Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Eden is dug into the Seoul landscape like a scab. An itchy, irritating, ugly thing that begs you to pick at it until it heals into a pocked scar that'll leave you marred forever. As Jongwoo shoves the last of his belongings into his suitcase, he flexes his unblemished hands with quiet relief. Unlike someone he could mention, skulking around in long sleeves through the late-summer heat, he's going to get out before Eden can leave its mark.

After today, this place will never get its dirty claws into him again.

It’s almost time for him to meet Seokyoon down the road at a bus stop - their gateway out of this neighborhood and into a new one a few dozen blocks away. There, a slightly more expensive and equally ugly goshiwon awaits them. They toured the place together, they grimaced at the state of the toilets together, they put down the key money together, and they decided to leave Eden behind at any cost together.

Nothing can be worse than this place. With his suitcase finally packed, Jongwoo extends the handle and hitches his backpack over his shoulders. He already returned his key to the landlady, which was a trial in and of itself, and now he’s ready to get out of here immediately.

Alas – “Ehehehe!”

Jongwoo freezes, clutching his suitcase handle hard enough that he’s surprised the cheap plastic doesn’t crack beneath his palm. This is fine. This is perfectly okay. He just needs to walk past the Eden residents one last time.

He opens the door expecting the cackling twin from 306. What he gets instead is 313 staring at him with that sickening look in his eyes that Jongwoo can never read properly. It's something between hungry, horny, and murderous. Knowing this guy, it’s all three.

“You should stay a while,” he leers.

Jongwoo takes a deep breath and flashes a smile like a broken mirror, gritted teeth reflecting every bit of hatefulness he’s hiding behind the sharp straight lines. “I’d rather have my fingernails ripped out than stay here any longer.”

A snorting cackle from down the hall makes Jongwoo’s smile fracture into something a little more unhinged. “We can m-make that happen!”

The threat is loud and clear to Jongwoo. He turns his sharp gaze down the hall and shoulders past 313. “What did you just say?”

Before so much as another giggle can slip out, another voice joins them. “Is something wrong?”

The humid air of the goshiwon hallway turns frigid in a second as Moonjo steps out of room 304, dressed down in that casual black outfit that makes him look like a living shadow creeping across the wall. Jongwoo glares up at him.

“No. No, everything is great actually. I’m out of here.”

If he's being rude, he's beyond caring. These people don't deserve any respect. So he marches away, dragging his suitcase behind him, but it can’t be that easy. Deukjong plants a hand on the wall in front of him and devolves into a giggling fit that has him bending his knees and curling his torso, deliberately taking up as much space as possible.

“Ajumoni is upset that you’re le-le-leaving!”

“I don’t care,” Jongwoo says. “Move. Please.”

That only makes Deukjong laugh louder. Behind him, Jongwoo can hear a scraping noise. He turns to look, only to find the pervert creeping forward. His hands are behind his back and he's dragging something across the wall, letting it dig into the filthy plaster.

Jongwoo’s stomach drops. “Hey – hey, what do you have there?”

Before 313 can answer, a hand clamps around Jongwoo's shoulder.

Everyone freezes.

Jongwoo can do nothing but stumble clumsily as that hand drags him flush against Moonjo's side. It’s a gesture that, between friends, could look normal. Protective, even. But between the two of them, it can’t look like anything but an implied threat. Jongwoo feels small and exposed even with Moonjo’s arm laid across him like armor. Jongwoo doesn't feel shielded, or protected. He feels like he's being caged in. Hoarded. A tasty piece of meat about to be torn apart by hungry dogs, sandwiched between three psychopaths that would probably love to turn him into the kind of thing that could fit in a dirty container in the back of the fridge.

No one would find your body, a voice in the back of his mind whispers. There would be nothing to find but bones. The rest of you, every inch of you, will be ground to pulp between 304's molars. 

As if sensing that thought, Moonjo's fingers rub absently over the spot where Jongwoo's collar bone meets his shoulder. It leaves Jongwoo thinking up an irrational reassurance — Maybe I haven’t been eating well enough to taste good.

But those are fingers, not filet knives. Moonjo only looks back and forth between his two co-conspirators as if silently telling them to stand down. They quiet in submission, and Jongwoo is escorted past them. The suitcase drags behind him like an anchor trying to keep him here.

“We should be happy for the man in room 303,” Moonjo says, digging his thumb into the bone of Jongwoo’s shoulder hard enough to hurt. Jongwoo doesn't bother to correct him - he isn't the man from 303 anymore, and he never will be again. “It’s not like anyone would want to live in a place like this for long. He’s moving on to something better.”

His voice is hard and cold, and Jongwoo gets the feeling that there’s a subtextual conversation happening that he doesn’t understand. “Right,” he says. “Thanks.”

He tries to move away, but the hand on his shoulder tightens as Moonjo's lazy gait comes to a complete halt at the end of the hallway.

“Now,” Moonjo manhandles Jongwoo back around, forcing him to face the dark hallway they just traversed as if trying to terrorize him with the sight one last time, “Everyone say goodbye.”

“Bye bye!” 306 shrieks through a cackle.

313 doesn’t say anything. He only flashes a smarmy grin and waves his hand – the same hand he's been hiding behind his back this whole time, gripping the handle of a dull knife.

Jongwoo tries to jerk backwards in instinctive fear, but the arm around his shoulder holds him steady. “You –”

“Jagiya,” Moonjo says next to him, far too calm, “It’s time for you to leave now.”

“Leave?” Jongwoo blinks up at him. The arm around him is unyielding, keeping him close enough that Jongwoo can see the ghost of stubble growing on Moonjo’s jaw. An odd and unsettling reminder that this man is just as human as anyone else. “Right. I’m leaving. I’m getting out of here.”

“Let me see you out,” Moonjo offers in a way that doesn’t leave much room for refusal.

Jongwoo really wants to tell him that isn’t necessary, but he decides against it. Moonjo is the only reason he made the journey down that hallway without making another scene. Whatever sway Moonjo holds over the other residents might be his only safe ticket out of here. That’s how fucked he feels right now.

So he doesn't refuse the offer. He just straightens his posture and shoots one last glare towards the freakshow collection of human refuse he once called his neighbors, if only for a few days. “Okay, yeah. Whatever.”

Moonjo doesn’t waste any time as he uses the hand on Jongwoo’s shoulder to drag him away from the echoing laughter of Eden’s third floor.

Jongwoo twitches under the heavy embrace. “You don’t have to... Drag me out. I know the way.”

“Oh?” Moonjo stays glued to his side, making it difficult to take long strides in the narrow space. “Am I making you uncomfortable, jagi?”

Jongwoo would love to tell him that few things make him more uncomfortable than that sticky-sweet endearment, but again - he's almost out of here. So he keeps his mouth shut and lets Moonjo’s direct him as far as the stairs, where they have to break apart so Jongwoo can pick up his suitcase and carry it down three fights. He can’t help but notice the way Moonjo doesn’t offer to give him a hand. He just stares openly at Jongwoo’s arms as they descend, like he's watching for something in particular. It makes Jongwoo feel too… Too seen. The strain on his arms, Moonjo’s open stare – is there judgment in those eyes? Mockery? Does he like that Jongwoo is struggling and sweating?

Knowing this freak, probably.

When they finally take the last step out into the fresh air, the sunlight feels almost purifying. Not even Moonjo’s presence can dampen Jongwoo's relief as he glances up at Eden's third floor windows and thinks about how he'll never have to come back here again.

“How far is your new place?” Moonjo asks. “I’m free today, I can take you there.”

That’s the last thing Jongwoo wants. With any luck, Moonjo will never catch wind of his new address. “Don’t worry about it. I’m meeting with Seokyoon soon, we’re moving in together.”

“Ah,” Moonjo says, like it’s a revelation. “That’s right. You and the young man from 310 are sticking by each other’s sides. That’s good.”

There's condescension in Moonjo's voice. Jongwoo shrugs it off. “Yeah, so. You can head back inside, I’m fine.”

Moonjo hums in the back of his throat as he levels Jongwoo with a probing look. “It’s a shame. I was really looking forward to hearing more about that novel of yours.”

Jongwoo glances away, suddenly enthralled with a bicycle across the street. Anything to avoid looking at Moonjo. “You can read it when it gets published, I guess.”

“I suppose,” Moonjo says. His smile is audible in his voice. “I’m looking forward to it.”

Jongwoo nods awkwardly and takes a meandering step away. “Right. Bye.”

“See you later,” Moonjo says, and Jongwoo makes the mistake of taking one last look. The sunlight does nothing to dampen the shadows that seem to cling to Moonjo like spiderwebs, decorating him in a macabre sort of grace. His eyes are nearly lost beneath the curl of his fringe, but they meet Jongwoo’s regardless.

Hungry, horny, murderous – everyone in that godforsaken hellhole is the same. Except Moonjo carries far more danger in the angle of his smile than 313 could carry in his entire nasty-ass body. His gaze seems to hold a promise – see you later. Jongwoo can still hear that voice in his head, even as he turns away from Moonjo and makes the descent down that stained-glass staircase. He wants to stomp away, to take them two steps at a time so they shatter beneath his footfalls, to run until the eyes of Eden are no longer upon him and nobody from that place can ever touch him again, but he doesn't. Almost as if he's afraid the concrete really will give way beneath his feet, Jongwoo takes each step slowly, feeling the strain in his shoulders as he carries his suitcase down.

When his feet finally meet black asphalt, he swears he can hear Eden whispering to him one last time.

See you soon.

-

And then... Things go pretty well, actually.

The new goshiwon is an ugly crumbling thing that probably only has half a decade left in it, but it's better than Eden. Anything is. Seokyoon and Jongwoo move two doors down from each other and try to make things work. They eat dinner together when they’re both free. They shower together most evenings. They go up on the rooftop and bullshit together, bouncing song lyrics and murder plots off of each other. 

Seokyoon couldn't write a good verse to save his life, but Jongwoo doesn’t have the heart to tell him that. He also gives unhelpful feedback on Jongwoo’s writing, but at least his eyes don’t glaze over when they talk about it, and at least he doesn’t turn his nose up at the genre.

Jongwoo has nearly given up on trying to get any conversations about writing out of Jieun on the rare nights they find time for each other.

That paranoid tension that had Jongwoo wired and ready to blow when he was living in Eden has calmed down. Mostly. He still dreads going into work, hating himself for the way his fingers twitch with the desire to curl into fists any time Byeongmin speaks to him. And then there’s the lingering resentment he feels towards his boss in the moments where Jaeho makes it clear that he’s the sunbae, the man in charge, the guy Jongwoo owes it all to. He always has a joke about poor little country boys, or Jieun’s taste in men. He jokes in a way that demands to be laughed off even as it carries an undercurrent of sincerity. Jongwoo forces his face into a stiff smile when it's expected of him, even when his thoughts wander to the only thing that would really make him smile - Jaeho on his knees, holding his bloodied face as Jongwoo stands over him, knuckles dripping with blood.

Those daydreams are always quick and a little alarming, but his dreams at night move much more slowly and play out in much more gruesome detail. They involve staplers and sharp pens with ink that runs thick and red. The only thing that makes it easy to breathe after these dreams is the guilt.

Jongwoo will stare up at the ceiling of his room and reassure himself – as long as you feel guilty, you know it’s wrong, and you’re still a good person.

You’re still a good person.

And yet, the dreams keep rolling in. Jaeho's face caved in like a dented soda can. Byeongmin’s perverted eyes pecked out with needle-nose pliers.

But why stop there? That prick from 313 back in Eden, he deserves the same fate. They all did. Ms Eom skewered by one of her own knives. Those twins shoved into a black bloodstained sack together, more mangled than the poor cats they killed.

The worst of all is 304 – when Jongwoo dreams about him, it’s far more dangerous. It’s not a murder, it’s a fight. Seo Moonjo smiling from ear to ear as he catches every punch Jongwoo throws at him. Wrenching Jongwoo’s arms backwards, throwing Jongwoo to the floor. Jongwoo wants to kill him, kill him, kill him, but Moonjo is the only person who can match him blow-for-blow in those grisly dreams. They almost always end in some variation of the same climax - Moonjo settling in the space between Jongwoo's legs like a lover, reaching for his throat with slender, pale, hungry hands.

Jongwoo burns up. In the dream, and in his bed. He wakes with aching lungs, trying to draw in oxygen as he swears he can still feel the heat of Moonjo’s body over his, pressing him down, asking him in the sweetest voice Jongwoo has ever heard – honey, how do you want me to kill you? How do you want to kill me?

“With my hands,” Jongwoo whispers into the darkness of his bedroom, shoving a pillow between his legs and chasing a different sort of shame.

The guilt that follows those particular dreams doesn’t make him feel any better about himself.

-

If there's one thing about this goshiwon that is objectively better than Eden, it's the window.

The room is so small that the bed fills the entire length of the wall. Situated right above the footboard is a rectangular window, not exactly huge, but bigger than the pathetic little sliver of glass that was nearly out of reach in his old room. August has worn into September, bringing with it a crisp coolness in the evenings. Jongwoo props the window open and lets a breeze meander through as he types rapidly, fingers flying over the keys in an attempt to keep up with his brain. It’s hard to say how long he’s been at it – he hasn’t bothered to eat anything in hours, but he doesn’t want to stop writing. Not even the grating voice of his next door neighbor screaming at his computer all day can break Jongwoo’s flow right now.

But then – his phone buzzes.

I’m sorry oppa. Can’t meet tonight. This weekend maybe?

Jongwoo blinks down at the screen. I’m sorry oppa I’m sorry oppa I’m sorry oppa. It’s just about all she says to him these days.

Yeah, Jongwoo texts back, maybe. Eat well tonight. Get some sleep.

To be honest, he got so tied up in writing that he forgot they even made plans. He flips his phone over and turns his attention back to his laptop, but he’s already a little thrown off by the brief interruption. She knows he’s been hit with a wave of inspiration lately. He tried explaining all of his new ideas to her, the ones about a series of connected short stories in an apartment building run by serial killers. Sort of a whodunit. She wrote it off immediately as a revenge fantasy, not bothering to say much beyond this:

Ah, oppa, that’s so morbid. The people you lived with couldn’t have been that bad.

As if he isn't capable of coming up with his own story. As if twisting reality into whatever shape you want isn't the point of writing fiction.

Jongwoo’s fingers rest on the keys, but he’s no longer typing. An awkward funk settles over him as the sounds of Seoul suddenly become sharper. A fire engine screams past, sirens blaring. A dog is barking somewhere close by, a yappy little thing. Worst of all, his annoying neighbor is practically yelling next door. He’s trying to become a full-time broadcast jockey or something, streaming himself playing video games for an audience all day. The landlord lets him be as loud as he wants between noon and sundown as long as he keeps making enough money to pay for his room. Never mind that he's a nuisance to everyone else in the building. A residence like this should have rules about noise.

Jongwoo glances at the wall between them and thinks before he can help it – if this guy lived in Eden, he would have disappeared by now.

Maybe Jongwoo should write this guy into his story.

Before he can ruminate on that particular thought, someone bangs on his door loud enough to startle him into slapping his laptop shut. “What? What is it?”

“Hyung,” Seokyoon’s voice calls through the door. “Are you busy?”

Jongwoo gets up and opens the door. “No,” he lies, heart hammering with something like shame. “What’s up?”

“Come up on the roof,” Seokyoon urges. “There’s a huge fire somewhere! The smoke plume is massive.”

Jongwoo’s heart lurches. “Is it close?”

If he loses this little shithole, that might force him and Seokyoon back into Eden.

I’d rather have my fingernails ripped out.

“Not at all,” Seokyoon says, and Jongwoo lets himself relax. “That’s what’s so crazy. It’s far away, but you can see the light from the flames from here.”

Jongwoo follows him up to the roof, because anything is better than sitting in his room and listening to his neighbor streaming himself playing League or whatever. There are already a few people up here, watching the light dance over the dim horizon with their phones pointed towards the twinkling blaze. The plume of smoke is a towering thing, like a dark tendril reaching down from Heaven to rub a black mark into the cityscape.

“Whoa,” Seokyoon gapes. “It’s gotten bigger since I went down to get you.”

Jongwoo leans against the railing and looks out over the rooftops. “Any idea what it is?”

One of his neighbors answers instead of Seokyoon. “I saw online that it started on top of a hill and the wind carried it downward. Three or four buildings had to be totally evacuated so far, I think.”

Another neighbor chimes in, “There’s a convenience store I worked at in high school over there that’s in danger of catching. My old manager posted some really close-up pics online, look at this.”

The two neighbors gawk at their phones as the pink sunset dances with a bloody red undercurrent. Jongwoo swears he can taste ash from here.

“Hyung,” Seokyoon says beside him, “Isn’t that kinda close to where we used to live?”

Jongwoo nods. “Eden should be in that direction.”

Seokyoon turns to give him a slack-jawed look of dread. “You don’t think…”

Jongwoo wonders if Seokyoon remembers the conversation they had on Eden's rooftop not too long ago. They were talking about how they needed to get out at all costs just to get away from the shady people who lived there. What was it that Jongwoo had said back then?

Oh yeah – all these freaks need to die in an accident.

There’s a smile tugging at Jongwoo’s lips as he looks Seokyoon square in the eye and admits, “I can only hope.”

-

In the morning, Jongwoo isn’t thinking about the fire. He’s thinking about all the improbable ways he could make his next-door neighbor disappear.

The fire had most of the residents up late last night, including the landlord. It burned for hours, a red spot pulsating beneath the pitch black skies like a throbbing artery. When Jongwoo got bored of watching the flames dance, he went back to his room to discover his neighbor never got the memo. And with everyone preoccupied, there was no one else around to tell him to shut the fuck up.

Jongwoo didn’t trust himself to do it without getting angry. He could only put his headphones on and tune the noises out as best he could.

When Jongwoo wakes up to the cold light of an overcast morning, he can still hear muffled noises in the room next to his. It sets him off on the wrong foot immediately. Annoyance tinges his mandatory early morning groaning session before he flops back down to glare sleepily at the wall. The guy usually stays up late, but not all the way into the next sunrise. Jongwoo has never heard him moving around at this hour.

Driven by curiosity, Jongwoo shuffles forward enough to press his ear to the wall.

This place is just as flimsy as Eden. The illusion of privacy is shattered every time the smallest noises bleed out from one of the rooms. What Jongwoo hears right now is faint, but definitely gives away movement right next to him. It sounds an awful lot like the whisper of something… Stroking the wall? Jongwoo furrows his brow as he wonders what in the world the dude is doing. Fondling the chipping paint? He listens harder when the sound takes on a sharper timbre, like something small is scraping gently across the plaster. The noise almost seems to be mapping out the surface, inching back and forth across the wall. Jongwoo holds his breath as it passes right over his ear, coming to a stop somewhere just over his head. Things are quiet for long enough that Jongwoo starts to think he was just hearing things in his sleepy early morning haze.

But when he finally releases the breath he was holding, he swears that a soft, warm sigh answers him. Right next to where he’s pressing his ear.

Jongwoo recoils hard enough to roll all the way out of bed. It’s too early for this.

The rest of the morning goes about the same as it usually does. He still feels like an unwanted stepchild at work, with Byeongmin being absolutely no help and Jaeho finding nothing wrong with that. He fumbles through his tasks, but he cares less about his sloppiness at this point. If Byeongmin wants to piss and moan about Jongwoo’s quality of work, he can get off his ass and give him some guidance.

The day is just about half over when Jongwoo’s phone vibrates with a text. He assumes it’s just Jieun trying to make plans for this weekend, so he decides he’ll check it later. But then it vibrates again, right after, and then again, and the urgency puts Jongwoo on edge.

It turns out it’s not Jieun at all.

Hyung, did you hear the news about the fire last night? Eden really did burn down.

Hyung what the hell? Did we almost die in a fire? I owe you so much for dragging me out of there.

Jongwoo reads the texts about ten times each, and the words make less and less sense to him every time. He opens a local news site and it doesn’t take long to find updates on the developing story.

Six buildings lost and four others badly damaged – Eden’s address smack in the middle. A few confirmed casualties. A handful of people unaccounted for. Police investigating potential arson.

Jongwoo feels numb as he stares down at his phone.

“I–” Jongwoo pockets his phone and stands up, swaying a little on his feet, “I feel a little sick. I’ll be back in a minute.”

Byeongmin grumbles something behind him, but Jongwoo isn’t listening. There’s blood rushing in his ears as he stumbles into the bathroom and just barely makes it to the toilet in time to empty his stomach.

Behind his eyelids, he sees them all. Ms Eom charred up as if she had an accident making those disgusting fucking eggs of hers. Deukjong mummified with his hand over his mouth in one last giggle. That freak Nambok immolated in that fire trap of a room of his, burning up with all his filth. And Moonjo, oh Moonjo, no longer a pretty little sliver of moonlight. Instead, he’s blazing like the sun, like supple skin under slender hands.

Jongwoo wretches until his ribs hurt. He can hear Yoojung asking if he’s okay through the door, and he tells her he’ll be out soon in a slurred voice. It’s another five minutes after she leaves that he finally drags himself away from the toilet to stick his head under the faucet, rinsing his mouth and splashing his face with ice cold water.

When he glances back up in the mirror, he’s smiling.

He nudges his forehead against the glass and closes his eyes, clamping a hand over his mouth as a delirious little giggle bubbles in his throat. When he opens his eyes again, the gaze that meets him hardly looks like his own.

“Burn in hell, you fucking freaks,” he mutters. Then he washes his hands, and leaves the bathroom like nothing ever happened.

At least, he tries to act like nothing happened. Yoojung is on him the second he walks back into the office, pressing the back of her hand against his forehead even when he tries to duck away from her touch.

“Oh, poor thing,” she coos. “Let me make you something.”

“Don’t bother,” Jaeho shoots her down as he emerges from his office. “We don’t really need you, Jongwoo. Head on home and get some rest, you’ll get paid for the full day.”

How magnanimous.

“I’m fine,” Jongwoo insists, trying to assert some level of usefulness. “I can keep working.”

“And get me sick, too?” Byeongmin spits. “Crazy idiot.”

Jongwoo bristles, but a hand on his shoulder distracts him before he can shoot back with something that’ll just cause more problems. It takes every ounce of willpower not to shrug it off like it's something filthy.

“Jongwoo,” Jaeho says with a lofty sort of care, “As your senior and CEO, I’m telling you to go home. Imagine how mad Jieun-ah would be if she knew I kept you here when you were sick?”

Heat rises in Jongwoo again. Of course Jaeho is thinking about Jieun. No, worse than that – he’s using her as leverage. Ever since he moved to Seoul, Jongwoo can’t help but feel like an outsider in his own goddamn relationship.

Or maybe it's always been like this, and the distance only made it less palpable before.

Jaeho has an irritating look in his eyes again – like Jongwoo is only hanging on by a single thread of his generosity, and he could snip it at any moment. So Jongwoo defers, tail between his legs.

“Fine, thanks. I’ll see you guys tomorrow.”

He logs out of his computer and gathers his things up to leave. When Byeongmin mutters something about him being useless dead weight and Jaeho doesn’t reprimand him, it hurts more than Jongwoo wants to admit.

-

The walk back to the goshiwon is a miserable one, even though the overcast skies from this morning have cleared up to make way for a beautiful expanse of blue. Jongwoo keeps his eyes glued to the grey ground in front of him, too afraid to look up at the people all around as if some of them will be charred corpses shambling in the daylight. A man laughs in the distance, and Jongwoo cringes. The click of a woman’s high-heeled shoes sounds too close to the pattering rhythm of a tennis ball bouncing off the floor. He can smell meat grilling inside of a small restaurant as he passes by, and hears the echo of a voice asking him – you don’t think it’s human meat, do you?

His stomach rolls, and he has to halt on the sidewalk for a second when he thinks he might puke again. These thoughts were supposed to be gone once he left Eden, weren’t they?

So what's wrong with him now?

To make matters worse, he has a hard time getting back inside his building. On account of the fucking ambulance and police cars outside.

Eventually, he manages to creep past the bored looking cop telling him he can come back once they’ve “cleared the scene,” whatever that means. What scene? This is a normal residence. Things like this shouldn’t be happening anymore. After Jongwoo makes the trek upstairs to his floor, he finds a few cops and EMTs milling around. Most of his neighbors are gathered at the far end of the hall, gawking down in the direction of Jongwoo’s room.

His head is pounding. He doesn’t want to deal with this.

Moving forward past the group of gossiping men, Jongwoo awkwardly hovers next to where his landlord is standing halfway down the hall and rubbing his forehead.

“Ahjussi,” Jongwoo asks tentatively, “What’s going on here?”

“Yoon Jongwoo-ssi,” his landlord turns to him and breathes a haggard sigh. “Did you know there was something wrong with Mr Byun?”

Jongwoo arches an eyebrow. “Who?”

“The guy who lives next to you,” his landlord specifies. “The one who works from home on his computer.”

Oh, the streamer. Jongwoo just realized he never bothered to learn the man’s name. “No, I don’t know anything about him. Did he get hurt or something?”

"It looks like," the landlord pauses and lets his head hang for a moment before breaking the news - “It looks like He killed himself.”

The words pierce through Jongwoo, splintering something inside of him and knocking a small chip out of his foundation. Three words, and they put enough stress on him that he feels like he could collapse.

This isn’t normal. Things like this were supposed to stop happening after leaving Eden.

“That can’t…” Jongwoo wracks his brain for the right memories, “That can’t be right, I heard him playing his game last night like normal. He was up late while almost everyone else was up on the roof. And I thought I heard him this morning, too.”

The landlord shakes his head and glances down the hall at the minor bustle. “A resident noticed his door was open a little before noon. When they looked in, he was…”

The landlord looks a bit queasy. Jongwoo doesn’t blame him. “Anyway,” the landlord says.

“Anyway,” Jongwoo agrees.

He’s about to ask if he can get to his room, when the landlord is waved over by a man in uniform. The landlord marches forward with solemn steps, and Jongwoo follows. At least, he tries to. He doesn’t get very far before a cop stops him with a hand on his chest.

“Whoa, whoa,” the cop gives him a little shove backwards, “Where do you think you’re going?”

Jongwoo points down the hallway a bit awkwardly. “My room. I live one door down.”

“Are you stupid?” the cop asks. “We’re doing an active investigation here.”

“In that room,” Jongwoo points out, like the cop is the stupid one, “ Not in my room.”

The cop gives him a disgusted once-over. “A guy turned up dead next door, doesn’t that bother you?”

“Listen, I got sick at work an hour ago,” Jongwoo explains with a sigh. “I just want to go lie down. I’ll stay out of your way.”

“You can do that when we’re done here,” the cop replies tersely, shooing Jongwoo away.

He accepts defeat and wanders back towards the group of rubbernecking neighbors, trying to tune out their scandalized whispering about how sad it is, how pathetic of a man he was.

“What if there was foul play?” someone asks as Jongwoo brushes past them. "The cops are here for a reason, after all."

“You mean – you think he was killed?” another man asks. Jongwoo slows his stride a bit. “No way. Do you think someone can get into our rooms? Hey, you guys better stay out of my room!”

Jongwoo shakes off his own mounting paranoia and heads up the steps towards the roof.

The afternoon sunlight slants off the horizon at the perfect angle to give Jongwoo a headache. Still, he looks out over the rooftops to scan his surroundings for anything out of the ordinary, as if Eden burning has released something foul into the streets. There’s no smoke, no skeletal buildings, nothing in sight that suggests what happened from here. If Jongwoo wanted to, he could almost believe it never happened.

He doesn’t want to do much of anything right now, other than lie down for a little while. So he drags an old reclining lawn chair into a patch of shade, and flops down. It’s a calm afternoon, all things considered. He doesn’t intend to fall asleep out in the open like this, but the blue skies staring back down at him make him feel like it’s okay. It’s safe.

Once his eyes are closed, he dreams in red. Fire engines and neon lights. The Eden ajumma had a garish red shirt, didn’t she? It matched the redness of that tough meat she made. Jongwoo dreams about the bitterness of it on his tongue. It doesn’t suit his tastes, so he dreams about it between red lips instead. They look soft as they move with the motion of chewing, sharp teeth shredding the meat until every bite is accompanied by a crimson torrent from the corners of that shining mouth, dripping with rubies much deeper than before. Jongwoo can’t help but reach out to touch it.

It feels like warm velvet, like something soft and comfortable and right. Jongwoo presses a thumb to that tender mouth and coaxes the lips open, catching the waterfall of red on his hands, letting it soak his skin so deeply that he feels it everywhere, little wet rivulets covering him from head to toe. There's so much that it feels like it's coming from overhead, raining down on him.

The shower, he realizes. He’s standing in Eden’s shower now, and the room is ablaze in red. The water reflects the color as it douses Jongwoo’s naked body, making him feel paradoxically safe amid the flames. Nothing is going to hurt him like this, he knows. So he closes his eyes and tips his face up, letting that heat envelop him like a pair of strong hands that settle at his hips. The touch burns white-hot, trailing up his crimson body to map out the expanse of his skin. His twitching stomach, the curve of his ribs, the peaks of his nipple, the dip of his collar bone, fingertips are scalding and sweet. The touch only comes to a halt once it reaches his throat, resting there to stroke his adam’s apple with something like reverence, something like –

“Wake up, jagi,” red lips murmur next to his ear. “You sound like you’re having a nightmare.”

Jongwoo obeys.

When he opens his eyes into the real world, the sky above him is purpling like a dark bruise. The grogginess that always accompanies an afternoon nap settles heavily on him as he stretches out on the plastic chair and groans deep in his throat.

But beneath the racket of his own voice, he swears he can hear something that sounds like a shoe scraping on the dirty concrete. He whips around at once, glancing over his shoulder and seeing nothing at all in the desaturated shadows of the rooftop.

“Hello?” he calls out in a hoarse voice. “Is someone up here?”

His heart lurches as his eyes catch on a crisp white button up at the far end of the rooftop – but it’s only someone’s laundry, left to dry on the line.

Jongwoo flops back down against the chair and throws an arm over his eyes as one of his legs bounces in agitation. His free hand fists in the hem of his shirt, resting right above a particular sort of ache he doesn't want to deal with right now.

“Fuck,” he mutters, and then slaps both sides of his face.

Half-hard on a rooftop hours after his neighbor killed himself, the day after his previous residence burned down. As Jongwoo stands up and tries to adjust his shirt to cover the tenting in his jeans, he wonders how the hell his life ended up like this.

-

The atmosphere in the residence is understandably awkward for the next few days, but life goes on.

Everyone on their floor is invited to Mr Byun’s viewing, but neither Jongwoo nor Seokyoon go. Instead, they find refuge from the suffocating melancholy of their home by heading out to splurge on food and drinks at a nearby bar. Jongwoo feels completely irresponsible as he orders for both himself and Seokyoon, but also completely beyond caring. He needs to stuff his face with oily food and cheap booze immediately. Work sucks. People are dropping like flies around him. He might as well not exist to Jieun unless they’re right next to each other, and even that isn't a sure thing. The least he can do is slowly destroy his body through gluttony, right?

Seokyoon, god bless him, doesn’t seem to be nearly as bothered by the generally shitty string of events. But he’s certainly curious about them.

“It’s just a little weird, isn’t it?” he asks after a while, pointing at Jongwoo with a zigzagging hand. This kid is such a lightweight. “Maybe this is just what city living is like.”

Jongwoo hums in consideration. “Maybe, but I feel like people shouldn’t… Die this much.”

Seokyoon clicks his tongue. “Says you, Mr Murder Novelist.” 

“Crime novelist,” Jongwoo corrects.

“Crime novelist,” Seokyoon amends. He lifts his can in a toast. “To crime. And not dying.”

Jongwoo eyeballs the swaying can and thinks, yeah, okay, why not.

Clink clink.

They wander home under the last dying embers of sunset. Seokyoon is acting tipsier than he ought to be, but Jongwoo doesn’t mind letting him lean against his side. It’s getting chillier at night, after all. Seokyoon is a nice little heater. They meander and bullshit loudly as they trek through the streets, two small town boys trampling over cold city concrete. At some point, an ugly thought curls through Jongwoo’s mind: is this what it's like having a brother you can actually bond with?

It comes and goes in an instant, but the shame lingers. Jongwoo glances away from Seokyoon, trying to distract himself with the sights of their new neighborhood. The closed-up food stand, the convenience store right across the road, the sparse stream of strangers walking down the sidewalk, earbuds in, phones out. There is life here, in this city. This can be good for him if he lets it.

Unfortunately, his wistful little fantasy comes to a screeching halt when he catches sight of someone across the road. A tall man whose godawful posture doesn’t do much to make him look any smaller, standing with his hands in his pockets and his head cocked to the side. His bushy hair falls around his face like a shroud, covering his eyes and making skin look almost alabaster under the cold light of a streetlamp. Beneath those shadows, he's staring straight at the pair of men. Jongwoo is sure of it.

His heartbeat spikes, and he comes to an abrupt halt. Seokyoon, however, does not. He keeps moving forward, one hand still clinging to Jongwoo’s arm, jerking Jongwoo forward with the momentum of his drunken determination to get home. Jongwoo keeps his feet planted as he stumbles a bit, casting an annoyed glance towards Seokyoon.

When he glances back across the street, the phantom has disappeared among the shadows.

“Hyuuuung,” Seokyoon whines, tugging on Jongwoo’s wrist with both hands. “Come on, don’t stop here, we’re almost home.”

“Seokyoon-ah,” Jongwoo asks tentatively, falling back into step as they approach their building, “Do you believe in ghosts?”

Seokyoon gapes at him. “You think the ahjussi who lived between us is haunting the building?”

“No,” Jongwoo answers easily. That’s not what he was thinking at all. “I just thought I saw something strange.”

“Ooh, now I have the creeps,” Seokyoon finally lets go of Jongwoo to rub his own arms. “Bad landlords, and arson, and suicide, and now ghosts? Cities are bad places, hyung.”

Jongwoo snorts. They’ve reached the door that leads up to their goshiwon, and Jongwoo ushers Seokyoon in ahead of him. “Yeah, maybe they are.”

Seokyoon rushes inside. But Jongwoo lingers for a moment, staring out into the dark.

He can’t help but feel like the dark is staring back at him.

-

Later that night, after Seokyoon has stumbled off to bed, the goshiwon is blissfully quiet with its most obnoxious resident freshly underground.

Jongwoo wasn't going to hurt the guy, but he's also not going to feel bad for enjoying the silence. No coughing every few minutes, no clattering of a mechanical keyboard deep into the night. Just cool, crisp silence.

That is, until a soft voice decides to whisper –

Jagiya. I’m almost there.

Jongwoo, who was nearly asleep, jolts upright in the darkness of his room. “What?”

Unsurprisingly, his room doesn’t answer.

“Is someone here?” he mutters, fiddling with the lamp on his bedside table. It clicks on, flooding the room with dull orange light and revealing nothing out of the ordinary. So he crawls out of bed and turns on the fluorescent overhead light, squinting against the sterile brightness.

Nothing.

He looks behind the curtain over his closed window. In the small closet. Under the desk. Beneath the bed.

Nothing at all.

He plops back down on his bed, uncomfortably aware of how loudly his mattress groans, and stares up at the ceiling. This isn’t Eden, he reminds himself. He’s not going to hear any strange bumps in the night from an allegedly vacant fourth floor. The guy who lives above him seems to have a normal nine-to-five schedule, he’s probably dead asleep right now.

Then who did Jongwoo hear?

After turning the lights back off, Jongwoo crawls into bed and pulls the covers up to his ears in a childish gesture. As if a duvet is going to save him from his own delusions. It was probably just a dream, anyway. Some half-asleep imagining from his tired brain. There’s clearly no one in here, so there’s no need for him to stress out.

But that voice did sound awfully familiar.

Pushing that thought from his mind, Jongwoo curls up against the wall and wills himself to fall asleep. In the last few moments before he drifts off entirely, he swears he can almost hear something in the room next to him, like the whisper of skin caressing the wall. A ghost, maybe, trying to reach through to drag him to hell.

That night, Jongwoo dreams about pitch blackness. He turns in lazy circles in the void, trying to force his eyes to focus through the darkness, but no shapes become clear. He steps forward, expecting to trip on something and stumble, but the world in front of him is wide open and flat. Those unsteady footsteps carry him forward until he notices a pinprick of bright white light hovering around eye level. Approaching it brings him to the sturdy barrier of a wall, firm and unyielding as he pushes against the featureless darkness.

The light, he realizes, is a hole in the wall. Like a peephole fixed on a hotel door, except he can't see anything when he peers through it. Only a sterile field of bright, blinding white.

But if he listens hard enough, he can almost hear a calm voice coming through, promising him – jagiya, you and I will be together again soon.

-

The sun rises and the shadows retreat. Jongwoo wakes up slowly in the late hours of the morning and shakes his dreams off. When he steps out of his room, he’s surprised to see furniture leaning against the walls. The hallway has become an obstacle course - desk drawers, a bedframe, a stiff mattress. The door to the newly vacant room is propped open, and the landlord pops his head out as Jongwoo tries to creep past unseen.

“Yoon Jongwoo-ssi,” he claps Jongwoo's shoulder in an uncomfortably informal greeting, “Perfect timing! Can you come help with this? I need to set the room back up before the afternoon.”

Jongwoo looks around the hallway, as if there might be another Yoon Jongwoo hanging around. “Uh, sure.”

The first thing Jongwoo notices in the empty room is the carpet. It’s an ugly stiff layer of brown that's absent from his and Seokyoon's rooms. It settles a bit awkwardly at the corners, like it wasn’t measured properly. Jongwoo isn’t exactly a carpenter, but he’s pretty sure this isn’t a good flooring job.

The curiosity must show on his face, because the landlord starts explaining unprompted.

“The bloodstain won’t come out of the linoleum,” he complains, as if he's talking about some ordinary wear and tear and not a fucking bloodstain. “So I had no choice but to rip up the floor and redo it, or carpet over it. Let me tell you, Jongwoo-ssi, there's a lot more blood in your wrists than you'd think, haha."

The laugh is brittle and forced, a poor attempt to make light of a terrible situation. Jongwoo is too tired to humor this guy, giving him nothing but a quirked eyebrow for the awkward remark.

"Anyway," the landlord clears his throat. "I just need help setting up the furniture again, if you have the time.”

Jongwoo can feel the tackiness of industrial glue shifting underfoot as he steps into the room with the desk drawers in hand. The room is small, and carpeting it probably wouldn't take long if you knew what you were doing. His landlord probably didn't. It's slapdash and amateurish, but whatever.

Jongwoo won't be living in it.

“Are you really going to rent it out so soon?” he asks as the landlord gestures for him to grab one end of the bedframe.

“Of course!” the landlord says. “I have to make a living, don’t I? Some guy was already snooping around for a vacancy. He said he’d take any room we had on short notice. He's moving in sometime this afternoon."

"The room across the hall is empty, too," Jongwoo points out as they struggle to angle the bedframe through the door.

"I have to rent this one out as soon as possible," the landlord insists. "If I'm not able to, it'll be cursed."

“Cursed?” Jongwoo asks. “You mean – by a ghost?”

The landlord looks at him like he’s a few biscuits short of a picnic. “No, dummy. Worse than that – people will start to tell stories about what happened, and the room will get a bad reputation. No one will want to live here.”

“Oh,” Jongwoo tries not to think about voices whispering to him in the night, or the gentle brush of something against the other side of his wall. “Right. Makes sense.”

He can’t help but notice how the landlord directs them to the wall running alongside Jongwoo’s room. They slot the bed frame into a spot where only the flimsy barrier of plywood and insulation separates it from Jongwoo's own bed. It's a little weird to think about, but Jongwoo doesn't let it bother him. As long as the new guy doesn’t snore right next to his head, he can live with it. And with any luck, it’s not like he’ll be living here for long, anyway.

He’s not even planning on sticking around the building for today. Because it’s Saturday, thank god. Neither Jieun’s boss nor Jaeho have come up with bullshit reasons to keep one of them chained to their desk for overtime, so they finally have some real time to spend with each other.

They haven’t had a full day together in a while. He’s not going to squander it.

He excuses himself as soon as he can and rushes off to shower. He washes his hair twice and picks out his nicest shirt. It's nothing formal. He doesn't really do formal, but Jieun always looks her best, even on casual days. So he tries to match that put-together grace she always carries, even as he steps onto a crowded bus and finds a vacant seat next to a man whose music is too loud in his headphones. 

Jongwoo drums his fingers on his knee and keeps his eyes peeled on the streets outside, doing his best to tune out the obnoxious beats distracting him. The volume is so loud that it barely sounds like music. It's too blunt and industrial, too much like swinging metal and tennis elbow. Jongwoo gnaws his lower lip and reminds himself how rude it would be to rip this guy's headphones out to tell him to turn it down.

This is just how people are in the city, he reminds himself, and stands up before the bus even rolls to a stop at his destination.

Jieun is already waiting for him outside of a cafe, passing the time with a phone call that she ends when she notices Jongwoo approaching. The coffee date starts off nice. Jieun talks about her coworkers, her friends, the romance dramas she's been watching before bed. Jongwoo talks about getting his footing at his internship, and Seokyoon’s bad raps, and the changes he’s making to his novel. And in reply, Jieun circles back to coworkers, friends, dramas. Jongwoo tugs them back to internships, and goshiwon life, and writing. After a while, he realizes something – they’re both talking at each other, rather than to each other. It’s as if they’re having two separate conversations at once without being able to meet in the middle.

It hasn’t always been like this, has it? Jongwoo isn’t sure what he’s doing wrong.

So later on, he suggests a movie. A spontaneous matinee, so that they’ll experience something together and have something to talk about, to bond over. Except he lets Jieun pick what they watch, and it’s not something Jongwoo has any interest in. He doesn't argue. He just spends the movie with Jieun leaning against his shoulder, their fingers entwined, as he thinks about all the ways he’d write the plot differently.

When he brings up his ideas as they step out under the streetlights in front of the theater, she laughs him off.

“You always over-complicate things,” she teases. “Some of us like to turn our brains off when we watch movies, you know?”

“Where’s the fun in that?” Jongwoo pouts, and she boops his jutted lower lip with a giggle.

“My roommate is out, by the way,” she says, smiling shyly down at the sidewalk as they walk slowly with clasped hands. The abrupt non-sequitur isn’t lost on Jongwoo. “She went back home for the weekend to celebrate her brother’s birthday.”

It’s obvious where this is going, and Jongwoo thinks that maybe this is what they’re missing – simple intimacy. But by the time they’ve made it to her apartment to do the usual song-and-dance, Jongwoo finds himself struggling to focus on her. He’s too preoccupied with pushing back the memories of his dreams to live in the pleasure of the moment.

There is no blood here, no monster looming over him, sucking all the light out of the room and filling him up with a ferocious blaze that makes his toes curl and his teeth dig into his lower lip hard enough to hurt. Normal people don’t think about these kind of things when they’re fucking their girlfriend. Normal people don’t slip away into something like dissociation, feeling a gut-punch of satisfaction as a ghost whispers in the back of their mind –

jagiya jagiya jagiya

If Jieun notices something off about him, she doesn’t show it in the afterglow. She looks pretty like this, with her hair loose as she wears nothing but a white duvet. It’s soft and fluffy and matches the rest of her room’s minimalist decorations. It’s nothing like the sharp angles of a white button-up shirt, looking out of place amid walls caked in grime, no matter how much it reminds Jongwoo of standing on Eden's rooftop and spilling a murder fantasy to a smiling man.

He glances away from her and wonders what the hell is wrong with him.

“You should stay over,” she says, and Jongwoo is on board with the idea until she adds, “Jaeho-oppa is doing a sunday brunch thing tomorrow at a really good restaurant.”

Her eyes scan the room, stopping at where Jongwoo’s black button-down shirt is draped over a chair, and hastily adds, “We could go shopping in the morning and get some nice clothes.”

We . As if Jieun doesn’t already have a wardrobe built around making a good impression. Jongwoo tries not to sound too bitter as he says, “I’ll pass. I don’t have the cash to buy a… A brunch shirt.”

He doesn't even have cash to buy the brunch, not after tonight. Not that he'd have to, of course. Jaeho would treat them. Jaeho always has enough.

“I can get you something,” she offers. “It’s been so long since I got you a real gift, anyway.”

A real gift – not like the charm hanging from her phone, he thinks.

Jongwoo bites the inside of his cheek and wonders when he became a charity case to his own girlfriend. “I couldn’t ask that from you.”

“I don’t mind, if it means you feel more comfortable with that crowd,” she urges. “A lot of what makes someone successful nowadays is who they surround themselves with.”

Jongwoo immediately thinks of Seokyoon, tipsy and mumbling half-baked bars, clinging to his side with a cheesy grin. He’s a bit of an airhead, and annoying sometimes, maybe, but Jongwoo would much rather sit on a shitty rooftop quizzing Seokyoon about synonyms for the color red than sit under Jaeho’s condescending eyes any longer than he has to.

“Come on, oppa,” Jieun tries that cute smile of hers that used to make Jongwoo think that if he could just make her smile like that every day, things would work out just fine for him in the end. But his mood is off now, and he suddenly yearns for some fresh air. Even in Jieun’s apartment, much nicer than the goshiwon, he feels like he could suffocate.

People aren’t meant to live like this.

“Ah, well,” he scratches the back of his neck, “I just remembered I have something. I have to do something.”

“Oppa,” Jieun practically pouts, reaching out to hold his hand. Jongwoo draws away from her touch.

She sighs, and the sound grates on Jongwoo. “Does it have to do with that novel?”

Something in her tone feels patronizing. She’s off the mark, but Jongwoo can’t help but snap, “So what if it does?”

“I know you have fun writing,” she says, “But you have to make time for other things, too.”

“It’s not just some hobby,” he insists. “I’m serious about it. I want it to be published some day.”

It feels like they’ve had this conversation a dozen times already since he moved to Seoul.

“Everyone wants to be published,” she retorts, and then presses her knuckles to her mouth like she didn’t mean to blurt that out. “It just… Might be smarter to wait. Nothing is guaranteed right now, except for your job with Jaeho-oppa. It would probably be easier to put yourself out there once you have something stable to fall back on.”

The concern in her voice sounds almost rehearsed to Jongwoo’s ears, like it’s a veil thrown over the real sentiment: she doesn’t have any faith in him.

To make matters worse, she adds, “I know it sucks, I know it’s terrible. But it’s how things work here so you just have to grin and bear it.”

It’s as if she turns to Jaeho right in front of him – show me a smile.

How about that condescending prick shows Jongwoo a smile? Something pretty and red and wide, sliced open from ear to ear, so he'll never do anything but smile again.

Jongwoo shakes the mental image and tries to play it off like he’s shaking his head to what she said. “That’s Jaeho’s world,” he mutters, trying to keep the venom from his voice, “Not mine.”

“It could be yours, too,” Jieun insists. She’s trying to be supportive, but the words feel like barbs in Jongwoo’s ears. "It should be."

“I’m sorry,” he stands up and pulls his clothes back on, ignoring the way he can feel her eyes boring holes into his back. “I really have to go, I–”

The lie comes disturbingly easily to him as he turns back to look her straight in the eye:

“I promised I’d help a new resident move in tomorrow.”

She looks at him like she knows that’s total bullshit. He's never had anything good to say about his neighbors, except for Seokyoon, and now he’s dipping out on his girlfriend so he can lend a hand to some stranger who she'll probably hear him complaining about soon? Yeah, right.

“You should really move someplace more permanent, oppa,” she says, like it’s that easy, like Jaeho pays him enough for that. “Goodnight.”

Her gaze lingers, and this would be the perfect time to kneel on the side of her bed and apologize for being difficult. She would defrost a little bit, just enough to accept a parting kiss and a promise that he’ll try harder for her in the future. He’ll be a good little subordinate and bootlick his way to an actual salary, so they can move in together and start a family together and fade away in this stinking city together.

He doesn’t do any of that. 

“Goodnight.”

-

This is a tall building, built in the last ten years. Of course it has an elevator, and of course the elevator is full of tipsy college-age girls giggling their heads off. It’s a saturday night, after all. Any normal person wants to be out having fun.

Jongwoo stands near the doors and once again wonders how the hell he became a stranger in his own relationship. The elevator stops just one more floor down, letting a young couple on. The girls make room, one of them stumbling without sincerity right against Jongwoo’s side.

“Oh,” she grips his forearm for balance and giggles in his ear. “I’m so sorry!”

Jongwoo doesn’t even look over. “It’s fine.”

“You should let me make it up to you,” she insists. “How old are you? Can I call you oppa?”

Jongwoo reaches forward and smashes the button corresponding to the next floor, stepping out of the elevator to a chorus of disappointed voices telling him to loosen up and come party. He’ll take the stairs, thanks.

This city is just too much.

It’s nearly halfway into September, and nighttime is getting a little chilly. Jongwoo wishes he thought ahead enough to bring a hoodie or something. But then again, he expected to spend the night with his girlfriend. Any normal guy would have. But here he is, wandering into the wind with his shoulders hunched and his head down. Between dinner with Seokyoon and a day with Jieun, Jongwoo can’t justify shelling out for a taxi fare. So he steels himself for a long walk home in the dark and tries not to think of it as a walk of shame.

Good luck with that.

He’s crossing a small footbridge when his phone pings with a text. Two weeks ago, he would have scrambled to read it. But right now he’s sluggish about reaching into his back pocket and tapping his screen.

It’s not from Jieun like he expected, nor is it from his mother or Seokyoon. The text is from an unknown number, but the words are so familiar that it makes his gut churn.

Is Eden still burning, jagiya?

He spins on his heels, as if he’ll see that familiar figure following him through the dark. But the only people he sees are strangers, all going about their business without so much as a glance toward him. The street lamps are bright, leaving little room for ambiguity on this small bridge. But the city is far wider than what he can see in front of him, stretching its fingers out beyond what Jongwoo can even comprehend. There’s a million places for the shadows to gather here.

He pockets his phone and walks faster than before.

His legs and lungs are both aching by the time he makes it back home, taking the stairs up to his floor two at a time. His footsteps echo loudly in the stairwell, and he has to fight the urge to walk more slowly so he can hear his surroundings better. As if the sound of something more sinister is hiding beneath the echo of his footfalls.

The studio is pretty quiet at this time of night. The only person Jongwoo sees is some guy in his underwear making ramyun in the kitchen.

“Want some?” he asks in a bellowing voice, startling Jongwoo as he tries to slip through.

“Uh,” Jongwoo tries to get his heartbeat to chill out, “No thanks.”

The man tsks. “No one ever wants my ramyun. There’s meat in it, you know? The new guy brought some. Housewarming, I guess. It’s good and smoky.”

“I’m fine, really,” Jongwoo insists. “Goodnight.”

He wishes he could say he feels safer as he walks down the hall to his room, but he doesn’t. The landlord turns half the lights off every night as to lessen the fluorescent glare under people’s doors while they’re trying to sleep. Right now, it only serves to make the narrow space feel as dim and dirty as Eden was.

This isn’t Eden. Eden is gone.

Jongwoo doesn’t go straight to his room. Instead, he stops two rooms down, wrapping his knuckles against the door.

“Seokyoon-ah,” he calls out, knocking again. “Are you busy?”

There’s no answer. All Jongwoo can hear on the other side is the muffled sound of heavy bass.

“Ah, this kid,” he mutters, shuffling down the hallway to his room and pulling his phone out.

The strange text is still sitting pretty on his lock screen, asking him a question he doesn’t know how to answer. He swipes it away while he fumbles with his key, and shoots Seokyoon a text instead.

Are you busy?

It takes nearly five minutes for the return text to come through.

I’m making beats.

Jongwoo is briefly so disgusted with the concept of Seokyoon fucking around in a pirated copy of Garage Band so he can terrorize the denizens of the internet with fully self-produced music that he almost forgets about the more pressing issue at hand.

Have you gotten any weird texts since we left Eden?

This time, the reply lags by nearly ten minutes.

Weird like how? You don’t need to be paranoid. That place is long gone.

Jongwoo tosses his phone onto his desk with a harsh clatter and throws himself down into bed. He tries to tell himself that Seokyoon isn’t dismissive, he’s just a little spacey. But he can’t help but feel like the one person who was kind of on his side is starting to treat him just like everyone else.

Or maybe Jieun was right, and he’s being too sensitive.

He groans and rubs his face, wondering how he managed to fumble the first real weekend he got to spend with his girlfriend. It’s like all the tension that kept him on edge when he was at Eden hasn’t really left him, it’s just dropped to a simmer that still burns everything he touches.

You were always like this, honey, a voice whispers in his head, and it doesn’t belong to him.

“I’m not like this,” he mutters out loud “It’s Eden. It’s those freaks that died in a fire, they’re still in my head somehow. Or maybe it’s the whole city.”

He bites his tongue abruptly when a noise comes from the hall, followed by the sound of a nearby door opening and closing. The hairs on his arms stand up as he listens hard to the unmistakable shuffle of feet in the vacant room next to his, where a man died not too long ago.

Jongwoo’s heart leaps to his throat before he remembers – the new guy has already moved in.

It’s not a ghost. It’s just some guy.

He sighs a little louder than he should at the realization that the few precious days of total silence next to him have come to an end. But the new guy doesn’t make a racket. Jongwoo hears the mattress shift, the one that's pressed right up against the wall. It weirds him out a little, thinking that they’re lying right next to each other.

And then there’s that noise again, the barely-there whisper of something brushing the wall. Maybe the guy is hanging up pictures or something. Jongwoo lifts one of his hands and runs his knuckles across the adjacent surface, trying to reproduce the sound. It almost makes him laugh – if the other guy knew Jongwoo was fondling the divider between them, he’d probably be just as freaked out as Jongwoo was earlier.

The really shitty thing is the fact that Jongwoo feels no farther away from the anonymous man on the other side of the wall than he did with his girlfriend today. He runs his thumb nail over an imperfection in the paint job and wonders what kind of hell he's in for with this new neighbor. With any luck, he'll be some studious kid or a young salaryman. Just some stranger with a busy schedule that Jongwoo never needs to think about beyond these moments where they're settling side by side, trying to ignore the uncomfortable intimacy of knowing you're falling asleep next to someone.

That discomfort doesn't bother Jongwoo anymore. At least, not enough to keep him awake. His heavy eyelids droop shut before long, leaving him to dream in splintering plywood.

The bed is the centerpiece of the dream, a small one-man stage to frame the theater of hands breaking the wall down, tearing it to pieces. They reach into the next room and yank, dragging the flailing body of a bloodied man through the tight opening, pulling him into a chokehold. The two bodies thrash and writhe together, turning from red to blue and back again.

“Isn’t this fun?” the assailant asks. “I could kill you right now.”

The weirdest thing about the dream is that Jongwoo can’t figure out if he's the attacker or the victim.

-

In the morning, Jongwoo blinks awake to a revelation that cannot be ignored:

He's stinky. And a little sticky.

As he stretches and groans, he doesn’t have the mental capacity to dwell on anything that happened yesterday, including any dreams he might have had. He just wants to rinse his mouth and take a shower as soon as possible.

When he glances at his phone screen, it reads 10:24 in the morning. The wallpaper selfie of himself and Jieun makes his gut tie in knots. She’s probably brunching it up with Jaeho and company right about now.

Jongwoo is torn between two battling emotions: regret for shooting himself in the foot, and relief that he’s not sitting at a table picking at a meal he can’t afford.

The overwhelming funk of his own stinkiness beats both emotions into submission, and he rolls himself off his bed to head for the showers.

This place is a lot like Eden in the way that privacy seems to have been an afterthought. Nothing separates the line of shower heads except for pathetic little slivers of frosted glass that might as well not exist at all. After the military, Jongwoo doesn’t really care. You see one stranger's cock and balls, and you’ve seen them all. As long as he has shower shoes to protect himself from the lingering threat of crusted cum between the floor tiles, he can handle anything.

Well, almost anything. 

“Smells good.”

Jongwoo freezes as he’s lathering shampoo into his hair. The voice in his head, the one that doesn’t belong to him, is getting louder.

“Can I use some?”

Okay, that one definitely sounded real. Slowly, Jongwoo turns under the spray to look over his shoulder.

The voice wasn’t in his head.

The man looking down at Jongwoo has dark eyes that seem to see every part of him at once, inside and outside. He’s naked – of course he’s naked, they’re in the fucking shower – wearing nothing but a smile that would look handsome on anyone else. Innocent, almost, the way it shows a hint of his front teeth.

But it only makes Jongwoo’s heart pound in his ears. “W-What?”

The man leans against the frosted glass divider and nods towards the little nook in the wall where Jongwoo’s shampoo is sitting. “I like the smell of your shampoo. I lost all my belongings recently, so I’m getting by on some cheap convenience store stuff.”

Jongwoo barely registers a word that he says. All he can do is stare. 

“So,” the man raises his eyebrows expectantly, “Can I use yours instead?”

Jongwoo is dreaming. He has to be dreaming. Which means that, at any second, the faucet will run red. A knife will wind up in his chest, pushing a torrent of hot blood up his throat to spill from his lips in a crimson waterfall that this man will lick up like it's the sweetest wine.

But when that doesn’t happen, Jongwoo can only numbly hold his shampoo out to the other man without a word.

His generosity is rewarded with a satisfied smile.

“Thank you,” the man says, grabbing the bottle in a way that makes their fingers overlap for a moment. “It’s nice of neighbors to look out for each other. Right, jagi?”

Jongwoo can only stare ahead at the tile wall in front of him, ears ringing and vision darkening at the edges.

Welcome to the residence, Seo Moonjo.

Chapter Text

Awkward encounters are a fact of life, but nothing can really prepare you for standing naked next to a dude who has been plaguing your wet dreams and wetter nightmares from beyond the grave.

Wait. Wait, no, that sounds horrible. Jongwoo doesn’t want to take credit for living that existence, no matter how accurate it is.

How about this: awkward encounters are a fact of life, but nothing can really prepare you for standing naked next to a dude who should have died in a fire that filled you with the strongest wave of vindictive satisfaction you’ve ever – hold on, what the fuck? Why is this situation so tasteless and awful?

Whatever.

The point is, no matter how mortifying you think it might be to come face to face with the naked ghost of a man you absolutely despise, it’s even more mortifying to have a panic attack and pass out in front of said ghost, while you’re also naked. And the most mortifying thing of all is returning to consciousness shortly after, lying back in your bed with your wet hair dripping all over your pillow as the ghost sits next to you and stares down at you like you’re a weird little bug.

“Am I dreaming?” Jongwoo asks softly. This could all be fake. “I hope I’m dreaming.”

Moonjo smiles. “Do you dream about me often?”

Jongwoo is afraid to answer, because the truth is ugly and uncomfortable. So he just blinks up at Moonjo a few times and asks, “How are you here?”

“Where else would I be?” Moonjo asks. “I had to find someplace to live after the accident.”

“You should be dead,” Jongwoo points out. “I think you’re a ghost.”

“Is that what you’ve been dreaming about?” Moonjo asks, looking far too satisfied with the thought. “I’d love to hear the details when you feel better.”

Jongwoo swallows. His throat hurts. Hell, his lungs hurt. Distantly, he can recall the rapid rise and fall of his chest before everything went dark. But nothing outside of his body hurts. Only his insides – his tense muscles, his twisting guts.

He sits upright, wanting to level the playing field a little bit so that Moonjo is no longer looming over him. Unfortunately, the motion makes him acutely aware of the fact that he’s laying on top of his bedsheets with nothing but a damp towel around his hips. Moonjo, at least, is guarding his modesty behind a bathrobe.

“How long…” Jongwoo fiddles awkwardly with the knot in his towel.

“How long were you out?” Moonjo asks, and Jongwoo nods stiffly. It feels like Moonjo hasn’t blinked once this whole time. “Not very long at all. I wasn’t sure if moving you was safe, but I didn’t want to leave you on that dirty floor. You didn’t seem to be having a seizure, so I took a chance.”

Jongwoo’s skin crawls at the thought of his body lying limp on the slimy tiles. But, again – he doesn’t hurt anywhere. No bumps, no bruises. It’s as if Moonjo caught him before he could fall, and he’s not sure if that’s better or worse than the alternative.

And then Moonjo adds, as if Jongwoo’s decency is the only thing on the line here, “No one else saw you.”

“Well, thanks,” Jongwoo draws his knees up and angles his torso away from Moonjo. “You can leave now.”

“You should eat something,” Moonjo urges. “I brought meat–” 

“You can leave,” Jongwoo snaps.

It makes Moonjo smile again. This guy is just as weird as Jongwoo remembers.

“Alright. See you later, jagi.”

Goosebumps erupt across Jongwoo’s body as Moonjo stands, announcing his exit with the soft click of the door. As soon as he’s gone, Jongwoo leaps up from his bed, fighting a wave of dizziness as he pulls the towel from around his waist to scrub his skin raw.

No matter what, he can’t scrub the mental images from his mind – Moonjo catching his limp body in the shower, Moonjo throwing him over his shoulder, or maybe folding him up like some delicate thing and carrying him all the way down the hall to this room. Fuck, how did Moonjo even know which room was his? He almost wishes the guy had just let him crack his head open on the tiles.

His skin is dry now, at least. He moves to his hair, ruffling it in a way he knows is going to make it stand at awkward angles. And that’s when he realizes something –

There’s no itchy crackle of drying shampoo flaking on the locks. His hair is damp, but clean.

He was lathering his hair when Moonjo walked into the shower room and ruined his day. So that leaves Jongwoo with two hypotheses: he took the time to carefully rinse out his own hair before succumbing to a psychogenic blackout, or…

Moonjo rinsed his hair for him while he was unconscious.

Jongwoo flushes in anger as that mental image gets added to his growing library of intrusive thoughts. He hates that guy. He really fucking hates that guy.

-

The only real solace going forward is the fact that this is not Eden.

Jongwoo can’t say for certain, but he’s got a hunch that everybody in that place was in on something together. The landlady, that pervert, those twins, that guy with the big eyes and the mullet who disappeared. Even – no, especially the ahjussi in 304. Moonjo. It’s the only way to explain how someone was getting into Jongwoo’s room, or why everyone was so insistent that the fourth floor was empty even though Jongwoo kept hearing noises, or why that gangster was being investigated by a detective. It was a bad place full of bad people, no way in hell it was safe.

But this is not Eden. Whatever authority Moonjo had there doesn’t apply here.

After Moonjo leaves, Jongwoo spends a few hours hiding out in his room alone. He drafts a text to Jieun but decides against sending it. He tries to write, but his keyboard sounds too loud to his ears. It's as if everyone on this floor can hear the click of his fingers on the keys. He considers slipping out of the goshiwon and holing up in a cafe or PC bang, but he dreads the thought of venturing out into the hallway. So those few hours are spent in the most pathetic way possible, sitting on his bed with his back to the wall, listening for signs of life on the other side. Moonjo doesn't seem to be in his room. Why would he be? Freaky arsonist stalker or not, no one would want to spend a beautiful Sunday holed up in this miserable mausoleum. The entire floor is relatively quiet, which only amplifies every small sound.

Above him, below him, right next to him, the distance doesn't matter. Jongwoo holds his breath at every noise.

This isn't Eden. There is no giggling maniac behind the door that just creaked open somewhere nearby. This isn't Eden. The smell of food coming from the common area is safe to eat, no bitter meat or spoiled eggs. This isn't Eden. The shuffle of footsteps across the floor is far too quick to belong to that lazy pervert from 313. This isn't Eden.

So there's no reason for Jongwoo to jump as hard as he does when a fist raps frantically at his door.

A knife. Jongwoo glances around the room. A knife – he bought a kitchen knife when he was still living in Eden. But it’s deep in his suitcase somewhere, and he doesn’t have time to dig it out. His eyes catch the pen sitting on his desk, plastic and cheap. It’ll have to do. He’s sure he could do some damage –

“Hyung?” Seokyoon half-whispers. “Are you awake? Open up!”

Jongwoo lets out a breath of air so loud that he's almost embarrassed. He wipes his hands down his face and jumps to his feet, opening the door just wide enough to drag Seokyoon through before shushing him.

“He’s right next door,” Jongwoo hisses so quietly that he’s practically mouthing the words.

Seokyoon shakes his head. “I just saw him heading downstairs to smoke a minute ago.”

Jongwoo heaves a sigh. “This is crazy, isn’t it? Out of everyone, that guy had to make it out alive?”

“That's a little harsh,” Seokyoon reprimands gently, “He was weird, but… I don’t think he deserved to die.”

But Jongwoo barely registers the awkward disapproval in Seokyoon's voice, too alight as he is with anxious energy. “What if he started the fire? Would he deserve to die then?”

Seokyoon gives him a wary look. “Well, I don’t know…”

He frowns and scratches his neck in a way that makes it clear he’s uncomfortable with the abruptly vindictive direction the conversation has gone, and Jongwoo feels a pang of something like discordance between them – Seokyoon hadn’t been dwelling on that particular train of thought, but Jongwoo can't get it out of his head.

“Anyway,”Jongwoo nudges Seokyoon’s arm and steers the conversation back to something safer, “Did he say anything to you?”

“No, not really,” Seokyoon says. “Just said hi, like nothing happened. That's what's freaking me out the most - he seems exactly the same, like he's not bothered at all.”

“Of course he isn't,” Jongwoo glances out the window as if he’ll see someone out there watching him. One of his legs bounces restlessly. "That guy's not normal."

“The weirdest part was that,” Seokyoon grimaces a bit, “I, uh. I thought he was you for a second.”

“Huh?” Jongwoo gapes. “How?”

“I didn’t see him at first,” Seokyoon says. “He walked into the kitchen behind me and all I could smell was… Well, he smelled just like you always do.”

Jongwoo isn’t sure how he should feel about the fact that he hangs around Seokyoon enough that Seokyoon can apparently pick him out by his unique stink, until it hits him – Moonjo brought him back to his room, and only him. Not his shower caddy, not his body wash or shampoo. The freaky bastard has stolen his toiletries.

“He used–” Jongwoo closes his eyes and takes a deep breath, burying his head in his hands. “He used my shampoo this morning. I need to get my fucking shampoo back from him.”

Judging by the look on Seokyoon’s face, that explanation leaves him with more questions than answers.

The rest of the day drags sluggishly with the dual sensations of anxiety and monotony. It turns Jongwoo into an unfocused mess. He wants to hide out in his room, but he can’t get any work done. Every time he puts his fingers on the keys, he swears he can feel eyes on him. Just outside the window or peeking under the door. Jongwoo isn’t shy about the things he writes, but he suddenly feels self-conscious about every sound of his keyboard, every word he types. He manages to get a scene down about a victim limping away from a brutal attack, leaving a crimson trail of blood in their wake like a scattering of rose petals. But he stops himself short when he hears a voice in his head tell him – that’s nice, babe, but why don’t you make him crawl instead?

His stomach growls. Maybe he’s just hungry.

As much as he hates the idea of leaving the safe space of his room, he's starting to go stir crazy. So he makes his way to the kitchen for ramyun or rice or something, anything quick and easy. He gets as far as opening a cupboard before everything goes straight to hell. 

“Hello,” a soft voice calls out, and Jongwoo freezes like a rabbit.

Moonjo approaches through the kitchen, moving in and out of the slats of fiery light streaming in the window. “Are you busy?”

All things considered, it's a relatively normal interaction. No one is naked and covered in soap bubbles, so they're already off to a better start than before. But seeing Moonjo in a more normal context makes him realize at once that Seokyoon was right - he seems the same as he always was back at Eden. Same casual neutrality settling across his face, same slow gait that speaks to the confidence of a predator that has their next meal bleeding out in front of them. This might not be Eden, but Moonjo looks right at home here.

“Yes,” Jongwoo says automatically, slamming the cupboard shut and glancing towards the exit. “I was just leaving.”

“Oh? Ah, it’s the weekend. You probably have plans with your girlfriend.” 

“That’s right.”

That’s not right. But Jongwoo will say anything to get away from the invasive way Moonjo’s eyes touch him. Though, to be honest, he looks less ghastly than Jongwoo remembers somehow. Less sickly pale than the creature that’s been lingering along the edges of Jongwoo’s vision and slinking through his disordered dreams. Maybe it’s a trick of the golden afternoon light streaming through the small kitchen window, but his skin looks healthy and warm. Not the cool alabaster of a headstone, or a tarnished piece of porcelain.

It’s as if Eden’s death has given him new life.

Maybe Jongwoo has been wrong all along. It could be that Moonjo is an ordinary man who got caught up with a bunch of weirdos, same as Jongwoo and Seokyoon. Maybe that's why he's not terribly affected by the burning of Eden - he's glad the rest of them are gone for the same reason Jongwoo is.

“Well,” Moonjo’s tired eyes drag down the length of Jongwoo’s body like the prying touch of ten fingertips that Jongwoo can't shake off, “You have fun. I’ll be around when you get bored of all that.”

That makes Jongwoo quirk one eyebrow so hard he nearly sprains it. He doesn’t even know what to say to that.

No… No, never mind. This guy is a freak.

-

The rooftop is hardly private, but Jongwoo feels some of his paranoia lift as he slips out into the fresh air and lets the heavy door swing shut behind him. All around him, the Sunday afternoon bustle settles over the city like static on a television screen. Jongwoo loiters awkwardly by the railing and looks out across the grey clusters of buildings, half expecting someone to follow him up at any moment. It's only when he's confident that he'll be left alone that he finally takes his phone out of his pocket.

It rings for so long that Jongwoo thinks it's about to go to voicemail when Jieun finally answers against a cacophony of muddled voices.

“Hello?” she asks over the din. “Oppa, what’s up?”

Jongwoo’s brow furrows. It's a bit late for brunch. “Are you still out?”

“Huh?” she asks down the line as the sounds around her gradually quiet before muffling altogether. “Yeah, I am. It turns out some old friends from college were at the brunch. Jaeho-oppa said he’d treat us to dinner tonight, too, so we’re hanging out until then. What’s up?”

Jongwoo feels a bit slighted by the fact that she’s out surrounded by a handful of people while he’s playing hide and seek with a demon in his own home, but he reminds himself that he’s the one who ducked out on joining her. So he bites his tongue against those thoughts, even as his stomach growls loudly in protest. He decides to get down to business so he can get this over with as quickly as possible before running out to find some corner store food.

“Jieun-ah, this is going to sound crazy,” Jongwoo starts in perhaps the worst way possible, “But do you remember how I told you that my previous residence burned down?”

“Yeah,” she says, not without a hint of wariness. “That happens in those old buildings sometimes. Just be glad you got out. Unless you're afraid it’ll happen again? That's a once in a lifetime kind of thing.”

“No, no, that's not what I'm worried about,” Jongwoo says, and then changes gears. “Actually… Maybe I am. Because a guy who used to live there survived.”

Silence, and then, “... Okay?”

“He moved into my current residence,” Jongwoo adds. “Days after the fire. And he's acting like nothing happened."

“You’re upset,” she asks, “Because someone didn’t die?”

It’s at that moment that Jongwoo realizes that maybe this phone call was a bad idea.

"Not just someone," Jongwoo glances over his shoulder towards the roof access door. Still shut. "The most suspicious guy who lived there-"

"So a guy lost his apartment and moved into yours," Jieun says dismissively. "It sounds like he just needed a place to live. You should know firsthand how hard it is to find a decent room on short notice."

"You don't understand," Jongwoo insists, "This morning he-"

Asked to borrow my shampoo. Caught me when I blacked out in the shower. Brought me back to my room. Sat with me until I woke up.

Jongwoo feels bile rise in his throat as he realizes that no matter how he explains this morning's events, it'll just sound like that freak was being neighborly. But Jongwoo knows better. Jongwoo can still feel the phantom touch of their fingers overlapping on the shampoo bottle like a matchstick meeting phosphorus. Moonjo doesn't treat him with neighborly intent.

Moonjo treats him like he wants to carve open his belly and crack his ribcage into the shape of brittle angel wings so he can push his red mouth and white teeth into Jongwoo's bleeding, pulsing core.

But Jongwoo can't say any of that to Jieun. All he can say is a pathetic admission of, "I think he wants to hurt me."

"Oppa," Jieun breathes on a tired sigh, "I know you didn't like those people. But not every eccentric you meet is out to get you. This guy deserves a roof over his head as much as you do. If it bothers you that much, then swallow your pride and try to negotiate a better pay cut so you can move out sooner."

Swallow his pride - what fucking pride? First he needs to be more assertive, now he needs to grovel harder? Jongwoo's eyes sting as he looks out over the blurred beige city in front of him. There's nothing for him to say to her except for, "Okay."

This shit could not be farther from okay.

The rest of the conversation is short and goes about as well as expected. She finds an excuse to hang up, something about a friend needing a hand fixing her hair for dinner tonight, and Jongwoo doesn't question the sincerity. He just ends the call on cue, scrubs awkwardly at his eyes, and feels farther from safety than before. With his elbows braced on the railing, he stares down at his phone, at the sparse text conversations sitting on his messages screen. Jieun at the top, followed by Seokyoon. Then Yoojung asking him to do something for work with a half a dozen obnoxious stickers. Then Jaeho's demand to get drinks a few days ago, then his mother checking in last week.

That's it. His entire world condensed to five names, and one stranger: Is Eden still burning, jagiya?

For half a second, Jongwoo considers throwing the useless fucking phone down to the pavement below.

He doesn't linger on the rooftop much longer. The sunlight feels a little too pervasive as he tries not to dwell on the fact that Jieun didn’t even make a half-hearted attempt to invite him to dinner, and he’s still starving. So he shuffles his feet back to the rooftop door, scrolling through that limited catalog of text messages as if he’ll find salvation through his phone screen. When he pulls the door open, he yelps and drops his phone.

Because Moonjo is just fucking standing there, as if he’d been waiting all along, holding a book in one hand. He barely reacts as Jongwoo’s phone bounces and lands between his feet.

“Oh,” Moonjo says lamely. “Sorry about that.”

He nudges the phone with the side of his black slides before bending down to pick it up. Jongwoo feels a pang of embarrassed anger when Moonjo brazenly taps the screen and gives the background photo an unimpressed look before handing the phone back to Jongwoo.

He snatches it away and pockets it. “Can I help you?”

Moonjo lifts the book in his hand, and Jongwoo nearly has another heart attack. “You left this behind in the residence when you moved out. I kept it in case we crossed paths again.”

A copy of Kafka’s Metamorphosis stares back at him, his name scrawled on the back cover in dark marker strokes.

He nabs the book out of Moonjo’s hand. “Uh – thanks.” 

“I read it,” Moonjo says. “I hope you don’t mind.”

Jongwoo fans awkwardly through the pages. “No, that’s fine.”

“It’s very interesting,” Moonjo adds. “I can see how a person would relate to it.”

“Right,” Jongwoo says. “Excuse me.”

He ducks his head and narrows his shoulders, trying to slip through the doorway that Moonjo is blocking without touching the other man. Of course, Moonjo doesn’t budge from where he’s camping in the threshold like an asshole. Jongwoo keeps his eyes on the ground as their bodies brush, refusing to look at any part of the other man except for the hem of his dark pants where they fall over his black sandals.

Those damn sandals…

Jongwoo can’t help himself. He stops before taking the first step down into the residence and remarks, “It’s really lucky.”

Moonjo is still staring straight at him, of course. “Hm?”

“That this didn’t burn up with the rest of the stuff in the building,” Jongwoo taps the book on his open palm. “And that you didn’t lose your house slippers.”

He gestures to Moonjo’s slides, and Moonjo looks down at them as well. When he lifts his head, he’s smiling. “Yes. Very lucky.”

Jongwoo turns away without another word, lip curling in disgusted suspicion. His wallet is in his pocket, so he goes straight from the rooftop to the ground floor without bothering to stop in his room for his bag. The less time he spends here, the better. That's how he finds himself eating a cheap meal at a plastic table outside of a convenience store as the city dims around him. With nothing to keep him company but the muffled conversations of passing strangers, Jongwoo starts Metamorphosis over from the beginning to pass the time. It doesn't take long for him to find the bookmark.

Or at least, what’s left of it.

Honestly, he forgot it was even in there. A cutesy photo of himself and Jieun taken years ago, not long before his enlistment began. Except only half of it is there, bent haphazardly and jammed carelessly in between the pages. When he unfolds the flimsy cardstock, he's met with the sight of Jieun with a jagged crease distorting her face. The photo is ruined. He can barely recognize her features, so there’s really no point of even hanging on to it.

He can’t help but wonder about what happened to the half with his face.

-

The days roll by without any arson, so that’s nice.

One of the most concerning things lately is the way Moonjo’s presence makes Jongwoo almost excited to trudge into work. Of course, that feeling goes up in smoke as soon as he’s actually in the office with Byeongmin being frigid next to him and Yoojung being barely any help every time Jongwoo gets a phone call he doesn’t know how to handle. At that point, he almost wishes he was back in his room with the window open and the door locked. The cycle makes Jongwoo’s head spin.

The worst thing is that Seokyoon doesn’t seem put off by the whole thing at all.

After a few days, Jongwoo notices a pattern of behavior. Moonjo doesn't come back to the residence until well after dark. He's not sure what kind of hours the man's clinic keeps and he doesn't really care. All he cares about is the fact that he usually has a narrow window of time in the evening to sit with Seokyoon at one of the rickety tables in the communal kitchen so they can stuff their faces together in peace. Jongwoo tries to use that time to talk about their little Moonjo-shaped problem, but Seokyoon seems to defrost to the older man disturbingly quickly.

“I don’t know,” Seokyoon says over a steaming bowl of instant noodles one night, “I think we might have been off the mark. He’s been nothing but nice to me. Besides-”

His mouth twists in a poorly hidden smile.

"It’s not so bad, having such a good looking guy around to look up to.”

It’s in this moment that Jongwoo realizes something horrifying: Seokyoon might honest to god have the hots for a freaky dentist who could also be a mass murdering arsonist for all they know.

This makes Jongwoo angry for a number of reasons. Moonjo is a suspicious weirdo in desperate need of a haircut. Seokyoon is an impressionable puppydog of a man. It’s a recipe for disaster. Jongwoo needs to step in and put a stop to this before it can grow into anything real. It's his duty as the elder friend, that’s all. It certainly has nothing to do with the fact that Jongwoo has busted to the thought of Moonjo’s mouth slick with blood more times in the last month than he has to thoughts of his nearly-sexless relationship with his girlfriend since arriving in Seoul, thanks. If that’s the case, then it’ll just have to stay between his left hand and god.

Jongwoo shakes those vile thoughts from his head. “What's there to look up to? You shouldn’t get involved with a guy like that. Who knows if he was connected to the fire or not?”

Seokyoon levels him with a flat, skeptical look, like his concerns are completely stupid. It makes Jongwoo bristle – it’s the same way Jieun looked at him when he told her about the psychos in Eden.

“Think about it,” he starts, “Why would a guy burn down one crappy goshiwon just to move into another one? He said he lost all his stuff – who would put themselves in that position?”

Jongwoo glances around the room before he leans close to whisper, “A crazy one. He’s not normal. I’m almost willing to bet that he burnt the place down as an excuse to keep stalking me. Us.”

“The fire was an insurance scam set up by that ajumma,” Seokyoon reminds him. “Moonjo-hyung said–”

“Moonjo- hyung? ”

Seokyoon just blinks at him with those innocent eyes of his. “He told me I can be familiar with him.”

“Goodness, this kid,” Jongwoo sighs, pressing fingertips to his temple. “I’m telling you, he’s a creep. You should stay away from him, not get closer.”

“You could call me hyung, too, if you wanted.”

Jongwoo startles hard enough to bash his knee on the underside of the table, making the dishes clatter. He wants to hunch his shoulders, to curl up and hide away, but there's nowhere he can go that those prying eyes won't follow. The only thing he can do is try not to look at the tall figure that moves through the darkened doorway to loom over the table, dressed in a casual suit.

“I’ll pass,” Jongwoo manages to say. “I don’t think we’re that close.”

Moonjo raises his eyebrows, as if he’s wondering how much more close two men can get after an unconscious naked piggyback ride. Or bridal carry. Or maybe Moonjo just dragged his sorry ass across the floor by his ankles. Jongwoo is torn between wanting to ask Moonjo for the details so he can stop worrying about it, and never thinking about that morning again.

“That’s fine,” Moonjo braces a hand on the back of Jongwoo’s chair, pinning him with a hard look. “You’re a private person. I am, too.”

Jongwoo leans forward, as far away from that hand as he can, and thinks, yeah right. This guy was probably sneaking into his room just like 313 was. The thought makes Jongwoo fight back a shiver.

“Although,” Moonjo lets his hand slide from the back of the chair slowly, one finger at a time, “You have such interesting things to say about me behind my back.”

“Uh–” Seokyoon stutters awkwardly across the table from them, “Please don’t take what he said too seriously, he’s been having a stressful time–”

“I don’t mind,” Moonjo says, never once looking away from Jongwoo. “Let me know when you’re ready to say them to my face.”

And with that, he walks away. Jongwoo cranes his neck as he watches Moonjo head out the door towards the living area. He and Seokyoon sit in awkward silence as the slow rhythm of footsteps fades out down the hall, punctuated by the sound of a door opening and closing.

“See?” Jongwoo whips back around to face Seokyoon. “He’s a creep! Let me know when you’re ready to – who says stuff like that?”

Seokyoon frowns at the doorway Moonjo disappeared through. “It was a little weird. But, hyung… You were kind of talking shit about him again.”

Jongwoo rubs his temples. “It always feels like he’s egging me into snapping. God, I hate that guy.”

“Ah, I think you’re taking him too seriously,” Seokyoon picks up his bowl to slurp the cooling broth. “I wouldn’t worry about him too much, hyung.”

Jongwoo grabs his own bowl, fingernail hooking on a small chip taken out of the lip, and hears the echo of something Jieun said to him not too long ago.

Maybe you’re a bit too sensitive.

Weird, her voice is starting to sound like Seokyoon’s.

-

Apparently, the simple knowledge that Moonjo is alive near him is enough to send Jongwoo into a spiral.

Where he used to see ghosts, Jongwoo now sees the figure of a real man made of blood and meat. In the tired eyes of commuters on the bus, in the salarymen that blend in with the morning rush hour crowd, in the young punks with their long hair and their dark clothes. Jongwoo finds himself catching sight of Moonjo in impossible places.

The bright side is that things are going well for Jaeho's company. At least, that's the impression Jongwoo gets. 

He's still new enough that he doesn't fully grasp everything they're expected to do for their clients, but as long as he’s not being chewed out, he doesn’t care. All he knows for sure is that he's expected to spend his lunch hour in the office today, where a client has catered a small meal as a thank you for their service. Whether or not that's a normal business courtesy is beyond Jongwoo. Maybe he should ask about that, risk Yoojung tittering at his ignorance so that he can better understand the world he's trying to assimilate into. But when he sees the food lining the windowsill and his stomach gurgles at the promise of a free meal with some actual substance for once, he decides to keep his mouth shut and enjoy it as much as he can.

Even if that means squeezing into a seat at one of the small round tables right next to Byeongmin, since eating at his desk would be considered rude.

Byeongmin mercifully keeps his mouth shut as Yoojung does most of the talking. Jongwoo has gotten better at dealing with her – letting his mind wander and nodding every once in a while works wonders. He learned not to take her seriously when he realized just how fickle her attention can be, anyway.

“Ah,” she sighs, glancing over Jongwoo’s shoulder towards the group of men laughing by the food. “Why can’t all our clients be handsome men?”

Jongwoo turns to get a look at the so-called handsome man, and his blood freezes. The line of his back is long and could look almost willowy, if not for the broad expanse of his shoulders. His narrow waist is accentuated by the white button-up shirt tucked neatly into the waistband of his dark slacks. From behind, his hair looks a little bit fluffy and unkept, in a charming way. Less charming is the color - such a deep black that it almost doesn't seem to shine. It's a sight Jongwoo knows all too well.

But no, Jongwoo tells himself, he can’t be, he can’t be –

He isn’t, of course. The man turns around to reveal a delicate face, made of narrow curves and gentle slopes. A real prettyboy prince type. The dread in Jongwoo's body detoxes on an exhale.

“He almost looks like you,” Yoojung teases. “If you were a little taller.”

The bitter snort that gets out of Byeongmin is lost to Jongwoo as he stares ahead blankly, trying to purge the blinding white imprint of a button-up shirt from his mind’s eye. But no matter where he looks, the color scalds his vision like a blue flame.

“Jongwoo-ssi,” Yoojung says, still playful, “You’re spacing out. Are we boring you?”

“No,” Jongwoo says. “I just noticed – this whole room is grey and blue.” 

What it needs is some red.

“Minimalist design is trendy,” Yoojung points out. “If we had too much saturation, our clients’ advertisements wouldn’t pop as well as they do.”

“Everyone knows that,” Byeongmin mutters, and Jongwoo barely has time to feel the usual sting of annoyance before a stranger's voice greets them.

“Do you mind if I…?”

Jongwoo turns to look at their client who is, puzzlingly enough, addressing Jongwoo. He has chaebol written all over him, cleanly put-together and far younger than Jongwoo would expect. Even younger than Jaeho, maybe. It's jarring to see him up so close. Jongwoo has no idea how he ever saw Moonjo in the elegant and deliberate set of his hair. He's looking at Jongwoo and gesturing towards the only open chair left at their small table, and Jongwoo has no idea why he'd want to take a seat there.

“You don’t need to humor the intern,” Jaeho waves dismissively toward Jongwoo. “Don’t let that pretty face fool you, he can be a bit of a cold one. Here, take a seat with the managers…”

“Of course,” their client says with a smile as he’s whisked away by Jaeho.

“Ah,” Yoojung sighs quietly as the big shots stroke each other’s egos at the next table, “You blew it, Jongwoo-ssi. He almost sat with us. This is why men need to be cordial with each other.”

She means it as a joke, but Jongwoo still feels the bruising ache of being a punchline. Jaeho is right - why would anyone want to sit next to the intern? Don't make him laugh. Jongwoo casts a glance towards his senior and wonders what kind of person would be able to turn him into a joke instead.

-

None of the sting of being relegated to the nameless cold intern has faded by the time Jongwoo is back at the residence.

The weather seems to match his temperament, at least. A chill creeps into the night wind, cooling him off as he takes a call from his mother up on the rooftop. It feels good after the sweltering intensity that August brought, so he lingers there a while after hanging up. Despite everything, the skyline still looks deceptively pretty. Busan is by no means a small city, no matter how much Jaeho likes to tease him for being backwater, but Jongwoo never really got to see sights like this back home. He was always tucked away in sleepy neighborhoods, or meandering through the low-lying fish market his mother works at from dawn until dusk. Even poverty in Seoul has a certain shine that would never reflect on the dull little neighborhood Jongwoo still thinks of distantly as home. If this was his only impression of the city, he’d love it for sure.

Unfortunately, the city also comes with one Seo Moonjo, who seems to sleep in every shadow that spills across the concrete and mortar.

The door to the roof swings open, and Jongwoo doesn’t even bother to look at who it is. He’s learned Moonjo’s gait by its sound already. That slow, unbothered walk, like a scavenger animal that knows it has plenty of time to pick its prey clean. He stops next to Jongwoo, and Jongwoo pointedly doesn't look at him. He opens his mouth, Jongwoo can tell by that little exhalation that preludes speech, and he’s not in the mood for what he knows Moonjo is about to say.

“I don’t want to hear any of that jagi shit,” he bites out, surprising himself a little. He immediately bites his lip in something like embarrassment and takes a steadying breath as the cool September evening begins to burn up around him.

“Hello to you, too,” Moonjo’s shoes scrape across the grit below their feet, but he doesn’t move away. “Feeling a little tense today?”

“I’m... Sorry,” Jongwoo forces out, not feeling sorry at all. “That was rude.”

“Don’t,” Moonjo says. There’s an unusual sharpness in his whip-quick reply that almost makes Jongwoo flinch. It’s softened a bit when he adds, “Apologies are pointless. I don’t want you to hide what you feel.”

Who says shit like that? Jongwoo shoots Moonjo an incredulous glance. Only then does he notice the open beer can in Moonjo’s hand.

Moonjo doesn’t miss the lingering look. He takes a slow drink, maintaining eye contact, and says, “I only brought one. You can have some, if you’d like. I don’t mind.”

Jongwoo glances away. “No thanks. I don’t drink after other people.”

“You’re awfully frustrated,” Moonjo points out, no tact or hesitation. It makes Jongwoo want to scream. “It might help you unwind.”

“It’s nothing, just something,” he waves his hand towards the skyline in a vague gesture, “Something about the city. It gets under my skin.”

Moonjo hums in consideration. “You prefer your hometown?”

“God, no,” Jongwoo nearly laughs bitterly at the thought. With anyone else, he’d be embarrassed to let that slip so easily. But Moonjo is different, somehow. He soaks up all of Jongwoo’s anger like he barely feels its heat. “No, I’d rather be crazy here than suffocating there.”

Moonjo goes quiet at his side, and Jongwoo finally thinks he’s said something awkward enough to stun the guy into silence. But that would be too good to be true.

“Then where would you go,” he asks, probing almost, “If given the choice?”

Jongwoo tries not to sound resentful as he says, “No point in even dwelling on that. As long as Ji–”

He cuts himself off in abrupt shame. It’s not his place to disparage his girlfriend for just trying to make a career in the city with the best opportunities for her - for them.

But Moonjo is an evil little gnat of a man. “Well, go on.” 

“I’m not sure it’s any of your business,” Jongwoo says.

Moonjo, of course, only smiles. “If you’re happy, you should let yourself feel happy. If you’re sad, you should let yourself feel sad. So why not let that anger of yours out, too?”

Jongwoo grips the railing in front of him and rocks on his heels, trying to keep his head screwed on straight. This moment could have come straight from Eden – same rooftop breeze, same vibrant skyline, same unnamable tension under his skin, same weird ass dude trying too hard to get inside his head.

It’s all just like Eden, even after Eden is long gone.

“Look at you,” Moonjo says, in a lower voice than Jongwoo has ever heard from him, “You’re shaking.”

A hand envelops Jongwoo’s on the banister, broad-palmed and burning hot in a way that boils away all of Jongwoo’s rational thoughts to steam. It’s too forward, too intimate. He jerks his hand out from under Moonjo’s and turns to the man, giving him a hard shove that sends him stumbling backwards. The can of beer falls to the concrete in a wet fizz, saturating the air between them with the thick scent of alcohol.

“Is this what you want?” Jongwoo barks. “You’re just like that fucking freak from 313, aren’t you? Just some pervert with a death wish. You want me to get mad? I can get fucking mad!”

If Jongwoo was shaking before, he’s positively vibrating with caustic energy now. He wants to get his hands on Moonjo, yank open that top button of his pristine white shirt to expose the tenderest part of his throat, dig his thumbs in there as Moonjo jerks and struggles beneath his hands, burning up with the same intensity that burned Eden down.

And Moonjo, the fucking freak, only looks at Jongwoo with wide eyes and says, sweet as honey, “Yes, jagiya, why don’t you do it?”

Jongwoo hates him. Jongwoo really, really hates him.

He steps forward, crunching the beer can underfoot, and grabs ahold of Moonjo’s collar, dragging him close and winding one arm back, fist clenched, ready to beat that disgusting glint of excitement off this creep’s face –

“Hyung, hyung!”

Seokyoon’s voice is like a bucket of ice water. Jongwoo lets go of Moonjo’s shirt just as Seokyoon’s hands wrap around his middle, dragging him backwards like he’s some hissy little cat. Jongwoo just shoves the hands off of him and walks in tight little circles with his hands on his hips, breathing heavy.

“Uh,” Seokyoon looks between the two men, one frazzled and steaming, the other quietly smiling. “Uh, sorry about that. Jongwoo-hyung is, he’s kinda–”

“It’s fine,” Moonjo says. That adoring lit of his voice is gone, replaced by a gentle and polite cadence that sounds so fake to Jongwoo’s ears that it gets his blood up again. “I understand. He didn’t do anything wrong.”

Jongwoo stops his frenzied pacing to level Moonjo with an incredulous look over Seokyoon’s shoulder. Moonjo meets his gaze with the slight tilt of his head.

Seokyoon bows slightly, a gesture of deference and thankfulness. Jongwoo doesn’t want to see it, so he walks away, down into the stagnant air of his room down below.

-

If other people are going to drive Jongwoo insane, then Jongwoo will simply shut everyone out of his life.

For the next few days, he barely speaks to anyone. He brushes off Seokyoon’s unsubtle attempts to talk about whatever the hell was up with him and Moonjo on the roof. He acts like he has blinders on any time he catches the phantom image of Moonjo lingering in his peripheral vision. He tunes out Byeongmin’s deriding remarks and Yoojung’s sticky-sweet attempts to con him into more work. He even ghosts Jieun, by accident.

He glances at her text and thinks – fuck it, I’ll answer that later, and silences his phone.

It’s only when he’s holed up in his room around midnight that he realizes he’s been ignoring her all day. Six texts and two calls. She’s worried about him.

He glances up at the open word document in front of him and thinks about all the work he got done today while his phone was silenced. And then he sighs, tapping her contact and giving her a call, knowing she’s probably trying to get some sleep by now.

“Jieun-ah… Jieun-ah, I’m sorry I can’t – I have to be quiet, okay? This is all the louder I can talk. I’m sorry for ignoring you, my phone battery died. I was really busy today, yeah. Yeah, can we meet tomorrow? Oh… how about the day after? Yeah, yeah we’ll see. Okay, I have to go now. Get some sleep. Make sure you eat well. I… Goodbye.”

He hangs up and tosses his phone onto his desk with a clatter far louder than his voice was. And then louder than that – a knock at the door.

It startles him into jumping up in embarrassment, wondering if anyone heard him. But the room across from him is vacant, and the room next to him is…

God, it’s fucking Moonjo, isn’t it?

There’s no peephole, because that would make Jongwoo’s life too easy. So with a sigh, he moves forward a step and cracks the door open just enough to find the devil staring down at him.

“Sorry if I was loud,” he says automatically.

The dim lighting of the hallway at night makes Moonjo’s eyes look darker, thick shadows eating at his features until all that's left is the shape of his bones. Jongwoo is halfway through wondering if anyone has ever been murdered for being too loud in a residence when Moonjo reaches behind himself, fishing around in his back pocket, and brandishing…

A pack of cigarettes. 

Jongwoo exhales.

“Can I smoke?” Moonjo asks. “The window in my room doesn’t open.” 

That’s the dumbest excuse Jongwoo has ever heard. “Go up on the roof.”

“I’d rather do it here,” Moonjo presses. “It’s getting cold out, and I thought we could discuss your novel a little.”

“Stop trying to befriend me,” Jongwoo grumbles, neck heating in something like embarrassment.

“I’m curious, honestly,” Moonjo says, leaning against the doorframe in a way that makes him seem massive and immovable. Like he’s not going to budge even if Jongwoo shoves him out. “I heard you’ve changed gears. No more pianist, babe?”

“How do you know that?” Jongwoo switches to high alert immediately. He thinks back to the evidence that his laptop was tampered with in Eden. All signs pointed towards 313, but all of those freaks were suspicious. “Have you been going through my stuff?”

Moonjo smiles, like he’s enamored with being accused of breaking and entering. “What, you think I’ve read it personally?”

“How else would you know about it?”

“The young man in the room on the other side of mine,” Moonjo explains. “He sure likes to talk.”

Jongwoo sucks in a deep breath and beats down the urge to cuss Seokyoon out. That kid and his big mouth…

“Oh,” Moonjo wears an apologetic expression like a coat that doesn’t quite fit right, “Was he not supposed to say anything?”

“Do you talk to him often when I’m not around?” Jongwoo asks, failing to keep the irritation out of his voice. The idea ties his gut into knots.

“Why wouldn’t I?”

Jongwoo tries to keep a sneer off his face. “He’s too...”

Simple.

Moonjo won’t be coaxing murder fantasies out of Seokyoon, so what does he want with him?

“He and I don’t have a lot in common,” Moonjo admits, “But he’s… Nice. Maybe I’ll ask to smoke in his room. I think he’s still awake. He’ll probably let me.”

Jongwoo heaves an annoyed sigh. “Ah, just do it here, then. I don’t want him getting in trouble for breaking the rules, he doesn’t have anything to fall back on.”

Moonjo pushes into the room at the first utterance of permission, shooting off an infuriating, thanks, babe, as he does.

The window at the foot of Jongwoo’s bed is already propped open. Moonjo makes himself comfortable, letting his house slippers slide off his feet as he draws them up onto the sheets. It grates on Jongwoo for some reason, the way he looks curled up next to the window as he lights a cigarette. He’s too comfortable, like an invasive species that has reached its tendrils into Jongwoo’s life and taken root.

Jongwoo tries not to look at him as he opens up his social media, pointedly ignoring the half a dozen word documents open on his task bar. He thinks that if all Moonjo wants to do is smoke and stare at him, he can handle that. Five, ten minutes, and he’ll be gone anyway.

Of course, Moonjo can’t keep his mouth shut around Jongwoo for that long.

“So,” he says, voice low, “An apartment complex? That’s what you’re writing about now?”

Jongwoo tightens his jaw and considers giving him the silent treatment before breaking. “What about it?”

“I’ve never spoken with a writer before,” Moonjo says, “But I’ve always heard that it’s best to write what you know.”

“I don’t – know,” Jongwoo insists, sparing a glance for Moonjo that turns out to be a mistake. This is always what happens. If he keeps his eyes averted, he’s safe. But the second he gives Moonjo the attention that Moonjo seems to demand, he can barely find the strength to crane his neck away.

There’s something dangerous in the sight of him, sitting cozy at the foot of Jongwoo’s bed, one elbow propped on the windowsill as he blows smoke – upwards, not outward. It curls past his lips, obscuring his face behind a ghostly haze for a moment, before hovering right above their heads.

The bastard.

“What don’t you know, jagi? I figure a building full of strange people is something that hits close to home.”

“It’s not about Eden goshiwon,” Jongwoo insists defensively, waving away some of the smoke so that maybe Moonjo will take a hint and blow it out the window instead.

“Of course it's not,” Moonjo smiles. “The idea came to you out of thin air.”

Jongwoo heaves a sigh. “I can’t imagine anyone would want a story about such an ugly stinking place as that.”

“But that’s the value of making art,” Moonjo says. “It allows you to take something ugly and beat it into a new shape. A filthy residence becomes the vibrant backdrop to something beautiful.”

Jongwoo levels him with a flat look. “Something beautiful?”

Moonjo raises his eyebrows in a sorry mimicry of cluelessness. “Isn’t that what makes crime novels so interesting? It’s no fun to simply read about a hammer falling on someone’s head. A dead body can become a canvas where anything is possible with enough creativity and skill. An author might as well be a god, for all the power they have over a story. ”

After he says it, he brings his hand back to his mouth, puffing idly on the cigarette with his long fingers obscuring the bottom half of his face.

Jongwoo can’t help but stare at them for a moment. Moonjo had described his own hands as – what, delicate? Nimble? Something about having a writer’s fingers.

That jagged scar on the back of Moonjo’s hand peeks out from the hem of his shirtsleeve. It disappears when he shifts to blow the smoke out the window for once, but Jongwoo can’t stop thinking about it. Moonjo’s hands are nothing like his own, nothing at all.

They look dangerous.

Jongwoo swallows. “Be honest. Does your window really not open?” 

Moonjo shakes his head. “It won’t budge.”

“Weird,” Jongwoo says, still not believing him for a second.

“Maybe that’s why he did it.” 

Jongwoo blinks. “Huh?”

“The guy who lived there before,” Moonjo specifies. “Maybe he felt like he was suffocating in that room without being able to open his window. It feels like a coffin already, might as well actualize that fantasy.”

“You think…” Jongwoo’s brain tries to sort out what Moonjo is saying, “That he killed himself… Because his window wouldn’t open?”

Moonjo shrugs. “People have gone crazy over smaller things. An environment can dictate a lot about a person’s psyche. Take you, for example.”

Jongwoo hates that he wants to know what Moonjo means. “What about me?”

“Eden had you going crazy, didn’t it?”

“I wasn’t crazy,” Jongwoo insists. “Even if everyone else there was.”

“Hm,” Moonjo looks Jongwoo dead in the eyes and takes a long, slow drag. “Are the characters in your novel going to be crazy, too?”

Jongwoo scowls. “Finish smoking and leave.”

Moonjo holds the cigarette out. “Want a drag before it's gone?” 

Jongwoo eyeballs it warily. “Why would I?”

“You won’t stop looking at it,” Moonjo points out, smiling in that infuriating way of his. Like he knows just what Jongwoo is thinking about, especially when Jongwoo is thinking about something he shouldn’t.

“No, thanks,” Jongwoo tries to keep his eyes on his laptop screen. “I quit after college.”

“Oh, really?” The cigarette returns to Moonjo’s lips, burning bright at the tip. “It must bother you that I’m smoking, then.”

And yet, he keeps smoking.

“My girlfriend thinks its gross, so–”

He trails off the moment Moonjo, the absolute prick, starts laughing. It’s just a quiet little chuckle, but there’s a condescension to it that makes Jongwoo blaze up.

“How would she find out?” Moonjo asks, breathing out another lungful of smoke. Except it doesn’t go out the window, and it doesn’t go up into the air above their heads. He leans forward a fraction and puffs it right in Jongwoo’s face. “You don’t seem to see her much, anyway.”

Jongwoo waves the smoke away in annoyance. “I still have some self- restraint.”

“Jagiya,” Moonjo practically croons like some siren on the rocks, “Don’t you want to do something, anything, just because it feels good? Not because you think it’s what you’re supposed to do? Being a people pleaser doesn’t suit someone who burns as bright as you. You should live for yourself above all.”

Someone who burns as bright as you – what the hell does that even mean? Jongwoo isn’t sure anyone has ever described him like that. It makes him feel itchy and agitated, like Moonjo’s eyes do when they prickle his skin with their invasive gaze. Jongwoo tries to bite back that feeling, but seeing Moonjo’s lips wrapping around the filter reminds him of how he was when he used to smoke – how there was always that lingering desire for one little puff to take the edge off of everything.

One drag won’t hurt.

“Just… Just give me the cigarette.”

Moonjo holds the shrinking stub of it outward, staring up at Jongwoo with naked amusement as Jongwoo snatches it and draws in a lungful of nicotine. He’s got that filthy look in his eyes, like he’s thinking about the sort of thing respectable people never dwell on. Jongwoo has to wonder – is he thinking about my lips? My mouth, my teeth, my tongue? Is he thinking about the expansion of my lungs, tucked under rows of my ribs, soaking in the blood of me?

Does he want to be under my skin with more than just words? Does he want to crawl inside of me, fill me up like a plume of smoke, like cigarettes and city fires?

Jongwoo moves forward, kneeling on the bed as he shoves his head out the window next to Moonjo to exhale a lungful of smoke into the syrupy-thick darkness.

Suddenly, he wonders why he ever stopped smoking.

A breeze slips by in a cool caress, ruffling his short hair a little. It’s a good counterpoint to the warmer caress across his back as Moonjo eases him down to sit fully on the bed, curled up with his knees knocking against Moonjo’s legs in the small space as they lean out the window next to each other.

The cigarette slips from his fingers as Moonjo takes it back, sucking in one last deep lungful of nicotine before flicking the remaining stub out the window. Jongwoo watches it fall down to the pavement, tip still lit. He’s aghast for a second, thinking that it could land on some trash and start a fire. That little tiny cigarette could send this building up in flames, under the right conditions

He very nearly asks Moonjo – did you burn Eden down with a cigarette?

The only thing that stops him is the hand on the back of his head, dragging him close as Moonjo takes advantage of his surprised gasp to press their mouths together and exhale secondhand smoke straight down his throat.

“What the hell?” Jongwoo asks, coughing a little in surprise more than anything as he cranes his neck backwards.

“I figured we could share the last drag,” Moonjo explains, like it's obvious. There’s still smoke lingering around their heads, covering them in a quiet haze.

“You’re so full of shit,” Jongwoo says, poking Moonjo in the center of the chest with an angry finger. There’s still a palm cradling the back of his head, fingers digging into his scalp. Moonjo has broad hands. Dangerous hands. “You want me to be honest about everything, but you come up with stupid excuses like that? Like your window that doesn’t open?”

Moonjo sways forward with a hungry glint in his eyes. He looks like a predator again, like a cat that spotted a sweet little bird singing on a windowsill. They’re still leaning out into the open air of the neighborhood. Backlit, no doubt, by the warm light of Jongwoo’s bedroom.

Anyone could look up and get the wrong impression.

“Are you calling me a coward, honey?” Moonjo asks. 

“I’m calling you a hypocrite,” Jongwoo challenges.

“Oh, we can’t have that,” Moonjo breathes, and presses his mouth to Jongwoo’s like he’s chasing the lingering hum of nicotine.

It’s pathetic, really, how quickly Jongwoo opens his mouth without a second thought.

There’s no easing into it, no tentative flirty exploration. Moonjo kisses him like he wants to fuck him – like he’s already fucking him, pulling him so close that their knees knock and their legs tangle together. The hand cradling Jongwoo’s head slides lower, running across the side of his neck, down his chest. Cold fingers creep under Jongwoo’s shirt just high enough to make his skin pebble.

But a cigarette is just a cigarette, it’s no excuse for going completely out of his mind. As soon as Moonjo pulls back a fraction, Jongwoo’s conscience flares up.

“I have a girlfriend.”

He wears the statement like its body armor, even as he lies still in Moonjo’s arms. Moonjo only glances down the length of their bodies.

“We can fix that later.”

“Uh,” Jongwoo blinks, stunned. “What?”

Moonjo answers with another kiss, licking his way back into Jongwoo’s mouth.

And Jongwoo…

Well, he just kind of lets it continue on.

Moonjo, predictably, likes using his teeth. The first bite to Jongwoo’s lower lip leaves him gasping with his mouth hanging open, like he’s asking for more. He’s never quite understood the concept of bruised lips before – just how hard are you kissing someone to wind up like that? How long? Just move on already. It always conjured images of noses knocking together, teeth catching awkwardly, incoordination and too much spit. Animalistic and ugly.

But as Moonjo kisses him like he’s something tender and bloody to be savored, he thinks he’s starting to understand.

He’s slipped down a bit by this point, head craned back uncomfortably against the windowsill as Moonjo kisses the life out of him, and it abruptly makes him feel like some sort of slut. He’s letting an older man, someone he doesn’t particularly like, kiss him in full view of anyone who would happen to look up at the window. It’s shameful, it’s wrong, it’s the kind of thing Jongwoo needs to put a stop to immediately.

So he does, pushing Moonjo off of him with a firm shove that sends Moonjo staggering backwards a little bit, leaning back on the bed.

Get the hell away from me is what Jongwoo should say in this situation. This isn’t right. He needs to throw Moonjo out, lock his door, start looking for somewhere else to live, somewhere far away, where Moonjo won’t be able to follow him. He should, at the very least, stop this right now.

Unfortunately, his dick has overridden his brain in the decision-making process.

Moonjo’s hair is falling over his eyes in a way that makes Jongwoo shudder a bit. He looks dangerous as he pants softly, sprawled back on Jongwoo’s bed and staring at him with an unfathomable heat in his gaze. The soft red gape of his mouth chases all rational thought away from Jongwoo as he crawls forward and presses Moonjo backwards, straddling his hips and kissing him hard.

If Jongwoo is going to walk out of here with bruised lips, then so is Moonjo.

Sometimes, Jongwoo thinks there’s a place for him reserved in Hell. All the hateful violence that sits on a simmer under his skin, driving him to bite back all his rage, it’s not normal, right? If he’s predetermined to burn up like this, he might as well claim it himself, rather than fall victim to it. He wants to own it, in a way he isn’t allowed to anywhere else.

With anyone else.

“I hate you,” he gasps when he pulls back, still hovering over Moonjo, still staring down at the mess he’s made of his mouth. He can feel Moonjo getting hard beneath him, and it makes his toes curl in his socks. “I hate you so fucking much.”

“Good,” Moonjo’s hands are filthy as they touch his body, one hand curving around his waist as the other trails up his chest, stopping to rest at the base of his throat. “Do you hate me enough to kill me, baby?”

Jongwoo’s breath catches as his throat bobs against Moonjo’s palm. “Yes.”

“How would you do it?” Moonjo smiles up at him. “Would you do it with your hands? Like the killer in your novel?”

“I’d use a knife,” Jongwoo blurts out, leaning low enough to bite at Moonjo’s swollen lower lip. The motion makes the hand on his throat tighten, which makes his hips roll downward in turn. “I want to feel your blood.”

The noise that comes out of Moonjo can only be described as a moan, and Jongwoo immediately thinks – he sounds nothing like Jieun.

And that’s it, he’s done.

Moonjo seems to notice the change in him almost as soon as it happens. The air around them turns icy, and Moonjo props himself up on his elbows, forcing Jongwoo to lean back a fraction. He says nothing, but there’s a challenge in his eyes. An expectation.

“I have a girlfriend,” Jongwoo says quietly, sitting upright, half-hard and straddling a man he wishes was dead. “I can’t do this. I have a girlfriend.”

It wasn’t long ago that he’d say that with glowing pride. I have a girlfriend – look at her. She’s pretty and smart and hard-working and sweet. She’s everything a guy could want as he crests his twenties, staring down a lifetime of white cubicle walls and drinks with the boss late into the night. He’s done everything he was supposed to, so why is he fucking it up so spectacularly now?

Moonjo sits up straighter, chasing Jongwoo backwards, but he doesn’t let him get up and run away. Instead, he grabs Jongwoo’s waist and holds him still, pressing him down against Moonjo’s lap in a way that makes Jongwoo feel like he’s going to black out again, just like he did in the shower.

Jongwoo’s hips twitch, a tiny involuntary motion that could be mistaken for fear. He should be frightened, recoiling at Moonjo’s insistent touch.

It’s hard to write off what he’s feeling as fear, though, when he gasps and grips Moonjo’s shoulders, clinging to him. With no small amount of shame, Jongwoo realizes – if Moonjo intends to take, Jongwoo might just let him have anything right now.

Goodness, make out with your creepy neighbor once and all your common sense goes out the window like smoke.

Fortunately, or unfortunately, or something in between, Moonjo does not do that.

“That moral resolve of yours sure is impressive, jagi,” he murmurs against Jongwoo’s lips, sarcasm dripping from every word like venom. “Let me know when you get sick of it.”

And then he unceremoniously dumps Jongwoo down on his bed, standing up to take his leave, practically slamming the door on his way out.

It leaves Jongwoo gaping stupidly at the closed door, at the rumpled bedsheets, at the open window. He feels ridiculous, like he just screwed up a date and now his girlfriend is mad at him.

Moonjo is not your girlfriend, he has to tell himself. He’s not a girl. He’s not your friend. He’s a freak. He’s a bad person.

He’s just like you.

“Ah,” Jongwoo groans, flopping down on his bed so he can stare up at his ceiling. “Jieun-ah, I’m sorry.”

That train of thought gets derailed as a door slams in the room next to his and Jongwoo is forced to confront the ugly reality – even here, in his own private space, he can’t truly be away from Moonjo. The other man is right next to him, separated by the relatively arbitrary barrier of some shitty old plywood. It’s hard to claim privacy when you can hear someone’s breathing on particularly quiet nights.

And tonight, the goshiwon is positively muted.

Jongwoo lies as still as he can in bed, afraid and embarrassed at the thought of Moonjo hearing even the smallest sound from him. Moonjo doesn’t seem to have such reservations. Jongwoo can hear him lie on his bed, right next to Jongwoo’s own. Moonjo has to realize how close they are. He has to realize that Jongwoo can hear everything.

Which is why it pisses Jongwoo off when Moonjo seems to moan on the other side of the wall.

“Give me a fucking break,” Jongwoo huffs out loud as the desire to stay quiet leaves his body entirely. He rolls over onto his side with his back to the wall, folding his pillow around his head like a barrier.

But he can still fucking hear it.

It’s like that single breathless sound has wormed its way into the deepest parts of his brain. He shifts uncomfortably, rubbing his knees together, and tries not to think about the body lying adjacent to his, or about the insistent hardness in his pants trying to get his attention. Moonjo could be touching himself. Moonjo could be touching the wall.

Jongwoo can practically hear the whisper of a hand stroking over the surface, accompanied by a chorus of jagiya, jagiya, jagi.

“Jagi.”

Jongwoo’s eyes snap open.

“Ah, jagiya…”

Alright, those were real.

“Let me hear you…”

The fucking nerve of this guy, to walk out on him and then rub one out where he knows Jongwoo can hear him!

Jongwoo’s heart is pounding as he turns back to glare over his shoulder, as if he’ll see Moonjo right behind him instead of the bleak canvas of off-white that’s separating the two of them. He doesn’t, of course, but he swears he can still hear him. Soft, muffled noises that could be anything at all.

So when Jongwoo turns around very slowly and leans close enough to the wall to listen in on the other side, it’s only curiosity. That’s all.

And when he hears Moonjo sigh in a deep voice, the hand that instinctively creeps between his legs is only curious, too.

“Shut the fuck up,” he whispers. The hand between his legs isn’t moving, it’s only touching softly. That’s okay, right? That’s normal. He’s not doing anything wrong.

But then Moonjo makes a choked-off noise on the other side of the wall, and Jongwoo’s dick throbs happily without permission.

“Do you want to shut me up?” Moonjo murmurs. His voice is too loud for this, too lewd. It’s revolting. “Come on and shut me up.”

Jongwoo wishes he could. With his mouth, with his hand. With his cock. He hisses between his teeth as he thinks about it without meaning to, those soft red lips stretched wide around him. Moonjo has a pretty mouth. It would look right at home kissing the tip of Jongwoo’s dick, under those heavy eyes looking up at him with an expectation that Jongwoo doesn’t understand.

Those eyes are the most dangerous thing of all.

Jongwoo presses a palm flat against the wall as his other hand slips below his waistband. “Be quiet. You’re disgusting.”

Of course, that just elicits another filthy noise from Moonjo. Jongwoo is flushing so hard that he feels like he’s going to burn up. Someone might hear them. Seokyoon might hear them. And as much as he wishes that thought were a boner-kill, it would seem that his boner is far too invested in this to give up just yet.

But this is still okay. Right? Jacking off is jacking off, it’s not weird or immoral. It’s not cheating if you’re just touching yourself.

“Oh, jagiya,” Moonjo’s muffled voice murmurs right next to him, “You’re louder than you think.”

Jongwoo bites his lip and, unfortunately, whines. Just some ugly involuntary noise in the back of his throat, but it makes him feel like Moonjo. Like someone could hear him and know what kind of a freak he is, jacking off to the thought of his neighbor, toes curling at every quiet sound through the wall.

“Just like that,” Moonjo murmurs in encouragement. “I knew you’d sound pretty–”

“Be quiet,” Jongwoo breathes, grinding his forehead against the wall as his hand speeds up. “Be quiet, be quiet, be quiet, be quiet–”

Moonjo’s voice is a barely-intelligible rasp through the wall when he asks,

“Come on, don’t you want to shut me up?”

“Yes,” Jongwoo moans, thinking about mouths and hands.

“Do you want me to shut you up?”

Mouths and hands, Moonjo pressing him down, palm over his lips, breaking him apart and building him back up again. Something ugly into something beautiful, a flame that burns so hot it turns white.

Jongwoo turns his face into the pillow beneath his head and gives up the last bit of shame left inside of him as he whispers, “Yes.”

It’s hard to make out what Moonjo says next, but Jongwoo is pretty sure it’s –

ah, jagi

i’ll make you perfect

Jongwoo doesn’t want anyone to turn him into anything. But those words seem to melt into some stupid, savage part of himself. His hand moves faster, slickened by the embarrassing amount of wetness leaking from the tip.

And then Moonjo says, so clearly that he might as well be speaking inside of Jongwoo’s head –

i’ll make you mine

– and nothing in the world could stop Jongwoo from falling apart to the thought of Moonjo trying.

Trying, because Jongwoo would be hard to keep. A mad dog on a short leash, always a second away from biting its master. Moonjo, though… Jongwoo breathes hard into his pillow as his blood surges and thinks that nothing in the world would be prettier than Moonjo stricken in veneration. Except for, maybe, Moonjo bleeding with a smile on his face. He wouldn’t fold easily, he’d make Jongwoo fight for it.

Jongwoo bites down on his wrist as he thinks about Moonjo beneath him, breathing hard and slick with sweat, grinning in triumph with his neck bared.

Even in Jongwoo’s fantasies, he can’t win. He listens to Moonjo’s labored breathing on the other side of the wall and imagines pressing a hand over his mouth, obscuring that satisfied smile. But of course, the Moonjo in his mind bites down on the flesh of Jongwoo’s palm.

He always looks at Jongwoo like he wants a taste, after all.

-

Shortly after, seconds or minutes or hours, Jongwoo has his first nightmare since Moonjo returned.

The power in the goshiwon has been cut. He’s darting down hallways that never end and opening doorways that make him loop back to where he began. There’s light spilling out from under some doors, a sickly cyan or a fiery crimson. The sight of them makes him nauseous.

There’s nothing behind him, nothing he can see at least, but he keeps running anyway. He can’t shake the feeling of being hunted. He throws open a set of double doors and finds himself on a stairway. Down is blocked off by metal grating. Up is bathed in red.

But he can’t stand still, so he climbs.

The stairs only lead to one door, into a hallway that looks identical to the one he lives in except dirtier. He has to jump over garbage and debris as he runs panting past the charred walls, all the way to the end of the hall.

He tries his own door: locked. He doubles back and tries Seokyoon’s door to find the same. Between them is Moonjo’s, and Jongwoo figures he has nothing to lose. His hands shake as he twists the doorknob –

It’s open.

Inside, the room is bright and warmly-lit by the afternoon sunlight. Everything looks normal until he steps forward and hears a sickening crunch. Below his feet, the floor is littered with syringes and bone – no, not bone. Teeth. Hundreds of them. His feet bleed when he steps over them so he can lunge for the bed, crawling to the end of it to pry the window open.

Except it won’t budge. The latch is stuck, the hinges are rusted, and there is no way out.

As soon as he realizes it, he hears a crunch from behind him. He’s been caught.

“Turn around, please,” Moonjo says, condescending and smug. “Honey, look at me.”

Jongwoo does. He glances over his shoulder and musters all the hatred he can into the glare he shoots at the other man.

“Beautiful,” Moonjo murmurs. “You should look at me like that all the time.”

“Let me out,” Jongwoo demands. “I don’t care what you’ve done, I don’t care about… About the fire, or the cats, or whatever the hell you people did. Please, just leave me–”

The words dry up on his tongue when Moonjo raises a finger to his lips to shush him. “None of that, now.”

He takes a step forward, glass and calcium grinding beneath his stupid fucking slides. Jongwoo swears he’s going to burn those slippers.

“I know you want to kill me,” Moonjo says as he props one knee up on the bed. Jongwoo scrambles backwards farther, pressing against the sealed window that overlooks the normalcy of the world outside. “So why don’t you?”

He holds his hand out, brandishing a knife. Except the handle is pointed at Jongwoo, while the blade is digging into Moonjo’s palm. Blood seeps between his fingers, dripping down to dirty Jongwoo’s jeans.

Jongwoo doesn’t think, he just acts.

The knife slips out of Moonjo’s hand with a sickening squelch as Jongwoo grabs the handle and lunges forward. But of course, Moonjo isn’t going to lie down and die. He dodges, grabbing Jongwoo’s wrist with his clean hand and Jongwoo’s jaw with his bloody hand, bashing his head into the wall beside them.

The impact makes Jongwoo feel like he could puke. He tries to flip Moonjo over, but Moonjo is too strong, too brutal. There’s a smile painted on his face as he and Jongwoo grapple on the bed, like he’s having the time of his life. Jongwoo manages to sink the blade into some soft part of Moonjo, and the victory only lasts as long as it takes Moonjo to grab his arm and wrench it backwards, stressing the joint of his shoulder so hard that Jongwoo thinks it’s going to dislocate as Moonjo flips him onto his front.

Like this, Jongwoo is lying on his stomach facing the sealed window. He crawls forward with all of the strength he has left, scraping his blunt fingernails across the latches and seams to no avail. So he bangs on the window, pressing his palm flat against the glass as if he can push through to the clean world outside if he tries hard enough. But then Moonjo presses a bloodied hand over his, linking their fingers and smearing crimson banners that muddle the view.

It isn’t long before Jongwoo has trouble finding patches that aren’t obscured by red. All of his senses have dulled – except for touch. The only thing he can focus on is the heat of Moonjo’s body as he curves over Jongwoo’s back, pressing him down into the bloodied bedsheets.

“There’s a million different ways to kill a person, you know,” Moonjo says against his ear, so close that Jongwoo can feel the wet drag of his lips against skin. “A knife across the throat, or maybe wedged right here.”

Jongwoo realizes he’s shaking when Moonjo’s free hand creeps beneath his shirt, dragging over the protrusions of his ribcage, counting each bone and pressing hard into the soft space between them.

“A claw hammer could do a lot of damage,” he says, and Jongwoo imagines it: the brutality it would take to pry a chest cavity open with a blunt object like working a bent nail out of a sturdy board. “I could pull your heart out–”

His hand flattens against the apex of Jongwoo’s ribs. “Right–”

Something sharp presses against Jongwoo’s skin with the gentleness of a kiss.

“Through–”

A knife, a scalpel, a claw – whatever it is, it breaks the skin. “Here.”

Jongwoo feels it press inside of him, hard and insistent and slick with blood. But it doesn’t hurt, not like he expected it to. If anything, it sets his body alight with newfound energy, giving him the strength to swing his arm backwards and smash his elbow into Moonjo’s face.

From there, it’s easy to tangle their legs together so he can wrestle Moonjo beneath him, flat on his back. The knife is in Jongwoo’s hand now as he slashes aimlessly, letting instinct take over as he carves Moonjo into a million soft pieces. Moonjo doesn’t seem to die as he lies back against the bed in a patch of blood-red light. The window is completely soaked now, turning the sunlight into a grisly spotlight.

The gore Jongwoo has left behind doesn’t look very frightening. It almost looks like a trampled bouquet of flowers, like deep red rose petals burying Moonjo in his self-made grave. Jongwoo stops moving and starts breathing, heavy and wet and heaving as he sits astride Moonjo’s hips.

Moonjo seems content to watch him for a moment, before lifting a bloody hand and pressing it against Jongwoo’s stomach. It trails upwards, finding the oozing wound that seems to bore the whole way through Jongwoo’s body like a stigmata. One broad palm covers it easily.

His voice is thick and choked as he sputters, “See how beautiful we are now?”

“Shut up,” Jongwoo mutters. “Shut the fuck up, please, you bastard, just–”

A grunt cuts him off as Moonjo sinks a thumb into the wound and pleads, “Make me more beautiful.”

Jongwoo grips the hand that’s tearing him open wider and obliges, lifting the knife over his head and bringing it down over and over, until his face is dripping red and his eyes have gone blind from the beauty of it.

The next thing he sees is far uglier – a water-stained ceiling that reflects the blue light of the early morning.

He blinks a few times and then shoots upright, grappling out of his shirt and running frantic hands over his chest and ribs. His hands are shaking as he touches the unblemished canvas of his body, finding nothing in the way of blood or viscera, just the frantic pounding of his heart where a knife wound should be. His face is clean, but not dry – he’s sweating like crazy. The smell and slickness of it is overwhelming, but not so concerning as the discomfort he feels when he shifts his legs and realizes that sweat isn’t the only thing he’s covered in.

For a second, he’s afraid his legs won’t be able to support him. Knees wobbling, he peels his sticky boxers off and curses every single event in his life that led up to this moment. He’s nauseous with shame as he throws on whatever clothes he can reach and scampers off to the shower, praying to a god he doesn’t believe in that he doesn’t run into anybody on the way.

He does, of course. It’s early morning on a weekday, and people have to shower before work. But Moonjo isn’t here. He doesn’t care if anyone else can smell his debasement, as long as it’s not Moonjo.

Luck is with him as he gets there and back without incident. It’s only when he’s pulling on clean clothes that he hears activity in the room next to his.

He tries not to think about Moonjo doing what he’s doing now – pulling a shirt on, covering up those strange scars that litter his body like falling autumn leaves. The thought makes his mind wander – he could have seen them again last night, if things went a little differently.

But they didn’t. Because that would be wrong.

Jongwoo slips out into the hall and twists the lock, trying to avoid thinking about Moonjo anymore. But it’s hard, when the first thing he sees is white light spilling out of Moonjo’s room. The door isn’t closed like usual, but instead propped open by a leather bag. Jongwoo approaches slowly, letting his curiosity get the better of him as he peers past the threshold.

The room is empty. Where Moonjo is, he doesn’t know, but at this moment he realizes that he’s never seen the inside of Moonjo’s room. Not at Eden, not here. So he can’t stop himself from taking in the sight of it: the neatly made bed, the shirts and suit pieces hanging innocuously from pegs on the wall, the general lack of clutter aside from a few notebooks on the desk and a pen gleaming under the fluorescent bulb.

He steps inside of the room before he can think better of it, and touches the pen. It’s beautiful, a fountain pen. The notebooks are an interesting sight as well, and Jongwoo wonders if Moonjo does some writing of his own.

As if Jongwoo would want to read anything this freak would write.

He’s about to make his getaway when a chill wracks his body. It’s getting cold in the mornings. The breeze through the window is practically frigid, and he wonders if it would be smart to grab a–

Wait.

Jongwoo glances over at the window, identical to his own, and very clearly wide open.

“Son of a bitch,” he mutters under his breath, just as a loud scraping noise makes him jump and turn on his heel.

Behind him, blocking the doorway, is Moonjo casually nudging his bag back into the room and letting the door swing closed behind him. Jongwoo backs up and presses his palms to the desk behind him, conscious of the way the pen is right behind him. The tip is sharp. It could come in handy.

Moonjo takes a steady breath and tilts his head to the side. “So, what do you think?”

Jongwoo blinks at him. “What?”

“The room,” Moonjo points two fingers at the ceiling and gestures around the claustrophobic space. “Is it everything you expected from a man like me?”

Jongwoo has been teased plenty of times before, but never by a guy who knows Jongwoo hates him while also knowing what the inside of Jongwoo's mouth tastes like.

It makes him bristle. “I’m just glad your window works, so you won’t have to smoke in my room anymore.”

Moonjo gives the window a dull stare and says, “Ah. Yes, lucky.”

“Now, if you’ll excuse me,” Jongwoo takes a step forward, “I have to go–”

But Moonjo sidesteps, blocking Jongwoo’s way with his own body. “Are you okay, jagi?”

“Why wouldn’t I be?” Jongwoo asks in a snappier voice than he intended. He can’t look at Moonjo right now, so he scratches his elbow and glances to the corner of the room where the ill-measured carpet bunches up.

“I was worried about how loud you were last night.”

Jongwoo feels his face twitch in anger at the reminder of what they did, until Moonjo adds –

“You sounded like you were having a nightmare just before sunrise.”

The way Jongwoo’s heartbeat falters makes him think that he might just die for a second. Surely, Moonjo doesn’t know. He can’t know. For as much of a depraved stalker as he is, he’s just a man. There’s no way he can see inside of Jongwoo’s dreams to decipher his worst fantasies.

“I was,” Jongwoo says eventually. “A lot of scary things have been happening to me lately. A lot of scary people around.”

“Is that so?” Moonjo raises his eyebrows, as if that’s shocking to him. Prick. “You need to be careful, you never know what other people are planning to do.”

Jongwoo stares at him for a minute before bluntly declaring, “There’s something wrong with you.”

Moonjo’s face doesn’t change, but Jongwoo swears he looks pleased with himself.

“I have to go to work now,” Jongwoo says, and tries to step around Moonjo to get to the door.

But Moonjo stops him with a hand on his shoulder, and all Jongwoo can think about is the way he touched him last night. The way his hand sounded brushing up against the wall. The way he felt in the dream, blazing up and beautiful –

Wait, beautiful? What the fuck – no! He was horrifying, grotesque, disgusting–

“I’d love to know what you were dreaming about,” Moonjo says, mouth dangerously close to Jongwoo’s ear. “I’m sure your nightmares are beautiful.”

Jongwoo is getting tired of that word. “There’s something really, really wrong with you.”

When he glances to the side, Moonjo is smiling at him like he was just paid the sweetest compliment. Their faces are close, and all Jongwoo can think about is the way his mouth felt last night. That might have been the worst mistake of his life so far.

He can feel even worse mistakes crawling up his spine like the teasing fingertips of a lover.

“I have to go to work,” he repeats like a mantra.

“Right,” Moonjo says as he leans down, clearly intent on a kiss. But Jongwoo ducks his head and presses his palms flat against Moonjo’s chest, keeping him at bay.

“You’re not my fucking boyfriend now just because we–” he can’t even bring himself to say it in the daylight.

“Of course I’m not,” Moonjo says, always so mockingly deferential to Jongwoo. But then he grabs Jongwoo’s face in both of his hands, holding him still.

Jongwoo tries not to think about the way his own hands are still pressed to Moonjo’s chest, not pushing him away but simply touching him. Moonjo is a frightening force of nature, the kind of person someone like Jongwoo could never contend with. So he goes limp, losing himself in the comforting idea that he couldn’t possibly bear responsibility for whatever wicked things Moonjo intends to do with him.

Except, all Moonjo does is lean close, and press a soft kiss to the center of his forehead.

It makes Jongwoo’s jaw hang stupidly in shock. This isn’t in the same league as the hungry, demanding kisses from last night. It’s not the violent and destructive passion from the dream. Something like actual fear chills his blood at the gesture, because he doesn’t understand it.

Jongwoo is not a stranger to closeness or intimacy. His mother hugged him enough as a child. He used to roughhouse with his friends. Jieun loves to hold his hand and cling to his arm, to curl up against his side and stroke his skin. He’s been touched before, in a million ways, by people who care about him.

But this is something else entirely.

Moonjo touches him like he’s trying to savor every point of contact between their bodies. His lips drift lower, brushing Jongwoo’s brow, before he finally pulls away slowly enough to let his fingertips drag and linger along Jongwoo’s jaw.

“You should get going, before you’re late,” Moonjo says, adjusting the collar of Jongwoo’s shirt. “Lock the door behind you.”

Jongwoo doesn’t say anything, he just watches Moonjo pick up his unwieldy bag and take his leave with one last lingering look at the conflicted mess he’s made of his neighbor.

When the door clicks shut, Jongwoo falls back to sit heavily on Moonjo’s pristine bedsheets. He looks down at the duvet and half expects to see blood. But there’s nothing there, of course. It’s just a bed, it’s just a room, and Moonjo is just a man, alive and breathing as his footsteps echo down the hall.

Before Jongwoo leaves, he crawls over the foot of the bed and shuts the window tight.

Chapter Text

It’s sometimes said that paranoia is the consequence of a guilty conscience. Do something bad enough, and you’ll spend all your time waiting around for retribution to bite you in the ass. But what if your crimes are only in your head? Dreaming about bone shards and biting kisses might be a little weird, yeah, but that’s beyond the realm of ordinary control.

Over the sound of the office's bathroom sink running, Jongwoo hears slow footsteps approaching. Something about the gait reminds him that not all of his shame is hidden beyond the canopy of sleep anymore. His hands are nearly red from scrubbing them under scalding water as the door swings open behind him. His heartbeat trips over itself.

It’s not Moonjo.

No shit, it’s not Moonjo.

The man who just walked into the bathroom is staring down at his phone, feet shuffling lazily as he makes his way into a stall. Jongwoo turns the faucet off and shoves his hands under the dryer so he can leave before this guy starts stinking the place up. He ignores the tremor in his hands as he turns them beneath the stream of hot air. Just like how he ignores the thumping coming from somewhere close by – a dull thud, thud, thud like the bouncing of a tennis ball.

The dryer cuts off. All Jongwoo can hear is the jingle and clink of a stranger’s belt buckle.

Back in the office, things are moving just as sluggishly as they were when Jongwoo excused himself. They’re nearing the end of the day and everyone is counting down the minutes until they can finally get out of here.

Jongwoo switches to seconds when Jaeho starts bitching about a stain on the bottom of his shirt again.

“Ah, you'd think that by now, I'd have a wife to do this for me,” he complains as he rubs at it with a bleach pen. “Jongwoo, you have to tell me how you managed to bag a girl like Jieun. I’d wife someone like that in a second.”

Jongwoo breathes steadily through his nostrils and refuses to look away from his computer screen. “I don’t think she’s interested in being a housewife. She has her own stuff to work towards.”

A hand claps down on Jongwoo’s shoulder, startling him and making Jaeho laugh. “They all say that when they’re young. Then you slap a ring on them and promise to pay for everything, and all they can think about is giving you babies. Isn’t that right, Yoojung-ah?”

“Sure,” she shoots back, unruffled, “Maybe seventy years ago when we weren’t allowed to work.”

Jaeho laughs at that too, like everything is a joke to him. He wanders off, saying something like tell me you would still be working if you could get a hot husband who paid all the bills, and it takes every ounce of restraint in Jongwoo’s body to stop him from yanking his monitor so hard that all of the chords snap with an electric sputter. The screen is huge on this thing, he could probably crack it over Jaeho’s head. And Jaeho would crumple, because Jaeho has never been in a real fight in his life. He’d fall to his knees in shock and confusion and twitch pathetically while Jongwoo beats him bloody, screen fractured as polarized glass and plastic scatter around the floor to twinkle pretty in the pool of blood running like a river from Jaeho’s head –

“H-hey! I said, hey!”

Jongwoo glances to his left with murder in his eyes. “What.”

It’s not even a question, really. More like a statement: if you waste my time, I will kill you with whatever is left of my monitor once I’m done with Jaeho.

Byeongmin, of course, has nothing useful to say. “I emailed you a negative review we just got. If you’re done goofing off with your friends, you can reply to it before the day ends.”

For a moment, Jongwoo feels a foreign pang of sympathy for Byeongmin. If he thinks that the relationship between himself and Jaeho looks friendly, then this guy clearly does not have much experience with friendship.

That sympathy is long gone about ten minutes later.

Yoojung is sluggishly cleaning up her workstation in anticipation to get out of here. She does this a lot, lazily taking her tea mugs to the kitchen and throwing away napkins one at a time. Jaeho never calls her on it. Right now, she’s pretending to be busy by rearranging the books on the shelf above her desk while Jongwoo is locked in a battle of wits with the digital dumpster fire that they call a website and wondering when CSS knowledge suddenly got added to his job requirements.

The frustration finally gets the better of him, and he turns to Byeongmin to ask for help. To his surprise, Byeongmin is already looking in his direction, gazing just over his shoulder. But he whips his head back towards his own computer as soon as he notices Jongwoo looking at him.

Jongwoo turns his head in the opposite direction and sees exactly what he dreads – Yoojung making the mistake of doing something completely mundane while wearing a skirt within fifty meters of Park Byeongmin. She’s literally just standing there, stretching up to reach the shelf, but Jongwoo knows what he saw broadcasted across Byeongmin’s face.

He turns to glare at the other man in disbelief, and Byeongmin frowns sidelong at him. “What are you looking at?”

“I’d ask you the same thing,” Jongwoo mutters quietly, leaning closer so Byeongmin can hear, “But I already know.”

“You don’t kn-know anything,” Byeongmin deflects. “You should mind your own business.”

Jongwoo doesn’t hesitate before gritting out, “And you should act decently, unless you want to die.”

To that, Byeongmin says nothing. All he does is gape stupidly at Jongwoo as if his mind is having trouble processing the words, weighed down too much by disbelief to move.

“Everybody!” Jaeho shouts, startling them both. “Drinks!”

“Can’t,” Yoojing says, grabbing her coat off the back of her chair and pulling it on now that Jaeho has given her the unofficial signal that she can leave. “I’m shopping with my mother tonight, remember?”

“Ah,” Jaeho groans in disappointment, “That’s right. Well, have fun. Boy's night!”

“I also have plans,” Jongwoo lies, busying himself with shoving his things in his backpack. “Sorry.”

Jaeho gives him a knowing glance. “You can invite Jieun along. I’d love to see her.”

“What?” Jongwoo scrunches his face up in confusion and irritation. “No, no, it’s not with her.”

“Oh,” Jaeho leans close. “I didn’t take you for a side piece kind of guy.”

“Side–” Jongwoo bites his tongue and sighs, trying to rein in some of his anger at the implication. “No, it’s nothing like that. It’s a friend. My neighbor.”

It's Jaeho's turn to scowl. “Neighbor? Don’t you live in a dump?” 

“He’s not that bad, he’s–”

A young guy. Aspiring rapper, really nice and friendly. Right?

“A dentist, actually. He likes the same kind of novels as I do.”

Jaeho doesn't look convinced. “What’s a dentist doing living in a residence?”

“It’s… A long story.”

“Well,” Jaeho sighs, like the world has wronged him, “Fine, whatever. I’ll find someone else to drink with. See you bright and early. Tell our Jieunnie I said hi.”

And then, just because he’s a prick, he adds –

“Or maybe I’ll hit her up for drinks and tell her you said hi instead.”

Jongwoo’s knuckles are practically white where he grips his backpack straps.

-

Maybe it would be a good idea to call Jieun and see if she’s free tonight, but Jongwoo doesn’t.

Something about him feels too off right now. The anger that was humming under his skin at the office hasn't dimmed at all during his long walk home. If anything, it’s gotten worse with every stranger who has brushed too close to him, or every shrill argument he's overheard. He feels ashamed of how easily it all gets to him, honestly. This is the last thing he wants Jieun to see.

As he rests his head against the dirty bus window, he wonders how much longer he’ll have to put up with this ugly side of himself. It’s wearing him down, trying to hide it from her. But this isn’t him – it’s just some phase he needs to get through. Some rut he needs to crawl out of.

He’ll be normal soon. He’ll get over this. He has to.

-

The rooftop refuge of this stinking, nameless goshiwon is losing some of its luster.

Jongwoo stares out over the landscape of the city, at the white buildings and dim lights that hardly shine in the desaturated sunset. It’ll be too cold to be comfortable up here soon, and he’ll have to wander back down into the bowels of the residence where he has a dozen neighbors and knows maybe four of them by name rather than room number.

9.9 million. Before leaving Busan, Jongwoo looked up the population of Seoul and that’s what he found – 9.9 million.

How many can he see right now? To be honest, none.

The best he can manage are vague impressions of other people. The sound of a car honking. A silhouette at a window, here and gone in a second. Laughter from somewhere, abrupt and short. Eyes boring into his back with the intensity of a physical touch.

9.9 million people, and the worst one of them has just opened the door to the rooftop. The only person within reach.

Jongwoo takes a deep breath and rolls his neck on his shoulders as the telltale footsteps approach. “I’m not in the mood.”

“I’m not here to talk to you,” Moonjo says, even as he stops right next to Jongwoo. “I only came up for a smoke.”

Jongwoo glances sidelong at him and sure enough, he sees Moonjo exhaling a thick white plume that disappears quickly into the muted tones of the sunset. He’s dressed like he just got off work and didn’t have time to change before coming up here.

“But if you don’t mind the company–”

“I mind,” Jongwoo bites out.

“I should have brought beers,” Moonjo ignores him.. “You seem stressed, honey.”

Jongwoo considers biting his tongue, but… Nah, fuck that. “I’m always stressed when you’re around.”

Moonjo idly flicks the ash from the tip of his cigarette while he considers Jongwoo quietly for a moment. “You have nothing to worry about from me.”

“Give me a break,” Jongwoo huffs. “I’m running out of patience with you. You’re weird. And a pervert.”

Moonjo smiles on an exhale, the smoke turning the cut of his mouth into a macabre shape for a split second. “Anything else?”

The gall of this guy!

“Probably all sorts of things! Can’t you just leave me alone? The things you say – you’re a bad influence on me. And – and Seokyoon, too.”

“Poor Seokyoon-ah,” Moonjo agrees with a thick layer of mockery. 

“Ah, forget you,” Jongwoo huffs.

If he was smart, this would be the moment where he’d storm away, leaving Moonjo to smoke beneath the yellow sunset. But Moonjo seems to passively drain his IQ by proximity alone, because Jongwoo doesn’t do that.

What he does instead is snatch the cigarette right out from between Moonjo’s fingers, and take a deep drag.

“I quit, you know,” Jongwoo says, holding the cigarette hostage as Moonjo remains standing there like a dumbass with his fingers held in the same awkward posture with nothing between them. “I quit these. I dealt with a month of headaches and moodiness. I coughed my lungs up. All I wanted to do was sleep and eat and bash my head on a wall, but I quit. For my eomma and for my girlfriend, I quit.”

Moonjo finally looks down at his hand and bites awkwardly at his thumb nail, as if he just now noticed his cigarette has been stolen and Jongwoo has no intention of giving it back.

“Is it really a bad thing,” he asks, “To give into what you want?” 

“Yes!” Jongwoo says, taking another drag. “It’s gross. Unappealing.” 

“Not when you do it,” Moonjo says, and Jongwoo almost gags.

“Of course you’d say something like that,” he gripes instead, looking hard at Moonjo in a way he really hasn’t before. He’s always averting his eyes, making sure their gazes don’t meet, as if he’s frightened of what would happen if they did. After seeing Moonjo lurking at the periphery of his vision for so long, it’s almost refreshing to stare at him head-on.

Facing your fears, and all that.

“Judging someone for smoking is stupid when most people are pressured into doing it in the first place,” Moonjo says. “But that’s not your problem, not right now.”

Jongwoo breathes out a sardonic laugh. “Alright, if you’re not putting pressure on me, then what is my problem?”

“You want to indulge in a vice,” Moonjo says, shifting closer. Jongwoo doesn’t shift away. “You want to do something you think you’re not supposed to do, because holding it in is becoming overwhelming. It’s just a little outlet for you, some temporary relief.”

“I thought you were a dentist,” Jongwoo says, “Not a therapist.”

Moonjo leans on the railing, close enough that their elbows nearly touch. “Up here, I can be anything you want. So tell me what’s wrong, honey. We’ll fix it.”

Jongwoo rolls his eyes, tosses the cigarette on the ground, stomps it out, and explodes.

“So there’s this guy at work, right?” he starts, already talking fast. “He’s supposed to show me the ropes, but he hasn’t shown me shit in the entire month I’ve been working. He just… Starts these stupid slap fights over nothing. Constantly.”

“That must be frustrating,” Moonjo says.

“Yeah, whatever,” Jongwoo waves the faux-concern off. “If he was just unhelpful, that would be one thing.”

“But there’s more to him that you hate?” Moonjo probes.

“He’s a total pervert!” Jongwoo says. “Ten times worse than you. Just… Disgusting. There’s a girl who works with us, a kind of, you know, pretty girl. Outgoing, sort of flirty.”

Something about Moonjo’s face shifts minutely, like he’s gathering shadows under those freaky eyes of his.

“I don’t take her bait,” Jongwoo adds in a rush, “She’s way too much, but I can tune it out. But Park Byeongmin, ah, that bastard. He’s a total creep, I swear. He stares at her ass, he brushes up against her sometimes, keeps a picture of her in his desk… I wouldn’t be surprised if he was stalking her.”

“Hm,” Moonjo’s eyebrows raise, even as the rest of his face remains neutral, “That would be scary.”

“Yeah, he’s like, like,” Jongwoo snaps his fingers a few times as he tries to conjure up the right name, “Like Nam… Nambok!”

No recognition shows on Moonjo’s face. “Who?”

“313 from the old goshiwon,” Jongwoo says. “You know, the gross ankle monitor guy who watched porn with his door open and never changed his clothes.”

Moonjo stares into the dwindling sunset for a moment before clicking his tongue in recognition. “Nambok-ssi, right. Shame about what happened to him.”

“No, he deserved it,” Jongwoo says. “But this guy at work, he’s not some nasty freak sitting around in his own filth all day. He wears polos and shit, he – he dresses like Jaeho. Like my boss. So he’s clearly integrated into this… This ecosystem of douchebags. And that’s the thing that trips me up – anyone would hate 313, but I’m supposed to respect Byeongmin? How am I supposed to defer to this fucking guy just because he’s been working longer than me?”

“Maybe you should kill him,” Moonjo suggests, in the same casual tone as before.

It makes Jongwoo’s thoughts stumble to a halt. “Huh? What?”

“This coworker of yours,” Moonjo leans close again and this time they do touch for a second, only a second, a simple brush of their arms that sends Jongwoo swaying backwards a bit. Moonjo’s eyes feel unnaturally round as they bore into Jongwoo. “He doesn’t respect you. He’s a waste of space. He might even be dangerous. Wouldn’t you be doing the world a favor if you killed him?”

No shit, I would be, Jongwoo doesn’t say. Byeongmin isn’t exactly a model citizen. He’s practically one missed paycheck away from becoming another 313, a porn-addled freak who finds fulfillment in other people’s fear. He’s dirty, and he’s hateful, and he’s never done anything for Jongwoo except cause problems and project his own insecurity upon him.

But you can’t just kill someone for that. Right?

“Anyway,” Moonjo blinks once, and his lids droop back into a look of casual lethargy, “I’m not saying you have to kill him, of course. But it’s normal that you want to. Anyone would feel the same.”

It’s normal that you want to – he says it with so much presumption, like he knows what Jongwoo is thinking better than Jongwoo himself. It’s annoying, it’s infuriating, but mostly because he’s right. Jongwoo has always hated that odd overbearing sense of omniscience about Moonjo, but at least it made sense back in Eden.

Eden was Moonjo’s territory. But this place, this ugly old edifice of concrete and dry rot, it’s just another building with no ears to the wall or eyes in the shadows or hands under the bed, reaching out of the darkness to pull him under.

Jongwoo hates him. He really fucking hates Moonjo for bringing Eden with him like a torch that melts away Jongwoo’s meekness and subservience to expose the ugly emotions underneath. More than anything, he hates him for how good it feels. To spill his guts. To be honest. To have someone who doesn’t look down on him for his anger – someone who likes him all the more for it.

Decent men don’t feel their fingertips itch with ugly desires during the day while their dreams drown them in a crimson wash at night, at least not without a healthy heaping of shame. That shame has been like an anchor for Jongwoo, keeping him steady and holding him in place.

Wouldn’t it be nice, Jongwoo thinks impulsively, to finally be able to move forward from that?

No. No, that’s not right. That’s the kind of thing Moonjo would say to him to get under his skin, isn’t it? It is. It’s not Jongwoo, never Jongwoo –

“Jagiya,” Moonjo calls quietly, cutting through the sudden tension headache squeezing Jongwoo’s rational thoughts into a fine pulp, “What’s going on in that pretty head of yours? You went pale.”

“I just need to sit down,” Jongwoo mumbles, stumbling a few steps towards one of the rickety garden chairs that litter the rooftop. It’s the kind with a long footrest, so you can stretch out and soak in the sunlight. But the sun is setting sluggishly now, casting cold shadows across the brick and concrete all around them.

Jongwoo rests his elbows on his knees and rubs at his temples, willing the pounding in his head to die down. It’s a stupid position to put himself in – letting his guard down, allowing this moment of vulnerability in front of Moonjo, but he doesn’t care. He massages his fingertips into his skull like he can press them past the bone and blood straight into his brain. From there it’s just a matter of fishing out his shame. It’s hiding in there somewhere, and he intends to hold on tight to it.

But there’s a shark swimming at the edges of these waters. When he opens his eyes, Jongwoo can see Moonjo’s feet. He’s wearing black dress shoes beneath the hem of his black dress slacks. It’s a stark reminder of the horrifying fact that Moonjo somehow finds time to have a real job in between terrorizing Jongwoo. For hours every day, Moonjo walks around a clinic administering healthcare. And people let him. Nobody else seems to realize how much of a danger this man is, not even Seokyoon.

Where Jongwoo sees a devil, everyone else simply sees Dr Seo. Even with grime beneath the heel of his nice shoes, Jongwoo is the only person who seems to truly recognize the discordance.

“Ahjussi,” Jongwoo lets his eyes slip closed as he rubs his temple, “I’ve been wondering – how did someone like you wind up living out of residences?”

He knows he might be swinging at a hornet’s nest here by giving Moonjo any kind of opening or attention. There’s clearly something abnormal about a man like him living in places like these, and Jongwoo wouldn’t be surprised in the least to discover their old goshiwon was a front for something.

But he just got an idea, and he wants to know –

“I would have to leave Eden eventually,” Moonjo says. It’s vague and unhelpful and an obvious attempt to deflect the real question. “And after losing everything, I had nowhere to go but here.”

Everything except his entire wardrobe, and Jongwoo’s copy of Metamorphosis, and who knows whatever else he got out before setting that place ablaze. Jongwoo isn’t stupid, but that’s not what he cares about right now.

“Why do you ask?” Moonjo seems to scrutinize Jongwoo for a moment. “Suddenly curious about me?”

“No,” Jongwoo says bluntly. “The thing is – I just got an idea. About my novel. I mean, the change from the pianist to the apartment complex stories. Why not combine the two, and make him live out of a residence?”

“Wouldn’t he seem out of place, though?” Moonjo asks. “A classically trained pianist doesn’t quite fit the setting.”

“That’s why I was asking,” Jongwoo explains. “If someone like you can live in places like this, is it really so unbelievable to write about?”

Some of the artificial neutrality bleeds out of Moonjo’s face as one corner of his mouth twitches.

“But you need to make it believable,” Moonjo points out. “How are you going to do that?”

It sounds like a dare, in a way. It sounds like Moonjo is trying to pry something out of him. As if to say – tell me, honey, all your wild theories about me. Let me know how you tick. Maybe you’ll surprise me. Maybe you’ll even impress me.

His voice is like a fish hook that gets under Jongwoo’s skin and pulls and pulls and pulls. Jongwoo hates how clearly he can conjure it in his own head, just as clearly as Jieun’s or Seokyoon’s or even his own mother’s. He doesn’t need someone else’s words curling through his thoughts like smoke when he has his own voice, thanks, even if nobody wants to listen to it.

Nobody except for Moonjo, apparently.

He wants it a little bit too much. Jongwoo can tell by now when Moonjo is trying to coax something out of him, and he’s getting tired of it. He could sit here all evening and run his mouth off defending his creative prowess and playing right into Moonjo’s hand. Or, he could do some coaxing of his own.

So he crosses his arm and sits back on the rickety old sun lounger with his feet up, pretending to consider that for a moment before settling on the most boring answer he can think of – “Must be money problems.”

Moonjo stares at him, unimpressed. “Do concert halls not pay well?” 

“Do clinics not pay well?” Jongwoo shoots back.

“There are hundreds of clinics like mine in the Seoul area alone,” Moonjo points out. “The notoriety of a musician is hardly comparable to a healthcare worker”

“I never said he’s famous,” Jongwoo says. “Just that he’s good. He’s up- and-coming, right? Not an older guy, not an established performer.”

“A prodigy?” Moonjo pries.

“Does every young artist have to be a prodigy?” Jongwoo asks. “If you put in the work for something you’re passionate about–”

“His passion isn’t music,” Moonjo cuts Jongwoo off, startling Jongwoo to a stop.

“Huh?”

Moonjo pushes himself away from the railing and takes a step forward, both hands in his pockets as his head hangs low to look down at Jongwoo. He feels towering like this, like a shadow sent by God to blot out the sun.

Jongwoo has to crane his neck backwards to look up at Moonjo by the time he comes to a stop next to the chair.

“Music is a byproduct,” Moonjo says, “He only plays so well because he kills before his performances. The music is driven by the murder, not the other way around. That blazing fire of a life being extinguished is the only reason the keys feel warm. That kind of art isn’t practiced, not really. It’s innate.”

That’s… Definitely not something Jongwoo has written, or even talked about with Moonjo. And yet, Moonjo speaks about it like it’s already codified into the story – like it’s Moonjo’s story.

A terrible twisting feeling settles into Jongwoo’s guts. He might just have the closest thing to a confession he’s gotten out of Moonjo yet.

“So,” Jongwoo says, against his better judgment, “You’re trying to say he needs a natural… Talent for it?”

“Talent… Not quite,” Moonjo says after a moment of consideration. “He just needs to want it. Desire like that isn’t learned.”

“That’s bullshit,” Jongwoo argues. “There are plenty of unexpected things that could spur someone on.”

“Are we talking about art,” Moonjo asks, “Or impulse?”

Jongwoo draws in an annoyed breath. “Why can’t art be impulsive?”

To that, Moonjo smiles, and Jongwoo realizes he fucked up. “Speaking from experience, jagi? Do you prefer creating things in the heat of the moment?”

All the scattered thoughts in Jongwoo’s head stumble over themselves as he tries to take back some control back over the conversation. “Who said anything about me? We’re talking about my protagonist, remember?”

“Your protagonist,” Moonjo parrots, scraping his shoe against the ground as he shifts his weight.

For a second, Jongwoo thinks he’s about to walk away, and he doesn’t know why that annoys him so much. But Moonjo doesn’t walk away. He does something worse – he sits down on the footrest of the lounger.

Jongwoo draws his knees up to his chest on instinct, curling up in a defensive posture. He glances from left to right, half tempted to vault over one of the armrests just to get out of the corner he’s found himself backed into. But for as much as Moonjo has managed to trap him in a tacky plastic prison, the other man isn’t doing much. He isn’t even looking at Jongwoo. He’s just sitting at Jongwoo’s feet and staring out at the dull hues of the sunset.

“Your protagonist shouldn’t be so passive,” he says eventually. “Letting things happen instead of making them happen… Where’s the fun in that?”

Jongwoo wraps his arms around his knees and looks anywhere but at the other man. “Sometimes, things just happen.”

“Do they?”

Moonjo leans forward, bracing a hand on the seat far too close to Jongwoo’s body for comfort. It’s crowding, caging, and Jongwoo internally kicks himself for getting into this position. There’s a reason why he doesn’t usually give this guy the time of day.

“I mean…” Jongwoo picks at a loose thread on the hem of his sleeve, “Everyone has a breaking point.”

“Is that what you’re writing about, honey?” Moonjo presses. “A breaking point? I think it’s more like an arrival. There are people in this world who deserve to die, you said so yourself.”

All these freaks need to die in an accident.

Jongwoo remembers letting that slip. He hasn’t stopped thinking about it since Eden burned down, as if he somehow spoke the flames into existence. Moonjo was there that night, lurking in the shadows, listening to every word. He crowded Jongwoo back against the rooftop bannister like he’s crowding him now, leaning close and looming heavily while Jongwoo tries to make himself small enough to disappear. He’d said something that night that also sticks in Jongwoo’s memories, he said, he said –

If you want to hate someone, hate them. If you want to talk behind someone’s back, do that too. If you want to kill someone, kill them. That’s true courage.

It doesn’t feel like courage when Jongwoo finds his voice. It feels like recklessness.

“Is that why you burned Eden down?”

While Jongwoo stares down at the denim stretching over his knees, Moonjo makes an inquisitive noise in the back of his throat.

“That’s what you think happened?” Moonjo asks. “Why would I do that?”

A hand lands on Jongwoo’s knee, making him jump. He can’t tell if it’s supposed to be a threat or a reassurance. It certainly doesn’t feel like the latter as Jongwoo’s throat tightens and his palms grow damp with sweat.

“Forget it,” Jongwoo tries to draw his knees up closer to his chest and farther away from Moonjo’s body, but the iron grip remains.

“Don’t,” Moonjo scolds. “You were brave enough to say it, now be brave enough to see it through. Let’s say I did do it – does that bother you? You did want them to die, after all.”

“No,” Jongwoo tries to defend himself. “I spoke without thinking, I didn’t really–”

“Maybe you’d be happier if I died with them,” Moonjo surmises. “If that’s the case, you could always make that happen yourself.”

There is no mercy between hungry beasts. Cornered animals can either cower, or bite back. Jongwoo understands his place in the food chain of Seoul well enough by now: he’s a cut of meat brought here to feed another man’s ego, and along the way he somehow wound up right in the bowl of a cruel and curious cat. He’s expected to keep his head down in deference, even if it means he’ll be devoured.

He understands all that. But he doesn’t understand this. Moonjo has shredded the rulebook and let the scraps blow away on a biting autumn wind. He doesn’t want deference, he wants defiance.

And with how tired Jongwoo is of all these teeth gnawing at him, he’s just about ready to give Moonjo what he wants.

“What is wrong with you?” he demands, finally shoving Moonjo’s wandering hand away from him and leaning forward with a curl in his lip. “All of you were like this, trying to get on my nerves – what the hell do you gain from pissing me off?”

It only makes Jongwoo angrier to see the satisfaction settling across Moonjo’s features. “Am I pissing you off? I thought we were having a nice talk.”

“There’s no such thing as a nice talk with you,” Jongwoo all but snarls. “You’re always trying to pry something out of me, and I don’t get it!”

“I told you before,” Moonjo says simply, “I like you.” 

“You don’t know me,” Jongwoo points out.

“Who knows you better than I do?” Moonjo challenges, leaning forward as if testing to see if Jongwoo will lean away to cower again.

He doesn't.

“The young man from 310?” Moonjo presses. “If he’s such a good friend, why don’t you go tell him all about how much you’d love to hurt this coworker of yours.”

“I don’t–” Jongwoo stutters, face heating in shame and embarrassment. He should have left the rooftop the minute Moonjo came out here. “I didn’t say that. You said that.”

“But you thought about it,” Moonjo accuses. “Go ahead and tell me it’s not true.”

“It’s not true!”

Moonjo lifts a hand to scratch idly at his forehead, a brief and oddly tense gesture, before letting his hand fall back to Jongwoo’s knee to clamp down harder.

“Now say it without lying to me.”

It should be easy. It should be the kind of thing that comes as naturally as breathing.

Right now, it doesn’t. Jongwoo stalls out, all of his indignance boiling off into useless steam. All he does is sit still in the cage Moonjo has made with his body and waits to wake up from what can only be yet another bad dream.

A bloodless dream – when’s the last time he had one of those?

The silence stretches between them. Moonjo takes a deep breath that might as well be the destructive rumble of two tectonic plates shifting against each other for as hard as it shakes Jongwoo. The oppressive heat of his hand on Jongwoo’s knee disappears, only to shift towards the bobbing swell of Jongwoo's throat.

Jongwoo presses his shoulder blades into the back of the chair and thinks, he’s finally going to kill me.

He should scream. If he calls for help, someone is bound to hear him. But right now, with Moonjo touching his adam’s apple, he feels as immobilized as a kitten being held by the scruff of their neck. He doesn’t dare do a damn thing as an indiscernible fire whips up into a blaze under his skin.

He suddenly feels so hot that it’s as if they’ve gone back in time to August, to Eden.

“Goodness, how did we get here?” Moonjo sighs. “I just wanted to talk about your novel.”

Jongwoo stays frozen as Moonjo fondles his throat. The touch spreads slowly, until Moonjo’s hand is fanned out and his fingertips are pressing just behind Jongwoo’s jaw, tipping his head back a little.

The thumping rhythm of Jongwoo’s pulse must be obvious to him. The blazing heat of Jongwoo’s flushed skin under the cold evening air must be obvious, too.

“Is your pianist’s MO still strangulation, honey?” he asks, stroking the sides of Jongwoo’s neck gently. “Does he know what parts of the laryngeal skeleton that are most vulnerable to trauma? Does he know that enough pressure in the right spot can dislocate the cartilage that your vocal folds need to flex properly, and his victims won’t be able to scream anymore even if they survive?”

Jongwoo swallows and swears he can feel every moving part inside his throat. “He doesn’t know about any of that.”

Implicitly, of course - I don’t think about any of that.

It’s not a lie, at least. Jongwoo doesn’t think about violence in those terms. The anatomical consideration, the clinical depiction of a broken body, these aren’t the things that concern him. He doesn’t care if an arterial spray looks nothing like it does in the movies, he wants to see the brilliant arc of it anyway.

Write about it. He wants to write about it.

“Well, then,” Moonjo’s hand slides down and away from Jongwoo’s neck, fingertips trailing over his collarbone and skirting across his chest before Moonjo reaches for one of Jongwoo’s hands, “Does he want to find out?”

It should be harder for Moonjo to pry Jongwoo’s death grip from the chair arm, but it’s not. He lifts the hand up to his own neck, and Jongwoo’s fingers spread open to accommodate the thick shape of it before he can think any better of it.

“Fuck.”

That’s all Jongwoo can manage, spoken in the same breathless tone from before as if Moonjo’s earlier touches left his cartilage collapsed and his voice box ruined.

“Go on,” Moonjo leans forward, mouth smiling and eyes a little wild, “I know you want to.”

Jongwoo’s heartbeat is embarrassingly fast in contrast to the steady thumping pulse beneath his fingers. The common sense factory in his brain would usually direct him to tell Moonjo to fuck off before fleeing as fast as possible. Unfortunately, it seems to have burned down along with Eden.

Because what comes out of his mouth instead is, “I’m not going to sleep with you.”

Moonjo blinks at him, slowly and deliberately, which is all the more striking since Moonjo isn’t much of a blinker to begin with. “I’m sorry, I didn’t realize you were writing that kind of book.”

Embarrassment blazes through Jongwoo. “Oh, piss off.”

He uses the hand on Moonjo’s throat to shove the other man and starts to stand up, but Moonjo doesn’t let him. Jongwoo gets a single foot on the ground before both of Moonjo’s hands land on the plastic arms of the chair to cage him in.

“We’re not done,” Moonjo says. “Now I’m curious – have we been talking about murder, or have we been talking about sex?”

“No,” Jongwoo blurts out awkwardly. “Neither. You’re the one who was talking about murder, and touching me like, like…”

“Like I want to fuck you,” Moonjo tilts his head like a curious little dog, letting his hair fall over those lidded eyes. The profanity sounds jarring in his polite tone. “Is that what you think?”

“Obviously, you do.”

Moonjo makes a noise that almost sounds like a laugh. “Obviously. Because I kissed you?”

“Because you kissed me!” Jongwoo has to resist the urge to throw his hands up in the air in frustration. “You kissed me and then popped a boner from it and then jacked off loud enough that I could hear it!”

“I don’t remember that part,” Moonjo says.

Jongwoo’s blood goes cold as doubt grips him. He heard it, right? He couldn’t have made something like that up, could he? The vague and surreal nightmares are one thing, but getting off to Moonjo’s imagined pleasure is another.

But while his mind is reeling from the implications, he notices something very important: there’s a small smile on Moonjo’s face, and a glint of something mischievous in his eyes.

Fucker’s lying.

“I hate you,” Jongwoo says, staring at the slight curve at the corner of Moonjo’s mouth, “So much.”

“Besides,” Moonjo ignores him, “You kissed me back.”

“I wasn’t thinking clearly,” Jongwoo insists. “The things you say to me, the things you do… You get me all mixed up.”

“So it’s my fault,” Moonjo says. “You kiss me, and it’s my fault. Convenient.”

“You mess with my head,” Jongwoo accuses. “You make me do things I wouldn’t usually do.”

Moonjo sighs. “You think you can undo all those dirty things in your head by pretending they’re out of your control? That’s not going to work, honey.”

“If I had any control over my life, then I wouldn’t be here,” Jongwoo says, “In this shithole, talking to a guy like you.”

The insult gets another smile out of Moonjo. “Am I really so bad?”

Something about Moonjo always leaves Jongwoo’s tongue loose, despite his better judgment to not piss off a potential arsonist and murderer. It feels far too good, far too easy, to speak up and say, “You’re a fucking creep. I don't know how you convinced everyone else that you’re normal, but it won’t work on me. You’re indecent, and probably dangerous, and you make me afraid to even leave my room at ni – ah!”

Jongwoo promptly shuts up when Moonjo grabs his chin in a clamping grip. His fingers are firmer than they were on his throat, almost to the point of aching. Jongwoo stares straight at Moonjo’s face with wide eyes, but Moonjo doesn’t meet his gaze. He’s too busy looking at Jongwoo’s mouth.

“If I’ve done anything to frighten you before,” Moonjo says in a low voice, looming so close over Jongwoo that the other man can nearly feel the words on his skin, “Then you must be terrified right now.”

Jongwoo doesn’t answer the unspoken rhetorical question. His throat is too dry, his tongue feels too thick. When Moonjo gently turns his head back and forth like he’s examining him, Jongwoo’s body flashes rapidly between hot and cold. He’s sweating under the early-autumn sunset. He’s shaking under Moonjo’s probing eyes.

“No,” Moonjo says softly. “You’re not afraid of me, not really. But you like the idea of being afraid of me. It affirms something, right? If you’re afraid of me, then you must be different from me. You must not be a guy like me.”

If Jongwoo isn’t afraid, then what is he? Heart hammering, hands shaking, eyes wet, and skin flushing hot. It’s fear. It has to be fear.

“Let go of me,” Jongwoo grits out, finally finding his voice. One hand reaches up to grip Moonjo’s wrist, but he doesn’t yank it away. Instead, his thumb finds Moonjo’s pulse.

His heart is beating fast.

“Or what?” Moonjo challenges, shifting his eyes up to meet Jongwoo’s. “Will you kill me?”

“I couldn’t,” Jongwoo insists in a small voice.

“I don’t believe that,” Moonjo shakes Jongwoo’s head like he’s a misbehaving puppy. “I don’t think there’s anyone that you couldn’t kill if you wanted to. You’ve got a bite to you that I’ve never seen before.”

Moonjo shifts the grip on Jongwoo’s jaw so that his fingers are practically curving like claws over Jongwoo’s chin, fingertips teasing the seam of Jongwoo’s mouth. As if he’s daring Jongwoo to prove him right and clamp down on the invasive touch that slips past his lips and hooks over the bottom row of his teeth.

It makes Jongwoo’s mouth gape slightly, stuck in a soundless gasp. His prey instinct is telling him to whimper and cry; his predator instinct is telling him to bite down hard enough to make Moonjo bleed. With both of them at war, he can do nothing but flush so hot that surely Moonjo’s skin must be burning where they’re touching.

“Ah, the light out here is so poor,” Moonjo laments, and Jongwoo has about a second and a half to wonder what the fuck he could possibly need good lighting for when the inferno under Jongwoo’s skin jumps up a few million degrees.

Because Moonjo works his jaw almost casually and, without a word of warning, spits straight into Jongwoo’s mouth.

And Jongwoo? Well, there’s not much more for him to do other than make a choked noise and immediately punch Moonjo right in the solar plexus.

The whole ordeal is almost worth it for Moonjo’s ugly grunt of pain as he doubles over.

“What the hell was that, you fucking–” Jongwoo rubs at his mouth with the back of his hand, trying to scrub away all the revulsion and heat crawling under his skin. “You bastard! You sick bastard! That’s what’s wrong with you, right there! Fix yourself, for goodness sake!”

Through the mini-tirade, Moonjo doesn’t have much to say. Rather, he moans, literally moans, these deep obscene noises that sound absolutely horrible to Jongwoo’s burning ears. He’s still sitting on the foot of the lounger, bent in half with his head hanging forward and that mop of hair obscuring most of his face.

All but his mouth, hanging open and, and – he’s fucking smiling.

“Stop grinning, you crazy asshole!” Jongwoo continues to harp. “You’re so gross. Now I’m definitely not sleeping with you.”

“You were still considering it?” Moonjo asks. He sounds a little winded. Serves him right.

Jongwoo’s comeback dies on his tongue when Moonjo leans back a bit as he untucks and lifts the hem of his shirt high enough to look at the space between his ribs, like he’s trying to find a mark. The skin is reddening slightly, matching the flush of anger on Jongwoo’s cheeks.

It’s as if the fluorescent glow of that huge cross on the rooftop of Eden is still watching over them in spirit. Their bodies are red and burning hotter than the worst August day. That place might be gone, but nothing has changed. Not for the better, at least. They’ve only spiraled deeper into hell.

Jongwoo can’t take it anymore. He watches Moonjo press his own fingers into the reddening promise of a bruise, and the near-reverent masochism of it breaks him.

“Have some decency,” Jongwoo scolds, grabbing Moonjo by a handful of that long hair and yanking hard before Moonjo can react.

The other man grunts in surprise, but he lets himself be dragged down onto the dirty ground. The knees of his nice work slacks must be filthy already as he kneels in front of where Jongwoo is still sitting, looking up at him with expectation in his eyes.

For a second, Jongwoo thinks this must be the first time he’s ever loomed over this imposing shadow of a man. But then he remembers what he’s been trying hard to forget – Moonjo lying beneath him in bed, mouth red and swollen from the things Jongwoo did to it.

Those lips move as Moonjo says, “You're doing a bad job of pretending to be afraid of me.”

“I'm disgusted,” Jongwoo corrects. “What makes you think you can just do that to people, huh?”

Moonjo laughs dryly. “People? You think I go around spitting in just anyone’s mouth?”

“Great,” Jongwoo scoffs, “So I guess I’m special?”

“You are,” Moonjo says, leaning forward against the unwavering grip on his hair. It must hurt. “I know that, because I know you. You’re just like me.”

“Open your mouth, then,” Jongwoo barks. “Let’s see how you like it.”

Moonjo, always infuriating, listens a little too well. His jaw falls open obediently as his tongue peeks out over his bottom lip, just enough to show Jongwoo that he’s waiting for it. He wants it. Jongwoo musters every ounce of loathing in his body as he gathers saliva in his mouth.

It’s supposed to be debasement, when Jongwoo returns the filthy gesture and spits in Moonjo’s mouth. But he can’t help feeling like he’s lost some unseen battle between them when Moonjo lets out a shuddering breath and closes his mouth like he’s savoring all the hatred Jongwoo is pouring down on him.

The only thing Jongwoo can say in the wake of it is a scolding repetition, “You’re disgusting.”

Moonjo swallows hard for emphasis, and smiles. “Not like I’ve never had your saliva in my mouth before.”

“Stop,” Jongwoo bites out, clamping his fingers over Moonjo’s chin and mouth in a mimicry of what Moonjo did to him just a few moments ago. “Stop bringing that up.”

Moonjo talks too much, and the things that come out of his mouth aren’t worth listening to. Unfortunately, it turns out he’s even more insufferable when he can’t talk. As if to cling to the subject of their shameful little tryst, one of Moonjo’s hands finds it’s place back on Jongwoo’s knee, skirting up his thigh so quickly that Jongwoo can’t react in time to stop him from brushing his knuckles against the suspicious straining in the front of his jeans.

“Okay, that’s just unfair!” Jongwoo squawks, shoving his entire hand and wrist between his legs like a barrier and unfortunately freeing up Moonjo’s mouth in the process.

“How long have you been hard, jagi?” Moonjo teases, retracting his hand with a nearly gentlemanly promptness.

“I’m not hard,” Jongwoo insists. “I’m – I’m half mast at best. It’s an involuntary reaction. Fuck off.”

“Was it pretending to be afraid of me that got you going,” Moonjo asks, “Or was it putting me on my knees? That power can be intoxicating.”

“Shut up,” Jongwoo says. “You talk too much.”

“You could shut me up,” Moonjo suggests, “Very easily.”

And there’s that heat again, flaring through Jongwoo’s body fast enough to make him dizzy.

No. Stand up. Shove Moonjo away. Leave the rooftop. This is stupid. Moonjo is a creep, and probably dangerous. Sticking your dick in his mouth can only lead to great misfortune. Think unsexy thoughts. He can probably clamp down at 250 psi. He’d probably stare up unblinkingly the whole time in that weird way he always does. It’ll probably be sloppy and wet just to get Jongwoo as filthy with his spit as possible, and – oops, no, wait, that one just made Jongwoo inexplicably hornier.

“If it makes it easier,” Moonjo says, “You can keep blaming me. I don’t mind. But I hope you understand that me making you want something doesn’t mean you don’t actually want it. It means you want it from me.”

“God,” Jongwoo sighs, “You’re so full of yourself.”

Moonjo grins up at Jongwoo from beneath his messy fringe. “But I’m not wrong at all.”

“Shut up,” Jongwoo says again, “Just – shut up.”

He uses his grip on Moonjo’s hair to drag him forward, forcing Moonjo to hunch over his lap. Moonjo doesn’t hesitate for a second. His hands are undoing Jongwoo’s jeans and tugging at the waistband before Jongwoo’s brain can catch up and remind him of how stupid this is. Instead, his body acts on instinct. Lifting his hips at Moonjo’s urging, spreading his legs wider to accommodate Moonjo’s broad shoulders, shuddering in pleasurable discomfort when the cold evening air meets his overheated skin.

He wasn’t lying earlier – he isn’t fully hard. Moonjo strokes him a few times with a too-dry hand and looks at him harder than Jongwoo thinks anyone has ever looked at his dick. Jongwoo feels the ridiculous urge to defend his poor cock from the unreadable scrutiny, but Moonjo tucks a lock of his fluffy bangs behind his ears and wraps his lips around the tip before Jongwoo can say anything.

After that, Jongwoo doesn’t have much to say at all.

His dick is a vile traitor that perks up almost too fast under the languid attention of Moonjo’s mouth. Everything about this is wrong – the location, the act, the other person. This is stupid. A horrible idea. Moonjo does nothing out of the kindness in his heart, because there is no kindness in his heart. Surely, he has an ulterior motive. This has to be a manipulation tactic.

Jongwoo needs to get out of here. Unfortunately, Jongwoo doesn’t really want to.

His hand is still in Moonjo’s hair, fingers weaving between the locks to rake his blunt nails across the other man’s scalp. It might hurt. Jongwoo hopes it does, even as Moonjo works his wet mouth over Jongwoo’s cock like he’s never tasted anything better. He pays close attention to the head, stroking the rest of it with thick fingers in the meantime, before sinking down low.

Low enough that the head nudges against the back of his throat two or three times, making it spasm gently. Jongwoo grunts, and shivers, and thinks about cartilage.

Somehow, that thought doesn’t make him any less hard.

It’s after one of Jongwoo’s bitten-off noises is accompanied by the twitch of his hips that Moonjo finally pulls back for the first time. If his mouth was swollen when Jongwoo kissed it, then it’s practically abused now. There’s spit and maybe even precum shining on his lower lip.

Jongwoo swallows hard, and thinks about kissing him.

“Mm,” Moonjo prods the side of his mouth with his tongue, “You know, I never imagined you’d be so sensitive.”

Jongwoo gnaws on his bottom lip as he tries to think about how to phrase this in a way that won’t feed Moonjo’s ego. “I haven’t had my dick sucked in a long time, alright?”

Moonjo hums quietly again as he strokes Jongwoo’s cock. The wetness makes an obscene noise that has Jongwoo’s stomach clenching. “That girlfriend of yours doesn’t do this often?”

Jongwoo bristles as the heat of desire is fed by the flames of anger. “Of course not, I’d never make her do that.”

“Make her?” Moonjo’s hand stops as he looks up at Jongwoo with an expression of incredulity that looks out of place on his normally impassive face. “Doesn’t she want to?”

“No – I mean, why would she?” Jongwoo hates this conversation. “I thought… It’s like a chore. No one really likes to… Do they?”

“Oh, honey,” Moonjo says against the tip of Jongwoo’s cock, “I’ve got a lot more to show you than I thought.”

He tongues at the slit before wrapping his lips around the tip again, sucking and kissing at the slippery wetness in a way that has Jongwoo biting back more embarrassing noises. Moonjo pulls back with a huff of laughter, circling his forefinger around the spot he was just teasing with his tongue.

“Remember, your larynx is fine,” he says. “You shouldn’t take that for granted.”

“Wasn’t this supposed to shut you up?” Jongwoo gripes. “Always running your mou – ah, ah. Fuck.”

A satisfied hum reverberates around Jongwoo’s cock, and Jongwoo mutters another desperate little fuck as his toes curl in his shoes. Moonjo wants him to be loud, but he can’t be.

This is risky enough as it is, no matter how dark it’s getting under the quiet evening sky. Jongwoo leans back to grip the edge of the footrest behind him and tips his head back to look up at the absence of stars above him. It’s nothing but a dull greyish-blue up there, interrupted only by the slow blink of an airplane overhead. Hundreds of people right above them, a miniscule amount of those 9.9 million, but they don’t matter.

Jongwoo’s eyes slip closed as his breathing grows heavier. Nothing matters right now, except for this: Moonjo’s mouth on him, wet and hungry as it works over Jongwoo’s cock like it’s savoring him. Moonjo’s hands on his hips, gripping any inch of exposed skin he can touch. Moonjo’s hair between his fingers, long and soft, perfect for pulling.

So Jongwoo pulls, and Moonjo moans, and Jongwoo answers with his own noise. It’s far too loud. It probably echoes to the street below. But none of that matters, not when one of Moonjo’s hands shifts to touch the base of his cock as the bobbing of his head grows faster. Not when Jongwoo tightens his grip in Moonjo’s soft hair.

Especially not when Jongwoo’s head rolls forward again so he can gaze down at Moonjo, just as he pushes his hips forward in a gentle, experimental roll.

Throatfucking. It’s such a crass term, and Jongwoo kind of hates it. But Moonjo doesn’t seem to hate what’s happening to him. For a second, he seems to go nearly slack, like he’s waiting for Jongwoo to move again. So Jongwoo does. He holds Moonjo’s head in place and uses the hand behind him as leverage as he rolls his hips forward.

It’s not easy. Jongwoo is working muscles he didn’t even know you could use for sex. And the sound of it, it’s just disgusting. A wet click of saliva every time he pushes forward, much more filthy than when Moonjo was doing all the work himself. Between that noise and the quiet moans pouring out of Jongwoo’s throat, it would be impossible for someone to overhear them and not realize what they’re doing.

No – that’s not quite right. They’d know some people are fucking, big deal. What they wouldn’t know is what Moonjo’s stuttering breathing feels like against Jongwoo’s skin through every puff from his nose. They wouldn’t know how freakishly human that feels, the way Moonjo is struggling to breathe and yet sitting still and letting his mouth hang slack for Jongwoo to use.

They wouldn’t know what Moonjo is capable of. Nobody seems to, except for Jongwoo. They wouldn’t know about the stalking, or the fire, or the subsequent killing. The meat, fuck, the meat – they wouldn’t know about that. The gangster, and the noises from the fourth floor.

They wouldn’t know what it feels like to have this man on his knees, half- choking, lungs burning, jaw aching, all for Jongwoo.

“Ah-ahjussi,” Jongwoo murmurs, smiling a little foolishly at the thought, “I think you might have been right for once. I don’t think I’m afraid of you.”

A shuddering groan from Moonjo, a manic moan from Jongwoo.

“In fact,” Jongwoo adds, ignoring the burning ache in his legs as he rolls his hips faster, “I don’t think I’m afraid of anything right now. I feel so stupid, but I don’t care.”

The sounds are even wetter now. Moonjo must be drooling around him. 

“I kinda want someone to catch us, you know?” Jongwoo pants, breathing heavier and heavier with every word. “Kinda want someone to see the shit you’d do for me.”

Moonjo’s body is moving now, too, twitching and rolling like he’s trying to rub his cock up against a pressure that isn’t there. Jongwoo laughs breathlessly and almost considers wedging a foot between his legs. Let him get off on that like a dog. He probably would, if Jongwoo told him to.

In this moment, Jongwoo feels like he could get Moonjo to do anything.

“I’m close,” Jongwoo suddenly says in warning. Moonjo might be a bastard, but he at least deserves that.

The kindness is wasted on him, though. As soon as Jongwoo loosens his grip and halts the motion of his hips, Moonjo springs back into action. His broad hands hold Jongwoo’s hips down as his head dips low, tongue working restlessly along the underside of Jongwoo’s cock, throat teasing at the head.

“Ah, oh, you crazy bastard,” Jongwoo scolds deliriously. “Always thought you could be a pervert, but who knew you were such a slut?”

Moonjo’s moan sounds positively wounded in the sweetest way. His body is curling between Jongwoo’s legs, back arching like it’s an instinct and fingers gripping Jongwoo’s hips hard enough to bruise.

There’s no surviving an onslaught like that. Jongwoo is gone in a second, tipping over the edge so violently that his orgasm hits him like a punch to the gut. He cries out with that perfect, whole larynx of his, and it must echo across the pockmarked landscape of Seoul.

And he doesn’t care. His vision is spotted, and he doesn’t care. His legs hurt, and he doesn’t care. Moonjo pulls back after the pulsing of his cock dies down, and – oh, yikes, fuck, that’s cold.

Jongwoo hisses through his teeth and spares a glance down between his legs where saliva is abruptly cooling on his cock. Moonjo’s head is hanging, hair obscuring his face, and Jongwoo feels an irritating pang of sympathy for the work he just put this guy through.

He thinks of it as a kindness when he cups Moonjo’s face, and tilts his head up. Just to check on him, just to assess the damage.

Bad idea of Jongwoo’s overactive sense of shame. Great idea for Jongwoo’s libido.

Moonjo’s face is red and his chin is a mess. It’s difficult for Jongwoo to reconcile the sight in front of him with everything he knows about Moonjo. The man who once moved through Eden like a ghost and commanded Machiavellian respect from a group of freaks and weirdos is now looking up at Jongwoo through a such a thick film of lust that Jongwoo can practically taste it.

“Not so high and mighty now,” Jongwoo says, running a thumb along Moonjo’s wet lower lip.

“I disagree,” Moonjo rasps, and Jongwoo shivers at how ruined his voice sounds. “To be honest, I’ve never felt closer to god.”

Jongwoo flushes pleasantly at those words, and he’s too high-up on lingering pleasure to be annoyed by it.

“And what about you?” Moonjo coaxes. “How do you feel?”

“I feel…” Jongwoo thinks about lying just to take the wind out of Moonjo’s sails, but the truth comes to him almost uncomfortably easy, “Pretty good. I think I needed that.”

“Really?” Moonjo grins. “I thought you’d be more upset about cheating on your girlfriend.”

The blood drains from Jongwoo’s face, and pulls away from Moonjo like he’s been burned.

“I…” he says, a single syllable forced through the tightness of his throat.

Moonjo looks far too smug for a guy with spit all over his chin. He dabs at it with the sleeve of his dress shirt and asks, “Didn’t it feel good to do what you wanted? It felt good for me.”

“No,” Jongwoo scrubs his hands across his face as the night sky falls around him. “That’s, that’s – fuck. I shouldn’t have done that. Why did you let me do that? Don’t you dare say a word about this until I sort it out!”

“Who do you think I’m going to tell?” Moonjo asks dryly, “I don’t exactly have her on KakaoTalk.”

Jongwoo stands up in a rush, sending the rickety old chair skittering behind him. This place is filthy and cold. He can’t believe he just did that.

“I... I’m out of here,” Jongwoo declares, leaving Moonjo kneeling on the ground and looking up at him with the kind of satisfaction that doesn’t fit his circumstances right now. “Don’t come looking for me.”

He storms away without a backwards glance, feet slapping loudly with every indignant step.

“And if you want me to kill you so bad,” Jongwoo calls out, “Maybe the blue balls will do it!”

-

Following his grand exit, Jongwoo promptly hides in his room for hours.

At first, he sits in total silence with his ears perking up at any sounds he catches in the building. Moonjo has to come back to his room eventually. After that, Jongwoo has no idea what to expect. He just knows it’ll happen eventually.

Except, it doesn’t.

Ten minutes turns into a half an hour, which turns into a full hour, which turns into an hour and ten. Surely the freak isn’t planning on sitting up there all night, is he? Maybe he slipped into the showers to crank one out. But he’d have to stop by his room first to get his robe and toiletries.

Or maybe…

Jongwoo thinks about hunter bars and prostitutes. He thinks about a secret girlfriend or a wife tucked away somewhere nicer than this shithole. Hell, he thinks about a boyfriend – someone like Jongwoo, but better. Sweet and lithe, submissive and eager to please. He thinks about Kang Seokyoon, twenty-five years old and as cute as any idol rapper as long as he’s not, you know, actively rapping.

He thinks so hard that he gets a headache and winds up lying in bed facing the wall.

Moonjo is no ghost, and the door hinges in this building squeal like a slaughterhouse. If he was in the room next to Jongwoo, Jongwoo would have heard him come back at some point.

Jongwoo slowly runs his fingertips over the uneven plaster of the wall, and sighs.

He gives it two full hours before crawling back to his feet and grabbing the toiletries for his nighttime routine. There are two older men in the bathroom when Jongwoo arrives, bare naked under the spray and carrying on a conversation over the rush of water. Their voices echo in the tiled room, bouncing off the walls in a way that makes it sound like there’s more people in here.

But there’s not. It’s just three neighbors.

Jongwoo brushes his teeth for far longer than necessary, like he’s trying to scrub away some of Moonjo’s lingering saliva. But brushing just makes him think of dentistry, which makes him think of Moonjo. It makes him think of something solid in his mouth, which makes him think of Moonjo. A rhythmic in and out, white spilling out of the corner of his lips – fucking hell, Moonjo has him so messed up that he’s got Freudian brainworms now. This is pathetic.

Get it together, Yoon Jongwoo.

When he meanders out of the bathroom with lazy steps, a whisper-shout startles him enough to make him jump.

“Hyung!”

“Keep your voice down!” Jongwoo hisses, and Seokyoon puts a sheepish hand over his mouth. He smells like the greasy food from the convenience store he recently got a job at, and Jongwoo’s gut rolls as he realizes he forgot to eat dinner again.

“Sorry,” Seokyoon says quietly. “I haven’t seen you much lately. How have you been?”

Jongwoo rubs one of his sweaty palms against his thigh and glances away. Seokyoon isn’t the most perceptive guy around, but Jongwoo feels like everyone who he comes across will be able to see the things he did to Moonjo written out across his face.

“Fine, fine,” he says. “And you?”

“Can’t complain,” Seokyoon says, tired by cheery.

“Right,” Jongwoo inhales and tries to mask his jittery nervousness. “Hey, have you seen the ahjussi who lives between us lately?”

“Moonjo-hyung?” Seokyoon frowns. “Not for a few days, I guess. Why?”

Jongwoo’s face heats up, and he’s grateful for the low light of the hallway. “Nothing. He, uh. Borrowed a book that I want back.”

“Well, if I see him, I’ll tell him about it.”

“Cool, thanks,” Jongwoo nods. “Hey, I just remembered, I forgot something on the roof earlier. See you tomorrow, maybe?”

Seokyoon nods easily. “See you tomorrow, hyung.”

And just like that, they split off in different directions. Seokyoon was something like salvation to Jongwoo once, but after tonight, Jongwoo can hardly look at him.

Who knows you better than I do? The young man from 310?

Jongwoo exhales slowly in annoyance. Room 310 doesn’t even exist anymore.

It comes as no surprise that the rooftop is empty, but Jongwoo is still oddly disappointed. As if he wanted to find Moonjo here, still kneeling quietly, waiting for Jongwoo to come back to him. Even by Moonjo’s standards, that’d be fucking weird. There’s nothing here, and no evidence of what happened. Except, maybe, the askew garden chair.

The sky is black. The rooftop is cold. Jongwoo goes back inside.

-

If Jongwoo dreams that night, he doesn’t remember it once he wakes.

The one unexpected mercy is that he slept better than he imagined he would. He thought he’d toss and turn for hours stewing in his rightful guilt and misplaced jealousy. But he didn’t, and now he feels oddly refreshed in the reddish-yellow morning sun streaming through the window.

He’s doing up the last two buttons of his shirt when a knock rings through the room. It’s not too surprising – the landlord finds nearly-constant excuses to bother tenants.

“Just a minute,” Jongwoo says, straightening out his shirt. When he opens the door, he doesn’t find the landlord.

“Oh,” Jongwoo crosses his arms and leans against the door frame, “So you are here.”

“I live here,” Moonjo points out. He’s dressed for work, and Jongwoo can’t help the way his eyes flit down to see if there’s dirt all over his knees. “Where else would I be?”

“Figured you went somewhere else last night to find someone to, uh,” Jongwoo glances down the empty hallway before finishing, “Take care of you after I left.”

Moonjo laughs at that, fucking laughs. “And that makes you angry?” 

“I’m not angry,” Jongwoo says angrily.

Moonjo hums in consideration. “Of course you’re not. Wouldn’t make sense to walk out on me and then get jealous if I found someone else to finish me off.”

“I’m not jealous,” Jongwoo insists.

“I didn’t sleep with anyone else last night,” Moonjo assures him. 

“I don’t care,” Jongwoo huffs. “What do you even want?”

“Oh,” Moonjo glances down at himself, and starts unbuttoning his shirt. “I just want to show you something.”

“Well don’t show me out there!” Jongwoo hisses in mortification, dragging Moonjo through the doorway and slamming it shut.

Moonjo seems unbothered by the whole thing as he swiftly exposes his chest. With his shirt hanging open, he grabs Jongwoo’s hand and presses it to the space between his ribs.

Jongwoo tries to jerk his hand away, but Moonjo keeps it firmly in place. It’s hard to miss the low, pained groan in the back of Moonjo’s throat that accompanies the motion.

“Look at it,” he prompts. “Isn’t it pretty?”

Beneath Jongwoo’s sweating palm is a rather impressive field of bruised reddish- pink skin haloed in purple.

“You did that,” Moonjo murmurs. “How easy was it? You didn’t think, you just acted. You wanted to hurt me, so you did.”

“I want to hurt you right now, crazy bastard–” 

“Then do it,” Moonjo urges, and Jongwoo freezes.

It’s early. His eyes are still a bit heavy with sleep, but his heart is hammering behind his ribs. He wonders if Moonjo can feel it through his skin, like he’s some manic pulsating thing. All of his tells, his anxiety, his hatred, everything that makes him human in this moment is laid bare before Moonjo.

Jongwoo jerks his hand out of Moonjo’s grasp, but he doesn’t pull it away. Instead he trails it higher, over Moonjo’s pale chest. This is the first time he’s seen so much of the other man’s skin outside of the shower, he realizes. One of Jongwoo’s fingers presses to the dip of Moonjo’s clavicle and all he can think about is how different Moonjo looks when he’s not buttoned up to his throat or swaddled in the inky hue of a shadow.

There are bones beneath Jongwoo’s hands. Muscle, a bit warm from the blood pumping in his veins. Sinew and soft flesh. Cartilage, capillaries – he’s human.

He’s breakable. Jongwoo learned that well enough last night.

The hand trails higher, up to Moonjos throat, fingertips teasing around his Adam’s apple. Delicate fingers, a writer’s fingers, a pianist’s fingers – Jongwoo watches Moonjo swallow hard, head tilting back slightly.

“I didn’t sleep with anyone last night,” Moonjo repeats suddenly. “Are you disappointed that the blue balls didn’t kill me?”

Jongwoo’s fingers twitch on Moonjo’s throat as his face heats up at his own crassness thrown back in his face. “I definitely am now that you asked that.”

“We could try it again right now if you wanted,” Moonjo offers. “And if it doesn’t work, I’m told the third time’s a charm.”

Jongwoo gapes at the boldness in that statement. “Are you… Are you propositioning me at seven-thirty in the morning?”

“I am,” Moonjo says bluntly. “I want more.” 

“You want more?” Jongwoo parrots.

“I want more.”

“Already?”

“Already.”

Moonjo’s fingers touch the waistband of Jongwoo’s jeans, and Jongwoo realizes something that should probably bother him more:

He’s going to be late for work.

The only consolation is that since he’s just the intern, maybe no one will notice.

–

People notice.

By the time Jongwoo throws himself down into his chair with legs that feel like rogue electric eels, he’s almost 45 minutes late.

“Useless jerk,” Byeongmin mutters.

“Run into some trouble this morning?” Yoojung teases. 

“Don’t let it happen again,” Jaeho reprimands.

Jongwoo barely responds to them.

Before today, he never put much stock in the concept of men being slaves to their own banal horniness. He’s read plenty of literature focused on the contrary, of course, where a man’s downfall can be found in the bed of a beautiful woman. Maybe that’s why he likes Raymond Chandler’s stories about Phillip Marlowe so much – he sees straight through the attempted seductions of the archetypal femme fatales. He has no time for them and their games.

But as Jongwoo stares hard at a write-up that might as well be written in the cyrillic alphabet for as much as he can understand, he starts to wonder if maybe Moonjo sucked his brain out through his dick.

He shifts slightly in his chair, feeling the rough pull of denim over the raw marks on his thighs. Turns out blunt fingernails can do plenty of damage with a can-do attitude, judging by the crisscrossing latticework of welts Moonjo tore into Jongwoo’s skin. Of course he couldn’t be as docile as he was last night, he had to give back even rougher than he got. Those mean fingernails, those piercing eyes, those red lips stretched wide around him…

“I’ll be back,” Jongwoo mutters to no one in particular, excusing himself to the bathroom so he can splash cold water on his face.

Rock bottom or not, there’s no way he’s getting hard thinking about Moonjo at work.

He takes a minute to compose himself, gripping the sides of the sink and watching droplets of water slip from his nose to the basin below. This isn’t who he’s supposed to be – cheating and showing up to work late and spacing out thinking about his freak of a neighbor. This isn’t who he was a month ago. He glances up into the mirror and gives himself a hard look, trying to find the Yoon Jongwoo who arrived in Seoul with the optimism of a healthy man with a job lined up and his girlfriend finally back within his reach.

What he sees instead are wide eyes with piercing dark pupils. Shadows gather beneath them – maybe one night of good sleep wasn’t enough. And under the sterile cool fluorescent bulb, his tan skin looks a bit sallow, like the harvest moon heralding the autumn equinox.

Is this really his face? He touches his chin, his nose bridge, the soft bags under his eyes. He’s not so sure.

Back in the office, people call him intern. Sometimes, Jongwoo-ssi. They see him, and they recognize him. Maybe he’s always looked like this, and everybody noticed but himself.

Mild identity crisis or not, Jongwoo has work to do. Work to catch up on. He stays diligent all day, not slacking off for a second. To everyone in the office, he must look penitent for his lateness. But the truth is, if he lets his thoughts lag for even a second, they find a way to wander back to Moonjo. The things he says. The way he moves. Byeongmin is being more of a dick than usual today since he has something to leverage over Jongwoo, and it takes every ounce of mental willpower to keep Jongwoo’s thoughts from wandering to cracked bones and laryngeal cartilage.

He shudders minutely, shaking his head. Strangulation is too intimate, especially now that Jongwoo knows what Moonjo’s throat feels like under his palm and against the head of his dick. If he’s going to kill Byeongmin, he’d prefer not to touch him with his hands at all.

Alas, Byeongmin lives another day. The office winds down as the hours wear on, and Byeongmin clocks out even faster than usual. He must feel the negativity radiating off of Jongwoo. Or maybe, he’s just rubbing it in that he gets to leave on time while Jongwoo is expected to stay after hours to make up for time lost.

At least, that’s what Jongwoo assumes will happen when Jaeho calls out to him as he’s shouldering his backpack.

“Jongwoo-yah,” Jaeho beckons Jongwoo towards his office. “Stay a minute, I need to talk to you.”

It’s disappointing in a way Jongwoo doesn’t expect, like some part of him deflates at the idea of being held here rather than returning to the goshiwon – returning to Moonjo.

The building isn’t empty, not by a long shot. Yoojung is still lingering in the office, gathering everything up in her bag so slowly that she couldn’t make it any more obvious that she’s stalling. Outside of the office suite, there are still a dozen voices echoing through the hall. Laughter and polite platitudes, farewells at the end of a long day of work.

As much as Jongwoo would love to defy Jaeho’s authority, he knows it’s not his place. He’d just be making a scene for all those ears to listen in on. So he shuffles forward, hating the way he becomes meek under Jaeho flexing his authority, and hunches his shoulders when Jaeho puts an arm around them.

It’s not a comfort, of course. Jaeho uses the leverage to push Jongwoo into the office, making him stumble a bit before he obediently drops stiffly into the chair in front of him.

Jaeho rounds the desk to sit opposite him, and Jongwoo can’t help but notice that the door is still hanging wide open.

“Care to explain why you were late today?” Jaeho asks directly, keeping his tone friendly even through the implied reprimand in the question.

“There was some trouble,” he says with deliberate vagueness, “In the residence I live at.”

Jaeho shakes his head in disapproval. “You've got to get out of there. People are only meant to stay in them short-term.”

Jongwoo grinds his teeth and thinks about how he has no other choices.

“I think a place like that has been taking its toll on you,” Jaeho continues. “Sometimes I barely recognize you these days.”

These days. They were friends in college years ago and have been working together for a few weeks, and yet Jaeho purports to know anything at all about Jongwoo. His concern is as insincere as Yoojung’s quiet fumbling in the office behind them as she lingers behind and eavesdrops on something that’s none of her damn business.

That is, until Jaeho decides to make it her business.

“And besides,” Jaeho adds before Jongwoo can say anything, “Byeongmin said you’ve been checking out Yoojung, and that's not like you. Not when you have a girl as good as Jieun letting you hang onto her."

Jongwoo stands up so fast that he gets dizzy with it. “Byeongmin said – Byeongmin said what?”

“Yoon Jongwoo!” Jaeho waves for Jongwoo to sit down.  “Cool it, will you?”

The gesture is so patronizing and irritating that it makes Jongwoo want to grab his wrist and yank him over the table. Maybe throw him on the floor and show him what it feels like to be kicked when you’re down.

“How can I cool it when I’m being accused of something like that?” Jongwoo asks. “He’s lying.”

“He’s never caused trouble like that with anyone else before,” Jaeho says, like that settles it. “I’ve never had a problem with him, and it’s your word against his. So if he said he saw something, then it’s my duty to believe him.”

“He’s projecting,” Jongwoo spits. “I catch him ogling her every other day. He’s the one you have to look out for!”

Jaeho makes a reproaching noise. “So now you’re jealous, too?”

“J – jealous?” Jongwoo stutters in disbelief. The next words are squeezed out of him in a delirious sort of giggle, “You think I’m jealous of that pervert?”

“Goddammit, Jongwoo!” Jaeho slams a hand on his desk, startling Jongwoo back to some modicum of mindfulness. “I don’t know how they do it back in Busan, but you don’t speak down to your seniors here. Not unless you want to keep jumping between shithole residences for the rest of your life.”

Jongwoo is breathing heavily, biting his tongue, when Jaeho has to go and add –

“Or maybe you like living in those places, huh? Anything to run crying to Jieun for sympathy.”

“Excuse me?” Jongwoo huffs. “How is that any of your business?”

Jaeho leans back in his chair, looking impossibly smug as he says, “She’s the one who’s been reaching out to me, you know. She needs someone to turn to after everything you dump on her. You can’t keep doing that to her. You have to man up some day.”

Jongwoo’s fingers curl into fists as his thoughts immediately jump to the worst conclusion – Jieun getting out of Jaeho’s car, Jaeho brushing a friendly hand on her arm, touching her in a way that implies a million more touches. Does he touch her like he’s wanted her all along? Does he kiss her like he wants to devour her whole?

“She’s been practically begging me to give you a handout so you can stop bitching about that place,” Jaeho says, eyes trailing down to Jongwoo’s torso – to his scruffy department store shirt, the same one Jieun didn’t want him wearing out to brunch. “But with your output these last few days, you’re lucky the internship is paid at all.”

“I’ve told you,” Jongwoo tries one last time, voice as even as he can manage, “I’m basically going at this blind. Byeongmin refuses to actually help me when I need it–”

“I don’t want to hear it,” Jaeho sighs. “I’m putting you on suspension.” 

“Huh? Su– what?”

“If you’re going to be late, don’t come in for the next three working days,” Jaeho explains. “When you return, you’ll apologize to Byeongmin for what you just said about him. Do that and keep your eyes looking straight ahead, and we won't have to let Jieunnie know about where they've been wandering, yeah?”

This asshole has no idea what those eyes have seen lately.

Jongwoo’s hands are clenched into fists in an attempt to get them to stop shaking. “I didn’t do anything wrong.”

“That’s not up for debate,” Jaeho says with finality. “You should be kissing my feet right now for not firing you outright. Workers get cut loose in this business for much less all the time. Now go on, I’ll see you on Wednesday when your suspension has passed. Maybe you can get some apartment hunting done in the meantime.”

He says it without a hint of humor or irony – this guy really fancies himself king of the world right now. Jongwoo turns on his heel, not trusting himself to say anything else, but even that’s a faux pas, apparently.

Jaeho clicks his tongue in annoyance and barks, “Jongwoo-yah! Come on, don’t get cold with me.”

Jongwoo only has one foot past the threshold of the doorway when Jaeho says it. Past the ringing in his ears, he can hear Yoojung apologizing to someone for nearly running into them in the hallway in her haste to sneak out of the office, but Jongwoo is beyond caring that there was an audience to his humiliating dressing-down.

What he focuses on instead is the fact that there are a lot of heavy things in here. A lot of sharp things.

Should I kill him?

Should I kill him?

Should I kill him?

With the stiffness of a man one crack away from shattering, Jongwoo turns around to face Jaeho and bows slightly.

“Thank you for only suspending me,” he says between gritted teeth, “Daepyonim.”

-

You know what’s really stupid? Drinking away your sorrows in a dive bar when you’re well aware you’re about to lose three days worth of pay. Does Jongwoo do that anyway? No shit he does.

None of the alternatives are appealing at all.

Call Jieun? Right, and get lectured about how he’s fashioned himself into a nice little doormat so Jaeho can wipe the shit off his shoe. Being too nice isn’t a good thing, he needs to stand up and be assertive. Defending himself isn’t a good thing, he needs to bow his head and have some respect.

Besides, Jaeho might have been talking out of his ass, but he's closer to the mark than he knows. Jongwoo is a big old dirty fucking cheater who spends more time thinking about dry humping the worst person he’s ever met than talking to his own girlfriend lately. To do what he’s done and then expect comfort from her – he’s low, but he’s not that low.

So that’s off the table.

He could, of course, go back to the goshiwon. Ideally, he’d lock himself in his room without bumping into anyone. He’d gather his anger in the tight circles he’d pace across the floor until the dirty linoleum is worn down to dust. He’d write out all his worst fantasies into a document on his unlocked computer – blood and metal, bone and knives, pieces of flesh flayed with the razor sharp tension of piano wire.

And he’d feel eyes on him the whole time, a voice so thick with fascination that it’s tangible. A voice like a lover’s touch. Hands curling around his shoulders, lips at his ear, asking him how good it would feel to let go. And tonight, Jongwoo might just fucking let go.

So, no. He doesn’t do that.

Instead, he sits at a bar and orders drinks and rests his head against one hand as the other one pokes at his phone screen, typing up plot ideas that will probably be unintelligible in the morning. He thinks of it as brainstorming, but that’s being generous. Mostly he’s just recording a stream of consciousness, ugly and violent thoughts poured out into a fictionalized allegory.

I’m not saying you should kill him, of course.

Why not?

But it’s normal that you want to.

Of course it is.

Anyone would feel the same.

Anyone would.

Jongwoo must paint a pretty pathetic picture at the end of the bar, because no one really bothers him except for the too-pushy bartender trying to slip in refills. He doesn’t drink nearly enough to get shitfaced, but there’s enough of a buzz under his skin that he has no handle on his temper when he sees what he owes at the end of the night.

“You’ve made a mistake,” Jongwoo tells the bartender. “There’s no way I drank this much.”

“No way?” the bartender shoots back. “I’ve been serving you all night, I know exactly how much you drank.”

A few weeks ago, Jongwoo might have awkwardly hung his head like a submissive dog and agreed with this asshole trying to scam him. But after the day he’s had – no, after the month he’s had, Jongwoo doesn’t have the patience for polite subservience to asshole strangers.

“There’s no way in hell I drank that much,” Jongwoo insists. “I’d be in the hospital getting my stomach pumped, idiot. You must have double charged me a couple times or something.”

“How would you know?” the bartender asks. “You’re trashed.”

“No I’m fucking–” he cuts himself off and takes a deep, ragged breath, ignoring the half a dozen pair of eyes watching him from around the bar. “No, I’m not. You’re robbing me here, asshole, don’t think I’m too stupid to realize that.”

“I got missing bottles with your name on them, kiddo,” the bartender pokes his finger in Jongwoo’s face. “All you got is a drunk’s temper. Maybe don’t drink alone next time and you won’t lose track of your drinks so easy.”

“Do you scam all your customers,” Jongwoo shouts, “Or just the ones who don’t have anyone to back them up?”

“The buddy system’s important,” comes a voice at Jongwoo’s side as a stranger leans against the bar next to him.

“Especially for a guy like you,” comes another voice, just as a man throws a too-friendly arm around Jongwoo’s shoulder.

Jongwoo shrugs it off and gives him a shove. “Nobody asked you. Fuck off.”

“Ooh, feisty,” one of them says. “Like a yappy little dog.” 

“Are you gonna pay,” the bartender cuts in, “Or what?”

Jongwoo takes a deep breath. The red fluorescent light above the bar is blinking too fast. It’s giving him a headache. “I’m not paying for anything I didn’t drink.”

“Kid, listen,” the bartender crosses his arms and leans forward as the other two men trade jokes and cackle right next to Jongwoo’s ear, “If you don’t have the cash, call up a buddy and have them come bail you out. It's fine, it happens all the time.”

“Yeah, I’m sure a guy like you is real popular,” one of the lingering men quips.

“Knock off the drinks I didn’t order,” Jongwoo says, “And I’ll give you your fucking money.”

“I'll only repeat myself once," the bartender says, "Get some of your buddies over here to cover your tab, and I won't have to press charges for theft."

“You think the cops around here will give a shit about a tab dispute?” Jongwoo scoffs. “Some freaks were killing cats up on that hill where the church burnt down, and they couldn't even figure that one out!”

“My drinks are worth a hell of a lot more than someone taking care of some alley cats,” the bartender says. 

For some reason, that pisses Jongwoo off more than anything.

“Oh, forget this,” he mutters, digging his wallet out. He throws the rest of his cash on the bar, and in case that’s not enough, he throws his whole fucking bank card.

“Whoa, buddy,” the bartender swipes the bills quickly, “Slow it down there, you’re giving me whiplash.”

“I’ll give you a hell of a lot more than that if I ever come back to this place,” Jongwoo grumbles. He shrugs his backpack over his shoulders and leaves in a hurry, ignoring the voices calling out to him as he goes.

The autumn air sobers him up as he throws himself outside, fingertips laced together behind his head like he’s trying to keep his brains from exploding out the back of his skull in anger. He can’t stay here, so he starts walking. Any direction will do. This bar isn’t a usual spot for him, but it’s in the same neighborhood as the goshiwon. A couple blocks worth of pacing in the crisp night chill should cool him down enough to keep him from doing something stupid.

Unfortunately, he doesn’t seem to be the only patron from that bar going for a walk tonight.

“Hey, where are you going, big shot?” 

“We just wanna party with you, man.”

Jongwoo clenches his jaw tight and ignores the men following him down the dark streets. He recognizes the voices from the bar. A couple of young punks with big mouths, that’s all they are. They’re just looking for entertainment. They’re just looking for a reaction. As long as Jongwoo doesn’t give them that, he’s home free.

Yeah, right.

The goshiwon should only be about a block and a half away. All Jongwoo has to do is make it there, and he’ll be fine. They wouldn’t follow him up into the residence. If nothing else, the landlord would call the cops on them the second he saw them.

Too bad Jongwoo never makes it there.

He hears every taunting word they say, every crude joke and each peal of cruel laughter. But he doesn’t see them. He doesn’t know what they’re planning to do with him, until their footfalls suddenly grow louder and a pair of arms drag Jongwoo past a dumpster and into the shadows of a dark and empty building.

“What the hell are you doing, you crazy bastards?”

“Don’t be like that,” one of them says, trying to hold Jongwoo still as he thrashes. “You threw so much money around at the bar, we figured you could share a little with us.”

“I don’t have any left!” Jongwoo snarls, finally twisting out of their hold just as one of them filches his wallet out of his back pocket.

They quickly discover he’s not lying. The fold of his wallet yields nothing but lint.

“What are we supposed to do with this, huh?” one of them slaps him in the cheek with the wallet. “No credit cards, either. Give us your phone and maybe we’ll forgive you for being such a tight ass.”

“You won’t get anything for my phone,” Jongwoo grits out, trying to swipe the wallet back. “It’s too old. Now give me that back, you prick.”

“Ah, what kind of a loser are you?” the man laughs in his face. “Threw around all that money at the bar, but you’re just another broke bitch.”

“That’s not what happened,” Jongwoo insists in exasperation. He doesn’t know how he keeps getting into these situations – “I got scammed, you saw it.”

“Aw, poor baby,” the man coos. “Never drank in this town before?”

He gives Jongwoo a shove in the center of the chest, sending him stumbling back a step.

“Man, I’d love to see you in a host bar,” he taunts. “Those girls would wring your stupid ass dry.”

“He could be working in a host bar with those cocksucker lips,” the other man says. “Play to your strengths, prettyboy. The tough guy act doesn’t work for you.”

“Man, this was a waste of time,” laments the other man. “Gimme his wallet.”

“No way,” the wallet-hoarder spits. “There’s nothing in it, so I’m calling dibs.”

“I want his ID,” the guy insists. “Hand it over.” 

“What, you got a crush on him or something?”

“It’s my wallet!” Jongwoo points out. “My ID! I should be the one to take it.”

“Piss off, prettyboy,” the man with his wallet says, yanking Jongwoo close by the front of his shirt and then sending him stumbling backwards with a backhanded slap.

Jongwoo gasps, and touches his reddening cheek, and thinks, I’m going to kill that guy.

But first, a little tussle between friends.

It’s dark back here with nothing but the dim glow of a dingy floodlight, and Jongwoo can hardly tell these two dipshits apart to begin with. It’s hard to say who escalates first – the guy holding the wallet, or the guy trying to take it. All Jongwoo can say for certain is that he sees the outline of two bodies overlapping in the dark like shadow puppets, tugging each other across the gravel, shoving, yanking, spitting.

And finally, throwing a punch. 

“Hey, fuck you, bastard!”

Which one of them was that? It doesn’t really matter. They might as well be the same man, a singular animal beating itself stupid.

What they need is a hand from someone who knows what he’s doing.

“Stop fighting, you idiots!” he shouts over their scuffling. “It’s my wallet, give it back!”

They ignore his approach. Why wouldn’t they? Two big boys who fancy themselves a pair of thugs, and Jongwoo is just a shortie with a slouching backpack and a few drinks loosening him up. Jongwoo is smaller than both of these men, but that’s nothing new for him. He was smaller than his superior in the military. He’s smaller than Jaeho. He’s smaller than Moonjo, and yet Moonjo seems determined to make him feel like the largest man alive.

If you want to do something, do it.

Jongwoo grabs one of their shoulders, wrenching a nameless man back hard.

If you want to kill someone, kill them.

Four knuckles meet the solid curve of a cheekbone, and the impact is almost wet. Like there’s already blood soaking their skin.

No one can stop you, jagi.

One of them retaliates, catching Jongwoo with a blow across the jaw that he hardly feels. He returns it with twice the strength.

You can do anything.

Jongwoo catches an elbow across the face, sending him sprawling backwards with a grunt. He lands in an awkward heap, stumbling against a pile of loose bricks behind him. He feels the hard edge of one cut into his palm, spilling blood on the dirty clay.

You can hate anyone you want to hate.

One of these men is clearly a better fighter than the other, who finds himself flat on the ground and screaming obscenities as a man he called a friend ten minutes ago looms over him.

Kill anyone you want to kill.

Jongwoo grips the brick beneath his hands. The night air smells like copper and salt.

That’s true courage.

The window of opportunity is slim: one man bending at the waist to taunt the man on the ground, while the other holds a bloodied nose and curses up at him. They’ve forgotten about little Jongwoo, his sagging backpack, his curling lip, his empty wallet. They don’t know anything about what his hands are capable of with the right weight behind them.

They’re about to find out.

There’s a strange sort of numbness in Jongwoo’s limbs as he rises up and winds his arm back. In that moment, all he can think about is how cold it’s getting at night – he needs to buy a heavier jacket.

“What are you doing, you crazy jerk?”

It’s a stupid question. Jongwoo is obviously beating someone over the head with a brick, don’t you have eyes? The man under him collapses in a bleeding heap far more quickly than Jongwoo expected, and for a split second, all he can feel is disappointment that it was so easy.

After that, all he can feel is the impact of some douchebag hitting him hard enough to knock the wind out of him, tackling him to the ground. The brick clatters out of his hand around the same time his cheek slams into the pavement, but that’s okay. Jongwoo is so wired that he doesn’t need something heavy to do damage right now.

To his credit, the guy on top of him gets in more than a few solid punches before Jongwoo manages to grapple him around so their positions are switched. It must hurt, certainly – Jongwoo can taste blood in his mouth, but he doesn’t really feel much. Even when his fist is a mess of blood and split skin, he barely registers the sting of it.

Mostly, he just feels pleased that this one had more fight in him.

It’s only after the man stops moving and groaning that Jongwoo stops hitting him. He looks down at the pulpy canvas he’s made of the man’s face and knows he can’t stay here. But when he tries to stand up, he stumbles, landing on his knees in a way that would probably hurt like a son of a bitch if his head was screwed on right.

Blinking blood out of one eye, Jongwoo crawls.

His wallet should be around here somewhere, but he can’t get his numb hands to cooperate as he tries to feel his way across the gravel and asphalt. There’s a strange thickness to his fingers and it takes him a moment to realize that at least two of them are swollen and purple under the messy smear of blood streaming from his knuckles.

He curls his hand into a fist, just to feel the surge of pain, and brings the bruised fingers to his mouth. When his teeth sink into the hematoma, he realizes his jaw is shaking. His heart is pounding. There’s so much adrenaline flooding his body that he feels like he could do this all over again and it still wouldn't be out of his system.

He wants to do it again.

“Look at you,” someone croons from above. “Aren’t you lovely?”

A cool hand cradles the side of Jongwoo’s head, pulling him sideways to slouch against something sturdy and warm. He reaches out with a bruised hand and clutches at it, feeling the muscle of a thigh beneath a pair of soft slacks. Craning his neck backwards, he sees exactly who he expects.

There’s a small smile on Moonjo’s face as he gazes down at Jongwoo’s battered body where it's leaning in an inelegant slump against his leg. That thick mop of hair seems impossibly dark against the floodlight above, framing his face like a pitch black halo.

The Devil was a fallen angel, Jongwoo reminds himself. And of course, here stands Seo Moonjo, as if his guardianship over Jongwoo was ordained by Heaven – or, more likely, Hell.

The hand on Jongwoo’s hair moves lower, curving around the side of his face and curling around his jaw. Moonjo’s skin feels strangely smooth and stiff, and it takes Jongwoo a moment to realize why.

He’s wearing rubber gloves.

“Are you going to kill me?” Jongwoo asks.

Moonjo’s hand shifts as he thumbs softly at the bleeding gash over Jongwoo’s lower lip. “I hadn’t planned on it.”

Jongwoo should probably feel disgusted when that thumb slips over his teeth and into his mouth, but to be honest, he doesn’t feel much of anything right now.

“We should hurry and get you out of here,” Moonjo says even as the motion of his thumb stroking Jongwoo’s teeth remains languid and relaxed. “Someone already called the cops. Those two men seemed to be having a pretty nasty fight. You were lucky to get away from them.”

Alcohol and adrenaline are pulling Jongwoo’s consciousness in two different directions, leaving him strung up and immobile. He doesn’t think to question Moonjo’s version of the story. He just stares up at him quietly.

“One of them might die,” Moonjo adds, finally looking away from Jongwoo to spare a glance at the two unconscious men on the ground. “Which one, I wonder?”

“Why are you doing this to me?” Jongwoo asks, voice breaking. 

“What am I doing to you?”

Jongwoo stares up at him in a daze for a moment before stating the obvious.

“You’re driving me insane. You’re ruining my life.”

“Am I, really?” Moonjo asks. His hand has gone back to stroking Jongwoo’s hair again, a soft and soothing motion. “Am I the reason you were so broke you had to stay at Eden? Was I your loyal girlfriend, ignoring all your concerns and telling you to get over yourself? Your generous boss, paying you poverty wages? Or your mom, asking for money that you don’t have?”

“That’s not fair,” Jongwoo shakes his head, grinding his browbone into Moonjo’s leg. “That’s not fair to them.”

Moonjo lowers himself down slowly, ducking his head so Jongwoo is forced to meet his eyes. “Did I lie about you at work and get you suspended, jagi? If I did, I don’t remember it.”

A shrill noise slips from the back of Jongwoo’s throat, some sort of broken little whimper. He didn’t tell anyone he knows about being suspended yet, but somehow Moonjo already knows. Moonjo knows everything, it would seem, almost as it's happening. It’s terrifying and it's unnerving in the way that Jongwoo feels like he has no privacy. His life is Moonjo’s life, nothing but the flimsy plywood of a cheap goshiwon wall between them to create the illusion of separation.

He reaches out and hooks a bloodied finger in collar of Moonjo’s shirt, buttoned up nice and neat to his throat. He wants to rip it open – the shirt, then the skin, then the meat, then the bone. It’s one thing to cope with nearly losing your job over something you didn’t do by beating a guy half to death. It’s another thing to have someone validate that mounting desire to kill and eat until there’s no one else left to cause problems.

This isn’t what he’s supposed to be, and he hates it hates it hates it. Head spinning under the sickeningly sweet attention that Moonjo pours over him, Jongwoo can’t do much but breathe in heavy, wet gasps.

When was the last time he cried like this? He can’t remember.

“Oh, I usually hate that,” Moonjo mutters, lifting Jongwoo’s chin so he’s forced to stare up into the blurry face of the devil himself, “But you can make anything beautiful.”

And then his lips meet the bruised canvas of Jongwoo’s face, tongue peeking out to lap gently at the iron taste of blood and tears.

Jongwoo thinks he could puke. His stomach tightens, his stomach rolls. He’s disgusted and he’s excited. When has anyone ever paid this type of overwhelmingly invasive attention to him? Moonjo’s lips drag across his skin, and he feels like he’s stuck in some sick joke where someone finally gives him the sort of care he’s always craved – only for it to come from the worst bastard Jongwoo has ever known.

Or maybe, someone like Seo Moonjo is just who he deserves.

There’s a hand carding gently through his hair, feather-light and almost unreal as Jongwoo grapples with the situation he’s gotten himself into. His head is pounding, and he just wishes the world would stop turning beneath his bruised knees long enough for him to come back to himself – back to who he’s supposed to be. He imagines that this must be what lucid dreaming through a nightmare feels like–

Yes, lucid dreaming. That’s right. This is just another dream.

Maybe he fell asleep in the bar, brainstorming murder scenes. He’ll wake up soon, and everything will be fine.

“Pay attention,” Moonjo says, thumbing away the last of the tears streaking down Jongwoo’s red cheeks. “Because we don’t have much time. Hypothetically, which one of them should die?”

Jongwoo doesn’t feel much of anything as he turns his head to look at the two men on the ground. Which one should die? It’s obvious.

He lifts his hand, and points to the man he was grappling with, before turning back to check Moonjo’s expression.

He’s met with an approving smile. “Very good,” Moonjo says. “Stay here.”

Whatever Moonjo does, Jongwoo doesn’t watch it happen. He only listens, and creates his own version of the scene behind his eyelids: Moonjo approaching the mangled body of the thug, casting a disgusted look at his ruined face. Nudging him with the tip of his polished shoe to see if he’ll start moving. And when nothing happens, Moonjo finds the brick.

In Jongwoo’s imagination, Moonjo is brutal and unrestrained. It takes half a dozen blows to kill the man, even though Jongwoo can’t figure out which sounds are real and which are in the story he’s making up. Honestly, he doesn't care what Moonjo is doing right now. What he cares about is the smile on Moonjo’s face as he does it – a wide, delighted grin.

There’s blood on his nice shirt, on his face, dotting his skin from his chin to his cheekbone. His tongue darts out to taste some of it as he turns back to look at Jongwoo with a beckoning sort of look.

Next time I’ll let you do it, honey.

Jongwoo only opens his eyes when he hears the snap of rubber gloves being pulled off. There is no blood spattered across Moonjo’s face, no signs of whatever just happened. Jongwoo doesn’t look at the man on the ground.

He can’t look at anything else right now, with the way Moonjo grips his chin with a bare hand and tits his face upwards.

“Come on,” Moonjo urges. “It’s time to go home.”

“My wallet,” Jongwoo mutters, gesturing vaguely towards the bodies beyond them.

Moonjo shakes his head. “Leave it. Trust me.”

Jongwoo wants to laugh. Trust me – as if giving Moonjo even the slightest bit of trust hasn’t set him on the downward spiral he’s been fighting hard to escape from since moving to Seoul.

But Jongwoo doesn’t fight him. He’s got enough fighting done today. He just lets Moonjo pull him upright, one of Jongwoo’s heavy arms thrown over Moonjo’s too-high shoulders. It’s not doing much. At least, not as much as the arm Moonjo has wrapped around Jongwoo’s middle, pressing Jongwoo into his side with a firm hand over his waist.

“I’m getting blood all over you,” Jongwoo murmurs. “Your ugly shirt is ruined.”

“If it’s your blood,” Moonjo says, “I don’t mind.” 

Whatever the hell that means.

-

The residence is quiet when they get back. It’s half past midnight, and there are no neighbors lingering in the common areas this late.

Moonjo directs them straight to the bathroom and turns over the rusted deadbolt that never gets any use. Being locked in here with Moonjo should probably alarm Jongwoo. Yet, Jongwoo allows himself to be pulled towards the sad excuses for shower stalls. He lifts his arms so Moonjo can take off his sweater and t-shirt, and steps out of his jeans and underwear when Moonjo pulls them off.

The touches are firm and matter-of-fact. He looks over Jongwoo with a clinical thoroughness. The bruises and spots of broken skin on his cheeks and jaw, the ugly gouge across Jongwoo’s palm, the tender ache at Jongwoo’s ribs. He says nothing, only looking and listening until he’s satisfied.

“You won’t need stitches in your hand,” he says, the first words spoken since they entered the building. “I’ll clean and bandage it when we’re done here.”

And then he turns on the shower without a word of warning, making Jongwoo hiss as the lukewarm water practically burns his cold body.

“You’ll feel better once all the blood and dirt is gone,” Moonjo says, like Jongwoo needs showers explained to him.

And then the hands are back, still firm, but not unkind. They turn Jongwoo’s face beneath the spray, sending streams of pinkish water cascading down his body. Moonjo stands outside the spray, but his hair is still curling a bit with the humidity. The front of his shirt is soaked, blood- stained patches sticking to his skin in a muted watercolor bloom, but he doesn’t seem to mind as he holds Jongwoo steady and rinses the blood off of him.

They have no soap, no towels, no change of clothes. Moonjo doesn’t seem to be thinking entirely clearly, which is a little alarming on its own. He's rushing into things, chasing the opportunity to look after Jongwoo.

“We’re gonna get caught,” Jongwoo mutters, barely loud enough to be heard over the shower. “How have you never been caught?”

Moonjo tips Jongwoo’s head back, letting the spray soak into the short strands of hair. “You’re the author. I’m sure you could come up with some ideas.”

“I’m talking about reality,” Jongwoo says, “Not fiction.”

“Maybe I’m just lucky,” Moonjo says. “Or maybe, I’ve never really done anything wrong.”

It gets a bitter laugh out of Jongwoo. “I somehow doubt that.”

“It doesn’t matter either way,” Moonjo says. “The only thing that matters is that I’m here.”

“You being here is the problem,” Jongwoo points out.

“Ah,” Moonjo gently thumbs away the caked blood and dirt from Jongwoo’s palm, “Right. I forgot, everything you do is my fault.”

“It is,” Jongwoo insists. “It is.”

“This was always going to happen,” Moonjo says like an assurance. “If not here and now, then somewhere else. You’re lucky it happened when I’m by your side.”

Jongwoo blinks, and realizes he can’t see anything anymore. There’s too much water: pouring down over his head, welling up in his eyes. He’s nothing but water now, thinned-out and slipping away down the drain next to the thick and dirty blood. The only thing holding him together right now are Moonjo’s hands, touching him like Jongwoo is wet clay and Moonjo has all the power in the world to bend him into whatever shape he desires.

When the water turns off, Jongwoo feels like the exact same shape he was before.

Chapter Text

That freak from 313 is standing in front of Jongwoo’s door again.

The knife in his hand is so dirty that it doesn’t shine at all in the poor light of the hallway, and so dull that it hardly looks dangerous at all. He might as well be holding a letter opener for all the more intimidating he looks. For once, Jongwoo doesn’t feel afraid as he stares through the humid darkness. He just feels annoyed. A little disgusted, but that’s nothing new.

“Hey!” he calls, striding in and out of the blocks of blue and orange light streaming through each doorway. Everyone’s rooms are wide open, except for his. “I said, hey!”

He gives 313's shoulder a shove, feeling the tacky filth of his oily skin for only a second before the other man seems to vanish into the shadows like a ghost. Jongwoo stands there for a moment, arm outstretched, wondering if he was ever there in the first place.

He must have been: Jongwoo felt his skin.

He couldn’t have been: he vanished without a trace.

Something real and something imagined. Jongwoo struggles to get his memories in order, but everything is slipping away from him like the smoke between his fingers.

The smoke…

Jongwoo glances down and finds wisps of grey smoke curling up from beneath his door. Panic sets in immediately, but when he twists the doorknob, he finds it locked tight. The room is sealed, and the smoke is growing thicker around his ankles. He pats down his pockets and finds nothing, no wallet, no phone, no keys. So he pounds on the door, shouting for the other residents to come quick. Someone has to help him. Someone has to come.

No one arrives. The door doesn’t budge.

The only thing he can think to do is throw his shoulder against the flimsy wood. This entire place is practically made of cardboard, it shouldn’t be too hard. So he slams into it once, twice, thrice, and finally breaks the weak latch on the fourth attempt.

A plume of thick smoke meets him, making his eyes burn. When he waves it away, he sees the flames, of course – the pile of kindling in the center of his bed, his suitcase, his laptop, his clothes, his books. The fire is spreading up the walls, eating away at the cheap wood to expose the bones of Eden beneath, but that’s not what Jongwoo is focusing on.

There’s a man in the middle of the room. He’s sitting in the rickety desk chair, leaning back haphazardly on its hind legs as he watches the flames with a bored expression.

He’s wearing Jongwoo’s face.

“What?” Jongwoo stutters out, because that’s all he can even say in this situation.

The Jongwoo in front of the fire glances sideways at him.

“Don’t look at me like that,” he sneers. “What did you expect to happen?”

Jongwoo doesn’t know what he means. He doesn’t understand any of this. He stands there in the doorway, mouth gaping uselessly as the fire spreads, threatening to consume this other iteration of himself that doesn’t seem to feel the heat. Jongwoo watches the flames lick at his own feet from a few steps away and feels like his legs will give out.

“Get up!” Jongwoo demands, still too afraid to step past the doorway into the blazing room. “Get up, what are you doing?”

The other Jongwoo obeys, rising up and stepping straight through the fire. Jongwoo reaches out to grab him, ready to haul himself to safety and snuff out the embers burning on his clothing.

His doppelganger reaches out, meeting him halfway. A pair of scalding hands grip Jongwoo’s shoulders like they’re about to pull him into the room so they'll both burn up together, lost forever in the ash and filth of Eden's remains. But they don’t. Instead, those hands give him a shove.

Jongwoo stumbles backwards, straight into a pair of unseen arms as if these walls can reach out and embrace him. The grip is suffocating, Eden squeezing him so tightly that his lungs ache as if he swallowed down all the smoke in that room. He jerks and writhes, but this place won't let him go. He's helpless to do anything but watch the flames kiss the back of his neck in that burning room, right before the other Jongwoo slams the door shut.

That's the last thing he remembers before waking up.

As far as dreams go, he’s had worse. But he still comes back to himself feeling like a rabbit in a wolf den, shaking slightly with sweat beading at his temples. He’s uncomfortably warm, like he can still feel the stinging heat of the flames, but he knows that no fire is to blame for it.

No, he can thank the body behind him for that.

He sighs, and groans, and stretches as much as he can with someone’s arm clamped around him. There isn’t a doubt in his mind that it’s Moonjo behind him. Not like he has any other freaky stalkers that could get into his room. And the way he’s touching him, fingertips pressing into his sternum like they could sink into the bone and touch what’s hiding below, nobody else has ever touched Jongwoo like that.

Nobody else could.

Still, he has to ask, “Why are you in my bed?”

“You were making noises in your sleep,” Moonjo says. “I wanted to hear it better.”

Okay. That’s fine. That’s normal.

“The door should have been locked,” Jongwoo points out sleepily, face still half-shoved into his pillow. “This isn’t Eden. You don’t run the place.”

Moonjo stretches behind him a bit, shifting so he can nose under Jongwoo’s jaw. “There’s an extra set of spare keys hanging on the wall in the landlord’s office. I don’t think he ever uses them, so I helped myself to the one with your room number.”

All Jongwoo can say to that is a long-suffering, “Oh my god.”

Moonjo hums in agreement, dropping a kiss on the hinge of Jongwoo’s jaw. “These cheap residences aren’t very safe.”

Jongwoo hunches his shoulders and kicks blindly behind him at Moonjo’s ankles, missing entirely. “Stop smooching me.”

Moonjo acquiesces, dragging his lips away from Jongwoo’s skin so he can rest his brow against the curve of Jongwoo’s neck. Nuzzling, practically. Cuddling.

The arm at his chest trails lower, brushing the exposed skin of his stomach where his ratty black shirt has ridden up a little. He can imagine Moonjo lying like this for hours before he woke up, stroking the skin there softly, feeling the flatness, the emptiness of his stomach.

It’s embarrassing to think that Moonjo must know how hungry he is. But not half as embarrassing as the little wiggle accompanied by a little laugh that sneaks out of Jongwoo when Moonjo’s fingertips graze a ticklish spot.

There’s still an involuntary smile on his lips as his heart plummets and the reality of the situation sinks in: he’s giggling in bed with another man spooning him. Not just an ordinary man, a murderer that violated his privacy and dignity by coming in here. Jongwoo shoots upright, twisting around to glare down at Moonjo.

The sight of the other man stops him short. Gone is the dark long-sleeve shirt that Jongwoo has become so acquainted with. In its place is, you’ll never believe it, a grey long-sleeve shirt. Not very exciting, but he still looks… Wrong. No longer a shadow on the wall, he’s more like a square of bright light shining through the window.

Moonjo must recognize the discomfort on his face. “What’s the matter? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.

“Do you own that shirt in every color or something?”

Moonjo glances down at the henley stretching over his chest. “It’s comfortable.”

Jongwoo huffs and flops back down against the pillow. “Comfortable. I’ve never thought of you as someone who cares about your own comfort. Not when you lived in that place willingly.”

“What do you think of me?” Moonjo asks, shifting restlessly like he’s trying to prove that he’s a normal person who needs to rearrange themselves occasionally to stay comfortable. All he really accomplishes is moving closer to Jongwoo in the narrow bed.

“I think you’re my weird neighbor,” Jongwoo says flatly.

Moonjo waits one heartbeat, two heartbeats, three. “Anything else?”

Jongwoo rolls onto his back and stretches his arms and shoulders as much as he can when he’s stuck between the wall and Moonjo, groaning loudly enough to be heard through the walls. Moonjo sighs, seemingly realizing he’s being deliberately ignored. His revenge is a hand under Jongwoo’s shirt, touching his empty stomach, dragging his fingernails across the warm skin.

… Tickling him?

“Oh, no you don’t,” Jongwoo warns, curling up and reaching down to grab Moonjo’s wandering hand.

Bad move. He hisses abruptly when the simple motion of gripping Moonjo’s wrist sends searing pain shooting through his palm. He lets go quickly, flexing his fingers stiffly beneath the bandaging that weaves from his split knuckles all the way down to his wrist.

It bled through in the night, both around his knuckles and on his palm. The dotted patches of dark brown blood drying on the bandages make his stomach knot up.

“Let me see,” Moonjo says. It’s his handiwork after all, so Jongwoo acquiesces.

They remain lying down, shoulders pressed together, as Jongwoo holds his hand above them and Moonjo carefully unwinds the bandages. It’s best this way. The more wakeful he becomes, the more he remembers from last night. And the more he remembers, the more unsteady he feels. The world seems to shift below him in a dizzying sway as more skin is exposed. When the gauze and adhesive are finally gone, Moonjo leans away to throw them in the bin by Jongwoo’s bed.

Jongwoo flexes his palm, spreading his fingers open wide like he’s trying to tear the scab back open. He stares at it and sees a brick in his hand, grey clay spattered red. He closes his fist, and sees the smaller splits in his knuckles.

Some of those have already begun to bleed again, seeping slightly as the scabs crack.

“Open it,” Moonjo says, grabbing Jongwoo’s hand and folding his fingers back and away from the main attraction. “It’s too early to tell, but there’s no sign of infection yet.”

“But it’s so red at the edges,” Jongwoo points out, feeling a little queasy.

“It’s fresh,” Moonjo points out, ghosting over the wound with his thumb. “That’s to be expected.”

Holding their hands up like this makes Moonjo’s grey sleeve sag down his wrist a bit. On the back of the hand that’s doing most of the touching, Jongwoo catches sight of a familiar scar. One of the first things he ever noticed about Moonjo.

“Will it scar?” Jongwoo asks suddenly. “Like yours?”

Moonjo’s hand twitches, like he considers retracting it, but he holds still in the end. “Afraid you’ll carry it around forever?”

“Not afraid,” Jongwoo corrects him. “Just curious.” 

“It might,” Moonjo says.

“What’s this from, anyway?” Jongwoo asks, letting himself be bold enough to switch their positions a little. Instead of Moonjo examining Jongwoo’s hand, Jongwoo examines Moonjo’s, gripping his wrist gently to get a good look at the scar tissue peeking out from the sleeve like a snake in the grass.

Moonjo is silent for a moment. “I don’t know.”

Jongwoo can’t help but breathe out a sardonic laugh. “What do you mean, you don’t know?”

“I’m not trying to hide anything from you,” Moonjo assures him. “I just don’t remember.”

“That’s hard to believe,” Jongwoo says. “This thing isn't exactly small.”

“A lot of things have hurt me,” Moonjo explains. “Not all of them left scars. Most of them aren’t worth remembering.”

“Must be nice to just throw out the things you don’t want to remember,” Jongwoo mutters absently, well aware that it probably sounds rude and dismissive. His thumb is grazing the edge of the scar now, testing Moonjo’s reactions to having it touched. “I can hardly sleep at night without my brain dragging old shit up.”

Moonjo says nothing, apparently too transfixed by the sight of Jongwoo’s hands on him. Slowly, he extends his arm outward, tugging his sleeve to expose the full length of the scar.

It extends down most of his forearm, and the sight of it makes the wound on Jongwoo’s palm throb with something like empathy. He doesn’t know what drives him to line up the twin pieces of ruined flesh, pressing his fresh cut to Moonjo’s long-healed wound. But Moonjo doesn’t stop him. Not even as Jongwoo slowly drags his hand downward, like he’s trying to carve out the shape of Moonjo’s scar with nothing but the serrated edge of his own scab.

Moonjo stretches his arm out further, giving Jongwoo the room to move down the full length of his forearm. And once Jongwoo has reached the tail end of the long scar, he doesn’t know what to do for a second. So he digs his thumb nail into the bottom of the raised tissue, and almost makes an offer: Hand me a blade and I’ll cut it back open for you. And when you have a new scar, it’ll be something worth remembering.

“I need to go to the bathroom,” Jongwoo says suddenly, rising upright and crawling over Moonjo.

“No,” Moonjo swings his legs over the side of the bed and grabs Jongwoo around the waist, stopping him from taking another step, “Let me clean and rebandage it before I go to work.”

“I should use the bathroom first,” Jongwoo says, pushing gently at Moonjo’s shoulders. “So I can wash my hands.”

Moonjo looks up at him like he wants to argue, as if he won’t stand for five minutes of separation.

“I’ll be back,” Jongwoo promises, and feels ridiculous. Why does he need to offer up assurances to a man like this?

“I’ll be waiting,” Moonjo promises in return.

Just a few days ago, Jongwoo would have interpreted that as a threat. Now, he’s not sure what to make of it.

He walks into the bathroom and keeps his eyes downcast from the two other men in there, one washing his hands and the other shaving at the sink. It’s more of a relief than usual to find them gone and the room empty when he comes out of the stall. He needs a moment to be totally alone with his thoughts after last night.

In the mirror, he’s greeted with a sight that would make his mother cry. The bruising isn’t terrible, but it’s still there. Some swelling at the edge of his browbone, a dark smudge of broken blood vessels lining his jaw and reaching towards the corner of his mouth. He’s almost embarrassed by how small the cut over his eyebrow is – a tiny little nick amid the bruising, and it bled so freely that it nearly blinded him last night.

Anyone looking at him might feel a pang of sympathy. But to Jongwoo, it’s just more evidence in the pile that proves last night was real.

He did that.

He got into a fight that he should have run away from. Worse – he escalated it. He knocked one man out in a single blow and nearly beat another to death. And then Moonjo asked him a question framed in false hypotheticals, and Jongwoo answered with conscious sincerity.

“It was a dream,” Jongwoo tells his reflection. “It was just another one of those bad dreams. I didn’t let him do that. I didn’t.”

He half expects the faucet to run red with blood. 

“It was a dream.”

-

Cops don’t investigate dreams.

There’s a paper cup full of ice-cold water on the table in front of Jongwoo. The surface ripples slightly as the heavy door in the interrogation room swings shut. Jongwoo doesn’t flinch. He only nods politely when the officer apologizes for accidentally slamming the door.

“This substation is getting old,” she sighs, taking a seat opposite of him and setting a manila folder between them. “It’s so drafty any time we open the windows. Anyway, how are you doing, Yoon Jongwoo-ssi? Those bruises on your face look like they hurt. We have a certified physician on staff, if you want to have them take a look at you.”

“It’s fine,” Jongwoo answers. “I’m fine. What’s going on?”

The officer purses her lips and opens the folder. She looks familiar, but Jongwoo can’t put a name to her face. Too many nameless strangers have passed through his life since he arrived in Seoul. Cops, detectives, creeps, clients from his company, irritating shit-stirrers. She pulls out two photos and the men pictured are barely more familiar to him than she is right now.

“Do you recognize these men?”

Jongwoo nods. “Yeah, they... They mugged me last night. Am I in trouble for not reporting that?”

She shakes her head. “No, I just want to ask you some questions. We figured a mugging was possible, because a wallet with your identification was found in one of the assailant’s pockets. Do you mind telling me what happened?”

Jongwoo has heard that you should never talk to the cops, even if you’re innocent. They’ll find a way to twist your words into guilt no matter how good of a liar you are. But in his nervousness, he starts babbling anyway.

“They followed me after I left a bar around midnight.” 

Starting off strong.

“When there was no one else around, they dragged me behind this old building.”

Not a lie.

“They took my wallet and got mad because there was no cash in it. I paid a lot for drinks, and they thought I’d have more. But I didn’t. I even left my bank card back at the bar.”

Couldn’t be more honest.

“So they started arguing about my ID, and it got pretty physical.” 

Technically, it did.

“And then one of them hit the other with something.”

Yoon Jongwoo, was that a little white lie? 

“A rock or something.”

You know exactly what it was.

“And as soon as that happened, I ran. I didn’t care about my wallet anymore.”

You crawled around on your knees for it. 

“And after that?” the officer prods gently. 

“I just went home,” Jongwoo says.

“On foot?” the officer asks.

“The uh, the room I live in was just a few blocks away.”

The officer nods. “I see. And you had no intention of reporting anything?”

“No,” Jongwoo shakes his head. “I was tipsy. And scared. I didn’t get a good look at them. I – I’m not from the city. That’s never happened to me before, so…”

“I understand,” the officer assures him gently. “Just for confirmation, did you get into a physical altercation with the two men?”

Jongwoo swallows. “When they hit me, I swung back on instinct. That’s self defense, right? It was two against one, and I was freaking out. I thought they were gonna kill me.”

Self defense with a brick in your hand, hammering away even after the man below you has stopped moving. Right.

But the officer doesn’t press. “And you said they started to fight with each other over the contents of your wallet?”

Jongwoo nods, afraid to say anything else beyond, “Yeah.”

“Was there anyone else at the scene? Anyone who might have witnessed what happened after you left?”

“No.”

The lie comes frighteningly easy. 

“No, I didn’t see anyone else.”

“I see,” the officer nods. “An anonymous call was made from a payphone corroborating your story about the two men fighting, although the eyewitness made no mention of a third man or a mugging. If you want to file charges against the surviving assailant–”

Jongwoo can feel his mouth hanging open as he struggles to find the right words. “Surviving?”

She seems to relax a little at Jongwoo’s surprise. “One man was pronounced dead at the scene, unfortunately. The other is in critical condition with a pretty serious head wound.”

“It’s not my fault, is it?” Jongwoo asks, panic creeping up his spine. “I didn’t…”

“The call leads us to believe you left the scene before things escalated,” she assures him. “And the injuries… Don’t take this the wrong way, Yoon Jongwoo-ssi, but they were both large men. A man with your build, and in an intoxicated state… It’s doubtful that anything you did in self-defense contributed to the severity of their conditions.”

“Oh,” Jongwoo says. It can’t really be that simple, can it? “Well, I… I don’t want to press charges. I just want my ID back.”

She nods “Of course, we’ll process it and have it returned as soon as possible. But there is one more thing, if you don’t mind. The bruising on your face looks superficial, but what happened to your hand?”

Jongwoo glances down at the thick white bandaging that obscures his split knuckles. Moonjo changed it for him this morning before leaving for work. The blood hasn’t seeped through yet.

“There were some rocks or something at the spot where they mugged me,” Jongwoo says, turning his hand over in contemplation. “When they pushed me, I broke my fall on a sharp edge. My neighbor bandaged it for me as best he could when I got home last night.”

“I see,” she says, quietly analytical as she considers his answer. “You’re lucky to have such kind neighbors. But you might want to get that checked out by a doctor.”

Jongwoo doesn’t say anything. He just curls his fist closed and hides it back on his lap.

After the officer leaves, they hold him for another half hour. Each minute of it wears heavily on Jongwoo’s anxious mind. When an officer drops in to offer him coffee, he startles so hard that he smashes his knee on the underside of the table. Real smooth, Jongwoo. The picture of innocence. But eventually, someone shows up with his wallet and tells him he’s free to go.

He follows the officer through the white-walled hallways of the substation and into the bright light of the lobby, where his stomach promptly drops.

It would seem that he can’t go anywhere without his guardian angel lingering nearby these days.

Something about seeing Moonjo interact with ordinary people is irritating. The smile on his face is empty, the tone of his voice is fake, even the clothes he’s wearing feel like a costume. These people have no idea what he is. And they’ll probably never know, not like Jongwoo knows.

But unfortunately, Moonjo might be saving his ass right now, judging by the way the substation is all smiles with him around.

“Ah, Yoon Jongwoo-ssi,” the officer from the interrogation room smiles at him from behind her desk. “You didn’t mention that the neighbor who patched up your hand actually is a doctor.”

“I’ve only practiced dentistry professionally,” Moonjo says in faux- modesty, “But I think I did alright with Jongwoo-ssi’s hand.”

Jongwoo-ssi. Hearing that come out of Moonjo’s mouth nearly makes Jongwoo dry heave.

It takes Jongwoo a second to realize he should probably say something. He flexes his injured hand and mutters, “Uh, yeah. Good as new.”

“May I?” Moonjo asks, gesturing at Jongwoo’s hand.

Jongwoo feels a bit cornered here with the literal eyes of the law on him, so he tries to relax as he extends his hand towards Moonjo. Sweat is beading behind his burning ears as Moonjo handles him gently, fingertips stealing touches that would look clinical to anyone else. To Jongwoo, they feel almost invasive.

As if Moonjo intends to say – they can’t touch you, but I can.

The moment comes and goes in a matter of seconds, but Jongwoo feels like he’s sweating under a spotlight until Moonjo releases him and says, “Come see me after I get home from work and I’ll change the bandage for you.”

“You really are an angel on earth, Seo Moonjo-ssi,” one of the officers praises. “Looking after your neighbors and making less paperwork for us. If only everyone could be like you.”

Jongwoo blinks at the officer and tries to connect the dots in front of him. “Less paperwork?”

“He was able to verify the time and place he met you to patch up your hand,” the officer from the interrogation room chimes in. “It checks out that you would have fled the scene before the phone call was made. We shouldn’t have to contact you again unless there’s a significant upset in the case.”

Jongwoo wonders how significant of an upset there would need to be. Moonjo’s DNA on the dead man, perhaps? It would only take one strand of hair, one drop of saliva. But they have no reason to put him at the scene. Do they? Jongwoo’s head spins with the possibilities of what could go wrong, but Moonjo is unwavering beside him.

He breathes, and lets himself believe Moonjo has handled this.

The two of them leave together, one of the cops going as far as to hold the door open for Moonjo. As they step out, Jongwoo shoots one more glance back towards the officer from the interrogation room. 

She seems nice. Rational. Level-headed. For a second, their eyes meet, and Jongwoo considers rushing back in to spill everything. He’d tell her about the dead cats, the weird noises on the fourth floor, the gangster that went missing and the detective that failed to follow up with him, his suspicions about Moonjo and the fire, everything the two of them did last night…

He doesn't. The door swings shut, and he can no longer see her behind the reflection of himself and Moonjo standing out on the street together.

“Let’s go,” Moonjo beckons quietly, walking slowly down the street like he’s expecting Jongwoo to start following.

Jongwoo lingers for a moment, and then falls in step.

“It’s warmer than it was forecasted,” Moonjo muses. “I hope the weather stays nice into October.”

Jongwoo ignores him. “What the hell are you doing here?” 

“Picking you up from the police station.”

Smartass. “Okay, but why? How did you even know where I was?”

“Because I wanted to,” Moonjo says, like it's that simple. “I asked the other young man from 310 to keep an eye on you, because I figured you’d be taken in once they found your wallet. I just didn’t expect it to be so soon.”

“Seokyoon?” Jongwoo’s brows draw together. “Is he in on whatever crazy shit you get up to?”

Moonjo breathes a soft laugh. “No. He’s just too helpful for his own good.”

“Great,” Jongwoo sighs and mentally deletes Seokyoon from the rapidly shrinking list of people he can trust to confide in. That poor kid has zero self preservation skills. “That still doesn’t explain how you knew about my job last night. Got my boss on Kakao too?”

“No, I was just outside the office suite,” Moonjo says bluntly. “I found out where you work before Eden burned down. I thought I would finally make you aware of that and offer to walk you home yesterday, until your boss started yelling. Quite the ego on that one.”

He says it like that’s totally normal and not freaky stalker behavior at all. It makes Jongwoo feel vulnerable in a new way – how the hell can he defend himself against someone like this? His head hurts. “So, you follow me around and you just… Loiter? Linger?”

“Something like that,” Moonjo says. “I like to look out for you.”

“Look out for me,” Jongwoo restates in disbelief as he comes to a stop in the middle of the sidewalk, “By stalking me around town? By refusing to give me a single moment of peace?”

Moonjo stops a few paces ahead and glances back at him. He looks wrong like this, dressed in muted airy tones with his hair combed neatly and a pair of eyeglasses in his jacket pocket. Like some sort of skinwalker. When he shuffles back and puts his hands on Jongwoo’s arms, Jongwoo nearly shoves him away and starts a fight over it.

It’s a good thing he doesn’t, though, because Moonjo just scoots him to the side as a young man awkwardly shuffles around them.

“You were blocking the sidewalk,” he states blandly.

“Stop trying to insert yourself into my life where you don't belong, or I'll go running back to the cops over it,” Jongwoo threatens, dropping his voice to a whispering hiss. “If you weren’t there last night, I wouldn’t have even been dragged to the police station today.”

“If I wasn’t there last night,” Moonjo points out, “That man probably would have died regardless, covered in your DNA, looking to the rest of the world like your victim.”

Jongwoo wants to argue, if only for the sake of arguing. But he knows that Moonjo is right – that Moonjo’s presence wouldn’t have changed the beatdown or Jongwoo’s loss of control. That part wasn’t Moonjo. That part he did all by himself.

“That’s all taken care of now, though,” Moonjo points out, finally moving his hands off of Jongwoo's shoulder to adjust Jongwoo’s collar instead. “As long as I’m around, you don’t have to worry about anything.”

Except for the crushing psychological weight of being an unpunished accomplice to murder, apparently.

“So maybe hold off on getting into any more trouble for the next few hours,” Moonjo suggests helpfully. “This is my break, I still have half a day of work left.”

On a normal day, the domestic mundanity of that statement coming out of the mouth of someone who is now solidly confirmed to be a killer might have sent Jongwoo reeling. Today is not normal. Jongwoo is pretty sure he’s out of normal days for the rest of his life.

So instead, he says, “Yeah, rub it in. At least one of us can juggle extracurriculars and a job.”

Moonjo smiles at the bitterness in his voice. “Look on the bright side - you have plenty of free time to work on your novel now.”

Jongwoo glares at Moonjo. “Go back to work.” 

“Mhm, see you later,” Moonjo says, “Jongwoo-ssi.”

The hairs on the back of Jongwoo’s neck stand up at the sound of his name in that voice – completely different from how he said it back in the police station. The honorific frames it in politeness that stands in contrast with the gentle tone. Jagiya. Jongwoo-ssi. Two words, three syllables each, and Moonjo may as well have reshaped them on his tongue into a singular expression. Jongwoo can’t help but wonder if this means he’s graduated from being a pet project with a pet name, or if it’s some more of this bastard’s goofy mind games.

“Maybe you will and maybe you won’t,” he calls out to Moonjo’s retreating back, “Ahjussi.”

-

Under no circumstances will Jongwoo ever let Moonjo find out that he takes his advice and spends the afternoon working on his novel.

He has to swing by the residence to grab his laptop and backpack. And then there’s a trip to the bar from last night to sheepishly ask if they still have his bank card sitting around. It’s a small mercy that the same bartender isn’t working, and nobody says anything to him beyond asking to check his ID to cross-reference the names on the cards.

The rest of the afternoon is spent in a small café, putting iced americanos and sandwiches shaped like cats and too-sweet desserts on his card with no care towards the dwindling digits in his bank account. This probably counts as self-destructive behavior on some level, but fuck it.

He really does not care anymore.

It’s a productive afternoon, at least. Not even the stiffness in his hand from the bandaging slows his fingers from filling pages and pages of progress.

The task bar is a mess of documents and his internet browser has so many tabs open that the text has completely disappeared, leaving him with a solid row of favicons stretching across the screen. One of his split knuckles bleeds through the thin bandaging. He doesn’t even notice until a little girl from the table next to his points it out, asking if she needs him to give him a new band-aid.

All he can do is smile, and assure her that he’s fine, it’s just a little boo-boo. He ignores the disparaging glance her father gives him as he turns his daughter's attention away from Jongwoo.

It’s the only hiccup in an otherwise suspiciously pleasant day, until his phone starts chiming on the table with an incoming call.

Jieun.

His heart rate spikes, but he can’t bring himself to answer it. Shame, embarrassment, fear, call it what you want. If he hears her voice right now, it just might break him. So he stares down at the phone like a coward in hiding until the jingle stops. The screen pings with a missed call, and then a text.

Jaeho-oppa said you got suspended. I hope you’re doing okay. I told him he’s being too harsh.

Jongwoo stares down at the message and manages a small smile. She defended him, actually defended him. She’s on his side this time. It makes him giddy with a strange sort of relief, until another message comes through –

If you apologize, he’ll probably go easy on you and let you work.

Instantly, Jongwoo bristles. He texts her back before he can think better of his words.

He should be the one apologizing.

The phone remains silent for a long time, but his concentration is shattered. Jongwoo won’t grovel for the right to earn poverty wages. And the next message from Jieun just frustrates him even more.

Suspending you for being late is an overreaction, but bosses out here have to be strict to keep people in line. He’s kind of stressed lately and probably looking for someone to take it out on.

He’s –

He’s probably –

She thinks motherfucking Jaeho is stressed lately?

Jongwoo can’t even be relieved that she seems ignorant to the misplaced accusations about pestering Yoojung, not when he’s being told that Jaeho having a bad day is apparently grounds for adding punching bag to Jongwoo’s job description.

Another text comes through: He’s still your friend. Just talk it out with him. Maybe it’s a misunderstanding.

With his mood soured, Jongwoo slaps his laptop closed and shoves all his stuff in his backpack. He throws his trash away on his way out, and then pulls his phone back out to send her one last text –

He understands exactly what he’s doing.

– before shoving his silenced phone into his hoodie pocket and stepping outside.

-

The days are getting shorter, and the sun is already setting in the late afternoon. Jongwoo didn’t realize how long he spent in that café. It felt good to get so much work done. He makes his way through the thickening Friday evening crowds, feeling lighter than usual even as his phone seems to settle in his pocket with the weight of a brick.

Maybe it’s immature to block everyone out like that, but he’s not in the mood to talk in circles right now. Besides, he’s not sure if he trusts himself to keep from saying something he'll regret later.

It’s with no small amount of annoyance that Jongwoo accepts that there’s only one person he can talk to right now who wouldn't act like he's an oversensitive idiot. And that person just so happens to be right outside of the goshiwon when he arrives, sitting on the steps in his familiar all-black ensemble with a cigarette dangling from his fingers. He’s staring down at his phone, hair hanging over his face, and Jongwoo wonders who he could be texting.

“You’re smoking too close to the building,” Jongwoo scolds, speeding his steps up. “Pass that here, I need a drag.”

Moonjo doesn’t lift his head. Because, as Jongwoo quickly realizes, this guy isn’t Moonjo. The face that glances up at him is gaunt and frowning beneath the scruff of a mustache. His hair is a bit greasy, falling over his face in thin strands. The shoulders beneath the black shirt are narrow. Upon closer inspection, it’s not even the right kind of shirt, it’s a scruffy button-down.

Jongwoo gapes in surprise. How the hell did he mistake this guy for Moonjo?

“Uhhh,” the man looks down at the cigarette between his fingers before holding it out, “Sure, man.”

Jongwoo waves the other man off awkwardly. “Sorry! I thought you were someone else!”

He bows apologetically, skittering past the stranger and into the building with burning ears. Footsteps echo through the stairwell as he takes them two at a time, feeling like he’s running away from something. The embarrassment of an awkward social interaction, or maybe the mortifying disappointment that it wasn’t Moonjo waiting for him.

This is getting ridiculous. He needs to make some more friends. Someone, perhaps, like Kang Seokyoon.

The voices probably would have caught Jongwoo’s attention much earlier if he wasn’t so stuck in his own head. All that penetrates his ears over the sound of his own footsteps is ambiguous laughter ricocheting down the stairwell. It’s practically right on top of him as he bounds a little too fast up the stairs, and his phone bounces right out of his hoodie pocket on one overzealous step.

“Hyung!” Seokyoon calls out in warning, as if Jongwoo can’t hear the horrible sound of his phone clattering back down the steps. He whips back around to look at it just on time to watch it skitter onto the landing below, spinning across the floor like a frisbee before coming to an abrupt stop against the wall.

Seokyoon hisses and rushes down the stairs while Jongwoo stares at his phone on the landing in defeat and thinks, at least I might have an excuse to ignore my messages now.

“Oh, goodness,” a voice comes from above, “That’s a shame.”

Jongwoo glances back up the stairs to find Moonjo standing on the landing above him, staring at him with his head cocked to the side. All black from head to toe, like a walking mockery of the mistake Jongwoo made just barely a minute ago.

Seokyoon. Moonjo. Seokyoon laughing with Moonjo. The two of them, alone in a stairwell. Jongwoo fights the urge to snap at them – what the hell is so funny, huh?

But he bites his tongue just as Seokyoon passes his phone back to him from his position on the lower steps.

“Thanks,” he says, snatching it back and hiding the screen against his chest like Jieun’s exasperated texts will spill out across the floor if he doesn’t. “What are you guys up to?”

“I was hanging out on the roof when Moonjo-hyung came up,” Seokyoon explains.

Jongwoo looks away from Seokyoon to glare up at Moonjo. The roof, huh? Moonjo sure likes the roof.

“But it’s getting dark, so we came back down,” Seokyoon finishes.

“Don’t you have a shift tonight?” Jongwoo asks Seokyoon.

“Nope,” Seokyoon says. “I was going to stay in and work on my mixtape, but we could get dinner if you wanted to.”

Jongwoo tries not to grimace at the mention of Seokyoon’s mixtape. “Maybe later, I need to talk to him first.”

He nods up at Moonjo, who simply raises his brows over the flat look in his eyes. “You do?”

Jongwoo nods, and treks up to the landing that Moonjo is standing on. “Yeah, come on. See you later, Seokyoon-ssi.”

“Uh, see you later!” Seokyoon calls out. “Let me know if you guys want to get something to eat!”

The Jongwoo from a few weeks ago would have slapped him if he could see himself now: walking away from Seokyoon, the one bastion of normalcy and sanity in his insane abnormal life, while Moonjo trails along behind him like there’s an invisible leash around his throat that Jongwoo is tugging on. He tells himself that he’s keeping Seokyoon safe by making sure Moonjo’s attention is on him rather than the younger man. Seokyoon doesn’t know what Moonjo is capable of.

But you don't know that for sure, some insidious thing in Jongwoo’s head whispers. You’re not special. Moonjo talks to him when you're away. He probably treats him just like he treats you.

The heavy door to the roof sounds like a canon going off as Jongwoo throws it open in a huff. He hopes that it swings back and hits Moonjo. But even if it does, the other man doesn’t seem too bothered.

“I should thank you for rescuing me,” Moonjo says. “He was telling me I have the vibe of an artist. He threatened to show me his music.”

“Is that where you were going?” Jongwoo asks, accusatory. “Were you going to cozy up in front of his laptop and tell him all about how his songs would be great if he just added a few more lyrics about, I don’t know, throat muscles or something?”

Moonjo looks infuriatingly endeared. “Oh, honey, you’ve got a lot on your mind tonight. Did you have a bad day after I left earlier?”

Jongwoo glances down at his phone, and the newly-formed bullet hole shaped crack in the corner of it, and sighs. “All I have anymore are bad days.”

Moonjo sways closer to him like a looming shadow and hums in sympathy. “Then tell me what I can do to make it better.”

His voice is low and soft in a way that makes Jongwoo's gut clench involuntarily. “Don’t.”

“Don’t what?” Moonjo asks.

“Don’t be so…” Jongwoo glances down the length of his body, “Don’t be so easy.”

“I’m not in the habit of denying myself what I want,” Moonjo says. 

“And what exactly do you want from Seokyoon?”

Moonjo stares flatly at him. “I think we’ve talked about him enough.”

“You had no problem talking to him earlier,” Jongwoo sneers. “Were you following him down to his bedroom when I got home?”

Some of the annoyance on Moonjo’s face gives way to amusement. “I can see why you like writing fiction. That’s an interesting story you’ve made up about us in your head.”

“Don’t patronize me,” Jongwoo says. “Just leave him alone. He doesn’t need you driving him insane like you do with me.”

Unfortunately, the warning just makes Moonjo smile. “He really liked the meat I brought.”

“Huh?” Jongwoo asks, eyes wide.

“When I first arrived from Eden,” Moonjo explains. “He ate a lot of it. You didn’t have any of it, did you?”

Jongwoo’s chest burns uncomfortably. “I wouldn’t touch that garbage.”

“He’s also very honest,” Moonjo ignores Jongwoo, glancing away from him to look out over the skyline. Jongwoo wants to grab his face and force him to return his attention where it belongs. “He speaks his mind, even when it might be better to keep his mouth shut. That kind of honesty can be refreshing. Right, jagi?”

He finally turns to look back at Jongwoo, piercing him through with an unblinking stare, daring him to react.

“He’s a good kid,” Jongwoo says, trying to keep a level head. “Leave him alone.”

“Oh, I see,” Moonjo says, leaning down against the rooftop railing so his eyes are level with Jongwoo’s. “He’s a good kid. I’m a bad man.”

“Exactly,” Jongwoo says.

“Then you’ll be relieved to know,” Moonjo says, eyes flitting down to the bandaged hand still clutching Jongwoo’s phone, “That's exactly why I don’t care about him.”

Jongwoo turns away from Moonjo, tugging his hoodie sleeve down to cover his knuckles. “I’ll believe it when you leave him the hell alone.”

“Fine by me,” Moonjo says, crowding back into Jongwoo’s space. “But you’ve got to do something for me in return.”

Before Jongwoo can tell him to shove his bartering attempts up his ass, the phone in his hand vibrates, illuminating the lower half of Moonjo’s face in the light of his lock screen.

A text from Jieun – Stuck in the office for a while longer. Our company has a huge problem to take care of here. But we should meet up tonight.

“Oh,” Moonjo sighs, craning his neck a little to read it clearly. “Speak of the devil.”

“Just shut up for a minute,” he snaps, trying to turn away from Moonjo for a bit of privacy.

Moonjo, however, is 184 centimeters of indifference. He stands behind Jongwoo and peers over his shoulder, tutting softly at the messages on screen as Jongwoo writes and deletes a reply three times.

“Does she know you were suspended for sexual harassment?” he asks.

Jongwoo throws an elbow backwards at him. “Eavesdrop better next time, stupid. I was suspended for being late, he just used that as an excuse to make me feel like shit about something I didn’t do.”

“I know you didn’t do it,” Moonjo says. “But would she take your side? Your boss seemed pretty emphatic.”

“Of course she would,” Jongwoo says.

Saying it and believing it are two different things. He wants to think she trusts him, understands him, knows him well enough that it should be beyond the realm of possibility to her that he would turn his eyes towards the only woman in the office. But maybe she would be right to doubt him. He may not have harassed anyone, but there’s proof of his disloyalty to her in the warm body standing right behind him.

“A misunderstanding,” Moonjo muses aloud as he reads over Jongwoo’s shoulder. “You and her should have plenty of practice talking about misunderstandings.”

Jongwoo draws in an annoyed breath through his nose and turns to look fully at Moonjo. “The riddles are getting old. Say what you mean.”

Moonjo frowns at Jongwoo in faux-innocence. “Surely you’ve talked about that time another man dropped her off at her apartment late at night. You looked ready to kill someone.”

Jongwoo blanches. It’s been over a month since that happened, and Jongwoo hasn’t said a word about it to anyone. Not Jieun, not Jaeho, and definitely not Moonjo.

“Speaking of,” Moonjo clasps his hands behind his back and rocks on his heels as he pretends to think deeply about it, “I swear I’ve heard that man’s voice somewhere recently.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” Jongwoo fumes, “Maybe when you were stalking me at my job yesterday?”

Moonjo smiles, looking smug. “So it was your boss. Your girlfriend was getting out of your boss’s car that night. That’s interesting.”

Jongwoo takes a deep breath. “And how the hell do you know that?” 

“Because I was watching you that night, too.”

“Oh, god,” Jongwoo presses his fingertips to his temples and groans to himself, “He’s not even pretending to hide it anymore.”

“I haven’t been for a while,” Moonjo says, as if that’s supposed to be a consolation. “Besides, given the subject at hand, I figured you’d appreciate the honesty.”

“I don’t appreciate anything about you,” Jongwoo gripes.

“Really?” Moonjo asks, grabbing Jongwoo’s bandaged hand and gently touching the wound on his palm. “Nothing at all?”

Jongwoo jerks his hand back. “You’ve done nothing but make my life hell.”

“I can’t take all the credit,” Moonjo says. “Your boss is doing most of the work for me lately.”

“Don’t say it like that,” Jongwoo groans. “The last thing I want to think about is you two in cahoots.”

“Our methods are different,” Moonjo says, “But I’m starting to get the impression that he’s trying to drive a wedge between you and your girlfriend."

“No shit he is,” Jongwoo bites out. “You think I’m an idiot? Everyone in the office has to know by now.”

“Do you think she knows?” Moonjo asks.

Jongwoo exhales slowly. “She’s not an idiot either.”

“Well,” Moonjo braces a hand on the railing behind Jongwoo and moves steps closer, making Jongwoo shuffle back and glance away, “She seems like a nice girl, all things considered. It might be best to break things off now, before she does something worth feeling guilty over.”

He punctuates the world’s most irritating mockery of concern by tipping Jongwoo’s chin back towards him with gentle fingertips, bringing them nearly nose to nose.

“You’re such an asshole,” Jongwoo mutters, clutching his phone to his chest like a lifeline.

“I think I’m being very considerate,” Moonjo says. “This way, we can avoid as many broken hearts as possible.”

Jongwoo tips his chin up, stretching his neck just a little bit. “That’s rich, coming from a heartless bastard like you.”

“If I'm lacking in anything,” Moonjo says, ghosting his thumb along the bruise on Jongwoo's jaw, “I can assure you, it’s not my heart.”

Jongwoo opens his mouth, ready to spit more poison. But before he can say a word, his phone starts vibrating between them.

“Shit,” Jongwoo mutters, fumbling with it so he can look at the name through the cracked screen. “She’s calling.”

He feels feverish here, with Moonjo’s body blocking the tepid wind of a September evening. He swears there's sweat beading at his temples as he stares down at the phone, feeling like he’s already been caught somehow.

“Well,” Moonjo says, ducking in so close that his nose brushes Jongwoo’s cheek as he says, “It's rude to keep her waiting. Answer it.”

Jongwoo turns his head towards Moonjo, heart pounding behind his ribcage, and obeys.

“Jieun-ah,” he whispers in greeting. His lips brush Moonjo’s as they form the syllables. He’s using her name to kiss him.

Moonjo smiles. Jongwoo can see it in the way his eyes curve. 

“Oppa?” Jieun asks across the line. “Are you there?”

Jongwoo clears his throat and nudges Moonjo back so he can speak more loudly. “I’m here.”

“Hey, did you see my text?” Jieun asks, sounding distracted.

She’s not the only one. Jongwoo bites off a gasp when Moonjo ducks down low and kisses his neck, just under the hinge of his jaw. “Yeah.”

“We have a program that might get canceled,” she says. “It’s seriously a mess. I’ll probably be stuck here for another hour or so, but we should meet up tonight some time.”

Jongwoo swallows, and hunches his shoulders, and puts his free hand on Moonjo’s chest to grip the thin fabric of his shirt. “Why not tomorrow? Since it’s getting late.”

“I’m expected to come back tomorrow,” she says with a sigh. “And I have no idea how long that’ll take. Seriously, oppa, this is – oh, hold on.”

Her voice grows muffled, like she’s just tucked the phone against her shoulder to talk to someone else. It’s the perfect window of opportunity to tell Moonjo off without her hearing anything suspicious. He doesn’t do that, not with Moonjo kissing his neck and touching his waist right beneath the dull sunset like they're stuck repeating stupid mistakes over and over every time they step out onto a rooftop.

Instead, he trails his hand upward over Moonjo's chest, touching the other man's throat on his path to grip Moonjo's chin. He drags Moonjo's face away from his neck far enough to kiss him on the mouth once, just once, before Jieun’s voice returns.

“Make that an hour and a half,” she sighs in his ear.

Moonjo dips in for another kiss, but Jongwoo blocks it with a hand over his mouth.

“At least the fact that I’m not salaried means I’m getting overtime.”

Jongwoo jabs a finger in Moonjo’s face and then draws the finger across his own throat in warning.

“I’d lose it if I wasn’t getting paid enough to… Ugh, forget it.” 

The gesture makes Moonjo bite his lip and smile wide. 

“Oppa? Are you still there?”

“Yeah,” Jongwoo says, trying to make his voice sound normal. 

“So, can we meet?” Jieun asks. “To talk about the Jaeho situation.”

The Jaeho situation. Not the job situation. Not the wrongful suspension situation. The world truly does revolve around Shin Jaeho.

“Yeah,” Jongwoo breathes again.

He leans back back over the railing when Moonjo leans forward with unmistakable intent again. A hand braces behind his shoulder blades, holding him steady and keeping him safe while Moonjo teases his lips along Jongwoo’s jaw.

“Yeah,” Jongwoo repeats a third time. “Tonight works. I… Have some things to tell you.”

“Great,” Jieun says, in a tone that doesn’t match the word at all. “I’ll text you when I’m about to leave so we can figure out where to meet.”

“Okay,” fingers curl around Jongwoo’s wrist, teasing at the edge of the bandages like Moonjo is going to yank the phone away if this call takes much longer. “See you later.”

“Goodbye.”

The second the line goes dead, Jongwoo shoves Moonjo away hard enough to make him stumble.

“Goodness, you are inconsiderate,” he scolds, frowning down at his phone to make sure the call has truly ended. “You’re like a cat that gets pushy when it doesn’t get attention.”

“So, you’re meeting with your girlfriend tonight,” Moonjo says, rebounding like a boomerang. “That’s nice.”

“Yeah, nice,” Jongwoo says, yanking a bit on the collar of his hoodie. It’s too warm to be wearing it this evening. “I can’t wait to tell her I’m a piece of shit who betrayed her trust and ruined our chance at a future together.”

“It’s good to cut things like this off cleanly so that nobody has any regrets,” Moonjo says in his infinite wisdom.

“Have a lot of experience ending relationships?” Jongwoo asks, half- rhetorically.

“Not usually my own,” Moonjo says. Something shifts in his face, turning his features icy – “I only did that once.”

A shiver zips down Jongwoo’s spine. “Yeah, well. If you’ll excuse me, I have to go mentally prepare to end mine.”

Moonjo stops him with a hand on his shoulder before he has the chance to take more than a few steps. “And leave me all alone tonight?”

Jongwoo’s lip curls as he glances down Moonjo’s body. “What, do you expect me to bring you along as a plus one?”

“I’m just surprised,” Moonjo says, “That after our conversation from earlier, you’d be fine leaving me here with no one but the young man from next door for company.”

Jongwoo sets his jaw and glares straight at the small smile curling at the corners of Moonjo’s mouth. He’s well aware that he’s being played right now.

“Don’t even think about it,” Jongwoo warns. “He’s off limits. In every way you can think of.”

“I won’t hurt him,” Moonjo promises. “I won’t talk to him. I won’t even think about him.”

“Good,” Jongwoo says, shrugging the hand off his shoulder just to annoy Moonjo.

“If,” Moonjo adds, leaning closer as he lays out his stipulation, “You let me make a statement.”

“A statement?” Jongwoo raises an eyebrow. 

“So that something becomes very clear to him.”

And that involves doing something Jongwoo should never in his right mind agree to.

He does it anyway.

The sun is setting, and the clock is counting down. They have time, but not an eternity, as Moonjo slips his key into the lock and Jongwoo sweats next to him. A stone’s throw away from them, through a few flimsy layers of drywall and insulation, Kang Seokyoon can be heard clearing his throat. If you strain your ears, you might even hear him muttering nonsense to an unheard melody.

The doorknob squeals when Moonjo turns it. Jongwoo’s throat itches.

“After you,” Moonjo says with a smug slant to his lips, gesturing for Jongwoo to enter first.

Jongwoo just gives him an unimpressed look before gripping the back of his collar and shoving him into the room.

Moonjo stumbles over his own feet a bit, letting the momentum carry him all the way across the short room to brace his hands on the desk. Jongwoo slams the door behind him as he storms in after Moonjo, squinting through the too-bright fluorescent glow of the light above them. He yanks Moonjo’s shoulder to spin the other man around, only to be met with a wide smile.

There are no shadows to hide behind here, no plausible deniability in the creeping darkness. There’s only Jongwoo’s body pressing up against Moonjo’s, pushing him into the hard edge of the desk as he stretches up to kiss the annoying grin off his mouth.

Guilt, shame, vindication – Jongwoo isn’t sure what he’s supposed to be feeling right now. This was Moonjo’s ultimatum. Make it dirty, make it loud. Make it clear to Seokyoon and anyone else on this floor what they’re doing.

Still, Jongwoo flushes at the first broken noise that slips past Moonjo’s lips and tumbles straight into Jongwoo’s mouth. He swallows it down on a shameful little gasp and says, “Make it quick.”

“Don’t worry,” Moonjo cups his face and nudges their foreheads together gently, “I wouldn’t want you to miss your appointment.”

Appointment, he says. Like it’s some routine clinical errand to fix something. Jongwoo doesn’t say anything about that, because he’s learned by now that Moonjo has far too much fun breaking all his words down and delivering them back to him all wrong.

No, Moonjo needs actions to render him docile and manageable. The hand that snakes between their bodies to squeeze his cock a little harder than necessary does the job pretty well. The way Jongwoo grips his chin and jerks his head to the side to sink his teeth into the tender skin of his neck helps, too.

Moonjo’s answering grunt sounds as animalistic as Jongwoo feels.

“Take this off,” Moonjo breathes, pushing his hands up under Jongwoo’s hoodie. “Honey, you’re burning up.”

Jongwoo leans back to peel his sweater and shirt off in one go, throwing them backwards onto Moonjo’s neatly-made bed. This entire room feels fake, like it was dressed up by the realtor to take photos. There’s no signs of life in here, not until Jongwoo dirties the place up a little while Moonjo drags mean fingernails down the exposed skin of his chest.

Jongwoo has almost forgotten the point of all this when his ears pick up a noise from next door. A chair groaning under someone’s shifting weight, or maybe an old spot on the floor creaking like an alarm bell.

“Sounds like our Seokyoon-ah is home,” Moonjo whispers, like he’s sharing a secret. He raises his eyebrows as he taunts, “Last chance to cling to your prized decency.”

“Don’t call him that,” Jongwoo warns loudly enough to be heard through the thin walls.

In case his words were ignored, Jongwoo punctuates them by grabbing Moonjo by the collar and dragging him away from the desk and over to the wall he shares with Seokyoon, shoving him against it hard enough that Moonjo grunts from the impact.

“Oh, be careful,” Moonjo smiles down at him, looking a little dazed, “These walls are flimsy, I don’t think they can take much abuse.”

“Then hold still,” Jongwoo says, “And let me get this over with.”

Moonjo has a soft mouth for such a horrible bastard, and it makes the kind of noises that have Jongwoo’s gut twisting. They rumble up from his chest and taste like the bad ideas Jongwoo has been fighting against since day one in Seoul. He holds nothing back as Jongwoo yanks his pants down just enough to stroke him off with a spit-slicked palm. It’s embarrassing, having such shameless noises kissed into his skin from nothing but a rough handjob from a guy with no experience doing this to someone else.

But it’s honest. If nothing else, Moonjo doesn’t sound like he’s playing up his own pleasure for the sake of their stupid little performance. He shakes and shudders and sighs and gasps with every one of Jongwoo’s crude touches. His unbandaged palm, his biting mouth – Moonjo lets all of them wash over him like a baptismal rain, until his own fingers finally trail far enough down naked skin to dip beneath Jongwoo’s waistband.

The noise Jongwoo makes at the first brush of knuckles beneath his belly button might not be as loud as Moonjo’s, but it makes him flush all the same.

“You don’t have to,” Jongwoo insists, feeling weak as he does nothing to stop Moonjo from yanking his pants open.

“But we have to take care of this before you leave,” Moonjo reasons, covering the length of it with his broad hand.

Jongwoo rubs his knees together. He’s running out of biting comebacks, mouth hanging open stupidly where words fail him.

“So hard for me, Jongwoo-ssi,” Moonjo says, pulling Jongwoo’s cock out and wrapping those now-familiar fingers around him tight.

“Shut up, shut up,” Jongwoo hisses, flushing so hard he feels dizzy. "Don't say that."

“Can’t have him thinking just anyone is in here with me,” Moonjo whispers against Jongwoo’s temple as he jerks him hard and dry. “That would defeat the whole purpose of staking your claim.”

“You’re enjoying this way too much,” Jongwoo pants.

“There’s nothing I’ve ever enjoyed more,” Moonjo says, “Then feeling you burn for me.”

Jongwoo rolls his eyes. “Burning is one word for it, you asshole. Make it wetter, come on…”

Moonjo swipes his thumb across the tip, and for a second, Jongwoo thinks that’s all he’s going to get. But then Moonjo lifts his hand, holding it open between them, and Jongwoo just stares at it in a crosseyed daze for a second before he realizes what’s being asked of him.

“Dirty old bastard,” he grumbles, spitting in Moonjo’s hand.

It feels better this way, but it’s also louder. Ragged breathing and bitten-off grunts, the wet sound of two hands making shameless work of each other, never mind Jongwoo’s heart thudding like those horrible noises from the fourth floor of Eden. He feels like someone will pound on the door any second now to tell them to keep it down. If he was more confrontational, it could even be Seokyoon.

Jongwoo buries his face in Moonjo’s shoulders, pressing his forehead to the wall. He has Moonjo caged in like this, held at Jongwoo’s mercy as they both try to move in the tight space between their bodies. With his forehead pressed to the wall, Jongwoo can feel it as much as hear it when Seokyoon rises up from his desk and pads softly across the room, like he’s trying hard to be quiet.

He can hear it, he can hear it, he has to be able to hear –

The cocktail of pleasure, fear, and shame kicks through Jongwoo so swiftly that a grunt is knocked out of him before he can stop it. He bites down on Moonjo’s shoulder hard enough to make his mouth ache, passing off the duty of making those sweet pained noises to Moonjo just as Seokyoon’s bedroom door opens and closes with an incriminating whine of the hinges. Moonjo is muttering something in his ear, some half-intelligible litany of praise and possessiveness, but Jongwoo can hardly hear it.

He finally loses his jaw, swallowing around the dry taste of cotton as he ruts his hips harder into Moonjo’s hand.

“Do you think he heard?” he whispers into the side of Moonjo’s neck, like nothing matters more than being quiet now. “Did he hear–”

Did he hear that he can’t ever have you now?

“He heard you,” Moonjo says. “And it’s the closest he’ll ever get to having you.”

Jongwoo’s heart is lodged in his throat. He gasps like it hurts him and rolls his hips forward harder, harder, harder, begging with his body for what his mouth is afraid to say. Seokyoon is long gone, but that doesn’t matter. This isn’t about him anymore. Maybe, it never was.

It’s about Moonjo’s hand at his nape, fingers curling in the short strands of hair until they’re finished, and staying there long after while they breathe against each other. Like he doesn’t want Jongwoo to slip away from him too soon, like he wants to keep him here.

He wants to keep him.

It’s the kind of cloying attention that should irritate Jongwoo. He’s not some thing for Moonjo to count among his possessions, like a pet that he can train to sneer and spit and bleed on command. But Jongwoo doesn’t say a word about it. He just leans against Moonjo’s body, caging him in against the wall, until the dull sound of his phone vibrating from inside the folds of his hoodie brings him back to reality.

“You don’t want to keep her waiting,” Moonjo says. 

At this point, Jongwoo has no idea what he wants.

-

He pulls his shirt and hoodie back on. Changes his underwear and jeans. Washes his hand no less than three times. Brushes his teeth. He does all of this alone, and then leaves alone.

On the way out, he stumbles across Seokyoon in the common area of the kitchen. He has his headphones on and his laptop open, and Jongwoo thinks he might get lucky and sneak past without the other man noticing him.

He doesn’t. Seokyoon does a double take as Jongwoo tries passing through the room, tugging his headphones down to his neck when he realizes who it is.

“Ah, hyung!” His smile is plastered on at an awkward angle. “Still, uh, in the mood for dinner?”

“I can’t,” Jongwoo says. “I have to go break up with my girlfriend.” 

Seokyoon’s smile turns into a grimace. “Oh. Sorry to hear that.”

“It’s fine,” Jongwoo says, and surprisingly, it doesn’t feel like a lie. “But… Seokyoon-ah?”

“Yeah?”

“Don’t talk to the ahjussi who lives between us anymore,” Jongwoo says. “In fact, you should probably move out as soon as you can.”

Seokyoon blinks owlishly at him. “Is something wrong?”

Jongwoo finally smiles. “No. These residences just aren’t very good to live in. See you later.”

“Yeah,” Seokyoon nods, looking even more confused. “Good luck.” 

He might need it.

It’s half past eight by the time Jongwoo finds himself sitting at a table meant for two, drumming his fingers restlessly against the side of a cardboard coffee cup. It’s the same café from earlier. Same table. Same seat. The café closes at nine o’clock, and he intends to be out of here by then. He just has to do this one thing, and he can move on.

Some of that self-assurance bleeds out of him the second he sees Jieun.

“Oppa,” she sighs, dragging her feet a bit as she approaches the table. “Sorry I’m late.”

He almost stands up to hug her out of reflex, but he feels far too heavy to approach her right now.

“Don’t worry about it,” he says as she drops into the seat across from him. “You’ve been working hard lately.”

“I’m telling you, it’s a madhouse,” she sighs. “I never knew this much work could go into a single press release.”

Jongwoo swallows, and takes a sip of his coffee to try to wash the guilt back down into the pit of his stomach before he starts vomiting up crude confessions without thinking them through. This is not going to be as easy as he’d hoped.

“Oppa,” she says in a worried tone, looking hard at him through the low- key light of the café after dusk, “Are you okay? What did you do to your face?”

Jongwoo swallows and tries to smile, wishing his hair would grow out a little faster so it could cover the throbbing bruise on his brow. “It’s nothing, just got tipsy last night and bumped my head.”

Her suspicious eyes travel down his face, to the matching dark mark at his jaw. “It looks bad. You need to be more careful.”

“Let me buy you something,” he offers in a rush, trying to change the subject. “What do you want? Pick anything.”

She hesitates. “Are you sure? Since… Your money situation isn’t great.” 

“I’m not worried about it,” he lies. “Let me treat you for once.”

Maybe, for the last time.

His answer makes her look more relaxed, and he winds up buying her hot tea and sweet bread. She notices his hand shaking as he sets them down in front of her.

“Are you cold?” she asks, reaching out to touch his fingers. “You’re – is there gauze on your hand?”

He tugs his sleeve down further over his knuckles. “I’m fine. I just had way too much caffeine today.”

At least that’s not a lie.

“It’s getting cold out,” she says, pointedly taking the hint and sidestepping the question about the bandages. “You should start looking into a coat.”

“It’s warm,” Jongwoo says, wondering why this suddenly feels like an argument. “It’s the warmest late September I can remember since I was in the army.”

“Ah, there you two are,” a voice bellows.

Jongwoo nearly squeezes his own cup of coffee in the sudden wave of anger that crests over him. A pair of car keys skitter across the tabletop as the grinding sound of a chair being dragged from an adjacent table heralds Jaeho’s arrival. He drops down next to Jieun, and Jongwoo doesn’t miss the way their elbows touch for a second.

“Got started without me?” Jaeho asks, picking at a corner of Jieun’s sweet bread like he has the right. “Well, let’s hear it.”

Jongwoo looks between the two of them. “What?”

“Not even I can resist her puppydog eyes,” Jaeho gestures to Jieun with his thumb. “She said you were ready to apologize so you can return to work earlier.”

Jongwoo pokes his tongue to one side of his cheek, just so he can grind it between his molars. A little bit of pain to ground himself before he asks Jieun, “You invited him?”

“Invited?” she blinks a few times, realizing that this isn’t going the way she thought it would. “Well, yeah. I thought you wanted to talk about whatever happened at work. Rip the band-aid off. ”

“I thought you meant with you,” Jongwoo says. “I thought–”

I thought you were going to listen to me for once.

Jaeho's expression has soured quickly. He clicks his tongue impatiently and says, “These kids, talking about me as if I’m not here. Come on, Jongwoo. Rip off the band-aid.”

“I already told you that I’ll make up for the time I missed for being late,” Jongwoo says, curling his fingernails beneath the lid of his coffee and bending the plastic just to keep his hands busy. “I’m not going to apologize for the harassment bullshit you and Byeongmin made up.”

“Harassment?” Confusion is painted across Jieun’s face in broad strokes. “I thought you were late.”

“I was late,” Jongwoo says. “But then my beloved sunbae decided to dress me down over stupid rumors that aren’t true.”

“Now, hold on,” Jaeho says, “That’s a completely separate issue that you and Yoojung need to work out. And Jieun-ah, now that you brought it up to her.”

“Who is Yoojung?” Jieun asks.

“There's nothing to work out,” Jongwoo snaps, "Because nothing happened!"

Jaeho heaves a disappointed sigh, like he can’t believe Jongwoo isn’t just crumbling beneath their scrutiny. “This, Jongwoo-yah. This is why you keep getting into trouble. We all make mistakes and maybe look where we shouldn’t, but this isn’t how to handle it. You’ve got to work on that temper of yours, yeah?”

“I’ll stop getting angry when you stop pissing me off.”

“Oppa!” Jieun scolds, glancing around the cafe with burning ears. “Oppa, please don’t make a scene. If there’s a misunderstanding, then you just need to explain yourself.”

“I already explained myself,” Jongwoo grits out, losing his patience.

“Ah, there you are,” comes a droning voice, and half of the fight immediately drains out of Jongwoo’s body with an exasperated sigh.

Another horrible scraping of chair legs, another body crowding around this too-small table built for two. Moonjo sits close to Jongwoo in a casual sprawl, still wearing the same exact outfit he had on when Jongwoo gave him the world’s most aggressive hand job not long ago. Bastard’s practically peacocking.

“Ahjussi, we’re in the middle of something here,” Jaeho says in offense, taking in the sight of Moonjo with a frown. “Did you break out of a home and lose your handler or something?”

“Coffee at nearly nine o’clock,” Moonjo notes, ignoring Jaeho entirely so he can rest his elbows on the table and lean close to Jongwoo. “Jagiya, you’re going to be up all night.”

“Ja– jagi–” That was Jieun.

“What?”

Aaaand, that was Jaeho.

“Oh, sorry,” Moonjo looks away from Jongwoo just long enough to take in the baffled expressions on their faces before correcting himself with a small smile, “Jongwoo-ssi.”

Jongwoo curls the lid on his coffee hard enough that the thin plastic splits. He feels absolutely ridiculous right now, like his wife just met his mistress. Jieun looks positively adrift in confusion. Jaeho just looks deeply repulsed.

“Uh,” Jieun starts awkwardly in a frantic tone, “Excuse me, but… Do you know Jongwoo?”

“I do, very well,” says with a shit-eating grin, “I’m his neighbor.”

“Neighbors, huh?” Jaeho forces out a sardonic laugh. “That’s not how I talk to my neighbors. Jongwoo-yah, who the hell is this guy?”

“Jieun-ah,” Jongwoo ignores him, voice calm, “I think we should end things.”

Her sharp inhale seems to suck the warmth out of the room, leaving everyone frigid. “What?”

“I think it’s best if we see other people,” he forces out, and feels a pang of shame. “No, no… It’s just. Jieun-ah, I never bothered anyone at work, I swear. But I still haven’t been a very good boyfriend–”

“You’ve been busy,” she says. “We all have, that’s understandable–”

“I cheated on you,” Jongwoo blurts out, and the table goes silent for a moment.

“What?” Jaeho barks, always itching for the first word even when he has nothing of value to say. Next to him, Jieun is lost. Her mouth moves, but no words come out. Her eyes shift between Jongwoo and Moonjo in confusion, shining with the sudden sheen of unshed tears.

“Oppa,” she says softly, rapidly blinking away the wetness in her now- downcast eyes, “Jongwoo-oppa, I don’t understand.”

“Mm, a real melodrama,” Moonjo drawls at Jongwoo’s side, and Jongwoo kind of wants to deck him. This is all his fault, after all. “You’re going to dump the poor girl just like that? You didn’t even try to explain yourself. It’s like you don’t want to keep her.”

Okay, Jongwoo really wants to deck him.

Jaeho provides a decent enough distraction from that thought, though. He stands up, letting his chair scrape loud enough that everyone in the cafe stops and stares. “What are you pulling, Yoon Jongwoo? Cheating on a girl like her, huh? How can you even live with yourself? Have some shame!”

Before Jongwoo can say anything, Moonjo speaks up instead. “This can’t be Park Byeongmin, can it?”

“Park Byeongmin?” Jaeho scoffs. “I’m Park Byeongmin’s boss.”

“Ah,” Moonjo leans forward with rapt attention, “That makes sense. You look like an important man, alright. And so strong and assertive the second the other guy is out of the picture – class act. You’ve been waiting for this for a while, haven’t you?”

Jaeho plants his knuckles on the table and leans forward in the world’s least effective intimidation attempt. “And who the hell are you to speak to me like that?”

“I told you,” Moonjo says, nodding his head towards Jongwoo, “I’m his neighbor.”

“Jongwoo hates his neighbors!” Jieun shrieks. She presses her fingertips to her temples and closes her eyes with a sniffle as if she’s trying to compose herself before saying, “Is this some joke? If you want to take a break, you don’t have to do all this. I know things have been hard, we can’t meet up often, but you don’t have to go this far.”

“I already went that far,” Jongwoo says bluntly, unsure of how to communicate that he bullied Moonjo’s dick like an hour ago. “Jieun-ah, I am breaking up with you because I have done something unforgivable to you.”

“I don’t get it,” she sighs, rubbing her forehead with shaking fingers, and Jongwoo feels something inside of him ache

The disbelief, he didn’t expect. But it makes sense. She probably never thought he would find anyone else. It’s entirely possible that they were the same thing to each other after all – Jongwoo as the difficult but earnest boyfriend who would always come crawling back to her with nowhere else to go, Jieun as the sweet but distant girlfriend who would weather his worst patches and then wait for him to grovel. Every time they speak these days, it feels like they’re having two different conversations, existing on two different planes.

But they’re familiar to each other. A sure thing. No one wants to be alone, after all. They just learned the hard way that sometimes the company of someone who doesn’t understand you can make you feel more alone than anything else.

“Jieun-ah,” Jongwoo says with finality, “I’m sorry.”

She can’t even look at him right now, and he’s fine with that. He gets it, and feels all the more lighter for it.

“Jaeho-hyung,” he continues, turning to his beloathed boss, “Sorry – daepyonim, go fuck yourself.”

Jaeho’s face nearly purples in rage. “Yoon Jongwoo–”

Jongwoo doesn’t plan on sticking around to listen to whatever tirade is sure to follow. He only turns to Moonjo and says, “We’re leaving.”

“Anything you say,” Moonjo grins up at Jongwoo, “Jagi.”

Jongwoo just rolls his eyes and takes his leave, turning his back on Jaeho’s insults and Jieun’s silent turmoil. He’s well aware that he’s just completely fucked over his last vestige of normalcy, but his experiences with normalcy in this rotten city have been their own kind of hell. He’s over it.

“How long were you waiting to make your grand entrance?” Jongwoo asks once they’re out under the endless sky. “I’m sure you loved that.”

“Would you have preferred sitting there until the employees kicked you out?” Moonjo asks. “I thought you were never going to get on with it.”

Jongwoo is about to defend his breakup strategy when he hears Jaeho call his name. He sets his jaw and rolls his head on his neck, turning around just on time to feel a pair of hands shoving his shoulders hard. He stumbles, legs failing him more out of surprise than anything. One knee bashes into the pavement and there’s gravel stinging in his unbandaged palm, but he doesn’t have time to worry about that.

Because the second he lands, he hears a solid thud and a bellowed groan. When he turns around, he finds Jaeho on the ground holding his face as Moonjo’s dark figure looms over him.

“You prick!” Jaeho spits on the pavement, and it comes out red. “Do you have any idea what you just did? I’ll sue both of you until you can’t even afford to live in that filthy fucking studio room!”

Moonjo flexes one hand and grins, cheeks rounding. “You shouldn’t push people. It’s unsafe.”

Barely a stride away, Jongwoo gapes at the sight they make – Moonjo standing up straight, Jaeho flat on the ground.

Someone finally put him in his place.

There’s blood at the corner of Jaeho’s mouth, like his tooth caught the inside of his lip. Jongwoo can’t help himself from thinking about how it’s not enough. He imagines Moonjo getting a hand in his hair and bashing his head straight into the pavement, shattering his bones like a brittle coffee mug. Stepping on him with those plain black shoes, grinding Jaeho’s face into the dirt like he’s nothing more than a smoldering cigarette –

But that doesn’t happen, of course.

Instead, Jaeho stumbles to his feet and throws a punch. Just on time for one of the onlookers on the street to pull out their phone and start recording.

More importantly – just in time for Jieun to rush out of the cafe. “Oppa, stop!”

Jaeho doesn’t listen to her as his fist collides with Moonjo’s face, and Jongwoo’s gut lurches.

Despite his fantasies, Jongwoo has never fought with Jaeho. He has no idea what kind of real strength the man is hiding in his body. But the blow seems to stagger Moonjo more than Jongwoo expects it to. Moonjo absorbs the force of it and stumbles backwards, bending at the waist and holding his nose with a groan that sounds painfully overdone to Jongwoo’s ears.

“First you assaulted my friend,” Moonjo says, pushing the fake inflection of fear into his voice, “And now you’re assaulting me? I thought wealthy men like you were more polite than this. We’re only trying to leave…”

He’s holding his face and angling his head away from the small crowd of onlookers. But Jongwoo can see him from where he’s still kneeling on the ground. He can see the mocking grin that flashes across his features even as his voice is pitched up in pain.

Their eyes meet for a moment, and Moonjo bites his bottom lip on a smile.

“Drop it!” Jongwoo hears Jieun shout. He tears his attention away from Moonjo to see her tugging on Jaeho’s arm, a frantic mix of fear and frustration turning her tone shrill. “Just drop it! Don’t make any more trouble. Let’s get out of here, please.”

Jaeho sneers at Jongwoo. There’s blood in his teeth.

“You did this,” he spits. “I hope you’re happy, because you just fucked up your own life.”

“Ah, so cruel,” Moonjo whines to the side. Jongwoo desperately wants to kick him in the shin.

But before he can even entertain that thought, Moonjo takes a staggering step forward and picks something up off the ground.

“Young man, you dropped these,” he calls out, dangling Jaeho’s shining ring of keys in front of him. “No use having a nice foreign car if you can’t start the engine.”

Jaeho simply stares at him for a moment, as if it’s a trap.

“Go ahead,” Moonjo gives the keys a little rattle, like Jaeho is some stupid baby he’s trying to entertain. “No hard feelings, right? We can leave things at this.”

Tentatively, Jaeho takes a step forward with a grim face. But just as he swipes his hand out to grab the keys, Moonjo lifts them just out of reach.

“Watch yourself,” he says quietly. “If you want to throw your weight around, you should learn to throw a better punch first.”

And then he drops the keys to the pavement with a clink, letting them land between Jaeho’s expensive shoes.

“See you around,” Moonjo smiles, and turns to walk back to Jongwoo. 

“Crazy asshole,” Jaeho mutters, crouching down to pick up his keys.

The sight of him brought to his knees like that, bleeding sluggishly from his mouth and humiliated, it makes Jongwoo flatten his lips in a tight line to fight back the laugh that creeps up his throat. If Jaeho notices it, he doesn’t let on. He just grabs his keys and twirls them on the tip of his finger, barely finding the courage to shoot Jongwoo one last parting glare.

Then he puts an arm around Jieun’s shoulder, and walks away. Jongwoo doesn’t miss the way she ducks away from his touch. But he doesn’t miss the way she follows him down the street towards that fancy foreign car, either.

When Moonjo steps in front of him and holds out a hand, he can’t see them at all anymore.

“That went well,” Moonjo says, eyes bright as he wiggles his fingers. “Did he hurt you?”

Jongwoo has no idea how he can be so casual about this. “Don’t worry about it, just… Let’s leave.”

Moonjo smiles that strange and uncharacteristically sweet smile, the one where his front teeth peek out. But the look in his eyes, the sick sort of manic excitement, that gives him away for what he is. He looks far too pleased when he says, “Let’s.”

Jongwoo takes the offered hand, letting Moonjo finally pull him up out of the dirt. The motion makes his palm sting, and he’s pretty sure Moonjo squeezes extra hard on purpose. Jongwoo pulls away, but not before Moonjo can steal a softer touch – a hand at his waist to steady him, a simple gesture that strikes far too close to intimate concern right now.

It makes Jongwoo feel like a juiced live wire, like something directionless and dangerous under Moonjo’s touch. He turns on his heel and walks off before Moonjo can take any more liberties with those wandering hands of his.

“But we’re not going back to that studio,” Jongwoo huffs, picking gravel out of the raw patches of ruined skin. The handful of people milling about step away from him awkwardly, none of them daring to say a word to either of the two men. Most of them seem bored already, honestly. A bit of excitement, and then on with their lives.

“Then where are we going?” Moonjo asks at his side.

“I don’t know,” Jongwoo says, making an abrupt turn down a narrower side street when he glances back at Moonjo and catches a stranger’s wide eyes still lingering on him. “Somewhere with fewer people. Just let me walk everything off, okay?”

“Fine,” Moonjo agrees easily. “I’m almost surprised you don’t mind my company.”

“I’d tell you to leave me alone,” Jongwoo says, “But I know you’d keep following me anyway. You weren’t even supposed to be out here tonight.”

“I couldn’t help myself,” Moonjo admits. “I’ve been waiting a long time for that.”

“We met last month, “Jongwoo says as he kicks an empty beer bottle out of the way and gets a dirty look from a passing salaryman for it.

Foot traffic is thinning out the deeper into the labyrinth between buildings that Jongwoo aimlessly drags them, and thank god for that. It means there’s not really anyone around to hear Moonjo’s latest saccharine declaration – “We could have met yesterday and it still would have felt like ages. I’ve been waiting a long time for someone like you.”

“If you want to sound normal, then don’t say things like that.”

“I’m not trying to sound normal,” Moonjo says. “I’m trying to sound sincere.”

“Well, maybe you should try to sound normal,” Jongwoo says. “Because all you’re managing instead is pathetic.”

“Is that what you call it when you feel alone in every room you enter no matter how many people are there?” Moonjo asks. “You seem to have a lot of experience with that. But if you find the alternative too pathetic, then you can always turn back and beg for forgiveness from someone who doesn’t look hard enough at you to truly see you.”

“She’s gone,” Jongwoo snaps, halting in the middle of the sidewalk. “Be quiet about it already, because she’s gone.”

Moonjo slows to a stop, lingering in front of Jongwoo like he’s waiting for Jongwoo to continue.

“So go on and celebrate, you bastard,” Jongwoo says through gritted teeth. “Everyone is gone. I lost my job, my girlfriend – you know, normal things that normal people have? I came to this city because it’s what I was supposed to do. I was supposed to get a shitty corporate career, make enough money to live in a real apartment, marry my girlfriend, start a family–”

He counts them out on his bruised fingers while his hands shake so hard that he can barely keep a grasp on his sanity right now. Everything in him is flying apart, getting sucked up by the intrusive darkness of the city at night. He’s like a fire without light right now, just a horrible column of heat eating up all the oxygen until nothing is left but thick, suffocating smoke.

He curls his hand into a fist and aims for Moonjo’s chest. Moonjo, the bastard, barely even sways with the impact.

“Now all I have left,” the words shake out of Jongwoo’s throat to the tandem of his hammering heartbeat, “Is you.”

“What you have left are raw materials,” Moonjo corrects, “You built yourself up all wrong, couldn’t you tell? Nothing you did ever felt right. You only did it all because you thought you were supposed to. That's no way for someone like you to live.”

“What the fuck does that even mean?” Jongwoo asks, gripping his hair in near-hysteria. “What do you want from me?”

“Don’t play stupid,” Moonjo scolds. “Cluelessness stops being fun once you’ve proven you understand me. All I want is for you to do the things you want to do. Not the things you think you should.”

“Stop acting like you know me better than I know myself,” Jongwoo hisses.

Moonjo tilts his head to the side in clear amusement. “I will when you stop proving me right. Or are you going to tell me it didn’t feel good to see him laid out on the ground?”

Jongwoo’s fingers twitch. The scabs on his knuckles burn at the reminder of their inception.

“Oh, but maybe,” Moonjo’s eyes flit down to Jongwoo’s hand, like he can feel the throbbing pain himself, “It left you unsatisfied. You wish you got the chance to put him there.”

“I don’t,” Jongwoo whispers, glancing up and down the dark street as if someone will bear witness to his guilt. But there’s no one here, at least not close enough to care about him. A man disappearing into the shadows at the far end of the street. A car rolling through an empty intersection without stopping for the sign.

“Are you saying I misread you?” Moonjo asks, swaying closer and dipping his head low to force Jongwoo to look at him. “You liked watching it. Imagine how much better it would feel if you were doing it.”

He punctuates the statement by jabbing Jongwoo’s ribs with his fist, only hard enough to startle him.

“I’m not stupid enough for that,” Jongwoo insists, glancing away even as he grabs Moonjo’s wrists and digs his fingernails in next to the protruding tendon. “Jaeho isn't some punk following me home from a bar. If there’s one person I can’t get away with fighting, it’s him.”

“Good thing I hit him, then,” Moonjo says, pushing deeper into Jongwoo’s space with every shuffling step that Jongwoo tries to take away from him. “If I let you do it, you might have killed him tonight.”

Jongwoo has to close his eyes and take a steadying breath as he tries not to think about it: Jaeho lying motionless in a bed of gravel, the obvious remedy to one of Jongwoo’s worst headaches. He wouldn’t even need a brick in his hand to do it. Jaeho would shred beneath him like tissue paper.

Jongwoo swallows. The collar of his oversized sweater feels too tight against the base of his throat, more like the stiff embrace of cotton fatigues than the slouching vee of his hood.

“But don’t worry,” Moonjo says softly. “The world is full of men like him. You’ll get other chances, I’m sure.”

“What if I don’t want to deal with assholes like him anymore?” Jongwoo asks, shoving Moonjo away from him. “Is it really so much to ask for a life where I’m not constantly running into bastards who have it coming?”

“I think you might be more adept at identifying those sorts of people than most,” Moonjo says.

Jongwoo barks out a dry laugh. “What, like you, doctor? I’ll bet not many people know what you’re really like.”

Moonjo tilts his head. “No. They don’t.”

“You’re just like Jaeho,” Jongwoo says, and he means it to sound like the worst possible insult. “A bad man hiding behind a good title so nobody looks too hard and sees what you really are.”

Moonjo gives nothing away on his face as he asks, “Is that what you think?”

“Am I wrong?” Jongwoo demands. “You’re both power tripping assholes who think you can get something from me.”

“I’m nothing like him,” Moonjo insists. “But if you disagree, then you should hit me like you wanted to hit him.”

“I wouldn’t give you the satisfaction,” Jongwoo sneers, hands clenched into fists at his side.

And then Moonjo smiles, a little smug and all too sure of himself. “It’s interesting, isn’t it? Deny me satisfaction, and you deny it for yourself, too. It’s almost like we want the same thing.”

Moonjo takes a step forward, and Jongwoo refuses to take a step back. “I don’t want anything to do with you.”

“Then get rid of me,” Moonjo says. His hands are clasped behind his back, posture exposed and exploitable. “Because if you don’t…”

He leans forward, lips so close to Jongwoo’s ear that he must feel the blazing hot anger simmering just under his skin.

“I’ll never let you go. I’ve already bitten down. If you don’t like it, you’re going to have to pry my jaw open yourself.”

“Cute metaphor,” Jongwoo bristles, “But don’t forget that I’m not afraid to literally bite you.”

Moonjo turns his head just enough to meet Jongwoo’s eye, and lifts his hand to press over the tender spot on his shoulder that Jongwoo sunk his teeth into not long ago.

“Trust the author to bring the figurative into reality,” he says, looking at Jongwoo's mouth. “Only in my wildest dreams did I think you’d gift me a mark of ownership like that.”

If Moonjo’s intention is to annoy Jongwoo to a breaking point, then he should be proud of himself. Jongwoo can’t confirm Moonjo’s words if he wants to keep his pride intact. Jongwoo can’t deny it without lying through his teeth and giving Moonjo more ammunition to pick away at him. But what Jongwoo can do is shove Moonjo backwards and throw a punch aimed straight for Moonjo’s jaw.

Moonjo is ready for it. He’s been waiting for this, after all. He just barely manages to dodge the attack, making Jongwoo stumble with the wasted momentum, before wrapping an arm around Jongwoo’s neck and yanking him down into a headlock that has Jongwoo trapped beneath his arm.

“Huh?,” Jongwoo gasps, trying to wriggle out of Moonjo’s hold. “What?”

“I didn’t say I’d make it easy on you,” Moonjo says, and knees him in the stomach.

Jongwoo’s pained grunt echoes down the dark street. The wind might be knocked out of him, but the fight isn’t. He uses his position to wrap his arms around Moonjo’s waist and throw all of his weight into shoving the man backwards, sending both of them straight into a wall.

This time, when Jongwoo pulls back to throw a punch, it lands.

Moonjo is tall and broad-shouldered, but he’s no brick shithouse of a man. Jongwoo has been pressed up against his body enough to know that their builds are nearly polar opposites. Where lean muscle still clings to Jongwoo from the endless days of working out in the military to kill boredom, Moonjo is made of jutting bones that feel like cudgels when he meets Jongwoo's blows half way like the pain hardly registers.

The quiet of this lonely little street is disturbed by all the gasping and grunting, the scraping of shoes across gravel. Someone’s bound to hear them and call the cops if they keep this up, but Jongwoo doesn’t care. Let  the police see Moonjo like this: dressed down and grinning as he catches glancing blows from the man they released without a fuss earlier today. His hair is a mess as the two of them grapple back and forth in the darkness. His skin is starting to shine with sweat under the streetlights. This isn't Dr Seo as they know him, scrapping like a stray dog under the moon.

Calling it a fight feels wrong. Neither of them is trying to win, they’re just trying to keep this little intoxicating dance going for as long as they can. Jongwoo’s role is to scratch and hiss, Moonjo’s role is to dodge and block and soak in the impact of Jongwoo’s hands on him.

And, occasionally, to parry.

Jongwoo lets himself get a little too languid, a little too free. He stops thinking about the motion of his body and lets it run on auto-pilot, driving into Moonjo with a blissfully empty mind. So forgive him for not quite being ready for it when Moonjo grabs him at one point, wrenching his arm back behind him and tossing him almost insultingly easily down to the pavement.

Jongwoo lands with yelp and braces himself for a kick straight to the ribs that will leave him gasping for air. It’s what he would do if he was in Moonjo’s position. But Moonjo keeps his feet to himself, standing somewhere behind Jongwoo and breathing hard enough that Jongwoo can hear every inhale and exhale.

“Oh,” Jongwoo sighs, rolling onto his back so he can stare up at Moonjo. The other man is hunching a bit, backlit by the overhead street light. “Oh, shit, you’re not half bad for looking like you’d snap like a twig under pressure.”

The silhouette of Moonjo’s body cocks its head. “Was that a real compliment?”

“Yeah, sure,” Jongwoo’s hand feels loose and lazy on his wrist as he waves it above him dismissively. “Your one virtue: you can stay on your feet in a fight.”

“I don’t do this often,” Moonjo admits. “But I didn’t want to miss the opportunity.”

“Well, opportunity’s over,” Jongwoo says, grimacing as he sits up and reaches out. “Help me.”

Moonjo’s hand is firm and warm. He drags Jongwoo to his feet and places a steadying hand on his shoulder, but Jongwoo shrugs it off as soon as he’s upright. He’d much rather arch his back and stretch his arms overhead with a groan, savoring the stretch of his sore muscles.

“That felt good,” he admits. “Why did that feel so good? I should join a boxing club or something.”

“I’d prefer it if you didn’t,” Moonjo warns. “If anyone else lays a finger on you, I might have to do something about it.”

Jongwoo sighs. “How can you say that after beating the shit out of me? You’re so weird.”

“I didn’t hurt you much, did I?” Moonjo asks, lifting Jongwoo’s chin and pressing his thumb into a tender spot.

Jongwoo grimaces and tilts his chin up.

“Well,” he asks bitterly, “Did you ruin my famous prettyboy face?” 

Moonjo smiles, still stroking Jongwoo’s jaw softly. “Never prettier, honey.”

Jongwoo rolls his eyes and jerks his head away before abandoning his last shred of shame.

“Are you horny?"

The question lands between them like a cartoon anvil. Moonjo says nothing.

"I always wondered if you were, I don’t know… Kind of like 313," Jongwoo explains. "Like you get off on being a gross dangerous asshole.”

“No, violence alone doesn’t turn me on,” Moonjo finally says dryly. “And I’d appreciate not being compared to someone like him.”

“Oh,” Jongwoo is left oddly bereft by the answer. “But, if it’s me…?” 

Moonjo raises his eyebrows. “If it’s you?”

“Do I,” Jongwoo doesn’t want to say it, like he’s afraid he’s somehow misread this entire situation despite Moonjo being all over him earlier. “Do I turn you on?”

He gets his answer in the splay of Moonjo’s hand at the base of his throat and the kiss on his waiting mouth, right here in the middle of the street.

Jongwoo pushes up into it for only a moment before shoving Moonjo away.

“Someone might see us here,” he hisses, as if their little tussle from a moment ago wasn’t a much more pressing disturbance of the peace.

“Then we should go somewhere else,” Moonjo suggests.

For the first time since they met, Jongwoo thinks Moonjo has some great ideas.

“Alright, then come on,” he says, marching away from Moonjo without a destination in mind. “First, we need to stop somewhere where we can buy stuff.”

“Stuff,” Moonjo repeats, falling into step with Jongwoo.

“Condoms and lube,” Jongwoo says in a rush, “Because I’m going to have sex with you.”

It seems to take a second for Moonjo to process the bold declaration. “Oh.”

“And then,” Jongwoo bulldozes onto the next topic at hand, “We need to find a hotel. Do you have your wallet on you?”

“I have money,” Moonjo says, “If that’s what you need.”

“I do,” Jongwoo says. “Because you’re going to pay for the room, because I don’t have any money, because I don’t have a job, because you drove me insane.”

“Short trip,” Moonjo murmurs offhand.

“I don’t want to hear it,” Jongwoo says, waggling an angry finger in Moonjo’s general direction as he marches forward aimlessly.

“It’s a compliment,” Moonjo assures him.

-

The hotel they wind up at is one that Moonjo has used before. For what, he refuses to answer, smiling softly the whole time Jongwoo bothers him about it, the prick. They stroll into the lobby, and Jongwoo half expects a security guard to show up and kick them out immediately. Two guys dressed down and covered in little scrapes and bruises don’t exactly blend in at a place where the elevator doors are so shiny that they’re practically mirrors.

Moonjo, however, walks forward on long strides with his chin up, looking more important than the smartly-dressed passersby in his plain black lounging outfit with a discrete black plastic bag dangling from his fingertips. The receptionist gives them both weary looks as they approach the front desk.

Rather than the usual welcome, he poses a nervous sounding question. “Are you guys okay?”

“We’re fine,” Jongwoo mutters, glancing away.

“We’re in a boxing club,” Moonjo smiles softly as he offers up the awful lie. “Different weight classes.”

Jongwoo shoots him a sharp glare at the unnecessary reminder that Moonjo is nearly a head taller than him.

Moonjo ignores the look. “What vacancies do you have open?”

“Two beds, please,” Jongwoo interjects. 

“One bed,” Moonjo speaks over him.

“It’s fine,” Jongwoo flushes, “We can afford two beds. Right?”

“But we only need one bed,” Moonjo rebukes, looking at Jongwoo with innocent eyes. “Right, jagi?”

The poor receptionist keeps his eyes glued to the screen in front of him, clearly not in the mood to deal with this.

“Fine,” Jongwoo sighs. “One bed.”

There’s a haunted weariness to the receptionist’s eyes as he slides them a keycard, like he’s bracing himself for the noise complaint he’s going to get within the hour.

-

A hotel room isn’t terribly different from a studio room. It’s built to offer the necessities: warmth, shelter, and a place to sleep. The only thing separating all of the strangers sharing the floor is a few pieces of wood here and there. They’re impersonal. Temporary. Not a real home, not at all.

You’d be hard pressed to find a goshiwon with a bed as soft as this one, though.

Jongwoo is flat on his back before he can even get his shoes off. There are hands back under his hoodie where they belong, exposing his stomach, and yet the shoes stay on. Moonjo doesn’t care about the threat of tracking dirt onto the nice fluffy duvet, because he’s a bad man whose brain is plugged directly into his dick right now.

Jongwoo, however, has standards of decency.

“You’re going to fuck me,” Jongwoo says, like he’s laying down ground rules for their shameless rendezvous while he fights with his shoelaces and Moonjo sits at the foot of the bed looking chastised. “And it’s going to be terrible. So bad that I realized what a huge mistake this is. And then I’m going to come to my senses, and leave this hotel with my sanity screwed back into me, god willing.”

“You really have no faith in me,” Moonjo practically pouts, trying to crawl forward once more.

“No,” Jongwoo says, slapping a hand over Moonjo’s impatient mouth. “I don’t.”

There is, of course, an implicit dare there – prove me wrong.

Jongwoo won’t admit it out loud, but part of him really wants to be proven wrong. A little while later, buck-ass naked knees with a few lubed fingers inside of him, he’s still unconvinced.

“There has to be a way to do this that doesn’t involve me sticking my ass in the air,” Jongwoo sighs, trying to cover up his nervousness with the complaint.

“It’s easiest like this,” Moonjo assures him in an unexpected tone of voice – half lecture, half letcher, like some painfully horny instructional video on how to survive your first round of ass play. “Being so exposed might be embarrassing, but it’s probably still more comfortable than if you were on your back.”

“Why do you sound like you’re giving me an examination?” Jongwoo grunts as Moonjo pushes his fingers deeper, “Is that your… Your fucking dentist voice?”

“My–” Moonjo stops moving behind him for a few beats of silence before saying, “It might be.”

“Oh my god,” Jongwoo sighs, hoping it sounds more like exasperation than pleasure. “Do you do that with everyone you finger?”

“I can’t say anyone else has ever commented on it before,” Moonjo says, spreading his fingers in a way that makes Jongwoo feel like he’s about to choke on his own tongue. “It’s been a long time.”

“But you’ve done this before?” Jongwoo chokes out. “I mean – given it to a guy.”

“Of course I have,” Moonjo says, as if gay sex was a beloved national past- time. “Why? Does that make you jealous?”

“You’re projecting,” Jongwoo shoots back, just as Moonjo teases another finger against his hole and Jongwoo, to his mortification, spreads his legs wider as if that’ll help.

Jongwoo refuses to look at him right now, but he can tell from Moonjo’s voice that he’s grinning. “Am I? Tell me, babe – just how many men have you slept with before?”

The finger slowly pushes inside next to the others, and the fitted sheet pops off of one corner of the mattress as Jongwoo clings to anything he can get ahold of.

“When I was in the army,” Jongwoo blurts out, “I’m pretty sure I could have slept with one of the officers in my division.”

Moonjo’s fingers freeze. His voice is practically arctic. “But you didn’t.”

“No,” Jongwoo tries to be subtle about pushing his hips backwards. “He was a good guy, I don’t think he’d actually go that far with a subordinate unless I was really pushy.”

The fingers leave Jongwoo entirely, and it takes every ounce of restraint to not groan in annoyance. A hand slides down the slope of his spine, fingers tacky with lube, and settles on the back of his neck so Moonjo can push Jongwoo father down into the pillows. His voice is almost icy as he says, not asks, “But you wanted to.”

Jongwoo does groan in annoyance at that. “Is a man not allowed to have a bicurious crush on a hot guy in uniform? He outranked me and was like ten years older than me, it was never going to happen you big jealous idiot.”

“I’m probably ten years older than you,” Moonjo points out.

“Yeah, whatever, at this rate I’ll be your age by the time you final– ah!”

Maybe yelping is an overreaction to having the head of a dick poking at his asshole, especially when Moonjo’s fingers were just in there.

“It’s not gonna fit,” Jongwoo blurts out.

“It’ll fit,” Moonjo assures him, grinding his hips restlessly against Jongwoo’s ass. “I won’t break you.”

“But will it hurt?” Jongwoo asks, feeling pathetic as the words tumble out. 

“Probably at first,” Moonjo says, pressing a bit more insistently, “In that aching way that we like.”

“Who the hell is we?” Jongwoo shoots over his shoulder. “I don’t li – ah, ah…”

Does he like it? Well, it’s hard to tell. This situation is so surreal and unlike anything Jongwoo ever thought he’d find himself in, so the mild out-of- body experience he’s having might play into how fucking weird it feels. But Moonjo is… Slow, at first. Gentle. You could almost accuse him of being considerate as he fucks into Jongwoo with shallow thrusts, working deeper with each steady motion.

It doesn’t feel like pain or pleasure yet, it just feels full. Jongwoo buries his face in the pillow and swears he can feel it all the way up into his throat.

“Shh,” Moonjo hushes into the back of his neck, just before his naked hips finally touch Jongwoo’s ass in a way that feels far too obscene when there’s a literal dick inside of him. “You’re shaking.”

Jongwoo comes up for air to admit in a strangled voice, “This is so weird.”

“Do you hate it?” Moonjo asks, grinding into Jongwoo deep and slow in a way that makes Jongwoo whine and tense beneath him.

“Keep going,” Jongwoo grits out.

“Do you hate it?” Moonjo repeats more firmly.

“I don’t know yet,” Jongwoo says. “And I’m never gonna find out if you just sit there.”

Moonjo hums low in his throat and curls his fingers around the slope where Jongwoo’s neck meets his shoulder. “Is that my permission to move?”

Jongwoo groans in frustration. “Do you expect a formal fucking invitation? Yes, move!”

Moonjo takes the order to heart.

Jongwoo doesn’t have time to be embarrassed by the first yelp Moonjo fucks out of him, because it’s immediately followed by a veritable avalanche of even more embarrassing sounds. Gasps, whines, whimpers, whatever you want to call them – every roll of Moonjo’s hips feels so foreign and unexpected that his body sure has a lot to say about it. He bites his knuckles, brow furrowing, but the groans still reverberate in his throat. He drops flat on his face into the pillow, but it just makes his desperate breathing feel louder in his own ears.

“Oh, no you don’t,” Moonjo says lowly, snaking his hand around Jongwoo’s chest to pull him up and away from his self-imposed censorship. “You have a lovely voice. Let’s hear it.”

“Pervert,” Jongwoo curses, but even it sounds indecent to his ears right now.

Worse than the noises coming out of Jongwoo are the noises between their bodies. It sounds like… Well, like sex. Jongwoo isn’t sure why he expected it to sound different, but the wet slide of Moonjo rocking into his body makes him flush deep at the familiarity of it. There’s sweat pooling in the dip of his spine already, making Moonjo’s fingers slip a bit as he presses a hand at the small of Jongwoo’s back.

Making him arch deeper.

“Oh, fuck,” is about the most intelligent thing Jongwoo manages to say. “That’s… Fuck.”

Moonjo hums behind him in agreement. It rumbles out of him like the satisfied growl of a wild animal after a meal.

“So, does it hurt?” he asks, more out of curiosity than concern.

“Yes,” Jongwoo admits breathlessly. It hurts in the same way a good workout or split knuckles hurt – like something worth it just for the catharsis, the flood of endorphins.

“Do you want me to stop?” Moonjo asks, even as he grips Jongwoo’s hip in a way that feels deliberately painful.

“No,” Jongwoo shakes his head, feeling sweat running down his jawline from his temple. “Not yet.”

“Not yet,” Moonjo repeats before wrapping his hands around the flanks of Jongwoo’s hips and dragging him back and forth against the pressure inside of him. “And how are you doing here?”

He doesn’t elaborate, he just seeks out the answer himself by shifting one hand around Jongwoo’s body to grasp his cock. The answer: hard and dripping.

“Don’t!” Jongwoo pleads, shoving one hand between his legs to chase Moonjo away from the evidence of his shame. “It doesn’t matter!”

It’s one thing to get on his knees and let another man fuck him. It’s another thing entirely to get off on it.

“It matters to me,” Moonjo teases, folding over the length of Jongwoo’s body and swamping him in an impossible heat as he rolls his hips slow and deep. “Are you just going to pretend it’s not there?”

Jongwoo doesn’t want to talk about this, not right now. He just wants Moonjo to keep moving, keep using him, keep things nice and simple so that Jongwoo can compartmentalize this later and move on.

“You talk too much,” Jongwoo deflects.

“What do you think we’re doing here?” Moonjo probes, grinding deep against a spot that has Jongwoo’s eyes losing focus.

“You’re fucking me,” Jongwoo bites out, growing angry. To his mounting chagrin, it doesn’t make him any less hard between his legs. “That’s all, now stop asking stupid questions.”

Moonjo slows to a stop. “That’s all?”

Jongwoo exhales slowly in frustration and wills his body to stay still. “What the fuck else would it be?”

“Oh,” Moonjo says, dragging the syllable out as he drags his hand down Jongwoo’s back.

And then, without a word of warning, he pulls out.

“Wait!” Jongwoo throws an arm behind himself, grasping at thin air. “Wait, no! Get back here!”

Moonjo is simply leaning back, not crawling off the bed or making to leave, but he suddenly feels too far away. Jongwoo’s head spins at the sight of him – disheveled, flushed, shining with sweat in the low lamplight, and acting like he’s trying to stop. Jongwoo doesn’t understand. He’s so out of his element here in every possible way. It’s instinct over rationality that drives him forward, wrapping his arms around Moonjo before the other man can escape and kissing him hard. Moonjo staggers into it like he’s surprised, before his hands find Jongwoo’s face and he kisses back with equal intensity.

“Don’t you dare leave,” Jongwoo says between biting kisses. “There’s no one else left. You can’t leave, you can’t–”

“Not leaving,” Moonjo assures him. “I’m not going anywhere.”

“Then what the hell are you doing?” Jongwoo scolds. “What is wrong with you?”

“It's just that - I think I’m learning a few things about defiance from you,” Moonjo says, and that’s just unfair.

“Not my fault,” Jongwoo insists. “I’m the victim here.” 

“The victim?”

“Of your stupid fucking mind games,” Jongwoo explains. “Come on, come here, you idiot.”

He drags Moonjo down onto the bed, and Moonjo lets it happen. He winds out sprawled back against the pillow, flushed skin almost looking healthy against the wrinkled white sheets. Jongwoo crawls on top of him, and a pair of hands immediately find his hips.

“Trapping me here?” Moonjo asks, staring up at Jongwoo through the messy hair curling in his face.

“You’re damn right I am,” Jongwoo says, lining Moonjo’s cock up with his hole and sinking down.

And now he’s officially even more out of his element.

The bright side is that he feels a little less ridiculous when the overwhelmed and needy noises start tumbling past his lips this time. Because now he can see Moonjo instead of just feel him. He can see that Moonjo is just as lost in sensation as he is, skin flushing red and mouth falling open around choked noises.

The downside: it feels deeper like this. So deep that Jongwoo has to stop and simply breathe for a moment.

“I only need a minute,” Jongwoo claims, “Just,” trying to rise up only for his thighs to tighten and give out, “A minute.”

He tries to figure out what the hell to do with his hands – digging them knuckle-down on the bed next to Moonjo’s ribs, pressing them too-gently against Moonjo’s chest like he’s afraid it’ll collapse under the pressure.

Moonjo solves that little problem when he grips both of Jongwoo’s hands, holding them so he has something unwavering to brace himself against.

“Go on,” Moonjo says, squeezing his hands tight. “I don’t care what you do, just do what feels good.”

“Good,” Jongwoo repeats, moving his hips in stuttering little circles. “Yeah – good.”

He finds something like a rhythm, grinding down on the pressure inside of him, chasing the motions that make his hips jerk and his blood run hot beneath his skin. He grows bold enough to finally find a steady rise and fall, eyes fluttering shut on their own no matter how much he wants to watch Moonjo turn into a harmless mess beneath him.

“I should have done this earlier tonight,” Moonjo trails a hand up Jongwoo’s body when he’s sure Jongwoo doesn’t need steadying anymore. “I should have sent you out there still dripping.”

“Ah-” Jongwoo grips the wandering hand, holding it still over his chest, “Ahjussi…”

Even fucking himself to a state of placid enlightenment, Jongwoo is overcome with how weird that feels to moan in bed. But his mouth is moving anyway, spilling nonsense that begs to be made into something.

“Moon–”

Augh, no, he can’t do this.

“Fucking bastard,” he tries again, breath hitching with the rhythm of his hips, and that feels right. “Fucking freak…”

His hands don’t need holding anymore. They find a home on Moonjo’s body, one curling over the bite mark he left earlier, just above a jagged scar that intersects his collar bone. The other finds his throat.

Moonjo tips his head back with a noise that’s practically torn out of him. His eyes are dark and shining, the tendons in his neck are straining. He looks like a wild animal caught in a cruel trap. For a second, Jongwoo thinks he’s about to fight back. Jongwoo almost wants him to.

But the hand that curls around Jongwoo’s wrist doesn’t push it away.

“Well, honey?” Moonjo asks, staring through lashes that almost look wet for how thickly they fan over his eyes, “Do you feel it? Am I blazing up?”

“Oh, fuck,” Jongwoo curls his fingers slightly, “Not yet, you’re not.” 

Not until Jongwoo squeezes.

Moonjo immediately tries to draw in a sharp breath, as if testing Jongwoo’s grip on his throat. A flash of panic knocks some sense back into Jongwoo, and he tries to pull away in a rush.

Moonjo doesn’t let him.

There are two hands on Jongwoo’s wrist now, holding him in place while Moonjo stares up at him. Moonjo might cling to his prideful chess master alpha bitch thing, but there’s no way to describe the look etched into his features as anything but pleading. Eyes wet, brows drawn together – there’s an unquestionably real expression blooming across his face, involuntary and heartbreakingly human.

There might be something wrong with Jongwoo. Because it feels like the kindest thing in the world to lean forward so he can loom over Moonjo and squeeze his throat tighter, tighter…

Moonjo’s eyes slipped closed. His gaping mouth curves up into a satisfied grin. He’s winning, he’s already won, and all Jongwoo can do is use the hand around his throat as an anchor to ride him while Moonjo trembles and burns beneath him, so hot that Jongwoo can practically taste the smoke that burned Eden down.

The touch feels more scalding with every passing second. There are flames licking up Jongwoo’s arms, threatening to consume him, and Jongwoo greets them with his own delirious smile stretching across his mouth.

When he lets go, Moonjo makes the loudest noise yet. Something wounded and animal wrenched from deep inside of him as he draws in desperate lungfuls of air, body drawn so taught that there’s no doubt in Jongwoo’s mind that he’s filling the condom. Jongwoo keeps his hand pinned just beneath Moonjo’s clavicle and rides him hard through it, until Moonjo is twitching and gasping like every roll of Jongwoo’s hips hurts.

Jongwoo hopes it hurts.

He doesn’t stop until Moonjo is soft and useless, and he has his own problem to take care of. With Moonjo mentally checked out, Jongwoo slips into a brief moment of insecurity. He might be able to slip off to the bathroom to take care of himself and clean up. He doesn’t really know what’s expected of him at this point. All he knows is that he’s so worked up that he feels like he could crack wide open.

Lucky for him, Moonjo has his own ideas. The other man still looks halfway to being fucked-stupid as he grips Jongwoo’s hips and tugs them impatiently, but there’s definitely intent behind the motion. Jongwoo finds himself shuffling forward on his knees, traveling up the length of Moonjo’s body.

Jongwoo winds up nearly straddling Moonjo’s face as the other man strokes him off, red mouth gaping right in front of the head of his cock like some world-class tease. Eyes that used to look empty to Jongwoo just look heavy now, the darkness of them growing as wide and dense as a black hole that Jongwoo can’t possibly claw his way out of.

All Jongwoo can do is grip the headboard and accept that there’s no more running away anymore. Not even when he shakes apart, spilling across Moonjo’s face and forcing those impossibly dark eyes to slip shut as Moonjo practically glows.

-

There are roughly six hundred muscles in the human body, and Jongwoo has lost the ability to use any of them.

Ten minutes must have passed by now since he collapsed in the center of the bed and Moonjo disappeared into the bathroom. In those ten minutes, Jongwoo has only done the bare minimum movement necessary for survival: inhale, exhale, swallow. His heart thumps softly, his arteries pulsate.

That’s all that can be expected out of him right now.

It’s amazing that he hasn’t fallen asleep by the time that Moonjo finally reemerges with a clean face and a fresh washcloth, preserving his modesty behind a hotel bathrobe. Jongwoo kind of wants to tease him for taking so long, maybe complain about how the lube is drying between his legs, but that would require movement. Even his larynx has checked out for the time being.

So he simply lies still and lets Moonjo look after him.

It feels backwards somehow, like Jongwoo should be the one doing all this. But he’s not about to protest. He feels worked-over and tender, aching pleasantly deep inside of himself. He could lie here for the rest of his life and be perfectly happy.

“How do you feel?”

“Like I just stepped off a rollercoaster,” Jongwoo says. “My legs are all wobbly.”

Moonjo hums absently, touching Jongwoo’s hips and thighs indulgently. “So you’re saying it was thrilling.”

“Don’t get ahead of yourself,” Jongwoo says, grunting softly when Moonjo’s thumb finds its way back inside of him. “What are you doing? Enough of that, I can’t take anymore.”

“I want to make sure I didn’t hurt you,” Moonjo lies.

“If you hurt me, I’d tell you off for it,” Jongwoo nudges him in the side with his foot. “You’re insatiable, you pervert.”

Moonjo drops a kiss on Jongwoo’s lower back. “I think I’m showing admirable restraint.”

“Like you could even get it up again so fast, old man,” Jongwoo snarks.

He finally decides to stretch himself out a bit, groaning at the pleasant pull of his overworked muscles as he rolls onto his side so he can look at Moonjo.

“And what about you?” he asks quietly. “Did I hurt you?” 

“You didn’t do anything I didn’t want,” Moonjo says.

“That’s not an answer,” Jongwoo waves Moonjo closer impatiently. “Come here.”

Moonjo crawls forward obediently, tipping his chin up to let Jongwoo prod at the column of his neck. There are no marks there, no blood pooling beneath the skin to form bruises. Jongwoo doesn’t know if he’s relieved or disappointed.

Luckily, he doesn’t have time to ruminate on that before his train of thought is derailed by a horrible gurgling coming from his stomach.

Moonjo cocks an eyebrow. “Hungry?”

“God, I barely put anything in my body today but coffee,” Jongwoo flops back down onto the pillows with a sigh. “It’s a miracle my blood pressure hasn’t killed me yet.”

“While we’re here, I might as well take advantage of room service for us,” Moonjo suggests.

“It’s late,” Jongwoo runs his hands down his face, suddenly bone-tired. “The kitchen is probably closed.”

“They have twenty-four hour service,” Moonjo says. “But the menu is limited at night. It’s better than nothing.”

It’s better than nothing has practically been the mantra of Jongwoo’s life lately, and look at where it’s gotten him. Cheap residences populated by irritating eccentrics. Low wages to do the work no one else wants to do. A relationship that makes him feel alone and unwanted. A friendship out of desperation and obligation.

And now this: Moonjo staring down at him with lidded eyes and mussed-up hair, offering to make him feel just a little less hungry.

Jongwoo takes the offer.

He hardly finds the energy to feel embarrassed twenty minutes later when Moonjo answers the door, still wearing nothing but a robe while Jongwoo lies behind him with a sheet haphazardly thrown over his naked hips. Anyone working in a hotel this late at night has probably seen worse.

The working plan is this: shovel the food into his mouth without saying a word to Moonjo. Find an excuse to leave. Fake a phone call if he has to. Pull his clothes back on and leave ahead of Moonjo. Never speak of this again.

That’s how this is supposed to go, right? Fucking first, then fucking off.

Jongwoo eats on the bed. He doesn’t make a mess or anything, but he also doesn’t care if Moonjo thinks it's gross on principle. He doesn’t intend to sleep here, anyway. He’s hungry enough that the plan starts off smoothly, since he’s too busy eating to say much to the man who has chosen the more civilized route of eating at the small corner table in their room.

But Moonjo speaks. He tells Jongwoo that he eats surprisingly well. Jongwoo reminds him that he’s starving, no shit he’s eating well. Moonjo finds that amusing, for some reason. Jongwoo carefully balances his plate on his knee so he can flip him off. Moonjo finds that even more amusing.

There’s no winning.

Moonjo hardly touches his own food, but Jongwoo cleans his plate quickly. He puts it down on the bedside table when he's finished and lets his thoughts wander to taxi fares and stiff goshiwon mattresses.

“Thank you,” Jongwoo says, uncomfortably formal. “For the food. And for the, uh… The room. But I should probably leave soon–”

“No you shouldn’t,” Moonjo says, so matter-of-factly that it disarms Jongwoo.

“But,” he says, grasping for an excuse, “I really shouldn’t stay.”

“It’s the middle of the night,” Moonjo points out. “There’s no reason for either of us to leave.”

“I can think of one pretty big reason,” Jongwoo says, “And I’m sitting on it.”

Moonjo eyes up the large bed beneath Jongwoo. “If sleeping in a shoebox and listening to every footstep or cough from all the men around you is preferable to sharing a bed with me, then don’t let me stop you. But if you’d like to sleep on something comfortable for once, it’s all yours.”

“I’m not sure how comfortable I’d be letting my guard down next to you,” Jongwoo admits.

“You were fine this morning,” Moonjo points out.

This morning feels impossibly far away now. It's hard to believe that Jongwoo woke up in Moonjo’s overbearing embrace not even twenty-four hours ago.

“If I stay,” Jongwoo says, twisting the sheets between his hands, “Don’t do that again. No cuddling allowed.”

“Who knows what I might do in my sleep,” Moonjo warns him. "I run cold, and you run hot."

“I’ll build a pillow barricade between us if I have to,” Jongwoo says. 

“A pillow barricade,” Moonjo repeats flatly.

“And if you don’t respect the barricade,” Jongwoo says, “You’re sleeping on the floor.”

Moonjo clicks his tongue in annoyance and flattens his mouth in a frown. “If those are your conditions, I suppose I can live with them.”

“You better,” Jongwoo says. “And… And put your underwear back on, at the very least!”

“Goodness,” Moonjo sighs, rising to his feet, “I’m sleeping with a tyrant.” 

Jongwoo glances away when Moonjo reaches for the belt around his waist. “Do you want your underwear, too?”

“Yeah,” Jongwoo says. “Give them here.”

He holds his hand out. Nothing happens. It’s reflexive more than anything when he casts an expectant look over at Moonjo, and immediately realizes it’s a trap.

Moonjo’s belt is loosened, but not untied. His robe is hanging open slightly as he leans forward, holding Jongwoo’s underwear out to him like he’s dangling a fucking carrot in a stick. One shoulder of his robe is askew. The posture practically begs Jongwoo to look down the length of his chest, at the pale skin that Jongwoo had his hands on not too long ago.

Moonjo shifts slightly. The robe falls a little more open. Jongwoo realizes he’s staring.

“Have some shame!” Jongwoo grumbles, lunging forward to rip the flimsy fabric out of Moonjo’s hand.

Moonjo laughs as Jongwoo yanks the garment up his hips, ears turning red at the tips.

“Let me take care of the dishes,” Moonjo says, “And then I’ll join you.”

“I don’t care,” Jongwoo says, crawling under the covers and showing his back to Moonjo. “I’m not waiting for you.”

It’s a vulnerable position to put himself in. He hopes it looks like an opening, like a temptation. He wants to catch Moonjo doing something that Jongwoo told him not to, just to prove that Moonjo is no different from anyone else who would find a weakness in him to exploit.

It might be too obvious. When Moonjo eventually peels back the covers and lies down, he puts a healthy distance between them. He settles into the mattress and lies so still for so long that Jongwoo’s tired brain could be made to believe he’s not even there, if not for the subtle signs of life somewhere close to him. The dip in the bed, the warmth of two bodies beneath the covers, the barely-audible sound of another person breathing in a dead quiet room.

Jongwoo lies awake waiting for Moonjo to touch and take beneath the veil of darkness. His senses are attuned to anything, even something as small as indulgent fingertips skirting across the planes of Jongwoo’s back. Stealing touches when he thinks he can get away with it. And when he does, Jongwoo will have something to throw back in his face.

The night wears on in complete silence. Moonjo doesn’t move.

Jongwoo rolls over onto his back and heaves a sigh. One of his hands rests on his stomach. The other is lying by his side, fingers spread wide.

His pinky finger touches something. A hand, maybe. Moonjo doesn't move. Jongwoo doesn't know why that makes his throat feel tight.

Chapter Text

The office looks different when Jongwoo returns after being suspended. The walls are pulsating like dark blue bruises. The lights are off and the curtains are half-drawn, casting squares of silver moonlight over the figure facing away from Jongwoo in the middle of the room. Khaki slacks, a too- expensive polo stretching over his shoulders, short clean hair sticking out over his nape and slightly disheveled like porcupine spikes.

It couldn’t be anyone but Jaeho. Jongwoo watches his posture shift slightly and his hands slip out of his pockets before he delivers a brutal kick to the lump of flesh on the floor.

The moonlight doesn’t reach that low. It’s almost impossible to make out the black-clad body lying broken across the tiles. Only the crimson glint of blood on his sallow features gives him any recognizable shape.

Jongwoo tuts in disapproval. “You killed my neighbor.”

Jaeho glances back at him with a sneer. “I’m just taking care of some trash. People like him are no good, Jongwoo-yah. You’ve got to watch out for them.”

Jongwoo steps forward, idly dragging his fingertips across the short bookshelf in front of the window. “You’re right, I guess.”

The boss is always right.

“He’s just as disgusting as the places he lives,” Jaeho looks back down at Moonjo in contempt. “Scum like this is better off gone, for the good of everyone else.”

There’s a wooden paperweight catching the blue hues of moonlight. It’s heavy in Jongwoo’s hand.

“I’m doing you a favor,” Jaeho says, grinding his heel down on Moonjo’s body like he has the right. “You’re lucky I'm here to bail you out again.”

“I don’t know what I’d do without you, hyung,” Jongwoo says, and swings hard enough to crack Jaeho’s skull.

Jaeho crumples into the void of darkness below, but Jongwoo isn’t done with him. He gets down on his knees and keeps swinging, swinging, swinging, until the darkness has turned red and the office finally has some color in it. He swings until Jaeho is long gone, and all he’s left with is bone and blood.

The end result is an improvement, he thinks.

Jongwoo is barely winded as he stares down at the two ruined bodies on the floor.

“You can get up now,” he tells Moonjo, because Moonjo isn’t dead. How could someone like Moonjo die?

“Don’t keep me waiting,” Jongwoo prompts. “Get up, you freak.” Still, Moonjo ignores him, obstinate and cruel.

“Come on,” Jongwoo shoves Moonjo’s shoulder, rolling his body over onto his back. “Stop playing games. I’m tired of it.”

The body beneath him is limp and heavy.

“Did you get bored of me already?” Jongwoo asks in contempt. “Am I not entertaining enough anymore?”

Moonjo doesn’t rebuke him. Finally quiet for once. Jongwoo pats his cheek. “You’re not being funny.” 

He’s not smiling, either.

“Get up,” Jongwoo pleads. “Please, I don’t have anything else left, you bastard. Get up!”

When Jongwoo’s fingers find Moonjo’s neck, it’s freezing cold.

“Oh,” Jongwoo says, slumping sideways off of the body. “You aren’t him.”

His Moonjo burns under his touch, looking as frigid as a corpse but blazing up like a matchbook for Jongwoo. He isn’t cold, never cold. This must be someone else. Another mistake of the eye. Jongwoo is seeing things, and his Moonjo will be back soon enough.

Jongwoo hugs his knees to his chest and bows his head low, blocking out the ugly sights of this office. He hates it here. The work and the people. But Moonjo will be here soon, bringing with him all sorts of problems for Jongwoo to deal with. And Jongwoo will deal with them in the way Moonjo likes best: with his fist and with his teeth.

He just needs to wait. And wait.

And wait.

And – oh, someone’s here.

Jongwoo’s head snaps up as the soft click of the door sends him careening straight out of the office, and into a warm hotel bed.

“Ah?” Jongwoo moans sleepily. “Ah…” 

“Jagiya?”

Jongwoo startles at the voice, and he rolls over to find Moonjo standing with one knee braced on the side of the bed. His hair is obscuring half of his face, and his skin seems to glow in the moonlight where it’s sticking out over the neck of his shirt.

It takes a minute for Jongwoo to figure out why that’s weird.

“Clothes?” he grunts like a confused caveman that only recently developed speech and is used to seeing schlongs swing around. “Wha–”

Moonjo glances down at himself in a strange and frenetic way, before pushing his hair off of his face. There’s a wild look in his eyes. He’s wide awake and buzzing like a livewire.

“What’s wrong?” Jongwoo asks, heartbeat stuttering. “Are we in trouble?” 

“Everything is fine,” Moonjo assures him.

“Then stop acting so weird,” Jongwoo complains, reaching out to tug on Moonjo’s wrist. “It’s too early.”

The second his fingers make contact with the other man’s skin, his heart drops.

“Why are your hands so cold?” Jongwoo shoots up, gripping both of Moonjo’s hands tight.

“I had to step out for a minute,” Moonjo says. “Do you know how beautiful you are?”

The sudden change in subject disarms the sleepy Jongwoo. “What? No–”

“You are,” Moonjo insists, squeezing Jongwoo’s fingers before moving his hands to cup Jongwoo’s face, making him gasp.

He’s fucking freezing.

“No, no,” Jongwoo whispers, just before Moonjo can land a kiss. Moonjo halts.

“No,” Jongwoo repeats, “You can’t be this cold, come here.”

Nothing feels more important right now than warming Moonjo up. Jongwoo drags him back under the covers, tucking the thick comforter around his body with sleepy, sluggish motions. Moonjo takes it in stride by lying still like a river rock and staring silently at everything Jongwoo does. He isn’t much help, but he also doesn’t stop Jongwoo from rubbing his arms and his hands and grumbling about how he needs to wear more layers if he’s going to go outside on an autumn night, for goodness sake.

It’s some time before sunrise. Three or four in the morning. Jongwoo tangles their arms and legs together so that he can feel the body next to him slowly heat up. He doesn’t fall asleep again until Moonjo’s hands aren’t so bitingly cold anymore.

-

The second time Jongwoo wakes up in that hotel room, he thinks he’s alone. The bed feels too big in its emptiness, all of the blankets cocooned around him where he rests in the center of the mattress. He rolls over and rubs the sleep out of his eyes to find Moonjo reading in a chair by the window where the heavy curtains are drawn.

Jongwoo stretches out and looks at Moonjo for a moment. “Where’d you get the book?”

“Bought it from a shop down the block when I stepped out for a smoke,” Moonjo says.

Only vaguely does Jongwoo remember their little encounter in the middle of the night. Moonjo’s cold hands, claiming he had to leave. Surely he wasn’t having a cigarette and buying books at four in the morning.

“Is it any good?” Jongwoo prompts after a moment, still curled up under the blankets with his face smooshed into the pillow.

“Not really,” Moonjo admits. “It’s science fiction that seems more interested in throwing jargon at me than telling a story.”

“Never took you for a sci-fi guy,” Jongwoo says, and lets that sit between them for a moment before adding, “You don’t actually like crime fiction, do you? Bringing up Raymond Chandler… That was way too on the nose.”

Moonjo smiles down at his book. It’s annoying, the way he’s refusing to look at Jongwoo. “I like crime fiction when it manages to surprise me.”

“But you were lying about liking the same author as me,” Jongwoo prods. “Weren’t you?”

Moonjo’s eyes finally shift away from the book, and Jongwoo fights the urge to pull the blankets up to his chin to hide his scandalously bare shoulders.

“I was familiar with his work,” Moonjo says, “In a round-about way. I’ve seen old movies based on them. Most of the dialogue went over my head, but I could still piece the stories together.”

Jongwoo barks a dry laugh. “Somehow, you watching foreign movies seems weirder than you liking sci-fi novels.”

Moonjo dog-ears the page he’s on and sets his book aside. He stares into the middle distance before he starts speaking, like he’s trying to recall something.

“Back when satellite TV was a thing,” he explains, “Ajumeoni’s husband knew a man who would ship him hacked cards to program the satellite dish at the orphanage. It gave him free access to global channels.”

Jongwoo whistles. “Sweet deal.”

“It was off-limits to the kids,” Moonjo says, and Jongwoo frowns. “But I didn’t like being told what to do, so I found ways to watch it anyway. The only channel I could ever find that interested me played nothing but black and white movies. I never read Raymond Chandler before meeting you, but I must have seen The Big Sleep half a dozen times before she caught me, and… Well.”

Moonjo rubs his thumb over the knuckles of his right hand. It looks like an involuntary motion, like he’s soothing an old ache.

“Her husband went blind a little while after that,” Moonjo says. “He didn’t need the satellite dish anymore.”

“This is a little backwards,” Jongwoo points out, trying to steer the conversation elsewhere. “Isn’t it?”

Moonjo tilts his head. “What?”

“The young guy is the one reading classic books,” Jongwoo says, “And the old guy is the one who’s only seen the movies.”

“I was young back then,” Moonjo reminds him.

Jongwoo struggles to imagine it: Moonjo with chubby cheeks and a mop of unruly hair falling over his forehead and into his round eyes. He could have looked innocent back then, in the way he looks innocent in the casual suits he wears to work. Whether or not he actually was innocent is a different story. It’s easier to think that devils like him are born rather than made.

The thought makes a quiet voice rasp through his head – that devil is certainly trying to make you into something.

Jongwoo shakes his head, and his phone pings from the bedside table. Moonjo watches Jongwoo reach out to tap the cracked screen so closely that he might as well be looming over Jongwoo right now. There’s a text from his mother waiting for him, but that’ll have to wait a second. Because his phone looks different, not just because there’s a giant gash bisecting it.

The selfie he took with Jieun is gone from his lock screen. In its place is a photo he only vaguely remembers snapping of the Seoul skyline on his first or second night here. He thought the lights were pretty, so he took a picture right on the rooftop of Eden.

Jongwoo refuses to give into the temptation to glance back at Moonjo. He won’t give the other man the gratification, so he opens the message from his mother instead.

“Always something,” Jongwoo sighs, unhappy but not surprised. 

Moonjo rises to his feet. “What is it?”

“Nothing,” Jongwoo drags a tired hand down his face and rereads the message. “Money problems.”

“How much do you need?”

“Not for me,” Jongwoo says, “Well, not yet. It’s my mom.” 

“Why is she asking you for more money?”

“She has no one else to ask when things like this pop up,” Jongwoo rubs his thumb over the crack in his phone screen. “Just me.”

What a pitiful position to be in. 

“Your father?” Moonjo prompts.

Jongwoo answers him with a wordless glare.

“Ah,” Moonjo says in understanding. “But is she good to you? When she’s not asking for money you don’t have, that is.”

“She’s my mother,” Jongwoo points out. 

“That doesn’t mean much,” Moonjo says.

“She’s a good mother,” Jongwoo says. “She got dealt a shitty hand in life, but she still does her best.”

Moonjo seems to consider that quietly for a moment while Jongwoo rakes through all his apps, ready to transfer the money.

“How much does she want?” Moonjo asks.

“Like 200k,” Jongwoo says, rubbing his forehead. “She always asks for less than she needs, though.”

“Double it,” Moonjo says, as if it’s that easy. And then – “Actually, just give me her information, I’ll send it over.”

Jongwoo gapes up at him. “No, you won’t.” 

“She needs it, doesn’t she?”

“I’m not going to be indebted to you,” Jongwoo insists.

“I won’t hold you to any debts,” Moonjo promises. “If your family in Busan is well taken care of, then they won’t need you to come running back to them.”

“Are you… Trying to buy me from my mother?” Jongwoo scowls. “Is this a psychopath’s version of a dowry? Fuck off, I can pay it myself.”

“If that’s what you want, fine,” Moonjo says, sounding put out. “But I think a psychopath’s version of a dowry would be a fair bit bloodier.”

“Tch,” Jongwoo finishes the transfer and tosses his phone back onto the bedside table. “You would know, wouldn’t you?”

“I’m not a psychopath,” Moonjo insists. “I’m just–” 

He smiles softly, like he’s proud of himself.

“I’m just not a good person.”

Jongwoo barks out a dry laugh. “Yeah? No shit.”

He isn’t convinced, but still it makes him wonder: if Moonjo isn’t a psychopath, then how did he become what he is? More to the point – how did Jongwoo become what he is?

Because Jongwoo doesn’t think of himself as a psychopath either, not really. If he wants to hurt people sometimes, that doesn’t make him crazy. Men like Moonjo, they make him like this. Men like Jaeho. Or Byeongmin.

If he thinks those bastards have it coming, who could blame him? He's not wrong for thinking that, he’s not, he’s not…

“Jagiya?”

Fingertips touch his forehead, brushing his bangs away from the bruise on his eyebrow. Jongwoo jerks his head away reflexively more than anything.

“You went pale.”

Jongwoo glances up at Moonjo, still standing with his fingers hovering close like he’s still savoring that short touch. Part of Jongwoo wants to lean forward again, to feel those fingertips on his skin.

To make sure Moonjo is still warm.

“I’m fine,” Jongwoo flops backwards against the pillows to resist that temptation. “Just let me savor this bed for a little while longer.”

At least until the ground feels steady under his feet again.

“Don’t take too long,” Moonjo says, rubbing his thumb and forefinger together. “We need to check out soon.”

Jongwoo glances back down at his phone and notices that it’s well into mid morning. “Shit, that’s right. Don’t you have work to do or something?”

“It’s still the weekend,” Moonjo points out. “My clinic is closed today, and I haven’t been thrown any emergency schedules.”

The weekend – this is supposed to be what Jongwoo looks forward to every day, a little pocket of leisure after a long week of working. It’s supposed to be the time he spends with Jieun, building their future together.

And now Jongwoo is spending it in a hotel room with his freaky neighbor. Might as well make the best of it.

“Do you have enough cash for another night?” he asks.

Moonjo’s eyebrow twitches in a barely-concealed expression of surprise. “Honey, we could live in this room if you wanted to.”

“I don’t need that much time,” Jongwoo says. “Just one more night.”

He leaves the rest unsaid – one more night to get this out of his system. One more night to indulge in this part of him before he locks it away forever and leaves Moonjo and this whole city behind now that there’s nothing here for him.

Yeah, right.

Jongwoo is horizontal again in no time. To his chagrin, he’s perfectly fine with it. More than fine with it – he instigated.

So much for bottoming for a man just to convince himself he doesn’t like it.

The amount of fooling around he’s done in the last week alone dwarfs everything that came before it. Like everything else, he blames it on Moonjo. The man has some kind of freaky incubus allure. He makes Jongwoo want to do nothing but fuck and fight, and the worst thing about him is that he indulges in that part of Jongwoo.

It’s as if Jongwoo is working out a lifetime of bottled-up tension thanks to this one guy.

The worst is what comes after. There’s no awkward silence, since Moonjo won’t give him a moment’s peace to stew in his own thoughts. And neither of them seems keen on slipping out once the afterglow brain-fog has lifted. That’s how this should end – a quiet tryst, and then radio silence from both sides. It was stupid to come here with a man like Moonjo in the first place.

Instead, Jongwoo lays flat on his stomach, too far gone to feel shy about the amount of bare skin between them, and brainstorms.

It reminds him of the way he and Seokyoon used to bounce ideas from their respective mediums off each other before Moonjo crash-landed back into their lives. Except those moments were always about contentment and company more than anything else – neither of them really cared about what the other was writing. They were just being polite. Friendly. Finding companionship wherever they could get it.

But Moonjo cares almost too much.

More importantly, he’s not afraid to say the kind of things that someone like Seokyoon would never even consider.

Sometimes it’s violence –

(“You have a nerve here,” he says, pressing unkind fingers into the dewey skin next to Jongwoo’s spine, digging in like he wants it to hurt, “That, if torn, won’t paralyze you in a technical sense, but your legs will become hypersensitive enough that moving them is too painful for most people to manage. No running. No walking. You wouldn’t even be able to crawl without debilitating pain.”

Jongwoo wiggles his butt like he’s trying to buck Moonjo’s hand away from him. It doesn’t work, not really, but he achieves a desired result anyway: Moonjo’s fingers are no longer probing his sore muscles, but instead flattening across his lower back. Touching him like he’s a velvet idol, soft and sacred.

“You know that from studying medicine, I’m sure,” Jongwoo mutters sarcastically.

“Of course,” Moonjo leans down to replace his mean fingers with soft lips, almost like an apology. “How else would I know?”

Jongwoo doesn’t dignify that with an answer.) 

Sometimes it’s pretentious –

(“When the throat is vivisected vertically, it almost looks like a skeletal angel. With the meat flanking the exposed cartilage and bone.”

“That’s gross.” 

“No, it’s beautiful.”

“No,” Jongwoo draws in a lungful of cigarette smoke, “I’m pretty sure it’s gross.”

This is a nonsmoking room, and they tried to respect that at first. But pulling their clothes back on to trudge all the way downstairs got old quick. The lights are dim, only a single bedside lamp illuminating the space, dreary daylight kept at bay with heavy curtains. It makes the whole room look nicotine-stained. For a second, Jongwoo considers asking Moonjo if he’s ever seen smoke coming out of someone’s throat when it’s cut open like that. He takes a deep drag and feels the roll of it filling his body with a hot haze that's too dry and bitter to be steam.

“I’ll show you sometime,” Moonjo promises. “Then you can judge.”)

But sometimes, in between the unsettling and macabre, it’s uncomfortably mundane.

“Glass cleaner,” Moonjo says.

Jongwoo quirks an eyebrow in disbelief. “Seriously?”

“The easiest way to get blood out of a leather car interior is with a glass cleaner,” Moonjo explains. “You don’t have to mix up a cocktail of cleaning products. Let’s not kill your protagonist with chlorine gas prematurely, jagi.”

“But what about the smell?” Jongwoo asks.

He’s lying on his side facing Moonjo, one hand propping his head up while the other fidgets restlessly. Scrunching the bedsheets between his fingers, drumming out faltering melodies on the mattress. Moonjo is lying next to him with his hair flopping across his face in chaos. Jongwoo’s fingers itch to brush it out of his eyes.

He doesn’t.

“I mean,” he says instead, “You can’t just air out the car once the body is gone, right? What if the smell seeps into the seats and keeps lingering afterwards.”

Moonjo hums in consideration. “As long as the body isn’t there for too long, I’ve heard that baking soda and peroxide works wonders. It makes a paste that will clear up most smells if it sits for a few hours. That, or vinegar usually helps as a last-ditch effort. People always underestimate vinegar.”

Jongwoo’s face scrunches up. “But vinegar stinks.” 

“Refuse and decomposition are much worse.”

And Jongwoo supposes that’s fair.

-

An orange glow curls its fingers around the borders of the drawn curtains like a rude reminder of the world outside. There are hundreds of people on this block, thousands in this neighborhood, millions in this city. They do what’s expected of them. They chase trends and wear calluses into their hands trying to cling to their place in the social ladder.

Jongwoo’s own hands are battered all to hell. The bandages are gone and the cut is as ugly as it ever was. The inflammation has gone down, but the scab is long and dark like a black mark. Jongwoo can’t imagine his skin ever looking smooth and clean there again.

Moonjo doesn’t seem to mind it as he examines it in the muted illumination of the bedside lamps. It would be better to do this in the bathroom, but nothing about Moonjo’s care is conventional. He runs his fingers over the ruined skin with a touch that belongs in a bed.

The low simmer of sunset burns just outside. It’ll be nighttime soon, and another day will have turned over before they know it. They’ll have to leave this place eventually. Jongwoo can’t hide in here forever, staring at Moonjo’s downturned face through the curtain of his bangs as the other man examines his wound like he wants to rip it open wider and crawl inside.

They’re going to have to walk out of here eventually, two whole and separate creatures. They can’t just break each other open and sink into each other like water. They have to leave soon. They have to leave. 

But not right now.

Jongwoo yanks his hand back and uses it to grip Moonjo’s chin, tipping his face up so suddenly that Jongwoo can hear the uncomfortable click of Moonjo’s teeth. Moonjo doesn’t look angry about it. He looks intrigued.

“Can I do something?” Jongwoo asks. “I don’t know if you’ll like it.”

Moonjo is leaning into his touch, stressing the healing edges of the wound. “There are very few things I wouldn’t like from you.”

“Then,” Jongwoo swallows around the dryness of his throat, “Turn over. Get on your knees.”

It’s easiest like that, after all. That’s what Moonjo had said. But Moonjo has different ideas for himself. He winds up sprawled on his back, arms overhead like they’re tied there, legs wide open around Jongwoo’s hips. His head is turned to one side, teeth worrying the skin of his bicep as Jongwoo drives into him.

It might hurt. Jongwoo isn’t quite as tender and careful as Moonjo was with him, but Moonjo doesn’t seem to mind. He soaks up every unkind motion of Jongwoo’s body, mouth wet and split open on wordless praises.

Jongwoo can’t resist the urge to dip down and bite into the red swell of Moonjo’s lower lip. It seems to be something Moonjo was waiting for, because his hands slip from their self-imposed bondage and fall on Jongwoo’s body to dig their claws in deep. They thread into his hair, scraping over his scalp when he fails to find leverage in the short sweat- humid strands. They rake down his back, cutting pink lines that’ll burn when sweat rolls down in their wake.

Moonjo is trying to make ribbons of him, and Jongwoo lets it happen as he fucks deeper and kisses harder, taking everything Moonjo will offer him.

And Moonjo offers him a lot.

He’s tight and desperate. His body arches and rolls like he’s trying to draw Jongwoo closer, not force him out. It shouldn’t be surprising when Moonjo’s ankles cross behind Jongwoo, locking his legs around him, but it still makes Jongwoo feel halfway insane. Moonjo needs him closer, closer, until there’s nothing left for Jongwoo to do but bow his head into Moonjo’s neck and bite down like a wild animal going in for the kill.

In return, Moonjo’s legs tighten around him like the fatal embrace of a python. An eye for an eye, it’s only fair for them to give and take in equal measure.

When they’re done, bodies past their limits as they lie in a dewy heap licking each other’s wounds, Jongwoo feels like he’s been unmade somehow. Like Moonjo found a loose string on him the day they met and has been pulling at it all this time, letting Jongwoo unravel before him.

Jongwoo can’t stop kissing him long after he’s spent, can’t keep his hands off of Moonjo’s body. Thumbs touching the dark circles under his eyes, fingernails cataloging the texture of every scar he can see.

He kisses Moonjo’s pliant mouth like eventually the red pout of it will finally taste as bloody as it looks.

But eventually, the madness ebbs and wanes. Moonjo pulls away from him, leaving a kiss on Jongwoo’s knuckles when Jongwoo whines and tries to drag him back down. And then he disappears into the bathroom, leaving Jongwoo all alone in the middle of that big bed.

On the bedside table, Jongwoo’s phone pings. He scowls over at it for a minute before it pings again, and he finally drags himself over to grab it.

That’s where Moonjo finds him a few moments later – sitting on the side of the bed with his hands on his knees and his shoulders shaking with every ragged breath he takes.

The fact that the sight doesn’t alarm Moonjo at all only makes Jongwoo feel worse. Moonjo stares at him placidly for a moment before dropping down in front of Jongwoo, resting his head on Jongwoo’s knee as he gazes up at him with inquiring eyes.

“Let’s hear it, jagi,” he prompts. “What happened this time?”

“Don’t play stupid, jagi,” Jongwoo spits Moonjo’s words from last night back in his face. “I think you know what happened.”

Moonjo’s gaze doesn’t waver. “I want to hear you say it.”

“What do you want to hear?” Jongwoo mocks. “You want me to thank you? You want me to fuck you? You want me to tell you how grateful I am?”

“All I want,” Moonjo says in his steady drawl, “Is to hear you say it.” 

Jongwoo takes a deep breath and barks, “Jaeho is dead.”

It happened sometime early in the morning, when the city was sleeping and the dark sky was frigidly cold. Robbery gone wrong, from the look of things.

Yeah fucking right.

The mask cracks, and Moonjo’s mouth twitches. “Oh. Rich boys should learn some restraint. It’s not a good idea to flash those car keys around wherever he goes.”

“How…” Jongwoo presses his fingertips to his temples, trying to get the room to stop spinning, “Why? What made you think that was a good idea?”

“Mm, maybe it was… Hasty,” Moonjo says, like he’s disappointed in himself. “But I don’t regret it. And I don’t think you need to worry about anything.”

“I don’t need to worry?” Jongwoo nearly laughs in hysterical disbelief. “My boss is dead! How did you find him? I don’t even know where he lives, he never fucking bothered to tell me!”

“Do you think I spent the month since Eden burned down sitting around?” Moonjo asks. “I’ve had a lot of work to do.”

“You can’t keep doing this,” Jongwoo says, voice wavering. “No more, please.”

“I had to, sooner or later,” Moonjo tries to reason with him. “A man like that wouldn’t just let you walk away after wounding his pride.”

“But why do you care?” Jongwoo explodes, grabbing Moonjo’s face in both of his hands and shaking him a little like he could shake the end of these stupid riddles right out of his stupid head.

“I thought it was obvious,” Moonjo says, making no move to push Jongwoo’s hands off of him.

“Nothing about you is obvious!”

Moonjo lowers his eyes, like that upsets him. “Why do you think? I want you to come up with a few reasons, and pick the one that scares you the most.”

Jongwoo buries the fingers of one hand in Moonjo’s long hair, tugging a little, trying to make it hurt. “Because he hit you. He threatened to sue you.”

Moonjo tuts. “Do better.”

“Because he hit me,” Jongwoo tries again. “You think you’re the only one allowed to make my life hell, so this is another insane game of yours. Staking your claim, like with Seokyoon.”

Moonjo only blinks at him, slow and patient. “That’s a fun idea. But not quite right.”

Jongwoo digs his fingers into Moonjo’s scalp, scratching his blunt nails across his skin as they trail down Moonjo’s cheekbone, to his chin.

“Because I…”

Moonjo grasps Jongwoo’s wrist and turns his head just enough to press a gentle kiss to the wound on his palm. “Go on.”

“I,” Jongwoo’s voice feels brittle in his mouth as he admits, “I wanted to kill him. I wanted to smash his fucking head in. Yesterday, and… And before that. A long time before that. That’s why you did it. You knew I wanted to kill him. Just like how you knew I wanted those bastards at Eden dead. You killed all of them because – because I wanted it. Fuck, I wanted it.”

Moonjo closes his eyes and takes a deep, satisfied breath. He’s still grasping Jongwoo’s wrist, still leaning into the hand on his cheek. “And why would I do that? What’s the scariest reason you can think of?”

“Because you,” Jongwoo is practically whispering now. He can’t say it –

Because you love me.

“I’m gonna be sick,” he says, and shoves Moonjo off of him so he can rush to the bathroom.

The linoleum is hard against his knees as he wretches so hard that his ribs ache. Everything he’s eaten today, all that classy hotel restaurant food they’ve been ordering on Moonjo’s dime, it’s all purged out of him through waves upon waves of what he can only describe as terror as the too-white walls of this tiny room close in around him.

At least now he knows that he was never truly afraid of Moonjo, not before this.

He’s naked and trembling on the bathroom floor when Moonjo kneels down behind him, pushing his hair off his forehead and leaving his hand there like he’s testing his temperature.

“That scary, huh?”

“Please,” Jongwoo groans, “Shut up.”

Moonjo laughs against his shoulder, actually laughs like the horrible asshole he is. “Wait here.”

As if Jongwoo can even walk right now. His legs feel like rubber and his head is spinning as he slumps hard against the side of the bathtub. The lights in here are too bright, too blue. He squeezes his eyes shut and presses his thumbs against the lids just to watch dull reds sparks dance across his vision.

He read once that what we understand as love can be attributed to specific chemical messages traveling through nerves and blood. Moonjo wants to fuck him because testosterone tells him to. The dopamine he gets from messing with Jongwoo keeps him hooked. Adrenaline is the reason why his sallow skin flushes on occasion. All of his hungry touches are just oxytocin acting up.

That’s all, Jongwoo tells himself as he grips his own shoulders, hugging himself like a frightened child. Moonjo can love, just like anyone else. It doesn’t have to mean anything. It’s crossed wires, mixed signals. When the hormones and chemicals grow dull, he’ll get bored of Jongwoo and throw him away.

No more invasive attention. No more firm hands touching him like every inch of his body has something to offer. No more eyes watching him close, eager to see what he does next, even when everyone else looks away.

Jongwoo stares down at the white floor, feeling numbness creep across his scalp. He stays like that until Moonjo reappears in front of him, looking stupid and harmless in a hotel bathrobe that matches the one balled up in his hands.

Jongwoo glares up at him. “Why did it have to be you?”

Moonjo’s face gives nothing away. “You should get up off the floor.” 

“I don’t want to.”

Moonjo approaches him, and Jongwoo doesn’t move an inch. This just might be the part where the chemicals fizzle out and Moonjo beats him to death for being such an unlovable asshole. Alas, all Moonjo does is wrap the spare robe around his shoulders, lifting his limp dead weight away from the bathtub just long enough to cover him in the soft drape of it.

“Aren’t you sweet?” Jongwoo sneers. He means for it to be sarcastic and cutting, but the words wobble on the way out. “Go get me my phone.”

“What are you going to do with it?” Moonjo asks.

“Answer the text from my coworker,” Jongwoo says, “So I can make her think I’m surprised.”

Moonjo must find that acceptable. He rises to his feet and disappears again, before returning to dangle the phone in front of Jongwoo’s nose. The motion of it illuminates his home screen, and the view from Eden’s rooftop stares back at him.

“And don’t change people’s phone settings without asking them,” Jongwoo scolds, wiping at the corner of his eye and swiping the phone out of Moonjo's hand. “It’s rude.”

“Right, right,” Moonjo says, turning away to fiddle with something on the sink countertop.

It takes Jongwoo a minute to draft a text that sounds appropriately alarmed, but not guilty. He tacks on a second message to tell her to be safe. That feels… Normal. For as well versed as he is in writing about murder, this kind of social interaction is outside his realm of experience.

When he puts his phone back down, Moonjo is holding a cup out to him. Jongwoo wants to make a snide comment about how Moonjo probably wouldn’t like kissing him now, but his mouth tasting like death is unfortunately terrible for Jongwoo, too. So he accepts it.

“I need to run an errand–”

Jongwoo nearly chokes, scrambling to spit the water out into the toilet. “No. No!”

“An actual errand,” Moonjo assures him, “To the corner store down the block. I shouldn’t be more than fifteen or twenty minutes.”

“You’re leaving?” Jongwoo asks in a rush. “But, aren’t you–”

Aren’t you afraid I’ll run away?

Maybe he hadn’t even considered it, thinking that Jongwoo is too weak and docile now. He doesn’t look very worried as he strolls out of the room with a parting, “I’ll be back soon.”

“I swear to god,” Jongwoo calls out, “If you hurt anyone else–”

Moonjo swings back around the edge of the doorframe with his eyebrows raised, daring Jongwoo to hurl a threat at him.

“Just get out of here,” Jongwoo shoos him. “Go.”

It takes Moonjo a minute to pull his clothes back on before the hotel room door swings open, and then falls shut. Jongwoo holds very still, listening out for any movement, any sign that Moonjo faked him out and is still in the room.

Crawling forwards slowly, Jongwoo peers out of the bathroom. Moonjo isn’t here. Jongwoo is alone.

He scrambles back to the bathtub and picks his phone up off the floor and dials three numbers: 112.

He has no real evidence. Does he need any? He could just call the police to drop an anonymous tip. Tell them to sift through the ashes of Eden. To look into the identity of Seo Moonjo. To comb Shin Jaeho’s apartment for any follicles of thick, long hair that may have fallen from a certain dentist’s head. To look for Jongwoo’s blood all over the bodies from two nights ago, far more than any self-defense would ever warrant.

Two nights, two nights. It feels like two years. Now he has no job, no girlfriend, no friends, no future that he can discern clearly in front of him.

He only has Moonjo. And after whatever the hell happened at Eden Moonjo only has him.

You know exactly what happened, a cruel voice whispers in the back of his mind. And you're glad for it.

Jongwoo’s thumb hovers over the call button for thirty seconds. Sixty seconds. Three minutes. Five minutes.

Ten minutes.

Moonjo will be back soon, and Jongwoo’s eyes are getting tired from staring at the illuminated screen of his phone for so long. Three simple numbers and a few difficult words. If he makes it quick, he could probably flee the hotel before Moonjo comes back. Better yet, he could leave now and call the police later. With any luck, Moonjo would be taken into custody before he could track Jongwoo back down again.

He would have no choice but to finally leave Jongwoo alone. Desperately, miserably alone.

The screen dims, as it has over and over for these last ten minutes. But this time, Jongwoo doesn’t tap it to reilluminate it. He stares at that three digit number until the screen goes black.

He turns his phone off. He reaches up to sit it face-down on the edge of the sink. He leans back against the bathtub, and lets the horrible weight of solitude close in on him.

It’s another ten full minutes before Jongwoo hears the hotel door open and close quietly. The crinkle of a plastic bag accompanies soft footfalls traveling across the room before Moonjo steps into the sterile light of the bathroom.

“Took you long enough,” Jongwoo says.

“Did you sit there the whole time I was out?” Moonjo asks. Jongwoo nods.

Moonjo hums quietly in acknowledgement before sitting the bag down on the countertop. He pulls out a pack of clean underwear, but no other clothes. A bottle of mouthwash. Shampoo, conditioner, and soap. Two toothbrushes. Shaving cream and a disposable razor to tend to the ghost of stubble growing around his mouth. He must not like the toiletries provided by the hotel. Then comes the antiseptic cream and adhesive bandages.

“I should have done this earlier,” he says, almost apologetic as he kneels in front of Jongwoo. As if they don’t have more pressing things to discuss than the cut on Jongwoo’s palm. He’s wearing his usual all-black ensemble, and Jongwoo wishes he’d strip back down into that stupid robe again. If only so they can be on equal footing.

Jongwoo just wants to feel like someone else is the same as him right now.

“Can I take a bath first?” Jongwoo asks. Moonjo glances up at him. “I mean – I really need one, and I don’t want to get the bandages wet.”

“Makes sense,” Moonjo concedes. 

“Take a bath with me.”

It’s not an offer, it’s an order. Moonjo seems to recognize it as such. He stands up and leans forward, crowding Jongwoo’s body as he turns the bathtub faucet. His thigh is right in front of Jongwoo’s face, nearly bonking him in the nose. Their sense of space has become so fucked up with each other. They might as well occupy the same exact place like a pair of ghosts overlapping.

Jongwoo really can’t be blamed for giving into the overwhelming desire to lean forward, and bite.

“Ah– augh!”

And a punch in the leg for good measure. Hearing Moonjo make pained noises never gets old. Watching him swivel on his foot to sit on the edge of the tub and stretch out his poor assaulted leg is worth it, too.

“Hope that gives you a dead leg, asshole,” Jongwoo grumbles, shrugging the robe off his shoulders and reaching for one of those toothbrushes on the counter to kill time while the tub fills.

The water in the goshiwon showers is lukewarm on a good day. At the beginning of the month, when the days were still hot, it was a blessing. After tonight, it might not cut it anymore.

“Ah, ah…” Jongwoo sighs as he sinks into the hot water. “You tore my back to pieces.”

“Sorry about that,” Moonjo says from his side of the tub, not sounding sorry at all as he rubs the spot on his own thigh that Jongwoo punched.

The air is thick with steam. Jongwoo finds it hard to focus as he scrutinizes the man across from him, leaning his head back against the wall with his eyes closed. He looks completely relaxed, despite everything. Jongwoo wonders if he has nightmares. There must be a chemical reaction to cause that.

“You’re staring,” Moonjo says, eyes still closed.

“I was wondering how you live with yourself,” Jongwoo says honestly.

Moonjo opens his eyes slightly, gazing at Jongwoo through lowered lashes. “Why? Looking for pointers?”

Jongwoo swallows. “It’s just a lot, isn’t it? The guys from the other night, and now Jaeho…”

“I assure you,” Moonjo says, “I’m not usually this productive. You’ve been keeping me busy.”

“Don’t call it being productive,” Jongwoo sighs, sinking deeper into the water. “I just started to calm down, come on.”

“I’ll work on my terminology,” Moonjo promises, “But things should… Even out, soon.”

“They better.”

“Just one more loose end,” Moonjo says.

“No,” Jongwoo's annoyed groan echoes in the bathroom. “No more!”

Moonjo smiles in a way that makes his front teeth peek out, looking far too proud of himself. “Are you sure? I think you’ll like it.”

“We have a truce right now,” Jongwoo says, lifting his hand out of the water with a dribbling splash to point it menacingly at Moonjo, “But if you drag the wrong person into this, you’ll regret it.”

Moonjo nods to himself before leaning forward, pushing into Jongwoo’s personal space. “I won’t hurt your mother. We’ve already decided the young man from 310 is off limits. Your girlfriend – sorry, ex -girlfriend, I’d rather not see her again if I can help it. Those would all be the wrong person, right?”

“Right,” Jongwoo says firmly.

Moonjo nods again. “I think I can work around that.” 

“You’d better.”

“Or what?” Moonjo teases. “You’ll kill me?”

“Who knows if a devil like you can even die,” Jongwoo shoots back.

Moonjo goes quiet at that, all the cruel mirth draining from his face. “You have no idea what you're capable of. You almost killed me already, once.”

Jongwoo lifts an eyebrow. “Shame I don’t remember it.”

Moonjo scratches his forehead. The gesture looks almost nervous as he pushes his hair out of his face, leaving an awkward track of it damp with his wet hand.

“The night you left Eden,” he says, “I felt sick. I’ve always felt sick. But that night, I thought I might die.”

Jongwoo eyes him warily for a moment. “Because we left?”

It feels stupid to ask. Presumptuous. As if he could have that much effect on anybody’s life.

“Because you left,” Moonjo says it like an accusation. “You.”

Jongwoo is starting to feel a little sick himself. “But you didn’t die. Everyone else did.”

“They didn’t die, either,” Moonjo corrects him. “They were killed.”

A car honks down on the street below. The sink faucet drips idly. Moonjo finally confesses to the Eden murders. And the earth keeps spinning.

Jongwoo tries to feel fear, as if he can will gooseflesh to spread across his skin or force his heart rate to get with the program and start pounding like a cornered rabbit. This is what he’s been waiting for, after all. The confirmation that he was right all along, and everyone else was wrong for acting like he was being too sensitive.

All the confessions lately must have dulled Jongwoo’s senses. “You stink,” he declares bluntly, cupping his hands in the water and dumping it over Moonjo’s head. “Why are we sitting here letting the bathwater get dirty? I haven’t showered in like two days.”

Moonjo grips his wrist and tugs him forward, making the water slosh around them like tempestuous waves.

“But do you understand what I’m saying?” Moonjo asks, looking a little silly as he tries to be all creepy and serious with half of his hair plastered down wetly.

“Yeah, yeah, your riddles are starting to make more sense,” Jongwoo shakes him off. “I don’t have anywhere to run off to, thanks to you. So you can relax. I’m not gonna ditch you again. Come here, and relax.”

Jongwoo drags Moonjo forward, pressing their bodies together. Moonjo, ironically, seems to be left out-of-sorts by Jongwoo’s total non-reaction. He moves wherever Jongwoo wants him, lanky limbs causing all sorts of problems for them, while Jongwoo braces a hand on his lower back.

“Lean back,” Jongwoo prompts. “Get your hair wet so we can wash it.”

“Surely there’s a better way to do this,” Moonjo says, casting a meaningful glance at the detachable spray arm.

“Well, this is my way,” Jongwoo says. “You can do it, or I really will leave.”

His other hand finds the back of Moonjo’s head, cradling it in preparation. Moonjo looks back at him hard, unblinking, and seems to understand. The tension in his body softens, his eyelids droop, and he gives Jongwoo a nod like this is okay. Everything is okay.

Jongwoo doesn’t hesitate.

He dips Moonjo low while Moonjo closes his eyes and tips his head back into the hand cradling the base of his skull. His hair touches the water, and he draws in a sharp lungful of air just as Jongwoo tightens his grip and drags him under. The hand on Moonjo’s lower back slides up and around his chest, the hand on the back of his head slips around to touch his throat.

He’s at Jongwoo’s mercy here, held down under the water, and he doesn’t fight it at all.

Jongwoo’s hands are steadier than he expected as he watches Moonjo’s hair sway weightlessly, obscuring his features and turning the water black like a thick plume of coagulated blood. He’s a faceless monster, a terrible thing that’s done terrible things. Jongwoo should kill him right now, just like this. He’d be doing the world a favor by making Moonjo join his old cult, or family, or whatever they were to him. Stabbing them in the back so he can chase his death under Jongwoo’s hands should earn him a place in hell alongside them.

“I’m not like them,” Jongwoo says, knowing that Moonjo can’t hear him. “I’m not like any of those freaks at Eden.”

A bubble of air escapes from Moonjo’s nose. Both of his hands have found Jongwoo’s arms, fingernails digging in hard as he resists the animal urge to struggle.

“So if you plan on leaving me after all this,” Jongwoo says through the suffocating tightening of his own throat, “If you get bored and try to throw me away, I’ll make your life hell.”

The bubbles are coming quicker now. Moonjo’s body is twitching, survival instincts fighting against the desire to submit. His lungs must be on fire.

“I need you,” Jongwoo admits. “If you leave, then I’m alone. So either keep me, or I promise you, I’ll make you wish I killed you right here.”

He drags Moonjo back up far more violently than he pushed him under. Moonjo doesn’t sputter and cough like he expects, but he does gasp. His chest is heaving and his hands are like iron clamps, gripping Jongwoo’s arms like he’s afraid he’ll slip back under any second. There are a few strands of hair sticking to his face like black, rotten veins. Jongwoo uses one hand to push them away, leaving behind nothing but clean droplets of water on Moonjo’s face.

He looks different like this, when Jongwoo can see all of him.

“Ahjussi,” Jongwoo says, still looming over Moonjo, “Be careful. You could have drowned.”

Moonjo is panting hard, staring up at Jongwoo with dark, unfocused eyes. Sometimes a monster is just a man, and a man is just a body. Nothing but bones and meat running on chemical reactions. Dopamine, oxytocin.

What chemical is linked to fear, Jongwoo wonders? Whatever it is, it’s in short supply in this room. The clawlike fingers on Jongwoo’s arms creep upward in hungry motions, until Moonjo is touching Jongwoo’s face and looking at him like he wants Jongwoo to push him back under again.

The water here might as well be infinite, but neither of them will be getting clean any time soon.

-

In the morning, they get dressed in their days-old clothes and leave.

They’re whole, and they’re separate, but they walk step-in-step the entire way back to the building they call home for lack of anything better. It feels good to stretch their legs.

When they get back, the dingy rooms of the old goshiwon feel even more oppressive after spending two nights hidden away in a hotel room. They sleep separately, and Jongwoo can’t help but feel like he’s being toyed with again. Moonjo has the key, he has the desire, and yet Jongwoo stares at the wall at night and listens to the other man crawl into bed on the other side.

He wonders if Moonjo is testing him again, trying to push him into instigating. But Jongwoo won’t approach him for anything but a single late- night conversation at the rickety common table in the kitchen, spoken so thickly in code that it’s probably incomprehensible to anyone who might overhear them. The first break in their twenty-four hour cold war comes when Jongwoo gets notified about Jaeho’s memorial service.

Jongwoo does not want to go to Jaeho’s memorial service.

It’s not that he’s paranoid to show his face because of the nature of Jaeho’s death. No, he and Moonjo were promptly questioned thanks to their little public slap fight with him hours before he was killed. But the only video evidence they could find was some SNS post with a video of Jaeho hitting Moonjo, not the other way around. Besides, the receptionist at the hotel confirmed they checked in that night and were in contact with hotel staff for things like room service throughout the weekend.

And who could forget the noise complaints.

Having a police officer confirm his alibi through earwitness accounts of him getting railed over the course of two days is not something Jongwoo ever wants to experience again. 

Honestly, Jongwoo has no idea how Moonjo managed to slip in and out so quickly. But then again, he does know that wasn’t Moonjo’s first time. He’s had practice with this sort of thing, it would seem.

Anyway, no, that’s not the reason Jongwoo wants to ghost the memorial service.

It’s because Moonjo wants to go.

“You need someone by your side during this period of grieving,” Moonjo says, and Jongwoo bites down the urge to strangle him with one of the argyle old man socks he’s slipping up his ankles beneath his smart slacks.

“What’s your ulterior motive?” he asks. “You always have an ulterior motive.”

“Maybe I just want to see my handiwork,” Moonjo says.

“He’s already ashes,” Jongwoo points out, “And even if he wasn’t, it would be a closed-casket viewing. Because you fucked his face up.”

“A corpse is only one component of a broader piece of art,” Moonjo explains.

“There is something deeply wrong with you,” Jongwoo rebukes. 

They go to the memorial service anyway.

Moonjo is dressed rather blandly in the same clothes he goes to work in, just a plain black and white suit sans tie. He’s put together for sure, but a keen eye might notice traces of dishevelment in the worn threads at his knees, where the fabric appears thinner under the bright lights in the viewing room. Jongwoo, by contrast, is wearing a scruffy department store button down and jeans.

A keen eye might see something a bit more alarming: off-color stains at his collar where a bleach pen couldn’t quite get the last of the blood out.

“Goodness, already drunk,” Moonjo notes quietly, taking in the solemn figures slumped over the low tables.

“They’re in mourning,” Jongwoo whispers. The room is too quiet for Moonjo to be talking shit. “Let them drown their sorrows.”

“Anything for free soju,” Moonjo says, and Jongwoo weighs the pros and cons of smacking him right now before deciding against it.

They pay their respects properly, and it feels like a mockery. The warm smile on Jaeho's face in the photo on the altar does nothing to make his eyes look less sly, less knowing. It makes Jongwoo feel like a trespasser here.

Discomfort pulls at the back of his mind like a hangnail he can't stop picking at until it's seeping with blood.

That’s your conscience, he reminds himself, palms damp with sweat.

“I’ll be back,” he says, excusing himself to rush off to the bathroom. Leaving Moonjo unsupervised is probably stupid, but he only needs a moment to screw his head back on straight.

He uses the bathroom, and washes his hands for long enough that Moonjo has to know he’s stalling. There’s a wide mirror in front of him, and he’s afraid to look up into it. All he can see in his peripheral vision is the bottom half of his shirt, and his own hands twisting beneath the water.

The reflection moves without his permission, but he holds his ground. The hands on the other side touch the glass with probing fingertips before pushing through to the other side, reaching out and turning the faucet off for him.

“You’re wasting water,” his reflection chides. “Stop hiding and go face what you did.”

“I didn’t do anything,” Jongwoo argues in a small voice, still staring down into the whirlpool of water that swirling endlessly in the sink. “I’m not responsible for what that freak does.”

“That freak did it all for you,” the reflection reminds him, pressing fingernails into the back of Jongwoo’s hand and trailing them up his forearm. “And you’re still here with him, letting him follow you around like a stray dog. Anyone would think you like it.”

“I don’t!” Jongwoo snaps his head up, and finds his own wide eyes looking back at him.

His ears are ringing. The faucet is still running. A quick, uncoordinated shuffling of feet heralds the arrival of another person, and Jongwoo scrambles to turn the sink off.

“Who invited y-you?” 

Oh hell no.

“Don’t start with me,” Jongwoo warns, shaking his hands dry and yanking at the paper towel dispenser.

“You think you can show up here with that pitiful face like nothing happened,” Byeongmin preaches at him. He’s wearing a black suit. The sleeves are too short. “Everyone knows what you did, f-fighting with your superior in the street. Acting all cute isn’t going to save you anymore.”

Jongwoo absently wipes the remaining wetness from his hands on the hem of his shirt as he turns toward Byeongmin. “You talk too much.”

Byeongmin draws in a deep breath and shakes his head, like he can’t believe Jongwoo would have the nerve to say that. “I don’t know what he ever saw in a guy like you. Hiring you – hiring you was the worst mistake he ever made! Ever since you came here, you’ve been nothing but – nothing but trouble.”

“Are you trying to piss me off?” Jongwoo asks through gritted teeth, taking a step towards the other man. “What kind of a dumbass picks a fight at a memorial service?”

“S-see?” Byeongmin takes a nervous step back, but keeps running his mouth like an idiot. “That pretty face is just an act. I know your type, alright. I know all about people like you.”

This feels a hell of a lot like being trapped in the hallway of that burned- down goshiwon. “With the way you’re running your mouth, it’s like you want me to kill you.”

Byeongmin’s eyes widen.

“Jongwoo-ssi.”

Both men turn to look at the figure looming in the doorway, standing casually with his hands in his pockets like he was enjoying the show.

“Is there something wrong?” Moonjo asks, stepping forward into the tense air of the small bathroom, making every breath feel as heavy as lead.

He’s looking at Jongwoo like there’s nobody else in the room, eyes warm and lidded. A chill creeps across Jongwoo’s scalp. He must have heard, he must have.

Byeongmin shakes his head again and tries to leave with a huff, stopping short when Moonjo makes a noise in his throat and raises a hand.

“I don’t believe we’re acquainted,” Moonjo says, glancing down his nose at Byeongmin. “Do you know Jongwoo-ssi well?”

“This is my senior from work,” Jongwoo says quickly, desperate to get the words out. “Park Byeongmin.”

“Ah,” Moonjo says, mouth smiling while his eyes are completely blank. “I see. Thank you for taking good care of our Jongwoo-ssi.”

“I won’t anymore,” Byeongmin says with his head down and his hands balled at his sides, leaving the room in a huff.

Jongwoo listens to his footsteps echo into the ambient noise beyond the bathroom. Through the silence, Moonjo stares at him like he’s waiting for something.

“What are you thinking?” Jongwoo asks, accusatory.

Moonjo takes a swaying step towards him and brushes his bangs away from his still-bruised brow. “I’m thinking that your hair is getting long.”

Jongwoo slaps the hand away. “You know what I’m talking about.”

Moonjo raises his eyebrows. “Do I? Whatever it is, it sounds like you’re thinking about it, too.”

“The only thing I’m thinking is that we need to leave,” Jongwoo says, walking away from the other man. “I didn’t even want to come here!”

“But isn’t it nice to catch up with old colleagues?” Moonjo asks, following him out.

Jongwoo wishes this bathroom had a door so that he could slam it in Moonjo’s face.

-

One week after being suspended from his job, Jongwoo finds temporary work to fill his time and keep money coming in.

“Jongwoo-oppa – can I call you oppa? The red apron looks cute on you!”

… At the café he dumped Jieun at.

He honestly didn’t think they’d actually hire him when he returned one day while Moonjo was away at work, just to get a change of scenery, and saw the Seasonal Help Urgently Wanted sign. He figured causing a fuss last week would put him straight into their bad books, but it’s not like he has anything left to lose at this point.

Nobody seemed to give a shit or even remember it, though, aside from a younger girl who rubs his arms like they’re friends and looks at him with sympathy when she tries to bring it up. Most of his coworkers are college students. His manager is younger than Moonjo. And when he awkwardly tells them that he already has a degree and is just stuck between jobs right now, they tut and sigh and tell him that’s too bad.

Their pity gets under his skin, but the discount on coffee makes up for it. Plus, he really likes the funny little cat-shaped sandwiches.

He works shorter and much more hectic shifts than he did under Jaeho, but his hourly wage is actually slightly higher. It should even out to him bringing nearly the same amount home every pay period, and discovering that makes Jongwoo curse Seo Moonjo for killing Jaeho before Jongwoo could do it himself.

“Paying in experience my ass,” Jongwoo mutters under his breath late in the evening one night, stabbing the bottom of his takeout container like it's personally responsible for all his problems.

“That’s how they get you,” Seokyoon agrees vaguely, nodding along, and Jongwoo has to bite his tongue to keep from asking how the hell Seokyoon would know what entry-level corporate jobs are like.

They’re not hanging out, not really. They just happened to be in the kitchen at the same time and Seokyoon started saying things, because Seokyoon always has something to say. There’s definitely an air of awkwardness around them, and they don’t fall into the comfortable routine of shallow company as easily as before.

But Seokyoon doesn’t know how to leave well enough alone, until someone makes him.

“Are you two having a nice talk?”

Seokyoon’s eyes snap towards the doorway, looking like a kid who got caught doing something they weren’t supposed to do. Jongwoo glances sidelong at him before looking at Moonjo.

“Ahjussi,” he calls out, ignoring the question, “Do you think it’s right for internships to pay less than coffee shop jobs? No wonder students are struggling to break into the workforce.”

“Sounds like you’ve got a lot weighing on your mind, honey,” Moonjo says, placing a plastic bag on the table between the two men with a solid thunk that rings out like a declaration.

“Uh,” Seokyoon smiles crookedly and looks back and forth between the two men, neither of which are looking at him, “I uh, just remembered I have to be somewhere tomorrow morning. I better make it an early night.”

Seokyoon ducks out of the kitchen like he’s fleeing for his life, disappearing from sight before Moonjo can get another word in. In return, Moonjo drops down into the newly-vacated seat before the other man is even fully out of the room.

“Now he’s afraid of you,” Jongwoo sighs. “After everything, he finally gets it.”

“I don’t think that was fear,” Moonjo says, pulling two beers out of the bag and passing one off to Jongwoo. “It was embarrassment.”

“Ugh, whatever,” Jongwoo peels back the tab with a satisfying hiss. “Why are you out so late, anyway? Doing freak things and causing freak problems?”

“Not exactly,” Moonjo says, “Everyone in my clinic is getting sick. I had to fill in for someone else tonight.”

“You better not bring anything home to me,” Jongwoo warns.

“I'm doing what I can,” Moonjo assures him. “But we’ve already rescheduled tomorrow evening, so I won’t be long.”

“Good,” Jongwoo says.

“In fact,” Moonjo smiles down at his beer can, running a fingertip along the rim of it, “I have plans.”

Jongwoo stares at him warily from across the table. “Plans.”

“I want to give you a gift,” Moonjo says, looking up at Jongwoo in a way that can almost be described as coy. “If you’ll accept it.”

Jongwoo narrows his eyes. “Depends on what it is.” 

“It’s a surprise.”

“I don’t like surprises.”

“I think you’ll like this one.” 

Jongwoo will be the judge of that.

-

It’s already dark when they set out the next evening. Moonjo brings a flashlight, which doesn’t inspire great confidence in Jongwoo.

October has arrived with sharp teeth in each gust of nighttime wind. It's cold out, and Jongwoo's been on his feet for hours. That’s why his legs shake as he and Moonjo trek over sidewalks and stairways under a moonless sky, tasting the lingering petrichor from an afternoon rain storm. The farther they walk, the more Jongwoo’s legs shake and the fewer words Moonjo uses to dodge all his questions. He realizes after a long while that they’re climbing a hill. It’s steep enough to have him sweating under his hoodie as they follow narrow paths under the guidance of street lights glinting off wet asphalt.

They climb towards the overcast sky, until the lights in the buildings abruptly grow sparse, and they’re greeted with nearly a solid block of darkness. The vacuum of light looks wrong in the middle of a city, even though Jongwoo has been bracing himself for the sight of it ever since he realized where they were going. His shaking legs lose their nerve, and he halts as soon as he catches sight of the soot-stained rainbow staircase.

“Why did you bring me here?” he asks, staring up at the skeletal remains of Eden.

“I told you,” Moonjo says, walking back to where Jongwoo has rooted in place, “I have a gift for you. It’s waiting inside.”

Jongwoo swallows around his dry throat, feeling like the column of it must be coated in ash. “I don’t trust you.”

“If I wanted to hurt you,” Moonjo says, “You’d be dead by now.” 

That’s… Not the kind of reassurance Jongwoo was hoping for.

“Everyone wanted you to stay back then,” Moonjo continues, reaching out to fiddle with the strings of Jongwoo’s hoodie. “No one more than me. But I let you walk out, and I’ll let you walk back out again tonight, if everything goes well. And I think it’ll go just fine.”

His fingers trail upwards, teasing at the swell of Jongwoo’s throat, massaging his Adam's apple gently in a way that makes Jongwoo feel once more like a fish swinging on a hook.

“Besides,” Moonjo smiles at him, “Aren’t you curious? Who knows – you might just find some inspiration inside.”

“What is it?” Jongwoo asks quietly, chin tilted up and eyes wide. "Just tell me."

“The only way to find out,” Moonjo says, “Is by going inside.”

The touch leaves Jongwoo’s throat, and Moonjo turns away from him. Jongwoo watches him take half a dozen steps before forcing his legs to drag him forward.

“Isn’t this unsafe?” Jongwoo asks, neck craning backwards and sideways as he looks out for anyone who might see them crawling into a condemned building. But there’s nobody around. Half the buildings framing Eden have been left abandoned as well, adorned in caution tape and filling the entire neighborhood with the humid smell of rotting wood.

“Yes,” Moonjo holds a strip of tape up for Jongwoo to duck beneath as they step towards the remains of the stairwell, dirty and damp after the rain. “The whole foundation has a concrete base, but the structural integrity is still badly damaged.”

“So you dragged me up here to kill us both in a pile of rubble,” Jongwoo says. “That’s wonderful, thanks.”

“Have a little faith, honey,” Moonjo says, stepping down the steps.

Down. Moonjo is dragging him into the basement.

“Oh, god,” Jongwoo sighs, stepping over crunching debris. He swears the scent of charred wood grows stronger with every footstep. “This is such a bad idea.”

“The whole place is set to be torn down next week,” Moonjo says, finally turning on the flashlight he brought. “I think it deserves a proper sendoff, doesn’t it?”

“The only thing it deserves is another fucking fire to finish it off,” Jongwoo grumbles, curling his fingers in the back of Moonjo’s dark shirt like he’s afraid he’s going to get lost without some kind of tether.

“Hm, maybe these remains deserve it,” Moonjo muses. “I always hated coming down here. This was her stomping ground, not mine.”

Jongwoo doesn’t ask who her refers to.

“I always preferred the fourth floor,” Moonjo admits. “There were a lot of valuable things up there that got lost in the fire.”

Jongwoo’s foot hits collides with a piece of trash on the floor, a metal bowl or something equally loud in the unnatural stillness of the dark. He gasps and jumps at the sound, but freezes when a noise answers it from ahead.

Just a short guttural vocalization, a whine of pain diffused through the night.

He freezes, senses switching to high alert. “What the fuck was that?” 

Jieun? No. The sound was miserable and pathetic, but far too low. Seokyoon? Jongwoo hasn’t seen him all day. But Moonjo promised to leave him out of this, and if Moonjo went back on his word then Jongwoo will –

“It’s okay,” Moonjo assures him, reaching back to grab Jongwoo’s hand. “Just follow me.”

Another grunted whimper. It makes Jongwoo’s skin pebble in fear, but he grips Moonjo’s hand and allows the other man to lead him deeper into the bowels of Eden. It isn’t long before Moonjo comes to a stop and fiddles with something on the ground before a halogen work light floods the room with a blueish-white glow.

It’s as if the light burns the figure in front of them. It thrashes and moans pitifully behind the tape covering its mouth, whimpering and crying for salvation.

Such a shame that there’s none to be found here.

Jongwoo thinks he might be going into shock or something. His body feels numb down to the bone as he stares straight ahead and watches the unmistakable shape of Park Byeongmin fight uselessly against the restraints binding him to the chair in the middle of the room. 

He's filthy, blood saturating one leg as it drips down from his knee. There’s a cascade of red drying around the rectangle of tape over his mouth. Whatever Moonjo did to him, it must have been horrifying. Jongwoo knows this is the part where he should gasp and collapse in terror like he did the day he saw the dead cat in the garbage bag. He should grow angry with Moonjo like he did when he heard the news about Jaeho.

But Jongwoo doesn't feel anything at all, until a pair of hands land on his shoulders and Moonjo's voice speaks right next to his ear. “So, how does it feel?”

Jongwoo turns his face towards Moonjo’s a fraction, just enough to catch the light glinting in one of his eyes. “How does what feel? Being back at Eden?”

“No,” Moonjo breathes a soft laugh, “How does it feel to have all your suspicions confirmed beyond the shadow of a doubt? Is it exciting?”

“I already knew,” Jongwoo says, “Since before the fire. I think I knew from the moment I saw you.”

But suspecting it, hearing about it, those are very different from and seeing it right in front of his face.

“Did you?” Moonjo whispers, chillingly enamored with the declaration. “I love thinking that you recognized me so quickly.”

No shit Jongwoo recognized him. How could he not? Even if everyone else thought he was being too sensitive, too touchy, too nosey, Jongwoo could see straight through that plastered-on civility. Jongwoo would love to call it intuition, but he knows he’s not quite so lucky.

Recognition only occurs when you've become familiar with something. The first time Jongwoo ever saw Moonjo was before they ever met, when Jongwoo was staring down at the blood dripping from his split knuckles a pair of military-issued camo fatigues.

"I should let him go," Jongwoo says, still somewhat numb. "What would you do if I let him go?"

“I would be disappointed,” Moonjo admits easily, “But you and I both know it wouldn’t end at that. We'd have to reconcile our creative differences somehow.”

Byeongmin is still groaning, still fighting uselessly against his restraints, but he’s not important right now.

“So, should I kill you?” Jongwoo asks, turning to face Moonjo fully. “Is that what you’re saying? That's my ultimatum? Either I kill him, or I kill you?”

“If it comes to that,” Moonjo says over the din of Byeongmin’s crying, “You’d have to try.”

“Shut up!” Jongwoo barks, turning his attention back to the man in the center of the room. Byeongmin freezes. His eyes are round and bulging. Jongwoo wants to pluck them out.

“But,” Moonjo says, voice back to a comfortable quiet drone, “I don’t think it’ll come to that. Will it?”

“I should kill you both,” Jongwoo says, and Moonjo smiles.

“If that’s what you want,” Moonjo says, “Then I’d love to see you try. Do you hear that?”

The question is directed behind him, towards Byeongmin. Moonjo approaches him with the unhurried gait of a carrion watching the last bit of life bleed out of its next meal.

“Goodness, look at you,” he mutters, circling behind Byeongmin with judgment in his gaze. “Aren’t you ugly?”

Something about his voice sets Byeongmin off again, jerking his head back and forth, twisting in his restraints. He sounds like a wounded animal as he wails beneath the duct tape. He sounds pathetic.

“But don’t worry,” Moonjo meets Jongwoo’s eyes over Byeongmin’s shoulder. “My baby will make you beautiful.”

He says it like it’s a sure thing, and then lazily meanders to the side of the room with his hands folded behind his back. There’s a smile etched on his face, like he can’t beat down his giddiness. When their eyes meet, he nods at Jongwoo.

Jongwoo steps forward. The first thing he does is immediately regarded as a mistake – he rips the tape from Byeongmin’s mouth.

“Intern,” Byeongmin forces out after a few stalled attempts, voice slurred as syrupy-thick blood pours past his ruined socket of a mouth. “Intern, I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I don’t know why I’m here. You have to get me out! Get me out, please! I don’t deserve this. I’ll never – never speak down to you again!”

Fascinating stuff. He rambles on like he’ll never run out of words, and Jongwoo mostly tunes him out while he takes in the state of his poor mistreated superior. He certainly hasn't been paid much respect in Moonjo's care. Every word that spills out is thick and wet and wrung tight with pain.

"What the hell did you do to him?" Jongwoo finally asks, cutting Byeongmin's desperate pleading off short.

"The leg wound was a precaution," Moonjo tells him. "The teeth are safe and sound elsewhere. I only took a few, most of them were too ugly to bother with."

Jongwoo's lip curls in revulsion, but the complaint that comes out of his mouth is nothing but annoyed. "Trophies? Seriously? That's how idiots like you get caught."

"I assure you," Moonjo says, lurking just outside the spotlight, "They're more than just trophies."

"Forget it," Jongwoo says, "Do you have a knife?"

The question seems to wound Byeongmin prematurely, if his irritating squeal of terror is anything to go by. Moonjo doesn't react to the question at first, simply staring impassively at Jongwoo for a moment before pacing back to the small industrial light on the floor. He kicks something next to it, and Jongwoo has to hold up a hand and squint to make out the shape of a leather bag blending in with the sorry state of the ground.

Inside, Jongwoo finds quite the kit. He’s afraid to root around in it, too intimidated by the vague shapes of scalpels and hammers, syringes and opaque plastic bags holding god knows what. He'd rather not slice his hand open, so he plucks up the first sharp thing he can find. It looks like a regular kitchen knife, and the blade feels sharp enough for what he needs to for when he tests the edge with this thumb.

This is good enough.

Byeongmin is back to wailing and thrashing in his seat, but his tune changes when Jongwoo kneels down and draws the knife over the thick woven layers of duct tape. And then he has nothing but praise for Jongwoo, raining down mindless declarations of gratitude. They grate on Jongwoo's ears as he unfastens the bindings on Byeongmin's wrists, letting the other man yank them away from the tacky surface of the crudely-built chair. Byeongmin is still thanking him, still running his mouth, still begging for his life without taking a breath.

Those useless words are replaced with unintelligible shouting when Jongwoo grabs the back of the chair and tilts it forward as hard as he can, sending Byeongmin sprawling down to the dirty floor.

“Ah, sunbaenim,” Jongwoo scolds, letting the chair legs clatter back down loudly. “What are you doing down there? You're wasting everyone's time. Get up. Work harder.”

Byeongmin cowers on the ground uselessly, curling in on himself and holding his wounded leg and wailing about it like he’s never felt pain before.

“Are you dim-witted, or what?” Jongwoo spits in contempt as he leans over the other man. “If your legs don't work, then just crawl. Anyone can crawl.”

“He-help me,” Byeongmin begs, and Jongwoo barks a laugh.

“Help you?” Jongwoo can’t believe it. “Like you’ve helped me? Sure, I'll fucking help you."

Jongwoo tosses the knife on the ground next to Beyongmin and kneels down. Byeongmin might grab the knife, Jongwoo isn’t sure. It doesn’t matter. He can’t do anything with it, anyway.

He can’t do anything right at all.

Jongwoo, however, doesn’t need a knife. He makes do perfectly fine with the endless expanse of soot-stained concrete beneath them. It’s disappointing, frustrating even, that Byeongmin hardly poses a risk.

Jongwoo was never afraid of him, but he was repulsed by him. All that condescension, that projection, that poorly-hidden lechery and miserable bitterness. Jongwoo thought that maybe Byeongmin could have a modicum of bark to his bite, but all this man knows how to do is grovel and talk.

He’s not talking now.

Jongwoo aches all the way from his knuckles up to his shoulder, but he has work to do that won't slow for any old pain. It must be an angel, he thinks, that slips down from the field of blinding light and presses something solid into his hand. This is better – easier. More effective. The claw hammer is a comfortable weight in his hand, something to anchor Jongwoo as he dreams in a Genesis deluge of crimson floodwater once more. He could do this all night, until his arm gives out or he wears a hole straight through the earth so that Eden can collapse into it and leave him entombed beneath the filthy concrete and rotting wood. But there’s someone here trying to touch him, fingers finding his wrist like he’s not busy with something else. He's busy, don't they see that?

So he lashes out.

It’s easy to throw an elbow backwards, shoving the weight over his back off and sending it sprawling. Jongwoo crawls forward with blood in his eyes and brings the hammer down hard enough to feel the impact of it in his own teeth.

The head of the hammer doesn’t meet soft flesh. It lands on the concrete floor instead, barely a breath away from Moonjo’s ear.

Shit. Jongwoo blinks hard, trying to get his eyes to focus. He forgot someone else was in here.

Moonjo doesn’t move, doesn’t push him away to start a scuffle. He just stares up at Jongwoo, eyes wide and wet in a way Jongwoo has never seen before. Jongwoo is used to seeing those eyes dead and dull. Watching them shine like celestial bodies feels like a boot to the sternum. 

Jongwoo is shattered into jagged pieces like soot-filthy stained glass, and he's adored.

“Are you happy?” Jongwoo asks.

Moonjo says nothing. He only reaches up to cup Jongwoo’s face with both hands, touching him like something precious and holy.

“Are you fucking happy?”

“Are you?”

“I am,” Jongwoo admits easily. A laugh bubbles up his throat, but it sounds more like a sob when it breaks. “I am. What’s wrong with me? What – what am I going to do now?”

Moonjo’s thumbs are stroking Jongwoo’s cheeks, smearing the blood. “Anything you want.”

Jongwoo blinks. A teardrop falls from his lashes and lands on Moonjo’s face.

“And I’ll take care of the rest.”

“Just like you took care of Eden?” Jongwo asks. 

“Just like that.”

And Moonjo does.

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

The book in Jongwoo’s hands is telling him that on average, only around 10% of violent crime is committed by strangers.

He flicks cigarette ash out the window from his perch at the foot of the bed and wonders if things have changed much since that particular study was published. It’s not that he doubts it, he’s just surprised. But then again, the lousy study doesn’t really attempt to define strangers. It could be someone you’ve never ran into before in your life, or a person whose eyes you’ve met countless times without actually knowing anything about them.

Someone whose motivations are so obscured to you that recognizing their name and their face doesn’t matter in the end.

Jongwoo leaves that thought behind when he turns the page, sighing as he finds yet another dog-eared corner hiding in this old paperback. He smooths it out just as he hears the mechanical drag of a pin tumbler, and the door to his bedroom creaks open.

“How are you planning on returning that key?” Jongwoo asks in lieu of a greeting, tossing the cigarette towards the late October sunset and closing the window tight one last time.

Moonjo steps fully into the room and glances down at the spare he stole. “I wasn’t. We can call it a memento.”

Jongwoo frowns. “I don’t like the idea of you having some random future tenant's key. That’s creepy.”

“Sorry,” Moonjo deadpans, “I wouldn’t want to make you think I’m creepy.”

Jongwoo sits up and stretches with a groan before grabbing his backpack from where it’s sitting on the floor next to his suitcase. “Whatever, I don’t care. Keep it. Are you ready to go?”

“My duffel and suit bag are sitting in the hall,” Moonjo says. “How about you? I figured you wouldn’t have much time to pack after getting off work.”

“I probably own less than you do,” Jongwoo points out. “Besides, I think they could tell I was phoning it in since it was my last shift. I wound up trading the last half hour with a girl who was coming in after me anyway and got there early.”

“And just like that, your life as a service industry worker ends.” 

“Thank god,” Jongwoo says. “It’s for the best.”

The entitled customers, coworkers smiling at his face but whispering behind his back about his useless degree, the amount of off-putting and downright offensive conversations he overheard from the tables – yeah, maybe it’s not the place for him. Luckily, he has interviews lined up for less face-forward jobs. Maybe one of them will have coworkers that don’t make him want to start smashing things.

“Oh, but speaking of souvenirs,” Jongwoo digs the insulated lunch bag out of his backpack and unzips it for the prized treasure waiting inside. “Here.”

Jongwoo brandishes before him the most luscious sandwich made in his entire short-lived career as a café wage slave. It’s got all the fixings, made with the freshest ingredients he could get his hands on. And, most importantly, it’s shaped like a kitty.

“Cute,” Jongwoo says, waving the sandwich in front of his face as he makes his own eyes as round and sweet as possible. “Isn’t it?”

Moonjo’s stare pierces straight through its beautiful little whole grain ears straight into Jongwoo’s soul, like he’s trying to leave behind a gluten-rich wound. “Precious.”

Jongwoo rolls his eyes and frowns down at the culinary masterpiece. “Come on, you have to eat better.”

“And your plan to get me to do that,” Moonjo says, “Is by making me food marketed to children?”

“These are really trendy among college girls,” Jongwoo says matter-of- factly. “Besides, you already have the palate of a psychotic toddler. I know you’d prefer to have nothing but unseasoned mystery meat for the rest of your life, but that’s no way to live.”

Moonjo smiles at the mini-tirade. “Worried about me, honey?”

“Keep dreaming,” Jongwoo grabs Moonjo’s hand and shoves the paper- wrapped sandwich in it. “I just don’t want your boney body stabbing me every night if we’re going to be sleeping in the same bed on a daily basis.”

The reminder of the one-bedroom apartment that awaits them seems to placate Moonjo. He looks at the sandwich like he’s made peace with it, and says, “Can we go now?”

Jongwoo extends the arm of his suitcase and shrugs his backpack on. “Lead the way.”

This hallway is too narrow for two grown men dragging bags behind them to fit side-by-side, but they still try to anyway. Their steps are sluggish as they talk back and forth, too loud for a communal hall like this. Nobody bothers to tell them off, though. There’s no point when they’re on the way out the door already.

Not like they’d catch flak on a normal day. Ask anybody living on that floor and they’ll tell  you the same thing: both of those men have weird eyes, hollow and piercing all at once. If you look too hard, you’re bound to see things you don’t like. So, no, nobody bothers them.

Jongwoo drags his suitcase behind him, one stiff wheel scraping on the linoleum. His voice is loud in the echoing corridor as he and Moonjo argue back and forth over something ultimately silly and meaningless. He’s speaking freely, saying things that could be considered rude, especially given what a mismatched pair they make. Any stranger would be forgiven for shaking their head at a younger guy in a hoodie that's been bleached so thoroughly that it's nearly orange shooting his mouth off at an older man dressed smartly in a clean suit. But Jongwoo doesn't care, and neither does Moonjo. No one bothers them for it. No one understands this thing between them, and they don’t ask anyone to.

It’s an unfamiliar comfort, knowing that nobody could even try.