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Johnny doesn’t know how he managed to do this to himself.
In this sport, injuries are inevitable. It’s the first thing Johnny says to every class he teaches. Doesn’t matter if they’re beginners or if they’ve been doing it longer than him. Do this long enough and you’ll come due for a major injury. It’s not an ‘if,’ just a ‘when.’
Mark and Ten know it just as well as he does. Hell, by now, cataloguing everyone’s old scars and new bruises is basically foreplay.
That doesn’t mean he enjoys being sidelined with a walking cast while everyone else is scrambling up the walls, doing kong vaults over barriers, and swinging laches off metal bars. They’ve given him a task, which makes it slightly more bearable, but Johnny would rather be in front of the camera than manning it.
At least it gives him a chance to watch them in action. Ten and Mark’s freerunning is so different from Johnny’s own, more focused parkour. They definitely borrow from one another and Johnny likes being expressive in his movements and definitely works in more butterflies and corkscrew tricking than is strictly necessary–entirely their influence–but the way Mark and Ten move is just something else.
At all times, Ten’s movement is a dance and he uses every millimeter of his body to express himself. When Johnny does a webster, he focuses on control, flipping forward efficiently with a clean landing. Ten does a balletic chassé, gaining air so that he can extend his legs in his leap before drawing his body in close, spinning twice before hitting the precision point and then moving away again before a viewer even registers that his feet hit the ground. Every showy trick that Ten does is designed to look effortless but Johnny’s laid hands on the wiry, corded muscles that speak to Ten’s strength. He makes it look easy because he knows his body from dance, using it as a tool to create beauty that belies power.
Mark, though. Mark is fucking crazy. Mark just kickflipped his skateboard and then sent it rolling beneath a table while he did a cat pass and vaulted over said table. Once Mark is over, he lands back on the deck of his skateboard and rolls along like he didn’t just execute something stupid hard. He’s been working on that one awhile and more than earned the exhilaration that crosses his face every time he lands it right. Johnny’s been there for all the times Mark came this close to breaking his ankle when he fucked it up. Johnny has no idea where Mark got the idea to mix skateboarding techniques with freerunning but goddamn it’s a sight to see.
“Yo, we gotta do this with the GoPro next time, man!” Mark pulls up to a stop and flops into a sprawl next to him, head falling back on Johnny’s shoulder. “I’m hittin’ it almost every time.”
Johnny laughs and wraps an arm around Mark. “Wait until I can run after you with the camera rig again. We can cut together some badass wide shots with it too.”
“You mean, wait another six weeks?” Mark’s pout could melt Johnny’s resolve right there if he was trying to get his way.
Just to his right, Johnny hears Ten hit the ground before rolling to his feet so he can join them. “That’s assuming you actually listen to the doctor and don’t push yourself.” He gives Johnny a sharp look, one that tells him that he won’t be getting away with anything.
“It’s such bullshit,” Johnny groans. “My foot’s not really even broken broken!”
“Dude, what do you think a stress fracture even is?”
Johnny scowls at the boot strapped around his foot and ankle. “All of me is stressed, why do my metatarsals get special treatment?”
Ten rolls his eyes and sets himself on Johnny’s lap, pointedly keeping all of his weight on the thigh of Johnny’s good leg. “Because they’re so stressed they’re full of little cracks.” He raps his knuckles gently against Johnny’s temple. “So, you get to relax and let us take care of you for once, hyung.”
Johnny shoots Ten a glance that tries to be annoyed but that he knows mostly comes off as fond. He knows they’re right and if their positions were reversed, he’d be dishing it out just as bad. It just sucks not being able to run like he’s used to. He’s got all this nervous energy that’s supposed to get expended on perfecting his techniques and teaching classes of would-be traceurs and, instead, the most freerunning he’s going to get to do for the next six weeks will be in Assassin’s Creed.
(Not gonna lie, he’s racking up achievements in Black Flag, but it’s not the same.)
“Once I’m cleared, you know I’m going to be running circles around both of you. You know that right?”
Ten smacks a kiss on Johnny’s cheek. “Looking forward to it.”
Johnny leans back and lets the sunlight hit his face. It sucks not being able to run but there’s something really great about sitting in the warm summer sun with two gorgeous athletes on either side of him.
- - -
Ten doesn’t know how Johnny can act so calm. And it’s definitely an act but it’s more of an act than Ten would put up in his position. They all love what they do but Johnny’s the one who’s made it his life. The first time Ten met him, Johnny was behind Off the Wall’s front desk. He’d signed up for the pole dancing classes that Bambam was teaching and then a beginner’s parkour class for the hot instructor.
He’d only expected the hot instructor to become a passion. Instead, he got a three for one deal. Two boyfriends plus a whole new way to move through the world that dance hadn’t previously offered.
Now, his freerunning is showy, full of tricking moves that he’s learned from all forms of dance. His dance has become more powerful and dimensional, incorporating the kinds of leaps and tumbles he’d previously only ever landed in his dreams. All because he’d wanted to impress the cute guy behind the desk.
Johnny is still cute too. Even when he’s on crutches and trying to navigate his way through the door with the cats underfoot. Mark is hovering behind him, trying not to hover and Ten’s watching them both. He feels so unbearably in love with both of them, even while they’re being a pair of idiots.
The home they’ve made is as chaotic and multidisciplinary as they are. Their walls are lined with framed posters for Johnny’s favorite horror movies, Ten’s favorite dancers, and Mark’s favorite skateboard decks. A poster of Taemin takes place of pride right in the middle though, because they’re all gay and they all have eyes. Slender shelves are installed between posters, allowing their cats to roam from cat tree to cat tree, lording over them all, as is right and proper.
Ten’s installed a pole in the living room and Johnny’s got pull up bars in two doorways. He thought he was being slick by putting one in the hallway because “It’s the strongest doorway in the house” but Ten knows different. That pull up bar means that Johnny gets a full view of Ten whenever he’s practicing his pole dance when they’re both working out. It’s fine; it gives him more motivation to show off. Something he plans to do later.
For now, they install Johnny on the sectional. Mark heads into the kitchen and Ten flops in right next to Johnny. Without asking for permission, he grabs Johnny’s bag off his lap and paws through it for his camera. Johnny swats gently at him, an arbitrary warning not to go through his stuff. “Did you get good footage at least?” He’s not gonna be the one to tell Johnny but ever since he got benched, Johnny’s cinematography has gotten more creative. Since Johnny isn’t able to just lay on the pavement or run up the half-pipe, the last two weeks have seen him rigging cameras in different places, sometimes even stealing one of Mark’s skateboards.
The footage he got today is going to shine on their YouTube channel. Mark has that amazing grin, the one that’s just a little bit too wide. It’s all teeth every time he whoops victory at the camera when he finishes a trick. Ten on camera looks calmer and more enigmatic but Ten watching the video now can remember exactly how thrilled he’d been for Mark every time.
Johnny’s not on camera but Ten got plenty of chances to sneak a look at him too. He’d be happier if he could run but Ten saw him smile.
“Do you know what’s taking Mark so long?” Johnny asks. “We need to order dinner.”
The question is answered with a screamed “Incoming!”
Ten looks up in time to see Mark, who’s grinning like a maniac. His hands are empty, held out like he just pushed something. Johnny catches it first, bursting out into laughter as one of Mark’s longboards comes slowly rolling into the living room, a dazed-looking Louis riding along. The cat doesn’t look upset, only confused, but that’s also just Louis’ face. About halfway to his favorite cat tree, Louis decides that this nonsense is beneath him and leaps off.
“You really just want that cat to suffer,” Johnny says. Mark laughs and eases into his favorite spot between Johnny and Ten, holding a half-gallon plastic container of watermelon. He waggles a chunk at the end of his fork, giggling when Ten shoves him, and then offers it to Johnny. He takes a big bite and leans his head back to chew, startling a little when Mark kisses his exposed neck.
“We should take video of the cats. People will go crazy for it.”
“Fifty-fifty shot that someone calls the Animal Protective League on our asses.”
“Or we’d make bank on a video of a skateboarding cat!”
Johnny and Ten each take a shot at jostling him before Mark settles back down to take a look at Johnny’s footage. “Dude, like, how do you make us look so good when you film us?”
“Easy. You look amazing and I just point the camera.” Johnny gives Mark a kiss and then steals another piece of watermelon. He gives Mark that flirty look that always makes him get all cutely self-conscious and it works like it always does. Two seconds of prolonged eye contact and Mark’s got his face in his hands, giggling up a storm.
Ten shakes his head at them and eases off the sofa. “I want pad see ew tonight.” He anticipates getting his way, especially when he crosses over to the stripper pole.
“Don’t overdo it,” Mark warns, even with his eyes fixed on him.
Ten grins and wiggles his hips a little. “I’m just gonna stretch, promise.”
He already knows their eyes are fixed on him but he works it a little, walking an easy circle around the pole before moving into one of his favorite stretches. Left foot planted on the ground, he leans away from the pole and raises his other leg, toes pointed at the ceiling so that he feels the stretch throughout both his legs. Holding this pose, he feels a little bit like a drawn bow, full of potential energy. Then he feels the strain and lets his raised leg return to the ground. He shifts to the other side, fully aware that it shows off his ass to them. By the time his other leg is curved toward the pole above his head, he’s pretty sure he could get them to order him at least half the menu of Golden Sukhothai if he asked it.
- - -
Mark doesn’t know how he got so lucky. Sure, Johnny’s kind of moody over not being able to run and Ten conned them into buying, like, a crapload of (delicious) Thai food last night, but that’s a trifling issue. So what if he blew a bunch of money on them? What’s the point of making money by skateboarding on YouTube if he can’t spend it on his boyfriends and their cats?
And all of it matters a lot less than the fact that he got to stare at them while they slept this morning. At some point in the night, Mark had overheated and ended up at the edge of the bed. By the time he woke up this morning, Johnny and Ten had smushed together to compensate, both of them reaching an arm out so that they could still hold one of Mark’s hands to bridge the divide. It had made a space in the middle for Louis and Leon to curl up between them like a set of perfect donuts.
Johnny used to worry it meant something bad, back when they were still figuring out this whole poly situation and each of them was afraid that if he did one wrong thing, the other two would leave. Now they all know that sometimes, people just overheat or can’t sleep right. Scooting away from them and closer to the air conditioner doesn’t make him love them both any less.
Everything about it used to scare Mark. Johnny and Ten had already been together since the dawn of time when he met them. They’d been at the park near where Mark liked to practice, Johnny filming Ten while he tried some freerunning tricks at the edge of the skateboard ramps. Mark had never seen anything like it before, never seen anything like them before. And then he’d been so struck by Ten’s smile that he almost hit the concrete because he forgot what he was doing in the middle of a basic ollie. Even worse, they’d seen him do it.
They still decided to keep him anyway, so Mark figures it was worth it, even if he wiped out while he was trying to make a sponsored video.
Johnny and Ten came as a package deal with their athletics, which means Mark started learning how to freerun. It was only a matter of time before he tried to figure out how to mix together the best of two sports the way he’d mixed up the two best parts of his personal life.
Today is a parkour day. He and Ten don’t have to be anywhere but Johnny’s got a shift at Off the Wall. He’s parked on desk duty until he heals but Mark can still see how much Johnny’s mood improves the second the doors slide open.
There’s a certain smell to the parkour gym that’s become perfectly, comfortably familiar. It’s wooden obstacles, chalk, and gym mats and Mark is hardwired to associate it with his boyfriends and one of his favorite things to do (besides them). The massive space echoes with the squeak of sneakers, the smack of people falling and hitting the mats. There’s shouting too, always. Someone’s groaning in sympathy when a friend falls or else screaming for joy when someone succeeds. It’s the kind of thing that Mark knows from skateboarding too, probably what made the transition so easy. Both sports involve a lot of trying and a lot of fucking up on the way to success.
They ask a lot of their bodies, pretty much on the daily. Johnny’s stress fractures are just the latest in a long line of injuries they’ve all had. Ten says he was sidelined for almost a year from a knee injury before they met him. Mark’s left wrist still clicks a little funny if he bends it at the wrong angle even though it’s been years since he fell with his whole body weight on one hand. He wouldn’t trade any of the pain for the world because it’s how he ended up with them.
As much as Johnny’s sulking behind the desk, Mark knows he feels the same way.
“I’m gonna work on that cat-to-cat trick Johnny was showing me,” he says to Ten as they’re chalking up their hands. Ten gives him a sly smile, one that says he knows exactly what Mark is up to. Maybe Johnny can’t run with them yet but Mark wants to rock some new tricks, make him proud. Because he taught them how to move like this but they still move best all together.