These Paper Pages

just "friends" [isen x reader]

tw: unhealthy coping mechanisms & unhealthy relationships.

Isen supposes the relationship between you and him is unhealthy, yet despite the glaring evidence pointing towards an inevitable fallout and heartbreak, he stays and threads his hands with yours. The calluses of his fingers press against your soft palms, tracing obscure figures as he buries his face in the crook of your shoulder.

Perhaps it’s pity, perhaps it’s guilt, or it could be both; a potent mixture thrumming through your veins as you pull your hands from his and instead cup his cheeks, forcing him to look at you. You’ll deal with the regret when it comes tomorrow, but right now what you need is a distraction and Isen was more than happy to provide. In the veil of night the shadows linger where the moonlight hits and the demons that haunt your nightmares skit across the inky darkness as you capture his lips with yours. Isen wraps his arms around your waist, dipping his head lower so he sinks into you.

He tastes whiskey on your tongue, but Isen doesn’t mind. Over the course of the year of being with you, he has come to learn to not mind the things you do even at the expense of his own feelings. Briefly, even when he is caught in a daze as he kisses you, fingers wandering under your shirt and feeling supple skin, he wonders if it’s fear or just desperation, a yearning for someone he cannot have because even when he has you trapped in his arms, your heart belongs to someone else. He pushes it in the back of his mind, turning his attention to you as he moves from your lips to the underside of your jaw, leaving a trail of kisses down your neck to your clavicle.

You both pretend it’s Isen’s name that leaves your lips. You pretend to care and he pretends that it doesn’t hurt in the slightest.

You both know better.

XXX

When morning comes creeping in, sunlight slipping through the slits of the curtain and dimly illuminating his dark apartment, your eyes flutter open. Over the corner of your eyes, when you tilt your head slightly over your shoulder, Isen’s messy mop of amber hair peeks through the bedsheets.

“I’m sorry.” You whisper. Isen stirs beside you, a soft scoff escaping his lips. You feel his shift beside you, the bed creaking as he moves.

“You always say that,” He replies, sighing. Glancing over to you, he pretends he doesn’t admire the way your hair cascades over your back, covering the marks he knows he left behind. “ I’m getting tired of hearing it.”

“If you’re apologetic, then you should just stop coming here.” You push yourself up, pulling the covers over your shoulder to give you some sense of modesty.

“I should.” You answer, tone gentle. You know you won’t.

He watches as you pick your clothes off the floor and make a beeline for the shower. Perhaps he’s mad and desperate, always wanting what he cannot have. Pressing his palm against the space you once occupied, laughter leaves his lips; quiet and pathetic sounding.

“But you won’t.” Isen knows, it always ends the same way every week.

Glancing over your shoulder, you try to smile at him, but from the way he looks at you, the smile never reaches your eyes. The door closes behind you and you sink to your knees, head against the wooden door.

“That's a given.” It will always end the same way.