Chapter Text
It’s late by the time Rumi comes back— late enough that she doesn’t think too much about how loud she’s allowed to be, nearly certain that Zoey and Mira have already retired to bed.
“Rumi?” Comes Zoey’s raspy voice, the one that scrapes its way out when she’s just woken up and Rumi freezes behind the wall of the entryway, pressing against it and clenching her hands and eyes like it’ll make her disappear completely.
But then—
“We can see you, you know.” Mira croaks, more gravelly than usual, and then Rumi’s eyes fly open just as her patterns dim from the violet she’d flashed across the dark penthouse.
“Fucking patterns!” The Rumis all groan in unison, before Awkward Rumi speaks.
“Okay, whatever, we have to run!”
“No, we have to face them!” Anxious Rumi counters.
“If we face them, we risk making things worse!” Awkward Rumi explains, but Anxious Rumi protests, “If we run, it certainly will!”
“The question is,” Leader Rumi cuts in, drawing both their gazes, “which would hurt them more?” And the answer is clear even before Awkward Rumi sighs in resignation.
“I thought you guys would’ve been asleep by now.” She says when she rounds the corner, stands in front of them stiff and sticky— feeling more uncomfortable in her skin than ever.
Rumi’s thankful the light of the TV isn’t enough to see their faces from here, especially when Zoey answers, “We were waiting for you.”
“Why would they just say— that!” The end of Anxious Rumi’s sentence pitches up in surprise when she suddenly keels over.
“Oh my God,” Awkward Rumi squawks beside her, “are you alright?”
“Yes, I’m fineeeee!” She responds, the sentiment of the sentence marred by the elongated groan that distorts the last word. This pulls Leader Rumi and Awkward Rumi closer in concern, but Anxious Rumi tries to brush them off.
“Just— respond!”
“But—”
“She’s right!” Snarky Rumi calls. “We can’t just stand here like an idiot!”
“I’m so wet and sticky.”
“Why would we say that!?”
“B— because I was running. Outside. So… I have to go shower.” Rumi hears Zoey’s soft laugh and the low bass of Mira’s chuckle.
“You know we don’t care.” Zoey says then makes grabby hands from the couch as Mira adds, “Have you forgotten all the times we’ve come back bloody and sweaty and would still be a pile of limbs on the couch?” Rumi can hear the eyebrow raise and the smirk she’s most certainly sporting and it almost makes her roll her eyes.
It doesn’t matter, though— she doesn’t realize she’s drifting closer towards them, lost in their pull, until she’s close enough that she can see the way they’re holding hands.
Eyes instantly shoot away from the screen before Awkward Rumi croaks, “Now we can run, right?” Leader Rumi lingers in front of Anxious Rumi, who gives a weak thumbs up to show she’s alright, before she pats her on the back, sends a nod to Awkward Rumi, and then stands up to face the screen.
“Or stay.” A voice hisses in her ear, and she whips around violently, wide eyes scanning her fellow Rumis, who all look at her with confusion.
“Leader Rumi…?” Awkward Rumi ventures and Leader Rumi stares for a moment, studying their faces.
“I’m fine.” She states, her voice cracking slightly before she turns back to the screen to hide the way she takes a deep shaky breath.
“I’m fine.”
“Right.” Rumi answers before she clears her throat and tries nonchalantly, “Well, I’m kinda tired, so I think I’ll—”
“We should finish our talk.” Mira cuts in and Rumi freezes.
“What the hell, what the hell, what the hell!”
“We— I thought we already did?” Rumi croaks and— really, she should expect it, the way their eyes find each other so easily and the words that pass unspoken between them.
“It felt… like there was more that needed to be said.” Zoey strings out slowly, gaze gentle like she knows how skittish Rumi is.
“Why?” Rumi laughs uneasily, tries to muster a placating smile before she realizes her face muscles won’t cooperate.
“We’re okay, guys, I promise.” She implores but, still, they don’t look comforted.
“This isn’t working.” Snarky Rumi sighs. “We’re not getting out of this without convincing them we’re okay.”
“How are we supposed to do that?” Anxious Rumi cries.
“I don’t know, but we have to keep trying.” Awkward Rumi reasons. “We have to give them something.”
“Or everything.” A shiver passes through Awkward Rumi as the words run through her, before she glances over her shoulder quickly, feeling more unsettled when she finds no one there.
Rumi opens her mouth and thinks hard about what she’s going to say, but then her heart spills out before she can stop it.
“I will always love you two.”
“That’s too much, that’s too much!” Snarky Rumi shouts and Anxious Rumi, who’s clutching weakly at her stomach, nods her head as best she can.
“We have to leave. Now.”
“Or we could stay.” She hears whispered in her ear and she cranes her neck to try and look around but she stops and winces when it jostles her too much.
“Keep still, dummy.” Snarky Rumi instructs, an arm wrapped around her shoulders and pressing her into the chair.
“You— you didn’t hear that?”
“Hear what?”
“That we want more.” Snarky Rumi startles back from Anxious Rumi, her eyebrows furrowed as she hears those growled words but sees the way Anxious Rumi’s lips are sealed together.
“What the fuck…”
“You heard it, too, didn’t you?” Anxious Rumi pleads and Snarky Rumi gives a jerky nod. In the solace they find with each other, their gazes seek out another and naturally shift towards Awkward Rumi, whose widened eyes and frozen stature chill them further.
“Awkward Rumi…?” Snarky Rumi croaks, but Awkward Rumi doesn’t respond.
All she does is lift a shaky finger to point at Leader Rumi.
Like a woman possessed, Rumi slowly closes the small distance separating her from them. She lowers herself to the ground like a servant, their eyes on her the entire time as she moves towards them and envelops them in an embrace. She doesn’t hold back this time, allows herself to sink into their warmth.
She imagines what it’d be like if she were to press her lips to Zoey’s neck, if she were to nuzzle further into Mira’s neck and breathe in the way she always smells like oranges.
She imagines what it’d feel like to press against them, skin to skin, so raw and vulnerable and open with them that she wouldn’t know where she would start and they would end.
That she could sink in and become one with them.
Two hands slowly brush their way up Rumi’s back before intertwining in the center, right above her heart.
“We love you, Rumi.”
Anxious Rumi drops to the ground and retches loudly and violently, hands gripping and struggling to hold her up, but the noise isn’t heard over the chaos of Snarky Rumi and Awkward Rumi clawing at Leader Rumi’s back, trying to rip the parasite that’s rooted itself there.
“Get off!” Snarky Rumi growls but the arm she has a grip on is slippery like slime and she loses her grip on it quickly.
“No! We want more!” The fiend hisses, curling tighter around Leader Rumi as it coaxes, “Right, Leader Rumi?”
“Y— yes!” Comes the response, broken and weak— not at all the strong and confident voice of their leader. Her eyes are glazed over, her shoulders drawn in in a vulnerable way as the fight slowly seeps out of her.
“No!” Awkward Rumi yells, pulls at a leg but gets kicked off and lands on Snarky Rumi, and the two of them can only watch as Leader Rumi slowly loses herself.
“HEY!” Anxious Rumi bellows through the moans of her pain, drawing everyone’s attention.
“We love them!” She lifts a weak hand and points viciously at the screen. “We love them so much that we can never never let ourselves get in the way!” She groans loudly, both arms curling around herself as she pauses to hold herself together temporarily.
“Do you hear me!?” She calls out, whipping her head back up with determined eyes.
“We can’t lose them!” The words snap Leader Rumi into action, whose eyes draw back into focus as she reaches over her shoulder and yanks the body over her before pinning it to the ground.
“We won’t let you push them away from us.” Leader Rumi growls in the face of Greedy Rumi, who snarls back and strains against her restraints.
“But we want them!” Greedy Rumi cries out, thrashing underneath Leader Rumi. She’s moving so erratically that it takes a moment for Leader Rumi to make sense of Greedy Rumi’s expression, to note the lines that are carved into her face and the tears that have started to collect in her eyes.
“We want them!” She cries out again and it’s clearer, this time, how the words are weaker, how they nearly fall apart the moment they leave her lips.
“We want them!” She finally sobs, the tears pooling and spilling out the sides of her eyes as the fight slowly leaves her.
It grants Leader Rumi a brief moment to meet her eyes.
“I know...” She confesses sadly.
“But, we can’t have them.”
Then, she squeezes Greedy Rumi— she squeezes and squeezes and squeezes against her floundering body with everything she has until it begins to slow down even more, until it starts to shrink and shrink and shrink until Greedy Rumi is no more.
Rumi rips herself away from them, unable to even conjure the pretense of naturally parting from them. They stare at her with widened eyes and parted lips and Rumi can feel the tears pressing against the backs of her eyes, can feel the itch and the heat of her patterns ready to display whatever emotions she’s feeling.
Before it can even get there, though, she’s already stumbling backwards to scurry away to her room.
Even through her door, she can hear the low murmur of Zoey and Mira talking, the fluctuations in volume and tone telling her that they’re likely arguing. She presses her eyes closed to hide from the colors her patterns are running through, to hide from the reality that she’s found herself in.
She goes through the motions of undressing herself and standing in the shower, the searing hot water scalding her skin. It’s been a while since she’s taken a shower this hot— a revisit to the times when she used to think she could burn away the evil branded into her skin.
This time, however, she stands in the fire and wonders if it can burn away her sins of wanting Zoey and Mira.
But, it doesn’t matter.
There’s a single thought that cycles through her mind as she lies down on her bed, staring up at the ceiling;
She can’t ruin them.
She can’t.
She ticks through a list in her head, another mantra that’ll keep the ones she loves as close to her as she can without crossing the line;
She’ll keep her hands to herself, keep her eyes where they’re meant to be, keep her heart locked down.
No matter what, she’ll keep her distance so that their love for each other has room to stay.
# # #
She’s nailed the smile— a delicate common ground between too big and too close to a frown that she’s perfected over the last three days. Her fingertips tingle with yearning but she’s managed to keep it pressed down. She doesn’t touch too often but allows herself to be touched, tries not to be so obvious with how she soaks it up like a sponge.
She can do this.
She has to do this.
She tries to make it easier on herself, though, keeps herself to her room as much as she can so she doesn’t tempt herself and wakes up even earlier in the mornings than she normally does so that she doesn’t accidentally run into them.
She’s been able to get away with it for three days, so she can’t be blamed for the way she startles when she hears, “Morning,” called in Mira’s low raspy voice. Her body draws stiff for a second before she course corrects and has to let out a deep breath to feign ease.
“Good morning.” She echoes, turns her head slightly to acknowledge Mira but keeps her back to her, focusing on the bowl of kimchi she’d planned on slinking away with to her room.
“That’s my job.” Mira calls back and it throws Rumi off so much she has to turn around to face her.
“What?”
“Are you hungry?” Mira asks like she doesn’t see the bowl in Rumi’s hand, her eyebrow raised like she’s challenging Rumi to lie to her face or deal with the truth, and Rumi knows she has to be honest. She doesn’t speak, though, instead gives a jerky nod as she holds the bowl tightly.
Mira strides towards her, long legs making quick work of the distance, before she looms over her. Slowly, she grasps the edge of the bowl and tugs gently, and that’s all it takes for Rumi to release it.
“Sit.” Mira calls in a low voice, and it’s not forceful but it bears the essence of a command and has Rumi obeying before she knows what she’s doing.
And then her eyes don’t leave Mira— can’t— not when Mira’s turned around and can’t see her so she’s free to gorge herself.
She stares at the way Mira’s back muscles flex through the curtain of her hair as she grabs plates and pans, how she moves so fluidly through the kitchen like it’s a dance she knows by heart.
How is Rumi meant to look at anything else?
“We’ve been staring for too long— that was three seconds over! We can’t do that again, or they’ll know the truth! We have to—”
“Hey!” Snarky Rumi cuts in, snapping aggressively in front of Anxious Rumi’s face and peering deep into her eyes. “Rein. it. in.” Anxious Rumi’s eyes vibrate wildly as they take a moment to settle on Snarky Rumi in front of her. Then, her mouth slowly closes as she swallows the last of her words before she gives a sluggish nod.
“Okay, good.” Snarky Rumi says then pats Anxious Rumi’s head. “We don’t need you turning into Paranoid Rumi.”
“Everything is okay.” Leader Rumi declares. “We’ve been keeping ourselves in check.” She pauses as a shiver runs through her and she has to take a deep breath to collect herself.
“We haven’t crossed any lines. We just need to eat and get out quickly, because it’ll be harder to keep things together if—”
Shuffling precedes Zoey’s sluggish entry and Rumi’s been better at keeping her emotions in check, so she’s proud of the way her patterns continue to flicker their idle iridescence instead of flashing bright red like she knows they would.
Zoey finishes rubbing her eyes then pauses when she sees Mira and Rumi in the kitchen at the same time. Instead of finding Mira’s eyes, like Rumi’s expecting, she finds Rumi’s instead before quickly looking away.
“Why… won’t they look at each other?”
“Morning.” She mumbles as she comes to sit a respectable distance next to Rumi and Rumi responds half-heartedly and has to press her hands into her lap to stop herself from growing towards the sun that is Zoey.
In the ambience of Mira’s cooking, Zoey tilts her phone towards Rumi with a giggle every once in a while to show her some random video on TikTok, and Rumi wonders how she’s meant to get her heart under control.
But in her yearning to be closer to Zoey, grows her sense of confusion also.
Because Zoey doesn’t go up to Mira and wrap her arms around her back or plant an obnoxiously loud kiss like she’d normally do, even before they announced they were dating. She stays seated next to Rumi, scrolling mindlessly through her phone, her gaze shooting to Mira’s back every once in a while.
“This isn’t how they’re supposed to be.”
Rumi glances back and forth between Zoey and Mira with her eyebrows furrowed, a growing sense of unease making her ready to explode.
“Are you guys… okay?” Comes tumbling out of her mouth before she can stop it.
“No, why would we say that!?”
Mira whips around, juggling three bowls of gyeran bap, her gaze bouncing between Rumi and Zoey like she doesn’t know where to land, before Zoey turns to face Rumi with a strained smile.
“Of course.” She chirps and, at Rumi’s frown, she finally makes eye contact with Mira. Then, she’s biting her bottom lip like she does when she doesn’t know if she wants to speak, and Mira’s nose twitches like it does when she’s holding too much in and won’t let anything out.
As Rumi looks at them, these two people who she loves more than herself, who love each other in a way she’s always wished for herself, something cold passes through her when she realizes—
“It’s because of us, isn’t it?” It’s phrased as a question, whispered so tentatively like there could be any other truth, but the answer is known so certainly that it makes Leader Rumi tremble.
“We did everything we could... but we still ruined it.” She clenches her hands to try and get the shaking under control, but it’s futile.
“But, we will fix it.” Snarky Rumi dictates with a hand on her shoulder and it steadies Leader Rumi. “For them.” Leader Rumi looks around at the rest of the Rumis, sees them nod, and knows what must be done.
“For them.”
“We need to talk.” Rumi croaks before she swallows, a useless attempt of returning moisture to her dry throat. Mira and Zoey’s eyes widen before they share an uneasy glance and Zoey says, “About…?” Rumi glances down at the bowl of gyeran bap in front of her, takes a deep breath, before she looks back up at them.
“I hope I didn’t… I mean, I’m not trying to insert myself into your relationship—” Mira scoffs quietly and Zoey’s eyes zip away, causing Rumi to falter for a moment.
“Um… anyway, I just wanted to make sure that I didn’t… do anything to… mess it up? Do you— do you get what I mean?” They look at each other but Mira looks away first.
“You didn’t.” She murmurs and Rumi has to channel her restless energy into stabbing her egg with her spoon as she forces herself to continue.
“Okay, because I told you guys that I’m fine with it— which I am! Of course, ha. But it feels like something’s still happening… like, between you guys… right? You forget I know you. You’re not acting the way you’re supposed to… w— with each other, I mean. So, I’m just wondering… if there’s something I can do to help? To make it easier?” It’s as they look at each other again that Rumi feels the desperation burn through her.
“Tell me.” She pleads, stretching towards them before reminding herself of her limits. “Please. Whatever it is, I’ll do it.”
Mira’s hand twitches with something, slowly drifting towards Zoey’s as her eyes take their time to settle on Zoey. This time, Zoey meets it head on and they seem to come to some understanding as they settle Rumi back in their sights.
“Don’t run.” Zoey states simply and Rumi freezes.
“Oh crap, oh crap, oh crap, oh crap!”
“Wh— what?”
“You’ve been hiding from us for the last couple of days.” Mira says as calmly as she can, but Rumi can hear the slight tremor in her voice and it makes her panic more.
“What? No, I—”
“Rumi, please don’t lie.” Zoey murmurs and Rumi doesn’t realize how tightly she’s coiled up until she sighs and her shoulders sag completely in resignation.
“We can’t... Not to them.”
She allows her gaze to linger on them before she looks down at her bowl and pushes her food around.
“I’m just… trying to give you guys space.” She quietly confesses but Zoey counters, “That doesn’t mean hide from us.”
“Yes, it does!” Rumi exclaims and her patterns flash purple for a second.
“Okay, we have got to get a grip!”
“I didn’t—” She has to take a deep breath to reorient herself, the action so clearly visible as Zoey and Mira’s eyes never leave her, that she has to pair it with her superstar smile to try and dissipate the tension coating the air.
“What I meant was… the two of you are together, and I’m…” She shrugs, can’t meet their eyes but waves a flippant hand and laughs as if she’s telling a joke.
“It just means the way we fit together has to change.”
“But...” Zoey starts and then pauses for long enough that Rumi doesn’t think she’ll finish her sentence.
“What if it doesn’t have to?”
“What?”
In the middle of Anxious Rumi’s sudden coughing fit, Leader Rumi bellows, “Everyone, STOP! Just— stop.”
“We... haven’t even done anything yet.” Awkward Rumi stutters.
“Exactly. We can’t have some people,” Leader Rumi’s eyes naturally settle on Anxious Rumi, “jumping to conclusions or getting twisted into knots.”
“Look,” She sighs, “they just want us to be normal. That’s what they’ve always wanted, so that’s what we’ll give them. Okay?” The other Rumis look at each other before looking back at Leader Rumi in agreement.
“Okay.”
“Oh.” Rumi says as she gives a strangled laugh. “I get what you mean. We go back to how things were before. Yeah, I can do that.” She nods her head too many times to the point that she almost gets a headache, before she busies herself with eating the gyeran bap, which has gone cold by now. She puts all her focus into ratioing the ingredients evenly and making sure each spoonful is measured correctly, so that she doesn’t have to look up and see whatever Zoey and Mira are doing.
The matter is settled. Rumi can adapt and go back to the way things were before, even if it burns her from the inside out.
But, they are okay. They will be okay, because everything is okay.
“No.” Mira says and it’s sharp enough that, not only does Rumi whip her head towards Mira, but Zoey does too. Her eyes are narrowed with determination, her face a mask of seriousness that would send a chill through Rumi if not for the way her lips tighten with nerves when Zoey clasps her hand and turns to her.
“Mira…” Zoey murmurs, staring deep into her eyes, and whatever she sees has her giving a small smile and a jerky nod of her head.
Mira turns back to Rumi.
“Rumi… Zoey and I…” Mira takes a deep breath, seems to grow with confidence when Zoey squeezes her hand, before she looks directly into Rumi’s eyes.
“We’re in love with you.”
The gasps the Rumis let out are only allowed to linger a couple of seconds in the air when a loud guttural noise rips its way out of Anxious Rumi’s throat, so loud and forceful it slices through the atmosphere and causes her to collapse to the ground.
“Holy shit!” Snarky Rumi exclaims before the Rumis scramble to Anxious Rumi’s side, holding onto her and trying to keep her together as turmoil ripples through her.
Suddenly, her head snaps back, wide teary eyes staring upwards as her mouth cracks open.
Then, the tips of fingers slowly start to peek out.
“Oh my God.” Awkward Rumi gasps.
Her head cranks forward again and she drops into a fetal position, clutching at her stomach as the fingers continue to stretch out from her mouth. Gargling noises accompany the growth of an arm, and the other Rumis can only watch in shock as Anxious Rumi eventually ejects the invader, then flops backwards, coughing and sputtering aggressively.
Blurry eyes take a moment to adjust before they look up and around, meeting the tear-streaked faces of her fellow Rumis.
“I’m... back?” Hopeful Rumi croaks and the Rumis look at each other before slowly nodding.
“Wh— what’s happening?”
One last cough erupts from Anxious Rumi before she crawls her way over to Hopeful Rumi and manages to stand up with the help of Snarky Rumi.
Then, Anxious Rumi looks down and curls an arm around Hopeful Rumi, her face drenched with tears but still smiling.
“You were right.” She rasps and it takes a moment for the words to hit Hopeful Rumi, but then they do. Then she looks around with a look of disbelief, meeting the assured expressions of her fellow Rumis.
“They’re in love with us?”
“They are.” Leader Rumi answers, and she steps forward just in time to catch Hopeful Rumi when she bursts into tears.
One by one, the Rumis wrap around her and hold each other, to the point where there’s no telling where one ends and one begins.
All that’s known is the warmth they feel in this moment as they hug one another.
“Rumi, you’re crying…” Zoey observes and Rumi lets out a wet laugh.
“Happy tears.” She murmurs and through the blur, she can see the way the tension in Mira’s face eases.
“Yeah?” Mira asks without asking and Rumi nods desperately.
“Yeah.” She answers. “I love you guys too. Or—” She laughs, “—I’m in love with you guys, too. I never thought… I never thought this could be real. I’ve always wanted you two. I’ve always hoped… but I just never…” It’s too much for her and a sob breaks free. She wipes at her eyes, which have become too blurry for her to see anything, but she feels Mira’s hand on one of her shoulders, feels Zoey’s clasp around her wrist just staying there, steadying her.
They wait until Rumi slowly lowers her hands from her face, their teary faces the only things she can see.
“Well, believe it.” Zoey whispers, a bright and snotty smile breaking through.
“This is real.” Mira affirms in a croak, her other hand coming up to quickly wipe at her face, before she gives a soft smile.
“We’re in love with you, Rumi.”
Hopeful Rumi sobs louder as Anxious Rumi takes a deep breath and Snarky Rumi laughs while Leader Rumi smiles as Awkward Rumi tightens her embrace around all of them.
Nothing could disrupt this moment. Nothing, except for—
“Greedy Rumi?” Leader Rumi calls out in confusion when she looks down and sees a small figure clutching at her leg. She’s half her height and her eyes peer up at her with a wildness behind them that Leader Rumi knows instantly.
However, the Rumi shakes her head and it confuses Leader Rumi even more.
This has to be Greedy Rumi; she recognizes the desperation in her, turns to look at the other Rumis and sees that they see it too. She doesn’t understand— not until the Rumi bites her lips like she’s holding back, clenches her hands like she’s not sure if she’s allowed anything; to want or to have or to—
“Needy Rumi?” Leader Rumi tries and the shy smile that grows and the nod she receives is all she needs as confirmation. She crouches down to Greedy Needy Rumi’s level and feels the other Rumis do the same.
“She’s kinda small.” Snarky Rumi notes and gets an elbow from Awkward Rumi when Needy Rumi looks down with sadness.
“It’s okay.” Awkward Rumi says with a hand on Needy Rumi’s shoulder. “You’ll grow.” Needy Rumi looks up with a small smile before Leader Rumi moves in closer to her.
“What do you need?” She asks gently, but Needy Rumi frowns and shakes her head, taking a step back as if she means to retreat.
“It’s okay.” Hopeful Rumi assures softly, waving her closer. “It’s okay. Whatever you need…”
Hopeful Rumi turns around and, through the opening that the Rumis part to create, points at the screen.
“…they’ll give it to us.” Needy Rumi looks up at the screen, her eyes wide with awe, before she turns back to the other Rumis.
They nod and smile at her, give touches of encouragement, so it isn’t long before Needy Rumi soaks it in.
She clenches the hand she’s holding, takes a deep breath, and says—
“Couch?” It cracks at the end, like it’s too fragile for the air, but she doesn’t even get a moment to tense up from the effort of it before Zoey and Mira are smiling at her and taking her by the hands to lead her to the couch.
Mira plops down first then yanks Rumi down into her side before Zoey follows next, curling into Rumi’s side like a koala.
Rumi takes a moment to feel the weight of them pressing against her. She’s allowed to have this.
And she’s allowed to have more.
Slowly, she reaches out to place a palm on Mira’s thigh. The worries fade away when she feels Mira’s smile against her head.
She lets herself wrap an arm around Zoey. The shame crumbles when she hears Zoey’s relaxing sigh.
And then, finally, Rumi feels at peace, as everything inside her narrows down to one feeling:
Love.