The sheets were still trembling —

from warmth, from breath, from everything they had just been through.

Hong didn’t move.

He was breathing slowly, deeply, like someone who had been running for a long, long time… and had finally made it. His chest rose and fell with quiet purpose, and though he wasn’t crying, his eyes were glassy with the weight of something too big to hold in silence.

Nut was beside him. Curled close. One leg tangled in the sheets, the other draped over Hong’s thighs, but his face — his face was pressed into Hong’s waist. Clinging. Gripping.

Not with desire.

But with need.

His arms wrapped tightly around Hong’s middle, as if letting go meant waking up from something holy. As if Hong’s slim waist was the only safe place in the whole world.

Nut was trembling. His breath came in shaky pulls, soft against Hong’s skin. And Hong didn’t speak. He didn’t dare.

He just slipped his fingers through Nut’s hair and stroked gently, tenderly, the way someone touches something they’ve waited a lifetime to love.

And maybe it was that —

Maybe that exact touch made Nut shake harder.

He clung tighter. He buried himself deeper into the curve of Hong’s body like he wanted to disappear inside him.

Then, in the hush of the room, came the whisper —

broken, hoarse, and barely there:

“I trust you.”

It hit like thunder.

Small words. But everything in them cracked open.

Hong closed his eyes, heart swelling, breath catching. He pressed his forehead to the top of Nut’s head, lips brushing against his hair, and he didn’t need to say anything.

Because everything in him already was.

This wasn’t about sex.

This was arrival.

This was the place where every version of them finally met —

the boys they used to be, the men they were now, the silence they shared, the fear they survived, the love they didn’t name — but felt.

Nut’s arms stayed locked around Hong’s waist, like a lifeline.

And Hong, for the first time in his life, felt necessary.

Felt loved in the quietest, realest way.