When I knocked on Taemin’s door, there was no answer. There wasn’t even so much as a rustling of sheets on a bed or the thumping of feet on the floor. I started to doubt he was even in there when I glanced back toward the living room where Jonghyun was leaning into the entrance of the hallway, miming wearing headphones and stage whispering “Just go in!”

Well, until Onew pulled him back from my sight with a glare and quiet, annoyed words.

Taking Jonghyun’s advice I reached my hand out, said a silent pep talk, closed my eyes and turned the door knob.

As I slowly opened my eyes, I found that Taemin was, in fact, lying on his bed dressed in grey sweatpants and a black tee shirt but he wasn’t looking at me. He didn’t even know I was in the same room as him because, just as Jonghyun had indicated, he was wearing a large pair of turquoise headphones and his eyes were closed.

I took the opportunity to quietly step into his room and shut the door behind me, my eyes taking in the space before me. His room was basically the same, if not a bit more messy. He had some clothes strewn on the floor, a couple dirty glasses on his desk and a pile of CDs on the floor next to his bed. How Key had ever let him keep his room this messy was beyond me, but then I thought back to what Onew had said before - He was pretty messed up for a while - and bit my lip.

I slowly began walking toward Taemin’s bed, watching as he sighed, readjusted his head and stilled again. God, he was flawless. The curve of his lips, the slope of his nose, the way his eyelashes rested on his cheeks. With or without makeup, he was perfect and I had ruined everything. Because I was a coward. Because I was an idiot. Because. Maybe it could have been different, but I’d never know that now.

As I reached the bedside, I kneeled down and folded my legs underneath myself. Taemin’s body suddenly stiffened and his eyebrows furrowed. He inhaled deeply and I watched as his eyebrows scrunched together further before his beautiful eyes slowly opened and stared at the ceiling. They swiveled down to my own and Taemin started, eyes big as saucers, and he ripped his headphones from his head.

“Jiyeon-ah,” he breathed out and pulled himself into a sitting position.

“Oppa,” I moved up to sit on the edge of his mattress. His eyes were still on me like he didn’t believe I was there.

“What are you doing here? How did you know we had a day off?”

“I called JiAh eonni at SM,” I smiled, referring to one of the coordi eonnis. He nodded in response and I took in the pallor of his skin, the tired puff of his eyes. “You look tired, Taeminnie.” My hand itched to reach out and touch his cheek.

“I am tired,” he smiled softly. “We’re about to release Sherlock. You know how it is.”

“They work you too hard,” I felt a frown pull at my face.

“It’s what I signed up for,” Taemin only shrugged.

I hummed in response, but I wasn’t really focusing. I knew that he worked hard, I’d seen him go from concept to concept and it had the same effect every time. What I was really thinking was how was I going to do what I had come here to do? How do you say goodbye like that? Forever.

“Jiyeon-ah,” Taemin murmured. A deep frown sat on his face and I started as his fingers brushed just below my left eye, but I leant into the touch all the same. I was so weak when it came to him. “Have you been crying?”

“Oh, uh…” I cleared my throat.

“Your mother again?”

“No, that’s not it. When I came in to the dorm Key-oppa was a bit upset…” I trailed off softly, letting my eyes fall to stare at my hands. It stung to think about what Key had said. He was so right.

Taemin’s hand dropped from my skin and he started shifting on his bed. I looked up to see him getting off his bed looking rather pissed. He was almost to the door when I stopped him.

“Oppa, wait! Wait,” I grabbed Taemin’s wrist.

“What did he say to you?” he near growled. I started for a moment, a bit shocked to hear him so angry.

“Nothing he just… He… Taemin-oppa, he was right.”

“What did he say,” Taemin insisted.

“He said that I was just going to sleep with you and leave. He said – he said… that I broke your heart,” I whispered the last part. It stung to think of hurting Taemin. But that was why I had to end the insanity, right? He needed to be happy again.

“,” he whispered. “!” he repeated a bit louder.

“Oppa,” I murmured and looked up into those big, beautiful eyes. “I’ll leave.”

“What?”

“I’ll leave. I’ll go and I’ll never talk to you or the other members ever again. That will fix this right?” I near pleaded. “Then you’ll be happy again.”

Taemin only stared at me in silence. He looked like he was torn between several different emotions. His face seemed to finally settle on a mixture between bewilderment, anger and exasperation.

“In what universe would you leaving make me happy?” he asked incredulously. “You don’t get it. You don’t ing get it! Oh my God.”

“I thought…”

“No! Jiyeon-ah don’t think! This is what you do. You think too much and then you freak yourself out and you run. You took my ity and you ing disappeared.”

“Your ity?” I asked in shock. Oh God that made it all so much worse.

“Of course! You’ve known me since we were fifteen. I’m eighteen and spend all my time with you or the rest of the guys. When have I ever had time for a love life?”

“Oh my God, Taemin!” my hands flew up to cover my face. “But this is why! I took advantage of you, I stole that experience from you!”

“No, you didn’t. Jiyeon-ah, I was drunk but I wasn’t out of my mind. I knew what I was doing. It shouldn’t have happened that way but we…We can forget about that, we can just pretend it never happened and go back to how things were. But…” Taemin trailed off here and he looked like he wanted to cry or scream or punch a wall. But he didn’t. He just let his shoulders sag. “Please. You’re the only one who stayed by me. The only one. And I need you. So don’t run, Jiyeon-ah. Don’t run. Not from me.”

I just stared up at him in silence. My eyes were full of unshed tears, blurring his face as my mind tried to digest everything he had said. He’d known what he was doing. He remembered. He still wanted me around. Did that mean…? I felt a few tears slip and then his hands were there, cupping my cheeks, thumbs catching my tears as they fell and wiping them from my skin.

“Taemin-oppa,” I whispered. “We can’t just be friends now.”

“Jiyeon-ah,” he whimpered in reply, looking terribly panicked. “Please…”

“I’m in love with you. I can’t just be your friend anymore.”

And Taemin laughed at that. His hands fell from my face, his arms wrapped around his middle and he laughed like I hadn’t seen him laugh in a long time. I jumped a bit in surprise and backed away from him. A pain blossomed in my heart, my stomach dropped to my feet. Was it really so funny that I should love him?

“Jiyeon-ah,” he gasped out as his laughter subsided. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” he said through leftover giggles. Hands on my shoulders, he looked into my eyes. “I’m laughing because… Jiyeon-ah, I’ve been in love with you since I was sixteen and a half and you broke your leg. I was at a commercial filming when I got your text and I panicked. I had to help you hobble around for a few weeks in between schedules, do you remember that?”

“Yeah,” I whispered.

“I knew then, because I realized I was more worried about you than I should have been. All this time and you never saw,” he smiled at me softly, and I wasn’t sure if the tears in his eyes were from previous laughter but I had a feeling that, maybe, they weren’t. “I thought you’d never love me back.”

“Oppa,” I broke out into a smile now, too. “I love you so much.”

And instead of answering me, Taemin leant down and captured my lips with his. It was a different kiss than the ones we shared that night after the party. This one was slow, soft and sweet; so sweet that my heart almost hurt from how much it swelled with that kiss.

And as his arms wrapped around my back and mine around his neck, as he deepened our kiss and my legs came up to enfold his hips, I felt the pieces of myself that had been falling apart slowly start to pull back together. I felt the parts of myself that had been warring with each other, fighting over every little thing, quiet down and fall silent.

Taemin laid me down on the bed softly, following soon after to crawl beside my hips. He smiled at me for a moment before leaning down again to capture my lips in another kiss, just as sweet but perhaps a bit more forceful. Then he pulled away and slid down the bed to rest his chin on my stomach, arms around my lower back.

“Oppa,” I sighed out with a giggle, running my fingers through his soft hair.

Taemin smiled and his eyes sparkled happily, in a way I haven’t seen them sparkle since well before the whole situation began. “I like when you call me that.”

“I know,” I laughed. “I especially noticed your reaction while we-“

“Yah!” he cut me off with an embarrassed laugh. “Don’t talk about that.” His face buried itself into my stomach. I just kept his hair and watched his head bounce with my laughs.

“It was kind of hot, actually,” I mused.

“Oh really?” his eyes were back on mine again, but this time with a look that caused a squirming in my stomach.

“Tae-“

“What?” he slinked back over my body, between my thighs. Thank God that I was lying down because the smirk on his face would have made my knees buckle.

“We can’t. The others-“ I cut myself off with a whimper as his lips locked onto my neck.

“I think they’ll be smart enough to not bother us. If I remember correctly, you’re not exactly quiet,” he spoke into my neck.

“Oppa!” I groaned in embarrassment but it quickly turned into a moan of pleasure when he rolled his hips into me at the sound of the honorific. “We can’t! Key-oppa already hates me! He’ll murder me.”

“ him,” Taemin responded simply.

And then he kissed me with such passion that I forgot what my argument had even been. When he pulled away, his lips found my ear.

“I love you,” his breath washed over my skin and I could have cried with the weight of the emotion that took over me at the moment. “I love you,” he whispered, this time against my cheek.

“I love you,” onto my closed eyelid.

“I love you,” onto the tip of my nose.

“I love you,” into my jaw.

“I love you,” into my neck.

“I love you,” into my collarbone.

And Taemin continued like that, kissing me and undressing me slowly until the words he kept whispering didn’t even sound like words anymore. Just sounds that he let out to lull me, calm me.

“I love you,” he whispered one last time as he entered me. I wanted to cry, choked on the sensation. All I could do was move against him, whimper as I got lost in him, and love him. Love him like I’d never loved anything before in my life.

I came to the realization then that, though I had told myself so much in the past, he had never been just Taemin. He’d always been special; he’d always been more.

I let a few tears slip as we made love. Not from sadness or fear or uncertainty. But from pure, unadulterated happiness. And Taemin was there to kiss them away, absorb every last one before it could stain my skin. He was there to catch me if I fell.

Just like he’d always been, just like he’d always be.

-------------------------------

So, surprise this is the last chapter!

I actually planned on writing two more parts but when I wrote this chapter it just flowed better together and wouldn't have made sense to split it in half.

Can you believe it's over? ;-;  Was it too cheesy? Tell me the truth... >_>   lol

So I went and saw SHINee in Osaka this past week. It was absolutely amazing and, actually, I got inspired and I may or may not be working on something new that may or may not involve a certain Lee Jinki... Also, keep paying attention because I'm considering posting some vignettes related to this story in Taemin's POV as suggested by a reader a bit ago.

Please comment on this! I am so curious about everyone's thoughts, especially now that it's over! 

Thank you so much for reading. ^_^

NOTE: I am not marking this story as complete because the "last chapter" will be a post saying that I'm starting to post the one-shots related to this story. That way all the subscribers from this story will know when they go up.