Page 91 of When Worlds Collide
I ached to reach for him, but kept my hands clenched in the folds of my dress.
No one else around us seemed to be paying attention. It seemed we might have somehow not drawn attention to our quiet, but intense exchange.
“No.” My voice a mere breath, but he nodded, seeming to take the first, deep inhale in a long time.
He held my gaze for the span of several heartbeats, and then-
“Dance with me.”
I blinked.
“What?”
“Dance. With me.” He held out his hand, the gesture so obvious it would have been hard to disguise it as anything but the invitation it was.
“There are people-”
“I do not give a fuck. You’re mine, let them see. Dance with me.”
And all those people? They faded into indistinct shades of colour and vague shapes as I raised my hand to slide my fingers against his. He smiled, that lopsided smile that made me weak, and pulled me towards him until his hand rested on my waist, and I ran my other hand up his strong arm to his shoulder.
Out of the corner of my eye, I thought I saw someone pointing a phone in our direction, and I twisted around to look, but there was no one there.
Just as the band began to play the first bars of ‘Rewrite the stars’, Jihoon led me out onto the dance floor, and we began to twirl, twining in amongst the other dancers, just another couple under the chandeliers, both of our masks in place.
After that, we decided not to stay.
The giant clock had just begun its slow toll, marking the twelve strokes of midnight when we slipped quietly out of the ballroom, and took the elevator back down to the basement. Jihoon had already called his driver, who was waiting for us at the bottom.
The same young woman with the sharp haircut was there, and she bade us goodnight as we stepped out into the basement, and into the waiting SUV.
On the way home, we stopped at a chicken shop. Neither one of us had eaten more than a few snacks at the party, and we were starving. The driver went in to get us our food for obvious reasons.
By the time we got into the apartment, Jihoon was moaning about how he was going to die if he didn’t eat soon, so not bothering to get changed out of our finery, we sat our butts downin the living room and ate chicken and drank beer until we were fit to burst.
I can say with every fibre of my being, that was the best part of the whole night.
Except maybe later, when Jihoon helped me out of my dress.
Chapter 28
December 25th
Christmas dawned two days later with all the fanfare of a quiet morning, which is exactly how we wanted it.
We’d both received invitations to join the other members at their homes for the day, but Jihoon declined on our behalf, citing he wanted to have a truly ‘off’ day.
No recording studio, no gyms, no Lives, nothing. Just the day to ourselves.
We lay in bed until nearly noon. Normally, Jihoon would have been up at the butt crack of dawn, but not on Christmas.
When we did eventually leave our rumpled bed, it was only to relocate to the sofa with the duvet and pillows. Jihoon didn’t have any traditional Christmas movies, which I thought was sacrilegious, but easily remedied by making him watch – in order – the Santa Claus movies.
By the time the credits rolled on the second one, I could tell I was losing him a little, so we took a festive movie break to switch over to the BBC – which I again insisted on. As I sat there, huddled under the duvet with Jihoon, nibbling on chocolate-covered popcorn, listening to the familiar voice of the BBC announcer telling us what the line up for Christmas Day was, a wave of nostalgia hit me so hard, my eyes welled up before I could stop them.
Memories of Christmases past flashed through me, and instead of bottling it up, I talked to Jihoon about it. This was the first Christmas I’d ever spent away from my folks.
Even when I’d lived in London, I always made the trip back up north for at least a few days.
