Work Text:
The request came over a lukewarm cup of office coffee on a Tuesday morning that felt like every other Tuesday morning until it didn't. Kim Seokjin, a man who usually carried himself with a refined, effortless grace that made even the most stressful quarterly reports look like light reading, looked uncharacteristically frazzled. His charcoal suit was perfect, as always, but his tie was a fraction of a degree off-center, and his dark hair was slightly mussed, as if he’d been running his fingers through it in a fit of nerves.
"Jungkook," he’d said, leaning against my cubicle wall with a heavy sigh that rattled the polaroid photos pinned to my corkboard. "My cousin is getting married. It’s the event of the season for the Kim clan. My entire extended family will be there. And if I show up alone one more time, my Aunt Mi-cha is going to try to set me up with her neighbor’s son who breeds show-poodles. I’ve seen the photos. Both of the son and the poodles. I cannot survive this, Jungkook. Please. Be my plus-one?"
I looked up from my spreadsheet, blinking. We were friends, sure—the kind of work friends who grabbed lunch together twice a week and traded cynical jokes about the CEO’s motivational emails—but this felt like a leap.
"A wedding?" I asked, leaning back in my chair. "That’s high-stakes, Jin. That’s 'meet the parents' territory."
"It’s 'survive the parents' territory," he corrected, his eyes pleading. "I just need a shield. Someone to stand next to me so they stop asking why I’m 'still single' with that pitying look in their eyes. You know the one. Like I’m a broken appliance they’re considering throwing out."
I leaned back, tapping my chin. "What’s in it for me? Besides the honor of your company, obviously."
He laughed, the sound bright and musical, cutting through the hum of the office printers. "The most expensive open bar money can buy. A five-course meal. And I’ll cover your shifts for the next three Friday afternoons."
I didn’t even hesitate. "Is there steak?"
"Aged ribeye."
"Then I’m your guy."
The True Backstory: Rivals in the Firm
Before we were "we," we were two people trying to occupy the same square inch of corporate ladder.
Three years ago, I had walked into the offices of Kim & Associates—a top-tier marketing and strategy firm—with a freshly minted degree and a chip on my shoulder the size of a mountain. I was the youngest person ever hired for the Junior Strategy Lead position, a fact I was very proud of until I met Kim Seokjin.
Seokjin had been there for six months already, the golden boy who seemed to breathe in data and exhale brilliant campaigns. He was polished, he was eloquent, and he was annoyingly handsome. For the first six months, we didn't speak; we competed. If I stayed until 8:00 PM, he stayed until 8:30 PM. If he landed a local client, I went after a regional one.
The turning point came during the "Great Beverage Account" pitch. We had been paired together by our director, who was likely tired of our silent war. We spent seventy-two hours straight in a conference room that smelled of stale takeout and desperate ambition.
At 3:00 AM on the second night, I found Seokjin slumped over a stack of demographic charts, fast asleep with a highlighter still clutched in his hand. Instead of taking the opportunity to pull ahead, I found myself staring at the soft curve of his cheek and the way his eyelashes cast shadows against his skin. He looked less like a corporate titan and more like a person who was just as tired as I was.
I’d draped my hoodie over his shoulders. When he woke up an hour later, he didn't say thank you. He just looked at me, then at the hoodie, and then at the screen where I’d finished the last three slides of his presentation.
"You got the font wrong," he murmured, his voice thick with sleep. "I use Helvetica Neue. You used standard Helvetica."
"You're welcome, by the way," I snapped back.
He’d smiled then—a small, tired, genuine thing. "Thanks, Jungkook. Truly."
After we won the account, the rivalry evaporated, replaced by a strange, magnetic friendship. We became the team to beat. We developed a shorthand that bordered on telepathic. I knew when he was about to lose his temper in a meeting by the way he adjusted his cufflinks; he knew I was overwhelmed when I started clicking my pen in a specific rhythm.
By the time the wedding invitation arrived, we were the two most important people in each other's daily lives, though we’d never acknowledged the weight of it outside the office walls.
The drive to the countryside on the Saturday of the wedding was filled with the kind of easy banter that had defined our friendship for the last two years. The morning sun was bright, reflecting off the hood of Seokjin’s silver sedan as we left the gray sprawl of Seoul behind for the rolling greens of Gyeonggi-do.
"We need a strategy," Seokjin said, gripping the steering wheel. "My family is like a pack of bloodhounds. If they smell a contradiction in our story, they’ll tear us apart. We need a 'how we met' that sounds just boring enough to be true, but just romantic enough that they won't ask follow-up questions."
"The library," I suggested, staring out the window at the passing orchards. "Section 400. Language and linguistics. It’s niche. It’s quiet. We both reached for the same rare copy of an old Korean dialect dictionary."
Seokjin made a face of mock-nausea, but he was grinning. "Disgusting. Tragic. Utterly poetic. I love it. Why were you there?"
"I was looking for a gift for my grandfather," I lied effortlessly. "And you were... doing research for a project you never finished."
"Perfect," he said. "We locked eyes over the Dewey Decimal System. The silence was broken only by the sound of our heartbeats and a very stern librarian telling us to hush. It’s a classic."
We spent the next hour ironing out the details. We decided we’d been dating for six months—long enough to be serious, short enough that we didn't have to know every single detail about each other's childhood pets. We settled on "Kook" as a nickname he could use if he felt the need to be particularly affectionate.
"Don't overdo it," I warned him. "If you start calling me 'sweetheart,' I’m going to bolt for the nearest exit, ribeye be damned."
"Deal," he laughed. "But if Aunt Mi-cha approaches, I might have to touch your arm or something. Brace yourself."
The moment we stepped out of the car and onto the manicured lawn of the estate, the air changed. The estate was breathtaking—a sprawling traditional hanok updated with modern glass and steel, surrounded by ancient pine trees. It was the kind of place that screamed "old money" and "high expectations."
I expected Seokjin to be awkward—to perhaps hover near me with the stiff, forced smile of a man who was lying through his teeth. Instead, the second we approached the receiving line, his demeanor shifted. His hand found the small of my back as we moved toward his parents.
It wasn’t a tentative touch. It didn't feel like a staged gesture intended for an audience. It felt like his hand had simply found its rightful home, a steady anchor in the sea of silk dresses and tailored suits. I felt a strange spark of heat through the fabric of my dress shirt, a physical reaction I wasn't prepared for.
"Mother, Father," Seokjin said, his voice dropping into a warmer, more resonant register. "This is Jungkook. My Jungkook."
He didn’t rush the introduction. He stood tall, his thumb tracing small, absent-minded circles against my spine, looking at me with a pride that felt far too heavy to be fake. I found myself leaning into him, my body reacting to his proximity before my brain could tell it to stop.
"It's a pleasure to finally meet the man who keeps my son so busy," his mother said, her eyes scanning me with a terrifyingly sharp intelligence. She didn't look like a woman who was easily fooled.
"The pleasure is mine, Mrs. Kim," I said, offering a polite bow. "Jin has told me so much about you."
"Has he?" She arched an eyebrow at Seokjin. "He’s been very secretive."
"I wanted to keep him to myself for a while," Seokjin said, and the way he looked at me in that moment—soft-eyed and unwavering—made my breath hitch. He’s a really good actor, I told myself. Give this man an Oscar.
During the reception, the band slowed the tempo as the sun began to dip below the horizon, painting the sky in bruises of purple and gold. The lights on the terrace dimmed into a warm, amber glow. Seokjin led me to the floor, pulling me into the circle of his arms.
"We have to dance," he whispered. "Everyone is watching."
We swayed slowly, the scent of his cologne—something crisp, like cedar and rain—filling my senses. He leaned down, his chin brushing my temple, his breath warm against my ear.
"You okay?" he asked.
He wasn’t scanning the room to see if his aunt was watching. He wasn't checking his watch. He was looking directly into my eyes, searching for a sign of discomfort. He was checking on me.
"I'm fine," I said, my voice sounding a little breathier than I intended. "The bar is indeed excellent."
"Good," he murmured, tightening his grip on my waist just a fraction.
When his formidable Aunt Mi-cha finally cornered us by the buffet later that evening, her eyes narrowed behind her gold-rimmed spectacles like a hawk spotting a rabbit.
"So," she said, her voice like gravel. "And how long has this been going on? Seokjin never mentions anyone. We all thought he’d married his desk at the firm."
Seokjin didn’t look at her. He kept his gaze on me, a soft, private smile playing on his lips that felt like a secret shared between only us. "We’re taking our time," he said.
We.
The word hung in the air, weighted with a promise neither of us had authorized. It felt less like a lie and more like a confession.
The drive back to my apartment was quiet. The adrenaline of the "performance" had worn off, leaving behind a strange, buzzing tension that seemed to vibrate in the confined space of the car. After he pulled into the parking spot outside my building, the silence became deafening. The engine was cut, the ticking of the cooling metal the only sound in the dark cabin.
The streetlights cast long, sharp shadows across Seokjin’s face, highlighting the sharp line of his jaw and the weary, yet softened set of his shoulders. He laughed softly, a dry, slightly hollow sound that carried more weight than a sigh. "This is the part where we remember it’s fake," he said, though he didn't look at me.
"Right," I said, my hand hovering over the door handle. My heart was thumping against my ribs in a rhythm that felt entirely too loud for the quiet night. "The food was great. Mission accomplished, right? Aunt Mi-cha looked sufficiently thwarted."
"Mission accomplished," he echoed.
I nodded, but I didn't open the door. My hand stayed on the handle, unmoving. His stayed on the steering wheel, his knuckles white under the yellow streetlamp glow. We sat there for five minutes, trapped in the gravity of what we had just spent eight hours pretending to be. The space between us felt electric, charged with all the things we weren't supposed to say because they weren't part of the script.
Then, slowly, the distance began to close. Seokjin turned toward me, and I found myself leaning in, drawn by a magnetic pull I no longer had the strength to resist. We met in the middle, our bodies tilting toward one another until the space vanished. He reached out, his hand cupping my cheek with a tenderness that made my breath hitch.
When he kissed me, it wasn't a performance. It was the softest, warmest thing I had ever felt—a slow, lingering press of lips that tasted like unspoken promises and the relief of finally letting go. It was a kiss that said more than any of our rehearsed backstories ever could. We stayed like that for a long moment, leaning into each other, the world outside the car windows ceasing to exist.
When we finally pulled apart, Seokjin’s eyes were dark and searching. He didn't say a word, but the gentleness remained. Being the gentleman he always was, he stepped out of the car and walked around to my side, opening the door for me.
"Goodnight, Jungkook," he whispered, his voice like velvet in the cool night air.
"Goodnight, Jin," I replied, feeling a flush that had nothing to do with the car's heater.
He watched me walk to the entrance of my building, standing by his car until I reached the door. As I closed the door to my apartment and leaned back against the wood, my heart was still racing, the warmth of his kiss still humming on my lips.
I expected Monday morning at the office to be awkward. I expected us to go back to being 'work friends,' maybe with a few jokes about the poodle-breeder we had successfully dodged.
But the following Saturday, a text lit up my phone while I was halfway through a bag of chips and a video game.
Seokjin: My parents are having a family barbecue. Apparently, my mother won't stop talking about you. They’re expecting you. I told them you liked ribs. Please don't make me face them alone?
I looked at the screen for a long time. I should have said I was busy. I should have drawn a line in the sand. But I thought about the way his hand felt on my back, and the way he’d looked at me on the dance floor.
Jungkook: Fine. But only because of the ribs.
Somewhere in the humid afternoons of July and the cooling evenings of September, we forgot to stop acting. The "family" part of the equation began to fade into the background. It stopped being about Aunt Mi-cha or the poodles.
The barbecue turned into Sunday dinners. Sunday dinners turned into Seokjin’s mother texting me directly to ask if I liked a specific kind of persimmon she’d found at the market.
"She likes you more than me," Seokjin joked one evening as we walked through a park near his apartment. The leaves were starting to turn, crunching under our boots.
"That's because I'm charming," I said, bumping my shoulder against his. "And I don't give her a hard time about her interior design choices."
"Hey, that floral wallpaper in the guest room is a crime against humanity and you know it."
He laughed, and for a moment, he caught my hand to steady me as I tripped over a stray root. He didn't let go immediately. We walked for nearly a block with our fingers loosely intertwined before he pulled away to point out a dog across the path.
It became about the way Seokjin knew I liked my coffee with exactly one ice cube so I could drink it immediately without burning my tongue. It became about the way he started showing up at my apartment on Tuesday nights with a toolbox, claiming he was "in the neighborhood" and remembered I’d mentioned a squeaky floorboard.
He began to learn the quiet version of me—the one that didn't need an open bar or a fake library backstory to feel comfortable. He knew that when I was stressed, I chewed on the inside of my cheek. He knew that I loved the smell of old paper but hated the feeling of velvet. He knew that I sang under my breath when I was focused on a task.
And I learned the quiet version of him. I learned that he was actually quite shy beneath the confident persona he projected at work. I learned that he took his tea with a ridiculous amount of honey when he had a cold, and that he worried, deeply and silently, about whether he was living up to his father’s legacy.
We never had a conversation about when it stopped being fake. We never sat down and said, “Hey, let’s make this official.”
It just… shifted. The acting became the reality, and the "pretending" became a protective layer we both used to hide the fact that we were terrified of how much we actually cared.
In October, we were called into the conference room. Not for a strategy session, but because our director, Mr. Choi, had noticed the way we were lingering at each other's desks.
"The company policy on fraternization is clear," Mr. Choi said, looking over his spectacles. "But you two... you're our best team. I need to know if this is going to be a problem."
Seokjin didn't miss a beat. "It's the opposite of a problem, sir. We've never been more productive."
Later, in the elevator, I looked at him. "You lied to the boss."
"Did I?" he asked, his voice low as the doors slid shut.
"The policy says 'romantic involvement,'" I pointed out. "We're just... keeping up the wedding act."
Seokjin leaned against the mirrored wall of the elevator. "Jungkook, we haven't seen my family in three weeks. Why are we still doing this at the office?"
I didn't have an answer. Or rather, I had an answer I wasn't ready to say out loud.
By November, the office had stopped asking if we were together. It was just a fact of life. Seokjin and Jungkook. We were a unit. When someone brought in donuts, they’d hand me two, saying, "Give one to Jin, he’s in a meeting."
One Tuesday night, I found him in my kitchen. I’d given him a spare key weeks ago after I’d locked myself out, and he’d never given it back. He was standing at the stove, humming a soft melody while he stirred a pot of kimchi jjigae.
"You're home late," he said, not looking back. "I figured you'd be hungry."
I stood in the doorway, watching the steam rise around him. He looked so domestic, so mine, that it physically ached.
"Jin," I said softly.
"Hmm?"
"Why are you here?"
He paused, the wooden spoon hovering over the pot. He turned slowly, his expression unreadable in the dim light of the kitchen. "Because you were working late. And I wanted to see you."
He didn't say, “Because my mom asked about you.” He didn't say, “Because we have to keep up appearances.”
He just wanted to see me.
I walked over and took the spoon from his hand, setting it aside. I stepped into his space, my heart doing that familiar, stupid flip. I reached up, tracing the line of his jaw with my thumb.
"We aren't at a wedding," I whispered. "Your aunt isn't here."
Seokjin leaned into my touch, his eyes closing for a brief second. "I know."
That was the first time we truly took it to the next level. The air in the kitchen shifted from domestic comfort to something thick with a year’s worth of restrained desire. He stayed over that night, and for the first time, I didn't wake up feeling like I was playing a part. I felt alive—every nerve ending electrified by the simple reality of his presence in my bed, his arm draped over my waist.
In the morning, the apartment was filled with the smell of toasted sesame and garlic. I wandered into the kitchen to find him, hair messy and wearing one of my oversized hoodies, plating a Seokjin-special breakfast. It was a sprawling spread of traditional favorites and perfectly fluffy omelets that he’d clearly spent an hour perfecting.
"Good morning," he said, his voice husky with sleep and a new kind of confidence.
He didn't move to kiss me immediately. He just stood there, breathing with me, letting the silence settle between us. It was a silence that didn't need filling—a silence that finally felt like the truth.
One night, months later—nearly a year since that first drive to the countryside—we were back in his car. Same parking spot outside my building. The heater was humming, keeping the biting winter chill at bay.
But this time, the silence wasn't heavy with the ghost of a lie. It wasn't electric with unspoken tension.
It was safe.
It was the silence of two people who knew exactly where they stood, even if they hadn't found the words to name it yet.
Seokjin turned in his seat, looking at me with the same expression he’d worn at the wedding—that look of utter, terrifying sureness. He reached out, tucking a stray lock of hair behind my ear. His fingers were warm against my cold skin.
"I don’t want to pretend anymore," he said, his voice steady.
My heart did that traitorous, violent flip, but this time, it didn't feel like fear. It felt like coming home.
"Okay," I whispered, my voice thick with emotion. "Then don't. Stop acting, Jin."
He smiled, a true, radiant Seokjin smile that reached his eyes and stayed there, crinkling the corners. It was softer than I’d ever seen—vulnerable and honest.
"So... this is real?" he asked, as if he still couldn't quite believe his luck. "The Sunday dinners? The Tuesday nights? The way I feel when I see your name on my phone?"
I reached out and squeezed his hand, tracing the knuckles I had come to know better than my own. I pulled his hand up and pressed a kiss to his palm.
"Jin," I said, looking him dead in the eye. "It’s been real for a long time. I think I stopped pretending somewhere around the second plate of ribs."
He laughed, a wet, shaky sound, and finally leaned across the console to press his forehead against mine. "Me too. I think I stopped pretending the moment I put my hand on your back at the receiving line. I just didn't know how to tell you."
"You're a terrible actor," I teased.
"And you're a cheap date," he countered. "All it took was an open bar."
"Hey, it was a very good open bar."
A year after the wedding that started it all, we were back at his parents' house for a Lunar New Year dinner. The house was loud, filled with the chaotic energy of the Kim family. The scent of grilled meat and savory pancakes filled the air.
Seokjin’s cousin—the one whose wedding we had attended—raised a glass of soju, clinking it against a bottle of beer to get everyone's attention.
"A toast!" he shouted, his face flushed from the heat of the room. "To Jungkook. I want to officially thank him for being such a good sport. Remember when he was just the 'fake boyfriend' Seokjin dragged along to my wedding to get Aunt Mi-cha to stop pestering him?"
The table erupted in laughter. I felt my face heat up, but I was smiling.
Seokjin’s mother reached over and patted my hand, her eyes twinkling with a knowing, maternal warmth. "Oh, please," she said, loud enough for the whole table to hear. "I knew from day one. I've watched my son for nearly thirty years. He has never looked at a 'fake' anything the way he looked at Jungkook when they walked through that door."
Seokjin didn't look embarrassed. He didn't offer a witty comeback or try to deflect with a joke. He simply leaned over, right in front of his entire family, and kissed my temple—a gesture of pure, unadulterated instinct.
"She's right," he murmured to me, loud enough only for my ears. "I was never that good an actor."
I leaned my head on his shoulder, watching the steam rise from the bowls of soup, feeling the warmth of the room and the man beside me.
Six months after that toast, the question of "when are you moving in" was finally answered. We spent a Saturday hauling boxes from my cramped apartment to his place, which was now undeniably our place.
As we stood among the bubble wrap and cardboard, Seokjin handed me a small, wrapped box.
"A housewarming gift?" I asked.
"Open it."
Inside was an old, weathered book. A rare copy of a Korean dialect dictionary.
I laughed, looking up at him. "Where did you find this?"
"In a library," he said, his eyes glowing with mischief. "I had to reach over a very handsome man to get it. We locked eyes. It was poetic. Disgusting, really."
I pulled him in by the collar of his shirt, the book clutched between us. "I love it."
"I love you," he said.
And for the first time in our long, strange history, those were the only words that mattered. No strategy, no backstory, no performance. Just us.