Chapter Text
Maybe it’s self-hatred that makes Hyunjin go out to Lunar on a Friday night. Hyunjin hates this more than anything in the world. The crowds and the bad music and the flashing lights that are beginning to make him second-guess whether or not he’s epileptic. And half a dozen people are trying to catch his eye right now, a couple of them smiling, most of them just hungry-looking, and that irritates him too. If he wanted to blend in, then he probably should have worn a Halloween costume. It’s a little early in the month for that, but he can still spot fairies and pirates and rappers in the crush of people. He’s here because as much as he hates to admit it, he needs a drink, and if he’s going to get one without a hundred pictures of himself tipsy all over the news tomorrow, it’s going to be at Lunar.
He’d drink with the members, but they know that when Hyunjin wants to drink, he wants to drink for a reason and Hyunjin doesn’t feel like talking about the reason right now. He’d drink at the apartment, but Changbin coming home from the gym and finding him tipsy is an even worse feeling than whatever’s brewing in his chest right now.
Changbin doesn’t like seeing Hyunjin drink alone, and Hyunjin doesn’t like to drink alone.
Technically, if he’s at a club, he isn’t drinking alone.
And, Hyunjin thinks to himself as he takes a seat at the bar and waves down the bartender, he’s probably about to be far less alone than he planned for. Three seats down, there’s a man- very handsome, fairly tall, and mildly drunk- who’s grinning at Hyunjin in a way that says he doesn’t plan on taking no for an answer tonight.
Lovely.
Hyunjin dodges his gaze anyway. He might as well make this as difficult as he can. He should have stayed home and dealt with this instead of going out.
“I’d say ‘Hello, beautiful’ but I’m sure you get that all the time.” Bar Guy sounds confident in the way that comes from deep pockets.
He isn’t exactly wrong. Hyunjin resents it.
“Wasn’t planning on company tonight.”
It’s the truth. And a warning shot. Hyunjin is willing to get much nastier if need be and honestly, he’s kind of itching to do so. People have a tendency to look at Hyunjin and decide that he’s a gold-digger. That his affection can be bought, if one is willing to empty their wallet. Maybe it’s the way Hyunjin dresses, or maybe it’s just the fact that he’s beautiful.
Does it really matter? Only one man is on Hyunjin’s mind tonight and every other night.
“Then it’s a pleasant surprise, I’m sure.” Persistence is not a trait that Hyunjin admires in this context. He finally spares the man a real once-over and realizes with a jolt that he recognizes him. It’s the Lim heir- Hyunjin can’t call his name to mind right now, but he’s satisfied to see that he was right about the deep pockets. What was his name? He made the news recently- something stupid, but not shocking enough for Hyunjin to remember it easily, and this kid isn’t worth the effort of Hyunjin digging around in his memory to find it.
“I wish I could say that it was, but I’m a bad liar and you’d see right through it. Go find someone with lower standards.” Hyunjin pours every drop of venom he can into the words. The nerve of this guy to stop him before he’s even had the chance to order a drink. Isn’t it supposed to be good manners that you at least wait until after someone orders? That way, you can buy them another of whatever they’re having.
The bartender is turned away serving someone else, so he waits. The Lim kid seems to be digesting his words. Regrouping. Probably isn’t used to being rejected outright. Hyunjin changes his mind and asks for a soda when he gets the chance, though he was initially planning on something stronger, because he wants to be coherent enough to put this trust fund jerk in his place.
When he next glances up from the bar, though, the Lim kid has scooted down a seat and is now on the second stool away. Hyunjin doesn’t hide his scoff, but Lim looks undeterred.
“Oh, come on,” he grins. “You haven’t even heard my pitch yet. Don’t you want to hear it? I promise it’s good.”
“I’m sure you say that to everyone that turns you down in bars. And I’m sure there’s been plenty of them,” Hyunjin retorts. He takes a drink of his soda, nearly choking on it because he’s breathing heavily with how irritated he is. He dabs at his mouth as elegantly as he can with his cocktail napkin, and Lim seems to take it as a minor victory.
“I certainly do say it. Don’t you want to be the last one I say it to?”
Hyunjin slams his glass down on the counter with such force he’s surprised it doesn’t crack. It has the intended effect, though- Lim flinches and leans away ever so slightly.
“Can’t you catch a hint? I’m not interested. Go harass someone else.”
“Let me guess. Boy troubles?” Lim says sympathetically and that strikes a nerve far more than Hyunjin would like to admit.
Because yes. Changbin is the reason why he’s out of the apartment right now. Because he hates being around Changbin and knowing that he can’t have him. The anger of it is eating Hyunjin alive. He’s never wanted anything more in his entire life. He can recognize that he has never been denied anything he wants. Not until now. So the thought that Changbin, the thing he’s wanted the most out of everything else, ever, is the one thing he can’t have is infuriating. It makes him feel like a petty child, throwing a tantrum because he didn’t get what he wanted at the store.
But the want is so much more. Gut-deep.
In the face of this feeling, Hyunjin feels small. Miniscule, helpless. The wanting crushes him under its heel, peels him up, and remakes him, over and over. Every morning and every night he lies in a bed not ten meters from Changbin’s own and to him it’s a world apart. They spend almost every waking hour together and it’s not enough. Hyunjin needs to be under his skin. Needs to curl up in Changbin’s rib cage beneath his heart. He needs to know that he’s embedded as deeply in Changbin as Changbin seems to be in him.
Being with anyone else is unthinkable. What’s the point of dating when every time Hyunjin goes out, he finds himself imagining it was Changbin sitting across the table from him instead? What’s the point of making plans when the perfect man is at home on the couch alone, waiting on Hyunjin to get back? And this Lim kid thinks he’ll waltz right up and Hyunjin will be falling all over him.
No. No one at this club- no one in Korea or in the rest of this hemisphere has a chance at Hyunjin while Seo Changbin is in this world.
But…
Changbin can be a jealous man, whether he likes to acknowledge that side of himself or not. Hyunjin sees how Changbin can be when Hyunjin hugs Yongbok a little too long, or laughs a little too loud at one of Jisung’s jokes. Changbin is jealous of Hyunjin’s attention more than anything. And if he were to see Hyunjin laying all that attention on another man…
Maybe…
Maybe it would work. But Hyunjin doesn’t want to give Lim the satisfaction of winning just yet. The plan needs a little more time to sit in Hyunjin’s brain before he puts it into action, so he sips his soda again to stall.
“What did you say your name was?” Hyunjin drawls, tracing his index finger around the rim of the glass. As unpleasant as Lim is, Hyunjin gets a kick of delight seeing the way Lim’s eyes track the motion. He likes the effect he has on people when he’s trying.
Charm has never been a stretch for Hyunjin, and this guy seems to be an easy mark.
“Lim Tae,” he grins back, and Hyunjin knows exactly how this is going to go.
Tae isn’t Hyunjin’s type at all- too slimy to be romantic and too rich to be real. But he’s handsome enough to fool Changbin into thinking that he’s serious, at least for a while. Long enough to stir up the jealousy that Hyunjin is looking for. And maybe, he’ll be a little fun in the meantime.
So, though he ignores Tae’s advances for the rest of the night, and tosses an insult his way every opportunity he gets, he scrawls his phone number on a bar napkin and leaves it. If Tae wants in, he’ll take the bait. If not, he won’t.
By eight the next morning, there’s a text from an unknown number sitting in Hyunjin’s messages, waiting to be read.
……..
The first time they meet up on purpose, it’s strange. It isn’t at Lunar. It’s at a quieter joint a little further downtown. A bit more private. Their text conversations have been few and relatively impersonal. Hyunjin knows more about Lim Tae from looking him up than from their actual interactions. So that gives them some material to cover when they meet, at least.
Hyunjin has a game plan before he even walks in the door. He’s arriving fifteen minutes earlier than they agreed on. He can’t let Lim Tae beat him here. He has to control the setting, and that means arriving first and being ready before Tae walks in.
But to his surprise, Tae has beaten him there and is chatting- in a way that strikes Hyunjin as overly friendly, for someone who’s here for a date with someone else- with another random at the bar. It’s only a couple days before Halloween now, so the man is dressed as a cowboy. A very scantily clad cowboy.
Hyunjin thought that he would beat Tae here by a wide margin. He’ll admit that he kind of expected Tae to be late. That’s a page out of the millionaire playboy handbook, right? Keep them all sitting around for you because your time is so much more valuable than theirs. But no, Tae has been here long enough to order a couple drinks and to strike up a conversation.
Just like that, Hyunjin can feel the control slipping out of his hands. He kind of wants to leave right now and go back to the apartment. He wants to be doing his bedtime routine with Changbin down the hall. He doesn’t want to be standing like an idiot in the middle of a bar, watching his date try to chat up some other man. But he’s already come this far.
Hyunjin slides onto the stool between Tae and stripper-cowboy, grinning wide.
“I’m surprised you beat me here! Making friends already?” Hyunjin knows he looks especially good tonight. He planned on it and did his makeup very carefully in order to be so. He turns his head just slightly towards the- admittedly very handsome- strangers and gives him a look that says in no uncertain terms to get out right now. The stranger makes for the door immediately, almost losing a spur in his haste.
Well. If nothing else goes okay tonight, at least he's accomplished that.
“No need to go scaring him off. He’s not your competition,” Tae laughs. “We were just talking.”
“Maybe he’s your competition,” Hyunjin shoots back. “He’s not bad-looking. Did you catch his name?”
“Okay, okay. I get it. Jerk move. I’m here to be with you, so I shouldn’t be talking to him. I just- you sounded kind of disinterested over text so I thought I might get stood up. But I’m glad you didn’t do that, and I’m sorry. Here. Truce.” Tae holds his hand out to shake.
Hyunjin gives him a long, hard stare. Slowly takes the offered hand. He had sounded that way on purpose, so that Tae would already be on the back foot by the time their date rolled around. Apparently, it’s already backfired, and they aren’t even five minutes into the date. Hyunjin picked the day, time, and place. He showed up early. And the control is completely tipped in Tae’s favor.
“I thought you would be late,” Hyunjin says. “So we both expected to be disappointed by each other. And we were both pleasantly surprised.”
“A very optimistic spin on the situation.” Hyunjin means it to sound neutral, not like a compliment, but it comes out as one anyway. He bites his tongue.
Tae cocks his head. “Well, thank you.” He slides one of the glasses in front of him down the bar so that it comes to a neat stop in front of Hyunjin, contents sloshing slightly but not spilling over. “This is yours, if you want it. If not, I can certainly buy you something else.”
Hyunjin is tired of the pleasantries, to be honest. “Where should we start?”
“I assume that you at least Googled me before you asked to meet. That would have been the responsible thing to do. To ensure that I’m not a murderer with a taste for very, very beautiful men.” Tae bats his eyelashes in a joking way.
“I did Google you. And it’s safe to say that you did the same?”
“I did. Though when we first met, I did have the nagging feeling that I recognized you from somewhere. Now I know it’s from that Versace billboard in Garak-Dong. I’m not familiar with your music, but I’ve seen a couple of your ads, as it turns out. Very impressive.”
Hyunjin considers that. He hadn’t expected- or wanted- to date a fan. But to have someone who’s completely unaware of his music is highly unusual. And maybe, a little refreshing. That means that with Tae, he doesn’t have to talk about albums or videos or antis. It’s about Hwang Hyunjin the person, not Hwang Hyunjin the idol. And that’s more freeing that Hyunjin could have imagined.
“I recognized you when I first met you. From Lim family appearances, mostly. But other than that, I didn’t know anything about you.”
“So you mostly know about my family.” Hyunjin doesn’t know how to confirm that without making it sound like he’s out for the Lim family fortune. “It’s a pretty influential family. And besides, you have to start somewhere, right?”
“That you do. So let me ask you this. When I first approached you, I got the impression-“ Tae cuts off with a scowl and pulls a buzzing phone out of his pocket. “Speaking of family.” He reads the screen for about half a second and his face gets very solemn.
“Hyunjin, I’m very sorry. I wouldn’t leave if it wasn’t so important.” Tae stands up and straightens his jacket, frantic. “I want to meet up with you again and have a proper conversation, okay? Please don’t be angry with me.”
“I’m not angry, I. . .” Hyunjin trails.
Tae slides his credit card to the bartender’s assistant, who stands ready behind a register to close him out. The assistant dutifully rings him up for the two drinks he’s purchased, neither of which have been touched yet, and hands Tae the receipt, which he crams into the jacket pocket of his suit without even looking at it. “I really do want to continue this with you. You believe me, don’t you?”
“I do.” Hyunjin can see that Tae is being earnest in this.
“Alright.” After a moment of hesitation, Tae leans over and kisses Hyunjin’s cheek. “I’m sorry again, Hyunjin. I’ll sort this out and I’ll text you later. Please be safe on the way home.”
He leaves Hyunjin sitting alone at the bar, face aflame and totally bewildered.
……..
Hyunjin takes too long to tell Changbin about Tae.
He promises himself that it’s only because- well.
What’s the right time to spring that on someone? Even though Hyunjin only initiated this to make Changbin jealous. The attention is nice, even if it’s from Tae and not Changbin.
It’s nice to have someone tell you that they like your outfit, even when you’ve barely put any effort in. It’s nice to have someone to text about your bad day or your bad week. It’s nice to have admiring eyes on you in general, no matter whose eyes they are.
So that’s what Hyunjin tells himself. He likes the attention Tae gives him. Not Tae himself. And Hyunjin knows that it’s awful, but he’s also sure that Tae also has a couple ulterior motives, so he can’t bring himself to feel too bad about it. Tae is finally, finally, something that comes easily to Hyunjin. After years of hard work and constant tension. With Tae, he can drop his shoulders and unclench his jaw and say whatever comes to mind. It’s okay. It’s all okay. Hyunjin is dramatic by nature- big gestures and big feelings and big speeches and Tae takes it all in stride, giving him the space and the company that Hyunjin needs in equal measure.
And Tae is a lot of fun, honestly. He knows everyone. He can get into anywhere and out of all kinds of trouble. He spends money with the same ease and thoughtlessness as breathing. He likes to walk the line between overly lavish and completely insane, and Hyunjin can’t bring himself to do the same but it’s a beautiful thing to watch.
Their relationship lives in the spaces between both of their very busy schedules- late nights out at Lunar, empty parking lots. Somewhere along the way, Hyunjin forgets to feel guilty about leading Tae on. Maybe because he isn’t really, not anymore. He genuinely likes the man.
When Hyunjin and Tae got together, Hyunjin did it because he knew that Changbin would be jealous. At least, if he loved Hyunjin, he would be. But he hasn’t acted on it at all. He’s defended Hyunjin and advised him, like a good friend would. No more and no less. Changbin sticks carefully to the boundaries of friendship. It’s Hyunjin that’s always stepping over the line. Maybe it’s time to admit the obvious. Whatever used to be between Changbin and Hyunjin doesn’t exist anymore. Maybe moving in together killed it. Maybe Hyunjin did, when he started to go out with Tae, or maybe he did somehow else and never realized it. In the end, does the reason matter? It’s over. It’s gone. And Hyunjin is trying to fill that crater with Tae, which seems to be working okay so far.
But Hyunjin takes too long to tell Changbin about Tae- takes too long to tell everyone, really. They should have been working on this for a while. He should have told management, at least, so they knew to watch out for him. There’s a time and a place to come out as an idol, and this isn’t it.
He has the courtesy to tell Changbin at the apartment, and to tell him before he tells everyone else. He expects it to be ugly, and they both deserve the privacy of their own home for this, even if it isn’t as bad as he anticipates it to be.
“I want to meet him.” Changbin is definitely surprised, definitely hurt, and probably angry.
Hyunjin blinks. He was expecting something a little more dramatic, he thinks. He’s not really sure. Maybe a couple of tears or a ‘how could you’ for all his trouble.
“Alright.”
And that’s that.