Work Text:
“Jumin?”
While he stood over the bed, book in hand, with the idea of her going back to Rika’s apartment in the morning looming over him—she stared. Moonlight kissed her eyelashes as they brushed her cheeks, and her body, tucked into the corner of his bed, was shifted to face him.
This was his favorite way to see her. When the night left they both cast in vulnerable blues, and the hum of the aquarium was the only noise buzzing through the apartment. When his sleeves were rolled just below his elbow and he read her a plethora of literary classics. When she, with heavy eyelids, would curl against satin sheets, entranced by his words.
It was the only time he watched her truly relax. The stress of the day-to-day—the party, the uncertainty, the hacker—it washed away for a moment. The tension would fall from her shoulders and her breath would steady, an immeasurable amount of peace spilling throughout the penthouse.
“Don’t go,” his lips parted at the sound of her voice, curiosity tugging at his features. “ Please.”
He froze for a moment, a flutter settling deep in his chest. He set his book on the bedside table and leaned towards the mattress, and in a set of unsteady motions, lowered himself onto the bed beside her.
The idea of reaching out to her stung at his fingertips. With his back against the bedding and his eyes focused on the ceiling, his body was stiff. Heat radiated from the other side of the bed, and the wilt of the sheets tugged at his legs, leaving his mind to reel at the unfamiliarity.
Something about her presence made him feel alive. The parts of him he’d closed off—the robotic, monotonous, ones that led him more often than not—they fell around her. He wished to tell her of his every thought, and feeling, and overwhelming affection towards her. He wished to ask her to stay here forever and build a home out of the cold architecture of his apartment. He wished to give her all of him and watch her layout the pieces, reconstructing him from the inside out.
But she wished to take things slow.
So, Jumin tucked his arms at his sides and studied the ceiling so intently that his vision began to blur, hoping that he could still feel her presence as he cast away the incessant feeling of melting into the mattress next to her.
Then, a hand danced across the bed. Her face was still buried in the pillow under her, but delicate fingertips trailed the back of his arm, an array of chills rippling across his skin. She ran blunt nails from his wrist to his shoulder, before her arm began to creep forward, and her body shifted towards him.
Her touch was delicate as she began to sneak her arm around his hips, as if her skin would burn at the slightest contact with his. Slowly, her frame began to dissolve into him and Jumin couldn’t help but let himself falter, his shoulders settling deep into the mattress under him with a sputtered breath.
She was warm, and quiet, and suddenly he realized that she, though their relationship still early in bloom, was home. Her legs met his, forming an entanglement of limbs, and before he could process anything further, her head slipped into the crook of his neck, the feeling of her breath leaving him utterly senseless.
The roots of her presence that dug into his home, though new, were incredibly deep. He cursed himself for his possessiveness, but watching as she danced across his kitchen with the sun fresh in the sky, or curled in front of the fireplace in the evening, or so delicately pressed kisses to the top of Elizabeth’s head—he only wished to keep her safe. To keep her presence lingering in his halls, even after she was long gone.
“Are you alright?” Much to his surprise, she wasn’t asleep. Her movements were lazy and prolonged, and her eyes still remained half-lidded, but her voice was still clear as it broke through the silence of the room.
At the sound of her words, Jumin was suddenly much too aware of his own existence. Though he’d let his body fall into the mattress, his shoulders were still wound tightly together, and his gaze never left the ceiling.
“I-” He collected himself, a sigh spilling from his lips. “Yes, I apologize. I just… haven’t been held like this in a very long time.” He felt her head lift from his chest, and then she gazed at him—doe-eyed in the darkness of the penthouse.
“ At all, ” he corrected, a shade of red crawling up his collar. “I haven’t been held like this at all.” Her expression softened as she loosened her grasp on his waist, reaching to take his hand in her own.
He yearned to tell her that this was something he wished to experience for eternity. To join her, even if it were only to be in his bed in the dead of night, would be a pleasure that he could never take for granted. Her ability to soften sharp rooms with loud laughter, and fill every inch of his penthouse with an unmistakable homey feeling was only strengthened with her touch. He opened his mouth to spill his adorations into the air, but instead, he bit his tongue.
“And are you alright with it now?” she finally asked. Her voice was soft, lulling the sweet ache that had begun to form in the back of his mind.
It’s beautiful, it’s lovely, it’s more than he could have ever dreamt it to be. It—
“I enjoy it,” he said. “As a matter of fact, I enjoy everything about your presence here.”
“I’m glad,” she replied in a gentle hum. “I have to admit, I’ll miss the penthouse when I leave. I’ll miss you, Jumin.”
His breath hitched, the faintest smile crawling up his cheeks. He decided in that moment he was glad she didn’t expect a reply. He wasn’t so sure he could give one.
Instead, he unwound his shoulders and stretched an arm around her back, hoping he could convince her he was the slightest bit more comfortable.
This was foreign to him. The loving touches, the gentle whispers, the patience she had as she watched his mind scramble—he’d never seen anything like it. To be so enthralled by another human being, and to have any semblance of that returned was utterly divine.
With her, he didn’t mind that he was lying above his covers, still in his work clothes. He didn’t mind that he would wake up in the morning, dark circles pooling under his eyes and a button-down wrinkled against his skin. As long as she was still there, wrapped in the satin of his sheets, he truly didn’t mind anything at all.