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“You’re kidding.”
Chan wishes he was with Joshua looking at him like that, one eyebrow raised and one hand on his hip. He shakes his head and Joshua smiles incredulously.
“You never learned?”
“Well, Seungcheol-hyung kind of had his hands full, y’know, raising me and all.” Chan sniffs. “I bet he doesn’t know how to ride a bike either.”
Joshua sighs behind his sunglasses, taking another sip of his coffee. They’re loitering outside, Google Maps open on Joshua’s phone while they try to decide what to do. “Well, there goes my bright idea for the day.”
“Hyung knows how to ride a bike, right?”
“Well, yeah.”
“Could...” Chan frames his face with one hand. “...could you teach me?”
“Me? Teach you to ride a bike?” Joshua tugs his sunglasses down his nose a little to look into Chan’s eyes, to check if he’s serious.
He’s serious.
“I mean...I guess I could.”
“C’mon, how hard could it be?”
“Yeah, okay.” Joshua straightens up and offers Chan his elbow. “You’re right. How hard could it be?”
They eat their words approximately twenty minutes in, when Chan has already wiped out twice and is bleeding from both knees. Joshua’s close to begging him to stop, but Chan is relentless; he keeps pushing himself out of Joshua’s hold before he’s ready and losing his balance. It must be quite a sight for everyone walking by the parking lot, one grown man in fitted jeans and a button-up holding the bike seat of another grown man who shrieks every time his front wheel begins to wobble.
“Okay,” Joshua gasps after an hour, three buttons on his shirt open because it’s fucking hot out today. He’s oblivious to the way Chan keeps peeking at what’s visible of his chest, at the way his skin gets shinier the farther down it goes. He misses Chan’s tongue darting out to his lower lip when Joshua leans over.
“Okay, what?” Chan’s got his feet planted on the ground and he’s resting on his handlebars, tugging at the collar of his t-shirt to try and get some air underneath it.
“Maybe we should be done for the day?”
“One more.”
“Ahh...”
“Hyung, please. Just one more.”
Joshua sweeps his hair back from his face. “Fine. One more. And then I’m out.”
He puts his hand on the back of Chan’s seat again, his lips next to his ear. Chan gets the crazy urge to lean over just a little so they would touch, so Chan could fake the feeling of receiving those little affections from Joshua that he thinks so much about.
“Ready?” Joshua says.
“Ready,” Chan replies, and pushes off.
Something about the feeling, something about the tidal wave that Joshua’s presence sends through him, something about the way the world seems to align itself suddenly as Joshua places his hand on his seat has Chan’s front wheel running straight and true. He hears Joshua whoop behind him as he glides across the parking lot, just him, riding his bike, before the excited shouts turn to calls of brake, brake, brake!
When Chan hits the chain link fence, he’s grinning. Joshua catches up to him and hugs him from behind, laughing an unbridled laugh as Chan holds onto his arms around him.
“You did it!”
Chan is laughing too, breathless, his vision filled with asphalt and the color of Joshua’s shirt.
“Aren’t you glad I tried one more time?”
“I am. You were right, I was wrong.” Joshua lets go, fanning himself. “But does this mean we can go back inside? I’m fucking boiling.”
Chan nods, suddenly exhausted, and together they walk back to the racks to lock up Joshua’s bike. Chan follows him up to the sixth floor of his apartment building, where Joshua leads him to the bathroom and starts handing him supplies to clean up his knees.
“Yikes,” Joshua says from the edge of the bathtub. “What, do you just not feel pain?” He sucks in air through his teeth as he watches Chan wipe blood from his skin with a washcloth, keeping a straight face the whole time. The scrapes aren’t deep, but they do sting. Chan looks up from where he sits on the lid of the toilet, smirking.
“I don’t know if you noticed, but I’m pretty tough.”
Joshua smiles, propping his cheek on his hand. “Uh-huh.”
“Ow!” Chan hisses as his arm bumps into the sink. “What—?” He tries to grab at the other side of his arm to turn it around, but the cut is in an awkward place, just above his elbow.
“How’d you manage that?” Joshua laughs. “Come here.”
Chan joins him on the edge of the tub and Joshua takes the washcloth from him, placing one gentle hand on Chan’s bicep. Joshua still smells like outside, like leaves that have been sitting in the sun, and Chan tries not to let all go to his head as he breathes in.
“Is that okay?” Joshua asks, running the cloth over Chan’s elbow.
“Yeah, it’s fine.”
He’s sitting close, holding Chan in place, but Chan couldn’t think of anything he’d move for right now. There’s Joshua’s mouth close to his ear again, and again, Chan longs for him to lean in. He doesn’t notice that he’s been gazing at Joshua’s face instead of his hands until Joshua stops, looking up. He smiles.
“What?”
Chan swallows, shakes his head. Shrugs. Where have his words gone? Where are all the stupid poems that spray from the leaky faucet of his brain whenever Joshua smiles like that?
“I—” he starts, but he stops when Joshua looks at his lips. At first he’s sure he imagines it, but then Joshua does it again. He lowers the washcloth.
“Chan.”
Joshua meets his eyes again, and then Chan holds his breath, takes his life in his hands, and leans in.
A hand immediately comes up to the side of Chan’s face, and after a moment of suspension, he feels Joshua exhale against his cheek. It’s a relief exhale. An exhale that says, thank God I was right , and this feels so nice , and finally, finally, finally. Chan twists so his knee knocks into Joshua’s and Joshua lets out a little gasp, taking the air right out of Chan’s mouth, and of course Chan has to go back for more. He kisses Joshua until they’re as breathless as they were climbing the stairs, as hot as they were under the midday sun.
“Wow,” Chan says after a while, close to Joshua’s lips.
“Wow,” Joshua echoes. “I gotta say, I...I was not expecting that.”
“Me neither.”
They giggle quietly, shifting back and forth on the edge of the bathtub.
“What now?” Joshua asks him, holding his chin between his thumb and forefinger.
Chan closes his eyes against the sensation, as Joshua’s thumb presses into his lower lip. He takes in the scent of leaves in the sun, the scent of asphalt that clings to his own t-shirt from his encounters with the ground. His elbow stings but Joshua is right there, ready to take his mind off it.
“Kiss me more,” he breathes, and Joshua does.