We became more acquainted with each other's bodies between lathering in the shower and moisturizing after. I fought against heavy eyelids, Seokjin's chest rumbling under my palms with a chuckle.

"Sleep, Seline." His fingertips trailed up and down over my nude back.

I shook my head, still letting my eyes close with a soft, mumbled reply. "I'm listening. You were telling me something about fried chicken when you were a kid." My partial memory of his story evidence of my need for rest.

Despite wanting to hear the ending that would tie back to the two inch scar on his forearm, thin skin that I traced back and forth, I fell asleep within the next breath.

With the sky slightly cloudy so that it blocked the sun from its full appearance and the consistent patter of rain the next day, I didn't wake until mid-afternoon. I'd moved into the spot where Seokjin formerly lay, his scent still pressed into the sheets without him there.

I heard his laugh first, loud and then halting suddenly as if he remembered I was sleeping. The massive size of the house made it more challenging to heat, the cool air making me shiver as I crawled from the bed in only my underwear.

There was a brand new toothbrush waiting by the sink along with a cloth for washing my face. Imprints from the night had been left on my skin, small and pink in the crook of my neck that would be easier to cover and burning with violet in areas designated for our eyes only. I laughed to myself at the memory of him wiping his brow dramatically while I played with the various spray settings in the shower. He claimed that mopping the hallway floor of the mess we'd made was the most cleaning he'd done in months.

I was pulling up my shorts when he turned through the door frame, reaching for me before I could tug the oversized t-shirt I wore to fall over my hips. "I made lunch." He muttered at the same time that he pressed his lips to mine, a now instant greeting.

"We still have food left over from last night." I chided, sure that he'd continue cooking for every meal so that we never ran out.

"I repurposed it." He replied and I was all too aware of the way his hands refused to leave me, comfortable as they spread around at my sides.

Steam still rose from the open sandwich he plated, peppers and cheese melted over the sliced steak he made the night before. He involved himself in every move I made, pulling out my seat and cutting my sandwich in half after putting on the lid.

"You're kind of clingy." I said, fighting the urge for my eyes to roll back with the first buttery, flavorful bite into my sandwich.

His head tilted to the side in question. "You don't like clingy?" He wondered aloud, an elbow leaned onto the countertop as he took a bite of his sandwich with one hand, not shy about the pleasant response to the taste. His other hand gripped tighter onto my thigh, as if the satisfactory taste was connected to his touch.

"I do." I confirmed. "You got your appetite back." My attention moved to the large bites he took, mouth full and puffed out as if he hid acorns in his jaws.

He wore a smile filled with mischief. "And my sense of taste."

The sound of rainfall picked up, the crack of thunder that followed assuring me that we wouldn't be leaving the house. I looked around, suddenly curious about how he spent days stuck indoors and how we would spend them.

"Do you have plans for today?" I asked.

"Finish your food." He nodded toward my plate, nothing left on his but a few crumbs. He wiped his mouth, pushing away from the table. "I'm going to make the bed and then I've got something I want to taste."

And he did, spreading my legs and on his knees as soon as he'd returned. We tasted and had each other through the entire storm outside, for three days inside every room we ventured to in the house, in the middle of my favorite movies, and between bouts of sleeping and eating.

I learned that he could spend hours entranced with video games that I didn't understand. I listened to his attempts to explain until he gave up at the blank look cast behind my eyes, settling for teaching me through play.

He beat me in every game without shame, gloating as if he weren't an expert playing against a novice. We eventually came to a stand still, with me pouting that I couldn't win a single match and his plump lips peppering my cheeks until I was giggling with glee.

I settled for draping my legs across his lap while he played, peering over the top of the book I read every now and again to watch the way his brow knitted in concentration, mouth parted into a circle. When I found myself submerged in the story, a romantic tale of a tribrid vampire that simultaneously had my heart fluttering and panties damp, he'd make himself known. I felt it every time one of his hands dropped from the controller to caress my leg or the action on the TV came to a full pause, Seokjin leaning over to lay his head against my stomach with both arms encircling my waist.

Just as he hadn't taken me literally when I first mentioned the idea of soulmates, I misjudged his intention to know every single thing about me. He craved every story from childhood to now, details of every member of my family and even my soulmates, down to intimate confessions that left me bashful.

"So you're telling me that you and Hobi haven't seen each other since the summer you graduated?" He asked on Thursday evening, over a spread of snacks that we were substituting for dinner. I'd been waiting for it, hearing him ask around the topic since I described Hobi and my first goodbye.

"Only twice." I shrugged.

His brows rose first, shoulders curving as he leaned over over the countertop to reach for a pinch of popcorn. He was seeking the answer in my eyes before his next inquiry, posed as a statement rather than a question. "You had sex with him."

"Yes." I answered, taking in his intrigue in the way he pressed his chin into his palm. He didn't have to ask anything further for me to know he was curious for more. I started with the first time I saw Hobi after we said goodbye, three years before I would leave for Italy. "He visited Chicago with one of the groups he does choreo for and got us tickets to the show."

I continued, recanting nearly every detail of the encounter that I thought would end our friendship. Faye and I made a staycation of the weekend, booking a hotel room that I later found out was across the street from the one Hobi stayed in with the woman he was seeing at the time. We met in a nearby park in the middle of the night, just hours before sunrise. Time passed easily, the years apart unable to penetrate our connection. We'd been catching up on the moments we missed and reminiscing on the past until daybreak.

The internal feeling of embers crackling over a campfire warmed me even with the windchill. That entire feeling was the reason I didn't automatically pull away when he couldn't resist any longer, kissing me after joking that his backlog of kisses was ever growing.

"He wanted to break up with his girlfriend, be together while we could but I couldn't." I shook my head, emotion swelling in me at the memory of the argument that erupted so early, most of the city still asleep. I wanted to be logical, to save our friendship and selfishly, myself, from the flip side of the soulmate gift that carried more endings than I ever hoped to have. I had him since we were kids and I couldn't bear the thought of or risk his ending.

Seokjin reached for my hand, the pad of his thumb rubbing across my knuckles.

"It's okay. It didn't take us long to make up. I think the feelings were just really intense after being apart." I made light of the few months of misery that followed.

Despite my nonchalance Seokjin leaned into comforting me, letting his lips rest against the fingertips that curled around his. "And the next time you saw him?"

"At his parent's thirtieth anniversary celebration." I answered, the former melancholy replaced by a small smile at the recollection of us dancing the night away. We'd snuck away in the middle of the fifth speech, volunteers to speak plenty with the open bar provided.

Seokjin listened with fascination as I disclosed that Hobi had me in one of the venue's private bathrooms first. It was quick, a necessary hand over my mouth with him inside me as he uttered three words that turned the campfire into an inferno that raged forests.

Hobi's parents stayed at the hotel in town and I'd expected him to book a room for the night for the opportunity at spending more time with them the following day. I made the drive back to our neighborhood, halfway carrying my dad to bed as he went on a drunken rambling about how much I favored my mom since coloring my hair a shade darker.

My bedroom was mostly the same, absent of my favorite books that I'd carried along with me over the years and with the bedsheets untouched from the last time I visited. Just as it was during my childhood and teen years, my blinds were pulled so that I had a perfect view to Hobi's bedroom directly across.

When the dull glow of his bedside lamp illuminated the room my eyes widened in surprise, Hobi appearing at his window only a moment later. His hair was disheveled from a ride home with the windows down, his tie undone so that it hung down either side of his chest. We held each other's eye as he pulled the thin fabric through his collar and I reached for the zipper that ran up the side of my dress.

His eyes followed my dress as it pooled to my ankles, leaving me in the short silk slip I wore beneath. It barely brushed below my bottom and he reached out to lift the windowsill, his palms heavy as they pressing onto the edge to demand my invitation. When I'd walked through the damp grass between our houses he practically pulled me through, desperate to have me again. 

Seokjin crunched into a chip coated with dip. "Why didn't you stay with him? Or any of them?"

The question brought me pause, prompting me toward insight and vulnerability despite him being casual in asking.

"I told you how they all ended." I replied.

His next line of curiosities urged me to push through the slight discomfort of bringing forth the flaws in my actions over the years.

"I know, but you could have chosen any of them. You know where Yoongi is because of his career, you could have brought the duo here, and it sounds like Hobi's always been there."

"It never really felt like I had a choice. By the time Yoongi left I started to accept that there would always be a beginning and an end. When I met with Valerica she told me some stuff that just complicated it more. As much as I tried to live in the moment, when it came down to it I always wondered about the next, the last." It didn't feel completely rational, but feelings seldom were. "I'm sure I didn't make all the right decisions."

He stood, moving around the island and guiding a hand around my waist so that I was forced to stand upright, facing him as he shared his true intention. "I didn't ask to make you feel bad. I want you to have a choice." Everything about him was so soft, the low, serious tone of his voice and his fingertips, trailing down my arms until they reached my hands.

"You make it sound easy."

"It is. If it's anywhere remotely close to this," he tightened his hold on my hand, protesting against the slight shake of my head, "those idiots would come back to you in a heartbeat. I'll put all of them on a plane tomorrow if that's what you want."

I laughed as if he'd told the funniest joke, imagining myself trying to balance the seven of them, each intense feeling peaking, stacked on top of one another and splitting my attention between. "Tempting," I commented, pondering the good parts, a limitless pool of love and pleasure that I couldn't even imagine, "but I don't think I could manage seven at a time."

He wanted me to decide, the haze of my mind and heart blurred by his lips meeting whatever part of my skin was closest. For now, they moved against my temple, words slightly muffled as they refused to leave me.

"Head, heart, gut." He reminded me of a conversation we had earlier in the week, referencing his process when deciding whether to move forward with treatment each time he was met with disappointing news. His head and heart were always a jumbled mess in those moments, moving through considerations of treatment outcomes, the complicated but ever present love for his family, and his desire for a full life.

Every time the decision was obscure, he went with his gut. It urged him to continue fighting his illness, and we theorized that it was partially influenced by the universe driving him to the circumstances which allowed us to meet.

With my head and heart deciphering through campfires and fireworks, voids and honor beats, and finally, galaxies and peace, I went with my gut.

I didn't care if it was the universe still steering me toward him, my gut leading me to choose the man standing right in front of me, my raw and pure love.