The new arrangement

He had entered her room again that night, his presence filling the space with a silent anger. Haeun was sitting on her bed, waiting, her body exposed, her heart pounding. He stared at her for a moment, his eyes roaming over her naked form.

Haeun met his gaze, refusing to look away, and spoke.

"I don't have to do this anymore. I could end this between us, you know."

His expression shifted, a sneer tugging at his lips, a silent challenge for her to try.

She did not. But she continued speaking, and what she said finally made him pause.

“I know I hurt you with what I did. That our relationship was not fair to you. Perhaps ending it would be the best solution for all of us. Or perhaps- perhaps I could let you make a request, one that I cannot say no to. Would that be enough for you, Jihoon?"

Jihoon froze, his hands on her shoulders, his eyes meeting hers with a mixture of surprise and something else. Suspicion? Fear? She couldn’t quite place it. He studied her, without speaking, for what felt like hours.

But then his eyes lit up, a slow, predatory smile curving on his lips. She knew then that she had made a mistake. A really bad mistake.

"You know," he began, his voice deceptively soft as he leaned in, his breath hot against her neck, "since you can ignore me when you are with him, wouldn't it be fair that you ignore him when you are with me?"

Haeun shivered, the implication of his words sending a jolt of unease through her. "What do you mean?" she whispered, already knowing the answer.

Jihoon's smile widened, a cold and calculating gleam in his eye. "I mean, if you want my forgiveness, you will give me your phone, and let me decide if and when you get to talk to him when you are with me."

Haeun felt the weight of his request settle like a stone in her chest. Her phone was more than just a communication device — it was her lifeline, her connection to Joonie, her one true solace in this whirlwind of stress. She slipped her hand into her pocket, clutching it tightly in her hand as if it might somehow protect her.

But try as she might, she could not deny that fact that Minjae would not only not object to the idea, he might even enjoy it.

She looked up, meeting Jihoon's gaze, and saw the triumph in his eyes.

He knew he had her cornered.

With a shaking breath, she pulled her hand from her pocket, still clutching her phone.

"Fine. But let me tell him about this arrangement first, at least."

Jihoon snatched the phone from her, drawing a shriek of protest that he ignored.

"I will decide if or when you talk to him, remember? Maybe I will do it now, or maybe I will let him think his precious girlfriend is ignoring him, abandoning him, hmm?"

"You don't have my passcode anyway, you stupid idiot," Haeun spat at him, angry at the fact that she had let herself fall into this situation.

He looked at her for a moment, before turning back to her phone. He tried 0-6-1-9, each tap smooth and practiced. The phone unlocked. She stared at him in disbelief.

"How did you...?"

He shrugged. "I saw you do it a couple times when you didn't think I was watching. I also tracked down his socials over the weekend that you were ignoring me. Guess whose birthday I found?"

She wanted to protest, but it would be useless. She leaned back instead, waiting for whatever humiliation he would put her through next.

He opened her text app, scrolling through the endless conversations between Haeun and him, noting how she had marked his chat as 'Joonie' with a heart behind, his heart filling with anger. He scanned the messages, each one a reminder of the connection they shared — the inside jokes, the secret confessions, the declarations of love and devotion. It made him sick, the way they spoke about each other as if no one else in the world mattered.

He paused at one message, a picture she had sent him. In it, Haeun was smiling brightly, but it wasn't just any smile — this one was real, not the practiced, plastic grin she offered to him, to her fans, and to the rest of the world.

This was the smile Jihoon longed to see from her when he entered the room; the kind of smile that could light up a room, that warmed his heart and made him forget for a moment any pain he felt.

He closed the app, locking her phone again. He wouldn't send any message tonight.

"You know I can just use another device to contact him right?" she said, a last ditch attempt to assert whatever control she had left of the situation.

Jihoon clucked his tongue at her as he slid the phone into the pocket of his jeans. He walked to the door, ready to leave for the night. But then he turned back around to look at her one more time, something dark flickering in his gaze.

"You could, but I will be watching everything you do on your social media and other apps anyway. Don't make this worse than it has to be, Haeun." He left her room then.

She stared after him, her heart pounding in her chest as she watched him go.

What had she done?

She collapsed onto her bed, burying her face in her hands, trying desperately not to cry. How had she ended up here? What had possessed her to give him that power over her? And how could she possibly explain it to Minjae?

The guilt and fear gnawed at her insides, twisting her stomach into knots. She wanted nothing more than to reach out to Minjae, to tell him what had happened, to apologize for all the pain she was going to cause him and try to fix it.

But now, with Jihoon in control of her phone, that would be impossible.

And so the days continued, each one harder than the last.