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He's spent ten years, half his life, training to be exactly where he is, but snaking through crowds and cameras at the airport isn't really something you can practice hours into the morning, preparing for the real thing. Unless you're the real thing. Performing in LA, his body set to Pacific Time, in pain, is as real as it gets, but sometimes, still, it's a little hard to believe.
In front of him, Tarzzan's blowing kisses, making hearts over his head, happiness he can't fake or replicate. Bailey's out of sight and reach, in another stratosphere, as she's always been. Not knowing what else to do, who to copy, Woochan just bows at points halfway, then out of honour, habit, looks behind him, and waits.
"I love you, Youngie-yah!" Even now that they are famous, Woochan doesn't think he'll ever get used to this, how people can act so familiar with them based on a few fancams, false translations, Santa is fake, it's okay to cry, Woochanie. But Youngseo just laughs, a perfect balance between bright and bashful, born for the attention in a way not even Bailey, who's been bigger than her body since she was three, or Annie, who from the womb has had servants attending to her every whim, is.
Case in point: a couple steps back from Youngseo is Seoyoon, frowning and frazzled as she lizards her way out of another pair of limbs trying to lock her in, or lop her tail off, or something. Real sasaeng shit. Wordlessly, without losing a step or her smile, Youngseo grabs Seoyoon by the hand, pulls her into the small bubble of space Woochan was able to hollow out with his own star gravity, and Seoyoon grins at her like she'd just saved her from a scandal, or sure-fire death.
To an idol, much less the heiress of the Shinsegae group, they probably mean the same thing. It's with that thought that he tells Youngseo later on in the van, once they've both been relegated to the back seats as the maknaes, back on equal footing, "You shouldn't encourage them."
Youngseo, with her weird, wide eyes, just blinks up at him blankly. "What are you talking about."
"The fans," Woochan says, even brandishes a hand to help get his point across, but his ring catches on the strap of her bag, so he ends up just looking like an idiot. What's new. "Back there, with all the hearts and shit—you gotta be careful with that. Give them an inch, and they'll take a mile."
"That's cynical," Youngseo says, as she detangles him, saves her second damsel of the day, fingers delicate in the way her speech never is, with him. He wonders if this is how she'd held Annie, earlier, how she touches all of her unnies, when she's deemed them worthy, and stops. Curls his forgotten hand into a fist. Therein lies danger, and he doesn't want to be a fucking cliché when he's this young, when the group hasn't come this far just to come this far. "Is being famous not living up to your expectations, Woochanie?"
"But we ain't even famous," he raps instead of a real reply, smirking in a way he thinks is roguish, but only makes Youngseo roll her eyes. It's what he'd wanted to say back at that radio show, when Kim Ina-sunbaenim had grilled them all about getting cocky—how the fuck can anything get to my head when I've got Youngseo humbling me at every opportunity? "I'm just saying. Not all of us are okay with people touching our bodies without consent. If you hadn't helped Annie—"
Youngseo's lips thin out into a line, which is usually Woochan's signal that he really messed up this time. Not that he stares at her lips a lot, or cares much about hurting her feelings. But something about this, about that interaction, has been doing his head in, and it makes him want to be a little less of the mature model Woochan he's supposed to, is trying to, be, and a little more of the mean-mugging brat he was on Show Me The Money. "I don't see you scolding Tarzzan-oppa for it, and he was out there hugging girls for free."
"You're not Tarzzan," is what he says, before he can even think about it, and something crosses Youngseo's gaze at the exact same time Woochan's brain clocks what it is he's saying. "Don't give me that look. You know what I mean. It's different for ladies."
"So you think of me as a lady," Youngseo says smugly, pulling out her phone, sending him packing. Who the hell she's always texting, Woochan has no clue. That boyfriend that made her quit the girl group she was supposed to be in, maybe. She's never told him about it, and he's never asked. He's not going to ask. Unlike Youngseo, Woochan actually respects boundaries, and he doesn't routinely ask questions that he doesn't want answering.
"Who said I was talking about you?" he huffs mockingly. He can make stupid faces at his phone, too, if that's the game they're playing. But he's got bigger goals now, bigger guns, and he doesn't shoot trying to miss. "Seoyoon-noona's a proper lady. You're just the baby no one wanted, which is probably why you don't get it."
Youngseo goes still. "Same age as you," she says, voice steady, but her nails screech against her screen, and at the next stop light she asks Bailey if they could switch seats. For the six seconds that it feels good, Woochan considers it a win, and then he goes to sleep, in silence, feeling like absolute shit.
"Woochanz, can I get a hand in the kitchen, please?" Bailey asks him later in the dorms, in English, a decapitated head levitating past his room's door jamb when she's supposed to be getting dinner ready. Nowadays, when he thinks of Bailey Sok, it's less the pink-haired, profile photo version of her that comes to mind, and more so the pus-filled pimple patches peeling off her chin. It's gross in the literal sense, but also in the sense that knowing someone this intimately always kind of is, but it's also kind of—nice. Chill. Being surrounded by living legends since you were twelve years old takes its toll, eventually, and no one else in the group had to rise from the ground up, runts in their respective litters, just like he and Bailey did. It's why despite the language barrier, how little they actually talk, she's the only member he's comfortable letting in, and half the time she doesn't even understand what the hell it is he's actually saying.
So when he steps out a few minutes later and it's only Youngseo there chopping kimchi, he stops short but doesn't bother to start suspecting Bailey. She's sneaky observant, yeah, and they've had the occasional one-on-one soju party for team bonding, but surely—?
When he's shuffled his feet long enough and there's still no sign of her coming, then he actually starts to panic slightly. What does Bailey know; did she and Youngseo speak? What other secrets has Woochan let slip when he thinks no one can see?
"Rules of the house say that the losers who stand and stare don't get to eat," Youngseo says, sickeningly sweet, and Woochan supplements the rest of his thoughts with a more succinct, ah, shit. "I'm telling Annie-unnie in three, two—"
"Alright, no need to play dirty," he snaps back, then winces just as suddenly. What the fuck is wrong with him. But Youngseo just sighs, steps aside, and leaves enough room for him to sidle up in her space, operating on muscle memory, like it's time to go on stage. Youngseo hides a snicker behind her pajama sleeve. Pink, because what about her isn't. Woochan stubs his toe against the kitchen counter on purpose before he can go down a very scary place. "What do you want me to do?"
"Here. Cut these." She reaches over him for the bowl of defrosted bacon, chucks it on a cutting board and slides it sideways. The room smells like sesame oil and green onions, with just a hint of the Jo Malone scent she'd bought him for his birthday. He isn't sure if that's because of his own spray, which he'd last left on his bed, or if because Youngseo had bought herself the matching set. Neither conclusion seems to get rid of the squeezing around his chest, so he shoves them both to the back of his head. "Make them small, okay? Chaewon-oppa doesn't like them too big."
That constricts it too, hearing Tarzzan's real name in her mouth. He jokes about there being a hierarchy, about him being dead last, but it's easier to swallow when he knows it's the other girls getting handfed honey-flavoured chips and head pats. "Yes, master. I'll even fry them extra crispy too because he doesn't like the texture of pig fat, master."
"I was gonna cook them soft how you like it," Youngseo says magnanimously, like it was so easy, like hearing shit like that isn't supposed to make him want to die of shame, or something else he doesn't want to think about, but everything comes easier to Youngseo than it ever has to Woochan. Dancing, rapping, making people laugh—that's the stuff he has to do to get to a spot he wants in life. Or what he thinks he wants. He doesn't know what he fucking wants. But getting people to love you with a blink of an eye, like Youngseo can, bypasses the need for all of that. "What?"
"'M sorry," he mumbles, then muffles it more behind a manufactured cough. "What I said in the van. You know no one actually thinks that, right?"
Youngseo just stares up at him. Woochan's about to ruin the moment, mimic her losers who stand and stare don't get to eat gimmick, but chooses to man up and muscle through it, for a change.
"It's not that serious," Youngseo says, shrugging, but her whole body's stilted beside him. Woochan kind of hates that he uses his brain matter to notice these small details about her, and not about all sorts of other things.
"It is to me," Woochan says, low with legitimate contrition, and everything from the collar up except her neck goes pink. That answers that question, then, he thinks, before he tells his brain to just shut it. "If I ever say something like that again—"
"Okay, okay! I get it," Youngseo says, slapping her gloved hand over the lower surface area of his face, kimchi juice and makeup and who knows what else being scrubbed into his skin by the beads. Woochan can ask for mercy, but he's still no martyr. He makes a face and a mangled noise in the back of his throat until Youngseo draws her hand back down to her midriff. "Oh. Sorry. You were embarrassing me."
"You're embarrassed?" Woochan asks incredulously, then shakes his head, smears off whatever sticky residue's left on his face with the back of his hand. "It's fine. It's not that serious."
For some reason, that's what makes Youngseo split into giggles. Despite himself, the situation, Woochan laughs, can't help it. In a tense moment at practice, a mental block in the studio, waking up on the wrong side of the bed in the morning. It's the same with all the members. Tarzzan's the mood-maker of the group, but that's always been Youngseo's particular brand of much-needed magic.
"I'll cook it half-half," Youngseo says, nods satisfactorily, hair falling into her face with the movement. Woochan's palms itch, molten, magnetic. But there are rules to the house, too many, so he just messes her hair up even more with a noogie. "Stop it—that's disgusting, seriously—Jo Woochan—"
"My bad, had to step out for a long-distance call. What else needs doing?" Bailey says, in impeccable Korean, finally emerging in the kitchen in the middle of their mutual hair-pulling. Most of the cooking gets done before they even manage to stop or notice.
The funny thing is that it's not just specific to co-ed groups: all groups, even of the same gender, crush on each other at some point before debuting. It's like a rite of passage. He wasn't in Trainee A for that long, all things considered, but he'd been in it long enough to have gone around the group thinking that this member was the coolest, changed his opinion to another one, and then re-started the cycle back to the same member that he'd clung onto in the beginning. Sangwon, Junil, Leo, Inhyuk, Jihoon, James, JJ, Yorch—rinse and repeat. Nothing amounted to it, of course, much like everything else they ended up doing, but it was a pretty formative time for his, uh, let's say, physical conditioning.
Naturally, when they'd first formed ALLDAY PROJECT, it was Tarzzan and Bailey who were caught in his cringe idol worship—Tarzzan, because he was so nice to him, and Bailey, because no shit. He'd crept around them in the practice rooms, hung onto their every English conversation, tried to copy all of their mannerisms. Youngseo claims that she'd used honorifics with him the first week they met, but he swears down she'd kept curling her lip at him whenever he'd say aight, bet like they did. Then Tarzzan had locked him in the control booth after just farting, and Bailey had all these awkward culture gaps to bridge, and the allure not so much as faded as it did crashed and burned into their current level of crass companionship.
Seoyoon was a little different; the cold chaebol type that drove the common guy crazy. Once his civvy friends found out about the lineup, they would all constantly video call him just for the chance to see her, get her contact number, and Woochan would cut a self-congratulatory image, tell them that it was classified information. She gave him more clout in one month than he got in all his combined years in the industry, but more than that, she was well-centred for who she was, and cute when she chose to be. What they lacked in childhood commonalities, they made up for with their natural chemistry. To this day, Woochan considers if he should've gone for it, but then Seoyoon will start cursing at him about some needless complaint and he remembers exactly why he didn't.
Now Youngseo—Youngseo had signed her contract last, so close to their debut date, that Woochan didn't really have the time nor energy to give a crap; he was too busy with composing and concept meetings and memorizing choreography, plus college entry exams on top of that. She could've been a cardboard cutout, for all he cared; he was finally, finally coming out. If he really had to give a crash course on his first impression, the curriculum was such as: she was pretty, talented, and already survived a controversy. Check marks all around. The fact that she could challenge Teddy-PD off the bat without cowering, and that she was always so calm under direct criticism—it was impressive, sure, but nothing to really write home about.
If he really, really had to confess about when it clicked—which he would never; he's a fucking university scholar, alright, so he's way smarter than that—it's when he'd realized that he'd never seen her cry. At some point during their training, everyone's been brought to tears about some deep-seated insecurity or general irritation, or from the overwhelming intensity of how they had to do so much in so little time. Even Bailey, who kept things close to the chest, never feeling like a fully integrated part of the group as the foreigner from a faraway land; even Annie, whose most likely cosmetic procedure to be accused of would be a tear-duct removal, who would sometimes crack under the pressure of being the progeny of a big business brand. Hell, Tarzzan's probably crying about some insensible bullshit right now. But not Youngseo, not even once, and that made Woochan go mad.
Maybe that's why he gives her so much crap—it's because he knows she can give it right back. Call him curious, or envious, or what. At the end of the day, Woochan knows it's, he's, fucked up; to want to see her curled up in pain, caught off-guard; to want to cut her chest open to see what's inside, carve out the chambers of her heart. Metaphorically, of course; he's not Leo. Maybe a little carnally, too. Okay, maybe a lot carnally, but that's just the nature of a run-of-the-mill, regular-degular, rookie idol crush. Trust.
It's becoming concerning, though, if not already a full-blown complex. Never mind that it's lasted this long, and just seems to keep on compounding with the increased exposure, every ironic joke, every incremental touch. During their Instagram Live, he's comically aware of everything he says or does, tries not to get too close, hopes the threat of a camera and a quarter-thousand fans can contain whatever it is that's crawling up his guts. He almost makes it, too, with no help at all from Youngseo—bringing up flirting and dating for ten seconds unprompted, the fuck—but then Annie comes and he gets too complacent, and lo and behold, he screws right up.
"What the hell was that?" Seoyoon closes in on him after, once Youngseo's been corralled out of the room for her fansign, but not without looking back at the two of them in confusion, in something Woochan can't quite certainly call. "Maybe I'll entertain your mouth when it's bored?"
"It was a joke," Woochan says, trying to be casual, but inside he's choking down his own tongue. He did not just say that, oh God. "Like wordplay? I was doing it the whole Live. I am a lyricist, you know."
"Spare me, LilDok2," Seoyoon says sarcastically, slapping him on the arm. There's no cuteness behind the cold; this one hurts as much as it looks. "You're lucky I just carried on and Youngseo's oblivious, because this could've been really bad for you."
Woochan scoffs, shakes his arm off. "Youngseo? Oblivious?" Then he stops, actually takes the time to sort through her words. "What, uh—what's she oblivious of?"
Seoyoon's eyes turn to slits. "You're seriously gonna do that? With me, of all people?"
"I'm not doing anything!" Woochan says, unable to control the rise in his tone. Where the fuck is Hojin-hyung. "You're the one making a big deal out of nothing. Chill, bro."
"No, you chill, bro," Seoyoon says, shoves him hard enough that his back hits the wall. "You wanna fuck Youngseo, fine, but you better do it on your own time, and you better do it right. She's been through enough without you messing her head up even more."
It's two sentences, but it's information overload. Woochan doesn't know where to start, if he even wants to start at all. "If you're talking about the group—"
Seoyoon snorts. "I don't give a shit about the group," she says, utterly serious, and Woochan's left with a sour taste in his throat. "It might be news to you, but I don't need this to work."
None of them do; they might not be Annie Moon levels of rich—who is—but all of them were pretty well off. As it is, somehow the first thing that comes out of Woochan's mouth is, "Neither does Youngseo."
"So that's your excuse?" Seoyoon says, one of her nail acrylics stabbing at his sternum. "Youngseo doesn't need it to work, so you can just string her along?"
"Who says I want to string her along?" Woochan says, righteous anger simmering just below the surface of his voice, and something like satisfaction alights in Seoyoon. "Hold on, that's not what I—"
"Woochan, you're up," Hojin-hyung interjects at the door, and Seoyoon slithers out of the room like she's the one who's been summoned, Woochan following behind her slowly like he's just swallowed a stone.
It's a sickness that grows. They don't talk about it again, but the stone skips in his stomach every time he spends time with Youngseo, overfilling already shallow waters, before it sinks to the bottom when Seoyoon shoots them a knowing look, not at all subtle. The fans shipping them is one thing, but it's a special type of hell to have your own members speculating about your intentions, every little interaction, and not knowing whether or not they're supportive, suffering your stupidity in silence, or a secret third option. Seoyoon hasn't told anyone, as far as he can tell, but he still feels like he's caught in a stand-off, all surrounded, waiting for someone to shoot first. He's super paranoid even in the boys' dorms, consciously trying to shepherd his thoughts, lest he think about Youngseo in any way, shape, or form that sends Tarzzan vibes through their shared wall.
He doesn't expect it, then, when on a Sunday afternoon, during a spontaneous studio session, it's Youngseo herself who says that something's seemed off. "I've been feeling a little forgotten."
"Not my problem," Woochan says, in English, continuing to pretend-type on his phone. That's literally not his problem to solve; quite the opposite. "Our precious DAYONES' love suddenly not enough for you?"
Youngseo stops scribbling on her lyric sheet to draw a slash mark on his spare arm, just below the strap of his Apple Watch. Woochan stays stock still, hoping that it'll settle his heart rate enough not to go off. "That's for hating on our fans again."
"I don't hate our fans," Woochan says, face screwing up, finally swatting her away with a hand, and she giggles, swivels on her chair with her legs drawn up and her knees slotted under her chin. Woochan sucks in on his inner cheek, trying not to smile, but slips. "I literally interact with them every day. Stop trying to get me in trouble in the workplace."
For full effect, he looks around and points at a fake hidden camera, theatrically whispers a she's lying, PD-nim. Youngseo says don't listen to him, Teddy-PD! No, I'm not! while laughing, before doing a dramatic chair spin. "I don't know. You just seem really..." Another spin. Woochan still can't believe that she used to speed skate, much less ski; he would've figured her for an ice dancer, looking the way she did. A Kim Yuna type, gorgeous, graceful. Out of his league. "Absent lately. With them, I mean."
Busted. "I just don't think that we should feed too much into what they say. That's all it is."
Youngseo's head tilts, until she's pressing her ear to her shoulder, spreading sparkles on her shirt. She's mostly bare-faced, coming into the studio, but she'd put a little blush and highlighter on. Lip stain, of course. Woochan just tries very hard not to look that way unless he's forced. "You mean you and me?"
Woochan shrugs, but he feels it, the stone stuck in his throat. "I mean everybody," he says, scrubs at the ink stain on his skin, and Youngseo slides her chair back over, arm reaching, before Woochan cuffs her by the wrist. "What are you doing?"
Youngseo looks up at him strangely. "You're gonna rub your skin raw like that," she tuts, frees her arm up with a simple wrist release. He'd taught it to her a long time ago, probably when they'd first met, after his chosen share something about yourself fact of the day was having a Taekwondo black belt. He doesn't remember much about anything else, but he does remember her practicing it any time she was seated, in between recording and PR training and choreography work, which meant she rarely ever did. He's surprised she still knows it, much less exacts it with such skill. The stone in Woochan's throat swells, pleased as all shit. "I have makeup wipes. Just sit."
She turns around to sift through her bag, but doesn't let go. Like all the times he'd been face to face with Youngseo before this, Woochan holds his breath, ducks his head low.
"Thanks," he says, as Youngseo wipes gently at his wrist, forehead wrinkled in concentration. Youngseo had complained about it being too wide the other day, in the makeup room for their W photoshoot, which everyone else was quick to gas her up about and say that it isn't, seriously, it's beautiful, Youngseo-yah! Woochan, in one of his worthless attempts to ignore her existence, and thus his wayward feelings, had kept quiet, wrestled with his hair enough to piss off their hairstylist, to the point that they had to wash and do it all over again. Even as he'd whined petulantly and performatively, he'd also watched Youngseo's reflection in the mirror, walking away to who knows where, but before she'd stepped out, she'd glanced back, and her and Woochan's eyes had met.
"Now you can't say I never took care of you," Youngseo says now, grinning winningly, her palm still warm against his hand, and the stone wedges itself permanently in Woochan's chest, waiting and wanting for something he can't have.
"Your forehead's fine," he says, wrests his arm away from her grip. Youngseo's smile warps into another shape altogether, but Woochan stands up and leaves before he can see which.
They fly to Japan the next day. It's their first time together, promoting as five, but all of them have been before on personal trips, Woochan when he was still a little kid. Back in Trainee A, him and JJ had used to talk about going back someday, once they were jet-setting global artists, the new BTS. JJ would talk about getting a hero's welcome, high off a Naruto binge, and Woochan would laugh, tell him to save him a front row seat. Such big dreams. Now Woochan's just glad to be hopping on a plane at all, knowing that it's the only place he can get any rest.
The airport's packed again when they leave, the fans coming in droves as they get walked from the van. Their security detail's a bit undermanned; Tarzzan's guy had called in sick last minute, earning the agency a spitfire reaming from Hojin-hyung, but Tarzzan had insisted that they'll be fine, we have the coolest fans. Hojin-hyung had hemmed and hawed the whole way over, but ultimately had no back-up plan. They were due for a TV appearance in less than seven hours from the fact, and better the other guy fired than him, right?
And Tarzzan's mostly right: the fans are respectful as they walk past, wishing them well and expressing their love with screams and shutters and signs. Easy enough to deal with; either you winked and waved, or wore noise-cancelling headphones and blackout shades. Woochan goes for the latter, too tired for it today, but accepts a stuffed Golden Retriever from a girl about his sister's age. He saddles it in between the straps of his bag, safely caged, and the girl smiles at him like he's just made her whole day.
Youngseo, as always, is very effusive with their praise, sending finger hearts and flying kisses to every person they meet along the way. She accepts a few of her own gifts, fan letters. Some people write their true feelings better than they can say, she'd explained, when Bailey had asked her why she got all excited about receiving traditional mail, and sometimes things just don't need to be said. Woochan's suddenly reminded of the letter she'd written him for his birthday, how he's never actually read it. He weighs the merits of doing so, at this stage, and decides that it's probably better that he didn't.
All in all, it's a fine experience. Not as bad as the last. But then they get on the plane, in first class, and that's when things start taking a nosedive: just as the seatbelt light turns on, some guy—no, a grown ass man—who's not part of their entourage kneels to the ground, puts his lips to Youngseo's shoes. He'd probably make his way higher than that, too, if not for Woochan shooting up immediately from his seat across the aisle to yell, "Hey, someone fucking stop this guy!"
"No!" the guy wails, grabbing hard onto Youngseo's forearm as their security guards and the plane stewardesses rush towards him in alarm. "I just want to talk to Youngie-yah! We're just talking!"
"Get off of her!" Tarzzan roars from behind, looking ready to fight, but two of the guards manage to pry the guy away and pin his arms behind his back, before being taken somewhere closer to the pilot's cabin. "Youngseo, fuck—are you—"
"Oh my God," Bailey says, hands cupped over her mouth. Seoyoon just stands at the back, shell-shocked, looking at Woochan. "Are you okay? Did he hurt you?"
Youngseo laughs. "I'm fine," she says, waves her hand in dismissal, but her voice shakes and her eyes are transfixed and she's pale fucking white. "I'm just—wow. I can't believe that just happened."
She laughs again, runs a nervous hand through her hair. In the background, they can hear Hojin-hyung yelling at someone on the phone, something about suing the whole airline and all their subsidiaries. Seoyoon finally jumps into action at that, pulls out her own phone and starts swearing about this and that, how she'll make sure to inform all of her contacts. Bailey crouches beside Youngseo, rubbing a hand down her back, while Tarzzan's face scrunches up, a telltale sign that he's either about to cry or talk crap. And Woochan—
"This is my fault," Tarzzan says soberly, opting for seriousness for once in his life, "If I hadn't told Hojin-hyung to go ahead without Jeungrae—"
"Stop," Youngseo says, voice back to soothing, smiling, but Woochan can see that her spine's still stiff. "It could've happened even with him here. And I'm fine, really. See?"
She holds her arms up like she's surrendering, her skin unmarked, clear. Tarzzan surveys her for a few solid seconds, scans her limb by limb, before he sits beside Youngseo, his shoulders sagging in relief. "I'm gonna sit beside you the rest of the way, okay?"
Youngseo sighs, and there it is, finally—her stubborn streak. Woochan almost sighs himself; she's still her. She's still here. "Oppa—"
"For oppa's sake," Tarzzan interjects, slinging an arm around Youngseo, squishing her in, and Youngseo laughs, more sincere. Something spools in Woochan's chest at the sight, mud-slick; he's glad, that Tarzzan can do that for Youngseo, be the pick-me-up she needs, but he also resents that it's not, can't be, him.
It makes him sick. It shouldn't matter who it is that's making Youngseo smile; as long as she's safe. That's all it is. "Let's see what movies they have here—oh, Barbie with Margot Robbie-ssi!"
"Woochan?" Bailey says, soft, but it startles Woochan all the same. "You wanna sit with me?"
"Yeah, sure," he says, his voice scratchy, and Bailey looks at him with too much sympathy for someone who shouldn't know anything. Woochan can't stand it, so he retakes his seat, slams his headphones on without a word to or about Youngseo, and forces himself to sleep.
At disembarkment, Hojin-hyung tells them that the shooting's been cancelled, rescheduled for tomorrow morning instead. Everyone expresses their joy about it, couching it behind the exhaustion of travel and time-sensitive deadlines they've so far had to meet, but Youngseo's lips are pressed into a tight, strained smile, clearly unhappy. She doesn't say anything, and no one makes her, not after what they've all just seen happen in 24K HD, but she's noticeably silent in the car ride to the hotel they're staying at, and pointedly ignores any surreptitious stares she gets, all except his.
Woochan doesn't know what to make of it. He should probably say something, but what's there left to say that the rest of them haven't already? Sorry that happened to you, seems trite, while I'm glad you're safe seems too close to showing how scared shitless he'd actually felt. Not just at what that piece of shit did—although he's purposeful in not thinking about him, because if he does he can't see straight—but how Youngseo had looked like, in the aftermath—scattered, soulless, a sorry facsimile of her regular self. Woochan would live a hundred times over not seeing inside of her, if all he'd see is an empty shell.
Even that's coming out all wrong in his head. His point is—he doesn't know what his fucking point is, but when Youngseo opts out of dinner and heads straight to her room, his feet automatically slides towards the same path, is only stopped by Seoyoon pulling at the back of his shirt to say, "Not now, Woochan."
Then when? he doesn't get to say, because suddenly Bailey's tugging at Seoyoon's wrist and dragging her away, stuttering over her sentences in a mix of English and Korean, but the look she gives him is clear as day, no need for a translation. Don't fuck this up.
He knocks at her door; just once, a light rap. He can hear her scuttle towards it, see her shadow from the gap, but she doesn't say anything. Woochan waits a bit, and then a while, before he gets tired of waiting. "It's just me. Just Woochan."
The lock clicks back. Youngseo opens her door, still in her travel clothes, except for the sweater she's worn over her blouse. Her shoes are strewn haphazardly down the hallway, like she'd kicked them off the moment she'd stepped inside. They're an old pair of white Keds, dirty and worn out, but Youngseo had used them since they were trainees, danced and sang and picked up late night snacks in them, all with Woochan. Rage surges within him, remembering how the guy had violated something so innocent, so innocuous—so intimate—but manages to tamp it all down.
"If you're just here to tell me I told you so about the fans," Youngseo starts scathingly, but she's looking at a spot over his shoulder, crossing her arms over her chest tight. "Then save it. I don't need that right now."
"I was just checking in on how you are, actually," Woochan says, just as snootily, but pockets his hands, doesn't want to be tempted to reach out and do something stupid like hug her, when that's also something she doesn't need, all his unsolicited, unnecessary feelings. "I can go and get Tarzzan-hyung, if you want. But you gotta talk about this to someone."
Youngseo laughs, but it's a humourless, hollow sound. "Oh, so now you wanna talk? But when I've been trying to talk to you the past week and a half like a grown-up, you've been shooting me down."
"That's not—" Woochan starts to say, but can't. He's been avoiding her, and that's a fact. "I just want to make sure you're okay. That's all it is."
"Well, if that's all it is, then I'm fine," she says, trying to close the door, but the sleeve of her sweater rides up and he sees the bruise on her arm and all of his inhibitions shut down. "Ow—Woochan—"
"Sorry," Woochan says, softening his grip, but he steps inside her room and shuts the door behind him, all without letting go of her wrist. "You said you're fine. This isn't fine."
"It's nothing," Youngseo insists, but her voice is unsure and she's stopped fighting his grip. "It's—don't tell anyone else. Please."
Woochan can't believe this self-sacrificing shit. "Youngseo, you can't perform if you're hurt."
"I'm used to it," Youngseo says, and something about the way she says it makes it seem that she doesn't just mean physically. Besides feeling sick like he did in the plane cabin, Woochan feels like a complete fucking dick. "Don't look at me like that, I didn't mean—"
"I'm sorry I've been ducking you," he says, and just like the first time they did this, Youngseo goes still. "I'm just—I've just been dealing with something, and I didn't wanna drag you into it."
Youngseo's face goes slack in some kind of dawning. "The fans?"
"Fuck the fans," Woochan says heatedly, a hundred percent meaning it. "Today, they deserve everything I've been saying and more. But it's not that."
"Then you're stupid," Youngseo says, but fondly, the first hint of a smile catching at the corner of her lips. "You know you can tell me anything."
And that's the problem, he thinks. He can tell her anything, so why can't she tell him? Why can't she ever just let him all the way in? "Who do you tell things to?"
Her smile falls before it can gain full steam. Good, Woochan thinks. Let her be spiteful, or sad, or seething. Let him see. "What—I tell Annie-unnie a lot of things, Bailey-unnie if she understands me—"
"But you won't tell them about this?" Woochan says, shakes her bruised arm gently in his, and Youngseo winces near-imperceptibly. "Youngseo. Come on."
"I don't want them to think of me as weak," Youngseo says quietly, just as easily could've been missed, if he'd wanted to, but Woochan notices, notices everything, because there's nothing about Youngseo he doesn't notice, nothing Youngseo would show him that he wouldn't want to see. "Everybody's worked so hard, for years, and I had my chance, and I blew it because of—because someone treated me badly, and I don't want—I can't ruin things again by being—"
"You're not gonna ruin things," Woochan says, a bit dispirited, didn't know it ran this deep. Whatever else it is Youngseo's been hiding, then it's also been hurting her for years. "Youngseo—if anyone was gonna ruin anything, it'd be—"
"But you said it, in the van," Youngseo says, and now Woochan truly feels like he's about to be sick. All of his dumbass attempts to chip away at her, and all it ever did was make her clam up like a clenched fist. "The last time we were at the airport. I'm just the baby no one wanted, the token vocalist."
It's a slap to the face, a kick to the shin, but like if he'd done it to himself in his sleep. "I told you no one thinks that."
"I think that," Youngseo says, eyes watering, and Woochan should be pleased, but all he wants now is to stop the tears, doesn't want to ever see her cry if this is what it means.
"Don't cry," he says weakly, and Youngseo scoffs, rolls her eyes up, as if that's ever been a successful tactic, and in his desperation, he says the first thing that comes to his mind, which is, "Don't cry, or I'll kiss you, for real."
That causes her pause. Woochan would be sighing, if he could even still breathe. "What?"
"I said I'm gonna kiss you if you cry," he says, stepping forward, pinning her arm against the wall, firm but loose enough that she can escape, do a wrist release, but she just looks up at him with rounded eyes, reflecting everything that's in his, "You want me to do that? Kiss you straight on the mouth? Me?"
Youngseo laughs, a loud cackle he's never heard her make. "Jo Woochan, you fucking idiot," she says, and then bursts into sobs, buries her face in his shirt, and all Woochan can do is bundle her up in his arms and brush her hair out of her face as she finally, finally chases her unburdening.
She's still sniffling by the time Woochan's urged her to change clothes and lie under the bedsheets, but she stops, eventually. Woochan sits on the floor right beside her, rubs Bepanthene and tone up cream on her bruise like she did for him. Under the harsh lighting of the bedside lamp, her skin is black, not pink.
"Don't say I never take care of you," Woochan says, because it's not the right moment for it, if there ever really is. But Youngseo just shimmies over, until her head's almost hanging off the bed, her face right up against his. This time, Woochan holds her puffy-eyed, bloodshot stare, and breathes her all in.
"Do I really have to cry for you to kiss me?" Youngseo asks, with one of her silly little grins, but before Woochan can answer, she's already kissed him.