LET ME - taehyun x oc

CHAPTER 7

TAEHYUN

"What's the point of loving someone if you're not gonna tell them?"

"Vi?" I mutter, gazing at the ground between my shoes before looking at her. My heart feels like it's about to beat out of my chest, but I don't know if I should speak.

She looks at me expectantly with those melancholy eyes I drowned in the first time we met. When I couldn't help but hold onto her as she pulled me closer, feeling the comfort in her embrace, her warmth, her soul.

"I love you," I blurt out, dying to make sense of it. To give it meaning. To give us something to cling to.

But she stays quiet.

My heart dangling in the air, exposed to the elements.

And here I am, desperate for her to take it and hold it.

She turns her gaze to me, her eyes full of questions. I know she loves me, I know she feels the same way. I can feel it, but there's a wall around her that I've been trying to chip away at since we met. Every now and then I'll see glimpses of her heart behind all the pain that she's surrounded by. I see it in her eyes when our bodies are intertwined, like our souls are seeing each other behind a pane of glass.

"Do you believe in soulmates?" I ask her, smiling out of the corner of my mouth. She gazes down at her shoes and grabs a small pebble from the ground.

"I don't know..." she mumbles, scraping the sand with it as she rests her chin on her forearm. "Do you?"

She turns her gaze to me, her eyes glossy with tears. A cold breeze blows through the park, rustling the leaves on the trees as they fall on the ground.

"Yeah, I do," I answer, turning my gaze back to the fountain in front of us. "I keep thinking about how we met- how random it was..."

She giggles, sniffling softly as she continues scraping the sand with her pebble.

"Soobin-hyung got so mad at me when I got back to the dorm the day we met-" I laugh, remembering how he scolded me for being so reckless. "I had never done something like that, you know?"

I turn my gaze back to her, noticing the soft smile on her face.

"I don't do things like this, Violet- I'm not one to throw it all on the line for someone I just met... but you've triggered something in me- you knocked me off my balance..." I chuckle, reaching for her hand. "Meeting you was like getting caught in the rain."

She chuckles at the thought, interlacing her fingers with mine.

"Meeting you has been the same for me, Tae-," she smiles softly, caressing her thumb over mine, stammering as her eyes well up with tears. I know she wants to say it, but I don't want her to feel forced.

"You don't have to say it back if you're not ready," I turn my gaze to her, pulling her hand to my lips. "But I want you to know how I feel about you. I love you, okay?"

She tries to smile, nodding to herself as the tears spill out of her eyes.

"I think you're perfect-" I say, pulling her to my chest. "You're everything I've ever wanted."

VIOLET

We walked back to my apartment in a haze. Silently holding hands and stealing glances at each other while his words played in my head over and over again, like a song I've put on repeat.

"You're everything I've ever wanted"

The air felt cold on our bodies as we sat under the tree, but his words filled me up with a warmth I haven't felt in a while.