Work Text:
I know someone who kisses the way
a flower opens, but more rapidly.
- Mary Oliver
It starts with a kiss, as it often does with these things.
In the foyer of her apartment.
She only pulls him in because she’s afraid her neighbors will recognize him. No other reason. But once he is inside, he is in. In the unlit hallway of her heart. Big brown eyes considering her resolutely. Like a mirror reflecting the longing buried deep beneath the fear of losing him that coils inside her chest. A heart captive under a curse. A blessing. Something in between, or something entirely different.
She has to remind herself. She broke time and space to see him again in a matter of days, but he had to wait fourteen long years. She has wondered before. Who has it worse—the one who tears off the pages that represent each day and lets it pile up on the floor, lets it form a decade high mountain of lonely days lost forever, or the one who is able to see him, to love him, to touch him with no such wait, with the caveat that they must also see him die again and again and again. Even if she could choose, she would refuse. The illusion of a choice is only comforting if one option is better than the other, or at the least, one is less worse than the other. They have no such luxury, so fate has decided for them.
She runs towards him; he waits.
He’s waiting again, a champion of the sport at this point. Patience is a virtue, and Ryu Seonjae is nothing if not its most persevering exemplar. But patience seems to evade him at this moment. His eyes are not patient, nor understanding. For the first time, they look eager, a little crazed in the way they look a little hopeful. Sol can swear that he’s holding his breath, but as he inches closer, she feels the soft touch of breath against her cheek. He descends slowly, and it feels like it takes another lifetime for him to arrive at her lips. The anticipation of it is so overwhelming that when he finally does approach her lips, she startles and turns her head just an inch away.
He halts immediately.
She hadn’t meant to make him stop. She takes a deep breath, looks at him still hovering close to her face. There is no reproach, no question in his gaze. Only understanding. Take all the time you need , he seems to say.
She stands on her tiptoes to find his lips and softly stamps a kiss on them. His eyes are on hers again when she opens them. He breathes out, the grip of the sigh that’s been building inside his chest for fourteen years finally released. He cups her face with a hand and seeks her lips out. This time, to claim forever.
Seonjae is gentle. His lips are soft, they are careful, they take care not to overpower. He pulls back for a moment. They look at each other like they can’t believe they’re finally doing this. Before she can blink, he’s back on her, and this time, he doesn’t seem intent on being gentle.
His mouth is open and warm and so unbearably soft. It’s also insistent, catching her lips in between his, lapping them up with his tongue. She had always admired how plush his lips were. But her thoughts on the matter only extended to the fact that he looked pretty with a pout. As he latches onto her bottom lip, and she’s suddenly sucking on his upper lip, her mind almost melts. Gliding against her own, his lips are sure and steadfast and scrumptious.
He turns his head as his other hand grabs the hinge of her jaw. Her legs feel like jelly, as he slowly pushes her against the wall. Sol knows this isn’t her first kiss. She had been surprised to find memories of two long term relationships that the younger version of herself had been part of over the last fourteen years. As such, physical relations are not new to her. But, everything that her younger self experienced while she zapped through the last decade in the blink of an eye feels like a hazy dream to her. So for all intent and purposes, this feels like her first kiss. It’s the only kiss that matters anyway.
Sol wraps her arms around his neck. She pulls him closer, and he abides, bending even further to re-slot their lips together. Because he’s so tall though, this creates a curve of distance between their bodies that Sol desperately wants to remove. She pulls back a little, and she unintentionally hangs onto the sound of their lips smacking in the silence of the apartment. She knows she’s red in the face, she can feel the heat practically emanating off of her cheeks. When he looks at her with a question, she grows even redder.
“We can stop,” He says, panting. “I didn’t mean to—”
“ No! ” Sol almost yells, dodging his curious eyes. “It’s just, your neck— I, I mean, should we, may-maybe sit down?”
His mouth hangs open for a moment like he can’t believe what she’s just said.
“I mean, we don’t have to, we can j-just keep going, you know,” She stutters, nervously eyeing the lapels of his overcoat. “Or, not? I don’t know, we can stop if that’s wha—”
Sol yelps as Seonjae suddenly scoops her up off the floor, and starts making his way over to the couch in the living room. He sets her down against a cushion, much more gently than he had picked her up.
“I don’t want to stop,” He says, kneeling in front of her, breathing hard. “I never want to stop.”
Sol looks at him dumbfounded. She’s dizzy from being lifted so unceremoniously. Or maybe it’s because of the way he alternates between staring at her eyes and her lips.
“Me neither,” She says, shaking her head. “I–I want…”
Seonjae crashes their lips together again. He kisses her hard, like suddenly all the inhibitions between them have been stripped off. She feels the heat of the fire he’s been stoking inside his heart for her all this time. It’s hot and wet and so, so intoxicating.
He’s still too far though. She only has his lips right now, but she wants the rest of his body to align with her own. Impatiently, she grabs the lapels of his coat, and pushes them off his shoulders so he’s only left in his sweater. Taking his cue from her, he helps her take off her coat as well.
He gets up off the floor and gently pushes her, one hand on her shoulders and one cradling the back of her head, until she’s lying down on the couch. Sol’s stomach twists into knots, like there are butterflies fluttering their wings madly inside, because she knows what comes next. Seonjae climbs over her without hesitation. He’s so much bigger than her, but he uses his arms to keep his weight from fully pressing on her. He is exactly where she wanted him though. His long, lithe body now lines the plane of her own, and it takes every last fiber of self control Sol has left within her to not ask him to ravish her right there.
Seonjae seems to catch onto the storm of feelings brewing inside her chest. He caresses her cheek with a thumb, and asks, “Is this okay?”
She wants to tell him it’s more than just okay, so she does. “Nothing has ever been more okay.”
He smiles broadly. It reaches all the way to his eyes and punctuates his cheeks with dimples along the way. Sol can’t help but return the smile, only because it’s the most beautiful thing she has ever seen. She can’t bear to not be kissing him a moment longer so she raises her head slightly and pecks his lips.
His smile slowly devolves into something more heady. She bites her lips in anticipation. He descends on her lips, and they pick up right where they left off.
Sol wonders; is this what being one with your lover feels like? Is the way the weight of his body is so snug over her own meant to set her skin on fire? Is the way her stomach swoops every time his tongue swipes her lips normal?
All Sol can consciously process at that moment is that his lips are something electric, something caustic. She doesn’t think it can get better than this when Seonjae adjusts the tilt of her head, and glides his tongue against her own. Something like current passes between them in that moment, and Sol gasps. The hand that had been cupping her face slinks away to snake around her waist. They’re already lined body against body, but he manages to pull her even closer.
Sol feels breathless—a little dizzy, a little drunk. She curls her arms around Seonjae’s neck, and they kiss again and again. Slotting their lips together in different configurations; Sol’s hands brushing through his hair, Seonjae’s slowly stroking the length of her torso. Up and down, from the jut of her hip bones to the flare of her ribs. Up and down, until one time it continues going up, and does not stop until he has tentatively cupped one of her breasts. He continues kissing her through it, not letting up for even a second. Sol trembles with a force so overwhelming that it’s a surprise that she doesn't miss a single beat in reciprocating Seonjae’s passion.
The moment shatters when there is a series of loud knocks on the front door.
Seonjae and Sol break apart in haste. Seonjae looks at her with a quirked eyebrow, wondering who could be at the door.
Sol clears her throat, and yells, “Who is it?”
“Maintenance!” Comes a booming voice of an older man, from the other side of the door. “I have a maintenance request here for burst pipes. Can I take a look at them right now?”
“Can you come back—”
“I only have right now, young lady.”
Sol looks at Seonjae. Her disappointment is mirrored in his eyes. He pushes himself up and off of her. Sol is getting up, haphazardly fixing her hair and sweater when she sees him extend his open palm to her. He’s smiling when she looks at him questioningly. The same smile that lights up his eyes, and melts her heart every single time. As she takes his hand, she can’t help but break into a smile as well.
He intertwines their fingers and lifts her hand to plant a kiss just below her knuckles.
A flower blooms on the spot he kissed.
Her heart skips a beat, and somehow, she feels even more breathless than moments ago when he had kissed the living daylights out of her. It’s the happiest she has felt in her entire discordant life.