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binniesthighs · 3 years

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hello stranger | reader x changbin |

a/n: we are getting to the “height” of the conflict, therefore the angst is gonna start amping up-just as a reminder! This fic talks about self worth and healing from past trauma so please read what makes you comfy! In this chapter, the majority is implied, but still, please read the warnings ahead of time :)

Part 4

Pairing: self insert, female reader x seo changbin, female reader x han jisung

Genre: strangers to lovers, fluff, smut, angst

Tags: (of this part) college au, rapper!changbin, rapper!jisung, establishedfwb!jisung, artist!reader, explicit language, fluffy growing feelings, mentions of food, hello yes I just wanna give this changbin a huuuuge hug

CWs: implications/discussion of past toxic realtionship, implications of negative self-worth and self-sabotage

Word count: 4.8k

Chapters:

PART 1 | PART 2 | PART 3 | PART 4 | PART 5

Popcorn flew into the air in slow motion and approximately four hundred multicolored skittles scattered the floor like the shattering of glass.

“Yes...yes...FUCK YES!!”

Felix launched his small body into the air with a victorious screech, turning his controller into a projectile. The clump of black plastic thumped into the torn up corduroy couch missing Chan’s arm by millimeters.

“HOW TO YOU LIKE THAT?? WOOOO!!”

Your friend took a victory lap around the tiny living room that was a mess of winter coats and boots with melted snow dripping to the hardwood floor.

“Felixxxxx, you made a mess!” Chan sighed out deeply and solemnly at the array of rainbow colored candies on the floor.

“I never win. You gotta admit the way that I finished that off was extra disrespectful. DID YOU SEE the way that I down-B’d you to pieces??? That was fuckin’ awesome.”

“Good job ‘lix.” You pulled a Twizzler by your teeth and dished out a little wink for him.

“Hey! I haven’t been playing for nearly as long as you two have. I see this as a complete win.”

“Well, Chan and I were at each others throats the whole time, so, we kinda killed ourselves off for you.”

“I still won!!”

“Alright, alright, good job.” Both you and Chan took turns patting his poofy blond hair.

“Ahhh our Lix’ is finally growing up.” Chan sighed, mockingly looking out in the distance to some far away place. “But...now you’ve gotta clean this up. Lucky you’re the one that paid for the Skittles, not me.”

In his fit of happiness Felix didn’t even care about getting down on his hands and knees to pick up the pieces like Cinderella.

Chan took a gulp of his electric green Monster. “Feels nice to have you back around here Y/n. It feels like it’s kind of been a while.”

“Mm, it has. You know how it goes, stuff gets busy and all that.”

“~And she’s been hanging out with someone else~” Felix’s words came out in a cutesy little song.

“You have?”

You slapped Felix right upside the head to which he whimpered out with a much more dramatic “owww” than was warranted.

It was likely a mistake that the two of you had kept Changbin a secret from Chan. Chan basically idolized him, and you felt that it was best not to...complicate things. Every other hour Chan would bring up one of Changbin’s songs, talking about him as if he was some kind of lyrical genius. He had half a plan to meet him at the last show, but had gotten too shy and pulled you both before he could get second thoughts.

For it to be so easy for you...it felt somehow unfair.

It was definitely a mistake.

“Who? Jisung?” Chan rolled his eyes a bit like he always would when spoke of that boy.

“No...” Your voice became small, then you shot deathly glares at Felix who tucked his tail in between his legs.

“Chan...”

Felix’s eyes widened to full moons once he had realized what you were about to do. You curled yourself up into a ball slightly, sweaty hands grasping at your controller.

“Its...Changbin.”

“CHANGBIN?” Chan shot upright from his seat. “Changbin?? Are we talking about the same Changbin?? Changbin-from-the-show-Changbin??”

“Yes.” You steadied your thumping chest.

“When did that happen??” Chan turned his body towards Felix who cowered into the mess of Skittles. “Did you know about this?”

Felix made a little grunt that could have sounded like either a “yes” or a “no”-- it was likely his safest bet.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because I knew it would be kinda...like this...”

Your eldest friend sat back down his his palm firmly slapped against his forehead. “Sorry, I’m just having a hard time piecing this all together.”

“It happened after the show that one day. I was walking home and I fell and got kind of scraped up, then he took me back to his place...”

Simply bringing that night back up again sent you spinning into your pool of memories: and they had a particular tendency to make you just as flustered as the night when they had first occurred. There were dozens of little things about him that had stuck with you, even if you wouldn’t admit it out loud.

There was that stupidly confident smirk of his, that little scar on his chin, how his fingers looked in those silver rings, his hooded grey-black eyes, those faint little stretch marks on the backs of his arms, and the way that his Adam’s apple would bounce when you kissed into his neck.

“Well? Chan’s voice snapped you back. “Does that mean...you aren’t seeing Jisung anymore?”

“...Jisung?”

His name hadn’t occupied your thoughts for weeks, and you hadn’t taken much notice of it. There were unread text messages from him that had fallen to the bottom of you message list, and missed calls that you hadn’t returned. Creeping inside of you was a sick and sticky feeling: the kind that you pushed deep down inside yourself to the place where things would get forgotten.

You didn’t know what you wanted from Jisung.

It wasn’t the way that he would kiss you roughly and needily, or how he would take greedy hands to every inch of your body. It wasn’t how he would fill praises into your ears or shake a little when he would finish himself off on your belly. Months ago, it would be all you could think of, then immediately forget after it had happened. That was what made it easy.

Changbin wasn’t easy. He wouldn’t give himself up entirely to you just because he could. He made you earn him, and he made you seek him.

You belonged to neither of them.

In your lap, your hands trembled with a memory of long ago: snowflakes in your hands burning with the cold and your throat scratched from all the yelling.

“Y/n?” Chan softened.

A sob had caught in your throat which you swallowed down with effort. “I-I’m still seeing Jisung.”

“Wait, you’re seeing both of them?” Felix popped up from the floor. “You didn’t tell either of them?”

“I don’t need to. I’m not tied down to either of them.” You had said it as confidently as you could, almost like you needed to convince yourself.

Both of your best friends eyes carefully held yours.

“Doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t tell them.” Felix nodded.

Chan nodded too in agreeance.

“But we’re just fucking around?? Its not like I’m cheating on anyone.”

“Y/n, you’re missing the point.”

“What? Don’t I have the right to sleep with whoever the hell I want to? Don’t you think that it’s kind of backwards that I should keep everyone in the loop when I’m just--why would I--”

Chan’s hand snuck over to yours which had started shaking even more violently on your leg; you hadn’t even noticed. The sobs that you had held in your chest started to overflow, bubbling and spewing from your surface. They felt choked in your throat, and then burned hot tears in your eyes. Both of your friends got to work, scooting in right next to you and sandwiching you between their arms.

“You don't have to be afraid.” Felix whispered softly. He smoothed his hand down your back.

“I-I’m not.” You clenched the words between your teeth. “Why-why are you guys drilling me like this??” You squirmed a bit between them.

Chan hushed, “We’re not.”

“Then why does it feel--”

“--You're doing it again.” Felix simply sighed, and rocked the three of your bodies to the tune of your messy sobs.

Chan let out little “shhh” sounds. “Stop digging yourself in that hole Y/n. You know that you’re doing it. Its more than just messing around.”

A tangible and thick silence held the air where your two closest friends held onto you tightly, almost like you would slip away. You fucking hated them for reading you as well as they did, but you also fucking loved them for being as good at it as they were. Being sandwiched like this with them was all too familiar. They had also done it on that same night: the night when your world had collapsed. That night you had been so weak you could barely hold back.

“It’s not gonna happen again.” Chan said at last. “I know that you must think about it all the time, and I’m so sorry that you do. You’re never gonna be stuck in that alley alone again.”

Felix quickly added, “We’ll be there--even if it does--which it won’t.”

“Stop dragging yourself through it okay? I know it’s easier said than done.” Chan took his black sweater sleeve to dab at your tears.

You were completely engulfed in your friends love, the unconditional kind: the kind that would part the seas and walk through flames for you. You don’t know how you could have forgotten how it had been there.

“Maybe its one of them or the other, but, I think you should tell them. You don’t deserve to tear yourself up like this over it all. It’s not good for you, or for them.” Felix laughed a little. “We’re not blind you know.”

Fat, thick sniffles clogged up your nose. Your subconscious and consciousness mudded behind your eyes and those memories of both boys: Changbin and Jisung became indistinguishable. You had sought them out for different reasons, but you hadn’t known why. Now, it was all becoming clearer.

“You like him don’t you?” Felix took his turn dabbing at your eyes too. “I can tell.”

“N-no...”

Felix didn’t even need to say who “he” was for you to understand.

“No?”

“I just...go see him sometimes.”

You would. You would see him, think of him, call all the little things about him to your memory: that scar on his chin and the faint stretch marks on his arms.

Snot dripped down your nose and over your quivering lips and you didn’t even care.

That voice rang in your ears just as you had remembered it on that night when he had dragged you out there, alone, furious. You didn’t even know what you had done wrong.

"I don’t want it to happen again.”

The words tore from your lips freely, finally. The fear that you had held so deep inside, the fear that would plague your every other thought. The fear that kept you from answering questions or giving answers. The fear that brought your feet to Jisung’s doorstep and the fear that kissed away words on Changbin’s lips. A massive weight like heavy metal chains that had wrapped around your body started to loosen.

“How are you going to let yourself have a chance at something good if you don’t try, right?” Chan and Felix exchanged hopeful little smiles.

Felix patted your hair to fix where you had frizzed it between them. “You know what you need to do.”

╚ ——————————————— ╝

[11:18]

changbin: this friday? yeah, I don’t think that I have anything else going on.

its been a little while.

everything okay?

...

i’m sorry if i overstepped that night

you just looked

...

fuck

you’ve got me thinking of you all the time

╚ ——————————————— ╝

Snow fell on your walk to class. It was the same early morning one that you shared with Minho. These days, the two of you had seemed to have gotten much closer. Even though you hadn’t been over in nearly a week, Minho still talked to you as if he saw you there every day. He would complain about little things such as how the rest of his roommates would leave dishes in the sink or socks randomly on the floor.

What the two of you didn’t talk about much was Changbin. There was some unspoken understanding now that the two of you had promised. He didn’t want to know much and you didn’t want to tell him; and it stayed that way. It was odd now considering that you had been quiet before so he couldn’t hear.

Admittedly, that did give you a chuckle or two from time to time.

Today, the snowflakes gathered in clumps and hugged each other while they floated down the the ground where they would melt instantly. This was the kind of snow that wouldn’t stick around. For this, you were grateful. In the first week of February, you had just enough of winter and longed for the green grasses that would peek from the melting white.

The tip of your nose and ears were warm as you marched onward with eyes squinted from the flakes that would get caught in them. In some ways, you were thankful. During the lectures, you would often prefer watching the blanket of white dancing in the windows behind the professors head.

Something you still had to learn however, was picking the right shoes. Your toes were frozen in the same canvas shoes that Changbin had scolded you for wearing. You pulled out your phone the check the time: eleven minutes early. It was somewhat of a personal best.

You smiled with a little pride, missing the body mass that was walking right past you and collided with your shoulder.

“Oh! Sorry, I’m so sorry, I was--Jisung?”

“Y/n?? Holy shit--”

Heartbeats rang in your ears and you felt as if you could hear the very blood pumping in your veins.

“I-I’m late for class, I gotta--”

“--No wait!” Rather than looking angry as you expected, that wide smile of his spread across his rosy cheeks. “I’m just glad that I ran into you.”

“Jisung, really, I need to go--”

His gloved hand reached out for your arm. “I’ve been trying to reach you but I think something must’ve gone wrong with your phone. How are you doing?”

“How am I doing?”

“Yeah, I was kinda worried, it was like you dropped off the face of the earth.”

You clawed your arm away. “I’ve been fine.”

Jisung sucked at his teeth, “Listen, after your class, can we talk? I borrowed my roommates car--I can drive us back to my place--”

“--That’s what you want to do? Talk?” The simmering anxiety that washed over you turned into irate heat.

“Yeah?”

“No its not.”

You slung your shoulder bag high up your arm, and walked on.

“Stop stop stop.” Jisung threw his body in front of your path. “What’s been going on with you? Hm? Did something happen? What is it? Your-uh art or something? You still do that right?”

Jisung had seen your paintings decorating the walls of your bedroom and the sketches that piled up on your desk next to colored pencils tied up together by rubber bands. He had seen them, but he had never looked.

“Why the hell do you care so much?”

“Baby--” He scuffed after your determined steps towards the business building. “Listen, I-I missed you okay?” Jisung yelled into the winter air: “I missed you. Alright?”

“Jisung, it wasn’t me that you missed.”

He stammered, and huffed up those puffy cheeks of his. In one final attempt, he approached you carefully with those cute brown eyes that you would often let slip into your daydreams. He reached out for your cold hand and took it in his. Had it been several months ago, you would have killed for him to hold your hand like that.

“I’ve been doing some thinking lately, especially when I hadn’t heard from you. I just...got this feeling like had done something wrong and I couldn’t figure out what the hell it was. Now, I know that I did. I...don’t like seeing you mad like this. Tell me what it is? I wanna see you at my show next week. I just want things to go back to the way that they were.”

The way that things were.

The way that things were was simplier. Easier. Just like he was. Jisung didn’t ask questions and Jisung didn’t take you out to noodle places just because he he felt like it.

The way that things were would have been easier and his hand did feel pleasantly warm in yours like you had imagined.

“I have to get to class Jisung.”

╚ ——————————————— ╝

On that Friday evening when you marched up to the front door of Changbin’s apartment building, he stood hooded under the tin awning turned to rust brown with age. He huffed out a little under the dinky light of the old building, but as far as you could see, his cheeks and nose had blushed with pink. You wouldn’t have pegged him it for it, but he had draped a thick black scarf around his neck in the same place where he would usually display that thick silver chain. As soon as you locked eyes, he gave you a little wave with knees bouncing.

“Shouldn’t you be inside?” Your breath vaporized into thin, white, visible droplets in the air.

“I thought that I could meet you out here rather than have you wait in the cold. I realized I did that last time.”

“Oh. Uh-thank you...I guess.”

Changbin cracked out a little smile, then announced, “Come on, let’s get going.”

“Get going? Get going where? Did you want to get noodles again?”

He chuckled, then stepped out into the lightly falling snow. It tangled up in his curling locks and got caught in the fabric of his scarf. “Hm-no. Not this time.”

Changbin looked over at you with his stormy grey eyes, something that hadn’t come to you as easily as before. Something in him had changed since you had first met him when he was standing on that stage as if it was the edge of the world. Before, you had felt as if you were drowning in the way that he carried himself, or the way that his gaze would bear down at you as if to test your strength. The aura that you once thought to be crushing had now turned into something much softer.

“You coming or are you just gonna stand there?”

One of his hands which he had tucked into his parka coat wiggled out to beckon you behind him.

“Come on. Take it.”

“Wh--”

Changbin made the choice for you then shoved both of your hands into his pocket. “It’ll be warmer this way.”

You scoffed at the gesture: it was the oldest trick in the book. “Really? Is it?”

In the cramped pocket filled with lint, his thumb rubbed up against yours. You obliged, and he tugged you close to him with each and every finger interlaced between yours.

“See? Feels better now doesn’t it?”

Flecks of salt crunched under both of your shoes when you turned the corner lit by a single streetlight. Both of the fabric of your coats squeaked standing this close to eachother. His scarf was pulled up all the way to his chin, and his hair bopped with each and every step that he took.

“You’re not going to tell me at all?”

“Can’t you just let this happen? I’m trying to surprise you, damn...”

“...Surprise? What...?”

Changbin lead the two of you past another corner to a much busier street in the nighttime: it was bustling with cars and taxi’s and it was lined with little shops on each side that leaked out tantalizing smells.

“Are we getting food here?”

“Quit asking questions.”

Two more blocks, and Changbin’s hand tugged at you all the way down the stairs to the subway where he used his own card to swipe you both in. Down there the sides of the walls were dirtied with old newspapers and cigarette butts, and the walls were of an aquamarine blue hue.

“The subway? We can’t be going too far...right?”

Still, he said nothing while he brought you right over the the waiting area, and the two of you stood amongst the businessmen in their best shirts stained with food smears and beer splatters as well as the nurses still in their scrubs after a long day.

“I said stop to asking questions.” His sentence trailed with a bit of an edge. “Here, stay close.”

A group of particularly raucous businessmen fell all over each other in a little pod closest to you and Changbin. It was as if it was instinctual for him the way that he wrapped his arm around your shoulder to pull you in to his chest where you stood on the subway deck. A dank smell of wet coats and the sweating bodies under them wove to the air once you had entered and mingled with the rest of the passengers. It was rush hour, and the capacity of the subway was near limit, so no seats could be found. You had to bury your face partially into that scarf of his as he held onto one of the straps dangling from the ceiling of the car. Both of your arms wrapped around him in a type of hug as you clung to his frame to keep your balance.

“Only a few more stops,” He assured you.

The lull of the car drew a heavy and sleepy film over your eyes, and you found yourself nuzzling into his warmth and clinging to the fabric of his coat just a bit tighter. You had never guessed, but there was an odd sense of intimacy about holding on to one person on a speeding train in a crowd of people.

“This one.” Changbin nudged you lightly, then pushed a few bodies out of your way bodyguard-style at the stop. “Watch your step.”

He swept your hand back up into his, then he led the both of you to the staircase and the sound of the city that was much louder and obvious than it was at the stop by his home. His smug smirk only grew the higher and higher that you ascended.

“Now are you going to tell me?”

“You’re horrible with surprises. Changbin nudged you with his elbow. “I’m never surprising you again.”

The skin of your cheeks were once more assaulted with the bite of the winter, and it took you several moments to figure out where he had taken you.

“Look over to your left.”

Just past a hectic intersection, there was the soft glow of lights: the first ones that you could see were yellow-white, and they were all tangled up in the branches of tree branches: making them appear as if the leaves had never fallen, but were instead replaced by these luminescent ones. You looked further past them to the entire park which was illuminated by similar string lights of all kinds of different colors: green and red, blue, pink and orange. Every single tree in the park was decorated with them, and they shone upon the area in a rainbow of colors.

“Christmas lights?”

“The last ones that they take down I think.”

“I mean...I wasn’t expecting...this” You gestured to the sea of lights before you.

The stoplight across the street blinked on to the little “walk” symbol.

Confident as ever, Changbin didn’t falter. “Let’s go.”

╚ ——————————————— ╝

You followed after Changbin under the canopy of spiny winter fingers and the lights that were spotted in between them. The passageway of the park was lined with benches on the side of the path and little groups of families, friends and couples each passed pointing out at the whole display. Christmas had been long gone, but somehow it still existed here in this little corner and the joviality it held with it.

He motioned for you to sit and brushed off the remnants of snow caked on the wood.

“I’ve got one more surprise for you.”

“I thought you said that you weren’t going to surprise me anymore?”

“Well, you’re in luck because I planned this one already.”

From his pocket he took out what looked like a thin aluminum container with hinges on the side. The metal was cold in your hands when you popped it open and inside was a small sketchbook with dotted paper and a set of double-sided colored pencils.

“I thought...you said something about colors the other day and how you liked them so I thought you would like it here with all the lights and maybe you could draw it? If you want?”

“Changbin...”

The wooden pencils were of a waxy quality; likely the kind that you could get at a corner store but that wasn’t nearly what mattered the most.

“Thank you. I mean it. I’ll draw something.”

Your heart always skipped a beat the second that you brought your pencil to the paper, and this was no exception. Across from you, there was another bench, identical to the one you sat on, and behind it, was a tree wrapped in pink lights. You set to work quickly, copying the picture as best as you could, not even caring for the little mistakes you could make. Changbin watched you from your shoulder, but you had barely taken notice. Once you had finished, you scribbled your signature at the bottom habitually.

“Here, I want you to have it.” You tore out the page. “It’s a thank you.”

He turned it over in his hand, then lightly brushed his fingertips over the way that you and woven the tree branches together and how it looked like the bench was dipped in the symphony of multi-colored lights. Beyond the tree line, you had drawn a few of the skyscrapers crowning the scene which he traced over too.

“Wow...um, thank you.” He hid his tiny grin after shoving it in his pocket.

Together you both sat, saying nothing, but rather taking in the scene together just as you had done at the noodle shop. It was peaceful simply existing next to another human being like this.

Your knuckles cracked in your lap while you recalled Chan and Felix’s urgings looking over at Changbin while he too wondered around himself.

Its not good for you. Or for them.

The man next to you rose, “Do you want to walk around a bit more? Or--”

“--Changbin...I need to tell you something.”

“What is it?” Under the pink glow of the string lights, his skin appeared softer.

“There’s something--I haven’t told you something and...you deserve to know.”

“Know...what?”

His head titled, examining the way that your face had fallen and became twisted up in the words on your tongue. He reached out to hold both of your cold-bitten cheeks in his hands, rubbing his thumbs to soothe you. You thought to yourself, there was something oddly intimate about standing out in the open with him like this: bearing yourself as such for the whole world to see, and how the tip of your nose rubbed up against his.

The words stung in your throat with a pain like acid.

“During this time when we were...there was also-I was also--”

“--I know what you’re going to stay and I want you to stop.”

“What?”

Changbin scoffed. "I should have guessed anyway but, it’s not my place either since we never really said exactly what this is.”

Your voice wavered, “I’m sorry. I’ll understand--” your arms fell to your sides. “--if you don’t want to--”

“--I said stop. Do you need me to say it again? I don’t own you or any dumb shit like that, and you don’t owe me anything either. But, I appreciate the honesty though.” Changbin pulled your forehead to rest against his, exhaling out visible breaths. “What are you going to do now?”

Just as he had done before, he reached down, all the way down your arms to wrap them around his waist.

“I-I don’t know. But--I do know that, being around you is...different and--” You sniffled, “--I don’t want to give that up yet.”

“Okay then.

You held your eyes closed, but you could hear his one and only smirk in his words.

“I wouldn’t mind sticking around either--but--you know what this means then?”

“What’s that?”

“You’re coming to my show next week.”

“Ugh, fine. I’ll go.”

Both of your breathless giggles filled the space between you both.

Your chest shook with a sigh, the kind that had been trapped, or maybe just held in for too long.

His lips were cold under the array of twinkling lights, and he delved himself into you carefully with his focus on nothing other than you. The way that he kissed you was terrifyingly beautiful: as if you were the way that each of the colors from the lines you sketched intersected and became one with the other. The heat of skin and the tip of his tongue filled your mouth with his promises that he had been composing for you since he had met you, and you could finally hear it for the first time. He had never changed the way in which he had done it from that first night.

He kissed you like he loved you, and maybe he really did.

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