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He’s peeking, she can feel it—he always does. Still, Hyuna can’t find it within herself to care, not with the gentle pressure of his body against her, the soft tickle of his hair against her nape; Luka’s perfectly capable of winning without cheating, but he prioritizes speed and a clear-cut victory without taking anything off the corners, a straight line towards getting what he wants.
The Rubik’s cube clicks, colours fly by underneath Hyuna’s fingers, she searches for patterns that Luka hasn’t seen, routes that haven’t been traversed—she doesn’t need to try so hard to stump him, just like he doesn’t need to rush to impress her; Luka’s been fascinated by her since their first shared glance, Hyuna herself can’t help but be endeared with his every action.
“Don’t look,” she reminds, empty scolding—words with no weight—not with how Hyuna says them, not when they float over them both with her affection.
“I like looking at you,” he says simply, and she can feel the shift of his fingers against the back of her uniform shirt. His hands twist, briefly bunches into cloth before they flatten, before she feels the featherlight slide around her waist. She can feel the press of his cheek against the flat plate of her scapula, the heat of his breath fanning against fabric, seeping into skin, and the sudden elation of it travels. Her fingers twitch, and not for the first time, there’s a stutter in her chest as he wraps around her—the sharp press of cartilage against the jut of her spine as he rubs his face against her, Hyuna can feel the small smile gifted to her through the baluster of cotton, kittenish nuzzling in his content as he squeezes. “Is that bad?”
Luka’s playing cute, Luka’s playing slick, Luka’s not being fair—and she huffs as she squirms to dislodge him—attempts to readjust as a laugh bubbles in his throat—the smallest displays of joy becoming more frequent, more potent in its verve, starlight breaking into shy sounds; somehow getting more adorable the day.
(There’s a selfish thrill in the fact that he’s like this just for her; the curve of his mouth and the impossibly golden glint of his eyes are things that she can keep to herself.
Luka isn’t the first child in the garden that she’s met like this, she’s friendly with even the most standoffish children, after all, but Luka had never minded her rare dip in moods, Luka had liked her even when she wasn’t being fun—Luka had liked her even with her miserable acknowledgements of the collar around her neck, because his choke chain had long since bored into his throat and festered.
He said that her life was his, and if it was him, maybe she wouldn’t mind letting him have her.)
She’s allowed to twist away because he knows she won’t leave, that she won’t go far, and Luka is proven right when the only thing she does after hitching sideways and getting green dye staining her side is gently tapping the toy—theirs, because there is nothing between them that they don’t share anymore—against his forehead.
His amusement tints his cheeks, curves his eyes as he butts his head against Hyuna’s occupied hand in a way that lights up everything inside her, sends a reverb through her entire being.
It’s the same either way, it doesn’t matter if Luka cheats or not—Hyuna will always forgive him.
Luka looks at her as if he has won some vast, enormous prize; the contentment bleeds thickly through his expression, eyes fever bright, and even now Hyuna can’t help but touch him, to let Luka turn his head sideways and rub his face against her skin.
(Once, before his smiles had become second nature with her, he took her face in his palms and said: you’re like a tune in a notation I don’t know.
She felt the same, still does. Shamefully she wants to figure him out just like he does with her, start to understand which cords signal the rhapsodic resound of his laugh, and wants to play him the same way he plays her.
This is a consonance that Hyuna can't comprehend; all the pieces are in place but she can’t register what’s in front of her—it should be something ugly, something monstrous, but the shape of him is so lovely it hurts.)
Her pinky hits Hyunwoo, and she feels the acoustics of a corpse run through the length of her arm. The cold chill of his grave should ground her—but even now Luka is beautiful, he is sweet, he is bright and so perfectly prismatic that her eyes burn—but the damp press of his lips sends her sanity spiralling again; another kiss, another thing he wanted, one of his little cheats to reconfirm that she loved him—tabs and blanks from a completely different box—rushing forward towards the finish line even though he already had his prize, even though she thought they both knew she was already his.
His tongue plays at the lines of her palm, laps at the webbing of her fingers. She blinks wetly as he rubs against the back of her hand, unbearably precious in his breathless happiness—anything that could distract her is gone, he’s won a game with no true competitors, made sure that no one else would ever play against him again.
(The rules have been twisted, the guidelines are a garrote around her neck, and still she can’t help but want to acquiesce to his every want. Still, a game with no challenge isn’t a game at all, there’s no purpose to it.)
“I’ll take care of you now,” he says gently, and carefully, she leans into him, rubs her cheek against his own as her eyes spill over, pressing her forehead into his shoulder as she shudders—something new roiling in her chest, a relative to shame, brushing fingers against a lingering, cold emotion that she’s only felt for Phan even as she clings to him, wanting his cheap comfort that won’t bring her baby brother back, needing the familiarity and kindness that he gives only to her. His voice is a siren’s song when he continues: “so don’t take your eyes off me.”
Luka holds her tight—he never plays fair, even when he has an advantage.
(Still, that’s fine; it’s fine.
There aren’t any shortcuts he can take, there aren’t any answers that he can find that aren’t purely of his own merit anymore—he’s always been smart, he’s always wanted to impress her, to keep her eyes on him. Even now she can tell that he’s trying to understand, plastic panels leaving imprints against his skin as he feverishly clutches her in his arms.
It's probably too cruel of her to give him such an arduous and confusing task to work through after seeing him again, but she's sure Mizi will give him a hint later on. It’s not like he doesn’t deserve a bit of struggle, at least a little bit.
It’s a little vindictive, but she lays out her impossible puzzle before him, broken cubes and saturated colours splay under his hands, and thinks, this time you can’t cheat.)