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It was quiet in the van on the way home – but not the bad kind of quiet, the kind of quiet that usually meant one of them had managed to piss the other one off – but a good, comfortable kind of quiet. The kind of quiet that followed a few drinks, some food, and enough being “on” for the cameras to leave them both happily languishing in silence. Donghyuck looked at Mark’s sleeping reflection in his window, sneaking a peek that probably wouldn’t get him caught, wondering how he could think Mark was cute after all these years. He supposed it probably meant that it was true love if he could still find charm in Mark’s smile when he had been the object of his frown more often than not, if he could know all of Mark’s ins and outs, his quirks and his qualms, and still find himself wanting to know more.
“You’re staring.”
Busted, Donghyuck stuck out his tongue, refusing to feel cowed out of enjoying his creep show when Mark’s reflection rolled his eyes and laughed at him. Donghyuk gave him a lazy smile in return, shifting in his seat to meet the real Mark head-on. “You look so ridiculous when you’re asleep, how could I not?”
“I don’t look irresistible any more?” Mark blinked at him sleepily, rubbing his face, as rumpled and adorable as he had when they were sixteen and Donghyuk couldn’t decide if wanted to pinch or punch his cheeks.
“Did you ever?” Donghyuck reached over and pulled on Mark’s earlobe, amused when Mark didn’t swat him away, yawning loudly instead and giving Donghyuck what passed for a sly smile on his cute dumb dog face.
“I must have. I must have been real cute if you couldn’t control yourself back then.”
Donghyuck stifled a laugh at how proud Mark was of making such an obvious point and tugged on his ear again, secretly pleased that Mark would want to make bad jokes about the kiss and Donghyuck’s once and still legendary desire for any of Mark’s attention – positive, negative, or otherwise. It was cute, really, that Mark thought he could use it against him, as if he suspected Donghyuck had any shame left to feel when it came to him, when it came to them.
“Couldn’t control my desire to drive you crazy, maybe,” Donghyuck teased, liking the way Mark’s expression crumpled just a little. “Ah, baby,” he cooed, letting his hand cup Mark’s jaw, “do you want me to tell you that I find you irresistible?”
Mark’s jaw worked beneath his palm, the beginnings of stubble rough on his fingertips as he dug them into Mark’s cheek. “Maybe,” Mark said, aiming for casual and missing by a Canadian kilometer because if there was one thing neither of them were, it was particularly subtle about anything, ever. Donghyuck’s eyebrows crept up his forehead in disbelief at what he was hearing, but his traitorous heart skipped a beat. “Maybe I do,” Mark said again, swallowing hard.
Donghyuck was grateful to the darkness of the car interior for hiding his blush and for the presence of their long suffering manager for keeping him from doing or saying anything stupid enough to get them both in the kind of trouble he caused when they were teenagers. “Well, then maybe you should try a little harder to be cute for me,” Donghyuck said, hoping that his attempt at sounding playful was a lot more convincing than Mark’s. “You’re not giving me much worth resisting these days.” He sighed dramatically and put his greedy hands back in his lap before he took advantage of Mark’s surprising tolerance for touch. “It’s like the spark has gone out of our marriage.”
“Back then, apparently all I had to do was lie around on a flat surface for you to lose your mind over me,” Mark complained, pouting in a way that was very becoming and made Donghyuck want to put his hands back on Mark’s face and squish his cheeks until his lips poked out even further.
“It lacks style, but you’re welcome to try that approach again and see if it works.” Donghyuck leered at him, pursing his lips in an entirely different shape than Mark’s pretty pout. “That is if you want me to kiss you so badly,” Donghyuck teased, fully expecting Mark to back down the moment he actually said the K word when it wasn’t for the cameras, to take the next step in their familiar push-pull dance by pushing Donghyuck away.
Mark just stared at him for a long moment, his expression stubborn and set, like he was gearing up for a fight. Donghyuck braced himself for the usual rejection, only to have a bomb set-off in his chest when Mark looked him dead in the and said, “Maybe I will.”
Donghyuck stared back, his heart beating hard enough that he could barely hear his own thoughts over the rush of blood in his years. Mark smirked at him as if he had just challenged Donghyuck to a game of cards rather than implying that he wanted to drive Donghyuck to kiss-inducing distraction.
“You do that, Mark Lee,” Donghyuck said, proud of the way his voice didn’t shake as he closed his eyes and pretended he was sleeping and not trying to parse each nuance of what Mark had said and how he had looked when he was saying it. Mark made a little noise next to him, one that could have meant goodnight or one that could have meant I just tricked you into playing another round of gay chicken with me.
Donghyuck ignored him, concentrating on the awful racing of his heart and trying to rein in his wild imagination, the one that already had him halfway in Mark Lee’s bed and Mark Lee’s arms just because dumbass Mark Lee had consumed one too many beers and decided to try his hand at being a flirt. He didn’t want to get his hopes up, not when he had spent years trying to school his affections into something that Mark would tolerate and even appreciate, not when things were good between them, good enough that Mark would allow the deep dark secret of Donghyuck’s stolen kiss to be revealed as if it were all a funny joke.
Mark knocked his foot against Donghyuck’s, clearly wanting more attention, but Donghyuck only looked at the back of his eyelids and told himself that he was older and wiser and maybe even a little better and that this time there was nothing that Mark could do to make him lose his precious, hard earned control.
~~
In the days that followed, Mark was inescapable. Or even more inescapable than he usually was in the run up to concerts, ever present and increasingly annoying, availing himself of any flat surface as if laying down and feigning sleep had become his second career. Two days of catching Mark lying on the floor in the practice room, Mark lying on the couch in the studio, Mark lying on whatever carpet happened to be closest to Donghyuck’s feet was enough to leave Donghyuck feeling itchy with irritation and yearning. By the third day, his skin was crawling with the need to do something to wipe off that twitchy little smile that Mark got whenever he thought he was being awfully clever. He had to give Mark some limited credit for his dedication to the bit, even if he wasn’t sure how much he appreciated being on the receiving end of Mark’s competitive streak, how much he wanted the choices of his checkered past used to taunt him day in and day out.
(And if he still found Mark’s fake-sleeping face cute, cute enough to make him want to give in and go over and give Mark what he wanted and make a fool of himself, well, that was neither here nor there).
He was granted a temporary reprieve from Mark’s antics thanks to the kind of soul-crushing exhaustion that followed in the wake of three stadium concerts, but it only lasted as long as it took for him to recover his typical boundless energy. Only days after their final curtain call in Seoul, Mark picked right up where he had left off, all supine and tempting and ridiculously annoying everywhere that Donghyuck went, so obvious in his provocation that the members had started doing the same, thinking that it was a fun new way to drive Donghyuck (more) insane.
He could feel his patience peeling away layer by layer with each attempt to make him cave, to bend to Mark’s will and lose at his little game. After two weeks of ignoring Mark’s pretty, petty attempts and stepping over giggling members who apparently shared a single brain cell, Donghyuck decided he could no longer pretend to be above it all. Unlike Mark, he was capable of some actual strategy, biding his time until all of the members had grown bored of trying to goad him into losing his shit and wandered off to cause chaos in some other corner of the universe. He waited until Mark assumed his now usual position on the studio floor, beads of sweat still beading down his throat and down the loose collar of his shirt as he put his hands behind his head, gave Donghyuck a not at all subtle look, and then closed his eyes, that damningly cute smile dancing on his lips.
Donghyuck took his time, even though patience wasn’t something he came by in spades, sauntering over just loudly enough that Mark had to know he was coming. As he came closer and he closer, he felt like he was going back in time, back to the days when he had been a besotted teenager who didn’t know what to do with all of those awful feelings for someone he wasn’t sure if he loved or hated, taking out his frustrations on the object of his affection. What was different this go around, other than the way his knees ached just a little as he sank down next to Mark, was the way Mark’s cheeks turned even redder, the way Donghyuck could see his hands curl into fists by his side.
The hopeless romantic in him wanted to chalk it up to anticipation of what was to come, but the hard won realist in him knew better than to give into the loud voice in his head stupidly chanting kiss him kiss him, he's practically begging for you to kiss him . He kicked his hopeless romantic to the curb, allowing his inner demon to take full control, knowing it was for the best if he didn't want to end up holding the short of the stick yet again.
“Did you want something from me?” Donghyuck asked, slipping into the cutesy tone that Mark usually insisted wasn’t cute at all. He watched as Mark’s lips parted, no doubt ready to declare victory and mock Donghyuck for making the same mistakes when it came to him all over again. He shook off the tangled mess of hope and hurt that seemed to follow Donghyuck everywhere that Mark went. He dipped down close enough to feel the warmth of Mark’s breath on his cheek as he murmured, “You do seem a little thirsty, hyung.”
Just as Mark’s pretty eyes fluttered open, Donghyuck dumped a bottle of water on Mark’s annoyingly handsome, delightfully shocked face and quickly ran out of the room, shouting, “I hope that cools you off,” over the sound of Mark’s spluttering, defeated curses.
To his surprise, Donghyuck’s cold shower actually worked, with Mark seemingly giving up, his body no longer plastered to every available horizontal surface. But nothing at all was back to normal, as Mark had apparently decided that it was time to torture Donghyuck with his pouty face and petty ways, staring at him across every room Donghyuck dared to occupy. Donghyuck chalked it up to Mark being a sore loser, disappointed that Donghyuck had bested him at his silly little game. Donghyuck just stared back, sticking out his tongue or mouthing what , and just once, because he couldn’t help himself, blowing Mark a kiss, which Mark caught and put in his pocket. This effectively ended Donghyuck’s counter campaign, leaving him too shocked to keep fighting back because Mark had never wanted to keep a kiss from him before.
After Donghyuck ceded victory to Mark in their staring contest, Mark approached something close to normal, if normal also included clinging to Donghyuck when Mark Lee supposedly didn't do clinging. At least not with him. At least not this often and with this much…touching. Donghyuck had to hand it to Mark for upping his game, for finding new and creative ways to carve away at Donghyuck’s sanity. By the end of the third week, when Mark had started up with the whole pretending to sleep wherever Donghyuck could see him shtick, he was close enough to caving and just telling Mark that he could brag all he wanted, that he had proven that Donghyuck still maybe had a crush on him and that he had no self control. Instead, he ignored Mark’s offended pout and sad-dog eyes and ran away, choosing to preserve the one shred of dignity he had left, trying as long as he could to hang on for dear life, even if it killed him to do it.
He managed to survive through avoidance for a little while longer, dodging Mark’s prone body or Mark’s increasingly attentive gaze long enough to find himself blessedly alone in the recording studio. He felt protected enough by the late, late hour and the closed door to shut his eyes and give into his emotional exhaustion and allow himself to regret having ever told the story of teenage frenemies and stolen kisses. Mark was clearly still trying to punish him for it. He couldn’t take much more of Mark’s pouting when Donghyuck ran away from the curl of arms around his waist or the way he huffed in frustration every time Donghyuck stepped over his “sleeping” form or the way he kept looking at Donghyuck like Donghyuck hadn’t given the right answer to whatever Mark was trying to ask him.
It was maddening. His heart was tired from racing and his feelings were frayed from being tugged back and forth between smitten and outraged at least twenty times a day. Something had to give, and much as it pained him to do so, Donghyuck knew it was going to have to be him.
He was half asleep when he heard the door creak open and more than awake when he recognized the scent of Mark’s cologne, even as faded as it was at this time of day, worn away by time. Donghyuck kept his eyes closed, not wanting to give Mark the satisfaction when he took a deep breath and finally, finally threw in the towel.
“Enough already!” Donghyuck kicked out blindly, hoping that his foot would hit Mark’s shin. “Whatever it is you want from me, you can have it. Just no more of this game you’ve been playing. I’m bored! So you win! Good for you!”
Mark, forever lacking in enough intelligence to have any self-preservation, ignored the shrill edge in Donghyuck’s voice and came right next to his chair, invading his personal space and what remained of his sanity. He was so close, so horribly close, that Donghyuck could smell toothpaste on his breath, which was just weird given that it was 1:27am and he was nowhere near home.
“I haven’t won anything yet,” Mark said, sounding weirdly confident and nervous at the same time, the way he used to just before a big show.
“What’s going on with you?” Donghyuck cracked open one eye with a sigh, swallowing when he found Mark staring right at him, one hand braced on the arm of Donghyuck’s chair and the other coming to land just above his shoulder. “Hyung,” Donghyuck murmured, both eyes now wide open, “aren’t you taking this a little too far?”
Donghyuck couldn’t look away, not quite believing that he was seeing his own lovesick, stupidly down bad expression reflected back at him. He had never thought that Mark would look at him the way that Donghyuck had spent years looking and then trying not to look at Mark.
“I’m sorry. I can’t control myself,” Mark said, and for the first time, Donghyuck dared to dream that maybe Mark hadn’t been messing with him at all, that maybe he had been playing an entirely different game with him all along.
Donghyuck sucked in a deep breath and tipped his chin up, his palms sweaty in his lap and his heart in his throat as he asked, “Do you mean that?” Mark smiled at him, slow and sweet, nodding and dipping down further, causing Donghyuck’s brain to short out, that last shred of dignity and sanity finally snapping in two. Donghyuck yelped and pushed a damp palm over Mark’s lips, his own mouth too busy spilling out years worth of worries to be available to be so thoughtlessly kissed. “Because I swear to god, Mark Lee, if you close the distance between us right now and then push me away tomorrow, I’ll never forgive you.”
Mark attempted to speak, his answer lost to the smush of Donghyuck’s palm. He raised his eyebrows and looked at Donghyuck until Donghyuck did what he did best when it came to Mark and relented, letting him go. Mark watched with fond amusement as Donghyuck ostentatiously wiped his hand on Mark’s shirt and stared back at him with an expectant pout. “I won’t,” was all Mark said, and it sounded enough like a promise that Donghyuck wanted to believe him, wanted to believe that this wasn’t another misstep or weird turn in some game Donghyuck didn’t know they were playing.
“You better be sure,” Donghyuck said, turning his head when Mark moved to kiss him again, his voice starting to shake a little, his eyes stinging with embarrassing wetness. “If you kiss me now, I won’t have any more control when it comes to you.”
Mark kissed his forehead, his lips soft and impossibly sweet. “Did you have any to begin with?”
Donghyuck laughed, despite knowing that it sounded thick with emotion, giving him away as surely as letting Mark see his teary eyes would have been. “Oh, I’ll be so much worse. You have no idea.” He turned his face back to Mark, blinking when Mark ran his thumb under his left eye and rubbed the tears into his skin. “I’ll kiss you and touch you and nag you all the time,” Donghyuck warned him, sucking back his tears and biting down on a disbelieving smile. “I’ll kiss you twice for all the times you didn’t let me before. I’ll want to sleep in your bed and cook you breakfast in your kitchen and hold your hand and call you baby instead of hyung in front of everyone and you’ll just have to put up with it!” Mark’s eyes were as wide as the moon, but his smile was still soft, his thumb still drawing little circles on Donghyuck’s cheek. Donghyuck sighed and threatened, “I’ll follow you around and make you tell me that I’m cute and that you love me and I will never ever let you go to sleep without me telling you the same. That I love you. Like a lot. Uncontrollably.”
Mark shook his head and murmured a single word. “Damn.”
“That’s right.” Donghyuck put his hand on Mark’s waist, daring to hold him, just a little, just enough to be able to have the strength to say, “Damn.”
“All of that?” Mark asked, leaning down until there was nothing left but breath between their lips. “Because of one kiss?”
Donghyuck looked at him with all the hope and expectation he had tried to get rid of for years, with the yearning he had felt at fourteen and the love he felt now as he stood on the edge of something entirely new and different. He closed his eyes and promised, “If you kiss me, it won’t end with just a kiss.”
“Yeah?” Mark’s lips touched the corner of Donghyuck’s mouth, his palm gentle on Donghyuck’s cheek, holding him close. “Then where will it end?”
Donghyuck turned just enough to meet Mark halfway, finding their way to one another just in time as they always had, Mark’s mouth closing over his own in their second first kiss. Donghyuck stayed still for a single second, long enough to let the reality of kissing Mark supersede the thousand daydreams and fantasies he had built up since he was old enough to know that he loved Mark more than he should. He let the feeling of Mark’s lips and the sound he made when Donghyuck kissed him with a little bit of tongue and teeth erase the sting of every rejection, the sweetness of Mark’s fingers cradling his jaw and warmth of his kiss making up for years of lost time.
“It won’t,” Donghyuck murmured, kissing the corner of Mark’s eyes and the tip of his nose, fully intending to make good on every last one of his threats for as long as Mark would let him. “You should know that by now, baby,” Donghyuck said, new dreams starting to take hold as Mark kissed him again and again, not letting him breathe, not letting him finish his thought. “You and me,” Donghyuck gasped out between kisses, determined to get the last word, to win at least this last round of their game, “We’re in this for life.”