Work Text:
The window beside Youngjae's bed was open. The sounds of the city drifted through it, along with the cool breeze that caressed his bare legs, and the soft darkness pressed comfortably against his open eyes. It was the perfect environment for sleep, but as he rolled over, he felt a pang in his stomach. Something was missing.
He swung his legs over the edge of the bed, quietly opening the door. Youngjae plodded down the hallway, and the tiles felt pleasantly cool under his bare feet. It soothed him, but not as much as his hyung could. He heard the distinct sound of typing coming from the living room.
Youngjae turned the corner. Leaning against the doorway, he watched as Jaebum typed as fast as his fingers would allow, hunched over his laptop. He didn’t look up. With a sigh, Youngjae retreated into the kitchen to make himself a cup of tea. Although he was awake, his limbs were heavy with sleep. He wondered how Jaebum could possibly be awake at a time like this. He lumbered over to Jaebum with his cup of chamomile tea, worry stirring in his stomach.
“Hyung?”
“Go sleep, Youngjae,” the leader spoke, his tired face illuminated by the bright screen of the laptop. “I have work to do.”
Youngjae wavered. But with one glaring look from Jaebum, he put down his cup of tea on the table beside the hard worker and left.
The bed felt awfully empty that night.
The next day, Jaebum looked exhausted. It wasn’t obvious at first, but if you looked closer you would see the blue under his eyes, the tired lines of his face, and the way his eyes swept the room, unfocused. It worried Youngjae to no end. Yet whenever he tried to speak up, Jaebum narrowed his eyes to stop it, as if he knew he would protest against the leader's demise. And so Youngjae spent the following night alone as well, finding himself in the exact same position as the other night. Whenever he looked over, he only saw empty white sheets, instead of the shape of auburn-haired boy that he was used to.
He spent the day a touch less chipper than he usually was, and if the other members noticed, they didn’t comment on it.
He wished they did.
When the night began to press against the window, everyone retired to bed- everyone except for Jaebum. Youngjae wrapped himself with a blanket, trudging down the hallway. He followed the typing noises Jaebum’s productivity emitted, stopping right in front of his tired hyung. He didn’t look up this time either.
“Go sleep, Youngjae,” he said, his eyes glued onto the screen. Youngjae didn’t.
Jaebum allowed himself to glance up, but Youngjae still didn’t move, and instead fixed the elder with a childish pout.
“Youngjae,” he repeated, sternly.
“Fine, I’ll go sleep,” a playful smirk spread across his face. And just like that, he slid into Jaebum’s lap, pulling the covers along with him.
He looked down, confused. “What the hell, Youngjae? I didn’t mean on my lap.”
“That’s too bad,” Youngjae dismissed, trying his best to rest his head comfortably on the rough material of the jeans Jaebum had on. Youngjae felt his stare, but when he opened one eye, the harshness he expected in Jaebum’s eyes was missing.
Instead he found a thoughtful expression.
“You said to go to sleep, but you didn’t say where,” Youngjae pointed out triumphantly. Jaebum shook his head, the barest hint of a smile playing on the corners of his lips.
“Aish, what am I going to do with you?” Under the layer of mock annoyance, his words were laced with affection. Youngjae thought his plan worked, he really did, because finally he was looking back down at him instead of his stupid laptop.
And when he met his gaze, he decided he liked looking at Jaebum from this angle. He longed to press kisses to the sharp counters of Jaebum’s jaw, to kiss him until his eyes sparkled again. His brown eyes, they were bloodshot and tired now, but they still had that depth that never failed to draw him in. Youngjae’s breath caught in his throat. Jaebum leaned in- but he reached for his laptop instead of him.
The mood fell.
He felt a twinge of pain-did Jaebum really prefer work over him? Maybe, he pondered, maybe he didn’t care about him as much as he thought he did. The idea bounced off of the walls of his skull, echoing over and over, until it settled into his brain. Maybe he was just a nuisance to him. The lump in Youngjae’s throat grew.
He finally spoke, stroking his jaw with a feather like touch. “Don’t work yourself too hard, hyung.” Jaebum didn’t react.
“I won’t.” It was a lie of course. Youngjae knew that. Nothing stopped Jaebum when he wanted something done, and he was quite silly to think otherwise.
Soon enough the jean stopped chafing him, and he was too tired to let Jaebum’s arm movements faze him. He fell asleep to the sound of typing and the warmth coming from the other’s sweatshirt.
But the next morning, he found both of those things missing. He felt his heart sink. Why hadn't he woken up with Jaebum beside him? He slowly rose, letting the world come back into focus, wondering if he imagined the entirety of last night. He trudged into the kitchen, rubbing his tired eyes.
"Morning. Want coffee?" were Jaebum's first words. He sat at the kitchen table, clutching his own cup of caffeine.
"No, I'm more of a tea person," came Youngjae's snappy response. Jaebum's eyebrows rose.
Youngjae began to make himself a cup of tea, because he wasn’t lying. He was a tea person and he couldn’t believe Jaebum forgot.
There was a silent tension in the air. Jaebum’s glare drilled into the back of his head, almost as if he planned to break into his skull and steal his thoughts. It made Youngjae tense.
“Alright, spill it. What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” Youngjae said a little too quickly, picking up his cup of tea to avoid being questioned. But one glare from Jaebum was enough to cause a nervous tremor to run down his arm. That, combined with his weak, tired grip, caused the tea to splash over the side of the cup and all over himself. With a yelp, he lunged towards the sink, turning on the cold water to soothe his throbbing hand.
“Youngjae! I didn’t mean to literally spill it,” Jaebum scolded, worry written over his features. He rushed to his side, running a washcloth under the water.
“Hyung, you don’t need to-“he protested, but Jaebum’s glower made him stop in his tracks. His hands were on him in an instant, guiding his soaked shirt above his head. He pressed the cold wash cloth onto his chest. Youngjae shivered. From the temperature or from something else entirely, he wasn’t sure.
“I think you’ll be okay, but really, you have to be more careful not to hurt yourself like that,” he chided. The accusing tone of his voice contrasted with the gentle motion of the washcloth.
“I have to be more careful? Says the guy who hasn’t slept in a week!” Youngjae burst out. Jaebum stopped, raising an eyebrow. There was a quiet moment where he just stared in disbelief. He broke it with a loud, barking laugh.
"Is this why you’re angry? You’re mad at me because I haven’t been taking care of myself?"
Youngjae didn’t appreciate getting laughed at.
“You’re a hypocrite.” And then he stepped back, not caring that he’d lose the cool of the washcloth or the other’s touch.
The topic stayed in his mind all day. What if he never felt Jaebum’s arms around him again? He hated to admit it, but it bothered him a lot more than it should. There was something so wrong about sleeping alone, he thought that night. In his arms was a pillow- a lousy attempt to replace his hyung. He didn’t need his comforting weight to lull him to sleep. But it was one in the morning and his eyes were still wide open.
“I’ve been thinking,” his voice swept over Youngjae as soon as the door creaked open, “about why you could have been so mad at me today.”
Youngjae continued to stare at the wall.
“I wondered if you were just concerned,” Jaebum sat down on the edge of the bed. “But no, expressing concern with anger isn’t like you at all. So I thought about what else would have made you yell at me like that, and I finally figured it out.”
He felt the bed dip as Jaebum leaned over him with a smile.
“You miss me.”
Youngjae couldn’t ignore him any longer.
“Hyung,” he whined, his cheeks a shade pinker than they were a second ago.
“Hmm? I’m right then? Admit it, you miss me,” he repeated, shaking his shoulder and bending down to nuzzle Youngjae’s cheek.
“No, I don’t,” he denied, but his smile gave him away. Seeing that smile, something seemed to crack inside of Jaebum. Instead of the pure ambition that had been keeping him running, his face was lined with fatigue and softness.
“You do. C’mon, Youngjae-ah, you miss me so much,” he pressed kiss after kiss to Youngjae’s cheek, curling a protective arm around him.
“I never said that!” Youngjae protested.
“You didn’t have to.”
And Jaebum was right. He pressed a goodnight kiss to his forehead, hugging Youngjae tightly to his chest and nestling his face into the crook of his neck. Youngjae smiled into the pillow. He should have been sleeping, but he was too busy savouring this moment- the erratic beating of his heart, the places where Jaebum’s skin touched his, Jaebum’s deep, steady breaths.
How could he have possibly thought he didn’t care, when he was here right now, holding him as if no time had passed at all?
He sunk deeper into the familiar hold that Jaebum had on him, and deeper into a sleepy oblivion. The longer they stayed together, the more he settled he felt. But not in a bad way- it was like coming home after a long day, like two pieces of a puzzle clicking together.
“…I did miss you,” Youngjae calmly remarked. He felt Jaebum’s lips curl into a smile against his neck.
“I know.”