who's the one that takes you higher
than you've ever been?

"Revels?"

I was echoing the event that had just been revealed to me, accompanying a plan for some kind of Lee party we were going to crash. So much for moving into enemy territory. We were apparently going partying.

"Crazy, right?" Yeeun said, though she didn't sound like she thought it was crazy at all. "Drinking, dancing, the works. When I first heard of it, the first thing that came to mind was that one scene from Titanic. You know." She shrugged. "It's hard to believe, so I won't be surprised if you choose not to believe me at all."

"No, no, it's not that hard to believe," I muttered. "In fact, I've been to one of those before, I think. When I was back in Daejeon."

She raised an eyebrow. "A Lee clan celebration?"

"Of course not." I only remembered bits and pieces of the experience, with lots of women and men and a lot of kissing, on all kinds of places. "A small-time affair. It was a biker thing, mainly just showing off."

She smiled a thin-lipped smile. "Sounds a lot like the one we'll be going to," she said. "But it's not something that happens among the clans commonly, so Jungkook believes it's just happening because the heir wants you there."

I raised an eyebrow. "If he had wanted me there, he would have called me."

"That's not how things work around here," she said. "People want to keep their mysterious reputation."

"Hilarious."

She smiled. "Anyway, these revels are part of an auction," she said, smile dropping as she took on a more serious topic. "Of people. Usually, there'd be more families to bid for possession, but the clan is big enough so it's just branches."

"Bidding for people?"

Yeeun paused, considering her words before she spoke. "Sex workers. Escorts. Toys." Her voice had gone quieter, even though there was no one around to hear us. "It's a common practice for mob bosses to keep one around for certain purposes."

The first thing I thought of when she explained the purpose of the auction was the blond escort who had helped me find Taeyong. And the girl I had seen in the bedroom... I swallowed against the dryness in my throat, remembering how Jungkook had called me the heir's 'toy'. Things were taking a turn, and not for the better. "And we go in as bidders?" I asked, surprised at the sharpness of my voice. "We're not celebrities, but if I really do have a bounty on my head, I'm pretty sure we'll be easy to recognize."

"Not all of us are going in. Just a spare few." She looked at the half-empty glass of water in her hands and shook it gently, watching the water rise and fall slowly. I watched her warily, wondering why she had taken such a long pause. "You'll be the one being sold."

"Great," I muttered, barely surprised by the news. "You're going to dress me up and sell me off?"

"Not really." She placed the glass back on the table. "We're going to pretend to give you up to the heir-that's what he wants, right? It's not like you're going to be just a comfort girl or something."

Comfort girl. I shivered. "I'm not coming back?"

She tapped the edge of the glass, and glanced back up at me with blank eyes. "Theoretically, no."

"Theoretically?"

She smiled, a smile I didn't like half as much as the other ones. It was secretive but flaunting, like a cage in which you could see past the bars. The smile reminded me of Baekhyun again, and I turned away painfully. If he had been there, things would have been so much easier to deal with. Or at least, that was what I told myself.

It was a stupid thing to hope for, now that I knew he wasn't coming back, but I hoped nonetheless. Believing that there was an alternate path for the me of the past, even when I knew deep inside that all roads would have led here. If I hadn't done this, or if I hadn't chosen that. Bullshit. I couldn't have stopped my momentum from carrying me here, even if I had known my future.

I felt like a stone, sinking slowly but surely towards the bed of the ocean, the light from the surface dimming as I went deeper in.

"So, what you're saying is," I started, frowning as I tried to think clearer, "Jungkook's offering me up to the Lee like some piece of meat."

"For now." Yeeun didn't even try to hide the bleakness of the situation, which I was thankful for. "I'm not sure how he's fine-tuned his plan, but he's ostensibly given up. The choice to fight, I mean. Now that he knows what he wants and how he's going to get it, we're all replaceable."

Weren't we always? "Not all of us," I said, leaning my elbows against the table with my back to it. "Not his crew."

"His crew goes first," she said, with so much conviction that I almost believed her. "Vernon goes first, since he's getting out of hand. The rest of us follow."

I glanced at her, too stunned to speak.

Her eyebrows arched as she noticed me staring. "What, you thought he was going to let them walk once he was done taking over?" she asked. There was a touch of humor in her smile. "Maybe he would have, in the past. He doesn't need a right hand anymore. Now that he has you."

"He doesn't have me," I responded, indignant. My shoulders had stiffened; I tried to relax them, but it just made me look even more tensed. "He can't trust me."

"Not on his own, he can't," she said slowly. "But now that he's got your brother-"

I turned away, pushing off the table and standing stiffly. Steadying myself, I rocked back and forth on my feet, trying to get my bearings. All of a sudden, breathing felt difficult.

I sucked in my breath through my teeth, feeling blood seep from a cut on my dry lips. It had been some time since I'd taken my meds. I raised a hand to my chest, pressing the heel of my palm against my sternum, and tried to calm myself. "I'm gonna go," I mumbled, swiping my tongue over the blood on my lip. "Don't wait up."

Yeeun followed me with her steady gaze as I left the room, heading towards the cupboard where I had kept the pills. The room was empty, thankfully, but I still felt a burning in the pit of my stomach when I opened the drawer. I'd thought that I had gotten past the shame a long time ago, but apparently not. I probably never would.

The drawer was empty.

"Looking for these?"

My heart seized up as I turned, finding Taeyong leaning against the doorframe at the entrance. He was holding up the tiny plastic bottle with my medicine, expression distant but open.

He tossed the container, and I caught it. I felt jittery and sick, like I had been jumping on a trampoline just seconds before. He walked up to me, and I glanced at his clothes, over the bandages that peeked out from under the collar of his jacket. The damn black leather jacket.

"I thought they were someone else's when I found them there," he said, gesturing to the pills, and my fingers clenched tighter around them. "You should keep them somewhere else. Carry them around. Who knows what might have happened if someone else had found them?"

I stayed silent, watching him and trying to gauge his expression, but it seemed like a book written in another language. He strolled up to the cupboard, not touching anything, but looking everywhere. My chest tightened with every step he took, but he made no move towards me.

Taeyong looked back at me after a moment, tilting his head slightly, so strands of his neatly done hair fell onto his forehead. "Aren't you going to take them?"

I exhaled, and nodded. "Later," I said, taking a step back and looking away, everywhere, anywhere except his face. "Are you allowed to get up?"

"In theory, no," he replied. "But it's not that bad, not anymore. My skin's used to getting torn open every now and then."

I winced, and he stopped. "I'm sorry."

"It's not your fault," he said, but it sounded empty, like something he had repeated to himself a thousand times. "I meant my brother, I-never mind. Pretend I didn't say anything."

"I can't just pretend that."

"You can, if you try," he said instantly, and I pressed my lips together. Taeyong sighed, and ran a hand through his hair, looking frustrated. "Did they tell you about the auction?" he asked, eyebrows drawing together, and my expression fell.

"Unfortunately, yes." I slipped the container into my pocket, feeling the vibrations of the pills as they rolled around inside. "You're not going, I hope."

He shrugged, and I narrowed my eyes, noticing that he hadn't answered. He put his hand in the pocket of his jacket and brought something out, but I couldn't discern what it was. He brought it up and put it between his lips, and I relaxed, thinking it was a lollipop-until he raised a lighter to one end of the stick.

"Didn't think you'd gotten this tired of living," I said coolly as he lit the cigarette, but the reflexive clench of my jaw gave me away. "Lollipops are much better."

One end of his lips lifted. "Lollipops are for kids."

I tried not to smile, but couldn't stop the one that came to my lips like a tide in the sea. "That's offensive."

"It was supposed to be." There was an odd look in his eyes now, as he took a drag and lowered the cigarette, parting his lips, letting the smoke float out from between his lips instead of blowing it out. "Go ahead and tell me you have one."

He was moving slower now, with disjointed words and slow gestures, like a video played slowed-down. Hooded eyes, a slight smile, and the seams along the insides of my chest ripped open.

"As a matter of fact," I whispered, pulling out the lollipop from my pocket and raising it like a white flag, "I do."

Taeyong's eyes were fixated on mine, a strange look in them that probably mirrored mine. Nostalgia, for days better and worse. Simpler days, and complex still, when there were choices and the cloud of death, but when the choices were simpler and less blood was spilled.

"Not this time," he muttered, taking another drag from the cigarette, and I leaned in, hypnotized.

His mouth opened against mine, and when he exhaled, I tasted the smoke. I closed my eyes, fingertips just touching the front of his jacket, pulling away to let the smoke dissipate before kissing him again. Taeyong brought his free hand up to cradle my jaw, and I ran my hands through his hair, the rough and the soft, remembering and wishing.

I touched him as gently as possible, careful not to disturb the bandages when I finally drew back. There was an unspeakable sadness in his eyes when we parted, and he let go of me with slow, stilted movements, not wanting to pull back.

"You know," I murmured. "You may have just given me a respiratory pathogen."

"Maybe I did," he replied, carefully brushing the pad of his thumb against the scar on my cheek. "Doesn't matter. Unless we're really, really lucky, we'll probably be dead by the end of the week."

His touch was warm, and softer than I remembered, but with the same anguished desperation I felt whenever I thought about him. "Maybe we're really, really lucky."

Taeyong's hand didn't fall, and the fire in his eyes roared brighter, if only for a split second. "I hope we are," he said, with finality. "I really do."