Loveless

Chapter 5

One step forward, two steps back.

Since arriving at the Chambers, that's all you'd done.

Taken one step towards your consort, only for him to take two back.

You had danced around each other in a game of deceit and threat, and while it was true that Changbin had set the hostile precedent for your relationship, you were more than willing to return the sentiment.

You'd had no desire to get to know him. None to see past the frosty exterior he wore as he marched to the beat of the Imperator drum, carrying their murderous reputation on his broad shoulders.

Until a few hours ago.

Until you'd taken a tentative step towards him, to find he didn't retreat.

In fact, he'd stood his ground, stalwartly and without so much as a grimacing flinch as he held your hand tightly, seemingly unwilling to let go.

You found yourself wondering if that moment was something of a breakthrough. If you could be branded a fool for thinking that, maybe, an emotion that didn't denote hatred or resentment had slipped through the cracks of his stony demeanour.

It didn't need to be anything profound. And indeed, it wasn't.

But contrary to the ideals of romantic grandeur you'd always subscribed to, you found it to be enough. More than enough.

A moment of weakness in a darkened room. A clasping of hands, a lingering gaze that hitched a breath and brought impossible thoughts to life, ones that you'd never have ventured to indulge in before that moment.

That's all it had been.

A moment where he hadn't stepped back.

And then came the glaring lights of the helicraft.

Blinding both of you to the fantasies you dared to creep into, you were drawn back into reality with a slap to the face, a punch to the gut, a kick to the teeth. It was a veritable assault on all that you were, as you looked out the bedroom window and saw the face of the one man who had never, not for fear of being caught, taken a single step back from you.

One step forward, two steps back.

Looking at Changbin from across your shared bedroom, you feel the space between you more than you ever have.

You know a storm of emotion looms on the horizon, and you see it in his face, as his eyes stung red and glistening meet yours.

He feels it too.

And neither of you are prepared.

He clears his throat, swipes the back of his hand over his eyes as he pulls himself back together, positioning the scraps of his usual calm and collected persona back in place.

"Looks like there's a new couple," he speaks, his voice hoarse.

You cock your head at him, disbelief runs amok.

Is he trying to play this off? Trying to act like he doesn't know the girl that just disembarked?

You saw her face when she spotted him, saw the state he got into that he's still trying to recover from. You saw her lips move and the word leave her mouth...

Romeo.

The very same nickname he got so upset over leaving your lips only several hours ago.

You wonder what it says about him that he's prepared to try and lie to you still. Is he going to treat that moment between you the same way? Like it never happened at all? Fleeting though it may have been, those minutes still need to be accounted for. Recognised.