(words: ~2k)

It’s been a while! I’ll leave you to it, but hopefully you’ll read my little message at the end :)

~⑨④~

it’s a thursday night and jongin is reading in his room. looking at the time, he sees that it’s almost 11 so he closes the book and heads downstairs into the kitchen to grab a glass of water. he’d taken a really long nap earlier in the evening, so he doubts he’ll be able to sleep again anytime soon. a nap never really turns out to be a short one, does it?

jongin’s finished drinking his water and is rinsing his cup when he receives a message. drying his hands, he picks up his phone and checks his notifications. it’s from sehun.

From Sehun [10:54pm]: I’ll be at your place in about half an hour, give or take, so get dressed.

jongin frowns at the message and locks his phone. he plans on just going back to bed and ignoring the message, but something in his mind bugs him about it so he decides to do as requested. as said, sehun appears at his front door in all his glory about 20 minutes later. jongin takes in the appearance of his boyfriend dressed in a white button up and tight black ripped jeans, his hair messily styled.

he watches sehun take in his outfit as well. he’d chosen to go with a plain black shirt and black jeans, similar to the ones sehun is wearing. sehun nods and pulls jongin by the hand.

“come on, let’s go” sehun says as he drags jongin to a car parked in front of the house. when sehun opens the door on the passenger side, jongin stays rooted in his spot.

“who is driving? wait, who’s car is that?” he asks.

“all the pressure” sehun jokes, “but I’m driving. come on, get in” he urges. jongin gets it, although reluctantly, watching sehun carefully as he enters. he watches sehun walk round the front of the car and over to the driver’s side. when he takes out the car keys and turns on the ignition, jongin finally believes that sehun was serious.

“wait, since when did you get your licence? what the hell? how long have you been driving, are you good?”

sehun crinkles his nose, something jongin knows he does what he’s bombarded by too many questions.

“I took my test about a week ago I think?” sehun ponders. he then shifts into gear and starts driving. jongin tries to remain calm and keeps his hand close to the hand break as possible, but not obvious enough so that sehun would be offended that his boyfriend doesn’t trust his driving skills.

to his surprise, sehun is a really good driver, so jongin relaxes a little and turns his head a little to watch his boyfriend drive. sehun had often told him how much he liked admiring him from the passenger seat as jongin drove. now he understood why. seeing sehun concentrate on anything has always been one of jongin’s favourite things to watch, especially the way his boyfriend would open his mouth a little when he needs to focus extra hard on something.

“do I look cool?” sehun grins.

“very cool” jongin agrees. “where are we going?” he then asks when sehun makes a turn. sehun doesn’t reply and only hums. jongin doesn’t ask again, figuring it better to let sehun focus on his driving. however soon enough, jongin recognises the roads they’re on and realises that they were on their way to the city.

they’re at a red light and sehun turns to look at jongin. that’s when all the feelings that have been pent up for so long burst. properly looking at sehun’s face after so long is unable to stop him from leaning over and capturing sehun’s lips. when he pulls away, sehun has a smirk on his face.

“that was dangerous. you could get punished” sehun says, his eyes dancing with amusement.

“I really don’t care” jongin murmurs as he leans in again for another kiss before seating himself properly. the light turns green just in time and sehun continues driving, with him clearly trying to stop another grin from appearing on his face. jongin rolls his eyes and looks out the window, sporting a smile of his own.

sehun makes a turn and jongin notices they’re headed into a private parking lot. he doesn’t say anything and lets sehun drive, trusting him with whatever he’d got planned. the drive up the levels is quite steep and jongin has to hold on the side of the door to calm himself down. sehun must have noticed because he chuckles. when they reach the fourth floor of the lot, sehun drives to a specific spot and parks.

opening the door, jongin checks the side and sees that sehun’s managed to park perfectly.

“I’m impressed” he says out loud. he hears sehun scoff beside him as he gets out of the car. jongin follows and closes the door. locking the car, sehun holds his hand out and jongin walks up to him and grabs his hand. sehun fixes their hands so that their fingers are entwined.

looking at his watch, sehun notices the time and proceeds to lead jongin towards the exit of the parking lot so they can go out onto the streets. they’re walking through the streets that are illuminated by iridescent lights from buildings surrounding the city. soon the lights begin to fade away and the moon lights their path instead. they make their way past a merry-go-round that jongin remembers riding with sehun a few years back when they were younger, when they were only starting out their relationship.

they reach the harbour and sehun leads them down the steps so they’re closer to the water. with it being late at night, there’s no one around. sehun looks around and they continue up the harbour a little more till sehun’s satisfied with where they are. jongin’s looking at his surroundings as sehun glances at his watch. jongin spins around slowly, taking in his surroundings. it’s been a while since he’s been to this specific spot in the city harbour.

the usual bustle of the city streets is void of people, as it’s almost midnight. looking up at the night sky, jongin notices the full moon and smiles.

“so what are we do–”

before he can speak any further, sehun suddenly pulls jongin by the arm to bring him closer to him, his other hand cupping jongin’s jaw, and kisses him. jongin’s momentarily surprised but he quickly relaxes and brings a hand up to caress the back of sehun’s neck. with jongin responding, sehun deepens the kiss and pulls jongin even closer to him so their bodies were pressed right up against each other.

when they pull away, breathes short of air, sehun leans in again and pecks jongin on the lips. sehun rests their foreheads together and grazes his thumb across jongin’s bottom lip.

“happy anniversary” he whispers before leaning in again for another kiss.

they’re now seated on the steps by the wharf, hands entwined and gazing out the water. jongin tugs on their hands and pulls sehun closer till his body is leaning against jongin’s.

“so is that you’ve been doing the past few weeks?” jongin asks.

“no”

jongin glances down at sehun, who’s eyes remain in front of him.

“do you remember the guy you met at the convenience store that was with me?” sehun asks. jongin hums in reply. “yeah, he’s been helping me for the past couple of weeks. he’s five years older than us, fully licensed, and kind enough to lend me his car”

jongin pulls back, astonished. “that’s his car?”

“you know I’ve been on my learner’s for a while, but I never bothered to upgrade. then after you told me your reason for getting your license, I don’t know. I just wanted to, so I put a deadline to get it. I had to practise a lot though” sehun says. “apparently I have a feel for it” sehun grins.

“you are quite good” jongin admits.

“so you’ll let me drive your car–”

“not a chance” jongin says immediately. sehun huffs and bumps his shoulder against jongin’s. jongin then asks if that was the reason why sehun had been busier lately, to which sehun nods and continues.

“I also picked up a part time job at his dance studio…earning a little extra cash on the side for…”

“for?” jongin repeats. sehun pulls away from jongin and turns their bodies so they’re facing each other. he then sticks his hand in his pocket and pulls out something. jongin’s eyes zoom in on the card in sehun’s hands. it’s not just any ordinary card. it’s a hotel key card.

“there’s more to tonight, if you’re willing to. I’ve been waiting for the perfect moment and I’ve planned everything out but if you don’t want to then–”

“let’s go” jongin says, cutting sehun off.

“really?” sehun asks again, just to make sure he heard correctly. jongin leans in and kisses the corner of sehun’s mouth and stands up, pulling sehun along with him.

“lead the way” he says, tightening his grasp on sehun’s hand.

~⑨④~

they have a room booked in a hotel by the harbour. upon opening the door, jongin’s amazed by the interior. it wasn’t extravagantly decorated, which jongin liked because he never understood the romance behind having to clean up hundreds of rose petals.

“how did you afford all of this?” jongin wonders in amazement.

“junmyeon hyung and kyungsoo hyung pitched in to help a little as well” sehun answers. jongin whips his head towards sehun’s direction in shock. to think he’d gone to those two a few days ago, and they knew everything.

“how long were you working for?” jongin asks curiously.

“long enough. helping to run a dance studio is brutal, honestly. yixing hyung would make go through drills to make sure I knew the new choreography he made up. I don’t know how you do it” sehun complains.

“passion really overrides any form of pain” jongin says nonchalantly. sehun huffs and walks closer to jongin and says, “well, you’re my passion, so I guess it didn’t hurt as bad”

jongin rolls his eyes and laughs. he then stops and realises something.

“this is going to make my own present seem a little funny now” jongin frowns. sehun wraps his arms around jongin’s waist.

“what is it?”

jongin drums his fingers on sehun’s arm and thinks for a moment. “I planned out a dinner for us today, but this is so much better” jongin looks around the room again. sehun smiles and spins jongin around.

“I’d appreciate whatever you do for me, no matter what” he tells him, grazing the back of his fingers along jongin’s cheek. “but I guess in terms of extravagance, there’s no denying it. but I’d still rather something more sentimental than this. we’ll just check out earlier” sehun concludes.

“what? no, let’s just stay here, it's not something we'll do often. we can always have the dinner another day” jongin tells him. sehun frowns and looks at his boyfriend.

“are you sure?”

“positive” jongin smiles. sighing, sehun nods and moves them over to the bed. sitting on the edge of the bed, he pulls jongin closer till he’s between sehun’s knees. sehun tilts his head up to look at his boyfriend, who is looking down at him with adoring eyes.

“I feel like our roles have reversed today” jongin muses. sehun rolls his eyes and pokes jongin’s stomach, making him laugh. sehun’s unable to contain his smile when he hears jongin’s laugh.

“then I guess it’s time for me to step up my game. I’m going to be absolutely irresistible” sehun announces. jongin chuckles and leans forward so is face is closer to sehun’s.

“you already are” he says. the mood in the room suddenly shifts and the both of them know what’s about to happen. though they’ve been together for a long time, they decided to hold back until they were older, more mature, and more prepared.

“I know we don’t say it often but I love you. I really do. don’t ever forget that”

jongin brings a hand up to tilt sehun’s head back a little more and kisses him. they lower themselves on the bed and jongin crawls on top, his limbs on either side of sehun’s body. looking down at his boyfriend with loving eyes, jongin leans down and presses a kiss on his forehead, his nose, his cheeks and finally his lips.

“I love you too” he whispers.

that night, they finally gave themselves to each other in entirety, holding nothing back. they’ve got a new chapter of their lives ahead of them, with more responsibilities and more pressure to deal with. they don’t worry too much about it though, because they know that as long as they have each other, they know that they’ll have their support beside them, whenever either turn to look for it.

~⑨④~

Greetings, readers. It’s been a while! Sorry I left this hanging for a while, life really can get busy for the lazy and antisocial, apparently. Looking back at the chapters it makes me cringe to see so many mistakes in my writing, but I can never find the control to hold back and edit because as soon as I finish typing it up I’m just like “Oh, I NEED TO GET THIS UP! MUCH FUN, I HAVE FINISHED A CHAPTER!” and I plan on editing it later but of course that never happens.

Nevertheless, to shorten the message, thank you so much for reading ‘home is (in your arms)’. Check out my other stories too, if you’re interested! I’ll be finishing off ‘morning kisses’ next, so if you happen to read that too, I hope you’re looking forward to it!

ANYHOW, once again, thank you for reading.

Much love,

aekcso