adoration, not the center of his attention, not his kisses—or his hugs.

She could feel him shrinking away. Kyungha could feel her barrier hardening again, and it was breaking her. She was painfully aware of how her lies were useless at protecting her.

“We should go,” Sehun says, his smile not quite reaching his eyes.

Kyungha’s noticed the distance. It wasn’t obvious to others, but to her, it was like a thorn up her side. She couldn’t put her finger on it. She couldn’t just pull it out, but she could feel it. Stinging and clinging to her. The anxiety. The guilt.

She watches as he messes around with Haeeun from across the wooden picnic table. Kyungha finds herself wishing he was here instead, but then she can really only blame herself.

She catches her mom and Henry speaking to each other, glancing at her briefly. Her eyes question them, and Henry smiles, acknowledging her. “My daughter’s at the door. Would you mind getting it?”

Kyungha returns a cordial smile, getting up to do as he says. She abandons her food that didn’t seem as appetizing anymore.

When she pulls the front door open, a woman who’d looked to be around her mid-twenties greeted her with a cheery smile. Kyungha’s habit of analyzing people took over and she’d already begun scanning the woman head to toe.

The older was sporting a flowery sundress that stopped modestly above her lower thighs. Her eyes were almond-shaped, lips perked up as if they were familiar to being used all the time, and Kyungha came to the conclusion that she was indeed pretty. Not just her natural beauty but the way she held herself. Confident. Content. The woman tousled her long, wavy chestnut brown hair before tilting her head to glance behind Kyungha. “Hi, I’m here for the barbecue?”

Kyungha nods. “I’m Kyungha. I’m guessing you’re Henry’s daughter.”

“Ah, did he talk about me?”

“A bit.”

“I see.” She laughs lightly, her laugh—bright and flowery like her dress. “Well, I’m Minjung. Park Minjung. Nice to meet you, Kyungha.” She holds out a hand, and Kyungha takes it. Her grip is firm, and she feels kind of threatened, which is stupid because she doesn’t even know of what.

She leads Minjung out to the backyard where everyone is. Taeyong, in the midst of running, skids to a stop. His jaw is wide. The little boy blinks rapidly. “Wow, you’re pretty,” he comments unabashedly.

Minjung laughs again, crouching to ruffle his hair. And the rascal lets her do it. Taeyong never lets anyone mess with his hair—not without doing something terrible in return.

Kyungha scoffs under her breath.

“Thank you, erm—“

“My name’s Taeyong!”

“Hi, Taeyong. I’m Minjung.”

“I like you, noona. Will you be my girlfriend?”

Kyungha chokes on a laugh. “Maybe when you’re not a snotty-nosed brat anymore,” she mocks, tapping his head with her index finger.

Taeyong glares at Kyungha. “You’re just jealous that I didn’t ask you.”

Minjung waves her hand. “How about I get back to you?”

The rascal seems to bite onto her bait and runs off to mess with the other adults. Kyungha leads her further into the yard until Henry catches sight of her. She watches them share a brief hug, and then he’s introducing her to everyone else.

Kyungha doesn’t miss the glimmer in Minjung’s eyes when Sehun introduces himself. Her chest grows tight as he begins to grow comfortable and throws in a couple of jokes here and there.

The rest of the night, she hangs around Jungkook and Soleil, who is blissfully unaware of how pissed Kyungha is inward.

She went from watching Minjung and Sehun converse about their jobs—surprise, surprise, Minjung is a medical resident—to laughing and arms touching. And what did she want to specialize in? Surgery. Things just couldn’t be more perfect.

Kyungha couldn’t understand why she wanted to rip Minjung’s perfect hair off. As far as she knew, Minjung was perfect with her demure, sparkly personality, and her perfect teeth, perfect skin, perfect everything.

Then, there was Kyungha. Simply jealous. Stupidly jealous. Because of Sehun? Yes, and she’d felt like a for it.

“Noona,” Jungkook calls.

She blinks. “Sorry, what?”

Soleil grins comedically. “Kyungie, I think they’ll notice if you glare some more.”

Kyungha feigns, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Jungkook nudges her. “Liar, liar, pants on fire. Hanging from a telephone wire~” He chirps. “You should go get your man before Minjung steals him.”

Kyungha kicks him lightly. “He’s not my man, and it’s noona to you.”

He turns his nose in distaste. “I don’t want to call her noona.”

“Why not?” Soleil asks with blinking curiosity.

Jungkook sighs. “Because she didn’t even try to talk to any of us before she stuck to Hoonie like glue.”

Kyungha adds, “she did. Her dad, Mom, Kyungsoo, Jongin—I think?”

Her nephew shakes his head. “To be polite, duh! She doesn’t really care. Normally, people would be gossiping with Haeeun at this point.”

Kyungha is quiet because he’s made a good point. Haeeun had a charm that made strangers want to converse with her, and she was interesting to talk to with her wit and humor.

But it didn’t seem like Minjung was interested in girl talk. She’d seemed to prefer the presence of a handsome man instead.

Kyungha didn’t doubt that he was probably charming the pants off of her.

And she was right.

“Where are you guys going?” Jongin asks Minjung and Sehun.

Sehun smiles at his friends. “Out for drinks. She said she was paying, so how could I say no?”

Haeeun gasps delightfully. “Oh my gosh! Sehunnie? Are you finally going to get out of your ten-year dry spell?”

Minjung laughs at that. To which, Sehun rolls his eyes. “Baekhyun, get your woman before I embarrass her with real facts.”

Kyungsoo smacks Sehun’s , winking. “I got her. You both have fun. Don’t stay out too late! And use condoms!”

Kyungha is in disbelief. A mix of loneliness, jealousy, and hurt. She bites the inside of her cheeks, walking up the group of nosy adults pestering the two with suggestive jokes. Sehun glances at her briefly, and then he looks away. She scoffs. Seriously?

Okay so maybe she was wrong. She shouldn’t have called their kiss "nothing". Kyungha didn’t know that he would react like this. She didn’t count on the kiss changing everything. Stupid. How stupid was that?

Of course, it would change everything. This means that there were other things in play. Feelings. Feelings that Kyungha didn’t want to admit to. Not anymore seeing how it was so easy for him to put up his walls—charm other women, completely erasing any evidence of what happened today.

What happened during the wedding—what happened this past month. She squeezes her fist at her side, digging into blouse so no one would notice. Who was she kidding?

That’s exactly what she’d been doing. She was a hypocrite, and she had nothing on him.

“Bye, Minjung. It was nice to meet you,” Kyungha says, trying her hardest to hold up her friendly facade.

Minjung, thankfully, doesn’t notice. “I’ll see you around, Kyungha.” This could insinuate two things. Either the woman hoped her dad’s relationship worked out or she’d hope things would work out with Sehun. Was Kyungha overanalyzing this? Possibly. Could she be wrong? Possibly. Was she jealous? Only out of her ing mind jealous.

And little did Kyungha know just how true her words were.

Her mom casually throws an arm over her, lowering her voice so only her daughter could hear. “Honey, be nice.”

Kyungha takes a deep breath, releasing the pressure in her jaw. “Same.” She glances coldly at blissfully ignorant Sehun. “Have a nice night, you two.”

“Are you dating Minjung?” Kyungha asks out of nowhere one day. It was the wrong question. She should’ve held it in. For ’s sake, she was snuggled up on his lap as he flipped through his charts.

Sehun pauses, blinking at her. “No, we’re friends. Why?”

Kyungha hums, “just curious. I mean, you guys seemed close.”

He purses his lips. “Not really.”

“Really? Because I beg to differ. You check your phone almost every minute when you’re with me or around our family and friends,” she points out.

“I guess that’s true. Minjung’s funny. We have the same humor, so I like texting her.”

His confession makes her feel worse. And to clarify, she was sitting on his lap. They were in his apartment. And it was the second night in the row that she’d stayed over. “Okay, I believe you.” It was more of a ploy to get him to shut up because Kyungha didn’t care to know anymore.

She becomes distracted by the fabric of his t-shirt, and he goes back to reading his paperwork. Silence fills the space, until he breaks it, “sweetheart, what are we?”

Kyungha let his question fill her head—all her brain space. Funny. As if he didn’t already fill her brain to the brim on a daily basis. “I don’t know.” Her answer is barely above the low hum of car engines and the echo of people.

He sighs but doesn’t ask.

“Why do you want to define our relationship?” She asks.

Sehun blinks back to her. “Why shouldn’t I define our relationship?”

“Because it’s complicated.”

“Only because you make it complicated, sweetheart.”

She bites her lip. “Then what do you want?”

He stills. “It’s not what I want. You can’t just ask me that and expect me to have an answer.”

“See? You’re as ing confused as I am. Stop trying to make me the bad guy.”

His jaw tenses. “Why are you getting angry?”

“I’m not angry,” she lies.

Sehun scoffs. “I’m not stupid.”

“You are stupid,” she snaps.

“Get off of me, Kyungha.”

Kyungha pushes herself off of him. “Why are we even fighting?”

Sehun threads his fingers through his hair. “I don’t know.”

“Of course, you don’t.”

“And you do?”

“This is why things shouldn’t get serious between us. We obviously can’t ing handle it.”

Sehun grits his teeth. “Sweetheart,” he warns.

“I can’t. I can’t define whatever this is. You’re always ing around. You’re pulling me in one day, flirting nonstop. And then the next, there’s this space wedged between us! And you’re always texting Minjung.”

Kyungha doesn’t know where the last part came from.

“So you’re jealous? Is this what this is?”

“I’m not jealous, . You’re not even worth it.”

“Take that back, Kyungha. You don’t mean it.”

“I’m not taking anything back,” she spats.

“Then you aren’t worth it either.”

It stings. More than she could handle. Her lungs burn like she’d been running a mile for the past few minutes. But she hadn’t. She was spewing words that she didn’t mean. She didn’t mean any of them, but they just came out. And then it was too late.

“Goodbye, Sehun.”

“Give me back my key,” he murmurs.

Kyungha whirls around so fast, her pulse tripping. “What the ? Are you actually serious?”

Well, he’s not laughing, so there’s her answer.

“I lost it,” she seethes. Her lie is blatant.

Sehun looks resigned. “Just go, Kyungha.”

And then she’s leaving. The rush of air suffocating her. The wind stinging her face. She can’t get out fast enough. Her shoes aren’t on all the way. She didn’t bother to lace them back up. She just wanted to get out.

After they got back from the trip, things were weird between them. But not talking about it helped. Sehun was the same as always. He’d mess around with her, teasing her like he normally did.

Kyungha had found herself over at his apartment with food more than she could count on her fingers. Eventually, he gave her a copy of his keys so she wouldn’t have to wait outside his door anymore.

Then, it escalated. She’d find herself waking up in his arms. Or the opposite. There was no discrimination in spooning. Sometimes she’d stay over his apartment or he’d come over. And they were able to sneak him out with the help of Jungkook’s window.

Then, it escalated again. He would openly hug her when they were alone, and he’d pull her into his lap and ask about her day.

She’d answer and then he’d laugh about how uptight she was. Then, he’d tell her about his day, painting vivid images of his interaction with patients and his friends at work. She’d fall into a daze, listening to him talk. Her favorite thing about him was his voice. His honey voice, his boyish laugh—the way his voice felt when she was pressed up against his chest. She appreciated that he liked to talk because she didn’t. She was a listener, and as long as he was around, she’d listen to him. Always.

And things were good. When they didn’t question their status. Or talked about anything deeper than what things appeared to be.

Kyungha thought that she could just accept that their dynamic had changed, but Sehun wasn’t satisfied with it. Clearly. She could tell by the hesitation in his touches. The restraint when sometimes he leaned in to kiss her but forgot that he wasn’t supposed to. Because they weren’t dating. They weren’t screwing either. And they definitely weren’t friends.

Friends don’t exchange meaningful glances—at least not the ones that Sehun shared with her when he found something funny or when he wanted to . Friends don’t share intimate hugs when they have sleepovers—not in the way that Sehun curls his fingers tightly into her skin, almost possessive. Friends don’t lie to their siblings so they could satiate their need to see the other person—not like Kyungha who hides the other part of her life from her brother.

She was afraid of the person she was becoming. She was afraid to come in terms with the side that she’d tried so desperately to push out. Until it was too late, and she’d ed it up. And then, Kyungha had to forget. She never had the chance to admit to her feelings, so how could she be foolish to think that it wouldn’t come back to bite in her in the ?

Kyungha didn’t know. She’d just push her problems to the next day, convincing herself she’d get to it eventually. But she never did. It was a constant race with herself. And Kyungha couldn’t stop because she was already in far too deep.