Work Text:
It was a modern testament to Taeyong's own stupidity that he'd expected the night to go down without a struggle. See, he didn't exactly expect a simple horror movie night to be so taxing as it was, both mentally and maybe physically, depending on if all his work paid off and he was too exhausted to drive by the end of it, and he'd crash his little, second hand Audi on the way out of the cinema's car park.
It was crowded when he pulled into it, driving slowly so the current song- some Taylor Swift one he couldn't name- would finish before he parked. The employee spaces were all taken up even though he was as sure as day that less than four people were working on Halloween. This was of course a sign of bad things to come, that he gracefully dodged. After waiting for some lady to read through her texts and drive away, he parked and let the car run until the song ended, going grey with the intensity of not singing along. There were too many people around with children carrying half eaten bags of magic stars. Being seen would have to be the most embarrassing mark on anyone's name, in the history of marked names.
The song phased out with a last vocal run, where Taylor didn't stray from yelling her lungs out. Taeyong stopped the car, and the heating system shut off with a mildly worrying bang, yes that did happen a lot for some reason. He should really go for that service check his brother had been pushing on him. As a matter of fact, the exhaust pipe had also been giving him some trouble- sputtering away like a newborn baby puking up white liquid.
He sat there for quite some time without actually moving. If someone walked by and payed any attention to other people besides themselves, they'd assume he'd caught a case of car heating based air pollution, toxic lung like those people who ran the gas with their windows rolled up, all to kill themselves. In reality, he wasn't bothered to go talk to Dongyoung.
Not that there was anything wrong with Dongyoung. Actually, it was exactly that- he could be so tiring that even rolling your eyes wouldn't be worth the effort, and it was already a redundant action when around him.
Taeyong rubbed his eyelids and felt how his pupils flitted from underneath them, then stepped out of a car, the cold hitting him all over exposed arms- he fucking hated the uniform, too. Like, it'd be fine if the radiators were actually utilised in the lobby. On particularly harsh nights, the employees tended to cosy up against the popcorn machine just to catch some of the heat that emanated through the glass. The place had all the means to not be a freezer, but unfortunately there were eleven screens with actual customers seated in them that got the heat first. The employees were never esteemed very highly by the assistant manager, who was imagined without a body or signifying features, more like eyes for the rarely seen, top of the chain manager, eyes who caught all the mishaps about the place and whined about it in spades.
She was standing by a cardboard cut out of some blocky pixar character, chewing at her lip. When Taeyong entered, she gained on him like a rottweiler after a small child. It seemed like her legs were turbo boosted in how she could walk sometimes. You'd blink and miss her.
"Taeyong," she said, flattening the lapels of her blazer with her bitten up hands.
He suppressed a groan and dropped his hands, which had previously been rubbing against his upper arms like crazy in an attempt to melt the ice in his veins. "Yes?"
"Sorry to ask this of you," she sniffed at her own layer of stifled politeness. "But, a lot of your coworkers called in sick, and so we need you and Dongyoung to work extra hard tonight. That's why you'll both be at the ticket desk, and I'll be at the snack bar."
Oh fuck no. Everyone who had ever worked in a movie theater before knew that the snack bar was the easiest job in the building- not to mention that popcorn machine. You could be deaf and still satisfy the customers. They'd settle for anything, really, no matter how unfairly priced. "O-okay," said Taeyong, avoiding eye contact.
"Great," she said. "Again. Thanks."
He moved over to the ticket desk as fast as he could, where Dongyoung stood already, his occasional fidgeting the only indication that he wasn't a promo wax figure who'd been sculpted all unremarkable and skinny. That was him. He didn't even really pay Taeyong any mind, even though they were both arguably the ones who worked together the most out of the whole coworkers group chat thing, which was sufficiently awkward for the first while until everyone realised that you didn't actually have to talk to your coworkers at all. Unless it was 'hey Taeyong, can't you cover my shift for me on Halloween? My pet snake just died' and other surreal excuses like that. As if he couldn't tell when the bus's tires were rolling over him, handprints on his back.
He sighed- no one was there yet, seeing as the horror night actually didn't start for another half hour. Everyone was saving their money up until then. For a while then, he felt like he was just standing at the train platform alone. And then Dongyoung was talking to him. No, really.
"You forgot your name tag," he said, voice raspy with a flu.
Taeyong looked down at his shirt. "Oh," he said. "Well, it's not that important anyway."
Dongyoung scoffed and fiddled with the workers' code of conduct book, which had been left in that part of the desk that customers couldn't see, courtesy of the assistant manager. It was more like a pamphlet than anything else. All the rules were common sense- don't swear at customers, don't go on your phone, don't make sexual advances during working hours. "Of course it's important. How am I meant to remember your name?" he said, even they both knew that he wouldn't forget Taeyong's name, so it was pointless. "And now the teenage girls are actually gonna start asking for your name and number instead of trying to find you on Facebook."
Taeyong resisted the urge to break down in tears- he'd only just gotten here, and already Dongyoung was going on uselessly. "That doesn't happen," he said.
"Just because they don't friend you doesn't mean they aren't looking," Dongyoung replied, like it was so obvious. To be honest though, it got Taeyong thinking about all those people that Facebook told him he "might know" even though they didn't have mutual friends or anything. And yeah, they were all girls, but that was irrelevant, as far as he was concerned. All this proved was that Dongyoung probably had a huge stick up his ass- one that had been there for all the time Taeyong had known him- and it didn't seem like it'd get shitted out soon.
"How do you know what teenage girls like?" Taeyong asked, narrowing his eyes just a bit.
Dongyoung shrugged, and they were standing close enough that Taeyong felt it against his shoulder. "My sister likes idols," he said. "And she's sixteen."
"What are you implying?"
"Nothing, absolutely nothing," said Dongyoung, running his finger along the spine of the conduct book. Taeyong would be scared of it, scared of getting paper cuts or anything like that. It, along with the cold, made him shiver. "I'm just saying."
Taeyong wanted to bat his hand off the book. "Saying nothing?"
"Yeah," said Dongyoung, and then there was silence. Across the lobby, you could hear the assistant manager opening and closing the cash register out of boredom. A screening ended and some people filed out, mostly parents with their kids seeing dubbed reruns of Hotel Transylvania 2, and their voices combined into this high pitched, noisey humming.
Some of them said thank you as they walked past the desk. Not many of them, though.
Taeyong sighed and slouched forward, propping his elbows up on the smooth surface. He leaned on them until they felt raw, and were probably gushing with blood. Dongyoung sniffed. He really did have a flu, yep, definitely.
And when Taeyong had walked in, he had looked so tired, eye bags sunken in. It was pitiful in a way- he seemed so inherently out of place. He never fitted anywhere, really. Dongyoung was weird like that. You always felt warmer around him, but it wasn't good or bad or anything at all.
After a while of lounging around at the desk some more, Dongyoung spoke up again. "What do you major in?" he asked, and it was kind of flattering that he assumed Taeyong was majoring in anything at all. He was, but still. Weird how he asked though. Like he was genuinely... interested? In Taeyong's life? What.
"Fashion merchandising," said Taeyong. He'd only been at it a year, for whatever reason. It wasn't a huge passion of his but it was good enough to study, he supposed- most of it was just about labelling and how you worded things. His notebook was full of drawings of tiny little heels and the spare buttons of those little plastic bags that come with new jackets, and sometimes even underwear models. It depended on what day of the week it was- tuesdays were his friskiest. That was when the boringness of life clawed its way into his dick, figuratively of course. Clawing would be more painful than arousing after all.
"Ah," said Dongyoung, and when Taeyong looked, he was smiling. Close lipped, so you'd almost forget about his rabbit teeth that hung from his gums. "Like Elle Woods," and, there they were.
"Who?"
"Legally Blonde?"
Taeyong looked at him, completely blank.
"You work in a cinema and you've never seen Legally Blonde," Dongyoung said; a statement and not a question. As if Taeyong worked there for any other reason than the fact that his hot landlord wouldn't accept sex as Taeyong’s overdue rent.
"Is that Korean?" he asked, and Dongyoung cringed so his shoulders rose up against his face.
"No. It's American."
"Oh," said Taeyong, "I'm not really a fan of subtitles."
"That explains the major," said Dongyoung, quietly enough that he could maybe get away with it, if he wasn't standing so close. Their elbows were brushing against each other, very unfortunately, seeing as there was no reason to move them, so they stayed where they were.
Taeyong narrowed his eyes. "What do you do, anyway?"
"I write stories about myself," Dongyoung replied simply.
"Why on earth would you ever admit to that?"
Dongyoung shrugged and brushed the sole of his shoe against the linoleum floor- it squeaked loudly. "Just do. My professor likes them. He says he likes how unreliable the narrator is, and how he quite obviously tends to try and convince people he's right, even when he's in the wrong," he said, like he was reading off a packet. It must've been common feedback for him.
Taeyong nodded, until he stopped and turned and they were looking at each other again. "Wait, didn't you say you write about yourself?"
"Yeah, so?" Dongyoung fiddled with the cuffs of his non-uniform sleeves. How could he complain about Taeyong's lack of name tag when he didn't even bother with the ugly cinema polo shirt? "They're still good stories, so what's the big deal if they're about me? What's the problem with that?"
Taeyong shrugged, but inside he was laughing, if only the smallest bit. There was an airy sound as the automatic doors slid open at front, and a college student stepped into the cold. This college student had all black and round lensed glasses- most likely here for the horror night. She bit her lip white as she walked up to the snack bar to buy whatever.
"She's here on her own," Dongyoung said quietly, preserving some common decency.
"I can see that," said Taeyong.
"I just think it's sad. I wouldn't go see a movie by myself."
Taeyong shrugged because the girl was walking over then, carrying a big box of popcorn that she had already began eating out of. A kernel hit the ground and scattered like it was being pulled away by a hoover. Looking at the floor, then at the girl's shoes- strappy platformers with untied laces- then at her face, Taeyong spoke. "Ticket, please," he said. The girl's eyes widened for some reason, and she was looking down, but not down at the floor or the desk, just down at Dongyoung's name tag, and then her eyes were flitting over to Taeyong again as she handed him the ticket, focusing, unfocusing.
Taeyong ripped it at the top so the printed digits split in half. "Thanks."
She took the ticket back and looked at it for a second too long, and when she opened her mouth he expected more than the quiet "thank you" that followed.
They heard her shoes thumping against the ground, until she stepped through one of the screen's doors.
"She wanted your number," said Dongyoung.
"Shut up," said Taeyong. His face was pink, though, and he could feel Dongyoung notice this.
"You should've given it to her," he said, shuffling over slightly. It was very noticeable. "She was kinda cute."
Taeyong raised his eyebrows. "Sounds like you're the one who wants her number."
Dongyoung frowned, but he said "maybe," and his voice sounded entirely too thin, like he was losing it. Maybe he was- his flu already had him sounding quite nasally. Made his nose red, too. And his cheeks, and his eyes. Not his hair, though. He'd since dyed it back to black. Taeyong thought it looked better natural, anyway. "Whatever, it's not like she cared about me ."
Well, that was definitely jealousy. It was the way his voice slumped on the 'me', the way his shoulders slumped, the way he couldn't even act mad out of some vague form of admiration. Taeyong scoffed, "don't worry about it," he said, "it's all in your head."
"Nah."
A crowd of students arrived, carrying umbrellas. It didn't even look like it was raining outside, though you could barely see anything through the dirty slabs of glass the assistant manager called the 'windows'. It was dark already. It felt like Taeyong had just arrived, even though his legs were detaching from his torso by the minute, kneecaps pulsing. He shook his head and it rattled off his neck. Dongyoung examined this movement, but he didn't say anything at all.
The gaggle of students moved up to the snack bar and ordered out the whole row of candy floss, which was stale and old since no one ordered candy floss. It was entirely too expensive, as far as Taeyong was concerned. Seriously, its weight in silver would probably work out cheaper. But, he supposed, you couldn't eat silver, since you'd end up with blue skin like a smurf.
"Here we go," Dongyoung muttered as they started lining up(almost like zombies) to get their tickets checked.
The first few times Taeyong said "tickets please" sounded normal enough, but the further it was repeated the further it felt like his own voice was being played back to him on some broken record player, with a scratched up vinyl turning over its creases.
The crowd finally passes with little to no hitch, besides the one girl with the sailor venus shirt who'd dropped her candy floss, and it had rolled away like a tumbleweed and she almost cried because it was fucking expensive. Taeyong looked up at the ceiling during the majority of this incident, there were inactive vents lined up all over the surface of it, with wiry offwhite grates and a terrifying sort of darkness, straight through. He felt himself get nudged.
"She's gone," said Dongyoung.
Oh. Taeyong looked back down, and then looked at Dongyoung, who had been smiling slightly and was now straight faced. He snivelled.
"That sucks," said Taeyong.
"What does?"
"How you're sick," Taeyong scratched at the inner skin of his elbow, growing a bit embarrassed. He felt scrutinised for some reason. Possibly, because he was being scrutinised- outlandish.
Dongyoung snivelled again. This time it was particularly necessary. It wouldn't be too alarming if his skull burst right that second, by how stuffed it sounded. "It really does," he said with a throaty sigh. "Now all I wear are coats. How annoying is that?"
"Pretty annoying. Coats aren't in, either," Taeyong told him, hoping it'd be helpful information for some reason. Even though it was winter, coats actually weren't in, stupidly enough. The current trend was thin layered windbreakers, like those ugly old shell suits that you could see old hipsters wear at tourist attractions on Google Maps.
"Oh sorry, Mister Fashion Major."
"Fashion merchandising major."
Dongyoung smiled with his mouth closed again, snivelled a great and deep one, and then let his mouth actually open again, but he covered it with his hand. It made Taeyong a little sad, to be honest. "Fashion merchandising, whatever. Either way you're above me."
Taeyong snorted. "Seriously, I don't know why I'm even talking to you right now."
Another set of students arrived. It was always students, with their stupid badges and adoration of what they deemed ' avant-garde '. Lucky for them, the assistant manager had picked out some flicks that would replicate the feeling of having your life flash before your eyes, preceding your untimely death. Such classics as Perfect Blue(which had some gore but wasn't really a horror, in Taeyong's movie critic, anti-subtitle opinion), After Last Season, and the Treehouse of Horror boxset. Taeyong was all too prepared to be asked for refunds after- he'd tell these customers to ask the assistant manager while hightailing it back out to his car, and his much loved copy of 1989, and maybe Pure Heroine too, depending on his mood.
He dealt with the line, and then another line appeared- these waves of students gaining on him like in that stupid Call of Duty game Yuta played religiously. When his voice grew hoarse, Dongyoung literally began cutting him off to take care of the lines, just because- even though his voice was sounding raspier with each sighting of Scream masks that they saw. The thing about the masks was that people were too embarrassed to actually wear them, and so they just had the elastic bands looped around their fingers so the masks would hang off and face the floor, low down. What was even the point, Taeyong thought.
After a while of this, the assistant manager came over when the place was empty yet again. "That should be it, now," she said, looking like a corpse. She'd pawed some foundation off her face out of pure stress, and it stained her fingertips, which she had scratching at her neck like she was trying to make a mosquito bite bleed. "You two can take your break now, but since the place is pretty empty you can have until after the horror thing, and then I'll need you to stand at the ticket desk in case there's any problems. Okay?"
Taeyong looked at her with mild admiration that buzzed lowly- however could she speak with so many commas without tripping over her words, or stuttering even? "Yeah, sure," he said.
She strutted away to somewhere indiscernible, like one of those straight-to-DVD guardian angels.
"It's only seven," said Dongyoung, dicking around with some functions on his stupid army watch. It kept making these high pitched beeping noises, and he wasn’t even embarrassed about it. Oh- the movies ended at ten.
Taeyong slumped somehow, even though he was standing up. With his full body too- not just his shoulders. Deflating into the ground. "For fucks sake," he said. Maybe he'd get away with sitting in his car with the heater on, belting out the lyrics to Welcome to New York through muscle memory alone. No, definitely not. He'd honestly get fired at this rate- and as mentioned before, his landlord wouldn't accept sex as payment.
"Well," he said, scoping out the place. "I'm heading to the popcorn machine."
"Right, same," Dongyoung mumbled, still distracted with trying to switch the alarms off his watch.
The popcorn machine was a godsend in disguise, with its yellow light and salty smell and greased up buttons. Taeyong sighed happily as he pressed both arms against it, feeling his flesh soak up the warmth. Even his skin felt buttery after, and not just because of the smears against the glass. Well, maybe a bit. But a small bit- it was mostly a credit to how heavenly the machine felt.
Dongyoung laughed at him when he got around to looking up from his watch, and hopped up on the counter after moving some buttershot bottles out of the way. One fell onto the floor and made this alinium sound as it rolled about the floor, topsy turvy.
"I'd better get paid for these three hours," Taeyong said, muffled against the glass. He turned over to heat his back. Overhead there were the price listings, and all the soda deals had these tacky pngs of coca cola cups with ice falling into them so the coke splattered everywhere.
"Doubt it," Dongyoung sighed and slipped off the counter to use the drinks machine, even though he probably wasn't allowed.
Taeyong watched him pour a cup with no ice. "Make me one too," he whined, and Dongyoung laughed and shook his head but did it all the same.
"No ice, I assume?"
"You assume correct," it'd stick to his tongue if he tried.
Dongyoung handed him a cup, sipping at his own through a bright red straw. He paused, like a ghost had just smacked him. With wide eyes, he turned to Taeyong. "We should sneak into the theater," he whisper shouted.
Taeyong gave him a look and said around his straw, "no way."
"Come on ," said Dongyoung, and Taeyong thought he might grab his shoulders and shake them, but he didn't, "why not?"
Taeyong sighed and took another sip of his drink before responding, with all the effort in the world. "We'll get caught."
"No we won't," Dongyoung put his cup on the table and looked at his watch. "We can sneak out again before it's over, and it's only quarter past seven."
"Fine," said Taeyong, "fine. But I'm refilling this," he held up his cup, "and I'm getting popcorn, and I'm not paying."
Dongyoung shrugged like whatever, and adjusted the collar of his shirt. He should pull it down at the back- you could, very faintly, see the edge of his collarbone. He kept scraping his hugeass reeboks against the tiles, almost rhythmically.
They just walked in. There was already this movie on, of course, beamed down from the projection room. They didn't have the film roll, so it was probably from a dvd- seemed to be Silence of the Lambs, by the looks of things. When they stepped in, Dongyoung snickered and leaned in so his words were almost imprinted into Taeyong's neck, "looks like it's subtitles," he said quietly. Taeyong batted him away and wasn't sure if it was annoying or not.
He'd be out by the snack bar, otherwise. He supposed some subtitles could be fine.
Onscreen, this tired looking fifties girl(in such a way that she couldn't have existed in any other time unconsciously) was talking to Hannibal Lecter, who Taeyong only recognised because of his weird leather mask.
They walked up the stairs and some extremely focused student threw a popcorn kernel at Dongyoung, "stop disrupting the movie," she said, eyes fierce. What a hypocrite. Well, her aim was good because the kernel fell down Dongyoung's collar like it was a funnel.
"I work here," he whined back at her, while Taeyong pretended they didn't know each other.
Dongyoung skipped up the steps after him, and then they were both sitting at the very back, where everyone else was too creeped out to sit.
"Hypocrite," he muttered. True, honestly.
Taeyong had to pick through the box for popcorn that was actually popped. It took longer than it should've, and it felt like he'd been dunking his hand into one of those little buckets of beads at the Sunday market. He only went because Taeil didn't suffer from retail therapy, but money saving therapy- he liked to know he was getting a good deal on the stupid imported electronic games and old blu rays and wallets with laminated pictures of yellowing geese on them. Taeyong couldn't understand him if he tried, really. Whoever would want old grandma shoes, even if you were being paid to take them?
"So, which one of us is going to be terrified?" Dongyoung asked, leaning in close again.
"Not me," said Taeyong, even though he A) wasn't sure B) wasn't paying attention to the screen. He could hear the little horror sound effects that sounded like someone sat on a synthesizer, occasionally. The sound of spiders walking across a microphone. A ghosting of fingers. He still wasn't looking.
And, he had never seen a horror movie before, so he was nervous enough not to look up from the greasy cardboard flaps that kept his popcorn lukewarm. He expected the worst. "Why?"
"Because that's how these things go," said Dongyoung.
"What things?"
Dongyoung shrugged, a movement that carried over to Taeyong's shoulder. Taeyong thought he might continue, but he didn't- just a shrug, and sure Dongyoung did it a lot, but it was still sort of annoying.
Taeyong looked up slowly, but a couple making out only a few rows away caught his attention first, rather than the actual movie. He wasn't a voyeur, he was just curiously grossed out.
Dongyoung followed his eyes and wrinkled his nose, "that's disgusting," he said. "Out in public like that."
"So it wouldn't be disgusting if it wasn't in public?" Taeyong asked him.
"If it wasn't in public I'd probably watch it online," Dongyoung replied.
Taeyong snorted and hit him lightly, "what the fuck, Dongyoung!"
"Just kidding. That's not what I watch online."
After two hours were up, and Taeyong was a lot less scared than he'd planned on being, they dragged themselves out of the theater with half a box of popcorn kernels left on the seat. The lights were adjusted too brightly in the lobby, and Taeyong had to blink himself through the sensitivity. His eyelids were fluttering in a way that felt so weird and light. He felt a shoe nudge at his shin, and then he followed the shoe out and over to the snack bar again. The shoe belonged to Dongyoung, who wanted another coke and some conversation to pass the time.
He was actually visible, as opposed to when he became a silhouette in the dark theater, with the occasional, atmospheric blues lighting up his features from the screen. He still looked plain and rednosed, like he could be a scarecrow for Halloween if he was anywhere else(maybe at a party... did Dongyoung actually get invited anywhere?), but there was something warm about him- even though Taeyong's hands were freezing off- there was always a hint of something there.
The popcorn machine was still lit up yellow even though no one had been around, and Taeyong clung to it yet again. "What should I be for Halloween?" he asked Dongyoung, who was pouring two cups of iceless coke over by the drink taps. They sputtered the soda out and leaked a while before stopping, and he put two straws in both cups, wasting four of them since they were meant to pay for the refreshments, even though they were employees and all. The manager was a total cheap skate, for sure.
"In case you haven't noticed, Halloween's already passing, and fast," said Dongyoung, voice slightly dippy with amusement.
Taeyong took a cup from him. "Obviously I know that," he took a sip and paused to look at Dongyoung, who was right there next to him. "Just my roommate's holding this party tomorrow even though everyone'll be hungover so they won't show, and he wants us to dress up for some reason," actually, the reason was so that Yuta could dress up as a sexy policeman, but Taeyong didn't feel like saying that. It made Yuta unfairly(or maybe fairly) sound like a cringelord. "What should I be?"
Dongyoung considered him, and Taeyong squirmed a little at the feeling. "Anything," he said helpfully. Taeyong raised an eyebrow.
"Anything?"
"Yeah, you won't look scary either way," Dongyoung grinned and you could see his rabbit teeth fully, which was surprising. Then he remembered to cover them with his hand.
"Says you, hypocrite."
"I know," said Dongyoung, pausing for a sip of his drink. A solid second later, he continued. "That I'm not scary."
They both laughed. It was one of those weird moments, and Taeyong felt his throat bob weirdly against his skin. Dongyoung was still looking at him. It was weird- that's all you could say about it; the thickened air that had no reason to exist between them, the subdued way that Dongyoung was lit up from overhead, the occasional snivelling.
Taeyong didn't know why he did it, but he caused the whole thing to happen by turning so his back was facing the dirty glass of the popcorn machine yet again. That was really why it happened, he thought.
Dongyoung gave him some mind before speaking, and Taeyong felt how red he must've been. "What's up with you and that thing?"
"It's cold," Taeyong said, almost defensively. "I'm cold."
"Oh," said Dongyoung. His mouth hung open some more. His teeth weren't even that strange to justify how he masked them with his hand, yet again. It wasn't like they jutted out or anything. They just looked like a rabbit's, and it was kind of cute in a weird way, not because rabbits were cute, but because Dongyoung was cute which meant this must be cute too, seeing as it was a part of him.
"Stop that," said Taeyong.
"Stop what?"
"Stop covering your teeth," Taeyong moved forward only the slightest bit and he could feel the tips of Dongyoung's shoes press against his own; they were close. "Just... stop," he said, trying to fix the problem himself with a hand on Dongyoung's chest and another on his wrist, guiding it away from his face. And his mouth was still open in surprise, and you could still see his teeth and his ears went a bit red and he still had this cold, and he was inches away, looking very vulnerable, but not so much like a rabbit. "You look so sick," Taeyong said. Dongyoung's chest was warm against his fingers. Warmer than the glass from before.
Dongyoung laughed a bit breathlessly, Taeyong could feel it against his hand still. "Well, thanks. I sorta knew that already though," he said a bit too loudly. Taeyong moved his fingers down Dongyoung's wrist so they were holding hands, for some reason. He didn't know. "Hey- whatcha doin there?" Dongyoung wiggled his fingers and went a bit redder. At this rate, he'd explode, blood all over the walls, and it'd be infinitely scarier than any horror movie.
"Nothing," Taeyong lied, moving closer, even. He was shorter than Dongyoung, if only a little, but he still had to look up to catch his eyes. "What are you doing?"
"I-" Dongyoung made this odd strangled noise, and then he leaned in and kissed Taeyong. Hard. Ah, that made sense.
The most astounding part of the day was the revelation that Dongyoung loved playing with the hair that jutted from just above Taeyong's nape. It felt odd, and he shivered a few times but didn't pull away or anything like that, didn't even think of it.
Actually, it was Dongyoung who did so. Taeyong looked at him, and his face(and his nose though for very different reasons) were redder than before somehow. He didn't cover his lips again, and they were sorta red too.
"If I catch your cold, I swear to god," said Taeyong, lowly. He didn't really care but being a conversationalist was maybe one of his good traits. Only one of them, implying he had more, which he wasn't all that sure about- not yet, anyway.
"Why'd you do that?"
"Did what? You were the one who kissed me," Taeyong said, honestly confused. Dongyoung took a shaky breath.
"Don't reciprocate if you're just bored and have nothing else to do," he said. The frown was taking over his face kind of quickly, like fish hooks were pulling the edges of his mouth downwards, and the rest of him was following suit.
"Stop jumping to conclusions," Taeyong said. "You always expect the worst. It's not like that at all."
"Then what's it like?"
Taeyong moved his hand up until it was looped around Dongyoung's neck, thumb lying on his throat. "Get down here," he said, and Dongyoung did as he was told, as soon as he was told. Another kiss, this time Taeyong took the lead.
"There," he said, pulling away. "I did that cos I wanted to do it, and you can't tell me otherwise."
Dongyoung smiled, sort of. "I guess so."
Taeyong squeezed his hand once, then paused and said, "this means I like you, alright?" even though he'd just decided on it a few moments ago. Or maybe he'd realised it. Who knows. It was a good arrangement anyway, to keep warm and all that. He thought, it'd be an insult to Dongyoung if the popcorn machine was picked over him.
Dongyoung sighed, "I guess I can deal with that."
"Rat," said Taeyong. They both laughed, again.
"You're awfully harsh," said Dongyoung. "But it's fine. Maybe I can put up with it."
"You'd better," Taeyong sniffed. "I'm even catching a cold for you."
Dongyoung hummed just as an alarm went off on his fucking annoying, stupidass, tacky, ugly, disruptive army watch. He groaned and broke apart from Taeyong. "She'll be here now," he said, then dragged Taeyong(by the hand lol) over to the ticket desk.
He was right. First, all the students started filing out of the theater, some laughing through the fear and others looking like they'd encountered a real ghost and not just a CGI'd one. Secondly, Miss Assistant Manager rounded the place when all the students had made their way out, then came up to the ticket desk to slip Dongyoung and Taeyong their bonuses. She looked not even nearly as tired as Taeyong felt, and her foundation was reapplied in the girls' bathroom, which was rumoured to have bottles of hand soap lying across the sink.
"Thank you for the extra help today," she said, rubbing at her under-the-eye concealer with her index finger. "It meant a lot," her voice was as detached as ever. Dongyoung nodded at her. Taeyong thought he should actually speak.
"No problem," he said, "thanks for the extra money." Well, that came out wrong.
She ignored him and began strutting away in her weird way again. That was a dismission if Taeyong ever saw one. And he had, countless times, from her specifically.
With a sigh, he turned to Dongyoung, who he found was watching him.
" Thanks for the extra money ," Dongyoung said, amused.
"Leave me be!"
" Thanks for the extra- "
Taeyong elbowed him, and then moved to hold his hands, which were weirdly rough. What the fuck.
They went out to the carpark, and stood halfway between both of their cars in the darkness just by the main road, where they could be subject to murder or hit and run or anything, but still they stood. It was so cold- Taeyong kept shivering the whole time, all the way down to his odd socks.
"You should go," said Dongyoung, eyeing him. "Or you'll freeze."
"I can't just go ," Taeyong replied, "not after all of... that."
Dongyoung laughed at him, which Taeyong thought was kind of unnecessary. "Just give me your number, and we can meet up soon or something. And then go and play your dumb Taylor Swift cd."
"You heard ?" Taeyong asked, handing Dongyoung his unlocked phone. The light from it lit up Dongyoung's mildly delighted face, which also happened to be mildly delightful.
"Yes, of course," he punched in his number and gave the phone back. "You practically belt the lyrics out. It's pretty funny, you know."
Taeyong didn't see what was so funny about it. "You're right, I should just leave you out here on your own. Escape while I still can."
"Go on, then," Dongyoung said, but he leaned in for a kiss. This one was quick and fucking freezing . Taeyong still felt warmer when he pulled away, and his stomach settled nicely.
"Alright, I'm off," he said, taking his hands back. They felt weird with nothing in them, now, even though that was how they were for the whole of his life before tonight. "For real, now."
"Text me," said Dongyoung, biting his lip, maybe in thought.
"You have my number."
"Oh," said Dongyoung, "guess I'll text you then."
"Do that," Taeyong smiled and actually began walking away. The cement felt weirdly soft under his feet, and his Audi had never shined brighter.
His phone buzzed as soon as he swung his legs into the car.
'its dongyoung
add me pls'
Taeyong smiled and did so, spending too long figuring out what emoji to put at the end of Dongyoung's name. He went with the rabbit one. Maybe his teeth were kind of like a rabbit's, after all.