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Changbin stubbed out his cigarette into the already full ashtray and leaned out the doorway, grimacing into the night. He massaged absently at the back of his thigh. “Fuck, I hate rain,” he commented to himself, watching the rain pound the alley in front of him, kept relatively dry by the faded orange awning over the doorway. He could hear occasional gunfire in the distance, a faint staccato burst here and there, but the storm seemed to have calmed things down for the moment. Every once in a while, Mother Nature still liked to have a say in the world at large, even if it seemed as if she’d mostly given up. Changbin didn’t blame her.
The ozone smell of rain was steadily taking over the faded smoke from his cigarette and Changbin tipped his face up at it, eyes sliding closed. He may have hated the rain, but he loved the smell of it. Even in a dingy alley at the edge of the city, not ten feet from an overfilled dumpster.
He heard faint jingling over the rhythmic drumbeat of raindrops on the roof and the muffled chorus of The Slits’ Vindictive and turned his head. It was a sound he recognized well, and Changbin was not let down. He let out a long, appreciative whistle. “Look what the cat dragged in. You look beautiful, Baby. Is that a new wig?”
Hyunjin shot Changbin an amused glance as he sauntered up to the door in strappy six-inch stilettos, finishing clasping a bracelet around his wrist. “You noticed,” he purred, patting at the long, blonde hair in loose, expertly styled waves about his face. “Everyone kept telling me I needed to go blonde, so I figured why not try it out for a night.” He leaned up against the doorjamb opposite, peering out into the downpour and rubbing the chill from his bare arms. He certainly looked cold, wearing what hardly constituted as a dress, more or less just a spill of low-cut rainbow sequins that ended abruptly just past his crotch. Still, Changbin would be hard pressed to find anyone more beautiful. Hyunjin had an intangible quality that could make anyone fall in love with him, and he used it to his advantage night after night in their little drag bar at the edge of the world. “Seems like I picked the wrong night.”
“It suits you,” Changbin murmured, reaching out and picking up a single, lazy curl and fingering it. “I take it that it’s not busy out there.” He leaned back, flipping open his shallow silver tin and began rolling up another cigarette, using the concrete post by the loading dock as a makeshift table.
“Just that one table from earlier, plus a few stragglers come in from the wet. Nothing Chan and Felix can't handle.” Hyunjin accepted the cigarette Changbin held out, holding it to his lips and bending when Changbin struck a match. He kept eye contact with Changbin as the tip caught, eyes sliding closed gratefully at first intake. “Thanks,” he blew out, straightening, smoke curling around his head.
“No problem,” Changbin replied, shifting to favor his injured leg. He didn’t miss the look Hyunjin flicked down toward it.
“So when are you and Chan heading back out again?” Hyunjin asked after a long beat, the smoke from his exhale punctuating his words, animating them.
Changbin licked his lip, worrying on the bottom one with his teeth. “We’ve got a run at the end of the week.”
“The Freeway?”
Changbin looked away.
“Further?” Hyunjin took a deep drag and threw the cigarette out into the rain, turning. Changbin watched it bounce and lay still, the red of the neon signs across the alleyway casting it bloodied, bloated already with rainwater. “You’re hurt,” Hyunjin said, painted mouth distorted through thick, white smoke, contrast turned up high. “You promised you’d take it easy for a while.”
“Hey, hey, I know, Baby,” Changbin tried to placate, crowding into Hyunjin’s space, putting his hands on his hips, thumbs soothing the sequins of Hyunjin’s dress.
“Longer runs mean more chances at getting hurt. Changbin—” Hyunjin shook his head, raising his hands to his face. Changbin could tell he wanted to run his hands through his hair or wipe at his face but he could do neither, lest he ruin his carefully applied makeup. Instead, he traced along his temple and jawline with his index fingers and thumbs, mindful. “I know I lost the right to say this a long time ago, but just because we’re not together anymore, it doesn’t mean I don’t still care. Changbin.” His voice went very quiet. “I can’t lose you.”
“You haven’t yet,” Changbin pointed out, which just earned him a glare, one he knew he deserved. “Baby, you know we’ll be careful, we always are. What happened last time was a fluke. And… you never lost anything. We both know who really lost back then,” Changbin said in a confessional tone, uncomfortable because he knew these words were overdue.
Hyunjin’s eyes crinkled, the thick eye makeup making them appear diminutive, but Changbin could tell he was going to dismiss his words. He could feel it like he felt the rain earlier in his bad knee. His spine.
Hyunjin huffed out a breath on cue, his mouth curling in displeasure, and Changbin pressed him against the jamb, making it easy on him. “Baby,” he crooned, “Come on. Let’s not think about any of that right now, okay? I’m here now. Let’s just enjoy the time we do have. Hmm?” he said. The music from the front of the bar was distant but still unmistakable back there in the open doorway of the dressing room, nearly drowned out by the rain. Still, Changbin swayed Hyunjin from side to side to the rhythm of it, humming the melody under his breath. At first, Hyunjin tensed, resisting, but Changbin knew it was only a token, and then he was putting his arms around Changbin’s shoulders. Changbin’s humming blossomed into singing, crooning at the hollow of Hyunjin’s throat.
When I met you in a restaurant
You could tell I was no debutante
You asked me what’s my pleasure
A movie or a measure?
They danced together like that for a while, simply lost in each other, alone in the world that otherwise wouldn’t let them be. Changbin twirled Hyunjin and bent him in a dip, Hyunjin kicking his foot up and laughing right there in that softly illuminated alleyway door, his heels and the butterfly pinned to the side of his wig glittering in the fall of rain. Changbin already knew it was going to be an image he’d recall when the stakes were high and he needed to focus.
Changbin righted Hyunjin, who tipped his head down and kissed Changbin chastely on the cheek. He immediately wiped at it after, but Changbin knew the lip print was going to stain his skin for a while. He didn’t mind. He liked it, really.
“That reminds me. I have something for you.”
Changbin watched Hyunjin spin away toward the double vanity piled with all kinds of different tubes, pots and jars of makeup and examine himself in the gaudy lighted mirror. “Do you?” he followed after, shoving his hands in the pockets of his stained jeans, feeling fidgety and fully besotted. “I love presents.”
Hyunjin flicked his gaze down and back up, the thick, false lashes making his expression instantly coy. “I know you do. That’s why,” he popped open a tube of lipstick and relined his lips, the color brighter, more vibrant. Changbin saw himself, battle-scarred in the background looking upon Hyunjin, the bright, golden star, the two of them framed in chipped red wood and highlighted in soft yellow; caught in time, young and alive and still free. Hyunjin caught his eyes and Changbin took a deep breath and came forward. He placed his hands on either of Hyunjin’s bare shoulders. He couldn’t see his own face anymore, but Hyunjin’s glance was mirror enough, and Changbin would go into battle gladly with Hyunjin’s lipstick stained on him.
The music changed over the ancient PA, Human Fly’s plodding surf guitar shattering the moment. Hyunjin blinked and stole his gaze away and Changbin let his fingers drift down Hyunjin’s arms to the back of his chair before stepping fully away. He turned and picked up a discarded pink feather boa from a velour trunk left open on the floor. He draped it over his shoulders and bopped mindlessly along to the music. “Do you think I could ever do drag?”
“Of course. Honestly, drag makeup is the only thing that can really cover all those scars,” Hyunjin replied, getting up from the vanity. He adjusted the boa, tucking one end over Changbin’s shoulder. “There. For you.” He pressed his refreshed lips to a piece of odd-shaped cardstock and held it out, and Changbin took it, puzzled.
It was a small, vintage card, yellowed with age, the edges gone rounded with handling. On the front was a drawing of a kitten, grey and white and fuzzy with a big, black bow on its head. Printed on a heart above it read, ‘I’d love to get kittenish with you, Valentine!’
“It’s not even Valentine’s Day,” Changbin said, feeling touched nonetheless.
“Turn it over,” said Hyunjin, voice dipped soft, intimate, tucking himself against Changbin. He smelled like smoke and hairspray and Loves Baby Soft perfume, something Changbin knew he would never be able to smell on anyone else without thinking about Hyunjin. Changbin turned the valentine over. On the back was a single lip print, coral red and fresh and an exact replica of the one half-wiped off of Changbin’s cheek. In the middle of it, in scratchy blue pen: Love, Baby. “For luck.”
It took two tries and a swallow around a thickening throat for Changbin to reply. “I love it.” He folded the valentine carefully and pulled out his wallet from his back pocket. He tucked the card next to his only other most prized possession, a fading picture of his parents and sister. “The greatest good luck charm. I love it now and I’ll love it forever. Thank you.” He sketched Hyunjin a deep bow.
“So formal,” Hyunjin admonished, clucking, but there was no bite behind his words. He pulled Changbin into him, hands on his triceps. “Now you have to come back to me.”
“Cross my heart and hope to die,” Changbin said, drawing an X over his chest. “A new promise, to replace the old one.” He reached up and traced Hyunjin’s jawline with the same hand, holding his gaze before tilting his chin down. He knew with deepest, surest certainty that there was no one else on this doomed planet who could ever mean as much to him as Hyunjin. He held a space inside Changbin’s heart as deep and fathomless as the ocean, he had since they were tender runaways still figuring the big, bad world out. For the longest time, they had no one but each other, and that made them cling too hard, hold too long. They were young, yes, and stupid and explosive, Changbin the gasoline and oil, Hyunjin the wick and the ignition. But when everything went up in flames, they were still left with only each other. And so they held on, a little looser now, and when Changbin joined up with Chan and his crew, Hyunjin had naturally tagged along. And thus was born: this. Officially not together, but bonded in a way that was far more real than anything either of them could find outside of one another.
So it was both nothing, yet everything, when Changbin met Hyunjin’s lips with his own, precision makeup be damned.
--
Changbin shoved his back against the flimsy lean-to he was taking shelter behind, his gun loose in one hand, holster flapping empty against his chest. He scanned the immediate area for enemies, but also for Chan. He ended up catching the latter’s gaze from the perimeter, about twenty paces away. He already knew his face was mimicking the solemn, worried glance Chan shot his way, brows drawn in and down and fingers tightening on his own gun. They were already down to their revolvers, not ideal when they were surrounded with at least six men bearing down on them.
The mission was supposed to have been a simple one; get in, get out. They’d had no idea they were going to walk right into a trap, none at all. Nothing had hinted that this was going to be anything more than a routine retrieval; if there had been, they wouldn’t have even entertained the brief.
Chan made a couple hand gestures, and Changbin’s eyes widened as he read them, his heart beating in his throat, blood pulsing in his ears. The cold-hot wash of adrenaline flooded through him, but he just nodded, even if everything in him was screaming no. Licking the dirt and blood from his bottom lip, Changbin bent down to one knee behind the thin, wispy wooden structure that was hardly any cover at all and fumbled in his back pocket with his free hand. He pulled out his wallet and shucked it away, uncaring of anything inside it. There was nothing in there of value anymore. Except.
The first scrap of paper, a faded, tenderly worn photo. In it, Changbin was smiling as wide as he possibly could, his cheeks hurting, his sister copying him because they had both wanted to show their parents what a good son and daughter they could be. The last Changbin had heard anything, his sister had managed to promote her way into a good position in the rebellion, further south where the battles were scarcer, but bloodier. He’d had to burn her last letter, but everything contained inside had sounded positive.
He shuffled the photo to the back.
The kitten was more white than gray by then, the paper of the valentine soft and worn from Changbin’s handling, smudged dirty in a few places. He flipped it over and there she was. Hyunjin’s lip print, coral red, slightly faded and curled up just a touch at the edges. Changbin remembered so vividly how he had been smiling, just a little, when he kissed the card before handing it over. Changbin held it to his own lips, and for the barest second, daydreamed that it was Hyunjin’s mouth against his. “I’m keeping my promise,” he whispered, his heart dropping, and then he was tucking the photo and the card, now stained red-orange, inside his empty holster before raising his gun once more.
--
It was pouring again.
Hyunjin stared out at the rain through the propped-open front door of the bar, eyes gone glassy and far away. The cigarette wasn’t rolled as expertly this time around; he’d run out of the stash Changbin had left him yesterday.
Felix was a bright spot in Hyunjin’s peripheral, covered head to toe in glitter and gold, but when he tilted his head and looked at her dead-on, Hyunjin could see his own chasmic numbness echoed in her face. She was picking at her skin again, veins blue and pronounced.
But the despair that radiated from Felix? Hyunjin wasn’t there quite yet.
He was surviving on fluffy clouds of memory, as pastel and distorted as he wanted them to be. A simple, seconds long back-hug from Changbin could be turned into a night’s worth of spooning if Hyunjin were determined enough, and he was. Hyunjin knew anything could turn into the truth if you just thought about it hard enough.
He caught his reflection between bottles of Johnnie Walker and Bain’s Cape, and—truly—he’d never looked better. His makeup was expert, sharp and bright because it had to be if he didn’t want to show how puffy his face had become, or how a person could swim in the bags underneath his eyes. He laughed loudly and sang even louder and danced and flirted gaudily with the patrons, and he was vivacious and shining and he didn’t feel even a little bit like if the wind blew just hard enough he’d scatter into a million pieces, trembling and cold and sick. He was fine. There was nothing wrong, and he didn’t keep brushing his fingertips over the spaces Changbin’s hands liked most even though it didn’t feel the same. He was just fine.
“They’ve been gone a week longer than they said they’d be,” Felix hiccupped into her drink. Hyunjin steadied the tremor in her hand.
“They’ll be back,” Hyunjin whispered as Poly Styrene crooned scrub away, scrub away over the PA. Felix tightened her grip on his fingers, the corners of her eyes crinkling. “They will,” Hyunjin repeated fiercely.
“He promised.”