Alcohol and was all Taekwoon could smell when he took a step into the club. This was definitely the last place he would like to be spotted, but Hakyeon was getting married soon, and he decided that he needed an epic bachelor’s party that may possibly end up with one of their friends getting laid. Why he ever hung out with such a lame group of boys remains a mystery, but he and Hakyeon had been best friends since forever, and he couldn’t not attend his bachelor’s party.

Standing in the doorway, a sigh leaves his lips already as he looks around with the hopes of finding his friends. He’s soon interrupted by a slight shove. It’s annoying, but he’s at a club so he doesn’t hold the person up to it.

Not until he hears the apology.

His ears perk up at the sound of a familiar voice, and he can’t believe the sight in front of his eyes. He almost pinches himself to make sure he isn’t dreaming, but with the way the female in front of her says his voice, he knows he isn’t.

“Taekwoon-ah.”

Her voice is still the same soft voice that he remembers, and he’s surprised he can even hear her over the loud music, but it’s like the rest of the club silenced itself, and the only thing he could hear was her. While her voice stayed the same, her eyes were different. A lot different. They used to be filled with dreams and passion, but now they were empty. Completely empty.

“Bae Joohyun. What are you doing here?” Looking down at her, he’s at a loss for words. There’s so much he wants to ask her, including what she’s been doing for the five years since high school ended, what she’s doing now, why she suddenly left, and why she’s dressed like that--

“I can’t talk right now,” she interrupts his thoughts, and he can’t help but notice that her voice is shaking as if she was scared of something. He wants to grab her and pull her into his embrace so he can tell her that everything is going to be okay, but he doesn’t know anything about her anymore. And so he just stands there in silence. Like a fool, an idiot, and just like that day she walked away from him.

Grabbing a random waiter that was walking by, she grabbed the poor fella’s pen right out of his pocket and then grabbed his own wrist. Before he could ask her what she was doing, her number was quickly scribbled across his palm and as quickly as she reappeared in front of his eyes, she had walked away. Again. For the second time in his life.

“Taekwoon hyung already got a girl’s number, and he’s been here for like five minutes! This is so unfair!” Sanghyuk had a slight pout on his face that had everybody else in the room laughing, but Taekwoon was too engrossed in his own thoughts. He was positive that was Bae Joohyun he had seen, but he couldn’t imagine what she would be doing in a place like this. Of course, she was probably thinking the same thing. That is if she was thinking about him at all.

His thoughts were giving him a headache as there were so many things passing through his mind. Frustrated, he grabbed a random glass that was on the table and shot down whatever was in it. The liquor burned his throat, he was never great at drinking, but it was exactly what he needed.

“Did you guys see that? Taekwoon hyung is actually drinking!” An arm is thrown around his shoulder by the youngest, and Taekwoon is too tired to even shrug it off like he usually does. He’s acting odd, and he knows it, but he doesn’t have the energy to think about it at the moment. The only thing lingering in his head is Joohyun.

Staring down at the number scribbled across his palm, he quickly takes out his phone and saves it in case something happens that night, and he loses it.

He wasn’t going to lose her again. Not if he could help it.

The rest of the night passes by like a blur, and he doesn’t remember most of it until the next day when Hakyeon wakes him up in the morning, telling him he’s going to need help recovering from his awful hangover, and boy was he right. The moment he woke up, he couldn’t even remember where he was and how he got there. Thankfully nothing must have happened because it ended up just being Hakyeon’s place.

They’re at the dining table, and Taekwoon is busy eating, but he’s not an idiot to realize that his friend had been staring into his soul for the last ten minutes.

“Do you want to eat too, or do you want something from him?” He puts down his spoon, a frown making its way across his face because of the uncomfort. He wasn’t sure if the food was going down his throat or through his nose because of Hakyeon’s intense stare.

The boy across from him clears his throat before tilting his head to one side. Taekwoon knew the look Hakyeon had across his face. It was the same one he used to give Jaehwan back in high school when he was about to question him about the missing food from his lunchbox.

Before Hakyeon can start questioning him, Taekwoon shakes his head, bringing a hand up to support his head that was pounding. “I know what you’re thinking--”

“You were acting different yesterday,” his friend states the obvious to him, and he can’t help but roll his eyes. “Like really different. You should have seen your face. You looked like you saw a ghost or something--”

“Almost.” The words slip out of his mouth almost on accident, but he’s been itching to tell Hakyeon since last night anyway so it’s not a total accident. “It might have been worse.” The confused look on his friend’s face deepens, and he can’t help but chuckle just a bit before taking a sip from the glass of water that was set out for him. “I saw Joohyun.”

It must take his friend a moment to realize who he’s talking about, but the moment he figures it all out, Hakyeon’s face is identical to his own yesterday. A grim smile had settled across his face as he rubbed the nape of his neck.

“Joohyun? As in Bae Joohyun? As in the one that just disappeared all of a sudden--”

“Yes. That one. What other Joohyun do we know?” The words come out a bit harsher than he had planned, but the look on his friend’s face tells him that he’s not hurt at all; he’s worried.

Running a hand through his hair, he tries his best to collect his thoughts, but the only thing on his mind is her. She had been the only thing for the past 7 years, and he feels like an absolute fool for not being able to forget her.

But then again, they say that a man’s first love is impossible to forget.

( They’re in their first year of high school when they first meet.

Taekwoon was sitting in his seat, trying his best to get Hakyeon off his back about what he was doing last night. His best friend had always been too nosy, but he didn’t mind it all that much.

Then she walked in. A transfer student from Daegu, and the moment he laid his eyes on her, he thought she was beautiful. She still had an accent, but he found it cute, and she was obviously shy with the way she couldn’t seem to meet eyes with anybody except the floor. Taekwoon was never a man of many words as well, and it almost made him relieved to find someone similar to him.

It didn’t help that she ended up sitting next to him. They were both too shy to say hello, and Hakyeon had to introduce Taekwoon to her, but all his embarrassment seemed to wash away with her smile, and her polite introduction, her daegu accent sounding like a beautiful melody to his Seoul ears.

They sort of naturally become friends after that. She’s amazing at math and physics, and he kind of at both of those so she helps him out. Meanwhile, she despises world history and literature, and he was always fond of that, and so he helps her out. It’s sort of a win-win situation.

It’s hard for him to forget the moment he realized that he actually liked her. Like, like like her. It was hard for him to admit it, but when he saw her in that baby blue dress for homecoming, he couldn’t deny it anymore.

Taekwoon didn’t believe in romance. he thought that it was all lies made up by big corporations so they could sell their romantic comedies or fantasy romances. But all those thoughts came crumbling down that night when he saw her coming out of her house. He had asked her out as friends, and she was more than excited. Apparently she always wondered what Seoul dances were like because the ones at Daegu were nothing special.

Seoul dances weren’t special either is what he replied with, but he realized that his thoughts would change after the night with her. What made the night special wasn’t the dance itself, but it was who you spent it with.

After that night, he could feel himself slowly falling for her. Every little thing she did had his heart racing, and he couldn’t even properly help her out with her history homework anymore because he was too busy staring at her beautiful face.

He was afraid of sharing his thoughts to anybody, but thankfully he didn’t have to because Hakyeon catches on fast, and he always seemed to know Taekwoon better than he did himself. It was Hakyeon who told him he should go for it, and that the worst that could come out of it would be awkwardness for a while. (“but she’s joohyun. she’ll get over it faster than you could even deny the words ever came out of your mouth.”)

That’s the story of how Jung Taekwoon ended up confessing to Bae Joohyun. It consisted of numerous stutters, mess-ups, and bites of the lip due to uncertainty, but Joohyun was basically an angel from heaven, and she laughed at everything with her bright laugh and accepted the shabby single rose he had held out to her.

Everything about their story screamed cliche, and he hated cliches, but he loved Joohyun. His whole life was an oxymoron because Joohyun herself was a cliche. A sad, pitiful cliche that just needed someone to hold onto her, and he tried. He tried.

He really tried. )

It’s just like the day Hakyeon pushed Taekwoon to confess.

His best friend had been on the phone with him for about an hour now simply listening to him stutter and contemplate all the pros and cons of calling her, and Hakyeon’s so sick of it that Taekwoon’s sure the phone’s just on speaker phone, and he’s walked away from it.

Believing that he’s bothered his friend enough, he finally hangs up, staring at the number that he had inserted into his phone but couldn’t bring himself to press ‘dial’. A deep groan left from his throat as he lied back down onto his bed. The last time he was this nervous was when he had asked her out years ago.

“I can’t do this,” is what he tells himself as he slowly gets up at the sound of his door ringing. He assumes it’s most likely Hakyeon because he always comes around with pizza whenever Taekwoon is having a hard time.

He makes his way to the door, an obvious frustrated expression on his face as he opens it up.

“Hakyeon, you should know that my door is basically always open--”

But Hakyeon’s not alone. No, there’s a surprise. Hakyeon and his ing surprises. His brain stops functioning properly because he’s standing there absolutely frozen. She looks a little different, but then again, the location is much different from yesterday. A white blouse, jeans, and sneakers; she hasn’t changed at all.

Reading Taekwoon’s mind like always, Hakyeon welcomes himself in, dragging Joohyun in with him. “Can you believe who I met at the pizza store just now? Bae Joohyun! How long has it been since we last saw her?”

“6 years,” he answers almost too quickly, and he can hear his friend snickering under his breath.  “But who’s keeping count, right?” Good job at trying to keep it subtle, Jung Taekwoon. He’s mentally slapping himself, but it looks like she’s almost as nervous as he is, and he isn’t sure if that’s an assurance or a worry.

Everything about this situation is too uncomfortable for him. And probably for her as well. The only person that seems to be enjoying the awkwardness is Cha ing Hakyeon, and he’s ready to kill his friend, but Joohyun was always against violence.

Several silent moments go by, and Taekwoon is still standing in front of the doorway, not sure what to do. It seems that Joohyun has relaxed a little because she’s looking around the house, and he can’t help but silently curse under his breath because his apartment is absolutely filthy, and this is not what he wanted to show her.

“The place isn’t usually this dirty, I swear.” Nobody asked him, but he felt that he had to clarify that. However, knowing Joohyun, that was probably the last thing on her mind. She was probably trying to observe how he had set everything up, trying her best to avoid the pictures of them on the wall that he hadn’t been able to take down.

“It’s a nice place,” she speaks for the first time since she’s walked into his house. “But I’ll look around later. Right now, I think the pizza is getting cold and cold pizza is not the best tasting.” An awkward smile spread across her face as she makes her way to his kitchen. “I’ll grab the plates.”

It takes him a moment to realize that this is her first time at his apartment, and she most likely doesn’t know where the plates are. “Wait! You’re not going to be able to reach them,” he says as he follows her behind.

And just like he expected, she’s struggling to reach the plates that are placed on the highest shelf. “You’re never going to be able to reach them,” he explains as a sigh leaves his lips. “Bae Joohyun, you haven’t grown one bit. Still the same height.” The words almost come out naturally, and he hasn’t realized that he had brought up the past until she’s staring at him with a startled expression on her face.

However, he’s too occupied with the plates to realize anything, and it’s only after he’s standing right behind her, reaching up over her head to grab the fine china. Their height difference was always something that Joohyun had stated that she liked about their relationship. Something about how girls like being able to lean on a guy’s shoulders, and that his shoulders were absolutely the best. It’s during moments like these where he understands what she means.

His face is far above her’s, but even this distance seems too close for them anymore. Their bodies are flushed together, and he can see her face turning a bright red. He’s awfully too embarrassed himself to move, and it takes her pushing him away from her for him to realize what really happened. But before he can start apologizing (for what?), she’s already making her way out of the kitchen, fanning herself.

He completely forgets Hakyeon’s still there as he chases behind her, grabbing for her wrist, but she’s become faster, and she’s already putting her shoes on, blabbering out some excuse about how she has to go home because her dog needs to be fed or something.

Ignoring his friend’s confused face, he slowly drops down to take a seat on his couch, waving for Hakyeon to leave.

His best friend knows him too well because he silently walks out, leaving Taekwoon by himself.

And it’s sad because he’s so used to it.

There’s a knock on his door. Checking his phone, he couldn’t help but furrow his brows. The brightness of his phone was blinding, and that added onto his frustration. The time was late — actually, kind of early — and he can't imagine who could possibly be at his door at this time of the day.

As soon as he opens the door, the figure standing in front of him looks up at him. A slight smile tugs at the edge of her lips as she welcomes herself in. “Taekwoon-ah.”

She’s drunk. He’s never even seen her drunk before, but he can tell she’s drunk. Her speech is slurred, and she can’t seem to walk straight. His instincts force him to grab onto her arm so she doesn’t fall, but she’s alarmed by the sudden physical contact, causing her to stop in her tracks.

They stay like that for a moment, and he’s too busy staring into her eyes in hopes that something had grown back into them. Nothing. There was nothing in them. They were still empty.

He’s about to lead her into the bedroom so she can get some rest and sleep off the alcohol, but she’s firm on her standing, refusing to move. Bewildered, he stares at her, waiting for her to say something or do something. Anything.

His wish is fulfilled, but not by what he was hoping. It only takes her a split second to pull on his arm, bringing him close to her. Her arms are wrapped around his body, and he could feel her warmth. Joohyun was always warm.

Her next move, however, catches him off guard. She had pulled on his shirt, bringing him down to her height, and she slowly leaned forward, connecting their lips together. He’s not sure what to do, and he’s torn between pulling her in closer and pushing her away.

But her lips feel so nice on his, and the warmth of her body has him feeling like they’re back in high school when everything seemed perfect. Before he could help it, he had already brought a hand up behind her head, bringing her closer to him.

That’s when he realizes it. This isn’t right. Nothing about this is right.

Opening up his eyes, he slowly tries to push her off of him, but he’s always been too gentle with her, and he can’t bring himself to force her off of him. And he’s too afraid to admit that he likes having her in his arms even if this is the only possible way.

“Don’t you still want me?” Her arms are wrapped around his neck, and he could smell the alcohol from her breath. He never thought she would be the type to drink (but there seemed to be a lot that he didn’t know of her anymore).

Joohyun stared deep into his eyes, but he still couldn’t tell who he was looking at. This wasn’t the Bae Joohyun he used to know, no, this girl’s eyes were too empty. They were full of nothing.

“Joohyun-ah, stop. You’re drunk.” He closed his eyes and let out a concerned breath as he grabbed her arms and unwrapped them from where they were. However, the alcohol seemed to make her stronger. Catching him off guard, she had grabbed onto his arm again, pushing herself onto him.

Her eyes never once left his as she brought a hand up to caress his face. “Just once. Tell me just once.”

But before he could respond, her lips make their way back onto his. The kiss is nothing romantic; it’s nothing like the ones they used to share. This one is needy, rough, and uncharacteristic for someone like Joohyun.

It takes every nerve in his body to scream at him to push her away for him to finally to do so, and he stares at her in disbelief while gasping for breath. “Bae Joohyun. What are you doing? This is nothing like you.” Shaking his head, he rubs his temples with his hand. “Let’s just get you to bed.”

All that’s roaming in his head is how she’s not going to remember this the next morning, and that she needs to sleep this off. Unfortunately, she seemed to have other thoughts.

Her arms are around his waist, pulling him tightly against her. Her lips attach themselves onto his neck, and she’s giving him soft kisses that make his knees go weak. Closing his eyes, Taekwoon grabs her hands and pull them off of him, using the force to push her up against the wall.

Staring down at her, he leans in close, his lips hovering over her’s. “Not like this, Joohyun. Not like this.” They stay like that for a few more seconds as he hopes that the message has finally made its way into her mind.

As if to verify his wishes, he can see the tears starting to run down her face. There were so many sides of Joohyun that weren’t there in the past but exist now, and he had been discovering them out one by one: this was another one of them. She seemed to be a lot more emotional now. And not in the best way.

He brings his hand up to her face, wiping the tears away. It hurts him to see her like this, but she won’t tell him why, and so he can’t do anything but watch. “You’ve changed.” The two words come out closer to something like a whisper, but he knows she heard it from the way she closes her eyes and looks down at the floor, her tears falling onto the floor.

“People change. Some for the better and some for the worst.”

A moment of silence passes as he simply stares at her, the tears now drenching his shirt because of how close they were. He breaks the silence with a simple question. “And which do you think you are?”

She stares up at him with those same empty eyes. “I have no idea.”

( She’s busy. She’s probably just busy. Taekwoon does his best to try to assure himself as to why Joohyun hasn’t been answering his calls nor responding to his texts nor even listening to him during class. He wants to ask, but it seems she has a lot going on in her head, and he isn’t sure if he should interrupt them or not.

“Just ask her what’s going on,” his best friend says, bringing him back to reality. Hakyeon always knew what was going on his head. Running a hand through his hair, he looked up at his friend before nodding. He had to figure out what was wrong. Whether he was doing something wrong or if… if she was getting sick of him. He prayed it wasn’t the latter.

He catches her out in the hallway talking to some junior. He thinks he remembers her name; it’s something along the lines of Seulgi, Seulmi, something like that. She seems to be close to Joohyun so he makes a note of which classroom she walks into, hoping he could talk to her if Joohyun doesn’t give him a clear answer.

Almost passing by him unnoticed, he grabs onto the female’s wrist, giving her a concerned look. She knew what was on his mind (it seemed everybody but he knew what was going on in his head), and she gives him an assuring smile as if to tell him that everything’s okay, but he can see the bags under her eyes as well as the lost of color in her eyes — everything about her seemed dead.

“Taekwoon-ah, are you listening to me?” she’s staring up at him with an equally concerned look, and it snaps him out of his observation, and he’s forced to shake his head, a little embarrassed.

Thankfully, she isn’t mad. Instead, she gives him another bright smile before going on her tip toes to pat his head. “You must be as tired as me,” she states as a forced chuckle leaves her lips. “I was saying, can you meet me at the park in front of your house tonight? I have something to tell you.”

Too bad he was too dumb to realize that this was another way of saying ‘let’s break up’.

The next day, she was gone. Both from school and his life.

He doesn’t know why she left. He doesn’t know what he did to have her leave him. He wished he was smart enough to read between the lines so it didn’t hurt so much to have to hear it from someone else. Because it hurt so much to hear it from someone else.

“She’s gone, man.” )

He definitely never wanted to come back here again.

While the club was the place where Joohyun was brought back into his life, the constant loudness and public display of affection was uncomfortable for someone so reserved as Taekwoon. However, Sanghyuk insisted that he come because the last time they were all here, he was the only one that ‘got close to getting laid’.

Letting out a groan, he looked around in search for the younger boy along with his other friends when something else caught his eye.

Dressed in red, a bright yet dark red, was her. Her arms wrapped around some old man, a fake smile spread across her face as her delicate fingers traveled down his face. Even before he could be disgusted, his feet were already making his way over to the table.

They teach you in school that your brain controls all the motions of your body, but in this moment, it seemed that his brain didn’t have time to wrap around the situation; it was more his heart that pushed his feet to move and snatch her away from the table, not looking back as he pulled her out of the club.

“What are you doing?” Rather than coming out as a question, however, it left his lips as more of a scream. Has his voice ever been this loud? Probably not. Did he care? Probably not.

Before she could give him a proper answer, he’s already dragging her out and trying to get her as far away from the table as possible. His expected reaction to this was her tearing up, maybe telling him thank you, but what he gets is completely opposite.

She pushes his hand off of her, and she’s running out to the exit. She’s about to run away from his life again, and he’s not letting her go.

“Joohyun, wait—”

“Stop! Just stop!”

He can’t help but stop in his footsteps at the sudden change of tone in her voice. It was the first time he’s heard her raise her voice so loudly. She was Bae Joohyun. She was supposed to be quiet and gentle. She was always the calm and collected one.

“I’m not some damsel in distress waiting for you to save me! I’m not--” She seemed to hesitate for a moment as she closed her eyes and bit down on her bottom lip as if she was thinking through what she was going to say. Habits are hard to break, and she was always one to filter her words.

“I’m not 18 anymore. We’re not 18 anymore. I’m not the girl who needed you to hold her hand before a presentation because she was a nervous wreck whenever she had to stand in front of people. I’m not the girl who needed you to whisper sweet words into her ear before finals because she was always a hundred percent sure she would fail. I don’t need your help anymore. I don’t want your help anymore.”

She’s been staring straight into his eyes as she said everything, but it takes him a while to realize that she’s crying. He wants to take a step forward towards her to tell her everything will be okay, but he stops instead and remains where he is standing right now, staring at her in shock. Had he been the one hurting her all along? Was he selfish for wanting to return to what they used to be?

Joohyun brings a hand up to wipe the tears that have fallen on her face, and she takes off the jacket he had draped around her shoulder, handing it back to him. He’s still in too much shock to move, and so she proceeds to wrap it back around his shoulders, giving him one last grim look before stepping back into the club.

She walked away from him for the second time in his life.

And he didn’t stop her.

After what had occurred last night, he’s been in deep thought. There are questions floating around in his head, but there’s no clear answers; it’s been keeping him up all night. Who knew Jung Taekwoon could be so dumb?

Drowning in his own thoughts, he almost misses the light knock on his door, and he already knows that it’s going to be Hakyeon at the door, and he wants to be alone, but he also knows how persistent is friend is.

“Cha Hakyeon, you better have a good reason to be here or something,” he beings to speak even before opening up the door, an exhausted sigh leaving his lips as he looks up, ready to meet eyes with his best friend, but he’s instead met with a pair of eyes that look almost as dead as his own.

“Bae Joohyun,” is all he manages to get out before he falls silent. He doesn’t know what to say to her. If yesterday never happened, he would be welcoming her in, asking what she’s doing here and possibly asking her to stay forever, but now he’s scared. He’s scared to say anything in fear that it’ll be the wrong words once again.

There’s something in her hands and before he can start guessing what it is, she brings it up, handing it over to him. “I hope you still like lattes, Taekwoon-ah.” Her voice is quiet and gentle, and he swears he can hear her accent again; her accent that now only appears when she’s nervous or comfortable. He can’t tell which it is (or if it’s both).

“Yeah. I do.”

He takes the cup of coffee, but he can’t stop staring at her face. The last time she ended up in his apartment, it ended in a mess with Joohyun on the floor crying and falling asleep in his arms and then leaving the next morning. It seems that nothing good ever happened when she ended up at his home, and he wasn’t sure if he wanted to risk letting her in because of that reason.

“Can I come in?” The request is a little hesitant, and Taekwoon wants to say no, but she’s looking at him with those eyes of her’s again, and he slowly steps back, letting her slide in between the door and himself.

Every little move of her’s proves that she’s not really sure why she’s here either. The way she walks into his house resembles someone walking on thin ice: careful, hesitant and scared. Looking down at the drink, he’s surprised that she remembered what kind of drink he liked.

“I’m sorry.” Before he can question her words, she’s already speaking once again.

“About what happened last night, about how I completely just left that one time when I came with Hakyeon, about how I couldn’t give you a proper explanation that night we first met again, and most importantly I’m sorry about walking out like that back in high school. But I had my reasons. Reasons I couldn’t tell you back then, but now I’m ready to, and I don’t expect you to understand it at all, and you don’t have to if you don’t want to, but I feel like I can’t move on if I don’t.”

He’s taking all her words in, swallowing slowly because he’s not sure if he wants to hear an explanation. Being left hanging was what’s been keeping him thinking of her all this time, and he’s not sure if he’s ready to let go of her just yet.

“My mom was sick. Like really sick. I don’t even know where to begin with how sick she was, but I’ll just say that she couldn’t really do anything around the house on her own anymore. She needed my help making her way over to the bathroom, and she couldn’t eat on her own anymore, and it was just bad. I knew if I told you then you would offer to help me out and to be honest, Taekwoon, I don’t think I deserved your kindness. I never said this back then, but you were the best thing that happened to me. I was the new kid from Daegu with the accent, but you helped me adjust to my new surroundings so quickly, and I was really thankful for that.”

Taking a breath, Taekwoon could see her eyes starting to tear up, and he could feel his own heart starting to beat faster. She was never good at expressing her feelings, but here she was telling him everything he’s ever wanted to hear from her.

“It got worse and eventually, Seoul wasn’t a big enough city for treatment. That’s how we ended up going to Boston on such a short notice, and I stayed there until my mother passed away a few months ago. There was no reason for me to stay anymore at a city that I could never call my own, and so I decided to come back, but there was nothing I could do. I couldn’t even attend school properly in America which is why I ended up doing what you saw me doing,” she paused for a moment to look up at him, the tears now flowing down her face.

“Did I want to do it? No. But did I have a choice? No. It paid pretty well,” she spoke with a sad laugh following soon afterwards, and he could tell that she didn’t really ever regret picking up the job. “And hey, I got to meet you again, didn’t I?”

Taekwoon hadn’t said a word throughout her whole story mainly because he couldn’t think of what to say. He was never much of a talker, more of a listener, and a man of actions. As if to prove this point, he stepped forward and pulled her into his embrace.

Her arms envelop around his figure, and she’s pulling him tighter, and he can feel her tears soaking his shirt as she starts relieving everything that she’s held in for six years. He can feel her fingers tugging on his sweater, and he pulls her back ever so slightly to see her face, wiping the tears from her face.

“Jung Taekwoon. I’m so sorry,” she manages to get out as her hand travels up to caress his own face, and he goes weak in the knees because the Joohyun he used to be so in love with is back. A slight smile creeps up onto his smile as he grabs the hand on his face, bring it into his own and squeezing it ever so slightly.

She's finally back, and he's managed to make her stay.

"Please don't walk away from me again."

There's a comfortable silence in the room, and he takes that as a yes.