Work Text:
It’s silver, metals twisted in a round shape that encircles Gyuvin’s finger perfectly. He hadn’t expected Ricky to get him a ring from Gucci, of all places, let alone get it for him at all. Certainly the expression of his affection through a silly heart ring on Ricky’s birthday couldn’t have allowed Ricky to do something so grand in return.
He bought it weeks ago. What Gyuvin ambitiously imagines is Ricky thinking of him while holding the ring in his pretty fingers. This is the simplest form of Gyuvin’s desires. This would not be the first time he’s imagined Ricky in such a romanticized way.
(Should it be enough to hint at certain things? Maybe, but Gyuvin’s always been the type to push it aside, leave it for now, he’ll come back to it eventually.)
The company dropped him off at the dorms alongside Gunwook and Ricky around two hours ago. Gyuvin had thanked the members for their gifts, took a quick shower, and now he’s here, lying on his bed whilst holding the ring up to the light. He can’t help but wonder how much thought Ricky had put into choosing it— not to mention, how much the ring must cost. Is Gyuvin really worth that much, to be given a Gucci ring on his birthday?
Gyuvin is the type to hope for the unthinkable and expect less than realistic. Ricky knows this.
Quietly, the door to their dorm opens, and Gyuvin turns his head to see Ricky walk in, then close the door behind him. A towel is wrapped around his waist, with the rest of his body bare; Ricky always takes freakishly long showers, but this time, his shower was significantly shorter.
“Put some clothes on,” Gyuvin tells him. Demands, actually— it’s his birthday, so naturally, he’s got the authority to do this. “And then come lie down with me.”
There’s some rustling as Ricky goes through his clothes. “I was already on that, your highness.”
“Well, get on it faster .”
Gyuvin watches out of the corner of his eye as Ricky pulls a soft-looking shirt over his head and expensive pajama pants; the blonde directs an amused look at him before approaching the bed. Gyuvin rolls over momentarily to allow Ricky space onto the mattress, then immediately hides himself into Ricky’s side, head comfortably tucked into the space between his neck and shoulder, arm thrown over Ricky’s stomach.
He hands the ring to Ricky, and wordlessly, Ricky slides it back onto Gyuvin’s pointer finger.
“It was a few weeks ago, like I said.” His chest rises and falls slowly, enough that Gyuvin can feel his heartbeat through it all. “I was by myself, you know, on the rare occasion that we’d been given a day with little schedules.”
Ricky smells clean. He’s warm— Gyuvin cuddles in and tries to cut down as much proximity between them as possible. “Yeah, I know,” he replies. That was the day Ricky came back to the dorm and brought him boba for (allegedly) no apparent reason.
“So,” Ricky continues, “I saw the ring, and I thought to myself, ‘hey, Kim Gyuvin would really like this.’ The last thing on my mind at the time was the fact that you’d gotten me a ring on my birthday. But, what scared me was wanting to see you with that ring, my ring, on your finger. I wanted people to know it was my ring, too. I wanted others to see the ring and assume, ‘oh, it must have been from someone who cares about Gyuvin quite a bit.’ I want to be that person for you.
“And I started thinking, ‘that’s not really normal, is it?’ To want to leave a part of yourself in another person’s existence, just so they know you will never fail to be by their side?” Here, Ricky pauses: Gyuvin feels him working through all of the words in his head, attempting to phrase it in a way that can’t be misinterpreted. “I think… maybe then, I knew.”
Gyuvin’s arm tightens where it’s wrapped around Ricky’s body. His fingers curl into Ricky’s shirt, their legs tangling comfortably. There is a small, selfish part of him thinking that right now, he could hold Ricky in his arms and forget the reality they live in; all he would feel is Ricky, right beside him, and the cold metal band around his finger.
He asks the obvious: “You knew what…?”
“I honestly don’t know the answer to that.” Ricky laughs something small, grinning when Gyuvin weakly hits him on the chest. “You can’t ask me to sum up what I feel for you. That’s unfair.”
“Kim Ricky,” whines Gyuvin, and Ricky chuckles again.
“I can tell you one thing. Since it’s your birthday,” the other adds, as if it explains the embrace they’re currently in, and the exchange of such exhaustive confessions. Ricky tilts his chin a little, placing his hand over Gyuvin’s head and wrapping another hand around his back, then pulls him in for a proper hug. It’s hard not to breathe in his entirety, so Gyuvin does just that, closing his eyes. “I don’t regret what I said. Anything I have said about you.”
Gyuvin is trembling a little, admittedly, because Ricky is hardly ever this honest. He’s a good idol since he’s able to wear a mask almost as if it’s second nature, but he bruises and feels easily. “I feel like you have something specific in mind,” Gyuvin says quietly, and then he hears that his voice is shaking, too.
“The soulmate thing,” comes out of Ricky’s mouth immediately. Shortly afterwards, “Gyuvin, do you know what 心肝 means?”
He mouths it into Ricky’s neck. The sounds are unfamiliar to him. Ricky repeats it once more, and Gyuvin tries his best to mimic the feeling of the word. “Wanna explain it to me?”
Ricky nods and breaks their hug, weaving his hand in and out of Gyuvin’s hair, playing with it carefully. “心肝 translates literally to ‘heart and liver.’ Two of the human body’s necessary organs. Because you can’t function without them, and someone with a 心肝 can’t function without that person.” Ricky reaches for his hand so Gyuvin lifts the one wearing the ring, smiling into his shoulder when Ricky intertwines their fingers. “I want to call you that. I feel like it suits you the most. I don’t know how I feel for you—” Ricky takes a deep breath, “but I know that you are someone I cannot function without.”
“Really,” Gyuvin says: he doesn’t need to ask, because he knows it’s true.
“Really,” Ricky echoes. Then, he lifts up their intertwined hands and studies them for a moment. Gyuvin watches helplessly as Ricky slides the ring off of Gyuvin’s pointer finger, and returns it to his ring finger.
Nothing can leave his lips except for a weak, “oh.”
“It doesn’t have to mean anything. What we say to each other.” Gyuvin believes he’d find it lovely, if he could wrap himself in Ricky’s words forever. His voice is careful and low, quieter than usual. “But I want it to mean something. And I think that…” Ricky’s voice trails off; he threads their fingers together. “心肝, you say things because you mean them too. Everything you say is with purpose.”
He’s still getting used to the idea of Ricky calling him such a thing in secret— he’s fairly certain it won’t take long before he wears it wholly, just like the ring he’d been given. “That’s true,” he agrees, “but if you can piece that together, Ricky, I think maybe you can piece together how I already feel for you.”
“Can I?” Ricky closes his eyes with a smile.
“Yeah, you can.” Gyuvin grins back, and whispers, “Kim Ricky,” because it feels right.
“Shen Kuibin,” he shoots back softly, his eyes still closed, and that feels right, too. Gyuvin soaks in the sight of his being, the image of such an unreal person devoting the unsaid to him. He wraps himself around Ricky and allows his conscience to fall asleep, until the last things he feels are the sound of the other’s heartbeat, and Ricky’s ring around his finger.