Cherishing you ♡ - Kang Daniel

×[¤ Chapter 26 ¤] ×

○ Love is unfair ○

*Upstairs*

"You are so not running away from me young lady!" Leo yelled, as he stormed in to his bedroom right before Risa could lock the door, "And you're definately not locking yourself up in my room!"

"You don't even live here anymore!" Risa yelled back at him, "Don't call it your room!"

"You never lived here!" Leo replied pettily, as he slammed the door shut "You got no rights to tell me!"

"Did you come after me to have this petty fight?" Risa asked him with fierce eyes, and clenched fists.

"Of course not!" Leo grumbled frustrated, as he took a step closer,  "I came after you, because we need to talk! You can't runaway midway like that!"

"There's nothing to talk about!" Risa immediately spat back, "A clear rejection is always better than a fake promise! And you were clearly not man enough to reject me."

"Who said it was an empty promise!" Leo brushed his hand trough his hair frustrated, realising nothing would get solved if they kept on screaming at each other.

"Stop the lies Leo! I'll never be good enough for you!" Risa walked closer to him, not wavering under his gaze "I get that, so lets stop this game off pretend."

"Risa I promise you," Leo pleaded with her, desperately, "It's not like that."

"Here you go again, it's always been like this." Risa fumed, as she pressed her finger in to his chest, "You give me a empty promise, and I take it like the fool I am. Even if my common sense tells me not to, but not this time. It's time to stop this."

When Leo was about to say something again, she held up her hand infront off his mouth, to sush him.

"It's time to let go off my feelings for you." Risa stated, as a sudden calmness came over her, "It's time for me to grow stronger, to learn from this and movw on. I'll never forget the day I realised I loved you, but I'm tired Leo. Honestly, I see no point in fighting, and hoping, any longer."

Leo grabbed her hand, and interwined his fingers with hers, pulling her closer to him. Skinship had never been a weird thing between them, but never so directly and close.

"What if I won't let you stop fighting?" Leo whisperd, as his eyes turned clouded. His stare pinned her down for the first time in years, "I do love you Jung Risa, and I won't let you give up after all this time. Not when I finally can say yes."

"Don't be so stupid." Risa shook her head in denial, not wanting to believe him that easily again, "You're only talking at the spur off the moment. When you've calmded down, you'll have second thoughts "

"I'm not. I'm definately not." Leo calmly shook his head "I won't deny certain things. It was true, I never saw you as anything more than Fays nice friend in the beginning. It took me three years to grow feelings for you, and to see what kind off wonderfull lady you had grown up to be."

"If you're lying please stop." Risa whisperd, protecting herself from a bigger heartbreak. She didn't want to be lifted up, to be dropped to the ground twice as hard.

"How can I? When I came to love you even more, than you did love me for the past years." Leo sighed resting his forehead against hers, he met her gaze with an tender and loving one.

"I had a lot off difficulties comming to terms with my feelings." He confessed, as Risa fell silent.

"My mind replayed all the scenarios off what would happen if I dated you. In middle school when I graduated, I was afraid it wouldn't last long since we would get seperated. After you came to the same high school, I saw changes in Fay and I was afraid us dating would turn it worser."

Slowly Risa lifted her hand, and started caressing his face in a soothing manner, ushering him to go on.

She had never heard this story before, but she knew he had thought this through for at least a thousand times.

Leo was the type to overthink things until he had explored every possible out come. Where as Fay, would sometimes completely act on feelings.

"Would she feel left out? Would she be lonely, or would she come to hate you? What would happen if we broke up? Would Fay have to choose between us?" Leo continued with a defeated sigh, "One side I knew your patience was running out, other side, I had to take so much in to consideration. It might seem easy to others, but not to me."

"Why didn't you share these thoughts with me?" Risa asked her eyes pooling because off hapinnes, "I know you're the type to overthink every possibility. Did you think, I wouldn't be able to help you?"

"I was afraid to give you too much hope, what if I decided not to date you in the end? I knew that would crush you." Leo stared her deeply in the eyes, as his arsm slipped around her waist, "But when you told me trough the phone, that you were giving up, with that broken voice. Not even a single thought off giving you up occured to me. I wanted to see you as soon as possible, and hold you. Yet even then, I restrained myself."

"Then what made you change your mind?" Risa questioned curiously,  not noticing tears slipping down her cheeks, "I mean it sounds like you were about to reject me."

"It happened today, when Daniel called me." Leo pulled his face back slightly, and admired her face lovingly. He whipped her tears away with his thumbs, "He told me he cared for Fay, and that he was worried. So I hoped, and thought, I finally could let my protective side go a bit."

"How chivalric of you." Risa rolled her eyes, but couldn't help but smile, as it was something typical for Leo, "You would only date if Fay got a boyfriend. Whata  bright future I had." She added sarcasticly.

"Hey, it's over now!" Leo protested, cupping her face in his hands "You don't need to worry anymore. I'm fully yours from now on."

"I'm not sure about that." Risa teased him slightly, "I mean, Fay before anything right?"

"I've always wanted to do this." Leo mumbled, as he pulled her face closer, and softly pressed his lips against hers.

Without thinking twice, Risa closed her eyes and kissed him back. She wrapped her arms around him, and he pulled her closer to him.

The moment she had been waiting for all this time, finally happened, and it felt even more wonderfull than she had imagined. A kiss purely filled with years off love, and a story only they would understand.

Breathless the both off them pulled back, and Leo asked her with a deep voice "I love you Riri, will you go out with me?"

"Despite the order beign wrong." Risa chuckled at him, "How could I ever say no to you?"

"You had me worried there for a second." Leo groaned dramaticly.

"You deserved it." Risa said, and just by looking at each other they started grinning, "For making me wait al these years."

"Well the wait is over, and I think we should go tell Fay." Leo proposed carefully, "I think we own her that."

"Yep, we really do." Risa noddedin agreement, as he grabbed her hand and guided her towards the stairs "She was our biggest shipper, and support."

The closer they got to the ground floor, the louder the voices got, and that's when Risa rememberd everything that happened between Daniel and Fay. 

As realisation hit her, her complexion turned pale. If they were fighting, and Leo got wind of the truth, things might get nasty. He wasn't over protective without power to back him up.

"Hey guys-" Leo trew the door to the livingroom open, but froze as soon he saw Daniel and Fay standing very close to each other, with different emotions displayed on their faces.

Leo's gaze slowly fell on Daniels hand around Fays arm, and his voice dropped to a low tone "What is going on here?..."