stray kids oneshots/reactions 🎐

yours anyway ; b.cn

the alley was quiet, tucked away just enough from the bustling streets. it had been chan's idea—pull her close, play the role of the protective boyfriend to shoo away the guys trailing him. she hadn't hesitated, because that's what they did. best friends, always looking out for each other.

but now, with his arms around her, the world blurred at the edges. they were supposed to be acting, but the way his hand lingered on her waist felt too deliberate, too real. when she looked up at him, her heart skipped in her chest. his gaze—dark and intense—held something raw, something that felt dangerously close to everything they had tried to ignore.

"this'll keep them away," chan whispered, but his voice wavered like he didn't quite believe it. his breath was warm against her skin, and suddenly, the air between them felt impossibly heavy.

y/n nodded, but the movement was slow, unsure. it was just a favor, just pretend. they did things like this all the time. but why did it feel so different now?

and why wasn't he letting go?

the question hung unspoken as silence wrapped around them, thick and suffocating. chan's thumb traced a slow circle against her hip, and her breath hitched at the soft, thoughtless intimacy of the gesture. when she shifted, the faintest brush of his lips ghosted her temple—so fleeting it could have been an accident.

it wasn't.

"chan..." she whispered, more warning than question.

he didn't move, didn't step away like he should have. instead, he pressed his forehead to hers, breathing her in as if she were the only thing tethering him to the ground. his hand slid down her arm, fingers threading through hers—gentle, yet desperate, as if he already knew the end of this story and hated it.

"if... if we weren't pretending..." she started, voice fragile. "what would you do?"

his lips parted, but no answer came. he just looked at her like he'd spent years holding back and was too tired to keep doing it. "i don't think i'd stop," he murmured finally, the admission falling between them like a confession too dangerous to exist.

something inside her cracked open, and it hurt—because they both knew what this meant. what it could cost.

"i shouldn't want this." his thumb stroked along her knuckles, and his voice faltered, heavy with guilt and longing. "you know that. we'll... ruin everything."

she squeezed his hand, feeling him tremble beneath the weight of his own words. her throat burned, but she forced herself to speak, even if the words tasted like surrender.

"let's ruin it," she whispered, voice trembling, barely holding back the ache that had lived inside her for too long. "because losing you would ruin me more."

his breath hitched, and for a moment, she felt him falter—felt him teeter on the edge of all the things he wasn't allowed to want. she could see the war raging in his eyes, the way fear battled with yearning, both begging for control.

"you know we can't..." he whispered, but it wasn't convincing—not to her, not to himself. his forehead still rested against hers, and neither of them dared to move, as if even the slightest shift might unravel everything.

"it's not possible," chan said, his voice cracking under the weight of reality. "not with my career. not with—"

"with everything stacked against us," she finished for him, eyes stinging. she knew. god, she knew. she'd thought about it endlessly—how the whispers would start, how people would judge her, how chan's fans would eat him and her alive. it wouldn't just cost him; it would cost her too. and yet, somehow, this—this thing between them—still felt worth more than every consequence combined.

"and if we try..." his voice was softer now, like he was talking more to himself than to her. "what if we lose everything? what if we lose... us?"

y/n felt that fear sink deep into her chest, heavy and unbearable. she knew what was at stake. if they gave in to this and it all went wrong, it wouldn't just break their hearts—it would destroy the friendship they'd built, the one safe thing in a world that never gave either of them enough space to breathe.

but the thought of letting him go—of walking away from this moment and pretending they hadn't both just fallen over the edge—was worse.

"chan," she whispered, voice thick with emotion, "we're going to lose each other either way." her hand tightened around his, her heart clinging to the truth neither of them wanted to admit. "if we don't try... if we walk away now... this thing between us will eat us alive."

he exhaled a shaky breath, pressing his lips to her knuckles like it was both a prayer and an apology. "i don't know how to let you go," he confessed, voice breaking under the weight of his vulnerability.

"you won't have to," she promised, even though her own voice wavered. "not now. not ever."

his lips hovered close—so close that she could feel every unspoken word hanging in the small space between them. this was selfish. reckless. impossible. and yet, with chan's thumb brushing over her hand and his breath mingling with hers, it felt like the only thing in the world that mattered.

for a beat, everything stilled. no fans, no cameras, no looming careers to protect. just the two of them, swaying on the edge of something they'd spent years pretending wasn't there.

"hope's a dangerous thing," he murmured, forehead pressing gently to hers. "but it's all i've got when it comes to you."

slowly, carefully, like a man crossing the last line he swore he'd never cross, chan kissed her.

it wasn't rushed. it wasn't desperate. it was soft, aching—years of longing folded into one stolen moment. his lips pressed to hers like they'd both been waiting for this, searching for this, and now that it was here, neither of them could let it slip away.

when they finally pulled apart, foreheads still touching, chan let out a shaky laugh that sounded more like a sigh of defeat. "we're really doing this, aren't we?"

y/n smiled through the tears threatening to spill. "we've been doing this for a long time."

he chuckled, but there was no humor in it—just acceptance, fragile and bittersweet. they both knew the road ahead wouldn't be easy. they knew they'd have to lie, hide, and pretend, not just from the world, but sometimes even from themselves. but for now, in the quiet of the night, there was only this: two people who didn't know how to stop wanting each other.

and for the first time in a long time, they believed it. there was no perfect solution, no guarantee they wouldn't stumble along the way. but they would try—they would hold on, fight through the fear, and protect what mattered most: each other.

and no matter what the world threw at them, they knew one thing for sure—losing each other was the one thing they wouldn't survive. so they clung to this moment, to each other, and hoped—no, believed—that somehow, they could survive everything else. because some things were worth the risk. some things were worth everything. and loving each other, despite the odds, was one of those things.

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cried writing this like wtf