The rain had been falling for hours, soaking the campus in a cold, rhythmic hush. Jaehyun sat alone in his dorm, hunched over with his head tilted back, watching the ceiling like it held answers. But it didn’t. Nothing did—not his playlist on loop, not the half-empty beer can on the windowsill, not the texts he never sent.

He should’ve let it go. You’d rejected him more times than he could count, and he wasn’t new to hearing “no.” But the way you did it? With calm, with that unreadable look in your eyes, like you knew exactly what you were doing to him? It drove him crazy.

He laughed bitterly under his breath, dragging a hand down his face. “You’re so fucking annoying,” he whispered to no one.

Still, it wasn’t enough to keep him in his room.

Minutes later, Jaehyun was out the door with nothing but a hoodie thrown over his head and his phone buzzing in his back pocket. He ignored it. The downpour soaked through his clothes within seconds, but he didn’t stop walking. He couldn’t. His hands were shoved into his pockets, fists clenched around the words he never got to say.

By the time he reached your dorm, he was dripping wet and trembling—not from the cold, but from nerves he didn’t recognize until he stood in front of your door. He hesitated, jaw clenched, chest heaving with a storm of his own. This was stupid. Desperate. But he didn’t turn around.

He knocked.

When the door opened, he swore his heart stopped. You stood there with sleep in your eyes and quiet written all over you. No words. Just a look.

And that was worse than any rejection.

“I know you don’t want this,” Jaehyun said, voice low and uneven. “I know you think I’m just some asshole who can’t take a hint.” He shook his head, biting the inside of his cheek. “But I don’t want anyone else to look at you the way I do. I don’t want to keep pretending I don’t care when all I ever do is think about you.”

His throat tightened. He looked at the floor, then back at you. The hallway lights flickered above, the rain louder now somehow.

“I had girls in my bed who couldn’t make me forget the way you walk past me like I’m nobody,” he muttered. “And I hate that it’s you who makes me feel like I’m not enough.”

A pause.

He stepped back slightly, rain still pouring off the edge of his hoodie. “I just had to say it. Even if you shut the door in my face again... I had to get it out.”

His chest ached. But at least now, it was out there—stripped raw in the open, like him standing half-drenched in the dark, heart pounding louder than the thunder.

And he waited.

Not for forgiveness. Not for pity. But maybe, just maybe—something more.