It was already late, too late for anyone with a normal life to still be in the office.
“You're so hardworking,” your coworkers would always say when they passed by your desk on their way out. You always laughed it off, waving them away with some excuse about deadlines or ambition.
You linger at your desk, eyes pretending to scan through documents, fingers tapping a pen without rhythm. Your body is here, but your pulse is down the hall with him.
Through the glass walls, you see him. His suit jacket discarded on the back of his chair, sleeves rolled just enough to show the veins on his forearms, tie loosened, top button undone. A picture of exhaustion and something far more dangerous. His hair is slightly mussed, the way it only is when it’s been tugged at by work stress or by you.
You chew on your bottom lip, not even noticing you’ve stopped breathing until he looks up.
Your eyes meet. He doesn’t smile fully—not here, not where cameras could catch it, where rumors move faster than people—but the corner of his mouth lifts just enough. A silent signal.
A sign only meant for you.
You wait for the last computer to shut down. The sound of an elevator door closing. The echo of footsteps fading.
You slip off your heels, carrying them with one hand as you rush toward the hall, illicit thrill thumping in your chest.
By the time you push the door to the emergency stairwell open, your breathing is unsteady.
He's waiting like he always does. Leaning against the wall, a half-burnt cigarette between his fingers. Smoke curls lazily around him, framing the faint glint of the ring on his finger.
“Hi, darling.” His voice is low, almost amused. He crushes the cigarette against the wall with a twist of his fingers, then steps forward.
His hands find your waist like it’s muscle memory, like your body is familiar territory.
And then he’s kissing you—hungry, urgent, like he’s starving.
You gasp into his mouth when his tongue slides against yours, his palm splaying against your lower back, pressing you flush against him. Your fingers thread into his hair, tugging, and he lets out a sound that was a half groan, half laugh, like he’s losing control but pretending he isn’t.
His hands slip under your blouse, rough fingertips brushing over your skin before closing around your breast. You moan, the sound swallowed into his mouth.
The heat, the smoke on his breath, the scent of his cologne clinging to his collar, it all crashes over you so fast you almost forget to breathe.
And in that dizzying moment, you remember how you ended up in this predicament.
It didn’t begin with a kiss.
It began with campaign deadlines and takeout containers stacked like battle scars on your desk.
You had been assigned under Kuroo Tetsurou, senior project lead for corporate communications. The kind of man people respected without question. He didn't raise his voice in meetings, he didn’t need to. He'd just fix someone with a lazy, knowing smile that said I see through you, and suddenly the whole room sat up straighter.
That smile had landed on you more times than you cared to admit.
“Are you actually working,” he asked one night, leaning against your cubicle wall like he owned the entire floor, a cup of black coffee dangling from his fingers, “or just pretending so management thinks you’re worth the overtime pay?”
You didn’t bother looking up from your screen. “If I'm pretending, I’m at least doing it better than you. You look like a case study for corporate fatigue.”
A low chuckle. “Careful. Some of us are your performance evaluators.”
You finally looked up at him, and he raised a brow, smug. Then he lifted a takeout bag ever so slightly—the good place, the one that actually seasons their food.
You paused. His lips tilted.
“Thought so,” he said, setting the bag down on your cluttered desk as if declaring a truce.
And just like that, it became routine with the two of you sharing takeout dinners on your office table.
For the next few weeks, the building slowly emptied, lights going out row by row until only your workstation and his office glowed against the glass windows and you were left alone with him.
He’ll sit on his office chair, typing on his computer and ruffle through his hair with stress while you sit cross-legged on the carpet, files spread around you like a paper nest.
“Do you think this campaign will kill us?” you muttered once, jotting revisions with your pen cap between your teeth.
“If it kills you,” he said, passing you a napkin without looking up, “I'm taking your monitor. It's better than mine.”
You scoffed. “You're unbelievable.”
“And yet,” he said mildly, eyes sliding to you with that infuriatingly calm smile, “You’re still here with me.”
It wasn’t flirty. At least not at first. It was drier than flirtation, quieter. Something that sat between companionship and danger, settling deep in your chest like a slow burn.
Maybe that’s when the line began to blur, not with lips.
But with the sound of his low laugh in an empty office meant for thousands.
After the campaign wrapped a week ago, everyone else celebrated by going home early for the first time in months. The whole floor felt lighter, almost foreign without the usual exhaustion hanging in the air. Desks that once held stacks of revisions now sat clean, untouched.
You had no reason to stay late anymore.
And yet, you found yourself still at your desk.
You weren’t even working, you’re just waiting.
For what? You have no idea, but you still stayed for when he might need you.
You heard him before you saw him, the soft click of his lighter, the faint scratch of metal against flint. He always smoked on the rooftop after a project ended. He said it helped “reset his brain.” It felt like an excuse now.
By the time you stepped outside, the city was stretched below in glittering strips of traffic and gold-lit windows. Kuroo stood with his tie tucked loosely into his pocket, shirt sleeves pushed to his elbows, cigarette resting between his fingers.
“You’re still here,” he said without turning.
A faint exhale of smoke. “True.”
You walked over and stood beside him. he didn’t offer you a cigarette, at least not immediately. He just glanced at you out of the corner of his eye, reading you in that slow, calculated way he always did.
“You don’t smoke,” he murmured.
You held out your hand anyway. “I didn't. during the campaign.”
He just let out a slow, amused hum. He tapped the cigarette against the railing, took one last drag, then brought it to your lips himself holding it there between his fingers steady and deliberately.
When his knuckles brushed your mouth, your breath hitched.
You inhaled. It tasted like mint, ash, and something distinctly him.
He watched you the whole time.
“You’re terrible at it,” he said softly.
“I don’t smoke these,” you replied, voice quieter than you meant it to be.
He lingered closer than needed, eyes trailing over your features like he was memorizing the way you looked under city lights instead of fluorescent office glow. The professional distance he always upheld had thinned, stretched so fine it almost snapped right there between you.
And yet, neither of you left.
“Feels weird," you said after a moment, exhaling smoke. “Not having anything urgent to do.”
Kuroo leaned back against the railing, crossing his arms. The cigarette glowed faintly between his fingers. “You mean not having a reason to stay late.”
Your pulse jumped. Just slightly, but you had a feeling that he noticed.
Then, casually, like it meant nothing or like it meant everything, he said, “For what it’s worth… I don’t mind having you here when it’s quiet.”
The city hummed below, the wind tugged at your coat.
And he was looking at you like your presence had become a habit he didn’t know how to break.
Maybe that was the moment you realized it wasn't the campaign keeping you there.
Your partnership with him had turned into a growing friendship.
Maybe because that was what you forced yourself to believe.
You kept ignoring that it's actually rising sexual tension between the two of you.
It started casually, naturally. That's what made it dangerous.
“Is the bar downstairs still open?” You asked as you gathered your things.
Kuroo checked his watch. “If we leave now.”
A pause. Then that faint curl of his lips, the kind he used whenever he was two steps ahead of you.
“Don't make me drink alone. That'd be tragic.”
The bar didn’t try to be anything it wasn’t. A couple of neon signs buzzed lazily against the wall, and there was a faint smell of fryer oil lingering beneath the sharp scent of beer. People looked like they came straight from their shifts with their loosened ties, worn-out heels, undone buttons. You and Kuroo fit right in.
A bead of condensation slipped down the side of your bottle the second it hit the table. He rolled up his sleeves without thinking, the motion casual and practiced. The ring caught the light again. It was subtle, but impossible to ignore.
You forced your gaze back to your drink.
“Two more beers,” he’d said to the server, like it was the default. Maybe it was.
You pulled the new bottle toward you and took a slow sip. “So this is your way of unwinding now?”
“Figured it beats going straight home,” he said.
Home. You were tempted to ask him, with her? but you bit your tongue.
Your fingers hovered near his bottle as you reached for the peanuts between you, brushing the back of his hand for a second too long. You weren’t sure if he imagined it, or if he just chose not to react.
“What does she feel about that?” you said, voice light, unassuming.
He glanced at you, unreadable. “Who?”
You shrugged like it didn’t matter. “Whoever’s waiting.”
There was a long pause. Just long enough to register.
He tilted his head, watching you over the rim of his bottle. “You asking?”
You met his eyes for a beat too long, the air pulling tight between you. “No.”
He showed a slow and knowing smile. “Didn’t think so.”
You took another sip to avoid answering, feeling the carbonation fizz sharp at the back of your throat. The silence that followed wasn’t uncomfortable.
It was charged, threaded with every question you weren’t asking.
And every single one he wasn’t answering.
You spun the bottle between your fingers, letting the condensation dampen your skin. "So," you said casually, “now that you’re done carrying another campaign on your back, what’s next, hotshot?”
He leaned back in his seat, stretching one arm over the backrest like the bar was his living room. “You say that like you weren’t right there doing the heavy lifting.”
“Please,” you scoffed, “I'm just the copy machine you occasionally throw ideas at.”
“You're more than that.” he said it too easily. too sure.
It shouldn’t have made your chest tighten. But it did.
You took a slow sip, not breaking eye contact. “Flattery already? We barely started drinking.”
He hummed lazily, eyes dropping briefly to your lips before flicking back up. “Didn’t know we were waiting for the alcohol to start that part.”
The laugh that left you came out softer than intended. “Bold.”
“Observant,” he corrected, not missing a beat.
You shifted in your seat, crossing your legs. His gaze followed the movement before he looked away, like he was doing you a courtesy. Or a favor to himself.
“Do you talk like this with all your partners?” You asked, tone light, teasing, but your pulse betrayed the effort.
He pretended to consider it, tapping his finger against his bottle.
“Because they don’t talk back like you do.”
You went still and the air between you felt heavier than the low hum of the bar around you.
You took a breath. “Do you like that?”
His eyes stayed locked on yours. “Maybe.”
You held his gaze for a moment too long. Long enough to feel the question crawling up your throat again.
About the one about who he goes home to, who he belongs to.
You swallowed it down with another sip.
“Dangerous answer,” You murmured.
Kuroo leaned forward, forearms braced on the table, his voice dropping low. “You asked a dangerous question.”
It felt like a warning but it also felt like an invitation.
You exhaled, slow. “You're in a mood tonight.”
He raised a brow. "And what mood is that?”
“The kind that makes you say things you shouldn’t.”
His lips curled at the edges, lazy and unbothered. “You assume I don’t know exactly what I’m saying.”
You toyed with the label on your bottle, peeling it back. “You’re good at that," You nod to his direction, "acting like you’re in control.”
Kuroo tilted his head, eyes tracing the movement of your fingers before drifting back to your face. “And you’re good at pretending you don’t like it.”
You froze, not enough to be obvious, but just enough for him to catch it.
He always caught it. Maybe he already did.
You forced a chuckle. “You’re really laying it on thick tonight.”
“Maybe I’m just tired,” he said, leaning back again. “Long campaigns make me honest.”
“Honest,” You repeated, like the word tasted strange. “That’s what we’re calling this?”
His gaze dropped to your mouth again, unapologetic this time. “What would you call it?”
Something flickered in his eyes, maybe amusement, tension, want. All of it but none of it spoken aloud.
He nodded once, slowly. “Reckless can be good.”
You swallowed. “Recklessness gets people in trouble.”
He didn’t look away from you, not even for a second. “Then why are you still sitting here?”
The question landed between you like a match hitting dry paper.
You could have lied. You could have laughed it off, thrown another sarcastic jab to push him back to a safer distance.
But your mouth moved before your caution did.
“Because you didn’t ask me to leave.”
There was a shift in the air, it was something quiet, dangerous, settling into place with terrifying ease.
Neither of you said anything for a moment.
Then he leaned in just slightly, voice low enough that no one else could possibly hear.
Your pulse stuttered. You didn’t answer.
So you lifted your bottle, clinked it lightly against his in a mock toast.
“You should finish your drink, Kuroo-senpai,” you said softly. “It’s getting warm.”
For a flicker of a second, something like frustration crossed his face—not annoyed at you but at himself.
But he matched your tone, lifting his bottle as well. “Yeah,” He murmured. “Wouldn’t want that.”
After that night, you couldn't deny it anymore, and you felt it in your gut. His magnet was stronger than your morals, and it left a foul taste in your mouth just thinking about it.
Over the next few weeks of daily work routines with him, he didn’t make a habit of lingering near your desk unless he had a reason. That evening, he stood there anyway, hands in his pockets, gaze moving over the now-quiet floor like he was assessing something invisible.
“You should head home early tonight,” he said casually.
You glanced at the clock. It wasn't time yet. Not by any normal standards. “Why? planning to actually leave before midnight for once?”
A hint of a smirk. “Tempting, but no. Just… don’t overstay for no reason.”
You raised an eyebrow. “Is that an order, senpai?”
He huffed, amused. “It’s a suggestion.”
You waited for him to continue, to explain, but he didn't. He just looked at you, leaning against your cubicle wall like he always did, sleeves rolled, tie loose, every inch of him saying stay while his mouth told you to go.
“You’re weird tonight,” you muttered, packing your things slowly but not actually intending to leave yet. You gave him a weirded out look.
“Am I?” he asked, voice mild, but his eyes were sharp.
You nodded. “You never tell me to go home. You like having someone to annoy until you finish your work.”
“I do,” he admitted easily. Then, he muttered under his breath, “maybe that’s the problem.”
The words hit the air between you. It was too honest, too heavy, out of character for him.
You only stared, waiting for the usual sarcastic follow-up, but it never came.
Instead, he straightened, slipping his hands deeper into his pockets.
“There's a celebration tomorrow for the new account. The team will go out. You’ll drink. So go home early tonight.”
“That’s your logic?” You asked, trying to keep it light even as your pulse spiked. “Save energy to get drunk tomorrow?”
He nodded once. “Something like that.”
He started turning away, then paused just for a moment without facing you.
“This… staying late with me when you don’t have to,” he said. There was a beat.
It wasn’t a warning you fully understood in the moment. It felt like one only he understood.
Or maybe it was you denying it again.
You forced a scoff. “Relax. I like my overtime pay.”
He didn’t call you out, he just gave a quiet sound that could’ve been a laugh but wasn’t quite.
Then he walked back to his office, leaving you standing there with your bag half-zipped and your pulse refusing to calm down.
The bar the team chose wasn’t anything fancy. It was a cheap beer, clinking glasses, neon lights reflecting off lacquered wood. a place meant for noise and laughter and coworkers pretending they didn’t hate each other Monday to Friday.
You sat between familiar faces, drinks being pushed into your hands faster than you could refuse them. People were loud, loosening under alcohol, leaning on each other, relief spilling in waves now.
You laughed when you were supposed to. You cheered when glasses clinked. But every time, your gaze found him.
Kuroo sat across the table, a beer in hand, tie loose, a few buttons undone. He wasn't drunk, he was far from it, actually. If anything, he looked more… restrained and collected in a way that made your chest feel too tight.
Someone draped an arm around you. “You’re turning pink,” your coworker laughed. “Slow down, or we’ll make Kuroo-san carry you home.”
Another joked from the other side, “He’s married, he’s good at that domestic stuff, right?”
Kuroo only took a sip of his drink, expression unreadable. The ring on his finger glinted when he set the glass down.
The night blurred in laughter and clattering dishes, someone ordering another round despite nobody having finished the last. You lost track of how many drinks you had. Time slipped and the room felt light and unreal.
You stood when someone suggested karaoke.
And that’s when your vision swayed, then a hand caught your wrist before you stumbled.
“Careful,” Kuroo said quietly.
His grip was firm, steadying you, thumb brushing your pulse point without meaning to.
Or maybe meaning to more than either of you would admit.
You blinked up at him, something hot curling in your stomach. “Too much?” he asked, voice low enough that only you could hear.
Your coworker noticed and grinned. “Boss, get her home. She's done for the night.”
Another voice chimed in, teasing. “You're the responsible one. And hey, didn’t your wife train you for this?”
Laughter erupted around the table.
Kuroo’s jaw ticked almost imperceptibly, but his voice stayed level.
“I’ll take her.” There was no hesitation.
And no one questioned it.
He slid your bag onto his shoulder, his hand finding your wrist again, not rough, not gentle, just something close to claiming.
The others barely waved goodbye.
You barely felt the cold air outside as he led you out of the bar, your steps uneven. The streetlights painted his profile in gold and shadow, and you realized he wasn’t talking. Not filling the silence with sarcasm the way he usually did.
“Are you mad?” you asked, voice slurring slightly as you walked beside him.
But he didn’t look at you. Not yet.
He walks ahead just a step, not dragging you but guiding you with that easy authority that made everyone follow him without question.
Your heels click unevenly against the pavement. He glances back at you.
“Take them off,” He says.
His gaze drops to your shoes. “You’re going to trip.”
When you don’t immediately respond, he sighs. And then, without waiting, he crouches, fingers brushing your ankle as he unbuckles your heel with infuriating calm.
You freeze, watching his every move.
He doesn’t look up at you, he just slips the shoe off, then the other, holding them in one hand while the other reaches up, his fingers gently curling around your wrist.
The city feels too quiet. You clutch the fabric of your coat. The pavement is cold against your feet but your pulse was burning too hot.
You don’t know how long you walk before you realize he’s not taking you toward the station.
“Senpai,” You murmur. “this… isn’t the way.”
You stop on your tracks, he stops too, finally turning to look at you. The streetlights cast his features in gold and shadow with eyes dark and unreadable.
“You’re supposed to help me go home,” you say, but it sounds weak, more breath than voice.
His jaw tightens at that word.
Like it tastes wrong coming from you.
There’s a pause. The world feels like it’s holding its breath.
And then, softly like it hurts, he says, "If I take you home, I’m going to lose it.”
You feel the ground shift—or maybe it’s just you swaying.
He steps closer, it was just one step but it feels like crossing a line.
“Don’t,” he says, voice low. “Don't say my name like that.”
“Like what?” your heartbeat feels too loud.
“Like you don’t know what you’re doing to me.”
Something breaks in the space between you. There's no noise, no movement. Just the quiet snap of restraint giving way.
His hand is still around your wrist. He lifts it slowly, as if giving you a chance to pull away.
His thumb brushes your pulse. It’s not gentle, it’s reverent.
“You’re drunk,” he says, but it sounds like he’s reminding himself, not you.
“I should get you home.” But none of you moved.
You take a breath that feels like a confession. “…I don’t want to go home.”
That was all it took for the last thread holding everything together to snap beneath the weight of something that’s been building for months.
He exhales all shaky and ruined and the sound alone feels like a surrender.
His voice drops, barely above a whisper. “Then don’t.”
The hotel lobby light is dim, washed in muted gold. It's late enough that no one looks twice when he leads you in. He still held your shoes in one hand, your wrist in the other. His grip never tightens, never hurts, but he doesn’t let go.
He doesn’t ask and you don’t speak. There was only the sound of your breathing and the quiet hum of an elevator arriving.
The doors slide open and you both step inside.
The moment the doors closed, something shifted.
He drops your heels to the floor with a dull thud.
Neither of you moved. Like if anyone did, the tension would burst.
His head leans back against the elevator wall, eyes shut for a second too long, like he’s forcing control back into his body.
You’re the first to speak, even if your voice trembles when it comes out.
His eyes open, slow, dark as midnight.
“Yeah,” he says softly. “it is.”
The elevator hums, climbing.
You swallow. “…then why—”
“Because,” he cuts in quietly, finally stepping forward, closing that last inch of space, “I am so tired of pretending I don’t want you.”
His hand comes up to your face, hesitating for the first time since this began. His knuckles brush your cheek but barely there, like he’s trying to figure out how to touch you without breaking you.
“Tell me to stop,” he murmurs, voice wrecked. “Just once. and I will.”
You breathe in, shaky. He's so close that you can smell his cologne, the cigarette smoke still clinging to his shirt, the faint scent of whiskey from earlier.
You don’t say stop, instead, you whisper his name.
The elevator dings at the next floor, doors sliding open. He backs you into the hallway without tearing his gaze from you, like he's afraid you'll disappear if he looks away. His fingers lace through yours, finally touching you like someone who has decided to be selfish.
You’re both silent as he slides the keycard into the door. His hand is shaking.
The lock clicks open and he swings the door inward.
You both step inside. He closes it behind you with a soft click.
Fora heartbeat, neither of you move.
Then he cages you against the wall, breath hot against your ear.
You’re still a little unsteady from the alcohol. You were not wasted, not gone, but warm and loose in a way that slows your thoughts just enough to make everything hit harder. Kuroo presses his forehead to yours, breathing like he’s holding something back with sheer force.
“Hey,” he whispers, thumb brushing your cheek, his other hand gripping the doorknob behind you like it’s the only thing keeping him anchored. “Look at me.”
His eyes are dark, conflicted, but steady on yours. “How drunk are you right now?”
You blink. “I sobered up a bit from the walk so maybe level two… maybe three?”
His jaw flexes. “Are you conscious at all, you're not just saying that?”
You shake your head, breath shaky. “I know what I’m doing.”
He swallows like that admission physically hurts him. His thumb lingers at your lip, tracing the curve of it slowly, reverently.
Too gentle for what he’s about to do.
“Say it clearly. I need you to say you want this. Not just because you’re… like this.”
You step closer, chest pressing against him. “I’m not drunk, Tetsurou.” you whisper, letting his name roll slowly off your tongue.
“I want this. I want you.”
His eyes flutter shut for a second. You feel him exhale against your skin, shaky like he’s running out of excuses to be decent.
“And tomorrow?” he murmurs hoarsely. “You’re not going to look at me like I stole something from you?”
You lean up, your lips barely brushing his. “What if I’m the one taking something from you?”
The next second, you’re in his arms, his mouth crashing into yours with months of restraint snapping all at once. His ringed hand slides under your blouse, and when the cool metal grazes your skin, you arch into him, needing more, needing him.
“Tetsu—” it slips out breathless, and he groans like your voice is the last tether to his sanity.
His name leaves your lips softer this time, like a confession instead of a plea.
He presses his forehead to yours again, eyes half-lidded but burning, his breath unsteady. “You have no idea,” he murmurs, voice frayed at the edges, “how long I’ve wanted to hear you say my name like that.”
His thumb drags over your bottom lip. You catch it between your teeth without thinking. That does something to him because you feel it in the way his hand tightens on your waist, in the harsh inhale he takes like he’s bracing for impact.
His ring brushes your skin again like a reminder, sharp and metallic against your warmth. His wife’s claim. A promise to someone who isn’t you.
You both look at it and he goes still.
You reach up, slow and deliberate, and take his wrist, guiding his hand back to your skin like you’re choosing this. Choosing him.
His voice drops low. “If we do this,” He says, searching your face like he’s memorizing every flicker of regret that isn’t there, “I won’t be able to pretend it didn’t happen.”
The last piece of restraint breaks and then he’s kissing you again like he wants to burn every trace of guilt from his mouth using yours as the flame.
There’s nothing careful about the way he walks you backward, lips never leaving yours, hands already dragging your blouse up. Every step feels like a line crossed. Every breath like a vow.
He backs you into the edge of the bed, his mouth moving to your jaw, then your throat leaving slow, lingering kisses like he wants to savor the fact that he’s finally allowed to touch you.
“Say that you don’t want this and I’ll stop,” he whispers against your skin, an attempt to try to control himself one last time even as his hands slip under your skirt, fingertips tracing up the back of your thigh.
You curl your fingers in his collar, pulling him down to you. “Don’t you dare stop when we’re just getting started.”
His laugh is low and disbelieving against your throat. “God, you’re going to ruin me.”
You meet his eyes. “Maybe I already have.”
Something desperate flickers there. He surges forward again, hands gripping your hips with a need that borders on worship.
“She’ll never find out.” It slips from him, low and rough, half reassurance and half a lie he wants to believe. “We… we’ll keep it between us. Just us.”
Your reply is barely a breath. “And if I want more than just a secret?”
He freezes for a second, just long enough for the truth to cut through.
Then, quieter, almost broken. “Then I’ll give you everything I can in this room… even if I can’t give you my name outside of it.”
There’s a split second, a flicker of hesitation.
“We don’t—fuck—” his voice trembles against your collarbone. “I don’t have anything on me.”
You know exactly what he meant. You look at him, and you still nod.
His breath catches. “You’re sure?”
He looks at you then, memorizing your face, like he knows this might destroy you both and still can’t bear to stop.
“This is wrong,” he says quietly, like it’s meant to scare you. Like it’s meant to scare himself.
And yet there’s something else buried under it--A wish he doesn’t speak. a quiet, dangerous wanting that ignores all of his morals.
Your lips brush his ear as you whisper, “then don’t leave anything of you behind… except everything.”
His mouth claims you again, rougher this time, teeth scraping your bottom lip as his hands grip your hips hard enough to bruise. When he pushes inside you, it was bare, hot, too intimate you gasp his name like it's the only prayer you remember.
The stretch burns in the most exquisite way, his cock splitting you open with no barrier between your bodies. The ring on his finger digs into your thigh as he braces himself, the cold metal a stark contrast to the feverish heat of your skin.
"Fuck—" He says your name in almost a whisper, a plead or a surrender "—you feel..." his voice cracks, strained with pleasure and something dangerously close to despair. His forehead drops to your shoulder, damp with sweat. "I shouldn't—Christ, I shouldn't be doing this..."
But his hips roll forward anyway, burying himself to the hilt with a broken groan. You arch against him, nails raking down his back as he fills you completely, the thick drag of him making your vision blur. Every nerve ending feels alive, oversensitive from his scent, the rasp of his stubble against your neck, the way his breath hitches when you clench around him.
"Look at me," you demand, voice wrecked. When he lifts his head, his eyes are black with want, pupils swallowing gold.
There’s shame there too, warring with the hunger and it makes you clench tighter around him.
"Look at what you're doing to me."
He curses, hips snapping forward in a brutal thrust that punches a cry from your throat. His hand slides between your bodies, calloused fingers finding your clit with unerring precision. The dual stimulation is too much and your thighs tremble, toes curling as pleasure coils tight in your belly.
"That’s it," he growls against your mouth, tongue licking into you in time with his thrusts. "Come for me. Let me feel you fall apart."
The orgasm crashes through you like a tidal wave, your body seizing around him as white-hot pleasure arcs down your spine. He follows moments later with a choked groan, spilling deep inside you in hot pulses, his entire body shuddering, coming undone.
For one suspended moment, you're both perfectly still with foreheads pressed together, breathing ragged, still joined in the most intimate way possible.
Then reality comes crashing back.
His ring glints in the dim light as he pulls out, the sight of his release trickling down your thighs making his jaw clench.
The silence between you is deafening, thick with everything left unsaid.
He reaches for you, not knowing if he's to comfort or claim, but you flinch back instinctively.
The movement makes him freeze. Something like devastation flickers across his face before he schools it back into careful neutrality.
He turns away to grab his discarded shirt, handing it to you without meeting your eyes. The fabric smells like him that it your chest ache. He then hands you a towel, helping you clean up.
"We should..." his voice trails off, unable to finish the sentence.
Should what? Pretend this never happened? Do it again tomorrow?
You both know there's no going back now.
When you finally speak, your voice is steadier than you feel. "This was a mistake."
His fingers pause on his belt buckle. For the first time tonight, he looks at you with complete honesty in his gaze. "Yeah," he agrees quietly. "but I want to do it again."
The terrible truth of it sits between you, heavier than any guilt. Because under the shame, beneath the layers of regret and responsibility, there's one undeniable truth; neither of you has the strength to stop.
Hell, if he asked if you would run away with him, you’d go without any explanation or question. Or maybe if you asked, he just might say yes.
After a moment of silence, you found yourself tangled in the sheets, his button down shirt the only thing you wore, your head resting on his bare chest beneath the thin hotel blanket. His arms held you tightly, as if you might dissolve into the night air the moment he loosened his grip.
It was well past the time he should have left—past the time he should have been home to his wife—but he stayed, his fingers tracing idle circles on your shoulder, his breath warm against your hair.
You studied his face in the dim glow of the bedside lamp, the shadows softening the sharp angles of his jaw, the furrow of his brow as he lost himself in thought. When he felt your gaze, he turned to meet it, his dark eyes searching yours.
“You okay?" you asked, your voice barely above a whisper.
He exhaled through his nose, a ghost of a smile tugging at his lips before he pressed a kiss to your forehead.
“I'm just thinking," he murmured.
Your eyes held for a heartbeat too long, then his mouth was on yours again, slow and deep, his tongue sliding against yours in a way that made your pulse stutter. You shifted, straddling his hips as he pushed himself up against the headboard, his hands gripping your waist to steady you.
His lips left yours, trailing down your jaw, then your throat, teeth grazing the sensitive skin just below your ear. You arched into him, your wetness pressing against the fabric of his slacks, the friction drawing a quiet gasp from your lips.
Fingers trembling slightly, you worked at his belt, then the buttons of his pants, freeing his cock with a slow, deliberate tug. He groaned against your neck, his hands moving to the buttons of the shirt, his shirt you were wearing, peeling it open to expose your bare skin.
His mouth found your breast, tongue swirling around your nipple before drawing it between his lips, sucking gently. His other hand cupped your other breast, thumb rolling over the peak until it hardened under his touch.
"Fuck," he muttered against your skin, his voice rough.
You rocked against him, your hips grinding down, his cock sliding between your thighs, already slick with your arousal. His grip tightened, fingers digging into your hips as he guided you, his breath hot against your collarbone.
"Tell me how much you want it," he demanded, his voice low, dangerous.
You didn’t hesitate an whisper in his ear, "I want it--no, I want you right now."
His hands moved to your ass, lifting you just enough before lowering you onto him, his cock sinking into you with a slow, deliberate thrust. You moaned, your head falling back as he filled you, the stretch delicious and the heat unbearable.
"Every Friday," he growled, his lips brushing yours.
"This hotel room. No excuses."
You clenched around him, your nails digging into his shoulders.
"No excuses," you agreed.
His hands gripped your hips as you rocked against him, the slow drag of his cock inside you making your breath hitch. His lips found your throat, teeth grazing your pulse point before he murmured against your skin,
"No marks where they can see."
You let out a breathless laugh, your fingers tightening in his hair.
"That’s your first rule?"
He pulled back just enough to meet your gaze, his dark eyes burning with hunger and something sharper with possessiveness.
"Well, first of many." his hands slid up your sides, thumbs brushing the undersides of your breasts. "No touching in the office. No lingering looks. No—fuck—" His words cut off as you clenched around him, your hips rolling in a slow, deliberate circle.
You smirked, watching the way his jaw tensed. "No touching? That’s rich, are you sure we can do that." You teased.
His fingers dug into your thighs, his breath ragged. "We’ll try, sweetheart." He replies, biting on his lower lip.
You leaned forward, your lips brushing his ear. "What else?"
He groaned, his grip tightening as he guided your movements, his cock sliding deeper. "No texts after work hours. No emails that could be traced. No—Christ—no meeting alone in the office."
You nipped at his earlobe, your voice dropping to a whisper. "What if I can’t help it?"
His hips jerked up, driving into you with a sharp thrust that made you gasp. "Then you wait until Friday."
You moaned, your nails scraping down his chest. "And if I don’t want to wait?"
His hands slid up to your waist, holding you still as he thrust up into you, slow and deep. "Then you remember what happens when we break the rules."
You arched against him, your breath coming in short, uneven bursts. "Which is?"
His mouth crashed into yours, swallowing your moan as his fingers tangled in your hair, tilting your head back.
"We lose control," he growled against your lips. "And then we lose everything."
You whimpered, your body tightening around him, pleasure coiling low in your stomach. "Fuck the rules," you breathed.
He laughed, dark and rough, his teeth scraping your bottom lip. "That’s the problem, sweetheart. We already did."
That was how you ended up tangled in his arms on the emergency stairwell. Because the two of you couldn't hold yourself back and it's only Monday.
When the lights have dimmed in the office again, everyone else had gone home hours ago.
Everyone except for the two of you.
You were bent over his desk, files scattered under your elbows, your skirt hiked up around your waist. His hand fisted in your hair, pulling just hard enough to make your breath catch as his cock pressed against your soaked panties.
"I thought we shouldn’t," you gasped, arching back into him, your voice already trembling.
His breath was hot against your ear, his voice a low, dangerous growl. "I don’t give a fuck what we shouldn’t do."
Then he was inside you in one brutal thrust, splitting you open, your moan echoing off the glass walls.
"Fuck—" your fingers scrambled, nails digging into the wood as he set a punishing pace, his hips slamming into yours with no pretense of restraint, like he’s been waiting all day to do this.
"You knew this would happen," he snarled, his grip on your hair tightening. "You stayed late again. You wore this fucking skirt. You knew."
You whimpered, your body clenching around him, your thighs shaking. "I—I didn’t—"
"Liar." his hand slid down, fingers digging into your hip as he fucked you harder, the desk creaking under the force.
"You wanted me to break the rules. Admit it."
You couldn’t. Not with the way he was pounding into you, stealing the air from your lungs, your thoughts scattering with every snap of his hips.
"Tell me," he demanded, his voice rough, his cock dragging against that spot inside you that made your vision blur.
"Y-yes!" you sobbed, your body tightening, pleasure coiling too fast, too sharp.
"I wanted—ah!—I wanted you to fuck me—"
He groaned, his fingers biting into your skin as he drove into you one last time, his release hitting him like a punch to the gut. You came with a broken cry, your body convulsing around him, your legs giving out as he held you up, his forehead pressed between your shoulder blades.
For a long moment, the only sound was your ragged breathing, the faint drip of sweat on the desk.
Then, slowly, he pulled out, his hands smoothing your skirt back down with a gentleness that belied what just happened.
"Friday," he said, voice rough but controlled again. "We stick to the rules after this."
You turned, meeting his darkened gaze, your lips still swollen from his kisses.
He smirked, adjusting his tie like nothing had happened.
Staying behind had already become habit, something your bodies did even when your minds told you to leave. It was muscle memory now.
The two of you still there like a secret the building itself had learned to keep.
You’d both worked late again, overtime bleeding into silence, but tonight you’d been good. No lingering looks. No brushing hands when passing papers. No excuses to stand too close at the printer. Just pure work.
You felt a small, pathetic victory of you not touching him. Of him not touching you.
Until the elevator doors slide shut.
The moment the soft mechanical hum seals you in, the air changes. Too still. Too private.
You force your eyes to stay forward, gripping your bag a little too tight, pretending to check your phone to keep your hands busy.
Two floors pass when felt his presence shifting.
Before you can process it, your back hits the cool elevator wall, his hand braced beside your head, the other cupping your jaw with a certainty that makes your breath catch.
“Don’t,” you whisper, your voice already betraying you.
His forehead lowers until it almost touches yours. He’s not kissing you. He’s just there and breathing you in.
Close enough that if either of you moved a fraction, your mouths would meet.
“I said we’d wait,” he murmurs, voice rough, like gravel under velvet.
“You did.” your pulse stutters. “You also said no touching.”
His thumb traces the edge of your bottom lip slowly, eyes fixed on your mouth. “I lied.”
Your breath hitches when his fingers slide to the back of your neck, guiding your head back just enough to expose your throat. He’s not touching you in any obscene way. And yet, it feels more dangerous than anything you’ve done.
“Tetsurou,” you breathe, warning or plea, you don’t even know.
He exhales a laugh, soft but shaking with restraint. “You have no idea what your voice does to me when you say my name like that.”
The elevator hums past another floor.
He doesn’t kiss you, he just… stares, like he’s burning the sight of you into him, like this moment alone could get him through the nights he has to go home and pretend you don’t exist.
He leans in even closer with his lips grazing your cheek, not kissing, just hovering. His breath ghosts down your neck like a confession.
He steps back, suit straightened, expression unreadable.
You stand there stunned, pulse racing like you’ve just been wrecked even when he didn’t even kiss you.
“See you tomorrow,” he says like nothing happened, hands in his pockets.
But as he passes behind you, his fingers brush your wrist. His fleeting touch, gone in a heartbeat.
Your skin burns like he branded you.
You hesitate for a moment, then you chase after him. He notices quickly as he unlocks his car.
The car was still warm from the summer heat, the leather seats sticking slightly to your bare thighs as Kuroo shoved the driver’s seat all the way back. The parking garage was mostly empty with just the occasional flicker of fluorescent lights and cars passing by.
You’d barely made it inside before his mouth was on yours, his fingers tangling in your hair as he kissed you hard enough to bruise. His other hand shoved your skirt up around your waist, his thumb hooking into the waistband of your panties and dragging them down in one rough tug.
“Fuck, you’re already wet,” he growled against your lips, his fingers sliding between your thighs, teasing your entrance. “Were you thinking about this all day?”
You gasped as two fingers pushed inside you, his palm grinding against your clit with just the right pressure. “Yes—”
“Say it.” his fingers curled, hitting that spot that made your back arch off the seat.
“I thought about you fucking me,” you moaned, your nails digging into his shoulders. “In the supply closet. Against the copier. Right the fuck on my desk—”
He cursed, his free hand fumbling with his belt, his cock springing free, already hard and leaking. “Should’ve done it,” he muttered, lifting your hips and dragging you closer to the edge of the seat. “Should’ve bent you over and taken you right there.”
Then he was pushing inside you in one rough thrust, the stretch burning in the best way, your moan echoing through the car. His hands gripped your hips hard enough to bruise, his pace relentless from the start, the sound of skin slapping against skin obscenely loud in the confined space.
“Tell me you love it,” he demanded, his voice rough, his cock driving into you with brutal precision. “Tell me you love how fucking wrong this is.”
You sobbed his name, your legs wrapping around his waist, pulling him deeper. “I love it—I love you—”
He groaned, his forehead dropping to your shoulder as his hips stuttered, his rhythm faltering. “Fuck, I’m close—”
“Inside,” you begged, your fingers tightening in his hair. “Please—”
He came with a broken groan, spilling deep inside you, his hips jerking as he fucked you through it. You followed moments later, your body clamping around him as pleasure ripped through you, your cry muffled against his shoulder.
For a long moment, the only sound was your ragged breathing and the faint hum of the empty parking lot.
Then, slowly, he pulled out, his fingers brushing your hip almost apologetically as he reached for the compartments for tissue to clean you up.
“We’re terrible at this,” you muttered, your legs still trembling.
He smirked, tucking himself back into his slacks. “Yeah. It's reckless. I thought you said reckless gets people in trouble?"
"Well trouble feels good right now." You smirked as you smoothed your skirt down. You kiss him one last time before getting out of his car.
When the most anticipated Friday finally comes, you don’t knock. You just use the keycard without a word, sliding it into the slot as if you’ve been doing this for years.
The door clicks open with a quiet beep. You find him already inside.
Kuroo is sitting on the edge of the bed, hair damp from a shower, only wearing just a white robe.
A bottle of red wine rests on the nightstand, two half-filled glasses catching the low light like something sacred and wrong.
He looks up the moment you enter like he’s been listening for your footsteps in the hallway. Like he needed to see you to breathe.
There’s no greeting. There doesn't need to be.
He stands and walks towards you, you drop your bag.
Clothes hit the floor and the bed swallows you both.
You don’t remember who kissed who first. But now it’s quiet.
The room still smells like sex and wine. The sheets are twisted around your legs, his skin warm against your back.
You’re lying sideways across his chest, one thigh thrown over his waist, your fingers laced with his. His thumb moves lazily over your knuckles, slow and absent, like muscle memory.
You feel the metal of the ring on his finger as he held you. You bring it up and stare at it.
Without thinking, your free hand drifts, fingertips ghosting over the silver band wrapped around his finger. He doesn’t flinch, he doesn’t pull away.
Instead, he just watches your hand trace the promise he made to someone else.
The air goes so still it hurts.
His voice breaks it. “Maybe…” his hand tightens around yours, just barely. “Maybe if we met before I made a promise to someone else.”
The words land heavy between your ribs.
He doesn’t say it like an excuse. He says it like a wish.
A wish he can never grant you.
And it felt like a wound.
You just looked at him while your thumb rests over that band of metal again. It's soft and reverent under your touch.
He just lets you hold the hand that doesn't belong to you.
He just lets you stay pressed against him like he has the right to keep you here.
You feel his breath stutter when you whisper—so soft you’re not sure if you meant for him to hear it:
“You’d still break my heart.”
There’s a pause before his lips brush your temple, slow and aching.
“Yeah.” he lets out a faint exhale, like defeat. “But I’d do it holding your hand.”
And somehow, that’s worse.
His fingers tighten around yours, it was not enough to hurt, but enough to make your pulse jump.
He doesn't look at you when he says it. “If I had met you first…”
The sentence hangs unfinished, trembling in the air like something fragile enough to shatter.
You almost don’t want him to finish it. Some things are safer left implied.
But Kuroo has always been a man who says things he shouldn’t.
His voice drops, rough with quiet conviction.
“—I would’ve married you.”
The words don’t sound romantic. It sounded so much like grief.
You feel it hit you in a slow, delayed wave, something hot behind your eyes, something heavy behind your ribs.
You could laugh or scream. You could kiss him until your lips go numb.
But instead, you breathed. Small, shallow and controlled.
Because if you let yourself feel all of it, you won’t survive this.
He finally looks at you then. His eyes are soft, and it hurts more than when he’s rough.
His thumb brushes the back of your hand again, just once, like he knows he's not supposed to hold it for real outside this room.
“But I didn’t meet you first.” his voice is steady.
“And I don’t get to rewrite that part of my life.”
You swallow, your throat tightened while your fingers curl around his, desperate and defiant.
“Then lie to me,” you whisper, eyes locked on his ring. “Just in here. Just on Fridays when I can have you.”
He turns your hand over, pressing his lips to your knuckles, right where a ring would sit if this were another life.
“On Fridays,” he murmurs against your skin, “You're mine and I'm yours.”
You hate how easily you believe it.
"Tetsu," you murmured, he just hummed in response.
"Can you take your ring off when we do it?" you asked, voice almost breaking. He didn't question, he just gave you a heartbreakingly earnest look.
"Okay." he agreed before he kissed your forehead.
It was supposed to be another Friday at the hotel with a room key slipped into your hand. A body against yours under dim light and unfamiliar sheets.
That was the deal. Fridays were for sinning, not pretending.
So when he texted, "Meet me at the restaurant near the station", you expected another careful arrangement of just two coworkers grabbing a normal meal, something that could be explained away if anyone asked.
But when you arrived, he was outside instead of inside, hands in his coat pockets, eyes drifting over the people walking past like the noise was too much tonight.
He looked at you once and something in his posture eased, like you were the only familiar thing in a city that wouldn’t stop moving.
A faint smile appeared on his lips, not quite reaching his eyes. then, gently, almost shyly, he whispers to your ear. “Let’s not eat there.”
You glanced toward the restaurant light glowing behind frosted glass. “No?”
He shook his head, quiet. not tense just seemingly… tired.
“I don’t want to sit across a table from you tonight.”
Your breath caught in your throat.
“I’d rather be some place where… we don’t have to pretend.”
“Come on,” he said softly, like a promise. “Take me with you.”
“We can just order something and get it delivered,” you suggested as you walked side by side toward the station. You kept a deliberate space between you, the kind that said we’re just coworkers, even though your heart was already reacting to the nearness of him.
His gaze stayed forward, voice low and strangely careful when he replied,
You stopped for a second.
He didn’t look at you, didn’t clarify. He just stood there in the glow of the streetlight, tie loosened, shoulders no longer carrying that sharp, composed authority he wore in the office.
Something in his expression was softer. It was something quiet and almost… hopeful.
You didn’t know what to feel about that.
So you only nodded once, turned and led him toward the nearest grocery store.
The grocery store wasn’t special, it was just a small neighborhood market tucked beside the station, fluorescent lights flickering faintly over displays of vegetables and instant meals.
A place meant for late-night errands and people with ordinary lives.
Yet walking through it with him felt dangerously natural.
You pushed a small basket along the aisle, trying to keep your hands steady. He walked beside you, glancing over the shelves like this was something he’d done a dozen times.
“Do you even know what you’re going to make?” you asked, stopping by the produce section.
He hummed, reaching close enough that his sleeve brushed your arm to pick up a bundle of scallions.
“Miso soup. Gyoza. Something easy.”
You raised an eyebrow. “I didn't know you cooked.”
He didn’t look at you, he just tossed the scallions lightly into the basket you were holding.
“It's just something simple I learned from her.” He said.
The words hit harder than they should have.
At the refrigerated section, he tapped a pack of pork filling.
“This one. The other brand falls apart when you pan-fry it.”
You blinked. “You have opinions about frozen gyoza brands?”
“I’m full of surprises.” he grins, you just rolled your eyes at him.
He reached over and took the basket from your hand without asking, carrying it easily in one hand as the two of you walked down the aisle. He grabbed tofu, soy sauce, a pack of cheap beer, moving with quiet confidence.
When you passed by the instant ramen, he paused.
“Do you like the spicy one or—”
“The mild,” you answered without thinking.
He nodded once and placed the mild one in the basket like filing away a fact he intended to remember.
Like a man learning his partner’s preferences.
That thought tugged at your chest, feeling quite hurt and comforted at the same time.
At the register, he paid before you could reach for your wallet.
“I know.” he just handed you the receipt like it meant nothing, like paying for groceries together was just another thing the two of you did.
You walked home side by side through the quiet street, grocery bags rustling between you.
From the outside, you looked like a late-night couple returning from a casual grocery run.
For a moment, you let yourself pretend that’s exactly what you were.
Your apartment is too small for two people, yet he moves inside it like he’s always belonged there—setting the groceries on the counter, loosening his tie with that quiet grace that makes your throat tighten.
You hover by the doorway, watching as he rolls up his sleeves properly this time, exposing the veins in his forearms, his watch glinting under the kitchen light.
“Where’s your cutting board?”
The question is so… normal it unsettled you. You point to a cabinet wordlessly and he finds it on the first try.
“You act like you've live here.” you joked, but something
“I just pay attention,” he says simply, rinsing the knife like he owns the place. You crack a can of beer, drinking one as you stood beside him, chopping scallions while he mixes the broth base. The scent of miso rises, comforting and warm.
He motions for you to come and taste the soup, he raises a spoon to your mouth and you tasted it. You nod of approval and he smiles before he gave you a kiss.
For a terrible, blissful second, it feels like coming home.
He moves behind you to reach for a spoon, his chest brushing your back lightly. It was not exactly intentional, but not careful enough to be accidental and that made you go still and he doesn't move away quickly.
“Relax,” he murmurs near your ear, voice too close. “We’re just… cooking.”
But his hand lingers at the small of your back a moment longer than necessary, fingers ghosting over the fabric of your blouse before he steps away.
You were plating the gyoza together when he steals one straight from the pan, burning himself, cursing under his breath while you swat his hand away.
You laugh, but there's a heavy feeling buried deep in your chest that notices how It feels too easy.
He stares at you for a second, something fragile and dangerous flickering in his eyes.
“Don’t look at me like that,” you say.
Like I’m yours. like this is the life we have.
The words hung on your mouth, but you don't say it. Instead, you just shook your head.
You eat at your tiny dining table, knees brushing every time either of you shifts. He hands you a glass of beer, then keeps one hand resting on the back of your chair as he eats, fingers occasionally grazing your shoulder like he needs the contact to stay grounded.
He looked at peace. Like he belonged there.
Not like your boss. Not like someone who belongs to someone else.
Just a man in your kitchen and eating miso soup like it’s the best thing he’s had all week.
“What?” he asked when you gazed at him for too long.
“You look…” like my husband. “...different here.”
He just smirked, faint and tired. “You mean happy?”
The air shifts. It wasn't heated like the hotel. Not frantic like the stairwell.
Because it’s gentle. Because it feels like love—the one thing you swore you wouldn’t call it.
When he takes your empty bowl and washes it in your sink without asking, sleeves still rolled, ring glinting under your kitchen light—
You realize this is the moment that will ruin you.
When he was done with the dishes, it turned quiet.
You should have asked him to leave, you thought to yourself, but having him here felt warm.
It didn't feel like your apartment, it felt like home, a real one.
Instead, you stand by the doorway of your tiny living room as he wanders around like he has every right to be there. His fingers brushing the spine of a book you left on the coffee table, gaze resting on the blanket thrown over the couch.
There’s no rush tonight. No frantic, breathless urgency like in the hotel or the office.
He looks back at you. “Do you always eat alone?”
You don’t know why that makes your throat tighten. “Yeah.”
He nods once, like that settles something inside him. then he walks past you, flicks the switch on your lamp, bathing the room in a softer glow. He sits on your small couch and pats the space beside him. It wasn't commanding, just… asking.
You head over to him and sit down beside him.
There’s only silence at first, then, slowly, his fingers find yours where your hands rest between you.
You could pull away but you don't. You let yourself feel his skin, his warmth. Like this is the last time.
“I shouldn’t be here,” he says softly,
Your heart stutters. “Then go.”
You don't mean it, and maybe he knew, he felt it. So he doesn't move.
His thumb just traces the back of your hand in a slow, absent motion, like a man memorizing something he knows he’s not allowed to keep.
“If I go…” he says, voice low. “…I won’t come back like this again.”
You held your breath for a moment. You pretend to not know what he meant.
“So stay,” you whisper, hating how fragile it sounds.
His jaw tightens before he let out a sigh, he leans his head on yours.
For the first time, you don’t kiss. You don’t touch beyond your interlaced hands. You just sit with his shoulder against yours, your fingers tangled, the steady sound of his breathing filling your apartment like a cruel lullaby.
He looks around your small, imperfect space—the single plant by the window, the unframed print leaning against the wall, the chipped mug still drying by the sink.
“So this what it would’ve been like?” he says quietly.
You didn't have the strength to answer. You didn't want to picture him being here ang longer, not when he doesn't plan to stay.
He decides to leave after midnight.
Not like the hotel where he slipped out quietly, fixing his tie in the mirror.
Here, he stands at your door for a long moment, shoes in hand, hair slightly mussed from your couch cushion.
He looks at you like he’s already mourning something.
You think he might say a simple goodnight but instead, he says:
“Don’t make me feel like I live here.” before placing a gentle kiss on your cheeks. You only close the door when he disappears into the hallway.
Instead, you just walk back to the kitchen, staring at the two bowls drying by the sink, the faint scent of miso still hanging in the air, his laughter still echoing in your walls.
And that’s when you understood
The sex would never be what ruined you.
It was this almost-life. This pretend peace. This quiet, impossible domesticity.
You press your hand to the counter where he stood, washing your dishes like it meant something.
And for a single, suffocating heartbeat, you let yourself imagine a world where he never put that ring on his finger. A world where he put one on yours and not on her.
You imagine a world where this wasn’t pretend before you turned the lights off.
But the warmth he left behind doesn’t leave with it.
Your affair with Kuroo Tetsurou lasted longer than it ever should’ve, but you both got better at pretending.
Good at keeping your distance under the hallway lights, good at making eye contact look like coincidence, good at walking past each other like strangers until the clock struck Friday and hotel room keys replaced restraint.
You learned how to tame the fire between you during office hours, you learned how to survive the moments when your hands brushed passing paperwork, how to ignore the heavy wanting whenever the last elevator ride of the night left just the two of you behind.
But that Friday, something felt different.
He sat beside you on the edge of the hotel bed, shirt still unbuttoned from your last round, fingers tracing lazy patterns over your palm like he wasn't about to ruin you with his next breath.
“You want to get away from here sometime?” he asked casually. Too casually. Like it was the easiest thing in the world to leave Tokyo, leave your roles, leave the rules you both pretended existed.
You blinked, unsure if it was a joke. “Like… a trip?”
He turned to face you fully, lacing his fingers through yours like a man making a vow.
You stared at him, waiting for the twist. “Are you sure?” you asked quietly, because someone had to be.
His thumb brushed over your knuckles, slow. Certain. “I’ll tell my wife it’s a business trip.”
And that’s how you found yourself waiting outside the station with a small duffel bag, stuffed with enough clothes for a weekend.
You saw his car pull up slowly. He doesn’t park properly, just leans over and pushes the passenger door open from his side.
You quickly got in and gave him a quick kiss.
The first thing you notice isn’t his face. It’s his hand. His ring finger was bare.
He just greets you good morning with a gentle smile before he started to drive.
He drives with one hand on the steering wheel, wrist loose, fingers tapping to the quiet music playing through the speakers. The breeze from the open window ruffles his hair as sunlight washes over his profile.
For once, he doesn’t look like someone’s husband. He doesn’t look like your boss.
Away from Tokyo, away from his wife, away from rules and the eyes of the people who know you and him.
The silence in the car felt like relief instead of heavy. Like a stolen breath you both know you were never supposed to take.
It was around noon when you arrived at the resort. It isn’t lavish, just a row of faded white villas with balconies facing the sea, curtains dancing in the afternoon wind. Palm trees sway lazily, like even the ocean here refuses to rush.
He takes your bag before you can protest, towel casually hooked over his shoulder like he’s done this with you a thousand times.
A staff member passes by, pausing with a polite smile. “Honeymoon?”
You freeze, breath getting caught in your throat.
You wait for him to laugh it off, to correct them, to remind the world you don’t belong to him.
But he just smirks, glancing at you once before replying, “Something like that.”
After settling down in your room, you got changed into something more comfortable and appropriate for the beach.
The sun paints everything in gold.
You sit on the beach with your legs stretched out, toes buried in warm sand while he kneels behind you, applying sunscreen to your back slow and unhurried, fingers tracing the line of your spine like he’s memorizing it.
He turns you around gently and does your shoulders next. The act is too intimate to be casual. You just watch his movements, eyes then traveling to his face where it’s gentle, almost looking at peace with just you here with him.
You take the bottle from him. “Your turn,” you murmur, and he sits with his back to you, head tilted slightly down as you spread sunscreen across his skin. He hums quietly when your fingers wander too far, but he doesn't stop you.
Later, in the water, he lifts you by the waist just to hear you laugh. You didn’t know he could laugh like that. Not the polished chuckle he gives during conferences. It was a real one.
Raw. Young. Almost happy.
On the shore, an elderly couple sitting under a straw umbrella watches with gentle smiles.
“You two look good together,” the old woman says.
He answers before you can. “Thank you.” Like a blessing he’s willing to take.
When you pass by the small market later, he buys you grilled squid on a stick and holds it out for you to take a bite. You roll your eyes, but you lean forward anyway. He wipes sauce from the corner of your mouth with his thumb, and it feels like something only a husband should do.
At a stall selling tourist trinkets, he slips a seashell anklet over your ankle while you’re distracted, buckling it silently. “So you don’t forget,” he says simply.
Forget what? But you don’t ask him.
When the night fell soft over the resort. The bar near the shore glows in neon pink and flickering blue, an 80s love song humming through old speakers. Whitney Houston sang, warm and dreamy yet feeling a bit like it’s mocking.
He buys two drinks and leads you away from the crowd, down to the stretch of sand just beyond the light where the sea whispers instead of roars.
Without asking, he takes your hand.
The music drifts down from the bar as he pulls you against him, one hand warm on your waist, the other still holding your fingers like something sacred.
You dance barefoot on the sand, the world swaying around you in salt-tinted air and half-hope.
His chin rests against your hair. He breathes you in like he’s praying.
He spins you once, slow and deliberate. Your laugh catches on the wind together with his.
For a heartbeat, you believe that this trip is real and not a secret you both keep.
You believe that he was never tied to someone already.
You believe you’re not just someone he visits on Fridays.
You believe you belong here with him like this.
And that belief hurts more than all the lies.
He kissed you then, pressing you closer to him by holding onto your nape. The moonlight made him look softer, more vulnerable.
You saw the want in his eyes, a want that’s different from what you always see in the office or in your hotel room, it was something more genuine, real. Or maybe it was just the liquor.
But either way, you find yourself stumbling back to your room, his hands all over you, only stopping to take the keys out of his pockets and fumbling with the knob as he drowns in your mouth.
The door barely clicks shut behind you before his hands are on your waist, spinning you gently against the wood as his mouth finds yours again, slow this time, savoring every flavor. The salt from the ocean still lingers on his lips, the taste of cheap tequila and something sweeter, something just him.
You laugh against his mouth, breathless, giddy with the kind of joy that feels dangerous. His fingers tangle in your hair, tilting your head back as he kisses down your throat.
"You're beautiful like this," he murmurs, his voice rough, reverent. "All sun-kissed and happy. I want to see you like this more.”
Your hands slide under his shirt, nails dragging over the warm skin of his back, feeling the muscles tense beneath your touch. He groans, pressing closer, his hips pressing against yours in a slow, deliberate grind that makes your breath hitch.
"I know," he breathes, pulling back just enough to meet your gaze. His eyes are dark with his pupils blown wide, but there's something tender, something aching that lingered behind it too.
Then his hands are on the hem of your dress, lifting it over your head in one smooth motion before tossing it aside. The night air is warm against your bare skin, the moonlight spilling through the open balcony doors, painting silver streaks across your body.
He stares for a long moment, his throat working as his gaze traces every curve, every dip, memorizing every inch of you.
"God," he whispers, almost reverent. "Look at you."
You reach for him, fingers trembling as you undo the buttons of his shirt, pushing it off his shoulders. His skin is warm under your palms, his chest rising and falling with each ragged breath as he watched you.
Then his hands are on your hips, guiding you backward until your knees hit the edge of the bed. He follows you down, his body covering yours, his mouth finding yours again in a kiss that feels less like hunger and more like worship.
His touch is slow and deliberate. His fingers traced the curve of your breast, his thumb brushing over your nipple until it pebbles under his touch. His mouth follows, tongue swirling around the peak before sucking gently, drawing a whimper from your lips.
"Tell me what you want," he murmurs against your skin, his teeth grazing your ribs as he kisses lower and lower.
"You," you gasp, your fingers tightening in his hair. "Just you."
He groans, his hands sliding down to grip your thighs, spreading them wider as he settles between them. His mouth is hot against your inner thigh, teeth nipping lightly before his tongue drags through your folds, slow and filthy. Licking off the slick from your arousal and looking up at you with earnest eyes.
Like this was a form or ritual to worship you.
You arch off the bed with a cry, your hands fisting in the sheets as he licks into you, his tongue circling your clit with just the right pressure.
He hums against you, the vibration sending sparks up your spine, his fingers digging into your hips to keep you still as he works you higher and higher..
Then he pulls away, leaving you gasping, your body trembling with need.
"Look at me," he demands, but his voice was gentle.
When you lock eyes with him, his lips are slick with you, his eyes burning with something that makes your chest ache.
He offers his hand, you take it and he leads you out.
The balcony railing is cool against your bare stomach as Kuroo bends you over it, his chest pressing flush against your back. The ocean breeze carries the scent of salt and blooming jasmine, mingling with the musk of sweat and arousal between your bodies.
His hands slide up your sides, his calloused palms skimming your ribs before coming to rest over your breasts with a claiming and possessive touch as he nips at the sensitive spot behind your ear.
"Beautiful," he breathes, not looking at the view but at you and the way your fingers tighten around the railing, at the way your back arches when he rolls his hips in a slow, testing grind. His cock slides through your slick folds, the head catching at your entrance teasingly before retreating.
You whimper, pushing back against him. "Tetsu, stop teasing, I want–“
"I know." His chuckle is dark, his chin warm against your shoulder as one hand leaves your breast to grip your hip. "I know, baby."
Then he’s pushing inside you in one relentless thrust, stretching you open, the fullness so intense your knees nearly buckle. The railing digs into your thighs as he bottoms out, his groan vibrating through your skin.
"Jesus—" His fingers dig into your hip, his other hand sliding down to circle your clit. "You take me so good. Like I was made only for you.”
He sets a steady pace from the start, each snap of his hips driving you harder against the railing, the metal creaking under your combined weight. The sound is lost beneath the ocean’s roar and your own broken moans, the slap of skin on skin echoing in the humid night air.
"Look at you," he rasps, his voice wrecked.
"Taking me like you were made for it. Like you’re mine."
You are. In this moment, with the stars as your only witness, you are his. Only his.
And you pretend that he’s yours. Just for the night.
His fingers work your clit in tight circles, the dual sensation of his cock pounding into you and his touch on your most sensitive spot pushing you toward the edge too fast, too hard.
"Come for me," he demands, his teeth sinking into your shoulder. "Let me feel you come on my cock."
The orgasm crashes through you like a the waves witnessing you coming undone under Kuroo, your body clamped around him as you cry out, the sound swallowed by the wind. He follows moments later, his thrusts turning erratic as he buries himself to the hilt with a groan, spilling inside you in hot pulses.
For a heartbeat, the world stills with just the two of you, connected and his chest heaving against your back, his lips pressed to your spine in something too tender for an affair.
Then, slowly, he pulls out, his hands steadying you as you turn to face him. Moonlight catches the sweat on his brow, the rawness in his gaze as he cups your cheek.
"We should go inside," he says, but his thumb brushes your lower lip, lingering.
You nod, but neither of you move.
At least not immediately.
Not when the night still feels like it belongs to you.
You don’t know how long you stay like that against the balcony, bodies still trembling from the echo of what you just did, of what you keep doing, every Friday, like worship, like sin dressed in silk.
Eventually, he pulls you back inside with a quiet, breathless “Come here.”
He doesn’t let go of your hand.
He tosses a thin resort blanket over his arm, then guides you back out through the balcony, past the sliding doors, and down the short path that leads back onto the sand. The night is quieter now. The bar’s music is distant, blurred by the sound of waves.
Everything feels slower. Softer.
He lays the blanket down on the sand and lies back, pulling you with him until you're resting against his chest. His skin is still warm from sex, heartbeat steady beneath your ear.
The sky above stretches endless and dark, constellations scattered like salt.
You breathe in. You don’t say ‘I love you.’
He doesn’t say ‘please don’t go.’
Instead, he sits up after a moment, retrieving something. It was a red ribbon, frayed from the dress you had carelessly thrown aside earlier. He takes your hand gently, as if it’s something breakable.
Without a word, he ties the ribbon around your finger.
Your heartbeat stutters as he wrapped the fabric gently on your finger. You watch him, his calm expression hid something destructive behind it, but you don’t ask.
You look around, finding a thin wire discarded nearby, your fingers trembled slightly as you loop it around his ring finger where his actual ring should’ve been placed if he didn’t remove it for your sake.
You twisted it so it wouldn’t come lose.
For a while, you both just sit there, staring at your hands with your fake rings.
“I promise to find you first in a different lifetime.” He whispers into your ear as he holds your hands and brings it onto his lips, placing a tender kiss to your skin.
He says in a soft way, as if he’s afraid the wind will carry it away before you can catch it.
Your throat tightens with his words, your chest ached as tears sting the back of your eyes. You just gazed at him, your eyes glossy.
You press your forehead against his shoulder, breathing him in, the salt, the smoke and just something undeniably him.
You don’t say me too. You don’t say I wish.
You just lift your hand and place your palm over his, covering the thread ring with your fingers, as if trying to keep it there.
As if that will make it real.
The silence stretched between you, heavy but also gentle. A silence that holds both love and grief in the same breath.
Kuroo shifts slightly, lying back down and bringing you with him, his arm looping around your waist. His breathing slows while his fingers still tangled with yours.
Long after he falls asleep, you stare at the sky, the silk ribbon catching faint moonlight around your finger like a promise that will never leave the dark.
And for a moment, you allowed yourself to imagine a life where you don’t have to let go.
You didn’t know it then, but somehow, you had a hunch that maybe that was the last time you both smiled like that.
With sun-warmed skin, salt on your skin and a ribbon ring that still sat in your bag when you returned to Tokyo, tucked between receipts and hotel keycards like a relic from a life that didn’t belong to you.
When Monday came, it felt like waking up from a dream and walking straight into punishment.
Back in the Office, reality comes crashing down all cruel and sharp.
With the fluorescent light and stacked paperwork waiting for you at your desk.
His voice down the hall, professional again. You pretended not to flinch when he passed by your desk with a nod reserved for coworkers, not for lovers who traced vows into each other’s skin under starry skies.
But there was something new now.
A shift, a fracture. Something restless beneath the surface.
He shouldn’t look at you here but he does anyway, like every glance is a stolen kiss.
By Wednesday, your chest is already tight. By Thursday, your hands shake a little when you pass by the hotel keycard in your bag.
When Friday came, it feels less like a ritual and more like an addiction.
He doesn’t wait in the hallway like he usually does. He comes straight to your desk, sets down a file, and lets his hand wander to your waist. Like it’s a warning or a promise, maybe a claim.
There were no words–just thick tension enough to choke on.
He’s becoming more reckless every week. When he’s getting impatient, he takes you to the back of his car before even reaching the hotel.
In the hotel, when he manages to keep his compsure, the door clicks shut behind you and for the first time, he doesn't greet you with a kiss.
He just presses you against the wall and breathes, “Come here,” with a low voice filled with hunger.
This isn’t how he touched you in the resort. This isn’t sunlit laughter and seaside gentleness.
This is teeth and fingers digging deeper into your skin and ragged breathing.
Kuroo fucks you like he’s furious—not at you, but at everything.
Your back hits the mattress hard and sheets tangle. His ring finger is now bare, just as you asked.
“Look at me,” he grits out when you try to close your eyes.
You couldn’t deny him of that so you always look at him as his thrusts become deeper than usual, unforgiving in rhythm.
He keeps your jaw in his grip, like he needs to be sure you’re with him, right here, in this lie you both chose to live in.
When you come, it feels like grief.
He doesn’t pull away after, he just stays inside you, forehead against yours, breath uneven. Like he’s trying to do something to you to keep you.
His hand slides over your ribs, then lower. Then up. Feeling every crevice like he’s ingraining it in his brain, not to be forgotten. Like this might be the last time he's allowed to.
He freezes when his name slips out your tongue. Like it hurts.
For one terrible second, it feels like he’s going to say it.
Say ‘Leave with me.’ Say ‘I’ll choose you.’ Say ‘Let’s run.’
But instead his eyes drop to his own hand resting over your hipbone. To the finger where his ring should be.
His jaw locks and there was silence, unbearable silence.
Before, he removed the ring before touching you.
Now, he looks at the absence of it after as if checking the damage he’s done. He doesn’t wear it anymore.
It’s as if he’s trying to decide which life is the lie.
Fridays used to feel like escape. Now they feel like proof that you’re both already too far gone.
Routine has decayed. Although Fridays still happen, now there's fear stitched into the sex, stitched into every thrust he makes and every groan that leaves his lips.
Where there used to be heat and hunger, there's something frantic beneath his touch. But now, he’s trying to claim what he knows he can’t keep. Every touch was filled with forbidden yearning.
You feel it in the way he kisses you. It was harder, messier. In the way his fingers bruise your hips like proof. He leaves marks on you now, breaking his own rule. Like he’s afraid you might slip away now.
You feel it in yourself, too. You feel it in how you cling to him after you’ve fucked–-no, made love. He feels you dig your nails into his back like you’re carving your name into him where no wedding ring can erase it.
He comes undone inside you with a sound you’ve never heard before. It was half pleasure, half something else you can’t quite figure out. He collapses against your shoulder, breathing heavy and uneven against your throat. Like a man possessed.
For a moment, the only sound is the ticking of the hotel room clock and your heartbeat thundering in your ears.
Then, he shatters the silence with words that he’s been drowning out with wine for weeks.
“My wife…” His voice is hoarse. A confession pressed into the damp skin of your collarbone.
“She’s getting suspicious of me. After we went to that resort.”
You froze above him. It was something you know you were going to hear eventually, but now that it was here, you didn’t know how to react.
It’s the first time he’s acknowledged her as something that could take him away from you.
Not as a duty. Not as a ring. But as a threat.
Your breathing stopped as you wait for him to continue.
He doesn’t move, his forehead just stays pressed to your chest with his arm tightening around your waist like he expects you to vanish if he loosens his grip.
He stays inside you even though the air is thick with something raw and dangerous.
His voice lowers, just above a whisper, ragged. “She asked me who I went with.”
Your fingers that were still tangled in his hair stopped.
He swallows, hard. “I told her it was a company thing.” Then there was a heavy pause.
“I could tell she didn’t believe me. She’s onto me. Onto us.”
For the first time during all your Fridays, he holds you like a man bracing for loss.
Not with hunger. Not with lust. But with fear. Of losing you, of his wife finally finding out? You don’t know, but it was evident in the way he held you that he doesn’t want to lose you.
His hand drags up your back, pausing just below your neck, as if he wants to keep you there under him, with him, in this room where you both pretend the outside world doesn't exist. Where he’s in heaven just by being beside you under thin hotel sheets.
That’s when you realize that he wasn’t afraid of being caught.
He’s afraid of you leaving.
And that’s when it hits you: loving him was not thrilling anymore.
You don’t find out from him.
You find out in the most mundane way, like the way fate always chooses when it wants to ruin you quietly.
A coworker passes by your desk, smiling too brightly.
“Did you see the email? Kuroo-san’s wife is pregnant. HR announced it this morning. Apparently, she’s due in a few months.”
You froze on your desk, unable to move or speak or process anything. You just keep staring at your screen with your eyes burning with tears wanting to break free from your lids.
So she was already carrying his future when you were in that resort tying pretend vows with ribbon and thread.
That explained why he acted so possessive, why he was acting so terrified you’ll abandon him.
That Friday, you stare at him differently. It used to feel like a wound staring at him, now it felt like a promise you don’t belong in.
He kisses you like always, touches you like always, but something inside you is breaking in a new way.
You break even more with his every move, every touch, every word.
“I want him. I want to be selfish. I want him to be mine. I want to ruin everything. I want to be the reason he never goes home. And I hate myself for it.” Your mind repeats as you held onto him with equal possessiveness as him.
The guilt doesn’t come like a slap. It comes like hands around your throat, slow and tightening until you couldn’t breathe.
Because a child did not ask to be born into your sin. And somewhere in your chest, beneath all that wanting, something whispers:
“If I ask him to choose… I won’t survive his answer.” You thought to yourself as his mouth took over yours.
He’s acting like nothing has changed. Like you don’t know. He pretends you don’t. And you pretend you don’t
Fridays still happen in the same room, same sheets, same way he breathes your name like a sin he’s willing to die for. Like it’s a prayer to a god.
Only now… his words are different.
He fucks you slow this time. Like he knows something is coming, and he wants to carve this version of you into himself before it’s gone.
After he comes inside you, his forehead rests against yours, breaths mingling. His thumb traces your cheekbone, soft.
“I think about leaving,” he confesses, voice barely audible. “More than I should.”
You just close your eyes because it hurts to look at him. If you did, you know the tears would come.
His hand finds yours under the sheets, fingers lacing through like always. You feel his pulse against your wrist. It was fast and steady and alive.
In the silence, he takes in a deep breath as he looks into you, with a dangerous tone, he says the words.
“Say it.” His grip tightens around your hand. “Say we run.”
You just stare at him. You look like you're about to say yes. You look like the kind of woman who would burn the world just to love him in daylight.
But your throat closes and you stay silent as your eyes lock onto his.
That silence becomes the most honest thing between you.
The next Friday after that, you just stand outside the hotel door, keycard clutched so tightly it bites into your palm.
The hallway feels colder than usual. Colder than it has any right to be.
You thought, ‘If I walk through this door…then I am choosing myself over a child who will grow up without a father…then I am choosing him in a way his life will never allow…then I am admitting I want something I can never keep.’
The keycard trembles once between your fingers but you open the door anyway.
At least let me savor this until I no longer can. Until I can be strong enough to walk away. You mutter under your breath.
He’s there like always. His shirt already off, his hair is slightly messy like he’s been running his hands through it while waiting for you.
You feel something is different. He doesn’t reach for you with aggressive hunger. Instead, he steps forward slowly, cupping your face like he’s afraid you’ll vanish if he grips too hard.
This isn’t lust. This is ritual.
He undresses you gently, like unwrapping something holy. Like he’s tracing memories onto your skin.
“Come here,” he whispers, his voice breaking. He wasn’t commanding, but pleading.
You lie down together, bodies fitting familiar patterns, but the air between you feels like mourning.
His thrusts aren’t rushed, they’re deliberately slow. He sets a steady rhythm that feels like heartbeat and grief. His eyes trail down your body, this time it wasn’t filled with its usual lust, but yearning.
Yearning for something he knows he can’t have anymore.
Your fingers drag through his hair, your other hand fisting in the sheets like you’re anchoring yourself against the weight of goodbye.
At one point, he pressing his forehead to yours, hips moving in slow, controlled rolls, and he chokes out, “Don’t let this be the last time.”
“Don’t leave me like this.” He mutters like he’s about to cry.
Because he says it like a man kneeling at the altar.
You kiss him like it’s a vow and he pistons into you like prayer. Both of you move like you’re trying to carve your existence into the other.
After coming undone, silence filled the room that usually still filled with his praises and you moaning out his name.
This time, there was no more sound except your breaths settling.
His head rests against your chest, like he’s memorizing the beat of your heart.
One of his arms draped heavy across your waist, holding you as if restraint is an act of love.
His voice comes low, raw, bleeding trust “Promise me you won’t leave me in the morning." His voice was laced with regret, grief, and aching.
You just press your lips to his hair, breathing him in and preparing for a lie that you know he already sensed was a false promise.
The words tastes like ash on your tongue and he falls asleep still holding your hand.
He never lets his grip loosen, not even after his breathing slowed into a steady, peaceful rhythm.
You realize then that he has never looked this unguarded. Not in Tokyo. Not even at the seaside.
Only here—in your arms, on the last night you’ll ever be his.
You bring his hand to your lips as hot tears streamed down your cheeks. You kiss his knuckles, right where a ring that you could’ve put on him in front of the altar if life had been kinder.
His lashes flutter. He murmurs your name, barely audible. Like he knows you’re slipping away from him at this moment. Even in his dreams.
That almost made you stay, but you just squeezed your eyes shut, pursed your lips to not let a whimper out as tears spilled.
You carefully slide your fingers away from his grip. Your warmth leaves his palm and you watch his hand close on empty sheets.
You place the hotel keycard on the nightstand. With a near and final glance. Like an obituary carved in silence.
Peaceful and unaware of your departure.
You take one last look, memorizing the shape of him in rumpled sheets.
Of his hair where your hands will never run through again during nights like this.
Of his mouth you will never feel on yours again, of how rough or soft it felt against your skin.
Then you walked out the door, stepping out and leaving your regrets inside the hotel room.
The door clicks shut with a soft click, his breathing continues, unaware he was just abandoned for his own salvation.
No resignation speech. No dramatic exit. Just a two-sentence email and a cleared desk, you didn't even show up at the office. You just asked a friend to get your stuff for you.
You moved apartments. Started a new job in a smaller firm where no one knew the name Kuroo Tetsurou.
Where Fridays were just Fridays, and hotel rooms were just hotel rooms people booked for business travel, not for making mistakes and forbidden love.
Years passed—not with healing, but with learning how to live around an ache.
You don’t love anyone else, you can't, but you learn how to cook for one without crying.
You learn which window gets the best morning light. You still trace your finger over your ring finger sometimes when you wake, as if expecting a thread to still be tied there.
It’s been three years, You didn’t mean to walk there.
You’ve buried your memories with him deep in your mind. But that evening, without thinking, you found yourself wandering to that part of the city anyway.
Near the station and past the cheap ramen place—A few blocks from the hotel where you said your last lie and where you left the man you'd die for.
You sit on a park bench overlooking a small public playground, twilight staining everything in amber. Couples pass, children laugh, trains whine in the distance and the streetlights flicker open.
You don’t cry, you just sit there and breathe like someone trying not to remember.
A shadow falls across the bench. You don’t look up, until someone sits beside you. It was slow, certain and achingly familiar.
Your heart breaks before your eyes moved to find his familiar eyes looking at you. “You’re the last person I expected to see here,” He says quietly, like he’s speaking to the ghost of someone he once loved.
You don’t respond at first. You’re afraid your voice won’t hold.
“I didn’t expect to come here,” you admit, voice steady, looking at your hands on your thighs. “I just… walked and I ended up here.”
You glance at Kuroo. He looks older and softer around the edges. There are faint lines near his eyes—laugh lines, not stress lines. The sight hurts more than anger ever could.
For a moment, neither of you speak. Then, from across the playground, a voice echoed. “Papa!”
You both turn to find a little girl standing by the slide, waving. Her hair is tied messily, cheeks flushed from play. She can’t be older than three.
His face softens in a way you have never seen—not even with you.
“Just a minute,” Your name leaving his mouth, at first you thought he was referring to you.
Then it sunk in that he called his daughter by your name.
Your breath leaves your lungs.
Your name. He named her after you.
He named her after the name he used to say against your skin when he kissed your shoulder in the dark.
Something felt heavy on your tongue, but you don’t speak.
He doesn’t explain, doesn’t apologize. He just looks at you as he lets the truth sit between you like a flame neither of you want to touch.
“She looks like my wife,” he says quietly. “But when she smiles... there’s something of you there. I see it every time. It's cruel, in a way.”
You look at the little girl again, who has returned to her slide, laughing as she runs down.
You swallow the lump forming in your throat. “You look… happy,” you say.
His smile is small. Not quite true.
“I have a good life,” he says. “Stable. Honest. The kind of life people are proud of.” Then there was a pause.
“You forced me to choose that. I hated you for it, at first.”
Your hands tighten in your lap.
“But now?” you ask, barely above a whisper.
He exhales. He didn't sound sad nor relieved.
“Now I understand.” The breeze moves through the trees. He watches the playground. “It’s the right life. For them.”
And something raw flickers in his gaze.
“But I didn't want the right life,” he says softly. “I wanted you.”
Your throat tightens, but you don’t look away.
“I know. ” You say as you showed him a pained smile, looking into his eyes now felt like liberation, even if it felt like he's leaving a gaping hole in your chest.
He glances back toward the playground. His daughter as she laughs and climbs the slide again. The sound carries across the park like bells.
“I love her,” he says, voice steady. “More than I’ve ever loved anything.”
You nod at him, returning your gaze to your hands that fidgeted with each other.
His jaw clenches like that compliment hurts.
“I try.” Another beat. “But some nights… I still wake up on Fridays expecting you name to pop up in my phone, it's crazy how I still go there sometimes. To our hotel room.”
You breathe. “And what do you do then?”
He looks at you, eyes tired and gentle and full of a love that has nowhere left to go.
“I close my eyes,” he says, “and I imagine you didn’t leave before morning.”
There was silence, the wind passes and ruffles the leaves on the trees.
His daughter calls again, “Papa, look!” holding up a dandelion like a treasure.
Before he walks away, he says without looking at you.
“If there is ever another life—run away with me.”
You don’t stop him, you just watch as he walks toward the playground, effortlessly lifting the little girl into his arms as she giggles, wrapping her small hands around his shoulders.
You don't know why, but you speak before he can leave.
“What do you think it would’ve been like?” Your voice is quiet. “If we… didn’t have to hide. If you met me first.”
He doesn’t turn, but his shoulders still.
A long silence. Then he sits back down beside you.
For a moment, you are not two adults who ruined each other. You are just two people imagining.
“I think…” he begins slowly, “we’d have a small apartment with terrible lighting. Near the station. You’d complain about the cramped kitchen.” That sounds like the apartment you had, the one he went to once.
You smile, eyes distant. “You’d pretend you hate cooking, but still do it anyway. Just to show off.”
His lips twitch. “You’d come home late, arms full of groceries because you’d refuse to let me do everything.”
“And you’d take them from me,” you whisper, “kissing me in the doorway like you always meant to.”
The breeze shifts, softer now. He doesn’t look at you, but his voice drops to something almost tender.
“We’d fight. About stupid things. Like laundry. Or how you leave your mug everywhere.”
Your eyes burn. “You’d follow me around the apartment to keep talking just because you hate having your words ignored.”
He huffs a quiet laugh, pained and fond at the same time. “And you’d… sit on the kitchen counter while I cook. Barefoot, in one of my shirts.”
“And you’d kiss me,” you say, staring ahead like you’re watching a life play out on a screen only the two of you can see. “While something burns on the stove.”
“I’d marry you,” he says simply. No hesitation. “The moment I realized you were home to me, I’d marry you before anything could take you away.”
Your breath catches, but you don’t cry.
You add quietly, “…And on Fridays, we’d just be tired from work. Not hiding. Not afraid.”
He swallows. “On Fridays, I’d fall asleep beside you instead of waking up alone.”
The streetlights hum. The city moves around you both, but for a moment time pauses.
“What would you name her?” you ask, eyes lingering on the little girl playing near the slide.
He exhales slowly. “Something soft,” he murmurs. “Something that sounds like you.”
He stands again, and this time, you know it’s real.
“Thank you,” he says, though you don’t know if it’s gratitude or grief.
“For giving me a life I only got to live in my head.” His eyes are soft when he looks at you. “It was enough, you know. Just knowing I could have loved you right.”
He turns toward the playground, toward the life he chose.
Because love, at its cruelest, sometimes means walking away first.
You don’t cry. You couldn't. At least not until he was gone.
You only sit there—at the edge of a life that could have been—with your name still echoing in the laughter of a child that was never yours.
