POV: Go I-ram

The apartment was quieter than usual.
Not peaceful—just blank. The kind of silence that didn’t soothe, didn’t hold. It just hung in the air like damp laundry.

Go I-ram moved through the morning like he was underwater. He brewed tea he didn’t drink. Let the toast go cold. Forgot about his inbox entirely.

He didn’t open the curtains.
Didn’t look toward the rosemary.
Didn’t think about the laundry room.

Except, of course, he did.

The scent had been real. Not imagined, not a ghost. His body had recognized it instantly and responded like it hadn’t forgotten what it meant to want something. Someone. No “maybe.” No “could be.” Just a sharp, clean jolt of alpha. From him.

It wasn’t just that he’d felt it. He hated how vivid it still was.
It was that he hadn’t rejected it. He hated more how his body hadn't recoiled from it.

That... scared him.

It was chemical, he told himself. Unreliable. A glitch. His hormones playing traitor after months of silence. The scent wasn’t even strong. It was barely there.

So he avoided everything that reminded him of Do-yun.
The rosemary. The rooftop. His name.

The hallway was quiet when he left for work.

He stepped out slowly, locking the door with the care of someone who didn’t want to be noticed. No sound from 502. He paused, listening for footsteps, the jingle of Bori’s collar, anything. But there was nothing.

Good.

He locked up, turned, and headed for the stairs. Halfway down, he heard movement coming from below.

He stopped.

A figure appeared on the landing. Jacket unzipped, thermos in hand, a small cloth bag hanging from his wrist. Cha Do-yun, of course. Looking calm, composed, dangerous in a way that wasn’t about muscles or dominance but something worse—gentleness.

Their eyes met, but neither of them looked away.

“You’ve been scarce,” Do-yun said.

“I’ve been busy.”

Do-yun tilted his head slightly, like he didn’t quite buy it but wasn’t going to call it out.

“I thought we were both emotionally constipated,” he said lightly, “but now I’m wondering if I got upgraded.”

I-ram huffed, not quite a laugh. Do-yun didn’t move closer. Just lifted the thermos.

“I made tea. Rooftop’s quiet. You don’t have to talk. Just sit.”

I-ram hesitated.

“I have to go to work.”

Do-yun nodded, unbothered. “I’ll leave a cup for you anyway. In case you change your mind.”

And with that, he walked past. No questions. No pressure. Just the scent of something grounding, like wet soil after rain, trailing behind him. The scent following him, like memory.

Hours later, I-ram found himself in front of the rooftop door. He wasn’t even sure how he’d ended up there. He told himself it was to check on the plants.

I-ram stepped out like he was trespassing. The space had changed. It wasn’t dramatic—but it was cleaner. The scattered leaves were gone. A few new pots lined the edge of the garden bed. He recognized mint, a fresh lavender cutting, and something that might’ve been basil. Alive. Intentional. The plants rustled faintly in the breeze, and the soil beds looked slightly darker—freshly watered.

He wasn’t here for Do-yun. He was here for the plants. That was all.

Under the gazebo, one of the chairs had a cup sitting on the small table beside it. Ceramic, with a lid. Steam no longer rose from it, but the lid had kept it warm.

Beside it, a cookie—wrapped carefully in waxed paper and string. Almond, if he had to guess.

He didn’t sit immediately. Instead, he paced a few slow circles around the garden bed. The soil looked good. Like someone had worked it recently. The kind of care that required patience.

He sat. Slowly. Like the chair might argue. Or like it might disappear if he acknowledged it.

He held the cup between his palms and stared into the skyline. The wind nudged his hair back from his forehead. The tea smelled like citrus and something minty.

Bright. Balanced.
Everything he wasn’t.

He didn’t drink it right away. Just let the warmth seep into his fingers. The silence sat beside him, just... waiting.

Eventually, he took a sip. It was good. Annoyingly so.

He heard the door open again twenty minutes later.

Do-yun didn’t say anything at first. Just walked over. He paused at the edge of the gazebo, one hand on the pillar.

“Didn’t think you’d come up.”

I-ram didn’t look at him. “I didn’t plan to.”

“Still counts.” Do-yun sat in the other chair. “Did the tea survive the walk?”

“It’s drinkable. I hate that.”

A laugh.

They didn’t talk much after that. Let the plants do the heavy lifting. A dragonfly landed on the planter beside them and stayed far too long. Bori was nowhere to be seen—maybe she had better boundaries than either of them.

“You didn’t have to leave the tea,” I-ram said eventually.

“I know.”

“It was warm.”

Do-yun smiled faintly. “Good. Wasn’t sure the cup would hold heat that long.”

A pause.

Then I-ram said, “She really did steal your sock?”

“Yeah. After a while, she dragged it under the bed and slept on it like a trophy for six hours.”

“She’s claiming you.”

“She claimed you first.”

I-ram sipped his tea to avoid responding to that. Do-yun leaned back in the chair. “You don’t have to explain anything. I just want you to know I won’t make it harder.”

“Good. You’re not.”

I-ram didn’t look at him, but he stayed.

He wasn’t saying yes. But he wasn’t running anymore either.

That night, I-ram paced before writing.

He wasn’t sure he even had a story this time. Maybe he could recycle an old column. Pretend life hadn’t shifted under him like sand.

He sat. Opened a blank document.

Typed.

There are people who enter your life like soft weather. They don’t tear down your walls. They wait outside until the wind shifts. And when you finally open the door, they don’t ask why it took so long.

He paused. Fingers hovered. Added more:

They don’t ask for explanations. They don’t offer ultimatums. They bring a cup of tea, a packet of seeds, or silence—and wait to see which one blooms.

He saved it.

Then hesitated.

He’d never told Do-yun which magazine he worked for. It hadn’t come up. And he hadn’t offered.

But if Do-yun ever came across it—just browsing, just reading—and saw the name “Go I-ram” at the top of a story like this... Would he recognize himself in it?

Would he say anything? Would he know?

Before bed, he watered Mister Needle.

The rosemary looked smug again. Or maybe it was just thriving.

He leaned close, brushing a thumb over its edge. Gentle. Careful.

He remembered the new sprout in the rooftop planter—small, stubborn, alive.

“I’ll go up again tomorrow,” he whispered.

Not a promise… But not nothing.

POV: Cha Do-yun

The tea warmed his body.
Cha Do-yun sipped it slowly from his favorite mug, seated on the floor with his back against the couch. His apartment lights were low. Bori was asleep in her crate, curled into herself like the smallest loaf of betrayal.

He stared at the windowsill, unfocused.

He kept thinking about that incident in the laundry room. About I-ram’s expression before he bolted—tight, unreadable. Hurt?

No, not hurt.
Not fear, either.

It felt more like... overwhelm.

Something had passed between them, and then it vanished—like steam in the cold. And ever since, I-ram had been drifting. Ghosting him in stairwells and morning silences.

And yet… Today he showed up, sat down and drank the tea with him.

He didn’t say much. But he didn’t leave.

Do-yun thought about the things I-ram had said. About the sock Bori stole. The deflections, the dry tone, the tiny surrender in the way he sat with his shoulders just slightly turned—not closed, not open.

He’d seen it before.
In animals.
In people.

The delicate moment where the fear doesn’t vanish, but it quiets just enough for something else to surface.

Hope, maybe.

Do-yun smiled faintly into his tea.

“I’ll be patient.” he murmured to no one.

He’d waited for gardens to grow in worse soil.

End of Episode Eight