The night had that particular scent—dense, almost metallic—
a scent of after-storm mixed with the heavy warmth of two bodies
who had just loved each other until breath and reason were gone.
Nari opened her eyes abruptly,
as if something had just ripped her out of sleep—
a jolt born not from fear,
but from that strange state where the soul wakes before the body,
still crushed under the weight of sensation.
The bedroom was bathed in darkness—
a living darkness, thick, almost warm,
one that still seemed to breathe with the echo of their moans,
their broken words,
their kisses that were too long, too deep, too real.
The vibrating silence around her wasn't real silence:
it was the heavy kind that settles after a night where everything has changed.
She turned her head.
Sion was sleeping.
A scene in itself.
A painting.
An almost unreal vision.
His face—always so hard, so closed, so finely carved in daylight—
now seemed human again.
His features relaxed.
His mouth slightly open.
A long, regular, deep breath.
A dark strand stuck to his forehead,
a trace of dried sweat at the roots of his hair.
He looked fragile.
Almost gentle—
but only because he slept close to her,
in this bed where he had collapsed after loving her
as if tomorrow did not exist.
She watched the slow rise of his chest,
then its fall,
the way his arm fell limply onto the sheet
as if even in sleep he refused to stray too far from her.
A smile.
A real one.
A soft smile, almost childlike, brushed her lips.
She didn't even remember the last time she had smiled like that.
She stayed like that for a few seconds—
or minutes, she couldn't tell—
drinking in the image with a new kind of thirst.
It wasn't the first time she'd seen this Sion.
Not the predator.
Not the monster.
Not the cold manipulator.
But the man.
The one who, in the shadows, slept as if his body had finally laid down
the weapons he had carried for too many years.
Every time she saw this Sion,
a storm of emotions overwhelmed her:
the fear that he would close off again,
and a love so overflowing it almost hurt.
She inhaled deeply,
and the warm air of the room brushed her bare skin,
a heat mixed with his scent—
his perfume, his breath, his sweat—
a scent that wrapped her like a caress,
clinging to her hair, her throat, her stomach.
She couldn't stay lying down.
She couldn't bear the sensation of being still too close,
too deeply tangled with him,
as if one more shared breath might pull her back under completely.
So slowly, without a sound, she sat up.
Her legs trembled slightly when they touched the floor—
a physical memory of Sion's body against hers—
but she forced herself to stand.
Her fingers moved automatically toward the nightstand,
where Sion's pack of cigarettes rested.
She took one.
Lit it.
The flame illuminated her face for a second,
highlighting her flushed cheekbones,
her swollen lips,
her eyes red from lack of sleep and tears she hadn't even realized she cried
while making love.
Then the light disappeared.
And the room fell back into its warm, humid darkness.
She put on his shirt.
Her shirt now.
Too big.
Too wide.
Too full of him.
The sleeves slipped, revealing her shoulders.
The fabric fell over her bare thighs.
She opened the glass door.
A blast of icy wind rushed inside,
biting into her still-burning skin.
She stepped onto the balcony.
Barefoot.
Her nails still painted with chipped red polish.
The cold concrete under her toes.
And there—
in the black, oppressive, silent depth of the Seoul night—
she took a long drag.
The smoke entered her lungs, hot and heavy,
like an embrace.
Then she exhaled slowly,
a white breath dissolving into the darkness.
Nari stared at the sky.
No stars.
No horizon.
Just thick, heavy, threatening clouds,
a lid pressed down over the city.
The city flickered below,
car headlights drawing pale golden lines across the roads,
but nothing disturbed the silence of her balcony.
And in the middle of that dark night, something inside her became clear.
Sharp.
Obvious.
Undeniable.
She wasn't made for normality.
She wasn't made for softness.
She wasn't made for a stable, clean, quiet life
where love comes in tidy boxes,
without overflow, without violence, without fire.
She loved the shadow.
She loved the crack.
She loved the chaos.
She loved Sion.
Not the version you can introduce to your parents.
Not the one you show on social media.
Not the one society accepts.
She loved the dangerous man.
The broken man.
The man who drove her insane,
who made her tremble,
who made her want to scream, cry, burn.
She loved the kind of love that devoured.
She loved what she became with him:
a woman alive.
Truly alive.
She crushed the cigarette against the railing,
ashes falling like gray rain onto the street,
and she stayed there a moment,
heart pounding,
breath heavy.
Then she walked back inside.
Sion moved slightly in the bed,
a faint murmur on his lips,
as if he felt her absence even in sleep.
She smiled.
A dark smile.
A loving smile.
A guilty smile.
She gathered her things,
his car keys from the nightstand,
and slipped out.
Morning hadn't really started yet.
Or maybe it had—
but for Nari, it was still night.
A night stretching into the gray-white light of Seoul,
the cold light that warms nothing, forgives nothing,
and certainly not the sins one leaves behind
in a messy bed.
She left Sion's apartment silently,
closing the door behind her.
Her heart was still pounding too fast,
as if her body hadn't realized she'd left the room.
Her thighs still trembled.
Her skin still burned.
Her lips still tingled from his kisses.
She descended the stairs slowly,
her fingers sliding along the cold railing.
At the parking lot, she walked toward Sion's car.
A dark, powerful, icy, polished car.
A mechanical beast in his image.
When she opened the door,
a rush of warm air soaked with leather and male perfume hit her.
It slammed straight into her stomach.
Her hands trembled slightly—barely—
when she inserted the key.
The engine roared, a deep growl, almost animal,
vibrating beneath her ribs.
She gave a slow smile.
Yes.
This was it.
This was her.
Not the good girl.
Not the perfect woman.
Not the obedient fiancée.
This woman—
the one driving a dangerous man's car
after spending the night dissolving into him—
was who she had always been.
The one she had suffocated for years.
She started the car.
The road unrolled beneath the wheels like a black ribbon,
the wet asphalt reflecting the faint red neon signs still lit,
the city breathing slowly around her like a sleeping creature.
Nari drove fast.
Too fast.
But she didn't care.
The wind rushed into the cabin,
pushing through her still-damp hair,
making his shirt—her shirt—
whip against her bare skin.
She could still feel his warmth in the fabric.
Each time she accelerated,
her stomach tightened,
a delicious surge of adrenaline—
almost orgasmic.
She felt free.
Freed from the role of perfect bride.
Freed from the "good girl" label.
Freed from the silent prison she had built around herself.
And yet…
Beneath the euphoria, something else was burning.
Deeper.
Darker.
A certainty.
She had just crossed a line.
Not a small moral line.
A border.
A limit.
A barrier separating the old world from the new.
And she had no intention of going back.