Dimmed Lights, page 7
part #3 of On Stage Trilogy Series
Not long after we were heading up on the familiar path. I took it super slow, enjoying another bright day. Some of the sun rays made it past the forest to us, making the path look almost magical. It had rained at night and the rays bounced off the leftover water drops on the trees and the ground.
It took us way longer than normal, to reach the view deck. Once again, I stopped to marvel at the sight that spread below us, leaning against the fence. There were only a couple of white clouds drifting in the bright blue sky, the glass-covered skyscrapers glimmered in the distance.
The fence gave in the teeniest bit when Joe leaned against it as well, right next to me. Normally, I would’ve moved somewhere else or flipped him off… but I was way too exhausted for that. Besides, it was too beautiful a day to ruin by letting my mind turn sour.
“Would you look at that, the view’s almost as beautiful as the company,” Joe said out of the blue.
Sigh. Of course, he couldn’t have let me spend the day in peace. What was I even thinking?
“Why do you keep teasing me?” I asked, staring ahead to the distance, completely worn out. It wasn’t even midday.
From the corner of my eye, I saw Joe shrug.
“Maybe I enjoy it. Maybe I genuinely like you. Maybe both. Take your pick. It’s not like you’re gonna believe me either way,” Joe stated.
It simultaneously made my skin itch in an annoying way and tingle in a very different, softer way. Maybe, or maybe not, it had something to do with the fact that he was annoyingly right.
Before I could recover, he continued, “Why do you hate me so much these days? I thought we had a wonderful time before…”
Another sigh escaped me as I momentarily let the memories of that night wash over my consciousness. He wasn’t wrong, we did have a wonderful time, if not counting the fact that he had disappeared before I even woke up.
“Hate is a strong word… I don’t think I really hate you. I don’t particularly like you either, but that’s not about you. I’m just not a people person in general.”
“Says the one that has a few million fans across the globe,” Joe said, turning his face towards me. His stare burned a hole in my face, but I chose to keep on ignoring it. Instead, I stubbornly continued staring at the skyscrapers in the distance. They looked oddly tiny from this far away.
“That’s different.”
“Fair enough…” he said, trailing off. “Though you do seem to get along with Do-hyun and the others well enough. How’d that happen?”
“Over time. Living in a tiny-ass apartment with only two bedrooms for a year, tends to do that to people. I learned to respect them.”
“Wait, that doesn’t make any sense. You only use honorifics in a sarcastic way. You barely listen to your hyungs. You argue with them all the time. Hardly seems like respect to me.”
Rolling my eyes at him, I finally turned to face him. Surprisingly, he didn’t look like he was scolding me, only genuinely curious. So I decided to humor him. Only this one time.
“Everyone who lives together argues. And there are other ways to show respect than an age-old system based on people's age. I don’t get why anyone would be a better person just because they managed to crawl out of the womb before me.”
“You know honorifics are not exactly about that. It’s more like… showing people you respect their life-experience and expertise.”
I shrugged again, turning my eyes back towards the view. Being old hadn’t stopped my father leaving Mom to raise four children on her own. Being old didn’t stop our first manager from scamming half the money we would’ve made from our first tour and album. Being old hadn’t made Min-ho any less of a fucking creep.
“Yeah, maybe older folks might have more experience and stuff. It doesn’t mean they know how to use that knowledge right. A scumbag is still a scumbag, however old.”
“True,” Joe said, finally letting go of the dumb subject.
We were silent like that for a while, both having our eyes fixed on the city below. Content with not letting him get me riled up, I made a promise to myself I’d stay calm and collected. But there was one thing I wanted to get off my chest, when we were finally talking like normal human beings and not flirting to make it all more complicated.
“You left. The morning after.”
I guess I took Joe by a bit of a surprise, as he didn’t reply right away.
When he did, he still hesitated. “Ah, that…”
“Yeah, that.”
“Well, for what it’s worth, I didn’t mean to. It was just…um, there was a lot going on at the time.”
I had heard enough. “I don’t need an explanation. I was just wondering, what’s with the change? I know it was just a one night stand, and it can stay that way.”
Joe stepped behind me and wrapped his arms around my waist. He pulled me flush against his chest—softly yet decisively—and I couldn’t resist. Once again my feet turned into total jelly, my eyes fluttered close as my heart hammered in my chest, full speed.
“It doesn’t have to stay that way if you don’t want it to,” Joe whispered, his breath tickling my ear in the most pleasurable way imaginable.
Even though this was the moment I should’ve gotten pissed at him and cursed him to the next century, hoping to start a fight just to get some distance between us, I didn’t. I completely gave up. Every damn muscle in my body, including the tiny ones, were still sore. I knew I couldn’t beat him anyway. At this point it was time to admit that something was going to happen between Joe and me whether it was healthy for me or not.
Maybe it was better to get my heart broken sooner rather than later. Maybe just getting this thing over and done with between us was the key to dealing with fuckboys like Joe. Maybe there was even a slight chance that Joe might’ve told the truth—that he didn’t mean to abandon me after our last time together—but I was not about to count on that.
So, calmly, I turned around in his embrace and glared him straight in the eyes. Well, as convincingly as I could considering the fact that I had to tilt my head so much to even see his face. How can a human be that tall?
“Then let's get it over and done with,” I said, opening my arms wide.
The surprise was very evident on his face. He even let go of me completely and took a step back… if only I’d known I’d get rid of him this easily earlier.
Raising his eyebrows, he asked, “What’s going on?”
“What, now that I’m practically throwing myself at you, you’re backing off? Pathetic,” I said and took a step closer to him. “Didn’t you want me to beg? Well, here I fucking am. I’m tired of fighting you, fighting against this…thing between us. Just fuck me out of your system. Let’s get this over and done with.”
He stared me down like I had gone insane. Wasn’t even that far from the truth, to be honest. “You do realize I’m going to do just that if you keep insisting?”
“Then what exactly are you waiting for?” I exclaimed, stepping even closer so our bodies were a mere centimeter apart.
Joe hesitated for maybe half a second, before letting out a growl and pushing me back against the fence. He pinned me there, leaving no way to escape. Not that it mattered. I wasn’t going anywhere. Rather, I dared him with my eyes, challenging him. Surely, I could’ve handled whatever was coming my way.
Let’s just say I hadn’t been more wrong in my entire life.
When Joe cupped my cheek and leaned closer, my eyes fluttered close. I anticipated that my heart would skip a beat like it had done every time until now… but it started racing instead. I had this assumption that he’d be rough, like last time… but instead, he was very gentle as he softly pressed his lips against mine.
It sent a surge of shivers down my entire body. It became seriously hard to resist the urge to smash my entire body against his, let him do whatever the fuck he wanted with me. Deciding that it was merely some kind of a carnal instinct, I still tried my best to not let my body lean against his… Let my lips move with his… Let my hands wander on his body.
My walls of resistance started to crumble down every passing second he tried his very best to coax out a response from me. He nibbled my lips, let his tongue brush softly over them, caressed my waist with his hand…to the point that my lips started to tremble from the raw intensity I was holding back.
When his kissing started to slow down, I tasted disappointment. And I wasn’t even sure if it was mine or his. Even then, I stayed still like a statue. It was only when he let his hands drop and stepped back, leaving my overheated body feeling cold and lonely before my mind finally went, “Fuck it.”
As every mental rope that was holding me back got cut off at once, I literally threw myself at him. I jumped into his arms which reflexively caught me, wrapping my hands around his neck. I clung to him with all the strength I had in me, before smashing my lips against his in a heated haze.
His reply was instant, as he started moving his lips in as urgent a manner as I’d come at him. Gripping my ass, he straight up lifted me up before laying me down to sit on top of the fence. If he would’ve let go, I certainly would’ve met my end by tumbling down the steep slope, but at that moment I trusted him completely.
It wasn’t until his hands made their way under my t-shirt and to my back when my mind finally cleared. All the defense walls around my heart were rebuilt at once. And I was more scared than I had been ever in my life before that precise second.
My own body had betrayed me. My heart was opening way too fast to make room for this weird man who was basically just an overgrown fuckboy. Who I had decided to not let near my heart. Who was my goddamn employee for fuck’s sake.
Hastily, I slid down from the fence. Once my feet touched the solid ground, I bit his lip so hard I tasted blood. He jerked away as every sane person would, but it wasn’t enough distance for me—I pushed him even further away.
And I ran.
Strictly Business
When I said I ran, I meant I fucking bulldozed my way down the hill. I found my limits, then exceeded them tenfold, charging straight through the bushes. The branches scraped my arms, but I barely even noticed.
Soon enough, Joe’s footsteps were reaching me at the same time his voice did, begging me to stop. But I couldn’t. And wouldn’t. One part of me wanted nothing more than to get rid of Joe and especially the way he made me feel. The other half… still wanted to throw myself at him once again and let nature do its thing.
I was not going to let the latter happen.
Joe caught me when we hit the road. Nevertheless, I managed to charge through the gate first, but that’s where my luck ended, and I came to a sudden halt when Joe grabbed my wrist. I almost fell.
“Fuck off!” I yelled, way too worked up to calm down to actually think what I was saying.
Joe stopped. Everything stopped. That wasn’t what I’d wanted to say at all. Even then, I twisted my wrist out of his grip, sped through the door, all the way up the stairs, to my bedroom, and slammed the door shut. My lungs finally realized what I had made my body go through and started burning as I locked the door and leaned my back against it. It didn’t take long before my shaking knees gave up, and I slid to sit on the floor, thoroughly spent.
There was a knock on the very same door I was leaning on. But instead of saying anything, I closed my eyes and made no effort to get up. What was even the point?
There was another knock. “Hey, Chris… what happened? I’m confused.”
So was I. But I couldn’t make myself say that out loud. Only the sound of me trying to hold down my ragged breath remained, until Joe knocked again.
“Are you still there?” he asked. “Just tell me what I did wrong, so it won't happen again.”
But the problem wasn’t him doing anything wrong. It was him doing everything right. I wasn’t exactly mad at him—I was mad at myself for letting things go so far. For letting him affect me so deeply. I had literally thrown myself at him, before coming back down to my senses.
My heart started to ache and tried to convince my brain that it was okay to say “sorry” and that I didn’t really mind. And that it wasn’t him who did something wrong but me. But the words stuck to my throat and my vocal cords downright refused to produce a single sound.
All I wanted was to get up, open the door, and continue where we left off before I ran away. But that’s what scared me the most. And that’s why I couldn’t force my body to move or my voice to work.
There was a loud sigh on the other side of the door. “Tell you what, I’m gonna make us some lunch, hmm? Come down whenever you feel like it and we’ll talk.”
He still waited for a couple of minutes for my reply—which never came—before I heard his footsteps receding.
It took me a solid ten minutes to gather my scattered thoughts and some strength to get up from the floor. And even then it was only because of the discomfort of sweat drying that got me going. On my way to the bathroom, I tore all my clothes away, not caring one bit of where they landed on the floor. Once I reached the shower, I turned it to scorching hot and stepped in.
Letting the warm water pour over me and rubbing my skin with shower gel, I hoped it would wash away all these weird feelings Joe had awoken inside me. I hoped it would melt down the guilt of the fact I had made him think the problem was him while in reality, it was me. I hoped…I wasn’t sure what I hoped for. A miracle? Untangling my brain? A happily ever after?
But no matter how long I stood in the shower and rubbed my skin until it turned red, it didn’t work. Did it ever? I wallowed in the memory of the kiss, repeating it over and over again in my head.
Which made me realize it hadn’t even been Joe who had made me challenge him daily, rather than my own desire to be close to the guy. It hadn’t only been Joe with all the flirting, I had made all the opportunities for him to do so myself. And based on how many times I had picked up a fight with him, I had been as obsessed, if not even more obsessed than him.
It hadn’t been Joe’s disappointment in my lack of response that made me throw myself at him earlier. It was my own disappointment over the loss of his touch that had made me lose it.
It was never Joe; it was all me.
It felt like all the rational thoughts in my head had taken a vacation, and I only now realized all the important stuff when I was forced to. For once, I understood why Min, Do, Joon, and Tae had been so fucking clueless all the time. I didn’t have the slightest idea of how this worked until I got a glimpse of the experience firsthand.
And honestly, it would’ve probably been the best if I ended it before things got even more out of hand.
But did I really want this to end? I knew I had to figure that out before I talked with Joe. Because it was already a fact that I had made him feel shitty just because I couldn’t stop my mouth from speaking things I didn’t even mean. And I was sure that if asked him to keep his distance—and actually meant it—he’d do it. No questions asked. Then I could never go back.
On the other hand, I had to keep in mind that there was still a chance that this was a mere joke to him, to pass the time when we’d be trapped up here in the mountains. He had said himself, that maybe he just merely enjoyed teasing me. But was there anything wrong with that either? Even if this would get even more out of control? Because let’s face it, everyone with a brain knew where all this insane chemistry was going to lead us. I mean…people have casual sex relationships all the time, right? I saw nothing wrong with it. It could even be a fun experience for the short time we’d spend together.
Deep down, I knew I wouldn’t be able to leave it at that.
But let’s just say I decided right then and there that I wanted nothing more than a strictly business relationship with him. Then what? We’d go back to being… what? Work acquaintances? A celebrity and his bodyguard. Friends?
I shook my head. No, we had never been friends. I highly doubted we could ever be friends. We had nothing in common, except our competitive nature and the mutual interest in martial arts.
Maybe Joe would go back to leading his company. Maybe I’d get a new guard. Maybe they’d ease up the security levels down to the point where they were before the Min-ho drama happened, although that seemed highly unlikely. Time would go by, we’d both forget what happened once upon a time, up in the mountains, on one beautiful spring day.
As my heart clenched at the mere idea of this actually being over, I knew I had my answers to every single one of these questions.
I don’t think I’ve ever gotten out of the shower and toweled myself dry as fast as I did then. I didn’t even look at which clothes I yanked on before hopping the stairs down, two at a time. Joe wasn’t in the kitchen, though—there was only some kind of a salad in a bowl covered with clingfilm. I strode directly to the hallway, put on the first pair of sneakers I found, and rushed out. I was across the yard in seconds and impatiently waiting for the garage door to open—there weren’t really many more places he could’ve gone to except the gym in the garage. Once the door was half-way up, I crouched under it, passed the Lambo, and… froze at the threshold to the gym.
Joe didn’t even notice me entering the room, and I had a hunch why. His whole face was distorted as he threw punch after punch at the poor boxing bag in the corner. I froze. The sight reminded me so much of myself.
He clearly wasn’t in a very bright place, something I recognized. But I hadn’t had a single one of those really bad days since Joe had started staying here. I had seen only one lonely nightmare. Though I highly doubted the anxiety attacks and the nightmares wouldn’t make a triumphant comeback at some point, I was still in a much better place mentally. I hadn’t even touched alcohol apart from the occasional glass of wine with dinner.
And now I had driven Joe so far in the corner he was the one punching the living shit out of the poor bag. But I knew better than to try to stop him, so I leaned against the threshold and watched him work the frustrations out of his system.
