Chapter Text
“Yo. Jaehyun.”
He turns, raising his brow at Johnny holding a phone towards him. They’re at a recording studio in LA —not recording anything, not yet anyway. They were just here today to take a look at the place, familiarize themselves with the equipment. It’s late. He wonders who could be calling at this hour.
“Who is it?”
Johnny smirks, winking.
“It’s a surprise.”
“Okay…” Jaehyun squints, bringing the phone to his cheek. “-hello?”
“Hi.” Came the youthful, slightly scratchy —somehow familiar— voice on the receiver. “-sorry, uh, is this, um, NCT? Am I, am I speaking to NCT right now?”
“Yes,” Then Jaehyun chuckles, twirling the phone cord with his finger. “-well, actually, just one part.”
“One part?”
“Yeah. One eighteenth, to be exact.”
He grins when he hears that slow whistle of acknowledgement.
“Well, uh, anyways,” The voice continued, a bit apologetic. “-I know it’s really late and I probably should’ve called at an earlier hour, so uh, I’ll try to make this quick.”
“Sure.”
There’s a pause and then voice blurts out, half-whisper:
“A-Actually, do you have to go soon or anything? I could totally call at another time —I mean, if it was the other way around and someone was calling me at this hour, I’d probably be really rude and start calling them names or swearing or—
“-No, no, it’s fine, don’t worry about it.” Jaehyun laughs. “-you took the trouble to call and I’ve got time.”Though I am wondering how you got this number…
“Oh, I used to record here.” Crap. Now he was starting to voice his thoughts out loud. “-yeah, back in 2015. Still have the business card and all that, haha.”
“Oh, so you sing?”
“Yeah.” He can hear the shy smile in his voice. “-I do. So, listen —I came across a video of you guys —NCT, eh? —performing live at KCon this year. And there was a part where a few of you sang a bit of ‘Where Were You In The Morning?’ —it was really nice —‘specially the harmonization, and I was wondering if you wanna, like, do a collaboration or something?”
“A collaboration?” But it’s too late in the day (not to mention he’s barely gotten any rest since practice) and Jaehyun holds the phone closer, asking dumbly: “-wait... who are you…?”
“It’s me.” The voice laughs, and the familiarity strikes again, but slips just out of reach. “-Shawn.”
“Shawn.”
“Mendes. Shawn Mendes.” Then he laughs again. “-wow, I really felt like James Bond just now…”
“Shawn Mendes.” Then his eyes lit up and he jerks his head to Johnny —who just nods earnestly, motions for him to keep talking —it’s not a scam, it’s real, it’s him —it really is him.
Jaehyun runs a hand over his hair, absently adjusts the front of his sweater, blinks a few times.
“Wow, Shawn Mendes, wow…It’s really you?”
“Yeah.” The voice grins. “-you know, actually I was gonna try trolling you and say 'No, this is a simulation and I’m just a voice implanted by the government.’ but you seem like a really nice guy so I decided not to.”
“Oh, yeah?”
“No.” He laughs. “-actually it’s cause I suck at that stuff. You’d never believe me.”
“You don’t know that. You should try it —next time you call, hmm?” Then Jaehyun remembers. “-oh, Doyoung is a big fan of yours…!”
“Doyoung?”
“He was singing “Where Were You” with me and Taeil in that video you saw. He’s always mentioning you when we get asked about our favourite artists in interviews. He really admires you.”
“Really?”
“Yeah,” Jaehyun smiles, recalling it. “-his eyes get all sparkly when he says your name.” And it’s the only English he ever bothers squeezing in other than the standard “thank yous” and “hellos”. Not a lot of people are worth that trouble.
“Aw. That’s sweet.” Then Shawn pauses. “-hey, since you were at KCon, that means you guys are Korean artists, eh?”
“Yeah —actually we’re international —we also have Japanese, Chinese and Thai members too. I’m Korean, though,”
“Oh —but your English is so good.” Then he quickly adds: “-n-not to be unintentionally rude or anything…!”
“No offence taken. I lived in America for four years.” Almost snorting when he sees Johnny making a face —having heard this line more times than he’d ever wanted —or needed (blame it on Mark, who won’t quit sending him NCT Cracks of it on loop.)
“Oh, what area?”
“Connecticut.”
“That’s cool. Is it nice there? Sorry —I’m from Canada.”
“I think it was alright —I don’t remember it too well, I was really young, like five? Oh, hey, one of our members —Mark, is from Canada too.”
“No way. Toronto?” Came the hopeful reply.
“Vancouver.” Jaehyun pauses. “-he really misses it. The snow and all.”
“Yeah. It’s really beautiful there. I get that, for sure.” Then he adds: “-you guys should go visit, then! For a concert, or maybe a tour —they have KCon there too. Also Toronto. I bet you guys have tons of Canadian fans.”
“I hope so. It’d make Mark really happy. Both things —returning home, meeting all the fans. I guess we could discuss things with our company and go on from there.”
“Sure, yeah, sounds great. Hey, what was his name again?” Shawn grins, almost feeling a blush on his face. “-the one who really likes me?”
“Doyoung. Kim Doyoung —he’s one of our main vocalists. He’s got a really good voice.” Jaehyun picks at the dust balls on his sweater sleeve. Now if I could hit those higher notes as easily as…
“Mm, I’m sure he does.” He pauses. “-hey, actually, could you not tell him I’m coming over tomorrow morning? I want it to be a surprise.”
“Sure! That’s a great idea. Actually, you should hide somewhere and pop out when he arrives —it’ll be so funny.”
“Yeah? Have you done that before?”
“Yeah, at a show we were both hosting, but I wasn’t too successful. All he did was put his hands up and say Aigoo kamjagiya really unenthusiastically…”
“Oh, wow.” He chuckles. “-so I’m gonna have to try really hard to surprise him…”
“Or maybe not. You’re Shawn Mendes, he loves you. Who knows, maybe he’ll start crying when he sees you.” He turns, suppressing another snort when he sees Johnny practically suffocating from being unable to laugh out loud.
“Oh, my. Should I be concerned?”
“Not at all. I was just kidding. He’ll be really cool, probably.”
“Oh, good. Don’t wanna accidentally send somebody to the ER.” Shawn chuckles, relieved. “-hey, listen, it was great talking to you —don’t think I caught your name though—
“-Jaehyun. It’s Jaehyun.”
“Yeah. It was great talking to you, Jaehyun. And I look forward to meeting the rest of you guys. Especially Doyoung. I gotta go now, though. So, uh, see you tomorrow?”
“Yup. See you tomorrow. Take care.”
He hears the line go dead and hands the phone back to Johnny. They exchange glances, grinning and muffling their excited chuckles.
“Shawn Mendes is coming tomorrow.”
“I know.”
“Doyoung is gonna freak.”
“I know. ”
“Great, now I won’t be able to sleep —I’ll be up all night thinking about it…” Jaehyun stretches, yawning, gets up and stretches again. Almost hits his knee into the desk.
“You should get some sleep though. Taeyong’ll be pissed you if you screw up at dance practice tomorrow.” Johnny goes over to the door, tosses him his jacket as he slips on his own.
“Oh that I definitely know.” Jaehyun catches it, rolls his eyes, smiling. He joins him, holds the door open as Johnny picks up the Starbucks they bought for the rest of the group. “-come on. Let’s grab some food and then head back to the hotel.”