Work Text:
Do you still like the person you liked six years ago?
***
When Yanjun sees him again, it’s at the red carpet of an awards show they’ve both been invited to, and if he’s being completely honest, he’s probably not supposed to do so in the first place anyways.
The only reason he actually catches him before the ceremony actually starts is because his manager changed his makeup artist at the last second, meaning that while in one moment he was heading down the north hallway, he’s being ushered to the south just a second later.
“Try to stay quiet; they’re still doing the red carpet opening ceremonies, and we don’t want you in the frame.”
“Who’s on right now?” Yanjun asks, just because he’s bored and there’s nothing more interesting other than peeping at the guests loitering through the venue. His co-star -- the only other person he would be comfortable with talking with to pass the time -- isn’t even near him, having long been swept away for another round of makeup, hair, photos.
His manager shrugs. “You’ll get to see who it is later when they come through in the back. Just keep your head down; you can figure it out later.”
Maybe he should have listened.
***
Zhengting has changed over the past six years.
When Yanjun first met him, it was at Dachang, and Zhengting had a head of deep brown hair that scattered all over his forehead, much like himself. Yanjun remembers seeing him walk into the recording venue, his striped shirt and black ensemble neat and professional looking, his expression feigning coldness but his bright eyes giving away how excited he really was from how they kept darting around him excitedly.
Yanjun knows this because Zhangjing’s told him so many times how stiff he can make his expression; no one can beat him at his own game, and Zhu Zhengting is no exception.
“He looks different from when he was on Produce,” Zhangjing whispers to him when they’re still backstage. Yanjun looks down and sees Zhangjing picking at the edge of his hoodie, and stops him by brushing his hands away.
“Don’t do that; you’ll ruin it.”
“I’m nervous!” his best friend whines, grabbing his arm and shaking it for dramatic effect. “And you won’t even indulge me with some gossip to take my mind off it!”
Yanjun sighs and squints his eyes at the Yuehua leader again. Zhu Zhengting has his hands tucked in the shirt of one of the other boys -- the really young one called Justin who also went to Korea with him --, and he’s busy trying to tug the collar of the boy’s shirt back up. His face is tense with concentration, but his cheeks are flushed from how much he’s talking to the other boys huddled around him, and his eyes are still bright.
“Looks about the same to me,” he decides, then looks away.
“He looks more mature for sure,” Zhangjing argues. “Him and Justin. Both of them seem a lot older.”
“How old is he again?”
“Twenty… twenty-two? Twenty-one? Not sure.” Zhangjing raises his eyebrows at him. “Why, are you interested? He’s only a bit younger than us, if that’s what you’re thinking about.”
Yanjun scoffs, shaking his head and tearing his eyes away from the man again. He hadn’t even realized he was looking at him again. “Stop making it seem like I’m interested in every guy I ask you about. You’re probably the one interested in him.”
Zhangjing grins at him. “Him? Not my type. Did you see that guy in pink though? That’s my type.”
“God, him? Do you even know how old he is?”
The smile vanishes off Zhangjing’s face. “Shit.”
***
He once told Zhangjing that Zhengting looked the same as he did when he last saw him, on the television screen back at the Banana dorms when he and Honglin and Zhangjing and Chaoze and the rest of them were all watching the Produce shows for fun. And he had meant it back then; Zhu Zhengting still seemed like the same soft, innocent, pretty boy he was in Korea.
But now, Yanjun can see that that’s no longer the case.
Zhengting meets his gaze when they’re bustling into the auditorium for the actual ceremony. Yanjun saw him earlier, at the red carpet, when Zhengting was signing his name on the big wall of all the actors of the night and Yanjun was trying to get by without having his face on a camera, but he wasn’t looking at him then.
Now, he does, with the man’s rosy-cheeked face breaking out into a bright smile as soon as he catches sight of Yanjun.
Yanjun smiles too, because there’s really nothing else either of them can do. The ceremony is starting soon, and he’d rather not start up some awkward conversation when they’re all trying to be quiet. However, he does go a bit further and raise his eyebrows at the other man, much like he did to him before, all those years ago at the dorm they once called home.
And for a second, he looks at him; really looks at him. Zhengting’s cheeks are still red and his hair is still the same shade of brown, but that’s about as close as the resemblance he still shares with the old Zhengting. He’s more weathered now, streaks of makeup covering up the dark patches under his eyes, and his mouth much more firm and set in place. The old Yanjun may have even laughed at him for how much Zhengting now resembled the very image he had once made fun of Yanjun for.
Zhengting’s eyes don’t shine as brightly as they did before, though they’re still very pretty, and they still sparkle.
***
Zhengting and him don’t really talk too much on the show, but that doesn’t mean that Yanjun doesn’t interact with him at all. Zhengting, he soon realizes, is one of those people who you can’t help but crash into at every opportunity, whether you like it or not. He’s loud and bubbly, and extremely extraverted, which in all sense should have clashed with his introverted self, but in fact, Yanjun grows to find him nothing more than endearing.
There’s Zhengting running on the treadmills, his hair looped up in a tiny ponytail on the top of his head.
There’s Zhengting pressing a knee to Chengcheng’s back, spitting out comments about how the boy should have stretched more as he screeches in pain from how Zhengting’s stretching his arms out.
There’s Zhengting playing around with Xukun, pulling the quieter man along with him everywhere he goes, chattering non-stop to him about whatever it is.
There’s Zhengting dancing.
Yanjun has seen a number of good dancers in his life (Lin Chaoze being one of them; he would scalp him if he didn’t say so), but for some reason, it’s Zhengting who really makes an impression on him when he walks in on the man practicing some elegant modern routine in one of the dance studios. He pauses at the doorway for a moment rather than back out, staring at how Zhengting is smoothly dropping down to the splits before pushing up and floating away again.
“Good god, don’t scare me!” Zhengting jumps when he finally sees him, glancing up in the mirror. He spins on his heels, pouting at Yanjun. He looks like an angry puppy.
“My bad, my bad.” Yanjun looks left and right; there’s no one but Zhengting here for now. “Should I go?”
Zhengting shakes his head. “Nah, you already startled me once. You won’t scare me a second time.” He raises an eyebrow at him, the movement making a strand of hair fall over his eyes. “Wanna stay and watch?”
“Won’t I bother you?”
“I’m a dancer. Dancers need an audience.”
So Yanjun takes a seat at the front of the room, right in front of the glass mirror. He came to dance as well, but perhaps watching Zhengting for a few moments wouldn’t hurt.
Zhengting dances, and Yanjun watches.
Zhengting comes over to him when he’s done his routine again. His eyes are sparkling when he looks down at him, sweat clinging to his smile. “How was that?”
Yanjun breaths out of his nose. “Beautiful.”
***
Yanjun gets some award whose name he forgets a minute later. It’s just another acting award, the product of the detective TV drama he starred in in the summer. His co-star is dazzling when they stand together on the stage, and when she smiles at him, he can’t help but think how pretty she is in her blue dress and silver hair accessories.
Maybe he should introduce her to Xiao Gui. Yanjun learned over filming that she’s sweet and extremely patient: exactly who Xiao Gui needs.
He thinks about this as he sees Zhengting climb the steps to the award stage. His brown hair is pushed away from his forehead, and he isn’t smiling much when he accepts his award for the movie he was in this past year.
Yanjun remembers a time when Zhengting painted his face with all the colours of the rainbow, and a time when Yanjun woke up every morning, it seemed, to another shade in his hair.
Those times are gone now though, and Zhengting’s hair and makeup are simple and brown. Mature. Hardened.
Yanjun claps for him when he comes down the steps again, but he doesn’t feel it much in his hands.
***
“You know, for our leader, Xukun can be pretty soft towards us,” Yanjun comments to Zhengting one night at their dorm. He’s sitting at his spot on the couch in their living room, scrolling aimlessly on his phone for some parts, but glancing over at Chengcheng and Justin and Linong messing around with something at the kitchen table every once in a while too.
Zhengting has his laptop propped up on his legs beside him. That’s another thing about Zhengting: even if there are so many spaces open to him, he’ll always choose the spot closest to you. Close enough, in fact, that Yanjun can peek over the man’s shoulder to see him shopping for dog clothes.
“Xukun is a baby,” Zhengting hums absentmindedly, clicking on a red puppy sweater. Privately, Yanjun isn’t sure whether or not Wubaiwan would even wear the thing. “You and I: we’re the only ones who are grown-ups in this group.”
“I heard that!” Zhangjing and Xukun’s voices come wafting over from the other room. Zhangjing is showing Xukun some vocal exercises he found online.
Yanjun ignores the both of them and grins at Zhengting. “You? A grown-up?”
Zhengting pauses at his scrolling and pouts at him, widening his eyes with mock betrayal. “Why the mocking tone? Am I not responsible enough for you?”
Yanjun laughs. “No, no, you’re very responsible.”
“Then why am I not an adult in your eyes?”
“Because you’re a baby like Xukun too, sometimes.”
Zhengting rolls his eyes. “Okay, that’s enough. Wanna go shopping tomorrow, by the way? I wanna see if I can get a new pair of glasses.”
Yanjun agrees; it’s becoming pretty common for the two of them to spend a bit of time alone in the afternoon. Sometimes it’s shopping, but other times, it’s just a walk around their neighborhood. Yanjun doesn’t really mind what it is.
“You are still a baby though,” he mutters under his breath as both of them return to their devices. Zhengting scoffs quietly, but Yanjun can’t help but smile at the sound and how comfortable and familiar it is.
“Idiot.”
***
“Damn.” Yanjun winces at the glass in his hands, his entire face twisting. “That’s a lot stronger than I thought it’d be.”
“It’s not strong at all though, is it?” his co-star frowns up at him, swirling her own drink in her hands. It’s the afterparty now, so she’s more relaxed, and the effect manifests itself in how pearly and pink her cheeks are.
“Maybe?” Yanjun frowns at his own drink. “I don’t drink that much normally.”
“You don’t?” His co-star looks at him in amazement. “ Well, that’s probably why you find it so strong. You’re just not used to it yet.” She sips her drink and suddenly grins. “Can I leave you for a moment?”
Yanjun shrugs. “Go ahead. What for?”
“Friend. Gotta say hi to my girls, you know?”
Yanjun nods at her as she takes herself and her sparkly drink and rosy sheen back into the crowd. Then, he’s alone again.
The other artists present are loitering around, taking minuscule bites of food from the tables dispersed around the area, chatting with each other about gossip, schedules, to name a few. This is usually when Yanjun would start looking for someone to talk to, a few hours shy of being too tired from the bustling and the awards and the entire day’s full of work.
“Lin Yanjun,” Zhengting’s voice says from behind him.
Yanjun spins around.
“Long time no see!” Zhengting smiles brightly, his eyes curling into crescents. He has his own drink in his hand that Yanjun eyes warily. Zhengting, if he remembers correctly, has a high alcohol tolerance. “How are you?”
“Not bad. Could be worse.”
“How long’s it been? A year?”
Yanjun nods, frowns. “Just under a year. Reunion last year, remember?”
Zhengting knocks himself lightly on the side of his head. “You’re right! It’s almost time for our next one, isn't it?”
Yanjun nods, sips at his drink again. “Who’s organizing this year?”
“Ziyi.” Zhengting downs his drink and sets it on the side table. He takes a roasted chestnut from a bowl and pops it in his mouth. “Unless he bails and passes it to Zhangjing.”
“Oh, Zhangjing would slaughter him.” Yanjun chuckles. “Or Nongnong would just beat Ziyi up for making Zhangjing nervous.”
“Of course he would,” Zhengting laughs. He takes a step closer to him. “But what about you? What have you been up to?”
Yanjun tells him about acting, about the new album, about the new sofa he bought to put in his living room. It’s comfortable and warm, talking to Zhengting face to face like this again, a feeling that he hasn’t experienced in a year now.
***
“Yanjun, are you still awake?” Zhengting calls out to him softly from the other side of the room.
Yanjun squints at him and sees the glimmering surfaces of his eyes reflect back to him. “What- Why are you still up?” He glances to his side: 3:13 AM.
“I can’t sleep,” Zhengting confesses. “I think I’m too jet-lagged.”
“I think you are too.” Zhengting just got back from Korea.
“And you sleep too lightly. I’m scared that I’ll wake you up just by tossing and turning,” he exclaimed. “How does Zhangjing room with you without being scared to wake you up?”
“He knows me too well,” Yanjun murmurs. His eyes are more adjusted to the dark now, and he can make out Zhengting’s soft, tired face peering back at him over his covers. “What’s it like, rooming with Chengcheng and Justin?
Zhengting makes a face. “Messy. They try though, I can give them that.”
Yanjun laughs. “Maybe it’s good you’re rooming with me for tonight and tomorrow night. I’m a neat freak.”
“I know you are! But you make me lose sleep, so that’s a big drawback.”
“You get the privilege of rooming with Lin Yanjun though; I’d consider that a win.”
“Fuck off.”
Just for tonight, NINE PERCENT switched around roommates, just to see how it would go. Zhangjing was (to his delight) with Linong. Xiao Gui was with Chengcheng and Ziyi. Justin was with Xukun. And Yanjun was with Zhengting.
Actually, Yanjun was supposed to be with Justin, and Xukun with Zhengting, but Justin had whined that he wanted to room with Xukun at least once, and Zhengting had given in immediately. That was another thing about Zhengting, Yanjun realizes; he’s always willing to give himself up for others. It’s part of how kind of a person he really is.
He smiles at the other smile across the room. “You’re so nice to me in the day; why are you so mean to me when the lights are off?”
There’s a small pause, and for a moment, Yanjun thinks that maybe he said the wrong thing.
However, just as quickly as it came, it goes, and Zhengting is whispering back, his eyes still glimmering at him. “I don’t have to look at your face when you talk.”
***
“How is your album going?” Yanjun asks him. He pours himself another glass of the alcohol, but he privately thinks that he’s only doing it to look cool anyway.
Zhengting studies him, tapping his fingers along the glass. “Fine, fine. I’m trying my best; I wish I had Zhangjing’s throat sometimes.”
“We all do, don’t we?” Yanjun chuckles.
“Yeah. Sometimes I can hear him sing through the walls.” He winks at him. “I tell him to keep it down, but I actually like listening to him.”
Yanjun remembers Zhangjing telling him in a call a week ago about Zhengting coming over and complaining about his volume. He had laughed then, and had told Zhangjing to tell Zhengting that Yanjun was in full support of Zhangjing’s singing. He didn’t text him himself.
It was natural that he didn’t. Nothing had happened between them, but that was precisely it. Six years had gone since he had seen Zhengting walk through the Dachang halls, and four had passed since NINE PERCENT had disbanded. Yanjun stayed close to all of the members the best he could, and the others did with each other. However, it was different with Zhengting.
From the moment of their disbandment, they talked less and less, meeting up less and less like they used to. There was even a period of time where Yanjun was sure the man was purposely forgetting about him, and it didn’t feel great, especially when Yanjun was so used to spending time with the other every week.
However, as time went on, Yanjun grew to realize that that was normal; somethings, perhaps, were meant to be left behind, like some trail of stardust that he could look back fondly at and make sure was not blown away altogether. That’s what he shelves NINE PERCENT memories as, and with that, Zhu Zhengting.
It wasn’t amazing when he thought about it too hard (why could everyone but them stay close friends?), but Yanjun wasn’t trying to think too hard about it.
Zhengting downs his drink, his face scrunching up from the sudden burn. It’s a cute expression.
“Damn, this doesn’t taste too great when you get to the end.”
“Tell me about it,” Yanjun sighed. He stared forlornly at his glass. “Drinks make me tired.”
Zhengting raised his eyebrows. “Do you want to get some fresh air? Walk around?”
Yanjun nodded. It was still so comfortable with Zhengting, still so warm. Even after six years.
***
“Lin Yanjun,” Zhengting says to him when the platform has descended completely into the ground. His eyes are red and puffy even through Yanjun’s blurry vision, but he still looks prettier than anything else Yanjun has seen tonight in his sparkling blue and silver jacket and slick hair falling over his forehead.
The crowd above them is still screaming, yelling their names, chanting the name of their group, now no longer a group. Yanjun’s veins are filled with adrenaline still from performing, from talking, from saying goodbye, and it’s only magnified with how Chengcheng and Ziyi and everyone around him seems to be crying. He’s crying.
“I like you,” Zhengting says very softly. His voice is drowned out in the crowd.
Yanjun blinks at him.
Linong crowds into him, crushing him in his embrace. Yanjun closes his eyes and hugs back, feeling the arms of seven others curl themselves around him as well.
They don’t talk about it again.
***
“I was hoping that we could walk around somewhere under the stars,” Zhengting sighed, tugging again at the handle to the balcony window. “But it looks like they’ve locked our only escape.”
“Break it open,” Yanjun suggested. He tries his own hand at opening the door, but sure enough, it’s locked, and Zhengting is pouting at him again.
“You break it open. I don’t want to get charged.”
Yanjun laughs. This Zhengting is more familiar to him, the one that looks less like the weathered artist who’s survived the harshness of the industry they’re in, who’s endured the years of hate and love and passion and dying flames. But Yanjun is one of those people too, and he knows that this isn’t the real Zhengting anymore; the hardened one is.
He wonders if Zhengting is thinking the same thing. Zhangjing and Linong told him last week that he was even more serious now, more sentimental even. Yanjun had acted surprised, but inside, he knew it was true. He felt older; he felt like things had changed.
He had changed.
“Let’s just sit here then.” Yanjun takes a seat just at the foot of the balcony door, probably dirtying his expensive suit pants on the dusty floor. Zhengting eyes him dubiously, but takes a seat next to him anyways.
The sounds of the after-party are still rocking all around the room they’re in. Yanjun lets the noise bathe him as he leans his back against the glass door.
“Do you ever feel like it’s all changed?” He asks Zhengting softly.
Zhengting doesn’t seem surprised at how sudden the question is, nor does he seem off-put by how someone who was so close to him once-upon-a-time but who drifted away from him as time got the best of both of them was suddenly asking him something deep all over again. Instead, he just hums.
“Of course I do. Do you?”
Yanjun shrugs. “Sometimes, but other times, I feel the same.”
Zhengting smiles. “Do you think I’ve changed?”
Yanjun nods. “Yes.”
Zhengting studies him for a few moments. “You’ve changed as well.”
“I’m uglier, am I?” he jokes.
“No,” Zhengting replies honestly. “You’re just as handsome as you were six years ago.”
Six years ago .
The concept of time feels strange when it’s coming from the lips of the person that was the cause of how time passed for him in the first place.
Zhu Zhengting has changed, just like him. But at the same time, in the starlight marred by the panes of glass that both of them couldn't open, he still feels the same to him: kind, comfortable, warm. Yanjun thinks that Zhengting might think the same way.
“Four years ago, you said something to me,” he begins, but Zhengting cuts him off.
“At the disbandment concert, right?”
Yanjun blinks.
In his eyes, he sees the same face of the boy who was Yuehua’s leader backstage at Dachang, the boy who danced with him late at night, the boy who had sparkling eyes and a sweet smile and a heart made of pure gold. He had the face of the boy Yanjun was so accustomed to linking with the past, of sunlight-dappled days when he was younger, more innocent, less serious.
Those were the days where he could walk side by side with Zhu Zhengting in the backstreets of their neighbourhood, each of them holding an ice pop as they quietly made their way into the sprawling streets of the city.
He blinks again, and it’s still Zhengting, but now it’s his red eyes that look back at him, the sparkling, puffy eyes that said something to him four years ago, and that he let crumble into dust because that was what felt right at the moment: to not address things he had left unbuilt in the first place because he wasn’t sure if the goodbye would be too painful. Yanjun left a piece of himself in that practice room at Dachang, but he also left a piece of it with Zhengting when he never said anything back to him.
“I like you,” he confesses to him, and maybe it sounds stupid saying it so suddenly, when it’s been four years of near-silence between the two of them.
Maybe it’s too late; it’s been four years, and maybe four years has been enough to sap the stardust out of Zhengting’s eyes that were once for him. Maybe time really has gotten the best of them, and the paths they walked along that were once side-by-side, are nowhere close to being intertwined again. Maybe Yanjun will leave this venue as he had gone into it: hardened, different, but always missing a piece of what he left behind six years ago.
But maybe all of that won’t matter. Yanjun is willing to take his chances again.
Zhengting’s eyes sparkle like diamonds.
***
I do.