Work Text:
“I think we should take a break.”
“Do you truly think that’s what we should do.”
“Yes.”
“...Okay. Let’s take a break.”
—
Perhaps Youngjae was young and naive to think that BAP would last forever. That they’d be able to stay and sing and be all together forever and ever, a happily ever after fairytale end.
But that’s not reality.
Reality is not knowing what to do when their contract to TSENT finally ends. It’s not being able to stay together as a group, it’s questioning if this is even the life he wants to live anymore, it’s being lost and finally free to do what he wants for the first time in years.
Reality is breaking up with the love of his life, Jung Daehyun, the night before his entry into the military because they have been and are so, so good for each other, but are just not right for each other right now. The both of them have a lingering cloud of sadness around them, scarred from all the years of work and tribulation they’ve been through.
Reality is fighting through those years of Daehyun’s service alone, then his own, only to return home with Jongup fighting for an opportunity he grabbed and ran away with for a BAP reunion back to them.
Reality is Youngjae, red-eyed from thinking all night despite knowing his answer, sending “Yes, of course I’m in.” into the group chat, heart hummingbird fast just as the sun breaks out over the horizon, lighting up a new day.
—
Youngjae’s breath catches when Daehyun walks through the door. He’s frozen in his seat for a long moment before he gets up with enough speed that it makes his chair roll further back from the table than it should, almost hitting the windows behind him. His heart stutters in his chest when Daehyun’s face immediately brightens when he sees him and rushes to meet him halfway.
They hold each other for a long moment. Youngjae breathes in Daehyun’s cologne, shuddering at the familiarity of it, before he pulls back when he hears Yongguk make his way towards them. He feels Daehyun’s fingers twitch on his back, before he reluctantly lowers his arms from around Youngjae as he steps back.
“Daehyun-ah!” Yongguk greets Daehyun, his smile bright and gummy.
“Yongguk-hyung,” Daehyun greets back just as warmly, eyes squinting from his grin. They both relax into the hug Daehyun pulls them into, patting each other on the back.
Youngjae goes to sit back down before he does something he regrets, like hug Daehyun again and never let him go.
Not that he regrets hugging him. It’s been a long two years in service and they’re friends. Not just that, but they’re also BAP members – which is basically family. No one knows them as well as they do.
It’s just, he doesn’t know what he wants. Well, he does, but he doesn’t know if that want is still shared between them.
Youngjae, uncertain of what the future held for the both of them, didn’t want to hold Daehyun back from anything: new friends, new opportunities, new relationships. So, he set him free. They needed each other, but they also needed time apart to figure themselves out.
He’s scared. He’s nervous.
He shouldn’t be, but many things have changed. He’s changed. Daehyun has probably changed. Maybe they’re too changed for each other now.
Jongup arrives around fifteen minutes later, a little late as usual.
They tease him as he sits down instead of getting up since cameras are already filming.
It’s both new and familiar as they sit and discuss their upcoming album and comeback. They’re all serious and silly, making jokes and poking fun when the opportunity hits but also know when to calm down and make decisions that are needed to move forward. They come up with a tentative schedule that gets typed up, emailed and printed out for each of them. It makes it seem more real when they can all see the dates lined up in a neat column on paper.
They and their staff naturally enter a moment of silence as they stare down at the schedule in nervous, excited anticipation.
It’s Yongguk who breaks it. He stares up from reading and meets all of their stares before he smiles. It’s his warm and reassuring leader smile; it makes Youngjae’s shoulders relax from where they were creeping up to his ears in tension.
“This album is like the official send off we never got to have. A farewell to those years and a welcome to the years to come,” Yongguk says, putting into words all of their feelings.
“A new beginning,” Daehyun responds softly, looking right at Youngjae. They keep the stare so long that Youngjae has to quickly take a sip of his leftover Americano, watered down by melted ice, choked up from his longing.
—
Youngjae stands, watching the large monitor flash through photograph after photograph in high definition. He feels satisfied at how the photos look, how he looks in them – it was easier than he thought, modeling in front of a camera lens again.
“We look good,” Daehyun says, coming to stand next to him as he watches one of their staff edit their “family photo-esque” concept photos.
Youngjae scoffs jokingly. “We? Please we all know that it’s me, the most handsome guy, that’s carrying all of you in these shots.”
Daehyun turns to stare at him, his eyes moving leisurely down the lines of Youngjae’s body before trailing back up just as slow. His stare makes Youngjae aware of every inch of his body. Youngjae’s stare shifts down to avoid meeting Daehyun’s heated gaze and ends up staring at Daehyun’s lips instead. They’re still pink, still plump, and they still twitch at the sides when he wants to smile. Youngjae wants to kiss him so bad.
Ask me, Youngjae thinks hard enough it could be a prayer. Ask me, ask me . He doesn’t have the courage to ask himself, yet. Please ask me .
Daehyun just continues to smiles at him. He doesn’t ask.
—
The night before their first live stage performance, Youngjae separates himself from the group to go and calm himself down. They’ve gathered in Yongguk-hyung’s apartment so that they can just go and ride to the stage in the early morning together. He ducks into the kitchen and splashes cold water on his face, patting it dry with some paper towel. He gets a glass of water.
He doesn’t know how long he stays there, leaning against the kitchen counter, fiddling with the now empty glass in his hand. He glances up when someone touches his arm and takes the glass from his hand to place in the sink with a muted clink. It’s Jongup.
“What, don’t tell me the great Yoo Youngjae is nervous?”
Youngjae’s mouth opens but he doesn’t know what to say as he closes his empty hands into fists to mask the trembles that shake through them.
“I thought hyung was the most celebrity-like one out of all of us?” Jongup asks, playfully repeating the words Youngjae said to them during their photoshoot as he nudges their shoulders together, supportive.
“Please,” Youngjae scoffs half-heartedly. “Even without practice I am still better at all of this idol stuff than the rest of you.”
“Of course you are, you’re Youngjae-hyung after all,” Jongup says with sincerity, with finality like there’s not even a chance of Youngjae potentially messing up or not being able to live up to their expectations in Jongup’s mind. The shock must show on his face because Jongup moves in front of him to face him.
“Hyung has always been BAP’s biggest fan. Youngjae-hyung is also in BAP. Let us be your fans and cheer you on too, hyung. Fighting!” He says, bringing up his fists in a ‘cheering, you can do it’ manner.
Youngjae is so touched he could cry. Ew.
“Ai-yah,” he says, coming forward to pinch Jongup’s cheeks and coo like one would to a small child. “When did this dongsaeng grow up, hah?”
“Hyung!”
—
Youngjae can’t help but smile when he enters their dressing room. There’s sweat drying on his skin and dampening his clothes. His breathing is slowly going back to normal and he’s in the middle of a performance adrenaline high that he hasn’t felt in years. He can hear Daehyun and Jongup messing around behind him, their high pitched giggles and Yongguk’s fond chuckles throwing him back a decade.
He turns around and leans back against his makeup chair, smile widening into a grin as he watches his group members.
He thinks back to when they were all platinum blond - Blond Asian People hehe - shrieking and screeching at each other in older dressings rooms, remembers Daehyun practicing his singing obnoxiously loud, remembers the adrenaline of performing and the lingering exhaustion of it all, knowing they’d do it all over again the next day and the day after that. Many things have changed since their debut, but seeing Yongguk’s smile and Jongup’s confusion and hearing Daehyun’s loud voice remind him that there are still some things, some people that don’t change.
Youngjae starts laughing, relieved and exhilarated, joy overflowing inside of him and nowhere else to go but out. The others turn to look at him, faces brightening before they fall into shocked urgency as they rush their way towards him.
Daehyun is at his side at once, warm hands cradling Youngjae’s face gently, like he’s something precious. “Youngjae,” he murmurs, thumbs brushing the wetness from his eyes.
Oh , Youngjae thinks. I’m crying .
Once he realizes, he can’t stop. His laughter turns into hiccuping sobs he can’t muffle. He presses forward into Daehyun’s shoulder, hands gripping the front of his shirt and holding Daehyun to him. Daehyun immediately embraces him close, his cheek against Youngjae’s head.
He feels Yongguk-hyung’s hand, strong and steady, cup the back of his neck; he feels Jongup’s hand, supportive, on one of his shoulders.
“I’m sorry,” he manages to gasp out, “I don’t know why I’m crying - I’m just so happy! And-,” he cuts himself off to press closer to Daehyun.
When he feels more collected, Youngjae slowly lifts his head from Daehyun’s shoulder, still sniffling a little. Daehyun cranes his head closer to look at him, brown eyes still just as warm and welcoming as all those years ago.
“There’s my baby,” he murmurs, a smile breaking out over his face again, the dawn breaking over the horizon.
Youngjae can feel when they both realize what Daehyun has said when his own heart skips a beat and he genuinely blushes, flustered for the first time in years, Daehyun’s eyes wide and shocked, frozen still against him.
“We’ll go and check out how to do these Tik Toks,” Yongguk-hyung says after a moment, glancing between the two of them. He steers Jongup, already grinning and typing maniacally into his phone, to the exit, closing the door behind them.
After a moment, Daehyun shifts and starts to pull back. Youngjae stops him by tightening his hands on his shirt to keep him close. Daehyun’s hands hover centimeters from his waist; Youngjae can feel the heat of them through his clothes.
“I’m sorry if I overstepped, I-”
“No, you didn’t,” Youngjae interrupts him. “I…”
It is very rare that Youngjae cries, much less becomes speechless and here he is, two for two all within the past hour. Great.
The history between them makes it both the easiest thing in the world to talk to each other and also the hardest.
How do you say I missed you calling me that and Please call me that again and I miss you and I love you.
After all this time, after growing together and growing individually apart it’s still Daehyun for Youngjae. It’s been him, it’ll always be him. Surely, they can pick up from where they left off. Surely they can start again, right?
Youngjae looks back at Daehyun and sees the same question in his eyes.
Daehyun reaches a hand out, slow and tentative, likely still remembering when they had mutually broken up before his military service and Youngjae hadn’t reached back to him before they both departed.
That’s always been one of Youngjae’s biggest ‘what-ifs’ that he liked to think about when he couldn’t sleep in the military. He knows himself to know that if he had taken Daehyun’s hand back then, he would have cried and crumbled and pleaded to stay together even if it wasn’t the best thing for them at the time. And Daehyun? Sweet, caring, heart on his sleeve Daehyun would have given in and accepted Youngjae back the second Youngjae reached his hand back out to grasp his.
Youngjae thinks of how cold he was when he left Daehyun’s apartment that night.
He thinks of the fear of the first lawsuit, how tired he was. how they all were at the end of their contracts.
He thinks of his own lonely military service and warm, loud laughter that echoes in his memory.
He thinks of Jongup’s persistence at gathering them together, of Junhong’s excitement, calling them whenever he has a spare moment, of Yongguk-hyung’s sheepish smile when he reveals the tracks he wrote and has been writing just for them.
He thinks of their Babyz waving their lightsticks from a decade ago, bright green beacons in a dark sea, their voices loud and happy and grateful, screaming fanchants at full volume.
He thinks of all the cold years leading up to today. What was a large gaping hole of black has faded into a dark gray, gradually becoming lighter. He says thank you to it. He says goodbye.
He looks back up from Daehyun’s hand to meet his stare again. He thinks of warm, shared coffee, a familiar scarf wrapped around his neck in winter, thinks of smiling so hard his cheeks ache and his eyes squint close. He thinks of love.
This time, Youngjae’s hand reaches back out and holds on.
OMAKE:
(later, in some kbbq restaurant after daejae tell jongup and yongguk they’ve decided to give their relationship a go again)
jongup: wait….you guys broke up?
daejae: ….
jongup: with the way you two act nobody could tell
yongguk: *just smiling in the corner as he eats surrounded by his family, moving his head to the side automatically to avoid errant pieces of flying food when the kids start bickering, making a note to text junhong updates later*