the spaces in betweenㅣtaeyong

12 ; entanglement

12 - entanglement -

—

Dohyeong's P.O.V

I didn't notice that I had even cut myself until I felt a stab of pain and looked down to see a little of blood pooling at my finger. I just shut my eyes and scolded myself silently as I grabbed a towel and held it to my finger, which additionally dyed the white towel pink.

When I turned to go to over to the sink, someone who I thought was Yuta at first was standing there, but his glowing halo told me otherwise.

Looking at him now, a part of me was relieved, but another part of me was just embarrassed.

His silent latency made me feel embarrassed that I had felt so lonely without him. But, I ended up letting the relieved part of me win over, drawing out a hushed sigh.

I tried to keep going after that, continuing to the sink where I put my finger under the stream of faucet water. But, when I heard him coming up behind me, my shoulders tensed as I expected the worst. I actually didn't even know what to expect, but I was still high-strung nonetheless.

Although, when he stopped beside me, all he did was put his hand out. I looked over hesitantly, only to see a single band-aid laying in his palm. When I eventually looked up at him, my lips parted, all he said was, "I was only gone a day, Dohyeong,"

I nodded, taking the band-aid from his hand as I began to see a hint of a smile on his lips. Then, when the water was off and the band-aid was on my finger, I mumbled out my thanks as softly as I could without raising the ears of anyone in the next room.

As I went back to cutting up everything, he came up next to me again.

"Hey, um, does this change anything?" I mumbled, trying to avoid his eyes as I continued faintly, "It was easy to act as if nothing was going on then, but now,"

He didn't answer right away, finally saying, "Do you really think that's possible?"

I stopped cutting, peeking over my shoulder to make sure no one was there before I looked up at him and said, "I'd rather keep pretending everything is normal,"

I looked away after that, shutting my eyes as I realised my mistake. I'd carelessly fallen into the trap of thinking him being here was normal.

He just raised a brow at that, making me open my eyes and let out a sigh.

"None of this makes sense, so it doesn't matter what are or who you are. In any case, we should at least try,"

"I'm a guardian angel, yours if you want to be specific. But I thought you already figured that out," He said, his voice veering right off of blunt sarcasm.

I furrowed my brows, looking up at him and defending myself, "It's what I thought, okay?"

"And," He began hesitantly, his expression blanking again as his eyes darted away from mine, "It's Taeyong,"

"What?"

"My name is Taeyong,"

--

Suddenly, his signature on the note he'd given me made sense.

I picked at my slice of pizza, too caught up in everything to eat. Nothing else was on my mind, not Hannah and Hyeokjae, not the fact that I'd cut the pepperoni so small, not even that fact that my thumb was killing me. The only thoughts in my head were about the angel, or, I guess, Taeyong. TY.

Through that talk, I'd confirmed that he was indeed a guardian angel like I thought, and, I'd even gotten his name, which, I didn't plan to get, but still gladly took.

And though I still had more unasked questions, I somehow figured that he either knew what was going on and didn't want to answer my questions, or he was just as clueless as I was. And I was betting on the latter.

But, after all, a good way to tell what someone's thinking is through their expression, and I bet you can tell where the flaw is there. Even just that little smile from earlier had to be the most of an expression I'd seen from him. But to me, it seems like, with the amount of blank expression he has, the amount of other things might be slightly misjudged.

"Hey," Aera nudged me with her shoulder from the seat next to me, making me look up. "Why aren't you eating?"

I shrugged. "I don't know, not hungry, I guess,"

She raised a brow but just ended up nodding. I let out a breath in relief that she hadn't asked me anything else. I don't know what I would say.

But, it seems I didn't avoid her as well as I thought, because as I rested my chin on my hand, she asked, "Woah, what happened to your finger?"

I pulled my hand away and looked at the said finger, the band-aid still wrapped firmly around it.

"Oh, nothing. I just accidentally cut myself," I told her, shrugging it off.

"I didn't think we had band-aids in the house," Hyeokjae said from his place across the table, giving my finger a strange look as he asked, "Did you find some in the cabinet or something?"

Fuck

"Ah, no," I laughed nervously, lying, "I, just had one in my pocket,"

Aera laughed and rolled her eyes. "You're never prepared when you actually need to be,"

I shrugged and laughed in relief.

"Can't help it."

--

When I sat down in bed a couple hours later, I felt weird. It just felt different, now that the course of the day or so had sunken in.

I have a guardian angel.

I have a guardian angel.

I could repeat it however many times I wanted, but I knew it wouldn't ever make sense. Not on the 5th time, not even on the 50th. Not to mention, it was a little more awkward now. I was definitely used to his silence, but now that I knew he could talk to me if he wanted, well, it just made me overthink.

But, my thoughts thankfully did stop momentarily when the angel came over and sat down on the bed beside me, leaving a him-sized imprint in the mattress. When I looked over at him, I was startled.

He had a look on his face that was subtle, but still a good amount above the flat expression he normally occupied. I didn't know how to explain it.

"I want to talk to you,"

--

AN: I didn't realise how hard it would be transitioning from only calling him 'the angel' to calling him by his actual name