Jongin finds her when everyone else has left and the building is almost empty. He hadn’t actually been searching for her when he stumbled upon the girl in the small dance studio, but when he stops to think about it, he decides he’s been searching for her for a long time now. It’s been days, weeks, months since he’s spent more than five minutes with her. And he misses her.

 

She doesn’t look up when he enters — typical. She is sitting upright, back against the wall almost uncomfortably, staring at empty space. Jongin slides down next to her without invitation. They are so close, he can almost feel the blood rushing through her veins where their arms touch. If she’s unnerved by their close proximity she doesn’t say anything. There’s no sound in the room except for their breathing for a while, and she is the first to break the silence.

 

"I’m a horrible person," she says in English.

 

Jongin doesn’t understand the language, but he can hear the self-loathing in her voice and wishes she would stop doing that to herself.

 

"I missed you," she continues in Korean, "You’re probably mad at me for not talking to you for so long. I’m mad at me for not talking to you for so long. It’s just, I’m no good with people and feelings and sometimes I just get overwhelmed by everyone and everything and I need to take a break and I go away for too long and I don’t know how to come back because I think everyone hates me for disappearing and then I just start to avoid people and I’ve been avoiding you and I —"

 

She stops speaking suddenly, realising that her sentence should have ended long ago. Jongin hears her release the breath she had been saving for the rest of her ramblings, and feels her drop her head onto his shoulder lazily.

 

"I’m sorry," she says, more sure of herself now. "Forgive me?"

 

He rests his head on top of hers, his hand finding hers and holding on tight. “Silly Soojung,” he teases, “There’s nothing to forgive.”

 

Jongin notices that she’s still tense. Despite her head on his shoulder and their interlocked fingers, he can feel the tension in her bones, like a wounded animal. She’s ready to spring away from him, and there is absolutely no way on earth he is going to let that happen.

 

"I forgive you anyway," he murmurs softly and her tension fades away (he imagines it melting away like butter on freshly made pancakes).

 

Soojung only ever allows herself to be like this in front of Jongin. He’s the only one who is permitted to see her when she gets like this — shy and lonely and oh so insecure. It isn’t because the others wouldn’t care. No, her band mates would probably pull all sorts of stupid stunts to try and cheer her up while Sooyeon would probably fuss over her non-stop. But sometimes, even when she feels lonely, Soojung wants to be left alone. Jongin never says much when she gets like this, and she likes it that way. She needs time to sort things out on her own, and she simply likes knowing that he’s there for her if she ever needs him.

 

(And the fact that Jongin likes to fill the silence with kisses is probably another reason why she likes hiding away with him.)

 

Jongin wakes Soojung up when he hears voices. The sun isn’t up yet but the working day has already started. Both of them have schedules to attend to. She blinks the sleep out of her eyes and gets up, offering her hand to the boy who accepts it with a grin.

 

"I’ll try not to disappear again," Soojung promises as she turns and heads towards the showers.

 

He watches her walk away, shaking his head slightly, a smile still playing on his lips. She says that now but Jongin knows her. He knows that at some point she’s going to start hiding away again, but that’s alright with him, because she always lets him find her eventually. And this game of hide-and-seek that they play only ever serves to make him love her even more.

 

And Jongin doesn’t think he could ever love her enough.