Work Text:
It was mornings like this that Kim Dokja cherished the most.
The soft morning light through the window slanted just right to frame his companion’s flawless face, his features relaxed in a way Kim Dokja had only seen in the days long after the scenarios ended.
It was almost as if time had frozen just for him to study the man sleeping next to him.
His arched brows had an almost delicate curve to them — Kim Dokja could hardly describe the regressor as delicate, especially after all the regressions he’d been through — and his lips were slightly parted as Kim Dokja listened contentedly to his slow, deep breaths.
“Yoo Joonghyuk,” Kim Dokja breathed, testing the name on his tongue, as if still unable to believe that he was lucky enough to see his boyfriend’s perfection in this peaceful quiet every single day.
His companion’s long lashes fluttered, revealing his dark, sleep-addled eyes. Kim Dokja spotted the split second that he tensed up — his jaw clenching and his grip tightening on Kim Dokja’s waist, his eyes unfocused as if looking into the past when every second was a desperate struggle for survival — before relaxing with a sigh as reality sunk back in.
“Kim Dokja,” he said back with an intense gaze that Kim Dokja used to think contained killing intent. (It was only after they got together that he finally understood that this was just how the sunfish bastard stared. And he did that a lot at Kim Dokja.)
The calloused hand resting on Kim Dokja’s waist slid to his back and pulled him closer. Kim Dokja, used to his companion’s clinginess, leaned into his warmth, placing a hand on Yoo Joonghyuk’s hair and pushing stray hairs down. Yoo Joonghyuk with a bedhead was a sight to behold. (How did he still look so good with messy hair?)
His companion closed his eyes and let out a lazy hum, letting Kim Dokja comfort him.
His work done, Kim Dokja’s hand slid down to cup his boyfriend’s cheek.
“You’re awake,” Kim Dokja said a bit dumbly, stunned into silence as he observed his companion’s face up close.
Yoo Joonghyuk seemed to find his speechlessness funny and his lips curved. “You’re the one who woke me up.” His low, magnetic voice carried a hint of teasing that stirred something deep inside Kim Dokja’s chest. His heart felt almost itchy and overwhelmingly full — a not unfamiliar or unwelcome feeling.
Kim Dokja could hardly contain himself as he gave Yoo Joonghyuk a light kiss on the corner of his lips before pulling away — but not before Yoo Joonghyuk placed a hand gently behind his head and tilted Kim Dokja’s lips to meet his again in a lazy but demanding kiss.
After they parted for air, they stayed close, their noses almost touching. Kim Dokja’s lips were wet and tempting to Yoo Joonghyuk’s eyes. Their breaths intermingled between them.
“You missed,” Yoo Joonghyuk said in a matter-of-fact tone, like that kiss that had made Kim Dokja’s knees go weak and heart beat out of his chest was the consequence of not giving him a proper morning kiss.
It was unfair that everything his Life and Death Companion did was attractive to him.
“That’s where I was aiming, you petty sunfish bastard,” Kim Dokja muttered under his breath.
“Mm,” said the petty sunfish bastard. “ Your petty sunfish bastard.”
Kim Dokja looked at him with incredulity before slapping him on the arm with no force. He still couldn’t get used to his usually stoic and serious companion spouting words of affection so naturally, and they had been together for months now. It was so starkly different from the Yoo Joonghyuk he’d thought he’d known in Ways of Survival, yet it was still so. . . him .
Yoo Joonghyuk, even before they’d met, changed him. In the years before the scenarios, he was the one who gave him the courage to live. And then he had gotten the chance to get to know him, see him as more than just a character. To become equals and to see their regression to the very end — beyond the Star Stream, beyond the Wall. Now, he was with the one he wanted to spend the rest of his days with.
It had taken forever for Yoo Joonghyuk to confess and even longer for the oblivious Kim Dokja to realize he had been confessed to. (Though to be fair, was an exasperated rant about how Yoo Joonghyuk cared about everything remotely related to Kim Dokja really a confession? Han Sooyoung rolled her eyes very dramatically and said it was, but what did she know?) It was honestly a miracle that they were even together.
“Mm,” Kim Dokja said back. “Mine.”
The warm, bubbly feeling was back, and he could only describe it as love. Love for his companion who stuck with him in life and death, through thick and thin.
“Joonghyuk-ah.”
The unsaid words reached the other, who responded with a smile that was no longer rare. Some words didn’t need to be said out loud between them. Sometimes, just a name was enough to convey everything that needed to be said.
“Dokja-yah.”