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Namjoon hasn’t always liked the moon. To tell the truth, before Jeongguk, he barely ever looked at it. He was always holed up in the studio, composing music until the cusp of day, squinting at the draining, artificial blue of the screen before him. That, or he was passed out before it had the chance to rise, exhausted by his inhuman schedule and the pressures of his everyday life.
He was prone to anxiety, the gnawing kind. It would eat away at him when he tried to sleep, prick and prod him until he got up and threw on his coat over his pyjamas to finish laying down that one track. And afterwards, when he was stumbling home at six am, half-blinded by the rising sun, it was Jeongguk who would still be up.
He never waited for him, Jeongguk still insists. He had his own stresses, his own duties keeping him up ‘til sunrise. Be that as it may, and Namjoon was and is generally one to let things be, Jeongguk was invariably awake when Namjoon came home from a particularly harrowing night. He would be in their room (they were still sharing in those days), with his big eyes and concerned brows, never asking why he’d been out so late (it was obvious), only if he had eaten (he very rarely had).
And so they ate together. At six in the morning almost three times a week, four in the months leading up to Wings, they would sit beside each other on the kitchen counter and chew on leftover bokkeumbap or kimchi jjigae or (Namjoon’s favourite) jjajangmyeon. Sometimes, Jeongguk would even have prepared some side dishes: cucumber and kimchi and danmuji. Namjoon loved those side dishes, and one day, mid-chew, he realised he loved Jeongguk as well. It wasn’t really a shocking revelation. On some level, Namjoon mused as he continued chewing, he must have always known.
It was a while later when he told Jeongguk. A long while, in fact. They were in the final stages of carving Answer, sanding down the rough edges, slicking on the varnish. It was a physical awakening for Namjoon. The idea of self-love, self-care, had always been there. Now he had the strength to realise it. That being said, Jeongguk still gave him the final push.
“I wish you wouldn’t stretch yourself this thin,” he murmured softly one morning on the kitchen counter at dawn. “At some point, you’re just going to snap.”
Namjoon swallowed his mouthful of noodles and radish. “You’re probably right.” His voice was heavy, thick. He cleared his throat. “But there’s so much to do, you know? Not enough hours in the day.”
Jeongguk nodded. “I know.”
The surface tension had broken and Namjoon was overflowing. “It’s just— The sun goes down and the day’s over and I still haven’t even got close to where I need to be and it’s not enough time. It’s never enough time.” His voice cracked, a whisper.
Jeongguk put down his bowl, looked him in the eye. “That’s the thing, though. The sun goes down, but the moon rises. The world’s still turning. So of course there’s time.”
Namjoon could only stare.
“There’ll always be time,” Jeongguk continued, “so don’t let your daytime worries bleed into your nights. It’s your time to be calm, to rest.” There were grey bags beneath his eyes and he was thin, cheekbones sharp enough to cut, but in Namjoon’s eyes, Jeongguk had never been more beautiful.
He kissed him. In the wan glow of dawn, with a blanket of exhaustion dulling their minds, Namjoon took Jeongguk’s breakable face into his hands and did what he’d been wanting to do since long before he’d known.
Breaking apart, Jeongguk didn’t seem surprised, only happy. He’d been waiting for weeks, he told Namjoon later.
“Can the night be our time?” Namjoon asked as he heard the first sounds of their group mates rousing themselves for the new day. “Can it be for us?”
Jeongguk smiled. “Yeah. Let’s watch the moon together.”
And they did. They still do.