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"No pity eyes, Mark."
"No, I'm sorry." Mark says, diverting his gaze and looking at an interesting chip pack on the ground thrown there by Yugyeom, probably.
He still turns back to look at Jackson just to make sure he saw correctly the first time.
Jackson is still laying by the dance studio's mirror, back against his reflection, tied up in colorful rope, every inch of his being covered in glitter.
"No, Mark, stop with the pity eyes. You will not look at me like I'm a fat kid riding a bike. Don't look at me." Jackson says, voice harsh.
The pity in Mark's soft eyes turns into amusement, and at that moment, pulling out his phone to snap a photo or two seems like a marvelous idea.
He reaches for it in his back pocket, only to remember it's dead.
So instead of embarassing Jackson forever, Mark squats down with a bored look and slight curiousity in his eyes, and decides on embarassing Jackson now.
He tilts his head sideways, Jackson following the move with his eyes, unconciously tilting his head sideways as well.
"How are you going to get out?" Mark asks, sitting down and crossing his legs.
"That's a very good question, Mark." Jackson nods while sitting up. "Is it rhetorical?"
"Is it?" Mark asks surprised, wondering what gave Jackson the idea that such a question could be rhetorical. "I'm not helping you."
"Yeah. I don't want your help anyways." Jackson scoffs.
"You don't?"
"No, I don't." Jackson says, matter-of-factly. "If I got out, that would mean that I lost." He explains. "I'm not letting Kunpimook have that."
"How does you getting out mean that you lost to Kunpimook?.." Mark raises an eyebrow.
"It shows I'm too weak to stay here."
"It really doesn't... I'll help you out if you ask me nicely." Mark offers with a challenging glint in his eyes.
"See, that's exactly the kind of bullshit that I'm talking about." Jackson says, and Mark's sure Jackson would wave his hand dissmisively at him if his hands weren't tied behind his back.
"Instead of helping me," He starts again. "Sit beside me and let's watch some videos on your phone?" He offers.
"Why would I do that?" Mark makes a little 'pssh' sound, which makes Jackson srunch up his nose in answer.
"Because you love me, duh?" He says like it was clear as day.
As much as Mark wants to fight against that, he doesn't.
Most likely, he doesn't fight, because they're dating.
Officially.
No, it's probably not that. So far, Jackson has gotten no special treatment at all because of their agreement to date and the special title of Mark's first love.
And Jackson was sure, that even if the title of boyfriend didn't bring him any glory, the first love one would.
Yet it didn't. Neither one did.
Real bad business, if you asked him.
"My phone's dead." Mark shrugs, and the apparent disappointment shooting across Jackson's face makes him apologize.
"I can still sit beside you, if you want?" Mark offers.
Jackson seems to think for a couple seconds.
Instead of waiting for an answer (which would be nothing but a positive one, anyway), Mark crawls towards Jackson to sit on his lap.
He comfortably settles there, Jackson's short legs being a good cusion.
"Oh, hey." Jackson greets, looking up at him. Mark nods back to answer.
"Any reason why?.." Mark asks, reffering to the whole glitter and rope ordeal.
"No idea." Jackson shakes his head. Mark snorts in amusement. "I just know Kunpimook and Youngjae have another thing coming. Yugyeom's probably in this, too."
"Even Youngjae? Wow." Mark chuckles.
He runs a finger against Jackson's glittered cheek. On his face the glitter is gold and blue.
It looks pretty on him, if Mark's being dead honest.
But Mark is going to kill himself before anyone makes him say that out loud.
"You just thought I'm pretty, right? Sexy, too." Jackson sings with a childish smirk.
Mark rolls his eyes, and his finger, decorated with glitter, goes into Jackson's mouth before Mark could ever possibly stop himself.
He could never possibly stop himself.
It's funny to see Jackson gag with the glitter sticking to his tongue and Mark's finger in his mouth. The disgust doesn't really settle in, because that finger has been in much darker places.
It is a little unnerving, though, when Jackson decides it to be a good idea to suck and lick on Mark's lone index finger.
Mark pulls it out of Jackson's mouth as if he's been electrocuted.
He feels as though he was seconds away before Jackson would've sucked his nail right off.
"Ew, Jackson, who taught you that?" Mark says with disgust dripping down his words. He runs his wet finger on Jackson's not-so-white-anymore shirt to wipe the wetness off.
The shirt has blotches of pink and red glitter on it, sparkling there innocently, making Jackson look like a gay toy sex machine.
"That's real disgusting." He says, leaning forward and giving a peck to Jackson's wet lips. "Don't do that ever again."
Jackson nods, but the way he leans forwards to kiss Mark as soon as they part has got Mark thinking he's just been ignored.
Mark kisses back for a minute, until he feels his heartbeat steady,
(no one has ever made Mark feel the same way Jackson does.)
(except for maybe the two magic Seos: Seo Kang Joon and Seo In Guk, with their actually unreal visuals.)
and the second he feels his heart calm down: he's away from Jackson's lips and his forehead has found place for it to sit atop Jackson's shoulder.
"Mark, another one." Jackson demands, leaning his head against Mark's in a silent plea.
Mark doesn't like the neediness, so he's quick to stand up.
Quick, because he doesn't want to leave himself the time to admit to himself that he needs and wants Jackson just about the same as Jackson wants and needs him.
The Japanese have a word for that.
A word Jackson sometimes likes to use when describing Mark.
Only sometimes.
A word for which Jackson mercilessly gets called a weaboo a lot by his peers.
"Mark, no!" Jackson yelps once Mark turns towards the door.
Jackson stands up just just as Mark starts sprinting, and that's solely the reason why, when they race each other, Mark runs out of the room and Jackson gets a face full of door.
As in, Jackson runs so fast, he isn't quick enough to stop, and his body unwillingly slams against the, apparently surprisingly strong, door.
That, and the fact his hands are tied behind his back, and his whole body is coated in a layer of glitter.
He's not sure he even wants to be seen looking this way.
That thinking promps him to turn his back to the door and try his best to turn the lock on it-- and suceed.
Such a tsundere.
"Okay, alright." Jackson walks into the dorm. "Which one of ya'll was it?" He asks, though only Mark and Jinyoung are present in the room.
He looks especially bright, with the shitty lighting of their living room's single lamp hitting against his shimmery self. His hands are untied now, somehow.
Mark wants to ask on that, but doesn't. That would spark a conversation with Jackson and that's just blergh.
It makes Jinyoung look up from his phone and raise an eyebrow, but that's pretty much all the reaction he deems Jackson worthy of.
Mark is sitting beside him, uninterested.
He lightly elbows Jinyoung's arm and shows his phone to him. It's probably a pretty picture of someone.
And it must be a really pretty person, Jackson thinks, with the way Jinyoung boredly goes:
"Oh, hit like on that one. Send them to me."
Jackson feels unloved here, so with slow, pained movements, a few, lonely glitters jumping off his every step, he walks towards the bathroom and slams the door shut just to show his dissatisfaction.
The sound makes Yugyeom poke his head out of his room in question, but after finding nothing, retreat back into his personal space.
"Should we tell him there aren't any towels in there?" Mark asks.
Jinyoung doesn't answer, doesn't even shrug. He's so immersed in stalking this person on Twitter and intentely reading every single tweet made, Mark's pretty sure he didn't even hear him.
"I got it." Jackson's voice rings after Mark hears the bathroom door click open, Jackson's feet tapping against the wood flooring to their bedroom, and back to the bathroom.
Mark smirks at his phone, and Jinyoung somehow manages to notice that, giving it a curious, yet unimpressed eyebrow raise.
"Maybe I should ask Kunpimook to mess with Jackson more often." Mark says under his breath.
Jinyoung shrugs with a quiet "Maybe."
"Okay, you fuckers." Jaebum shouts, stepping into the dance studio mid practice.
Just another boring day.
"Where's the teacher?" He asks loudly over the music, when he only sees the six members practicing without himself.
"Went to pee!" Yugyeom yoddels through the whole room and he'd be lucky if the teacher didn't hear him all the way in the restroom.
"Okay, anyway." Jaebum shakes his head. "Cut the music!" He shouts with leader like authority.
Probably because he's the leader.
Maybe because he's just naturally bossy.
A few not it's echo throughout the room over the blasting music, until Youngjae graciously drags his feet towards the laptop himself and turns off the music.
"A true hero..." Jackson says in a calm voice, tired, yet everyone still hears him. Yugyeom snorts, Mark sneezes.
"I just talked to Old Man Jenkins." Jaebum starts.
"JYP." Mark translates under his breath. "I'll tell on you once and he'll buy me a whole movie franchise for it."
"What're you asking for?" Yugyeom asks.
"Star Wars and nothing less." Mark says, decided.
"He'd ruin it." Jackson says. "Share the money you get with me, anyway?"
"Sure." Mark nods at him. "We could probably buy, like, 4 dogs and a two bedroom apartment for the money we earn before the whole thing busts because of poor managment."
"Sounds like a dream." Jackson says, laying on the ground and looking at a sitting Mark, 6 feets away, nodding at him.
Jackson kind of wants him to sit closer though.
"He'd make like, little key chains of himself as Princess Leia and sell it overpriced." Jaebum adds in, crossing his arms over his chest coolly while everyone marvels at his amazing sense of humor.
"Anyway, what did daddy Jinyoung have to tell us?" Kunpimook sings, plopping down to sit on the floor, every other body except Jaebum following suit.
"If you ever choose to use that word combination ever again, I swear on your mom, I'm murdering you in your sleep and feeding you to TWICE." Jinyoung says, and his dead stare and pit stains don't look half as menacing as his words sound.
"They're probably hungry, with the way they're forced to diet and all..." Yugyeom says and everyone nods in acknowledgement.
"Okay, okay! Anyway!" Jaebum shouts and everyone turns to him again. "Old Man Jen-- JYP said we're going on Weekly Idol again!"
Some start nodding, some clap unenthusiastically, one whistles and another one excitedly goes hell yeah!
"Anything else he had to add?" Youngjae asks.
"About the show? No, he didn't. Though, I do have a personal note attached I'd like to share." Jaebum says, weirdly uncharastically.
"Do go on." Kunpimook prompts.
"How about no exessive gay shit from the two of you." Jaebum deadpans, staring Jackson down.
Only Jackson, because Mark is capable of at least acting like a reasonable adult, unlike Jackson, who even fails at doing as little as that.
"Overruled." Jackson declares. "Mark needs me." He informs the bunch.
Kunpimook wisely rubs and holds his chin, nodding, his eyes closed.
"Fuck off, honestly." Mark complains.
"Then you can all suck my--"
Mark hears Jinyoung shout.
"I'll suck my own dick, thanks."
Kunpimook's calm voice retorts.
"I'd much rather suck Mark's dick anyway."
Jackson says, with a very likely hand gesture, and Mark guesses the steps going to his and Jinyoung's shared bedroom is Jackson.
The door opens with a quiet creek, Jackson peeking into the dark room, checking to see if Mark is even awake in the first place.
"You're not sucking my dick tonight." Mark says, turning to face the door.
Jackson nods in agreement, with a tiny "That's fair, I guess..."
"Can I come lay down next to you?" He asks, quietly, as if not to startle a wild animal.
Mark automatically scoots over without much thought, so Jackson steps into the room and closes the door behind himself, cutting off the only light source.
In complete darkness, he finds Mark's bed and falls down next to him and accidentally falls on Mark's arm.
Mark, scooting just a little closer to him until they're a single breath's away from kissing, pulls out his arm from underneath Jackson's heavy body.
"What was Jinyoung mad about this time?" Mark asks when Jackon throws an arm over him.
"Nothing. I think he just wanted to vent out a little. You get it." Jackson says.
"So he's probably staying in Jaebum's room tonight, reading. Or he'll sleep on the couch." He adds and Mark nods.
"Probably." Mark agrees.
On late nights like these, when the stress doesn't let anyone's minds relax, and body - sleep, and being released early from work does the opposite than what it should, it's only natural that at one point it all starts crumbling down like a pillar of salt, even if just for a couple of minutes.
A few little minutes of weakness, where they can just unapologetically be their raw selves, unfabricated and very real, letting the mask they all put on slip off.
On nights like these, it's hard to fall asleep with anyone who isn't just yourself.
Except for Mark, who, on a late night like this, much well prefers Jackson by his side.
"Stay with me tonight." Mark asks.
Jackson doesn't need much convincing.
He never does, he thinks.
So he reaches over Mark for the blanket, cast away by the wall, and throws it over both their bodies.
It's quiet for a minute, until Jackson decides he'd like to talk again.
"I'm a very bad person. A horrible person." He says, randomly, a sudden confession.
Mark doesn't answer, but Jackson knows he's awake because he's still rubbing circles with his thumb over Jackson's chest.
"No you're not, Jackson. I still love you, Jackson." Jackson goes after a minute of silence.
"You're a horrible person, but I still love you the way you are." Mark says.
"I'm not a horrible person!" Jackson screeches quietly into Mark's hair.
"You're not a horrible person." Mark agrees, easy. "I thought we were just both naming the biggest lies we could tell each other."
"I am very offended right now, but also kind of flattered." Jackson says slowly with a very confused tone.
"Are you also slightly hard right now?" Mark asks.
"No."
"Unrelatable. I guess that's just me, then." Mark says.
"Mark, don't be like that..." Jackson whines, wondering why are they never in sync.
"For the record though, I do love you." Mark says, half an hour later.
The time should be hitting around 4AM right now.
"Me too." Jackson answers in a drawn out voice, sleepy.
"You love yourself?" Mark says in a teasing tone.
"No. I love you, too." Jackson says, still drowsy, his voice breaking cutely.
"Ah." Mark nods slightly. "Also," He starts. "That was me, who told Kunpimook and Youngjae to get you in the dance studio that one time."
Jackson sits up, making Mark roll off and away from him.
"You did what?!"