Page 11 of When Worlds Collide (Between Worlds #2)

J ihoon sighed, and leaned forwards until his forehead was pressed against mine. “I really messed up with you, didn’t I?”

My brow furrowed as I looked up at him.

“I didn’t mean to make you feel that way. You’re not a problem, and you’re not an inconvenience. I am so happy you’re here. I can’t begin to describe it.” His thumbs gently stroked down my cheeks. “I still can’t believe it.”

I smiled tremulously up at him. “Do you remember our first date, when we sat on the beach?”

His smile reminded me of the sun that we’d watched cross the sky that day. It felt just as warm.

“You called me brave.”

His eyes held mine, unwavering in the conviction I saw in them. “I did.”

“You said I was brave because I moved across the world on just the idea that I might find my 'purpose'. I wasn’t sure I believed the part about being brave, at the time,” I admitted. “But I know now that my purpose, if I have one,” I shrugged, “is not in LA. Maybe it’s here, in Seoul. With you. But if we’re going to do this, I need you to let me in. ”

The look Jihoon gave me was nearly enough to buckle my knees under the weight of it, and it was only his calming hands on my face that kept me upright as he pulled me closer to him, the warmth of his body pressing against mine.

“Let me be brave for you now,” I murmured against his lips, hoping he’d finally stop shutting me out.

As Jihoon had barely eaten all day, and I was hungry again after all my swimming, we decided to order room service; a veritable feast, and mash-up between Korean and western dishes that nearly overflowed the coffee table we piled it on.

We’d shunned the generously-sized dining table in favour of camping out in front of the giant TV and streaming movies for the rest of the day.

I couldn’t get used to the extravagance. This room alone was a lot, but looking over the pile of food we’d ordered really kind of sunk into me the crazy expense this hotel stay must be.

For someone who’d spent the past several years budgeting to afford food and be able to pay utilities, this was…

a lot. I knew Jihoon was wealthy. It went without saying.

He was incredibly successful and I’d seen his clothes labels.

Why anyone would buy a plain, white t-shirt for $300 was beyond my comprehension, but it wasn’t my money, so whatever.

I was not used to being the direct recipient of it, however, and while the novelty was fun, I’d noticed that it made me feel…

out of place. This wasn’t my world. I didn’t fly in a private little pod, while in the next cabin, people were crammed so closely together that an armrest became the metaphor for a high-stakes stand-off.

I was enjoying the hell out of it, but I couldn’t help wondering how long it would take me to get used to this lifestyle. Or, if I ever would.

When my mum moved back to the UK, pregnant with me, she'd had to start all over again.

For the first few years of my life – not that I remembered it – we'd had next-to nothing.

It wasn't until she met my stepdad that life started to get a little easier.

Once I started school, she was able to retrain and earn her professional diploma.

She worked in a shop during the day and took part-time online classes at night. She had worked so hard.

Now, my parents were finally doing alright, but I'd grown up in second-hand clothes. I couldn't help it when my brain automatically started adding up the cost of the things around me. I wondered if I'd ever stop doing that.

We briefly paused our Marvel marathon to watch the sunset through the wall-to-ceiling windows.

The sun was setting behind the hotel, but as its reflective glow hit the skyscrapers across the Han River, it was like watching the tall, glass buildings catch fire, and then smouldering out as the shadow from the descending sun sank into the horizon.

I was used to seeing skyscrapers, having lived in London for university, and then in LA – however briefly – but somehow seeing that same sun bounce off the Seoul skyline was like seeing a city for the first time.

When I’d moved down south from the Lake District to London, I’d endured plenty of good-natured North vs South jabs, and many an enthusiastic discussion on the different ways we enjoyed a bag of chips, but that had all been variations on the same homeland.

When I’d moved to LA, there had been the odd person who thought my accent was anything from ‘quaint’ to ‘coarse’.

If I’d had a penny for every time someone had made me say ‘fish and chips’, I could have bought myself some.

But again, even though I’d flown thousands of miles and changed time zones, the US was such a close relative to the UK that settling in hadn’t really been too taxing.

Especially as I’d had Becka, my cultural tour-guide to all things LA.

I felt a pang as I thought about Becka. I missed her already.

I missed waking up and going about our day together, the companionable silences, though those were few and far between.

I missed the way we made each other coffee in the morning.

I even missed the way we’d snip at each other.

I didn’t have any brothers or sisters, but I’d come to imagine Becka was as close to one as I could get.

I hoped she was alright. In all my own drama, I had not forgotten about hers. I’d pretty much left her to deal with the Ben situation.

I made a mental note to call her in the morning. In fact, I made a mental note to call her every morning, just like how Jihoon and I used to do.

Used to do. Because we didn’t have to do that anymore.

Life was wild.

We went to bed hours earlier, but I still couldn’t sleep. I’d been tossing and turning for so long I was sure I’d worn a dent into the mattress.

Sighing, I turned over, yet again, and tried to pick out individual details of the still-vibrant city.

The buildings were lit up; individual shards of light, dozens of different colours, but all mingling to create a cohesive splash of illumination that blanketed across the buildings.

But despite the warmth of the colours, they felt remote and alien.

I supposed that it was actually me that was the alien.

Arms snaked around my waist before pulling me back against a hard body. His heat felt nearly scalding against my chilled skin.

“You’re thinking so loudly, your thoughts woke me up,” he murmured against the top of my head before placing a soft kiss there.

I twisted around in his arms until we were nose-to-nose. I watched him blink sleepily, his eyes shining with the borrowed light of the city.

“I’m sorry,” I said, the quiet of the room making me almost whisper so as to not disturb the shadows.

Jihoon hummed and tightened his hold on me. “What are you thinking about?”

I took a moment before answering, trying to arrange my thoughts.

“I guess,” I said slowly, “I’m wondering what happens next.”

“Tomorrow?” He frowned.

“And all the other tomorrows. I’m wondering what to do from here on out. I’ll need to get a job. I’ll need to get a place – can I even do any of that without a local bank account? How do I apply for a Korean bank account? How do I-”

“Sshh,” Jihoon soothed, pressing a kiss to the tip of my nose. “Can you solve any of that right now?”

“No, but I can at least think about it.” Truthfully, my mind was racing, and I would have loved to turn it all off for a few hours.

“I’m just… I’m scared I won’t figure it out. I’m scared I’ll mess this up.”

The words fell between us, an almost tangible weight on the pillows, but now they were out, they felt like surmountable goals, instead of mounting worries.

Jihoon made a soothing sound, half-hush, half-word. “Ky, you’ve only just gotten here. You have time to figure things out.”

“And what do I do in the meantime? Hang out in this ridiculously extravagant suite? It must be costing you a fortune.” I’d Googled the hotel earlier today. It was eye-watering. Jihoon just chuckled.

“You don’t need to worry about that, jagiya. I’m kind of rich now.”

As if I didn’t know that.

“And so humble.” I lightly smacked his chest, but got distracted by the feel of his skin.

“You can pay me back later, if it makes you lose sleep.” His mouth quirked up at the side.

“Another reason to get a job,” I grumbled. “Maybe I could be an idol, make those big bucks.”

He laughed quietly, idly running his fingers over my back, tracing shapes into my skin that had the dual result of pressing me closer to him.

“Maybe you could work for the company?”

“ENT?” I had considered it, but I still didn’t know what career I wanted to pursue. I huffed a laugh. “I can’t imagine they’d consider me qualified enough to take on a foreigner who doesn’t even speak Korean.”

The weight of starting from scratch began to press down on me, almost as tangible as the weight of Jihoon’s arms around me, grounding me to him.

I felt him shrug. “You have time to figure it out.”

“Time,” I echoed. “We’ve never really had that, have we?”

Our whole relationship had been dictated in some way by time, usually revolving around there not being enough of it.

Limited call times where he was either going to sleep, or I was going to work.

Brief visits in between performances, TV appearances, or stolen moments in conference rooms. We’d never had the luxury of just… being.

“No. But now we do, and I want to enjoy it. While we can,” he amended.

And just like that, I was reminded that this period of leisure, of lazy days curled up around each other, was not the true scope of his life. He had a full time ‘job’.

GVibes had taken the month off around Christmas, as they always did, to rest after their most recent comeback. The other members were still in Seoul, but they’d all split up later in the month to head home to their families, scattered across South Korea.

A sudden thought struck me. “Are you planning on going home to visit your parents for Christmas?”

We rarely ever talked about his parents. I knew they’d moved back to Busan, and that they weren’t thrilled about his career choice, but beyond that… I didn’t even know their names.

For a moment, he didn’t speak, but I knew from the pattern of his breathing that he was still awake. I opened my mouth to change the topic, when he eventually spoke.

“Christmas isn’t really a big deal for us. My parents go to church, and sometimes we meet to have a meal together. We haven’t made plans this year.”

His tone of voice told me all I needed to know.

It was cold, and brittle, like ice and something about his words made me want to reach for him, to comfort him.

But his tone also told me not to. I was wildly curious about his parents.

I knew they had a strained relationship, but now – in the pre-dawn hours of a hotel room – was not the time to ask.

“Do you want to go home?” he questioned, and I realised we hadn’t spoken once about our plans for the season, which in hindsight, probably said much about how we’d insulated ourselves in the bubble of our relationship.

“I’d actually planned to spend Christmas with Becka and her family, in Oakland,” I admitted, absently running my fingers over his forearm.

“Becka and I were going to go back to the city for New Year’s though.

We had tickets for Mania.” I quirked a wry smile, remembering all the favours Becka had cashed in to get tickets to one of the city’s most exclusive clubs.

With a twinge of melancholy, I wondered who’d she’d take with her now.

“Not home to England?” I could tell he was getting drowsy, his voice had taken on a deeper, more rumbly timbre. I snuggled in closer.

“Not this year.” I yawned. “I was supposed to move back in March, anyway.”

Sooner, or later, I’d have to tell my parents about my contract with Pisces coming to an unexpectedly early end. Although I’d probably leave out the more… salacious details. Hell, I’d have to tell them about Korea, and then… and then… Holy hell, there was too much to tell.

I shook my head.

“Jagiya?” Jihoon questioned sleepily.

“Nothing, just trying to shake the thoughts out of my head.”

He hummed and pressed a warm kiss to my forehead, and then, when he didn’t say anything else for a long moment, I could tell he’d fallen asleep.

As I lay there in the dark, listening to the peaceful rhythm of Jihoon’s breathing, I tried to remember what my mum had always said when I was struggling with something.

“Decisions don’t get made in the dark, love. You need the light of day to see where you’re going.”

The last time I’d heard her say that was when I was trying to decide what A-level subjects to do in my final years of school.

I'd wanted to do Music Production later at university so taking Music Theory was a given, but I’d also wanted a couple of safe backup choices, just in case I buggered it up.

I’d been necking Red Bulls in my bedroom, staring at a small mound of papers littered across my bed, each a different prospectus for the various courses offered by my sixth form college.

I was half-decided on doing Geography when I realised that not only was I rubbish at Geography, but that it wouldn’t benefit me in the slightest. That’s when my mum had come in, taken away my energy drinks and given me the advice I’d needed.

Despite the drinks, I’d gone to bed and woken up with the perspective I’d needed to make the decision. Music theory, English Literature, and a couple buffer subjects.

I’d aced Music and English, so if all else failed, maybe I could take up professional blog writing. I smiled wryly to myself at the thought.

Thinking about that time period in my life, barely 17, still living at home with my folks, the biggest decision I ever had to make was what to study for the last two years of college. I’d chosen my university out of three possible choices for Music Production and tossed a coin.

I’d chosen to come to LA because Becka said she could get me a job, and I could live with her.

Relatively speaking, I hadn’t needed to make many important decisions in my life, so when Jihoon had asked me to come to Korea, I’d barely thought about it.

I’d gone with my gut and given nary a thought to what came after the ‘yes’.

I was starting to see a pattern to my decision making. Maybe I was the kind of person who leapt first and figured it out later.

It seemed to have worked out for me so far. Maybe this would, too.