Chapter Text
“Again - from pre-chorus.”
Several groans echo around the practice room, Jisung among them. It’s the fourth time they’ve practiced this exact section, but Minho was having them go until it was perfect. Jisung couldn’t blame him, really; they had a huge music show stage in just three weeks and the song definitely needed some work. Not many big corrections, just a few timing issues.
The music runs again. Something tight is brewing in Jisung’s chest, but he disregards it. He’s comfortable with the feeling now, the way his body warns him of its restrictions.
“Jisung! You’re late.” Minho stops dancing and moves to the back of the room to pause the music. He squints at the younger boy, but there’s no malice in his demeanor. Hyunjin and Changbin back away from Jisung, knowing what’s coming.
Minho rewinds the music.
“Sungie, try this part on your own,” he says calmly. “You need to pick your feet up faster at the opening.”
Jisung nods, because he doesn’t trust himself to speak. He thinks he’d start coughing if he did, and that wouldn’t be good. It’s not even his fault, really - they were supposed to get a break forty five minutes ago.
It’s fine.
He grits his teeth and forces his mind to latch to the rhythm of the choreography rather than the erratic pounding of his heart. This time, Jisung’s steps line up perfectly, and his moves mirror the beats. When the song winds down, Minho nods approvingly. “Ah, what was the problem before?” he asks jokingly. “Just do it like that one last time with all of us, and we can take a break.”
Jisung hums in reply, hoping that they’ll actually rest this time round. When the music begins, he puts more focus into the run through than he has the last past four hours of practice; makes sure it’s perfect .
It pulls through, and Chan smiles at them all warmly when they finish. Jisung can only exhale a shaky sigh of relief while the others head to grab water.
He speeds over to his bag, digging through to the bottom until his hand meets familiar plastic; the small, hard object is immediately stuffed into the thick pocket of his sweatpants. Jisung almost trips as he stumbles to the door, abruptly spinning around when he hears his name.
“Sungie?” Felix says, looking up from his phone. The younger’s nose scrunches up in question, and Jisung realizes he must look a little frantic.
“Bathroom, Lix!” He says with a stuffy laugh, itching to turn on his heel and run from the room. “I’ve been needing to go for a while.”
Felix tilts his head for a moment before nodding at the answer, turning back to the device in his hands. He accepts it almost immediately. Why?
It’s well known to everyone. Joked about, even. Jisung and his many sporadic bathroom breaks. Before almost any big event. After them. During costume changes. They’re used to it all, now.
The second the door shuts behind him, Jisung’s a panting, shaking mess. He knew he should’ve said something , he thinks. They could’ve had a break much sooner, if Jisung had just dismissed his stubbornness and asked . It wouldn’t have been this bad. But he can’t, and won't . He’s not weak, never will be.
He’s scrambling into the company bathroom and seating himself on a closed toilet seat within seconds, grabbing for his pocket. The object comes out easily, and though it’s scratched and scuffed, Jisung couldn’t be happier to finally have the old inhaler in his hands.
It’s routine now, this process. After years of being a trainee, years of constant practices after debut, Jisung’s tolerance built up as his ability to hide this part of him grew stronger and stronger.
The relief never gets old though, he thinks, shaking the device frantically. It presses between his lips, there’s a push , and with the next few breaths after the release air rushes his throat clean and free .
Jisung feels giddy when he’s done with another puff, and it’s not exactly because of the treatment. It’s with the knowledge that he’s done it again, he’s continuing to keep this part of him a secret.
For some reason, he feels security at the fact that nobody knows. Essentially, all it presents is the smallest of inconveniences. So it's his problem, and he’d handle it as such.
Jisung leaves the bathroom quietly, hurrying back to the practice room. He’s been gone almost ten minutes, but the others don’t say anything. He has excuses for if they do, dozens of them, that he’s cycled through over the past couple of years. He doesn’t think it matters now, though.
He can breathe , open and light and he knows that he will never, ever get used to the comfort of the feeling. It’s always been like this, his emotional state fluctuating with the quality of both the air around him and the contractions of his lungs. It’s a little silly that it affects him so much though, Jisung thinks.
He doesn’t need even more stress over the frightening asthma-anxiety combo he’s got going on, so he’ll take the high end of a mood swing over its counterpart any day.
The rest of practice goes well after that.
-------------------------------------------
That night at dinner, Chan explains everything he’s learned about the setting of the stage they’ve been preparing to perform on for the past month. The event is in 3 weeks, and they’ll have a full-group company meeting to go over more specifics in just a few days.
“It’s a really big stage, so we’ll be borrowing one of the larger practice rooms later this week to practice spreading out the sequence,” the leader reports as he leans across the counter for another slice of pizza. They’re all scattered around the dorm's common area, chatting and plowing through dinner.
“As big as Kingdom??” Felix questions from where he’s sprawled out on the couch, mouth stuffed with cheesy bread.
Chan nods at this, and the younger boy's eyes glitter as he turns to whisper something to Hyunjin beside him. Jisung takes the lull in conversation as a cue to shyly ask the one thing he’s been wondering the past few days.
“Hyung?” he quips, and Chan immediately turns to look at him, “What are the special effects?”
“Ah,” Chan says, smiling as he turns to them all. “That’s another thing I wanted to tell you guys! The management team is really excited, they said they’ll have a whole bunch of new equipment for us. It’s supposed to look futuristic.”
Jisung swallows, picking at a pizza crust between his fingers. “So, uh, fog, and like lights and stuff?” Please, no-
“Yeah, that sounds about right, Sung. Heard there’s a crazy smoke machine that they’re testing out!” Ah, so, worst case scenario. Chan must have some sort of internal radar, because he seems to sense Jisung’s animosity almost immediately. “Something wrong, Jisung-ah?”
“Jisung doesn’t like fire,” Seungmin states from his isolation at the far end of the counter. Conversations around the room quieten completely. For a second, Jisung’s caught in a stupor, wondering how they could know something like th-
-Felix leaves something bubbling on the stove the night after they move into the new dorm. Jisung steps into the hall that night to tiny black clouds wafting up over the kitchen. He must drop to his knees in slow motion, because Seungmin’s already crouched down with him when he starts to hyperventilate. The younger thinks he’s having a panic attack, talks to him like he is. He’s not. Jisung pries himself out of Seungmin’s presence and bolts to his unpolluted bedroom, grappling for his pocket. He can’t breathe, can’t breathe, can’t-
“Hannie? Are you listening?” There’s something quizzical in Chan’s expression when Jisung snaps up to face him. “The machines are tested over and over before we can use them. They aren’t going to like, explode. No fire, I promise.” Chan smiles warmly, and Jisung can only mirror the action and nod back. Conversation continues, but Jisung’s mind is already working a mile a minute.
Jisung’s not afraid of fire, no; It’s one of his biggest triggers, sure, but it’s not a big deal.
(If it doesn’t start with inhalation, he’s almost guaranteed to have an attack in the vicinity of smoke; the anxiety of just seeing fumes often sends him into hyperventilation)
He’ll make sure he’s not positioned in front of it. It’s a two-song stage, nothing’s going to happen. Jisung’s dealt with this before, easy. Ask his mother, who had the scare of her life calling an ambulance for her 7 year old son after a broken lamp sent their rug up in flames.
That was the trip Jisung got his first inhaler.
He’s snapped out of his thoughts by a raucous of laughter from Changbin, giggles erupting through some of the younger members as well at something funny Jisung clearly missed while caught up in his head. He searches around the room for the source of the joke, only to be met with a far less pleasant sight.
Minho. The older boy has his eyes fixed on Jisung from where he’s curled up in a recliner across the room, eyes narrowed and lips flattened out humorlessly. He raises his eyebrows at Jisung when he knows the younger’s seen him, and Jisung almost shivers at the question in his gaze.
His relationship with Minho is more complicated than with the others, Jisung thinks. There’s something about the older boy that makes Jisung feel stripped bare; he’d feel less exposed if he was sitting in the room entirely naked than under the watch Minho has on him. It’s always been hardest to hide from Minho. Jisung tells him (almost) everything.
I know you’re hiding , Minho’s cat eyes telepathically speak to Jisung, and the boy can only stare, a newborn deer on shaky legs. There’s concern though, pooling deep and heady in the older’s irises, and Jisung squirms in his seat uncomfortably.
Eventually, he gulps and turns away from Minho to pick at his pizza again, and the tense mood is lost. Nobody’s cracking him that easily.
That night before bed, Jisung stands by the frame of his mattress and stares at the space beneath it. Somewhere under there, wrapped in blankets, is his nebulizer. It’s old, it’s worn out, and it was supposed to have been used yesterday. Or the day before. Or anytime this week or the last, really.
Jisung doesn’t like the nebulizer; not one bit. The canister, still empty of medication fluid like it had been for the past month, as Jisung had been too lazy (and tired) to pick up fillers. The wiry tubing, plugging into the wall and coiling awkwardly around his feet when he sat down with it. The fucking mask, making his breathing loud and obnoxious and alien-like. Jisung always had a hard time using it- bathroom door locked, bundled on the floor by the hair dryer outlet, shower and sink on to drown out the sound.
For a second, Jisung considers pulling out and using the machine - it'd definitely be making the next few days easier on himself. The bed is more convincing though, and his eyes seem to loll just looking at the piles of cushioning upon it.
Whatever, he thinks, crashing down on the mattress. It doesn’t matter anyway.