Page 44 of A World Apart (Between Worlds #1)

W e’d stopped at a little corner mart to pick up a few provisions for this evening and now we were in the kitchen, putting away the few items of food we’d bought.

Jihoon had been particularly excited about the tub of ice cream we’d bought.

For such a small store, they’d had a pretty impressive selection, so I’d let him pick the flavour while I picked actual food.

We’d also bought a six pack of beer because the idea of a cold beer in a hot tub sounded like actual paradise on a day like today.

I’d just put the chicken away in the fridge when I turned round to see Jihoon with the envelope with our mystery temporary tattoos inside.

“Let’s open this,” he said, grinning as excitedly as a kid on Christmas.

“Sure,” I said, walking towards him as he flipped open the envelope and pulled out two sheaves of paper. I leaned on the kitchen island next to him as he inspected the first one.

“I think this is mine,” he said, tilting his head to the side.

The words ‘pretty boy’ were written at the top of the page.

I barked out a laugh; Albert had been right about that, I thought, but I kept the comment to myself.

The design was of a swallow, the tail was so distinctive that it was unmistakable.

The bird was in mid-flight, powering upwards and so detailed, down to the tiny talons on its feet.

“Waah,” Jihoon exclaimed appreciatively. I gently pried the second sheet of paper out from under Jihoon’s one and pulled it towards me, looking down at the page that had ‘the redcoat’ written at the top. I chuckled at that before focusing on the small design, no bigger than a credit card.

“Wow,” I breathed in awe, the design similar to Jihoon’s. It was a swallow in flight, like his, but softer, the lines more shaded, less harsh and where Jihoon’s bird had taloned feet, mine were tucked around the stem of a dandelion in full seed puff.

“Matching tattoos,” Jihoon said, holding his page next to mine and something about the way they were side-by-side made my throat tight. Swallows were a symbol of resilience and known for flying thousands of miles each year.

“I love it,” I swallowed past the lump in my throat and said, “shall we apply them now?”

“Yes,” Jihoon nodded and pulled his t-shirt off over his head in one smooth pull that had me gaping at him, somehow forgetting how we’d curled around each other the whole night, wearing far less.

He caught me staring and grinned at me, and I’m fairly sure he flexed.

“Where should we put them?” I wondered aloud, mentally placing the images on various body parts, dismissing some and filing others away for consideration.

“I have to hide mine,” Jihoon said, bringing me back to the conversation.

“I can’t show it or it could be bad for the group.

” His mouth tightened into a firm line and I remembered reading about negative press some idols had gotten after getting tattoos, the way they had to cover them up with either makeup or even bandages.

The one he had on his ribs was so high up that you would never know, even in the most risqué of wardrobe malfunctions.

“We’ll put it somewhere no one will see it,” I tried to sound neutral, but I’m not sure my face cooperated.

“It’s probably the same as how you put kids tattoos on.

Hold on, Albert did say there were instructions.

One sec,” I opened the envelope, looking inside for any other bits of paper.

There was a card at the bottom and I reached a hand in to pull it out.

It was a business card with the name and address of the parlour, and on the back were some hand-written instructions .

My eyes misted as I read Albert’s words, so much more than the instructions I was looking for.

“Kaiya?” I shoved the card back into the envelope and tossed it onto the counter, spinning back around to see Jihoon holding his page, a frown pulling his eyebrows down.

“Okay?” he asked.

“Yeah,” I said quickly, “it’s as I thought, exactly the same as kids’ tattoos. Let’s do it!”

We decided Jihoon would go first ? for science reasons.

He’d decided to have his on his shoulder blade, it was one of the few places that would never be revealed, even accidentally, and still allow him to wear sleeveless tops.

We joked about putting it on his thigh, but apparently his trainers back home took body measurements every week, so that was out.

Boy, if I’d ever entertained the notion that it was only women in the entertainment industry that were held to such unrealistic body standards, I was quickly becoming educated.

When we’d shared that pretzel this morning, he’d told me that when he was a trainee, he hadn’t been allowed near refined carbohydrates for months, not until he’d gone to visit family with one of his hyungs for Chuseok ? kind of like the Korean equivalent of Thanksgiving, he’d said.

They were allowed a lot more freedoms now, but they still routinely monitored their weight, which seemed bonkers to me, considering how much physical exercise they all did.

I held the transfer paper to Jihoon’s sculpted back, making sure it was firmly placed, before I pressed the wet cloth on top of it, making sure to thoroughly wet the whole area.

Water dripped down his back, following the curves and dips and drawing my eye so inevitably that I had to remind myself to watch what I was doing.

As if I couldn’t resist, I ran my other hand down his broad back, skimming my fingertips over the contours of his muscles.

He shivered under my hand and looked at me over his shoulder, a smirk pulling the corner of his mouth up as he raised an eyebrow at me.

I blushed and refocused on the task at hand .

After the prescribed thirty seconds of holding pressure against the tattoo, I swiped the cloth downwards to remove the now-slick paper, leaving behind the transfer of the swallow.

“Is it okay?” Jihoon asked, flexing his shoulders, giving the appearance of a swallow in flight.

“It looks good,” I admitted, putting my hands on my hips, admiring the image.

“I want to see,” he whined, trying to stretch his neck over his shoulder and half-spinning around in the process, like a puppy trying to chase its tail.

I doubled up, holding onto the counter for support as I belly laughed.

The duality of this man, I swear. One minute he is pant-meltingly seductive, the next he is a complete clown.

Jihoon stopped spinning and pinned me with a heart-stopping smoulder, crowding into my space until I was backed up against the kitchen island.

I gulped as I looked up at him.

“Something funny, jagiya ?” he rumbled, pressing his hips into mine as he caged me in with his arms on either side of my body.

I could only shake my head. His eyes seemed to hold me as firmly as his body, and we just stood there, unmoving for several moments until a smile broke across his face, erasing all the smouldering embers of just a moment ago, and I knew I’d been played like a fiddle at a country wedding.

“You…” I trailed off in exasperation, lightly smacking his chest, which only seemed to make him laugh harder as he moved to dodge me.

“I like having this effect on you. I just hope you like my brain as much as you like my body.”

I rolled my eyes, but then turned away from him to hide my grin before I pulled my t-shirt off over my head. I turned back around, looking up at him from underneath my lashes.

Jihoon stopped laughing. He raked his eyes up and down my bared skin, his face growing more flushed with each passing second.

“Do me.” I all-but purred at him.

He choked; literally choked on an inhale and I had to thump him on the back several times before he could wheeze out, “Gwaenchana, I’m fine.”

“I just hope you like my brain as much as you like my body.” I repeated his words back at him sympathetically as tears streamed down his face .

An hour later we were floating in the pool, our new temporary tattoos proudly adorning our skin. I’d chosen to place mine on the inside of my right forearm, since no one I knew would care if I had ink on display, temporary or not. I couldn’t stop looking at it though, it seemed so perfect.

“Do you think you’ll ever get a tattoo in a place people can see?” I lazily waved my arms trying to keep myself from floating into the edge of the pool.

“Mmm,” Jihoon hummed before he answered, “I want to, but it’s a lot of hassle.

“When Sungmin got his, the managers were so mad.”

I almost rolled over in surprise and had to quickly get my legs under me.

“Lee has a tattoo?” I spluttered. I still didn’t feel comfortable using their given names. It made them like real people ? which they were ? just not to me, so I mostly used their stage names when we spoke about them.

“Yes, he has a tattoo of the moon on his hip,” Jihoon replied, tapping his hip bone.

I let my legs float back to the surface to resume my carefree passage around the pool.

“Did you get in trouble for the feather?” I asked, remembering the way he’d pulled up his shirt to show me, that day we’d had breakfast in his hotel room.

Jihoon made a humming sound. “They were not happy, but by that time, it was too late.”

I thought about this while I watched the clouds overhead. His body was so regulated, from his weight, to his hair colour. He kept reassuring me they all had so many more freedoms now, so how strict must it have been when they were trainees?

“Will you get more?” he asked, shaking me out of my reverie as he swirled his hands near to me.

“I kept meaning to,” I said thoughtfully. “But every time I thought about it, something would come up that stopped me.”

“Like what?”

“Uni work, no money, the annual blood-drive on campus. Just life things.” I shrugged, not easy to do while partially suspended in water.

We were quiet for a while, enjoying the peace of the garden, the warm sunshine tempered by the cool of the water and the shade of the trees .