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“Junnie,” Jiseok says, softly, in an attempt to cause as little of a disturbance to the quiet that’d settled over the two of them as possible. “You’re so far away.”
Hyeongjun hums in acknowledgment, his eyes not straying from where they’re fixed on the ceiling above them. There’s a strange dichotomy up there, seeing Billie Joe Armstrong’s face surrounded by glow in the dark star stickers. Hyeongjun is observant enough to know that the stars hadn’t been placed haphazardly, they’re actually a selection of constellations.
Quintessentially Jiseok.
Hyeongjun also knows Jiseok doesn’t mean what he said literally - how could he, when they’re laid out side by side on Jiseok’s twin-size mattress? Pressed together from shoulder to ankle, sure they could be even closer, but Jiseok is too respectful of Hyeongjun’s boundaries to overstep any further.
“You’re the closest anyone has ever been.”
It’s not a lie, either. Throughout his entire life Hyeongjun faced difficulties connecting with others, struggling to find points of relation with his peers or seemingly coming across as being somewhat off-putting whenever he tried. He’d made peace with the fact long ago, and was perfectly happy coursing through life with everybody held at a polite arm’s length.
Meeting Jiseok had changed that entirely, though. Truly he’s a force to be reckoned with, latching onto Hyeongjun from the moment he’d set eyes on him, not once paying any mind to the way Hyeongjun would near-constantly evade all attempts Jiseok made to get through to him past a surface level.
At first, Hyeongjun resented Jiseok for it. It feels a little bit mean to think about, but there’s really no other way to describe his feelings surrounding the beginnings of their friendship.
The premise of their meeting was simple enough - the first class of a mandatory unit, not knowing anybody else in the room, and sitting together by happenstance. Hyeongjun’s initial appraisal of Jiseok was that he was charming, in a cute, boyish way, with his messy, too-short bangs, jean shorts and well-loved band t-shirt. Considering the way Jiseok easily fell into one-sided conversation with Hyeongjun, it was obvious he’d find his own people in no time, leaving Hyeongjun behind.
Just like always.
“Why don’t you let people get closer, I-” Jiseok started, pausing abruptly so his tongue could dart out briefly, wetting his lips. Hyeongjun felt Jiseok’s fingers twitch ever so slightly against the back of his hand. He expected Jiseok to say more, but he doesn’t, letting out a long sigh instead.
“It’s not on purpose,” Hyeongjun shifts, hooking his pinky finger around Jiseok’s own. He feels Jiseok’s entire body bristle beside him, tensing up for a moment as if Hyeongjun is a cat that he doesn’t want to frighten away. “It’s hard to connect with others, I don’t want to risk investing too much of myself into something that likely won’t last.”
There’s a protective wall around Hyeongjun’s heart, one that he laid the foundations for as a child. It’s not like he never tried to get along with his peers, especially given his mother’s very obvious concern for his lack of friendships. But failed friendship after failed friendship only served to solidify the idea that maybe, Hyeongjun just… wasn’t supposed to let people in.
Of course, that didn’t mean he turned to becoming just outright anti-social. His mother always praised him for having such a gentle soul, so it wouldn’t be right for Hyeongjun to become completely cold and rigid in the face of interpersonal relationships. Responding when spoken to, greeting others with polite smiles and courteous nods, truly it’s all the bare minimum Hyeongjun could do to retain his position as a good person - regardless of the fact that he refused to let anyone know him beyond the surface.
Jiseok exhales, finally returning to his relaxed state by Hyeongjun’s side. “Pluto's atmosphere is going to collapse soon, you know.”
Jiseok's sudden change in topic would catch anybody else off guard, but not Hyeongjun. To anybody else it would come across as another symptom of untreated ADHD, but just like with the glow in the dark star stickers, Hyeongjun knows Jiseok well enough to know that he'd brought the fact up very deliberately.
“The further Pluto moves away from the sun, the colder the atmosphere gets, right?” Hyeongjun hums in acknowledgement, prompting Jiseok to continue his train of thought. “Eventually it's going to freeze over, and the weight of it will cause the ice to start falling to the surface.”
“Assuming you're using this as an allegory, then isn't that exactly what you want?” Hyeongjun turns his head where it lays on the pillow, observing Jiseok in profile. The slope of his nose, the pout of his lips, the way his long eyelashes flutter over his round cheeks every time he blinks. “The further I stay from people, the more my walls will come down.”
“Your walls won't come down, they'll collapse ,” it’s Jiseok's turn to move now, tilting his head to meet Hyeongjun's gaze directly with a slight frown. “You’ll only get hurt and there won't be anybody around to protect you from the fallout.”
“Then let’s consider the opposite. Pluto gets closer to the sun and its atmosphere thaws out, meaning the barrier stays in place,” Hyeongjun huffs out a quiet laugh, the corners of his eyes crinkling slightly. “I don’t think you chose a very good thing to use as an example, Jiseok.”
“It stays in place, but it's not impenetrable,” Jiseok makes a great deal out of rolling his eyes, though his accompanying smile only serves to prove his amusement. “Nitrogen, methane, carbon dioxide. Passing through would be no issue.”
“It’s becoming increasingly obvious which of us is the philosophy major, Jiseokie.”
“Oh, shut up!” Jiseok whines, shoving lightly at Hyeongjun’s shoulder. Before he can take his hand back, Hyeongjun catches him by the wrist, tattooed fingers slowly creeping up to intertwine with Jiseok’s own. “I’m trying to be vulnerable with you and you’re teasing me.”
“Something I’ve always wondered…” Hyeongjun starts, not bothering to even acknowledge Jiseok’s admission. It’s a habit he constantly felt bad for, not knowing how to respond when handling others’ raw emotions, but thankfully it’s a facet of his personality that Jiseok never took any offense to. “What was it that made you not give up on me?”
“What do you mean?”
“It’s just what I’m used to, I mean…” Jiseok lightly squeezed Hyeongjun’s hand where they were intertwined, silently prompting him to elaborate. “Everyone always gets tired at some point and moves on, but you never did.”
“I guess I just saw myself in you a bit after our initial meeting, I didn’t want to leave you behind.”
“I find that hard to believe.”
“No, seriously! I’m actually pretty shy around new people, the only reason why I’m friends with people like Jjoo is because they’re the ones to latch onto me first,” Jiseok wiggled his fingers while he spoke, not in an attempt to extricate his hand, but to simply tap patterns on Hyeongjun’s knuckles. “I’m just good at matching their energy, really.”
They’re friends now, but the first time Hyeongjun met Lee Jooyeon, he immediately didn’t like him. He feels bad about it, the boy never did anything to garner the dislike, it just… came down to pure envy, Hyeonjun had eventually come to realize.
He remembered the day well - walking into that shared core unit class, immediately directing his line of sight to his and Jiseok’s usual seats, only to find some kid with long blonde hair, cackling brightly while Jiseok gestured wildly with his hands beside him. Hyeongjun doesn’t even question it, simply accepts his fate and scans the room to find an open seat. Every relationship had always been a ticking time bomb for him, and it seemed that in the case of Kwak Jiseok, that time was finally up.
He’d barely even begun to make his way to his new seat before he was interrupted by the sound of Jiseok letting out an indignant shout from across the room. Turning to look in Jiseok’s direction, Hyeongjun finds him with an overly exaggerated offended expression on his face, pointing in Hyeongjun’s direction. As soon as Jiseok realises he has his attention, he grins, flapping his hand to beckon Hyeonjun over.
Hyeongjun complies, of course, eternally weak to bending to the will of others. It wouldn’t hurt to say hello either, even if it did mean coming face to face with his replacement.
To his surprise though, by the time Hyeongjun made his way over, Jiseok had shooed the intruder out of his seat. Jiseok introduces the two, and just as swiftly, the blonde invader (who Jiseok had playfully referred to as Yeonnie) is making his way to the back of the hall, where a boy with spiky hair and foxlike features immediately starts bickering with him.
The Hyeongjun in the present sighs, changed from the person he’d been back then, but still largely the same. “In that case, I wish I could be more like you.”
“I don’t.” Jiseok does take his hand back this time, to instead shift in closer to Hyeongjun, draping an arm and a leg over his friend’s body like some sort of koala. “Being friends with myself would be boring, I like you the way you already are.”
“I’m a bit… lacking, though.” Hyeongjun brings the arm that isn’t trapped between his body and the bed up, tucking some of Jiseok’s messy hair behind his ear before threading his fingers through the strands at the nape of his neck. “I could be more assertive, or more sociable, instead of keeping to myself all the time.”
“Forcing yourself to fit that kind of mold will only make you miserable, Junnie. People do like you when they have the patience to get to know you properly - I mean you got me and Jjoo to start off, and now you’re close with Seungmin and the hyungs too… we all love you as you are.”
Hyeongjun opts to stay silent, continuing to play with Jiseok’s hair while lost in thought. Jiseok’s right, of course - he always is. Hyeongjun is just stubborn, and it’s hard to erase an entire lifetime of being left on the sidelines and told to just try harder to fit in more with the people around him.
“When you talk about being able to pass through Pluto’s atmosphere,” Hyeongjun starts, his hand coming to a stop where it’s tangled in Jiseok’s hair while he figures out the best way to word his thoughts. “What… would be the purpose of going to the effort in the first place?”
“Well,” Jiseok draws the word out, propping his chin up on Hyeongjun’s sternum to look at his face directly. “I’d like to make a home there, plant a garden, so I can watch the planet flourish.”
Hyeongjun could feel his face growing warm, processing Jiseok’s admission. He’d expected some form of an allegory, considering the overarching theme of their conversation, but this…
“You already have,” Hyeongjun whispers. Jiseok just blinks at him with a placid smile on his lips, tilting his head like a puppy. “You’ve done more for me than you even know.”
Hyeongjun has never been more sure of anything in his life. Really, even though he sometimes doubted it himself, in the time they’ve known each other Jiseok has managed to draw Hyeongjun out of his shell more than anybody ever could. It’s only visible when he really looks for it - spending time with others outside of situations they’re forced to be together, becoming comfortable in expressing himself through growing out his hair and getting tattoos… The changes are small, but they never would’ve happened without Jiseok supporting him the entire way.
Jiseok gins, straightening his arms to push himself up, pressing a kiss to Hyeongjun’s forehead before scurrying away. Hyeongjun just stares after him, mind tripping through the sequence of events with how quickly they transpired. Jiseok is busy fussing over the mess of textbooks and tchotchkes scattered across his desk, but he glances back over his shoulder, toward where Hyeongjun is still splayed out on his bed.
He’s grinning, but Hyeongjun can tell the expression is stained with nervousness.
“Don’t… evict me alright? I like it here.”
Hyeongjun finally sits up, offering Jiseok a small smile in return.
“You’ve already planted your roots, I’m afraid you’ll be sticking around for a while.”