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Sunlight flows softly through a crack in the curtains and pools into Jihyun’s dozing mind, unusually quiet from falling asleep wrapped protectively around his boyfriend. As he drifts into consciousness, face still tucked over Jaewon's shoulder, arms snaking around his boyfriend’s waist and hands clutching the sweater he wore to bed, Jihyun hums softly in contentment. Jaewon’s sleep mustn't have been disturbed by any nightmares, or they wouldn’t be wrapped up together the way they dozed off.
Pressing impossibility closer, Jihyun gently nuzzles the nape of his neck, glad his boyfriend had some temporary peace through the night.
Sometimes he selfishly wished that they could stay like this forever. Jihyun wanted to squirrel Jaewon away somewhere he knew he was safe and peaceful, and keep him tucked in his arms until the sun collapsed in on itself.
It was an unreasonable thought, and Jihyun always scolded himself for thinking so hysterically. The idea that he would be trapping Jaewon by doing so, when his boyfriend had already spent his life bending to the will of the people around him, rises to the back of Jihyun’s throat like bile.
Soft movements from Jaewon signalling he was waking up abruptly snap Jihyun from the state of mild terror at his own impulses to focus back onto the real, steady warmth of the boy curled in on himself in Jihyun’s arms.
Every time, he was overwhelmed by how open and delicate and vulnerable Jaewon was willing to be around him. It seemed to have happened slowly, like a flower unfurling its petals towards the sun’s lifeforce, movements minute and unnoticeable until one day you’re suddenly forced to reckon with its full bloom.
Overcome with the force of affection rushing through his blood, fueling his heart and lungs and limbs with love, turning his very being into a vehicle for adoration, Jihyun found himself pressing gentle kisses to Jaewon’s neck as he woke up. I love you I love you I love you.
“Mmhmf… Jihyun-ah”
He laughs softly, before freeing a hand from around Jaewon’s waist to gently fiddle with his boyfriend’s bed head.
“Good morning to you too.”
He feels him let out a soft sigh, and suddenly finds himself strangely imbued with gratitude for the fragile gift of being able to feel something as fundamental as breath in another person. To feel how a body shifts with the force of a life.
Leveraging the loosened grip around him, Jaewon maneuvers in bed until they’re facing each other.
Jihyun wonders how many times he could have the same epiphany.
His hyung looks soft, eyes hooded with sleep instead of unnaturally wide and glazed over in panic; unseeing like last night. It had been his worst panic attack in a while.
Jaewon was always pretty vague when talking about his family for reasons Jihyun understood, but recently he had sensed more tension in-between everything his boyfriend didn’t say about his home life.
Last night an already taut string seemed to have snapped.
He manages to coax a soft chuckle from his hyung when he drowsily rubs their noses together. Casual closeness like this always felt more intimate than kissing to Jihyun, and his stomach writhes in quiet joy that he gets to have it. Drawing away slightly so he can properly look him in the eyes, Jihyun asks “Are you okay?” in a whisper, like he’s back in the valley where he grew up, standing waist-deep in a lake and challenging himself to keep the water as still as possible before his sister inevitably threw herself in and ruined his game.
A soft sigh. Then, “I don’t know.”
Jaewon had slipped further down on the pillow, so his head tilts slightly now to look up at him. It makes him seem more vulnerable somehow.
Jihyun’s heart clenches again at the unmoored look in his eyes and softly presses a kiss to his forehead, fingers continuing to fiddle with his hyung’s hair.
“You don’t need to be okay, you know? Not for my sake, or anyone’s. It’s alright to feel shitty from something objectively awful.” Jihyun murmurs, smoothing out some more bed head, and gets a noncommittal noise in response before the arms wrapped around him tighten.
He feels, more than hears what Jaewon says next from where he’s pressed his face into his shirt, the vibrations of his voice resonating through his body.
“S’ your birthday though. Don’t want it to be ruined just ‘cause I can’t control my own emotions.”
He shifts back a bit to dislodge Jaewon from his cocoon so that he can see his face again.
“Who told you it would ruin my birthday, hm?” Jihyun hums in gentle question, before tangling their legs together more securely and continuing.
“I’m not-” He begins, frustrated at how little vocabulary he seems to have for his own thoughts. “There are no unspoken rules I’m expecting you to follow. I care about you, and want you to feel that you don’t have to hide anything from me. Even the ugly things.”
He brings his hands to cup Jaewon’s face, and sighs before briefly looking up at the ceiling, turning over phrasing in his mind to say this right.
When they regain eye contact, his boyfriend is looking up at him in that painfully vulnerable and open way again.
Jihyun swallows back a broken noise, and quickly puts his mind back on track.
“Honestly, I’m grateful you feel so comfortable around me to show me this. You’re never making my day worse by letting yourself feel your feelings…. ‘Don’t want you to feel like you have to perform around me sweetheart. I’m already so lucky to have you here. Just exist with me today. That would be a present enough for me. You’re enough.”
Jaewon hums thoughtfully and shuffles up in bed until their eyes are level before pressing his forehead to Jihyun’s and closing his eyes. He sighs softly through his nose. “I did get you something, though.”
Jihyun sits up onto his elbows to look down at his hyung, gently dislodging him.
“Yeah?” he says in a shaky breath.
Jaewon has rolled onto his back to look up at him. He nods.
“You didn’t have to do that.”
His boyfriend scrunches his face into an exaggerated thinking expression, like Jihyun had just said something that already existed unspoken between them, and he didn't actually need to think about it all all. He’s being teased, but the relief Jihyun feels at Jaewon not needing the reassurance at this point trumps any indignant emotion.
“I know. I just found something that reminded me of you.”
He sits up to place a sleepy kiss to Jihyun’s forehead before extracting himself from the covers with similarly sleep-heavy limbs and moving himself over Jihyun to the floor to fish something out of his bag. Jihyun had managed to get a bigger bed for his second year apartment, but it was still pressed against the wall to make use of the space, so one of them was always trying to inelegantly clamber over the other when Jaewon was staying with him. He feels giddy with the routine of it and wriggles his legs under the covers, suddenly overwhelmed with happiness, with no say in how his body chooses to react.
After a few seconds, Jaewon slides back onto the bed and settles with his legs crossed in front of Jihyun, setting a wrapped present in front of him. Jihyun inhales so fast in surprise he lets out a deeply embarrassing squeak.
His hyung is looking at him with a smile on his face like he suspected this would be his reaction and is at least the tiniest bit pleased with himself. Good. Jihyun thinks, a little hysterically. He deserves to be after this.
Naturally, the paper Jaewon chose to use is only covered in a devastatingly sweet assortment of cute little baby animal designs. Because of course.
Oh, this mortal coil.
Being that he is only a mortal man, Jihyun’s second reaction to this is to promptly flop sideways onto the bed, cheek smushed against the duvet. Jaewon huffs in amusement above him.
“Are you alright love?”
He flushes slightly at the endearment before meeting his boyfriend's eyes again, and if Jihyun was still sitting up, he suspects he would have keeled over by now anyway at the look on Jaewon’s face. Just… unfiltered adoration. His smile has grown impossibly tender and his eyes are slightly hooded, looking down at him in a way that reminds Jihyun of a pleased cat. His stomach writhes for a second in delight at that image, before remembering the reason Jaewon looks that way in the first place.
Oh yes, he’s fine. Positively elated, in fact, if he wasn’t humiliated at how they’ve known each other for just over a year and already Jaewon has him and what he likes completely pinned. He swallows and heaves himself back up to a seat.
“I’m- I’m fucking great. Honestly.” He meets Jaewon’s eyes but he’s still looking at him like that so he averts his gaze back to the gift, overwhelmed.
“It’s just…” He groans and hides his face in his hands. “I find it a little embarrassing that you knew I’d like this” A warm hand encircles his wrist and another rests on his knee, just holding him there, thumb carefully rubbing soft circles into the fabric of his sweatpants. Once he scrapes enough brain cells together to look his hyung in the eyes again, he finds that they’re almost nose to nose from how close Jaewon has shuffled towards him. He thinks he must look like an idiot, blinking wide-eyed from the sudden proximity.
Exhaling in amusement, Jaewon softly bonks his head against his shoulder. Hyung, so tactile he thinks fondly, reminded that he has a cat boy for a boyfriend. He brings his hand to the back of his boyfriend’s head to hold him there while he breathes against him, before Jaewon pulls away, pressing a soft kiss to his lips as he sits up again, noses brushing. Jihyun keeps his hand where it is to hold Jaewon close and to absently fiddle with his hair. He’s been growing it a bit longer and Jihyun enjoys the gentle stimulation.
Their knees are brushing slightly and sunlight jolts through him at the subtle touch.
“What’s there to be embarrassed about? Hm?” When they’re this close he can feel his breath on his face and he shudders slightly.
“You read me like a fucking book hyung…” Jihyun says, pointedly looking down at where their knees are touching. He knows he sounds petulant but it seems to only delight his boyfriend more.
“I don't know. I think I feel really vulnerable. About how you’ve found something I try to hide about myself. I'm not used to people being so nice about my weird, so. Yeah. It scares me a bit.”
Jaewon’s hand comes to his cheek, large and warm. He’s making an expression Jihyun can't name, so he just leans into the touch and closes his eyes.
“Like how you figured out I was gay and also super into you I guess. You're good at spotting shit that I make an effort not to show people ”
“Jihyun-ah…”
Jihyun opens his eyes again and his hyung’s eyebrows are furrowed in concern.
This won't do.
He moves his hands to hold the other man’s face in return, a smile playing on his lips.
“I don't mean that in a bad way. Promise. You make me feel so safe.”
Jaewon now looks recognisably devastated, though Jihyun can’t tell if it’s in a good or bad way so, “Are you alright?”
His hyung blinks slowly before shuffling closer and pressing their foreheads together again, fingers combing through his hair. Jihyun lets out a content little sigh.
“Jihyun-ah. You know I love you. I love all the things about you that feel embarrassing.”
He feels sunlight beaming out through his ribs, the tips of his fingers tingling with it.
“And I- I don’t want you to ever think that I look down on you, or that I think you’re childish.”
Jihyun huffs a soft laugh, feeling a little like his chest was torn open and his racing rabbit heart now sat exposed and vulnerable through his ribs to the man in front of him.
“Not weird though hyung?”
“Well, you are weird. But I love your weird.” He pulls back to properly look Jihyun in the eye.
“You’re only ever just yourself. And I love that you feel comfortable enough around me to be weird.”
Jihyun definitely didn’t feel liable to burst into tears at any second now. Certainly not.
“Ah.” He rubs his eyes with his hands and blinks furiously as Jaewon wipes a few stray tears away with his thumbs, making him feel like he’s entirely translucent.
Jihyun doesn’t know what to do with his body when he cries. He hates how stupid it makes him feel. God, I’m making a fool of myself.
Jaewon ducks his head to catch his gaze, now focused back on their legs.
“Hey. You don’t get to beat yourself up for crying if I don’t.” Jihyun makes bleary eye-contact and before he can get the next word out, his hyung interrupts him.
“And you’re not allowed to apologise either. I know crying makes you feel vulnerable. But it’s always, always alright. I’ll never judge you”
He smiles softly again before untangling Jihyun’s hands from where he was wringing them in his lap and brings them to his lips to press light kisses to the backs of his hands and his fingers.
Jihyun makes a very broken, animal noise at his hyung’s attention. It feels excruciating, being so fundamentally seen for who he is and to also be consciously loved and held though it.
“Come on.” Jaewon releases his hands to press the present into them instead. “I want you to see what I got you.”
Jihyun furiously wipes his eyes again and brings his attention back to the doggies who could never know the emotion they’d just ripped out of him.
Pulling gently at the sellotape so as to damage the wrapping paper as little as possible, he opens the neat little parcel to find a small, brown rabbit plush, sitting in the middle of the paper like the brown pit of a white peach. He can't help his delight at the sight of it, and has to shake his head sharply a few times to stop the joy building up in his body. Something tells him he’ll explode if he lets the pressure increase too much.
Jaewon gazes at him with an incredibly sappy look on his face, before launching into an explanation.
“Ah, so. Remember a few months ago you were struggling really badly with sensory stuff and getting overwhelmed really quickly whenever you'd go out?”
Jihyun's eyes widen in surprise. He nods. Some of those days he could barely leave the house, and forced Joonpyo to live in the dark with all the blinds and curtains drawn.
His memories from then are similarly murky, and faded around the edges like an old photograph.
The culmination of almost a month of avoiding people and being quick to overwhelm was him shutting down waiting for his professor in a class that seemed incapable of shutting up, nails digging into his palms and calf repeatedly hitting the leg of his chair, desperately looking for another pain to focus on that wasn’t that of a world and peers he couldn’t control.
He ended up forgoing class completely to huddle outside on a quiet part of campus to text Jaewon through tears if he could take him home.
“Well, um. You mentioned how hard it was to find something to ground yourself when your brain’s feeling so scattered and overwhelmed already?” Jaewon taps the bunny softly on the head as it now sits in Jihyun’s lap.
“He's a really good size, like… solid to hold in your hands but you can also carry him around.”
His poor, slow mind is working overtime to keep up with everything his hyung is saying. Jihyun doesn’t think anyone’s ever paid so much attention to how he’s feeling without having to be told before. Junpyo, for all he seems to be incapable of taking things seriously, knows when to listen and is attentive in his own way, but struggles to understand the more anxiously wired parts of Jihyun.
His boyfriend is finishing his meandering explanation, and Jihyun absently tracks his hand gestures in a daze to give his eyes something else to do other than look directly down the proverbial barrel of the proverbial gun that are the eyes of the man in front of him.
“He's also really soft… so. Yeah. Made me think of you.”
Jihyun quickly blinks tears out of his eyes for the second time this morning.
“Hyung. I'm seriously about to start crying again, you know.”
Jaewon blinks slowly, affectionately at him. (Kitty!!) He looks a little scattered.
Beaming, Jihyun good-naturedly rolls his eyes before throwing his arms around his hyung’s neck and pulling him closer so his gaze naturally falls to Jaewon’s lips. He hears him make a soft startled noise, but his hands still instinctively go to rest on his waist, which is good because that's where they should be and where they definitely feel Jihyun shiver a little at the touch.
“I love them. I love you.” He finds that the atmosphere demands he speak in a hushed voice, like he would in the little church in his hometown. With a kind of religious deference.
Jaewon smiles, eyes moving to his lips and before he knows it, he’s being kissed.
Sunlight grazes the roof of his mouth and Jihyun lets himself submit to the heat, over and over again.
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