This story is a mixture of sunshine and rain, teardrops and laughter, pleasure and pain. 

Just remember, there was always a dark cloud that the sun couldn't shine through.

Rain's breaths were still ragged as she pressed her back against the wall, her hands against the cold surface, seeking relief from the numbness spreading through her veins, her erratic heartbeat, her racing thoughts.

"Come closer and find out." She breathed. And challenged. And internally prayed that he would and wouldn't at the same time.

Suga's smile became wider, he even dared to snort with audacity as he took determined steps to stop right in front of her. Crossed his arms. Waited.

She shook her head, closing her eyes in defeat. "That's the only way to make them listen to a fucking order, isn't it?" Breathing harder, her fingers opening and closing at her sides. Admitting the unspoken. That she would never hurt them. At least not physically. At least not if she could control it.

"I guess. That's how they are used to." 

"You know I wouldn't... hurt them, right?"

Sure, but just to be on the safe side, I'm never letting you choke me again when we're fucking.

He took another step forward but stilled when Rain held her hand up, stopping him. His smile disappeared, replaced with a frown.

She wasn't sure why she did it. Maybe because it hurt so much that he was seeing her like this. 

From close. Helpless. Detached. Shaking. Manic. Lost and small in this dangerous game of yakuza that will chew her up and spit her remains once her flame and passion will die once more. Very soon. The clock was ticking for her.

Filling the big meaningless shoes, they had created for her.

Becoming the Oyabun.

"Last I heard, you were plotting a deadly vanilla latte scheme." He whispered with a smile as if to ask, What went wrong? What triggered this?

Everything. She thought bitterly. Everything went wrong. Cause I'm fucked up. Cause I trusted you.

"Not that it's any of your business, but the vanilla latte scheme is thriving." She hissed, her teeth chattering from the tremors that now were expanding everywhere.

He moved her way again, his posture relaxed.

This time, she straightened. She tilted her chin up as she inhaled and shivered.

This is what I am.

What I really am.

"Thank you." She whispered. "For not telling them. For not including it to my file."

He just shook his head as if saying, Of course I wouldn't. "I assumed you wouldn't want them to know." Meaning: I know you would literally rather die a painful death than admitting you are vulnerable. To them. To society. To anyone.

"Just say it." He whispered intensely, commanding even. Cause I need to feel that I'm something different for you. An exception to your rules. "Ask for my help."

Rain wished then, as she looked to him, that she was her normal self. Or her usual self. The one who would tell him to stick his arrogance where the sun doesn't shine. Then shamelessly drag him to the floor and ride his face.

But she wasn't the usual Rain right now. She was the real one.

The broken, the vulnerable, the two seconds before the even grandioser breakdown.

The one that was brewing, bursting in anticipation from everyone to leave her alone so she could cry her lungs out and tear apart everything in a two-mile range. So she could breathe. So she could break.

The ugly side of the bitch.

The broken part of a sad tune.

The sad hidden meaning between the lines of a beautiful love poem.

The hidden side of the moon.

"I'm having a major panic attack." Rain inhaled and swallowed, holding their stare, trying to remain unflinching.

Something passed across his features -a moment of disbelief and unexpected satisfaction- before he sighed.

Hiking the sleeves of his shirt up to his forearms, he stared her down with even more disbelief before leaving her there to go and turn the faucet of the bath, turning the water to ice-cold.

Rain's body then decided that this was a great time as any to collapse on the floor, so it did just that.

She crashed on the tiles, heaving as she tried to draw her next breaths that were becoming shallower and more labored by the second.

The vitality was seeping out of her body, the echo of gurgling water pouring into the tub strangling her even further, as she felt her throat closing, the memory of frozen knives everywhere before her body shutting down, her thoughts racing faster than her heartbeat.

She closed her eyes and welcomed it.

The fear. The pain. The familiarity.

Reliving the memory of her death.

Suga came back, lifting her over his shoulder to carry her and place her on the bed.

She heard him walking to the table next to the door to pick up the syringe Jimin left behind.

Then she felt the bed yielding, as he lowered himself on the edge, patting his knee twice.

"On my lap Rei,"

"No." The word came out muffled by the linen she pressed her face on.

"That word shouldn't even be in your vocabulary with me."

"Well, turns out my vocabulary is full of fucking surprises. And if I turn and see you smirking, I'll strangle you until my last breath."

Still heaving, she turned to face him, and he was frowning.

Maybe dying wasn't such a bad idea.

The man who's been following her for seven years, the only person who had seen her at her worst, the one who knew the real her, was a secretive arrogant liar. And she was irrevocably in love. A fate worse than death.

"I don't care if I die." she breathed harder, not releasing him from her stare.

"But I fucking do.

So stay the fuck still." 

His arms came around her body, and he draped her over his legs, her chest pressing on his leg, her shirt dress riding up, her ass aligned with his face, allowing him a perfect deathwish view, that from this angle said wish death.

He eased the needle right into her right buttock, slowly releasing the diazepam into her bloodstream. The liquid hit her system immediately, she felt it painfully spreading through her veins, and sucked a lungful of oxygen before biting his thigh hard, shutting her eyes with force. 

She moaned in pain and relief, her back arching. She didn't comment that then she felt a bulge against her chest.

And the plot thickens.

And the plot wasn't the only thing that did just that.

They stayed like this for a minute, Rain slowly releasing her bite to regain her breath, gulping the precious air, and him running his hand through her coal hair with surprising calmness. Then put one hand on her butt and pulled the syringe out slowly, causing new ripples of pain and desire to run through her body.

Her head dropped to the bed.

Is it possible to have a panic attack and be close to an orgasm at the same time?

"Thank you," she murmured, being also thankful that he couldn't see her face that was now flushing for a whole other reason, as she pushed her palms on the bed to rise.

His palm plastered on her back, pushing her back down to lie across his lap.

"Don't move yet."

"Why?" She didn't turn to face him.

Cause I don't want you to leave. "Your bath should be ready any minute now."

Liar.

Two truths, but only one shared.

He had the annoying, irritating ability -and nerve- to pretend that he doesn't care while saving her at the same time.

So I guess we are both back at the pretending phase.

"So, Rei." She heard a curious yet heavily arrogant tone coloring his voice as he slowly ran a finger over her tattoo, like drawing it. "While in your hypothetical killing spree, were you intending to flash V while doing that uppercut or it was a farewell bonus?"

"Are you intentionally that much of a dick or is it your personality's bonus?"

"I'm sure he would be sad that he didn't live enough to absorb that image for longer."

"You know what?..." She yelled and turned to face him, then stopped.

Because then she knew.

For the fragment of a moment, before his face turned cold and unattainable, all his worries and his fear and his pain were exposed on his gleaming eyes.

The game was back.

And he was playing it, only to make her forget the misery of the moment, to take her mind away from the panic attacks and the problems and the pain and the fear.

To make it all go away.

To forget. To take a breather.

To just be.

To show her that nothing will ever pull her down.

To show her that he won't tiptoe around it, won't treat her like she's fragile. But as an equal.

And then she smiled at him, surprising herself as well.

A smile so honest and genuine, burning and bright as the fucking sun.

A smile that said I see through you too.

And maybe I'll never say it, but I'd break the back of love for you too.

The corners of Suga's lips might have tilted up a bit as he took off her shirt dress, leaving her completely naked.

He might have tripped somewhere in the room if he didn't know it by heart cause he didn't lift his eyes from hers once while he carried her to the bathtub.

She hissed as he lowered her in the ice-cold water, that was pooling around her, barely reaching her chest and soothing her skin. Calming her. Slowing down her heartbeat. As if it could pull the tension out of her.

She reached to turn the faucet on again, to fill the half-empty bathtub.

He immediately, madly, alarmingly fast, placed his hand over hers, stopping her short.

Because the pain of his own nightmares had come out to play.

Because he didn't want her to fill the bathtub.

Because he couldn't bear to even think of her laying back in the frozen water, sinking inside it, going under.

And he couldn't even care to hide his worries and his pain and his fear. That he can't relive his own nightmare.

"You can try to drown your demons, but mine know how to swim."

His words soaked the air, the walls, and the water, filling everything with the bare truth and charging it with electricity.

And reality sank in.

That she had forgotten that Suga knew everything about her that day he admitted his feelings. 

About the panic attacks and the even darker background that caused them.

That he knew that there was a thick adamant shell of pretentious hardcoreness and emotionlessness facade engulfing the chaotic storm inside her. That she made it and used it to protect herself. 

That it felt like their secret. That the perfect and unattainable Ryiuzaki Rei was, in fact, not so perfect. Not so cold. Not so strong.

That his words on the day of his deathwish were not random but calculated and exact.

That he knew exactly what those demons she tried to drown were. And he had tried to hint it to her back then.

And that even with all the secrets and the lies, it was and always will be impossible to hate him.

It's in the water, baby, It's in the pills that pick you up

It's in the water, baby, It's in the special way we fuck

It's in the water, baby, It's in your family tree

It's in the water, baby, It's between you and me

Bite the hand that feeds

Tap the vein that bleeds

Down on my bended knees

I'd break the back of love for you,

I'd break the back of love for you.

https://youtu.be/6vlm4JsBsPE