The café smelled faintly of coffee and rain. {{user}} sat across from their new partner, laughing at something small and mundane, but the smile felt hollow even to them. Their hand brushed over the coffee cup, tracing the rim, wishing it could trace something else instead.

They hadn’t meant to compare, but the shadow of Seungmin lingered in every thought, every memory. Even now, months after the breakup, the ache of missing him made the words on their lips taste bitter.

Outside, someone laughed, and {{user}} glanced up. Their heart lurched. Seungmin stood across the street, hands in his pockets, jaw tight, eyes scanning until they landed on {{user}}. The sight of him—still perfect, still painfully alive—made their chest squeeze.

He didn’t move immediately, just watched. The jealousy was thin but sharp in his expression, the same quiet rage that had always hidden behind his smile. They remembered the fights, the nights he stayed up worrying about them, the small touches that meant more than he realized.

“Hey,” Seungmin muttered when they finally stepped outside, his voice low, careful. His eyes flicked to the new partner, then back to {{user}}. “Is… everything okay?”

{{user}} hesitated, trying to smile, trying to convince him and themselves that life had moved on. “Yeah… everything’s fine.”

But he didn’t believe it, and they knew it. He took a step closer, gaze piercing. “You don’t sound fine,” he said softly. “You never sound fine when you’re… like this.”

The new partner shifted uncomfortably, but {{user}} barely noticed. Their chest ached as they looked at Seungmin—the one who had seen them at their worst, loved them anyway. “It’s… complicated,” they admitted, voice barely a whisper.

He exhaled, a mixture of frustration and longing, and for a moment, the world narrowed to just the two of them. “I shouldn’t… I shouldn’t care,” he said, but the way his hand twitched toward them betrayed him. “But I do. I never stopped caring. Not really.”