Archive of Our Own

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Seungmin

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The church was never truly dark.

During the day, sunlight flooded the church, and colour lived within its walls. Stained-glass windows scattered light in fractured ribbons, deep blues, wine-dark reds, gold catching the drifting dust made briefly holy. By evening, candlelight took its place, dressing the saints along the walls in a soft, flickering glow, their aged faces watching over the nave in silence.

Yang Jeongin loved this hour most.

He knelt in front of the altar long after the others had gone, cassock brushing his calves, hands clasped neatly over the wooden barrier. The fabric still felt reassuringly heavy against his skin, a reminder of purpose, of belonging. Every time he donned it, there was a quiet swell of pride in his chest. Not vanity, never that, but gratitude. To serve. To be trusted.

The ache in his knees was familiar, almost welcome.

Silence settled around him, thick and complete. This was his favourite way to pray, not aloud, not guided by words already written, but in stillness. In this quiet, there was nothing to pull at his attention, nothing to interrupt his focus. No voices, no footsteps, no distractions. Just the steady rhythm of his breathing and the overwhelming sense of presence.

Here, Jeongin felt closest to God.

Not distant and towering. Near. Attentive. Listening.

He prayed every day.
Morning prayers murmured groggily while the kettle came to a boil, the promise of caffeine helping to rouse him. Evening prayers whispered beneath his breath as he folded donated clothes in the parish hall, careful with each garment. Gratitude. Supplication. Intercession. Names stacked gently in his thoughts, the elderly woman who sat alone every Sunday, the man who smelled faintly of alcohol even in the early morning, but never missed Mass, the teenagers who laughed too loudly in the back pew and pretended indifference while still showing up, week after week.

Jeongin loved all of them.

It was not an abstract love spoken only from the pulpit. It was practical. Remembering birthdays. Noticing absences. Sitting beside someone instead of standing over them. He volunteered his time wherever it was needed, soup kitchens, shelters, late-night calls from parishioners who didn’t know who else to turn to.

Being a man of God, to Jeongin, was not about authority.
It was about service.

There were differences of opinion, of course. Jeongin’s father, the previous priest of the parish, had always dismissed the hymns as frivolous. Pretty distractions, he called them, insisting that lectures and scripture were what truly mattered. The Word delivered clearly and firmly with no unnecessary embellishments.

Jeongin disagreed.

He believed the hymns were irreplaceable.

He loved the way voices filled the church, uneven and unpolished, rising together. The way shy singers gained confidence by the second verse. The way harmony knit the congregation into something whole. Music made worship participatory. It turned listening into belonging. For those few minutes, everyone was equal, no hierarchy, no sermon separating speaker from listener. Just shared breath, shared devotion.

A family.

Eventually, Jeongin rose, the soft rustle of fabric shifting faintly as he moved. He crossed the nave, fingertips brushing the edge of a pew, and made his way toward the confessional. Once a week, without fail, he took his place there.

The wooden door creaked familiarly as it closed behind him. The small space smelled faintly of incense and wood polish as always, the air still but comforting. Jeongin adjusted the stole at his shoulders, bowed his head, and breathed.

“Lord,” he murmured, voice barely above a whisper, “grant me patience. Grant me wisdom. Let me be a vessel of Your grace.”

Then he waited.

The first confessions were often the lightest.

Someone admitted to envying their friend’s baking skills, ‘her sourdough always turns out perfect, Father, and mine never does!’. Jeongin smiled despite himself, offering gentle counsel on gratitude and humility. Another confessed to taking the Lord’s name in vain in traffic, shame thick in their voice.

These kind of sins were almost fondly human.

Others weighed more heavily.

Adultery spoken in fractured sentences. Theft confessed through tears. Long-held resentments laid bare. Jeongin listened to them all with the same careful attention, never rushing, never interrupting. He offered absolution where it was sought, guidance where it was needed, reminding each person, again and again, that no failing placed them beyond God’s love.

He believed that with his whole heart.

Some nights, the weight followed him home. He carried other people’s guilt like water cupped in his hands, carefully, knowing it was not his to keep. He lit extra candles after particularly heavy confessions, knelt until the ache in his legs sharpened and grounded him.

Tonight, though, there was calm in his chest.

This was his calling.
This was where he belonged.

Jeongin rested his head briefly against the cool wood, breathing in slow and steady. Whatever sins were brought before him tonight, small, foolish or devastating, he would meet them with compassion. With patience. With love.

The screen slid open softly.

“Bless me, Father,” a familiar voice said, hesitant but steady, “for I have sinned.”

Jeongin straightened, hands folding once more in his lap.

“Go on,” he said gently. “I’m listening.”

There was a pause. Not the brief, nervous hesitation he was used to, but something heavier, breath drawn in and held, released slowly, then caught again. The man on the other side of the screen shifted, the bench creaking softly beneath him.

“I-” Seungmin’s voice faltered, then steadied itself by force. “I’m not sure how to start.”

“That’s all right,” Jeongin said, quietly. “There’s no rush.”

Another silence. Longer this time.

“It’s been… A while since my last confession,” the man admitted at last. “I try to live properly. I pray. I come to Mass. I do my best to follow God’s teachings.” A faint, humourless huff of breath. “I just… This has been weighing on me.”

Jeongin nodded, unseen. “You’ve taken the first step by coming here.”

Encouraged, Seungmin continued, words tumbling out a little faster now. “I’ve been having thoughts. Unholy ones. Desires I can’t seem to stop no matter how much I pray about them.”

Jeongin’s response came easily, practiced and calm. “Temptation itself is not sin,” he said. “It’s how we respond to it that matters. Desire is something many people struggle with.”

Seungmin exhaled shakily, as if relieved by the reassurance.

Jeongin leaned forward slightly, voice gentle. “If there is a young woman you feel drawn to, it may be worth reflecting on whether your feelings could be guided toward something honourable. Courtship, with patience. With the intention of a future built in God’s light.”

On the other side of the screen, Seungmin coughed, sudden, as though the suggestion had caught him entirely off guard. He laughed once, breathless and strained.

“Father,” he said, voice tight, “it’s… It’s not a woman.”

Jeongin stilled.

He felt it first in his chest, a small, sharp jolt, quickly suppressed. Years of composure held firm. He drew in a breath, schooling his expression even though no one could see it.

“I see,” he said evenly. “Go on.”

Seungmin hesitated again, but the dam had cracked now. “It’s another man. I’ve tried to ignore it. I’ve tried to pray it away. But every time I see him, it just… Comes back.”

Jeongin listened, hands clenched lightly together in his lap.

“He’s not especially tall,” Seungmin said, voice softening despite himself. “But he’s strong. You can tell just by looking at him. He has… Really fluffy black hair. I wonder, if it would feel as soft as it looks” A faint, embarrassed laugh. “I know that sounds stupid.”

“It doesn’t,” Jeongin replied automatically, though his stomach had already begun to twist.

He couldn’t help it, the way his mind sifted through familiar faces. Parishioners he knew well. Men who lingered after Mass. Men who volunteered their time, who carried chairs and crates, ones who might fit Seungmin’s brief description.

His thoughts caught, on Chan.

The feeling that followed was swift and disorienting, a sharp flip low in his stomach.

“Father?” the man prompted, uncertainty creeping back in.

“I’m here,” Jeongin said at once.

Another pause. Then, quieter, almost ashamed, the man said, “It’s… Changbin.”

Jeongin felt something in his chest loosen, a release so subtle he almost missed it. Relief, unexpected, slipped through him before he could stop it. He frowned faintly, unsettled by the reaction, and pushed it aside.

“Thank you for your honesty,” he said instead. “That cannot have been easy.”

“It isn’t,” the man admitted. “I don’t want to disappoint God. Or… Anyone.”

Jeongin closed his eyes briefly.

“You are not beyond God’s love,” he said softly. “Nothing you have told me places you outside His grace. These desires, unbidden as they are, do not define you. They are something to be carried carefully, with prayer and restraint.”

He chose his words with care, the way his father had taught him. The way doctrine demanded.

“You must seek strength through prayer,” he continued. “Through service. Through turning your focus toward God’s love when temptation arises. With time, these feelings may quiet. And if they do not, you are not alone in that struggle.”

On the other side of the screen, the man breathed out slowly, as if some of the weight had been lifted.

“Thank you, Father,” he murmured.

When the screen slid closed again and footsteps retreated, Jeongin remained very still.

His hands were trembling.

He bowed his head, whispering a prayer he had spoken a thousand times before, but tonight, the words didn’t settle him as well.

And for the first time, the silence of the booth did not feel entirely steady beneath him.

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Yongbok

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A week passed.

The initial discomfort faded, as Jeongin knew it would. Awkwardness had a way of dulling with time, especially when buried beneath the monotony of routine and prayer. He told himself that what lingered was not unease but responsibility, a reminder that confession was not simply about listening, but about guidance. About knowing what to say when his words mattered most.

So he studied.

He rose earlier than usual, scripture open on the small table by the window, pages already indicating passages he knew by heart and others he felt compelled to revisit. He read commentaries late into the night, lips moving silently as he traced familiar arguments, reasoning that a priest who hesitated was a priest who failed his flock.

He never wanted to be unsure again.

If someone came to him burdened by sin, he wanted to meet them fully prepared, armed with wisdom, with clarity, with answers that could steady rather than waver. The weight of that responsibility sat squarely on his shoulders, familiar and welcome. Purpose always was.

The soup kitchen was busy that afternoon.

Steam rose from battered metal pots, the air warm with the scent of broth and freshly baked bread. Jeongin moved easily through the space, sleeves rolled, greeting people by name, hands already reaching to help before anyone asked. This, too, was prayer, service rendered without spectacle.

Changbin was there, as he often was, laughing easily as he hefted crates that were probably even heavier than they looked. He spoke softly to the guests, always at eye level, always patient. Watching him, Jeongin felt a familiar fondness settle in his chest.

He understood, now, in a way he hadn’t before.

It made sense that someone would be drawn to Changbin. His warmth was effortless, his kindness unshowy. He made people feel cared for without demanding anything in return. Of course Seungmin would notice. Of course feelings would grow where care already existed.

It was a shame, Jeongin thought distantly, that such a thing could not be allowed.

If one of them were only female…

The thought startled him. He shook his head faintly, physically dislodging it. Such considerations were pointless. Harmful. He needed to move on, just as Seungmin must. Dwelling served no one, least of all God.

Across the room, Chan was handing out bowls, sleeves pushed up, forearms dusted with flour. He moved with an easy confidence that came, Jeongin supposed, from having had to start over once already.

Chan had come from Australia a year ago for work. The transition couldn’t have been easy, an unfamiliar language, new customs, an entirely different way of living, but he had slipped into the community surprisingly easily. He volunteered. He stayed after services. He learned names quickly, laughed readily and listened well.

Jeongin had always thought that was what made the church feel like home for him. Not familiarity, but belonging, something chosen rather than inherited.

He caught himself watching Chan longer than necessary and looked away at once, attention snapping back to the task at hand.

Focus, he reminded himself.

By the time evening fell and the church quieted once more, Jeongin felt steadier. The rhythm of service, of study, of prayer had done its work. Whatever uncertainty had lingered from the previous week had been smoothed over, set neatly back into place.

He took his seat in the confession booth as he always did, posture straight, expression calm.

This time, when the screen slid open, he felt ready.

Or so he told himself.

Jeongin recognised the voice instantly.

“Bless me, Father,” Yongbok said, his tone deep and warm even as it wavered slightly, “for I have sinned.”

Jeongin felt his shoulders ease without conscious thought. Familiarity helped, voices he knew well always did. “Go on,” he said softly. “Take your time.”

Yongbok didn’t hesitate as long as Seungmin had. There was still embarrassment there, audible in the careful way he chose his words, but also a kind of resolve, as if he’d already rehearsed this, weighed it, decided honesty was better than silence.

“I’ve been… Indulging in temptation,” he said. “On my own.”

Jeongin nodded, unseen. “Masturbation,” he supplied gently, without judgment.

“Yes,” Yongbok said, exhaling. “That.”

Jeongin didn’t ask for elaboration. He never did. The confessional was not a place for unnecessary detail, but Yongbok, perhaps nervous, perhaps needing the relief, continued anyway.

“I don’t really… Have a preference,” he admitted, voice dropping. “Men or women. I think a beautiful body is just… Beautiful. It doesn’t feel different to me.”

Jeongin listened carefully, fingers lacing together in his lap.

“I know it’s a sin,” Yongbok added quickly. “But I tell myself it’s… Less serious than acting on it. That I’m not hurting anyone. I’m not involving anyone else.”

Jeongin considered that for a moment. “You’re right that there is some distinction,” he said at last. “Action carries weight beyond the self. Temptation turned inward is still something to be mindful of… But restraint matters.”

Yongbok let out a small, relieved breath.

Jeongin found himself thinking, unbidden, about how easy it would be. How temptation no longer required effort or imagination, how it lived only a few clicks away, always accessible, always waiting. The world made sin convenient now.

He reached, as he often did, for scripture.

“There’s a passage,” he said, voice calm, almost conversational. “Matthew, chapter five. It speaks about removing whatever causes you to stumble, an eye, a hand.” A faint, gentle chuckle escaped him. “Now, obviously, I don’t expect you to do anything so drastic.”

Yongbok laughed softly on the other side of the screen.

“But the meaning is this,” Jeongin continued. “If something tempts you, put distance between yourself and it. That might mean blocking certain sites. Creating boundaries that make it easier to choose differently when the moment comes.”

“That… Sounds manageable,” Yongbok said.

“That’s the idea,” Jeongin replied. “Faith is built through small, consistent choices. Not punishment.”

He offered absolution in the same steady tone he always used, words worn smooth by repetition and belief.

When Yongbok left, the booth felt quiet again, but not so heavy.

Jeongin sat back slightly, breathing in, breathing out. He felt composed. Useful.

Two confessions. Two different burdens. Both met with guidance, with scripture, with reminders of God’s love.

He told himself, firmly, that this was how it should be.

And yet, as the minutes ticked on, he couldn’t quite shake the sense that something was shifting beneath the surface.

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Jisung

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There had been a wedding the day before, and the joy of it still lingered in the air.

Jeongin loved weddings more than any other ceremony. More than baptisms, more than communion, even more than the festive annual spectacle of midnight Mass at Christmas. There was something profoundly hopeful about standing before two people who had chosen one another, who had come willingly, joyfully, to promise a shared life in the sight of God.

The church had been overflowing.

Fresh flowers were positioned at the end of every pew, white and pale pink, their scent sweet and cloying, clinging to the air long after the guests had gone. Light poured through the stained glass in jubilant colour, catching on silk dresses and polished shoes, scattering joy across the congregation. There had been laughter, tears, the soft chorus of voices responding in unison.

He had read from Corinthians, as he often did. It was his favourite passage, one he returned to again and again, never feeling it lose its meaning.

Love is patient, love is kind.
It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.
It does not dishonour others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.
Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.
It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
Love never fails.

This was the love Jeongin believed in. Not fleeting or indulgent, not selfish or grasping, but enduring. Steady. A love that required patience and sacrifice, that asked something of you in return. It was the love he felt for God, for the Church, for the people who filled its pews week after week.

For his flock.

He did not believe himself to be a judge. That was not his role. When someone came to his confession booth, voice shaking, breath unsteady, they did not come seeking condemnation. They came seeking reassurance, that they were not lost, that they were still loved, that God’s plan had not abandoned them.

Jeongin wanted nothing more than to guide them back toward that certainty.

Tonight, as he prepared once again for confession, the memory of the wedding steadied him. The vows. The way two pairs of hands had clasped together at the altar, certain of their future together.

Love, he reminded himself, was not a weapon. It was not something to be rationed or withheld. Love was patient. Love was kind.

The candles burned low as he took his place in the booth. He bowed his head briefly, whispering a prayer, not for himself, but for whoever would sit on the other side of the screen.

That they might feel safe.
That they might feel heard.
That they might leave knowing they were still held in God’s grace.

The screen slid open.

“Bless me, Father,” a voice said, quieter than the others had been, careful and tentative. “For I have sinned.”

Jeongin lifted his head, hands folding together once more.

“Take your time,” he said gently. “I’m here.”

The man cleared his throat. There was a pause, then another, longer this time, before he spoke again.

“… It’s me.”

Jeongin’s breath caught, just slightly.

“Jisung,” he said, the name leaving him before he could stop it.

“Yes,” Jisung replied, a nervous laugh threading through the word. “I… I figured you’d know.”

They had known each other their whole lives. Jisung had grown up in this church, his presence as familiar to Jeongin as the worn stone floor or the creak of the pews. He had been there as a boy, fidgeting beside his parents, as a teenager half-asleep during early Mass, as a young man who volunteered when he could.

The realisation settled between them, heavy and intimate.

“This is… Weird,” Jisung admitted quietly. “Because you know me. And I know you.”

Jeongin shifted, heart beating a little faster, but he kept his voice steady. “What you say here stays here,” he reminded him. “I’m not here as someone who’s known you your whole life. I’m here as your priest. I won’t judge you, judgment isn’t mine to give.”

Jisung exhaled slowly. “I know. I just… Needed to hear it.”

There was a brief silence, then Jisung spoke again, words hesitant. “I haven’t been completely honest in my confessions before.”

Jeongin frowned faintly. He thought back, tried to recall anything of note. Jisung’s previous confessions blurred together in his memory, small and forgettable, nothing that lingered. Missed prayers. Impatience. Distraction. Things so mild Jeongin had never thought twice about them.

“I always… Edited myself,” Jisung continued. “Said the easy things.”

“Thank you for telling me now,” Jeongin said. “Go on.”

Jisung swallowed audibly. When he spoke again, the words came unevenly, tumbling over one another. “I’ve been anxious about this for weeks. Every time I sit here, I think I’ll say it, and then I don’t. I just… Freeze.”

“You’re doing well,” Jeongin encouraged softly. “There’s no rush.”

“I have…” Jisung started, then stopped, exhaling sharply. “I have felt desire for another man.”

Jeongin felt himself relax, just a fraction. Familiar ground now. He nodded, already preparing the reassurance he had given others, the words lining themselves up neatly in his mind.

“Desire can be confusing,” he began. “Temptation-”

“I let him touch me.”

The words came out in a rush, blurred together, barely intelligible.

Jeongin blinked.

“I- sorry,” Jisung said quickly, breath shaking. “I- I said it too fast.”

Jeongin leaned forward slightly, pulse steady but attentive. “Carry on,” he said gently.

Jisung swallowed. “A friend of mine came on to me,” he said, clearer now, voice trembling. “And I didn’t stop him.”

Jeongin closed his eyes for a brief moment, not entirely in shock, but also to regain focus. When he opened them again, his voice was calm.

“Thank you for trusting me with that,” he said. “Tell me how you felt.”

Jisung’s breath shuddered on the other side of the screen.

“It wasn’t… Sudden,” he said. “It didn’t start like that.”

Jeongin stayed still, fingers gently threaded together, listening.

“We were just hanging out. Like we always do.”

There was a quiet smile in Jisung’s voice. “We’ve always been close. Comfortable, I guess. It’s not weird for us to cuddle, you know? Sometimes we watch movies like that. I’d be on his chest, or he’d throw his legs over mine. Stupid stuff. It never meant anything.”

Jeongin nodded once, silent encouragement.

“So when he leaned in… When he rested his head on my shoulder and put his arm around me, I didn’t think anything of it.” Jisung’s voice faltered. “It felt normal.”

He exhaled slowly.

“But then…” The air shifted. “Then his hand was on my thigh.”

A pause. Longer this time.

“I didn’t stop him.”

The words were clear. There was no stutter now, no rushing. Only the soft, raw honesty of someone determined to finish what he started.

“He didn’t go straight for it. He just… Let it sit there. Testing, I guess. I remember my heart started pounding, even though nothing was really happening yet. I thought about saying something, I did, but I didn’t want to break it. Whatever was happening, I wanted it.”

Jeongin didn’t move.

“And then…” Jisung’s breath caught, almost a laugh, almost not. “I turned to look at him.”

A silence bloomed, then cracked open.

“And he kissed me.”

Jeongin heard the tremble behind the memory, no shame, just awe. As if Jisung was still stunned it had happened at all.

“It was soft,” Jisung said quietly. “He didn’t rush it. Just his mouth on mine. Careful. It was like he didn’t want to scare me.”

A breath, a pause, a barely-there chuckle.

“It felt like my whole body lit up. My chest, my stomach… Everything flipped. Like, my insides dropped and floated at the same time. That warm, giddy, electric feeling, you know?”

He didn’t wait for confirmation.

“My hands were shaking, but I kissed him back. I think I was already shaking before he touched me. It wasn’t even what he was doing. It was just him. The way he looked at me.”

Jeongin’s throat felt dry. He swallowed, quietly.

Jisung didn’t speak for a long moment.

“We didn’t stop there.”

Jeongin blinked.

“I just… Let it happen.” Jisung’s voice was soft now. Less hesitant, more resigned. “His hand moved. He kissed me again, and while I was trying to catch my breath, he slipped his hand into my pants.”

The words fell slowly, one after the other, quiet and matter-of-fact.

“I was so hard already it hurt. The way he touched me… It was like he already knew exactly what I needed.”

Jeongin’s chest tightened. His knuckles ached faintly where his hands had clenched.

“I think I moaned,” Jisung said, not as an admission, just a fact. “I couldn’t stop myself. He kept his mouth near my ear, whispering, breathing, not even saying anything really, but it made it worse. Or better. I don’t know.”

Jeongin’s heart was beating harder now.

“There was a moment,” Jisung continued, “where I thought about stopping. Just for a second. Not because I didn’t want it. But because I wanted it too much. It scared me, how good it felt. How right it felt.”

His voice lowered.

“And then I came.”

Jeongin’s body went still.

“I didn’t even warn him,” Jisung murmured, almost embarrassed. “It hit so fast. I was shaking. My legs went numb. Everything just- everything pulsed. Like the world narrowed to that one place in my body and I wasn’t thinking anymore, I was just feeling.”

His breath caught.

“It felt… Incredible.”

Jeongin stared at the screen between them, the fine mesh blurring slightly. A flicker passed through him, intrusive and unbidden, an image, unshaped, but visceral. His own hips lifting into a touch not his own. His body clenching in response to imagined pressure, friction and heat.

A hand on his skin.

His stomach flipped, and he shoved the thought away, but not before he noticed something that struck him into shock.

The hand he imagined was not small. It was not soft, or feminine. It was not the image he’d always trained his mind to conjure in moments of wandering temptation.

It was broad. Firm. Masculine.

Jeongin swallowed hard.

He reasoned with himself, immediately, that it was only because of what Jisung had just described. His mind was responding to the details he’d heard. That was all.

That had to be it.

“After,” Jisung said, voice quieter now, more fragile, “I didn’t know what to do.”

Jeongin refocused. Fast.

“I cleaned up,” Jisung continued. “He held me for a bit. We didn’t say much. It wasn’t awkward or anything, not really.”

His voice dipped, softer still.

“And then, after he left, it hit me. The guilt. Like this… Fog, rolling in over everything. I sat in the shower for over an hour. Just sat there. Couldn’t look at myself. Couldn’t even pray.”

The rawness in his voice sharpened.

“I felt disgusting. I’d taken something good and twisted it. I’d wanted something I wasn’t supposed to. I’d thrown everything I believed in away for a few minutes of pleasure.”

There was a breathless pause.

“I didn’t sleep that night. I kept replaying it in my head, not just the way it happened but what it meant. What it said about me. I thought about not coming back here. Thought maybe I didn’t deserve to.”

His voice caught.

“But then I remembered what you always say. That this place isn’t about punishment. That it’s about returning. About finding your way back.”

Jeongin didn’t speak right away. He didn’t trust his voice.

He’d always thought himself steady. A compass, not a weathervane. But now, now, he felt untethered, his thoughts spinning slow and strange in directions he didn’t fully recognise. Or want to.

When he finally did speak, his voice was quiet, almost strained.

“You did the right thing by coming,” he said. “This is where you’re meant to be.”

A pause.

“Desire is not a sin,” he continued, choosing his words cautiously. “What we do with it matters. But what you’ve brought to me is not something to be condemned. It’s something to be understood.“

He drew a breath, slow and measured.

“What you felt, what you experienced, wasn’t evil. It wasn’t twisted. It was human. Beautiful, even, in its honesty. The guilt you feel doesn’t mean what you did was monstrous. It means your heart is still awake.”

Silence met him, almost tangible in its thickness.

Jeongin swallowed again.

“I can’t tell you how to feel,” he said, more gently now. “Only that God’s grace isn’t undone by a moment of intimacy. Or even by doubt. You’re not lost. You’re still His.”

Jisung was quiet for a long time. Jeongin had grown used to that part of confession, the silence between breaths, between revelations, between the weight of truth and the uncertainty of what to do with it.

Then, softly, “But how do I stop?”

Jeongin turned toward the screen a little more.

“I don’t want to feel like this again. The… The shame after. The guilt.” Jisung’s voice was thick, trembling at the edges. “How do I find the strength not to fall into sin again?”

That question, more than any before, caught Jeongin unprepared.

There were a dozen phrases ready on his tongue. Things he’d said before to others, to himself. Scripture. Doctrine. Half-remembered lectures from seminary. But none of them felt real right now. None of them felt like they would land in the space Jisung had just cracked open.

Jeongin stared hard at the mesh screen, as if he might somehow see through it. As if seeing Jisung’s face would make the answer clearer.

He breathed in. Held it. Let it go.

“Remember,” Jeongin said, “that you are loved. Fully. Deeply. Even in your confusion. Even in your weakness. God’s love doesn’t disappear the moment you stumble. It doesn’t hinge on you being perfect.”

He paused, not to search for more words, but to let the ones already spoken settle.

“You’re not expected to walk this path without faltering,” he said. “That’s why it’s a path. One you return to, again and again. Not because you failed, but because you are still trying.”

Jisung made a sound, small, almost like a hum, but not from confusion. More like… Acceptance.

Jeongin closed his eyes for a moment, heart still not fully calm. “Trust in the path God has for you. Even if you don’t know where it leads yet. Even if it doesn’t look the way you thought it would.”

There was a beat of silence, and then Jisung said, “Okay.”

Jeongin’s hands relaxed in his lap. His pulse was still unsteady, his thoughts frayed in places he didn’t want to explore, but he held on to the one thing that had not shifted. His calling. His role.

To listen. To hold space. To remind those who stepped into the dark that there was still light ahead.

He hoped his words had been enough. He hoped they’d comfort Jisung long after the screen slid shut.

⋆༺♱༻⋆

Hyunjin

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Several weeks had passed since Jisung’s confession.

Jeongin hadn’t forgotten what Jisung had said, of course. He doubted he ever would. But Jisung had made no further mention of it, and the few times they’d spoken since had been perfectly ordinary. A nod in passing. A soft greeting at Sunday Mass. Once, an awkward smile when their eyes had met across the courtyard, but even that had faded, replaced by something steadier.

Jeongin was grateful. Not because he wanted to pretend nothing had happened, but because there was something precious in being trusted, and even more precious in not having that trust become a burden. Jisung still came to church. Still sang softly during hymns. Still lingered after to help stack chairs or gather hymnbooks. The awkwardness had ebbed like a tide, never fully gone, but no longer crashing against every shared glance.

And in the weeks that followed, the confessions Jeongin heard had been… Manageable. Forgivable in the easy way. Petty arguments. White lies. Impatience with children. Working on the Sabbath. Human things. Familiar things. They came and went like passing rain, leaving only the faintest imprint behind.

There had been no further shifts underfoot. No intrusive images. No thoughts that startled him into stillness.

And Jeongin had let himself breathe again.

He had needed to.

Because everything else had not slowed. The calendar had not paused to let him catch up with his own soul. If anything, it had spun faster. First, the fire. Then the fundraiser. Then preparations for the harvest festival.

The fire had taken almost everything.

It had happened on a Friday evening, an old timber-frame house on the edge of town, too dry from a long, hot summer, too old for safety codes to mean much anymore. The family had made it out, thank God, but with nothing more than the clothes on their backs. Three children. One still in nappies. A father who worked nights. A mother who hadn’t stopped shaking even when she’d arrived at the church, blanket still draped over her shoulders, soot streaking her forehead like the faithful on Ash Wednesday.

Jeongin hadn’t hesitated.

The very next day, the donation drive was underway.

And the response from the community had been overwhelming.

The entryway of the church filled rapidly with boxes of clothing, baskets of fresh food, stacks of canned goods, bottles of toiletries, bedding and baby formula. There were homemade casseroles wrapped in foil, jars of soup sealed with wax paper and string. Toys had come in wrapped and unwrapped, some carefully chosen from a store, some previously loved.

But if the outpouring had been a blessing, the logistics had been chaos. Which was why, when Chan had stepped up to help, Jeongin had nearly kissed his feet in gratitude.

Not that he would have.

Not literally.

Still.

Chan had been tireless.

He’d brought a van without being asked, and filled it twice. He’d colour-coded every donation box with a small strip of tape, and had made spreadsheets to track which needs had been filled and which still required attention. He acted like someone who’d been waiting his whole life to be needed, and now that he was, didn’t intend to waste it.

He was good with people, too. Calm but firm, never flustered, even when the toddlers screamed or the donation piles toppled over. There was something about him that made people want to listen, and to Jeongin’s surprise, even the older parishioners, who could be territorial about how things were done, deferred to him without complaint.

Jeongin wasn’t sure when he’d started looking forward to their daily planning sessions. Only that he did.

There was something easy about Chan. Not careless. Not shallow. Just… Uncomplicated. Jeongin didn’t have to guess with him. He said what he meant. He worked hard. He smiled when things went right, and sighed when they didn’t, and always showed up on time.

It helped, too, that Chan seemed to enjoy the work. He had a kind of boyish energy that made it feel less like a chore and more like some sort of mission. Something meaningful. He didn’t speak about faith much, but there was something in his presence that made Jeongin feel like maybe belief didn’t have to be spoken to be real.

On Wednesday, after a particularly long afternoon of sorting and labelling, Chan leaned against the edge of a folding table and reached for the thermos Jeongin had brought him earlier.

“This coffee’s actually decent,” Chan said, tipping back the container. Jeongin couldn’t help but watch as his throat bobbed. “Didn’t have you pegged as a coffee guy.”

“I’m not, really,” Jeongin replied. “Just one strong cup in the morning. Enough to get me moving.”

Chan took another sip. “Still, this is good. You drink it like this?”

“Nah, black,” Jeongin said with a shrug. “Always.”

Chan smiled into his cup. “Figures. You’re sweet enough without the extra cream and sugar”

It wasn’t flirtation. Not quite. Chan had always been like that, easy with his words, comfortable with closeness, someone who had clearly never learned to be wary of how proximity might be misread. Or maybe someone who didn’t care.

Jeongin couldn’t decide if that made him jealous or anxious.

Still, it didn’t feel like temptation. Not the way Jisung had described it. There was no pulse of guilt beneath the warmth. No need to remind himself of his vows. Just a… Fullness, in the chest. Like standing in sunlight.

“You’ve done a lot,” Jeongin said after a moment, more seriously. “I don’t think I could’ve managed all this without you.”

Chan shrugged. “Didn’t do it for the thanks. Just figured you needed backup.”

“Well,” Jeongin said, smiling faintly, “I did.”

Their eyes met. A flicker passed between them.

Chan looked away first, rubbing a hand over the back of his neck.

“You’re gonna be ready for the harvest festival after all this?” he asked, changing the subject. “I heard Mrs. Park is gunning for the pumpkin bread competition.”

“She’s been training since August,” Jeongin deadpanned. “I honestly expected her to come to confession about hoarding cinnamon.”

Chan laughed.

Jeongin found he liked the sound of it more than he should.

“Let me know if you need help setting up,” Chan said, already reaching for the clipboard again. “I’m around.”

“I will,” Jeongin said, watching him go.

And then, quietly, to no one at all- “Thank you.”

He didn’t mean just for the donation drive.

He didn’t know what he meant, not entirely.

Only that lately, with Chan nearby, the world felt just a little more manageable. Just a little brighter.

The booth was warm.

Not pleasantly so- close. Stale. Jeongin had already undone the top button of his collar, but the fabric still clung to his skin. The wooden bench beneath him felt harder than usual, the sharp edge of fatigue pressing into his bones.

It had been a long day.

Another round of festival preparations. A meeting that had run late. A care home visit. The weight of small tasks, none significant on their own, but together, they pressed down with the heavy insistence of gravity.

He blinked heavily. Prayed silently for alertness.

Then the screen slid open with a quiet snick.

The sound jolted through him, sharp and sudden against the quiet. He straightened instinctively, palms flattening against his thighs.

“Bless me, Father, for I have sinned.”

The voice was unfamiliar.

Male. Young, but not uncertain. Not like Jisung’s trembling tone, or the hesitant admissions of the other two young men he’d heard from recently. This was different.

Jeongin cleared his throat gently. “When was your last confession?”

There was a pause, then the voice answered, “It’s been a while. And this is my first here.”

Jeongin nodded slowly, mind beginning to turn through the possibilities. A new member.

He cast back through names.

Hwang Hyunjin.

Jeongin hadn’t met him yet, not formally. He’d heard the name in passing, noted it when the roster updated. But he remembered the face, sharp features, long hair half-tied at the nape, the kind of face that made people glance twice.

Jeongin sat up straighter.

“You’re welcome here,” he said simply.

Hyunjin exhaled. Not shakily. Just… Slowly. Like someone preparing to unload something heavy.

“I’ve slept with a man,” he said.

No hesitation. No faltering.

Jeongin stilled.

Hyunjin went on. “It wasn’t a mistake. I wanted it.”

Jeongin’s fingers curled slightly where they rested on his knee.

Hyunjin didn’t wait for prompting. “I let him touch me. I let him inside me.”

Jeongin swallowed.

Hyunjin continued, voice lower now, not from shame, but intimacy. Like he wasn’t just confessing to a priest, but confiding in someone who might understand.

“I’ve done it before,” he said. “More than once. And, if I’m honest, it probably won’t be the last time.”

A pause.

“Not because I don’t care. Or because I’m reckless. But because when it happens… When I give in to it… I feel free.”

His voice didn’t rise, didn’t plead. It was even and perfectly clear.

“There’s something about surrendering,” he said. “About letting go. Letting someone else move me, hold me, use me.”

Jeongin inhaled slowly, keeping his posture still, his face schooled.

“It’s not just about sex,” Hyunjin continued. “It’s about being unguarded. No mask. No control. Just me, open, vulnerable.”

His voice softened further.

“I know it’s sinful. But it’s real. And I don’t want to lie to you, Father. I don’t want to sit in here and pretend I’m here to say I’ll never do it again.”

Silence filled the booth.

Thick. Unflinching.

Jeongin’s throat was tight.

He had been tired before. Now he was simply stunned into stillness. Not by the confession itself, but by the confidence in it. The honesty. The strange, terrible beauty of it.

When he finally spoke, it was slowly. Carefully.

“You’ve shown courage in speaking so openly,” he said. “And I’m grateful you came.”

Hyunjin didn’t answer. He didn’t need to.

Jeongin let the quiet stretch before continuing.

“We all long for closeness,” he said. “To be seen. Held. Wanted. That desire is not wrong in itself. It was written into us. By God.”

His voice softened further.

“But it matters where we take that longing. What we do with it.”

Hyunjin was still.

Jeongin breathed again, willing himself to be steady.

“There is a difference between being used and being held,” he said gently. “And God, He never uses. He only receives. Only loves.”

Another pause.

“You said you felt free in surrender,” Jeongin continued. “But I wonder… Have you ever felt that same freedom in being cherished?”

Hyunjin exhaled slowly. “I don’t know.”

“It’s easy,” Jeongin said, “to confuse surrender with salvation. One feels like letting go. The other is being caught.”

A long silence followed.

Then Hyunjin said, “You don’t sound angry.”

“I’m not.”

“You’re not shocked?”

“I’ve heard many things in this booth,” Jeongin said. “And many of them were said with far less honesty than you’ve offered.”

Another quiet beat.

“I’m not here to condemn you,” Jeongin added. “I’m here to remind you that you are loved. That God sees you exactly as you are. And He isn’t afraid of you.”

Hyunjin laughed softly, wry, a little bitter. “Most people are.”

“God isn’t most people.”

More silence.

Then, with something quieter than before, almost weary. “So what do I do now?”

Jeongin considered. The old answers, the rote ones, felt brittle on his tongue.

So instead, Jeongin drew a slow breath and said, “I can’t tell you what choices to make.”

Hyunjin didn’t interrupt. He seemed to be listening more closely now.

“That isn’t my place,” Jeongin continued, voice steady but unguarded. “I won’t pretend I have a simple answer for a… Problem, as complex as yours. Faith isn’t a list of instructions. It’s a relationship.”

He paused, searching for the right words.

“What I can tell you is this. Whatever longing you feel, whatever openness you seek, I hope you look for it first in God. Not as a substitute, not as a punishment, but as a source. Let yourself be known there. Truly. Bring Him the parts of you that feel restless, the parts that crave closeness and understanding.”

The booth was very quiet.

“There is a love there that does not ask you to disappear,” Jeongin said. “A love that does not require you to give yourself away to be worthy of it. If you open your heart to that, if you let yourself rest in it, you may find satisfaction.”

Another breath.

“And whatever path you walk,” he added gently, “be safe.”

The word felt important. He let it settle.

“God wants His children to feel loved, yes. But He also wants them protected. Cared for. Whole. Your body matters. Your life matters. You matter.”

Jeongin’s voice softened at the end. “Don’t forget that. Not here. Not anywhere.”

⋆༺♱༻⋆

Changbin

⋆༺♱༻⋆

Hyunjin’s confession had left an echo behind it.

It wasn’t the words themselves, Jeongin had heard confessions of lust before. Had talked parishioners down from the clutches of temptation, counselled them through guilt and shame. But this had been something else entirely.

Not cruel. Not arrogant. Just… Assured. Hyunjin had already made peace with his choices, and had come to confession not for forgiveness, but for the space to be heard.

And Jeongin had given it. As best he could.

But the quiet that followed had been uneasy.

Because despite everything he’d said, and meant, there was a part of him still reeling. Still circling the raw centre of what had been shared with him in such calm, private certainty.

But the reaction was only natural. He was human. He had not been trained to keep his heart frozen. He did not condemn Hyunjin. Could not. There had been too much honesty in him. Too much need.

And yet…

Mortal sin.

The words clanged through his mind like a struck bell. He could not forget them. Not when they hung in the Catechism so clearly, not when they lined the pages he had studied, memorised, vowed to uphold.

Sex between men. A grave matter. Willed and enacted. Without remorse.

Hyunjin had confessed, but he hadn’t asked for forgiveness.

And Jeongin, who had once believed his own convictions were as steady as the scripture they were born from, was left unsure if he had offered absolution… Or just understanding.

He didn’t know which troubled him more.

So he buried himself in the next thing. And, as ever, the church provided no shortage of next things.

The harvest festival arrived with the usual frenzy of food donations, stacked folding chairs, and contested competition rankings. Children ran through the pews with paper decorations and sticky fingers, and Mrs. Park had triumphed in the pumpkin bread competition as expected.

Jeongin smiled, presided, laughed when he was supposed to.

He said grace over steaming trays of food. He blessed the baskets of donations with hands that only trembled with exhaustion once, then steadied. He listened to the cheerful din, the shouts of good-natured competition, and told himself this, this warmth, this community, this joy, was where his heart belonged.

And then there was Chan.

Unfailingly present. Always lifting, always sorting, always stepping in without needing to be asked. When others flagged, he worked. When others wandered, he noticed. It was a quiet strength, not the kind that drew attention, the kind that steadied the room without needing credit.

Even after the last booth had been folded away, the last child coaxed home, Chan remained.

They stood together in the side hall, surrounded by stacks of canned goods and donation bins, lights buzzing faintly overhead.

Chan let out a breath, nudging a box closed with his foot. “Well. That’s that.”

Jeongin smiled faintly. “God will be pleased.”

Chan grinned. “About the food drive or the fact that nobody resorted to murder over the pumpkin bread competition?”

Jeongin’s smile widened. “Both. Though Mrs. Park is going to be insufferable all year about it anyway.”

Chan laughed, then looked down at the last bin, resting his hands on his hips. “Guess you’ll be glad to have me out of your hair now that this is all over.”

The words were light, but something in them tugged at Jeongin.

He found himself hesitating.

“I wouldn’t say that,” he said, softer than he meant to.

Chan glanced up.

Jeongin looked away, busying himself with the nearest box. “You’ve been a huge help. I don’t know how I would’ve managed without you.”

Chan shrugged one shoulder, casual. “Happy to pitch in.”

Still, he lingered.

And Jeongin, despite himself, felt the faintest pulse of disappointment at the thought of things returning to normal. Not because the festival would be missed. Not even because the donations were finished.

But because it meant fewer excuses. Fewer shared tasks. Less time in Chan’s company.

It was only natural. After all, how much time did he really spend with people his own age? The church filled his hours, his weeks, his years. Most conversations were pastoral, one-sided, or conducted through a wooden screen.

And Chan… Chan wasn’t like that.

He spoke to Jeongin like a person, not a priest. Made him laugh, made him feel, if not ordinary, then at least not entirely set apart.

But people didn’t invite the priest to movie nights. Or dinner parties. Or weekend hikes.

Priests were holy furniture. Respected, but not included.

And Jeongin had made peace with that.

Hadn’t he?

He closed the final box, taping it shut. “We’ll need to schedule drop-offs for the donations,” he said lightly, businesslike.

Chan nodded. “I’ve get a van on Monday.”

“Perfect.”

Their eyes met.

Another beat passed.

Jeongin cleared his throat. “Thanks again. Really.”

Chan tilted his head. “You don’t have to keep saying that.”

Jeongin gave a small smile. “Maybe not. But I mean it.”

Chan smiled back, then grabbed the box nearest the door. “See you Monday, Father.”

“Jeongin,” he corrected, too quickly.

Chan paused. Just for a second. Then nodded. “See you Monday, Jeongin.”

And then he was gone.

Jeongin stood in the empty hall, surrounded by boxes, and tried not to wonder why he already missed the sound of footsteps beside his own.

The weeks that followed the harvest festival passed easily.

Not without their usual duties, of course, there were always meetings to attend, readings to prepare, charity deliveries to organise, but the rhythm of it was familiar, almost soothing. Jeongin slipped back into his role like returning to a well-worn coat, the fabric of his days stitched with responsibility, sermons, and the scent of incense lingering long after Mass had ended.

Chan didn’t linger like the incense.

The man had gone back to his own life, as he should, and Jeongin had no reason to expect otherwise. He still came to church, sat in his usual place three pews from the back, nodded politely after service, even helped out with minor errands when asked. But the long hours of shared labour, the slow-burning camaraderie forged in the whirlwind of the donation drive… Those had passed.

Jeongin reminded himself that this was right. Chan had his own world, and Jeongin had his. Theirs had overlapped briefly, usefully, and now returned to their respective paths. He wasn’t disappointed.

Not really.

And if sometimes he looked up a beat too quickly when the side door creaked open, or lingered in the hall in case someone needed a hand with a heavy box… Well. That was just habit. Nothing more.

The confessions that week were almost comically mild. A woman confessed to eating three slices of cake in one sitting- ‘and not even for a celebration, Father, just because it was there.’ Another, half-laughing, admitted to complaining about her neighbour’s dog to someone who wasn’t the neighbour. A teenage boy shuffled in and muttered something about forgetting his chores for three days in a row.

Jeongin gave out prayers with half a mind, listening but not truly engaged. His thoughts drifted. His body was tired.

The door creaked again.

He didn’t stir at first. Only straightened a little out of routine, fingers laced loosely in his lap.

The screen slid open.

And then came a voice.

“Bless me, Father, for I have sinned.”

It took Jeongin a moment to place it.

Changbin.

He’d always spoken with confidence when they met in public. Ran the church youth group. Helped at the community garden. He was normally known for being loud, brash and joking easily. But now, now his voice was nothing like that.

Not quite sad. But close. With the air of someone standing barefoot at the edge of something sharp.

Jeongin leaned in slightly. “Go on,” he said gently.

Changbin hesitated.

“I think I’m in love with someone.”

Jeongin said nothing. Just waited.

“A man,” Changbin added after a beat. “I’m in love with a man.”

The words were fragile. Beautiful in the same manner as spun glass.

Jeongin exhaled slowly, silently. He had not expected this, not today, not from Changbin, but he felt no rush of judgment. Only the quiet brace of understanding. The way his mind had begun to slow, to steady.

“It’s not just attraction,” Changbin went on. “I’m not just… Confused, or going through something. I’ve tried to tell myself it’s a phase, or temptation. But it’s not.”

His voice tightened, turned inwards.

“I love him.”

Jeongin’s fingers tightened slightly against the wood of the bench.

“And it hurts,” Changbin admitted. “Because I know it’s wrong. I know it’s a sin. I know I shouldn’t… I shouldn’t want this.”

There was a pause. Jeongin could almost hear the effort it took to keep speaking.

“But I do. And not in a… Lustful way. It’s not about that.”

He drew a shaky breath.

“It’s just… It’s the way he makes me feel. Like I’m not performing all the time. Like I’m allowed to be quiet around him. And he doesn’t expect anything from me, but I want to give him everything anyway.”

A laugh, quiet and self-deprecating.

“He probably doesn’t even like me back. I mean, he’s nice. He talks to me. But that’s just who Seungmin is, I think.”

There was silence, and Jeongin realised his jaw had tensed, teeth pressed tightly together to keep from responding.

“He’s funny,” Changbin said suddenly, and the warmth in his voice was a spark in the dim. “Not the kind that tries to be. Just… He says things that make you laugh and then looks surprised when you do. Like it wasn’t meant to be funny.”

Jeongin closed his eyes.

“And he’s patient. God, he’s patient. You’d never guess it, because he seems so… Blunt. A little cold at first. But once he lets you in, he remembers things. He listens. Really listens. And he’s always there when it matters, even if he doesn’t say much.”

Changbin’s voice was steadier now. Not joyful. But certain.

“I love him,” he said again. “Not because I want to break rules. Not because I want something I shouldn’t. Just because… I do. Because it’s him.”

Jeongin opened his eyes.

He drew in a breath and spoke carefully. “Thank you for being honest.”

Changbin didn’t reply, but the silence was open. Waiting.

“You’re not alone in this,” Jeongin said. “Others have carried similar feelings. Struggled with the same questions.”

He paused.

“I know it hurts. And I won’t pretend I have an easy answer. But love, real love, is not evil.”

His voice softened.

“It can be misdirected. It can be acted on in ways that go against our faith. But the feeling itself? The longing to care, to see and be seen? That is not wicked.”

The breath on the other side of the screen trembled faintly.

“Your love for Seungmin… It doesn’t sound like temptation. It sounds like devotion. And that speaks well of your heart.”

“But it’s still wrong,” Changbin said quietly. “Isn’t it?”

Jeongin’s throat tightened. He wanted, desperately, to speak with clarity. To draw clean lines, as he’d once believed he could. But this? This wasn’t about rules written in the margins of a catechism. This was about a man sitting in the dark, asking if his heart was something to be ashamed of.

“I believe God calls us to chastity,” Jeongin said finally. “Not because He wants to punish us. But because He wants us to love in ways that reflect His own love. Steady. Faithful. Life-giving.”

He hesitated.

“But I also believe He sees your heart. He sees the goodness in it. The care. The loyalty. The longing. And He does not cast you out for it.”

Another silence followed. But softer now.

Changbin breathed out, quiet and long.

“I just… Needed to tell someone.”

Jeongin nodded, even though it couldn’t be seen. “I’m honoured you chose to tell me.”

There was a long breath on the other side of the screen. Then Changbin spoke again, voice quieter than before.

“I feel like I come alive around him.”

Jeongin stayed still.

“I know that sounds dramatic,” Changbin added with a soft, almost embarrassed laugh. “But it’s true. When I’m with him, I feel lighter. Brighter. Like the world makes more sense, just because he’s in it.”

The words were unguarded. Vulnerable in the way only pure love can be.

“I find myself looking for excuses to talk to him,” he continued. “Little things. Questions I already know the answer to, just to hear what he’ll say. And when he does speak, God, even when he’s sarcastic, it makes me smile without trying.”

Jeongin closed his eyes.

“I’ll catch myself laughing before I realise why. Or I’ll see something in my day and think, he’d love that, like he’s just… In my thoughts constantly.”

There was a pause.

“And when he’s not there,” Changbin said, voice softening further, “everything feels a little colder. A little less in focus. Like colour got drained out of the edges.”

Something in Jeongin’s chest clenched, then unfurled in an ache he didn’t recognise at first.

Because without meaning to, without wanting to, he was thinking of Chan.

The empty parish hall. The sound of a laugh that no longer lingered near the storeroom door. The quiet disappointment that had settled in his stomach the day after the festival, when he realised the excuses to see him had run dry. That the necessity of their shared tasks had ended, and nothing had taken its place.

He thought of Chan’s smile, open, earnest, always a little crooked at the corner.

He thought of the way his jokes landed so easily, the way he spoke to Jeongin like a person first, not a role, not a title.

He thought of how easy it had been to want to be around him, even when there was no obligation to be. How natural it had felt to turn toward his voice, to catch his eye across a room and feel the air shift, just for a moment.

And more than anything, Jeongin thought-

Whoever marries him one day will be the luckiest person alive.

That thought didn’t frighten him.

But it stayed. Bouncing noisily around his skull.

Because beneath it, another followed. Why does the idea of someone else having him hurt more than it should?

“Thank you for listening,” Changbin said suddenly, the words breaking gently through the hush.

Jeongin blinked. His hands had gone still in his lap.

“Of course,” he murmured, voice a touch hoarser than he expected.

The screen creaked closed. The booth was empty once again.

But Jeongin remained seated.

Not in peace.

Not in prayer.

Just still.

And somewhere behind his ribs, his thoughts turned and twisted, curling in on themselves.

He wasn’t sure what it meant, this warmth, this ache, this restlessness. Only that it had been waiting quietly in him, unspoken, unnoticed.

Until now.

⋆༺♱༻⋆

Minho

⋆༺♱༻⋆

December arrived, the air turning sharper, the evenings dimmer, the windows of the church fogging just slightly when the congregation filled it with breath. Advent had begun, its slow, reverent march toward the Nativity, and with it came the familiar flurry of preparations. There were garlands to be hung, a school carol ceremony to organise, candles to be trimmed, bulletins to be written. And of course, the nativity scene.

Jeongin had been dreading it.

Not the work. He welcomed work. It gave him something to do with his hands, his time, his thoughts. No, it was the possibility, the hope, foolish as it was, that he would be there.

And he was.

Chan.

He showed up one afternoon with planks of wood tucked under one arm and a hammer in the other, smiling like he had never stopped being part of the place.

“Thought you could use an extra pair of hands,” he said.

Jeongin had smiled back. His voice, by some miracle, hadn’t trembled.

It felt innocent at first. Chan talked with the same effortless warmth he always had, teased Jeongin when he handed him the wrong nail, complimented the school children’s recorder playing even as he covered his ears playfully during rehearsals.

But the innocence was only on the surface.

Because something had changed.

Not in Chan, at least, not outwardly.

But in Jeongin.

He couldn’t look at him the same way anymore.

It wasn’t just friendship now. Not just company. Not just the easy comfort of someone who didn’t treat him like an ornament in a robe.

He knew now.

He knew exactly what it meant, the flutter in his stomach when Chan laughed, the aching warmth that spread through his chest when he brushed past him to grab a tool, the way his gaze dipped, against his will, to the exposed curve of Chan’s shoulder in that sleeveless shirt, the way the muscles in his arms flexed as he hammered the base of the stable diorama into place.

Once, he might have dismissed the heat in his gut. Labelled it admiration. Brotherly affection.

But no.

Not now.

Not after Seungmin’s hushed, bitter monologue about fighting feelings he couldn’t shake.

Not after Felix, with his nervous laughter, admitting that a beautiful body was a beautiful body.

Not after hearing Jisung’s voice tremble in the confessional as he described the first time another man had touched him.

Not after Hyunjin, who had spoken with calm clarity of the way surrender felt like salvation.

Not after Changbin, who spoke of love so gentle it made the world itself softer in its presence.

Jeongin had heard too much to pretend anymore.

He knew what desire was now.

He knew it when it woke him in the middle of the night, when his fingers clenched against the sheets, when his chest burned with wanting and he had to bite down on his own tongue to keep from imagining too vividly.

And the object of that desire, the source, the weight, the sin… Was Chan.

By day, Jeongin welcomed his help. Laughed at his jokes. Listened to him speak with quiet admiration about how the parish had come together again for the season. They painted backdrops, strung lights across the chancel arch, hung paper stars from old string.

Chan built the entire nativity stable by hand, sanding the wood smooth, fitting each board with the precision of a master craftsman. Jeongin watched him from the doorway sometimes, arms crossed, pretending to be focused on logistics. But his eyes betrayed him.

They wandered.

To Chan’s strong hands.

To the line of his jaw.

To the warmth in his voice when he hummed carols under his breath, unashamed.

And each night, Jeongin returned to his rooms alone.

He knelt by the bed. Clasped his hands tight. Prayed as if the force of his longing could be crushed by repetition alone.

Lord, give me strength. Give me clarity. Take this from me.

Because this wasn’t about him.

It couldn’t be.

He was a man of God. His life was not his own, it was a vessel, a calling, a vow. He had promised chastity, not just of body, but of intention. His thoughts, his gaze, his heart… They, too, were meant to serve a higher purpose.

This desire was not his to explore.

And even if it were, even if some part of him dared to imagine what it might be like to have Chan’s affection in return, what right did he have to bring another soul into that darkness?

If he truly cared for Chan, if the feelings he buried were anything close to love, then he could not, must not, ever let them rise to the surface.

Because love, real love, does not drag another into sin.

Real love protects.

Real love sacrifices.

It would be selfish, monstrous, to indulge even a second of that longing, if it risked leading Chan away from his own path. From righteousness. From peace. From salvation.

And so Jeongin swallowed his heart every night and forced his thoughts back to scripture.

He wept without tears, lying still in the dark, and whispered liturgies to a ceiling that offered no answers.

Every time Chan laughed beside him, Jeongin smiled and said nothing.

Every time his hands brushed his sleeve, Jeongin kept perfectly still.

Every time he left for the night, Jeongin watched the door long after it had closed, breathing shallowly, silently.

He would carry this. He would bury it. He would suffer it quietly, because he knew, it was not Chan’s burden to share.

And if this was the cost of his calling, then so be it.

Better his heart be broken than Chan’s soul compromised.

Better to ache in silence than to lead another man into sin.

The week before Christmas was always an exercise in endurance.

Every year, Jeongin told himself he was prepared, schedule mapped out to the hour, volunteers assigned, candles stocked, but somehow the closer the calendar crept toward the 25th, the more everything threatened to collapse under its own weight.

Still, he didn’t mind. He preferred being busy. It kept his mind quiet.

The final confession session before Christmas was usually long, but rarely surprising. The confessional booth became a revolving door for seasonal guilt. Old grudges, lost tempers, lies told for the sake of peace. Year after year, Jeongin heard the same phrase open every session.

“Bless me, Father, for I have sinned.”

It was predictable. A familiar script to follow.

So when the screen snapped open with no subtlety whatsoever, followed by the thud of someone dropping onto the wooden bench like a man falling from a rooftop, Jeongin only just managed to keep himself from flinching.

Then, in a voice far too casual,

“Hi, I’m Minho and I’m a raging atheist.”

Jeongin blinked, once.

Not quite the standard greeting.

“I see,” he said calmly, folding his hands in his lap. “You’re aware this is a confessional?”

“Yep,” came the breezy reply. “Jisungie was adamant I come. Something about saving my soul or some such. And apparently you’re a good listener.”

That gave Jeongin pause.

The name, Jisungie, stirred something faint in the back of his mind. Not because he’d ever heard Jisung speak about a Minho. He hadn’t. But because Jeongin remembered Jisung’s voice during his confession. The nervousness. The half-swallowed name he hadn’t let himself say. The name Jeongin never pressed him for.

And now it echoed here, uninvited.

Minho.

He let out a breath and refocused.

“I’m here to listen,” Jeongin said. “But this is a sacred space. Not just a sound booth for venting.”

“Noted,” Minho said, clearly unfazed. “I didn’t come to troll you, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

Jeongin offered silence.

“I don’t believe in any of it,” Minho said simply. “Not God, not the afterlife, not miracles. But I keep seeing people cling to it like it’s the only thing keeping them from shattering. And I guess-” He paused. “-I wanted to see what they’re clinging to. Why.”

His tone was flippant, but there was something else beneath it. Not mockery. Something restless.

“So you came to a priest,” Jeongin said mildly.

Minho let out a soft huff. “Don’t sound so flattered. I almost didn’t.”

“But you did.”

“Yeah, well,” Minho muttered. “Jisungie has this look when he’s being sincere. I hate that look.”

Jeongin found his lips twitching in the ghost of a smile.

“Well,” he said, “I won’t try to convert you. That’s not what this booth is for.”

“Good,” Minho said. “Because I’d be terrible at being devout. I like swearing, drinking, and occasionally thinking humanity was a mistake.”

“I’ve heard worse,” Jeongin said.

“Yeah?” Minho snorted. “Try me.”

Jeongin shook his head slightly, invisible behind the screen. “I’m not here to measure your sins. I’m here to offer space.”

There was a beat.

Then Minho said, more quietly, “What if I don’t know what to do with the space?”

“You don’t have to,” Jeongin said. “You just have to be in it.”

A silence stretched. Not uncomfortable.

Then Minho muttered, “So what now? You gonna bless me?”

Jeongin exhaled slowly, deliberately, grounding himself before answering.

“This booth isn’t for blessings on demand,” he said gently, voice steady despite the strange turn the conversation had taken. “It’s for confession of sins. For naming what weighs on the soul. I’m here to listen, and to offer guidance where it’s sought.”

There was a quiet, thoughtful hum from the other side of the screen.

“Oh,” Minho said. “Right. Confessing sins.” Another pause, then, almost idly, “So… Jisungie must’ve been in here a lot lately then.”

Jeongin’s brow furrowed.

Jisung hadn’t been back.

Not once.

Since the night he’d confessed to letting Minho touch him, since the night his voice had shaken as he spoke about pleasure and guilt and that fog of shame afterward, Jisung had not returned to the booth. He still came to Mass. Still smiled. Still sang. But confession… No.

The silence stretched just long enough.

“Ahhhh,” Minho said, soft and satisfied, someone fitting the last piece of a puzzle into place. “Naughty Jisungie.”

Jeongin straightened instinctively, pulse ticking faster. “Minho,” he said, carefully, “I’m here to listen to any sins you wish to confess.”

Another hum, lower this time, amused.

“Right. Me and my sins.” Minho shifted on the bench, wood creaking faintly. “Guess that means I should tell you about me and Jisung.”

Jeongin’s fingers curled lightly into his cassock. “If that’s what you’ve come to confess.”

“Oh, absolutely,” Minho said easily. “Though… I think you already know the opening act.”

Jeongin said nothing.

“I came onto him,” Minho continued, unapologetic. “Slow at first. Testing the waters. Letting my hand linger. Letting my mouth get close enough that he could feel my breath.” A faint laugh. “But yeah. You already knew that. He told me he came to you.”

Jeongin’s chest tightened.

“Thank you for that, by the way,” Minho added, unexpectedly sincere. “He all but shut me out after that night. Would barely look at me. Like he was scared he’d break if he did.”

Jeongin swallowed.

“But after he spoke to you,” Minho said, voice shifting, warmer now, “things… Progressed. A lot.”

“Progressed?” Jeongin echoed before he could stop himself.

“He came to me,” Minho said. “Sat on my couch. Told me about the booth. About how much lighter he felt walking out of it. Because someone had finally let him know he wasn’t ruined.”

Jeongin’s breath caught, just slightly.

“I thought that’d be it though,” Minho continued. “That the guilt would clamp back down. That he’d tell me we couldn’t do this, couldn’t even talk about it anymore.”

A pause.

“But instead,” Minho said quietly, “he kissed me.”

Jeongin’s spine went rigid.

“That was the first time we made love, actually.”

The sound Jeongin made was involuntary, sharp and high, more breath than voice. A startled squeak that scraped its way out of his throat before he could contain it.

Minho laughed outright. “Wow. Didn’t mean to get that reaction out of you, Father.”

Jeongin pressed his lips together, heat rushing to his face even though no one could see it. “You don’t need to-” he started, then stopped, unsure what boundary he was even trying to draw anymore.

“Relax,” Minho said lightly. “I won’t subject your holy ears to all the filth.”

A beat.

“But honestly,” he added, voice lowering, intimate, “you’re missing out, Father.”

Jeongin’s breath stalled completely.

“There’s something about it,” Minho went on, unhurried, clearly enjoying the way the words filled the small space. “Being deep inside the person you love. Not just fucking, making love. Feeling them open for you, trust you, let you in completely.”

Jeongin’s stomach flipped.

“It’s like… When you’re connected like that, nothing else exists. Just the heat. The way their body moves with yours without thinking. The way every breath syncs up. The way it feels like you could explode…” A soft huff of laughter. “I mean, yeah, obviously I do explode, but y’know what I mean. That moment right before? Feels like you might actually burst apart from it.”

Jeongin’s pulse thundered in his ears.

He should have stopped him. Should have interrupted, reminded Minho of propriety, of boundaries, of sin. But the words lodged uselessly in his throat, heavy and immobile.

“Especially when you’re on top,” Minho continued, voice dipping further, rich with memory. “When you can see their face. See them fall apart underneath you. When they grab at you like you’re the only solid thing left in the world.”

Jeongin sucked in a breath so sharp it hurt.

And without warning, without permission, the image bloomed fully formed in his mind.

Not Jisung.

Not Minho.

Chan.

Chan, flushed and breathless beneath him, dark hair clinging with sweat, mouth parted in a helpless gasp. Chan’s fingers digging into his biceps as if anchoring himself there. Muscles straining. Back arching. Hips lifting instinctively, chasing friction, meeting Jeongin’s thrusts with desperate, wordless need.

Jeongin’s vision swam.

Heat pooled low in his belly, undeniable and immediate. His body betrayed him with ruthless efficiency, cock hardening against the fabric of his pants, achingly tight. A soft, broken sound lodged in his chest, threatening to spill out.

He pressed the heel of his palm against himself, hard, as if he could will the sensation away through pressure alone. His teeth sank into his lower lip, jaw trembling as he fought to keep silent.

On the other side of the screen, Minho hummed questioningly.

“You still with me, Father?”

Jeongin’s breath shuddered.

“Yes,” he whispered, voice rough, barely there.

And in the cramped, sacred dark of the booth, with his hand pressed shamefully against his own arousal and another man’s voice painting sin in loving detail, Jeongin realised with a sickening clarity that he was no longer only listening.

He was imagining.

And wanting.

And that knowledge settled over him, inescapable and warm, as the last fragile boundary between his vows and his desire began to crack.

“So yeah…” Minho said, voice gentle now, trailing into a hush. “That’s my sin. At least, according to your lot.”

There was no edge to it. No venom. Just a quiet acceptance of what he’d already known walking in.

“My sweet Jisungie will never be a sin to me though,” he added, softer still. “Never.”

Silence stretched long between them. Jeongin had gone still, the image of Chan still vivid behind his eyes, the ache in his body pulsing with every heartbeat. His hand, still resting against his lap, trembled faintly, not from seeking stimulation, but from desperately trying to maintain restraint.

He swallowed once. Twice. Then, with effort, forced himself to breathe.

And finally, slowly, he spoke.

“You’re not here to seek salvation, Minho,” Jeongin said, his voice slightly hoarse. “You’ve already decided what you believe. What you need.”

Minho didn’t answer. He didn’t need to.

Jeongin exhaled through his nose. “So I cannot grant it,” he continued. “That’s not mine to give freely. It has to be asked for. Sought.”

A pause.

“But…” and here Jeongin’s voice softened, dropped low, tender, the way he might speak to someone lost in grief rather than sin, “go with peace in your heart. Know that God’s love is not so fragile that it disappears when we stumble. His door is always open. His arms never closed.”

Another beat of quiet.

“He loves all His children,” Jeongin said. “Even the ones who do not love Him back. Especially them.”

There was a shift on the other side of the screen. A moment of stillness. And then Minho chuckled lightly.

“Sure thing, Father,” he said. “Be seeing you.”

A beat.

“Well. Probably not, to be honest.”

The booth creaked. The faint sound of a hand brushing against wood. Then the door opened, soft light flooding briefly into the tiny space.

And then it shut again.

Jeongin was alone.

He didn’t move for several seconds. Couldn’t. His pulse was a drumbeat in his ears, his skin hot beneath his collar, his spine rigid against the wooden back of the booth as if any shift in position would shatter him.

Then, finally, with no one left to hear, no one to witness, the sound broke free.

A moan. The softest sound his throat could make. Barely more than a breath. Fragile and fractured.

His head tipped sideways until it touched the edge of the screen, his temple pressing against the carved wood as if it could cool him, steady him, absolve him.

But it didn’t.

His cock throbbed, still hard, still straining. His thoughts were a storm of skin and sound, of Chan, eyes half-lidded, sweat glistening at his collarbone, lips parted in a moan that might be Jeongin’s name.

He bit down on the inside of his cheek until it hurt. Pressed his palm harder, enough to punish, not soothe. Shame curled in his stomach. He should have stopped Minho. Should have interrupted. Should have looked away in his mind.

But he hadn’t.

He had listened. He had imagined. And then worst of all… He had wanted.

The booth had never felt so small. So close. So hot.

Now, hours later, the world outside was silent, but Jeongin’s mind was louder than ever.

He lay in bed, curled beneath thin covers in the dim light of his room, but sleep wouldn’t come. Not even exhaustion could silence the torment playing in endless loops behind his eyes. His body ached, throat tight, skin hypersensitive, thoughts fraying like overhandled rope. His legs shifted restlessly beneath the sheets, chasing comfort, escaping it.

Chan.

Chan, still.

No matter how hard he tried to summon scripture or song, ritual or reason, it always came back to him. The vision wouldn’t fade. It never had.

Chan, mouth parted, flushed cheeks blooming with heat.
Chan, panting beneath him, back arched, chest heaving, sweat beading at his collarbones.
Chan, holding on.
Wanting.

Jeongin groaned softly and rolled onto his side, dragging a pillow down over his head as if the pressure of it could smother the desire. It only made it worse. The ache in his groin throbbed steadily, maddeningly present now. He clenched his thighs together, tried to will it away, distract himself, deny it.

He pictured Mrs. Park’s cat.

The tax forms for the church utilities.

The chipped stone at the corner of the baptismal font that had been bothering him for years.

But every image cracked and dissolved, devoured by the heat curling low in his stomach, by the phantom weight of a body under his, Chan under him, neck bared, arms trembling where they clutched at his back, whispering Jeongin’s name like a confession of its own.

“Fuck…” Jeongin hissed under his breath, dragging a hand over his face, jaw tight, thighs twitching with the effort not to move. His cock throbbed, hot and heavy against the fabric of his pyjama pants.

He shouldn’t.
He shouldn’t.

And yet…

His eyes flicked toward the nightstand.

The lamp was off. The room bathed in shadow.

But that bottle was there.

Lotion. Simple. Innocent. Nothing sinful about moisturising cracked knuckles in winter.

But now it felt like a loaded gun.

His breath hitched. He didn’t let himself think.

He couldn’t let himself think.

His body moved before his mind gave permission, reaching out fast, almost angry with himself. The bottle toppled as he fumbled, knocking it sideways against the base of the lamp before catching it with both hands.

His fingers were shaking.

He swallowed hard, unscrewed the lid with trembling hands, and squeezed a slick stream into his palm.

The scent was familiar. Comforting. Ordinary.

Nothing about this was ordinary.

He shoved the blanket down to his thighs and pushed past the waistband of his pyjama pants, the fabric catching rough against swollen flesh. The first touch of lotion-slicked skin to shaft made him jolt like he’d been shocked.

“Ah!” the sound tore free, strangled and hoarse.

He didn’t slow down.

His hand curled around his cock, too hard already, the ache too sharp to treat gently. He stroked with desperate rhythm, trying to outrace thought itself, eyes fluttering shut as heat rolled up his spine and down into his belly.

Chan.

The image slammed back into focus like it had been waiting.

Chan’s hands braced on his shoulders. Chan’s voice low and breaking. Chan’s thighs spread wide, muscles flexing, his body writhing beneath Jeongin’s weight. Chan, begging.

Jeongin’s breath hitched again, hips stuttering up into his fist.

‘Please’ he imagined Chan whispering, and it was all it took.

His orgasm struck hard and fast, a violent surge through every nerve ending as his back arched against the bed, cum spilling over his hand, hot and thick.

He gasped, the noise helpless, swallowed immediately by the back of his own fist as he bit down to muffle himself. His legs shook, twitching as the waves rolled through, his vision whiting out with the force of it.

Then, nothing.

Just breath.

Ragged and shallow.

He lay frozen for several seconds, hand still wrapped around his softening length, now cooling against sticky skin.

The silence returned.

But it wasn’t kind.

His heartbeat slowed, shame rising in its place like a tide.

Jeongin inhaled once, sharp and dry. Then he moved.

He rolled out of bed and padded to the bathroom, avoiding the mirror entirely. He couldn’t look at himself right now. The light was too bright. The tiles too cold. The silence too loud.

He stepped into the shower and turned the water on hot. Scalding.

Let it run.

Let it burn.

The lotion. The cum. The sin. The guilt.

It all swirled down the drain.

He braced both hands against the tiles and bowed his head beneath the spray, chest still rising and falling in uneven breaths. The water hit his skin and rolled down his back, down his thighs, down to the feet that had carried him through the sacred ground of the church just hours earlier.

He had held a parishioner’s hand that afternoon. Had prayed over a baby. Had promised someone that God would hear their cries.

And now he stood here, wet and bare and trembling, hollowed out by the thing he had tried so hard to bury.

Desire.

He shut the water off.

Stepped out, dripping, and wrapped himself in a towel with mechanical movements. Didn’t look up. Didn’t breathe too deep.

In bed again, the sheets felt different. He turned the pillow over and laid on the other side.

The ache was gone. Physically, at least.

But the mark was still there.

Chan.

Not just the image, but the want.

The terrifying realisation that it had been him all along.

The warmth, the laughter, the way he’d looked at Jeongin like he was just a man, not a priest, not a vessel, not a symbol. Just Jeongin.

But he hadn’t dragged Chan down.

This wasn’t a shared sin.

And that mattered.

At least tonight, it was only his soul on the line.

Maybe that made it bearable.

Maybe that made it forgivable.

He didn’t know.

He only knew that, for the first time in his life, he’d fallen, and he wasn’t sure if he was strong enough for it to be the last.

⋆༺♱༻⋆

Chan

⋆༺♱༻⋆

The days after Christmas brought with them a lull so quiet it felt unnatural.

The decorations lingered, but their sparkle had dulled under the grey light of post-holiday skies. The church held the familiar smell of candle wax and faint traces of incense, but the air was still. Resting.

Jeongin filled the silence with work.

There was always something, an entry to correct in the donation ledger, votives to replace, another home visit to make. But it was quieter now, the tasks fewer, slower, easier to complete without the usual press of the season.

He should’ve been at peace.

But his prayers had taken on a frantic edge again. Less gratitude, more bargaining. Less thanksgiving, more pleading. The ache in his chest that had flared in Advent had not gone. It had deepened. A slow, persistent wound that would not close, no matter how many times he laid it at the altar.

Chan had been scarce over Christmas. Out of town for a few days. Jeongin hadn’t expected to miss him. But he had. More than he liked admitting.

So when he stepped through the side doors of the church three days after Christmas, boots wet with melted snow, shaking flakes from his sleeves, Jeongin’s heart leapt before he could stop it.

Chan smiled when he spotted him. “Hey, Jeongin.”

Jeongin forced his face into the shape of welcome. “Chan,” he said, trying not to let his voice give anything away. “Good to see you.”

Chan walked down the nave, hands stuffed into his jacket pockets. He looked relaxed. Flushed from the cold. The light behind him caught in his hair, golden and soft.

Jeongin looked away quickly.

“Listen,” Chan said, stopping at the front pew, “I wanted to ask you something.”

Jeongin folded his hands behind his back. “Of course.”

“So…” Chan hesitated, then offered a small, almost sheepish smile. “I’m having a few people over for New Year’s Eve. Nothing big. Just friends, drinks, countdown, the usual. You know.”

Jeongin didn’t know. Not really. But he nodded anyway.

“I’d really like it if you came,” Chan added. “Just for a little while. You don’t have to stay long. I figured you probably don’t get many chances to… Relax.”

The silence that followed was almost comical in its weight.

Jeongin’s first instinct was to say yes.

To say yes, immediately, too quickly, to let the word fall out before his resolve had time to catch it. Because the thought of seeing Chan in a different light, in laughter instead of work, in warmth instead of worship, lit something in him he could barely contain.

But that desire, bright and urgent, was precisely why he had to shut it down.

Because this… This was not the church.

This was not a place where he could let the cross around his neck anchor him. Where iconography surrounded him on every wall to remind him who he served. This was not a setting built of scripture and incense and ritual. This would be Chan, unfiltered. Relaxed. Celebrating. Perhaps drinking. Laughing freely, maybe even a little too close, maybe his hand would touch Jeongin’s arm the way it did sometimes, thoughtlessly, easily, beautifully-

No.

It would be too much.

He couldn’t risk it.

Not just for himself.

He forced a quiet smile, eyes lowering slightly.

“I appreciate the invitation,” he said, voice soft, careful, “but I don’t think I should.”

Chan blinked. “Oh. That’s… Alright. I figured it might not be your thing, but I thought I’d ask.”

There was a flicker in his expression. Not anger. Disappointment. Subtle. A slight shift in the shape of his mouth. A drop in the brightness of his eyes.

Jeongin felt it like a knife.

He wanted to explain. To say I want to come. More than you know. To say I want to see you like that. To know what it’s like to be beside you without the weight of faith pressing on my shoulders.

But he couldn’t.

Because this wasn’t about his own selfish desires.

He cleared his throat gently. “It’s kind of you to think of me. Truly. But… I’ve got a few end-of-year responsibilities to wrap up, and the Vigil Mass.”

Chan nodded, a little too quickly. “Of course. Makes sense.”

He stepped back a half-pace, hands slipping deeper into his pockets. “Well, offer’s open if you change your mind. No pressure.”

Jeongin nodded once. “Thank you.”

Chan gave him a small smile, tight around the edges, then turned to go.

Jeongin watched him leave, heart sinking deeper with every step, shame curling around his ribs like barbed wire. He had disappointed him.

And yet, he knew he had done what he must.

Because this, this desire, this longing, was dangerous. It was temptation in its most beautiful disguise. And if he let himself indulge it, even for one night, he didn’t trust himself not to want more.

And more.

And more.

And that road did not end in holiness. It ended in ruin. For both of them.

Chan deserved better than that. He deserved to walk in light. To be loved in ways that didn’t come wrapped in guilt.

So Jeongin turned from the empty doorway, returned to his chapel, and knelt once more at the altar.

He prayed not for forgiveness, but for strength.

And for the grace to keep Chan far from the fire he could no longer pretend he hadn’t lit.

The bells rang out overhead, clear and slow, echoing into the cold December air. Inside the chapel, candles flickered in quiet vigil, casting soft gold across dark wood and bowed heads.

Jeongin stood at the altar, hands folded, voice steady as he guided the small New Year’s Eve congregation through the final Mass of the calendar year. The warmth of ritual wrapped around him, soothing and familiar. Prayers. Hymns. Scripture. Incense curling comfortingly through the air.

And still.

Chan wasn’t there.

He had known, of course. With the New Year’s Eve party, it was likely he wouldn’t be attending the Vigil Mass.

But now, with each passing minute of silence, of Chan’s absence, that smile felt further and further away.

He didn’t let himself dwell. Not aloud. But in the space between hymns, between verses, between breaths…

Is he having fun?

Is he dancing? Laughing? Drunk?

Is someone else touching him?

Jeongin swallowed, lips moving soundlessly around the final prayer. Peace be with you.

He didn’t know what disturbed him more. The sharp edge of jealousy that crept in uninvited, or the way he clung to the idea of Chan smiling at someone else, just smiling, like it was a knife to the heart.

The Mass ended. The candles flickered lower. Midnight struck somewhere outside with a cheer that felt very far away.

And Jeongin went to bed wondering whether Chan had met someone.

The next time he saw him, it was at a Wednesday Mass.

Chan sat alone.

Jeongin had looked up during the procession and there he was, three pews from the back as always, coat slung carelessly beside him, head bowed like he was trying to fold in on himself. The usual energy he carried was muted now, thin.

After the final blessing, their eyes met.

Chan smiled.

It was small. Tired.

But warm.

Until Jeongin looked away. Just for a second. Just long enough to lower his head in prayer. When he looked back…

The smile was gone.

Jeongin told himself not to read into it.

But it kept happening.

Every Sunday, Chan was there, reliably, like always… But different.

He sat straighter, somehow too still. He responded with the congregation, but his voice was quiet. And when it came time to share the peace, his grip was strong but brief, eyes flicking away too fast.

He looked thinner. Not sick exactly, but worn. Worn through.

Jeongin began to watch him too closely.

And one Sunday, after Mass, as the church emptied and the air filled with chatter, Jeongin caught Cham in the vestibule, halfway into his jacket.

“You okay?” Jeongin asked, and tried to make it sound light. Friendly. Concerned, not desperate.

Chan blinked, caught off guard, then chuckled softly. “Yeah,” he said, brushing a hand through his hair. “Just not sleeping great lately. Y’know.”

Jeongin’s heart twisted.

He nodded. Smiled. “Alright,” he said. “Well… Take care of yourself.”

Chan nodded back. “Always.”

But even as he turned to leave, Jeongin watched the weight in his shoulders, the slight drag in his steps, and felt something cold settle in his chest.

He told himself not to follow. Not to ask again.

Not to need.

But the worry bloomed, slow and steady, in the back of his mind.

Chan was unravelling.

And Jeongin didn’t know why.

He finally found out two weeks later.

The chapel was mostly empty now, late afternoon light slanting through stained-glass windows in fractured colour. It was the last confession hour of the week, and Jeongin had already begun to shift restlessly on the bench inside the booth. There were still five minutes left, technically, but he doubted anyone else would come.

Only one parishioner had stepped in today. A kind widow who always confessed the same gentle missteps. Swearing at her kettle when it didn’t boil fast enough, a sharp tone with her daughter on the phone. Jeongin had offered reassurance, a few prayers, his quiet voice calm behind the screen.

Now all was still.

He shifted to stand.

Then…

The sound of the booth door opening on the other side stopped him dead. It was subtle, soft. Like someone wasn’t sure they belonged here.

Jeongin froze halfway to rising, then eased slowly back onto the bench.

He held his breath, listening.

The seconds stretched, and the person didn’t speak. The booth was quiet, unbearably so. Then, at last, the sliding panel began to move.

But it didn’t glide open the way it usually did, with brisk confidence. Instead it edged along in small, hesitant jerks, like the person was wrestling a solid steel vault door, not a simple wooden screen. The soft shhhhck of wood on wood came in stutters, not a single motion.

It finally stopped.

Open.

Still, they said nothing.

Jeongin leaned in slightly, his voice low, careful. “Whenever you’re ready.”

A beat.

Then, from the other side:

“Bless me, Father…” A pause. The voice wavered. “For… For I have sinned.”

The air left Jeongin’s lungs all at once.

He knew that voice.

Even hushed. Even muffled. Even broken around the edges.

Chan.

He didn’t speak. Couldn’t. His heart had slammed upward into his throat, blocking every word. His hands curled tight into his lap, fighting the urge to reach through the screen, to see.

Chan.

Here.

Confessing.

It took all Jeongin’s training, all his years of practice, to find his voice again, to make it calm and steady when he said, “Go ahead. I’m listening.”

Silence.

Jeongin waited.

On the other side, Chan shifted, the sound faint, clothes brushing wood, a breath pulled in too sharply.

“I’ve…” Chan started. Then stopped.

Another pause.

And then: “I’ve been engaging in casual… Well… Anonymous… Sex.”

Jeongin inhaled, sharp, sudden, like someone had slapped the breath from his body.

The ache behind his ribs returned in full force, instant and brutal. His fingers dug into the edge of the bench. He felt his pulse thrumming hot in his ears.

He wanted to stop him.
He wanted to say ‘You don’t have to.’
He wanted to say ‘I’m sorry I didn’t ask sooner.’
He wanted to say ‘I’ve wanted to hold you for months.’

But all he said was-
“… Go on.”
As though his heart wasn’t breaking.

Chan was quiet for a long time.

The silence was so complete Jeongin thought he might have imagined it, that his mind, fevered and aching, had conjured the whole thing. That the voice wasn’t real, the click of the door hadn’t happened, and he was still alone in the booth, still waiting.

Then Chan spoke again.

“It started on New Year’s Eve.”

Jeongin’s stomach plummeted. Shame exploded in his chest like shrapnel.

Of course.

Of course it had.

He remembered the party. The absence. The way he’d tried to banish the thought of someone else’s hands on Chan’s skin, the way he’d imagined it anyway, the way he’d tried to justify not going after him.

He wanted to curse himself. Loudly. Violently. He wanted to bite down on his fist until it bled. But he couldn’t make a sound now. Not when Chan’s voice had gone small and strained and heartbreakingly far away.

“It was… I don’t know. A friend of a friend. Someone I’d never met before. We were drinking. Laughing. I wasn’t even thinking.”

Another pause. Chan’s voice thinned.

“We ended up in bed.”

Jeongin closed his eyes. His throat ached.

“We had sex,” Chan said. “It was… Sloppy. Drunk. It meant nothing, really. And the next morning he was gone.”

Jeongin’s breath caught.

Chan’s voice cracked. “I didn’t even ask his name.”

The booth was still. Silent.

“I thought it would feel good,” Chan went on. “And… It did. At the time. It felt like I was wanted. Like someone needed me.”

A shuddered inhale.

“I know it wasn’t real. He didn’t love me. Didn’t even look me in the eye half the time. But I just… I’d forgotten what it felt like to be touched. To be wanted.”

Jeongin pressed his fingers into his thighs until his knuckles burned.

“I told myself it was a one-time thing. Just a stupid New Year’s mistake.” Chan laughed, wet and bitter. “But it wasn’t. I started chasing it. Not him. Just… That feeling.”

His breath hitched.

“That feeling of being held. Even if they didn’t mean it. Even if I didn’t mean it.”

Jeongin’s chest felt like it was being squeezed by something relentless and cruel.

“I started going out,” Chan whispered. “Any opportunity for a party, a night out at a bar, Christ, I started carrying lube and condoms everywhere I went just on the off chance that…”

Another silence.

“I’d wake up and feel disgusting. Like I’d carved a piece of myself out just to put into someone else’s hands. And still… I couldn’t stop.”

Jeongin felt the tears before he even heard them.

“I don’t want it to be like this,” Chan gasped out brokenly. “I don’t want to… I just want…”

His breath broke into ragged pieces.

“I just want someone to love, Jeongin. I want to be loved. I want to give everything to someone and for them to want the same with me.”

Jeongin’s vision blurred. He didn’t know if he was crying. Didn’t care.

“I know it’s a sin,” Chan choked. “I know. I’ve tried to pray it away. I’ve begged. I’ve begged Him. But I just feel so fucking alone.”

The word echoed. Raw. Real.

“I thought the church would be enough,” Chan continued. “It was the best thing that could have happened for me when I moved here. Everyone’s so kind. The work I do here, it matters. It finally feels like I’m doing something right.”

He sniffed, thick and unguarded.

“But even when I’m smiling, there’s this hole in my chest. And I don’t know how to fill it.”

Jeongin couldn’t speak.

He couldn’t move.

Because the truth, the unbearable, blinding, shattering truth, was that he had thought he was protecting Chan. Keeping him safe. Holy. Pure. That by staying silent, by drawing the line, by locking his heart behind his ribs and telling himself that was love, he was doing the right thing.

But he hadn’t saved Chan from anything.

Chan had found sin all on his own.

And all it had done was leave him feeling broken and alone.

Jeongin’s vow hadn’t saved a soul.

It had only condemned both of them to silence.

To loneliness.

To an ache neither of them knew how to name.

He had thought he was doing the right thing. For both of them.

But now, listening to Chan weep behind the screen, tender and destroyed, Jeongin understood the awful, liberating truth.

By holding back, he hadn’t saved Chan at all.

He had only left him to fall alone.

Chan’s voice had gone paper-thin. Shaky. A single breath away from crumpling.

“I’ve…” He faltered again, then choked on the sob that had been catching in his throat for minutes now. “I’ve prayed every night. I’ve tried, Jeongin. I’ve begged God to help me. To take it away. To fill the hole. But…”

Another trembling breath. It shuddered loose like something splintering.

“… But I don’t think He’s listening anymore.”

The words should have been blasphemy, except they weren’t. They were a dying man’s whisper. A flickering flame at the end of a match.

Jeongin could barely breathe.

“Perhaps I’m not worth saving,” Chan said, so quietly it could’ve been a thought said aloud. “But I… I had to come here. I had to come to you. Because I thought maybe if you prayed for me…”

His voice cracked wide open.

“… Maybe then I’d find the strength.”

The bottom dropped out of Jeongin’s chest.

That was it.

The wall broke.

The vows, the ritual, the teachings, everything he’d clung to, crumbled under the weight of that voice. Of that hope. Hope buried in self-loathing. Hope that still reached out, even from despair.

He could not let Chan sit in that darkness alone.

He couldn’t let him believe that God had abandoned him.

That he had.

Before he even realised what he was doing, Jeongin was on his feet, wrenching open the door of the booth.

He crossed around, faster than he’d ever allowed himself to move before.

He didn’t knock.

He opened the other door.

Chan sat on the bench with his head in his hands, shoulders hunched, whole body drawn in like he was trying to disappear.

Jeongin stepped inside and closed the door.

He dropped to a crouch, and reached out with a hand that shook.

His fingers touched under Chan’s chin. Gently. No pressure.

Chan flinched at first, then stilled.

Jeongin tipped his face upward.

Red-rimmed eyes met his. Wet lashes. Tear-streaked cheeks.

Chan looked broken.

But Jeongin saw something else too.

That same light, still flickering behind all the pain.

Their eyes locked, and the words came, not perfect, but true.

“Maybe God hasn’t answered you yet,” Jeongin said, his thumb brushing a tear from Chan’s cheek. “But that doesn’t mean no one’s listening.”

A pause. A breath.

“Maybe it doesn’t have to be God tonight,” he whispered.

“Maybe it can be me.”

Chan’s breath hitched.

“Jeongin?”

The name came out small, unsteady, like he was afraid something might break if he said it too loudly. His brows knit together, confusion cutting through the tears still clinging to his lashes. He looked between Jeongin’s face and the closed door behind him, as if he couldn’t quite reconcile what he was seeing with what he knew.

Jeongin didn’t withdraw his hand.

If anything, he grounded himself there, fingers warm beneath Chan’s jaw, anchoring them both to the same moment.

“I came to this side of the booth,” Jeongin said quietly, “because I have a confession of my own to make.”

Chan looked overwhelmed now, eyes darting, breath shallow. “You don’t have to- I mean, you shouldn’t, I’m the one who came in here, I’m the one who-”

“Chan,” Jeongin interrupted softly.

Chan stilled.

Jeongin’s voice trembled then, just slightly, but he didn’t look away. “I am so very sorry that you feel like this,” he said. “So empty. So alone.”

“And it is my fault,” Jeongin continued, the words heavy but certain. “Entirely.”

Chan opened his mouth immediately, instinctively, like he was about to protest, to take the blame back where he thought it belonged.

Jeongin lifted his other hand, palm open between them.

A silent please.

Cham frowned, confusion sharpening into something like alarm. “No, Jeongin, that’s not- you didn’t-”

“I have been struggling with my own sins,” Jeongin said, and now there was no mistaking it, this was not Father Jeongin speaking. This was just Jeongin. A man, bare and shaking and finally honest. “Ones I didn’t want you to have any part in. Or-” he swallowed, “-or rather, ones I didn’t want you to suffer the consequences of.”

His thumb shifted, almost unconsciously, brushing along Chan’s jaw.

“I told myself I was protecting you,” he went on. “From sin. From temptation. From me and my selfish desires.”

His voice broke, just a little.

“But all I did was leave you alone with your own.”

Jeongin slowly slid his hand from beneath Chan’s chin to rest against his cheek. The touch was reverent, careful, like he was holding something fragile and priceless all at once.

“Because…” Jeongin whispered, the word trembling on the edge of everything he’d been afraid to say, “… I love you, Chan.”

The world seemed to stop.

Chan’s eyes widened, shock rippling across his face in real time. His lips parted, then closed, then parted again, but no sound came out. He stared at Jeongin like he was seeing him for the first time, really seeing him, and like the sight might be too much to bear.

“You-” Chan tried, voice cracking. “You… Love me?”

Jeongin didn’t hesitate. Not this time.

“Yes,” he said.

The word was quiet.

It was steady.

It was devastating.

Chan’s breath shuddered out of him, a half-sob, half-laugh caught painfully in his throat. His hands curled into the fabric of his own shirt like he needed something to hold onto, his whole body caught between disbelief and something dangerously close to hope.

“You’re not just-?” Chan began, the question dying half-formed in the air between them.

“No,” Jeongin said, firm and gentle all at once. “Really, I should’ve been going to confession myself for months now.”

Chan blinked. “Months‽”

Jeongin nodded, shame and warmth warring in his chest.

“Yes,” he said. “But I thought… I hoped… If I could stay away, if I could hold the line… I might save you from my sin.”

Chan stared at him like he couldn’t quite believe what he was hearing. “Shouldn’t that be my decision?”

Jeongin exhaled slowly, his thumb still resting at the curve of Chan’s cheek, his fingers trembling where they cradled the edge of his jaw.

“Yes,” he said. “It should.”

A beat passed, and then more softly,

“It is.”

Chan’s eyes flicked up to meet his, wide, wet, searching, and for a breathless moment, they stayed like that.

Chan’s gaze bounced between Jeongin’s eyes, flickering back and forth, like he was trying to see if this was real. His breath caught again as his eyes dipped lower, to Jeongin’s lips, and something in his expression twisted.

A flash of pain. Longing. The kind of ache that couldn’t be put into words.

And Jeongin, feeling that same ache cresting in his chest, a tide that refused to recede, sank.

He dropped to his knees in front of him without thinking, hands cradling Chan’s face.

And Chan, sweet, hurting, burning Chan, didn’t hesitate.

He leaned forward.

And pulled Jeongin into a kiss.

It was everything.

Jeongin felt it crash through him like the breaking of a dam, desire, salvation and wonder, deep and endless and impossibly bright.

Chan’s mouth was warm and trembling against his, salt-wet from tears, lips parting in something more like surrender than permission. Jeongin’s hands moved instinctively, one sliding to the back of Chan’s neck, the other curling into the fabric over his ribs, as though touch alone might prove that this was real, that this wasn’t a dream, a fantasy, a sin.

Chan kissed him like he needed to consume him to stay alive.

Their breath tangled between them, soft gasps and whispered nothings, mouths finding each other over and over in a rhythm more sacred than any rite.

Slowly, almost hesitantly, Chan shifted.

He slid from the bench, and settled astride Jeongin’s kneeling form on the floor. Their chests were suddenly close enough that every breath felt shared.

Chan inhaled sharply.

A soft, startled sound slipped from him when his weight settled fully and he felt it, the undeniable firmness beneath Jeongin’s pants, warm and solid against him.

Chan rolled his hips against Jeongin, and they both groaned, low, guttural and desperate. The friction between them wasn’t subtle, wasn’t a tease anymore, it was a demand.

“Please,” Chan moaned, panting into Jeongin’s mouth.

Jeongin’s brain stuttered, fogged with the heat of Chan’s body, the feel of him grinding in slow rolls, his cock hot through the denim pressing into Jeongin’s lap. And somewhere under that haze, his thoughts flickered back to earlier.

“Earlier,” Jeongin rasped, words catching between kisses, wet and clumsy. “You said- do you still have-?”

“Back pocket,” Chan gasped against his lips, breath hitching.

Jeongin didn’t need more than that. He slid a hand down and into the back of Chan’s jeans, and then- yes, foil and plastic. A condom. A lube packet. His hand closed around them, pulling them free.

Chan went still, just for a second. There was a flicker of something like embarrassment in his eyes, but then he met Jeongin’s gaze and it vanished.

“Are we… Here?” he asked, voice thin, rough.

Jeongin didn’t even hesitate. “I’m not waiting anymore.”

They stood, mouths still locked, still devouring each other, hands grasping at clothes and skin. Jeongin sat back on the narrow bench, breath ragged, and motioned Chan toward him.

Chan stepped in without a word, standing between Jeongin’s spread legs, his chest rising and falling fast. Jeongin’s hands went straight to his waistband, tugging pants and underwear down in one rough movement, and Chan’s cock sprang free, flushed and hard, bobbing in front of him.

Jeongin’s mouth watered. His hand twitched toward it, but he held himself back, barely.

Chan didn’t pause, tugging at Jeongin’s belt, unzipping his pants and moving them down just enough to free him. Jeongin’s cock was already slick at the tip, twitching with every shallow breath. And then Chan straddled him, lowering himself onto Jeongin’s thighs, his hand curling around Jeongin’s length, stroking him with slow movements.

Jeongin’s head dropped back with a broken gasp. The feeling of someone else touching him, Chan touching him, was almost too much. His hips jerked into the motion without his permission, cock pulsing hot in Chan’s palm.

He was still clutching the condom and lube uselessly in one hand, absolutely no idea how to really use them. Chan noticed.

“Here,” Chan muttered, voice a growl now, and took the lube from him with one hand. The other never stopped stroking. He brought the packet to his mouth, tore it open with his teeth, spit out the corner, and finally withdrew his other hand to squeeze a thick line of gel onto his fingers.

Jeongin groaned in relief, because the touch was gone, giving him a second to breathe. It had already felt far too good.

Chan shifted slightly in his lap, still grinding down just enough to make Jeongin twitch, and reached back between his own thighs. He pressed the lube-slicked fingers against himself, biting his lip as they slid in.

Jeongin’s jaw dropped open, watching, stunned, as Chan worked himself open, slow, careful, his thighs trembling faintly. His breathing hitched, then quickened as he twisted his wrist, spreading slick inside himself, getting ready, while his other hand rested warm and steady on Jeongin’s shoulder.

He added another finger, grinding down against his hand, chasing the stretch, moaning into Jeongin’s neck.

Jeongin opened the condom with shaking fingers. Chan leaned forward to help, hand briefly steadying Jeongin’s, and they got it unrolled together.

Chan didn’t wait.

He lifted himself, one hand braced on Jeongin’s shoulder, and guided the head of Jeongin’s cock to his entrance. His breath hitched, his muscles taut.

Then he sank down, slow, controlled, head tilted back with a drawn-out moan.

“F-fuck, Jeongin-”

Jeongin clutched at his hips, fingers digging in, trying to stay still, trying not to explode from the heat and pressure and fuck, the look on Chan’s face as he took him all the way in.

“Chan,” he choked. “You, feel- you’re…. Fuck-”

Chan was panting, both hands on Jeongin’s shoulders now, thighs trembling as he adjusted. “It’s okay,” he whispered, voice shaking. “Just, need a second- so full-”

Jeongin nodded, breathing hard through his nose, eyes squeezed shut. He couldn’t think. Could barely feel anything except the impossible squeeze around his cock, the stretch, the way Chan clenched around him every time he shifted.

Then Chan rocked his hips forward, once, and Jeongin made a strangled noise in his throat.

“Don’t move- don’t move,” he gasped. “I swear, I’ll- fuck-”

Chan just grinned, wild and flushed and hungry.

“Too late,” he whispered, and rode him again.

Chan began to move in earnest, the rhythm uneven at first, desperate rather than practiced, neither of them quite knowing how to pace something they’d waited so long for. Every roll of his hips pulled a sound from Jeongin’s chest, broken, half-swallowed curses that spilled out despite himself.

“Fuck- fuck, Chan-” Jeongin gasped, biting down hard on his lower lip, tasting iron. His hands clutched at Chan’s back, fingers digging into fabric and muscle alike, afraid that if he let go for even a second, this would vanish. “I should’ve- God, I should’ve-”

He didn’t finish the thought, because Chan leaned forward suddenly, chest pressed tight to his, and the closeness knocked the air from his lungs.

Jeongin cursed aloud, the sound rough and raw. He could feel it, how close he was already, how his body had been starved of this kind of touch for so long that it didn’t know how to hold back now. Every nerve felt flayed open, alive and screaming.

“I’m sorry,” he breathed, not sure who he was apologising to, God, himself, or the man clinging to him. “I held back for so long. I thought-“

Chan shook his head sharply, forehead knocking against Jeongin’s. “No,” he panted. “Don’t, don’t do that. Look at me.”

Jeongin did. He always would.

Chan’s face was flushed, eyes blown wide and shining, lashes dark with sweat and tears both. He shifted his weight instinctively, chasing something deeper, and the change drew a sharp gasp from him, his whole body jolting.

Chan made a broken sound, something between a sob and a laugh. His forehead dropped to Jeongin’s shoulder as he clutched him tighter, movements growing frantic.

“Jeongin,” he gasped, words tumbling over each other. “‘M close, so close, please-”

The words hit Jeongin like a blow.

Suddenly, unbidden, Minho’s voice surfaced in his mind, from weeks ago.

Being deep inside the person you love. Not just fucking, making love. Feeling them open for you, trust you, let you in completely

Jeongin’s chest tightened painfully.

This wasn’t sin.

This was worship in the flesh.

He tipped his head forward, pressing his forehead to Chan’s, breath shaking. “You’re so beautiful,” he breathed, the words spilling out before he could think to stop them. “I love you. I love you so much.”

Chan cried out, no words, just a ragged, broken sound torn from somewhere deep in his chest. His whole body seized in Jeongin’s arms, muscles clenching, nails digging into Jeongin’s back as he held on, trembling violently as the climax tore through him. His cock throbbed between their sweat-slicked bellies and then he was coming, hot and thick, spilling between them in sudden, desperate spurts, painting Jeongin’s shirt, streaking his own in warm, messy release.

Chan’s voice cracked on Jeongin’s name, head pressed to the crook of his neck, lips open against his skin, breath shuddering in sharp bursts. His thighs trembled, his whole body curling tighter around Jeongin.

And Jeongin felt all of it, every tremor, every sound, the pulsing heat between them, the way Chan clung to him, and it pulled him under, dragged him over the edge without hesitation. His rhythm stuttered, hips jerking erratically as he moaned through gritted teeth, deep and guttural. His cock twitched once, twice, then burst, thick ropes of cum spilling into the condom, hot and insistent, his whole body bowing forward into Chan with a sharp, helpless groan.

His arms tightened around him, clutching him closer, as if they could melt into each other. They were soaked in sweat, in each other, sticky and flushed and gasping, bodies tangled with no beginning or end. Jeongin’s cock gave one last pathetic twitch inside him, spent and still throbbing faintly, and Chan whimpered softly at the aftershocks.

For a breathless stretch of time they were one tangled body, sweating, trembling, heartbeats slamming in time, nerves singing.

Jeongin didn’t feel like he’d climaxed.

He felt like he’d ascended.

Chan was still shaking against him, face buried in his shoulder, breaths fluttering. Jeongin could feel his heartbeat in his own chest, their bodies pressed together so tight that it was like Chan was inside him too, his soul folded into Jeongin’s ribcage.

This wasn’t just sex.

It was worship.

Jeongin’s hand trembled as he reached up, brushing back the damp strands of hair sticking to Chan’s forehead. His eyes were wide open now, glassy, stunned, full of something that couldn’t be spoken.

And Jeongin thought, If there is a god, he’s here. In you. In this.

He’d spent years kneeling in empty pews, mouthing empty prayers.

And all this time, the altar had been Chan. The sanctuary had been this.

His lips touched Chan’s temple. He held him there, still joined, still buried deep inside him, and whispered, “If loving you leads to ruin, then I’ll gladly walk barefoot into the fires of hell with your name on my tongue.”