Chapter Text
Renjun had always believed that love was something you noticed in the details. The way someone remembered how he took his coffee even when he never ordered the same thing twice.
The way a hand hovered near his back in crowded rooms, not touching but always ready. The way silence could feel full instead of empty. That belief was why he became a photographer. He lived in the margins—between movements, between smiles, between the moments people thought no one was watching. His camera caught what others missed. Or maybe it was more accurate to say that he noticed what people forgot to look for.
Including himself.
The apartment was quiet again. Not the comfortable kind of quiet. Not the kind that settled into your bones and warmed you from the inside. This was the hollow kind, the kind that echoed even when nothing made a sound. Renjun sat on the floor of his studio room, back against the wall, camera resting uselessly in his lap. The city lights outside the window blinked like distant stars, indifferent and far away. He had been editing photos for hours, but the screen had gone dark a long time ago. He hadn’t noticed.
Jaemin and Jeno were late. Again.
He didn’t check the time. He didn’t need to. His body already knew the rhythm of their absence. It had learned it the same way it learned hunger or exhaustion—slowly, quietly, until one day it was just there, constant and unavoidable. They loved him. He knew that. Or at least, he told himself they did.
Jaemin’s love was loud when it existed. Bright smiles, warm laughter, arms around shoulders in public. Jeno’s was steadier, quieter—acts of service, small reassurances, an occasional hand squeeze when no one was looking. Together, they were overwhelming in the best way. But lately, their love had started to feel like something that happened around him instead of with him.
They were always traveling. Always in meetings. Always at dinners with people Renjun didn’t know and never met. Their schedules overlapped with each other seamlessly, like two perfectly aligned gears. Renjun, meanwhile, existed in the spaces between those gears—necessary once, maybe, but increasingly easy to forget.
He had tried not to be dramatic about it. Tried to tell himself that this was adulthood, that love didn’t always look like attention, that careers mattered too. He supported them. He really did. He celebrated their achievements, took their promotional photos, listened to their excited rambling late at night when they did come home.
But support, he was learning, was not the same as being seen. The door finally opened close to midnight. Renjun didn’t look up at first. He listened instead—Jaemin’s familiar laugh, Jeno’s deeper voice murmuring something he couldn’t quite hear. Shoes were kicked off. Jackets rustled. The sound of two lives moving in perfect sync.
“Renjun?” Jaemin called out when he noticed the light still on. “You’re still awake?”
Renjun lifted his head slowly. “In my own house?” he said lightly. Too lightly. Jeno frowned immediately.
He always noticed tone shifts faster than Jaemin did. “You didn’t have to wait for us.” Renjun smiled, small and tired. “I wasn’t.”
That was the first lie of the night. They sat together on the couch, Jaemin leaning into Jeno instinctively, fingers already intertwined.
Renjun took the armchair opposite them, knees pulled to his chest. He felt like a guest in his own living room, like someone who had arrived too early or too late to be included naturally. For a while, they talked about nothing. About work. About people Renjun didn’t know. About places he hadn’t been to in months. And then something inside him snapped—not loudly, not dramatically, but cleanly.
Like a thread pulled too tight for too long. “Do you ever notice,” Renjun said quietly, “that you two talk like I’m not here?”
The room stilled. Jaemin blinked. “What?” Renjun swallowed. His hands trembled, so he tucked them under his thighs. “You’re always together. Always moving. Always somewhere else. And I’m just… here.” Jeno sat up straighter. “Renjun—”
“No,” Renjun interrupted, voice still soft but firmer now. “Please. Just let me say this once.” They did. “I know you’re busy. I know your work matters. I know I’m not the center of the universe,” he continued, eyes fixed on the floor. “But I feel like I’m slowly disappearing from your lives. Like I exist only when it’s convenient.”
Jaemin’s expression cracked. “That’s not true.” “It feels true,” Renjun replied. “And feelings don’t really care about intentions.” Silence stretched again, heavier this time.
Jeno moved first. He crossed the space between them and knelt in front of Renjun, hands warm and steady as they wrapped around Renjun’s wrists. “We didn’t mean to make you feel like that.” Jaemin followed, sitting beside Renjun, leaning close. “Never,” he said softly. “We love you. God, Renjun, of course we do.” Renjun wanted to believe them. He really did. “You promise?” he asked, hating how small his voice sounded. Jaemin nodded immediately. “We promise. No more ignoring you. No more making you feel left out.” Jeno squeezed his hands. “We’ll do better.” Renjun nodded too.
That was the second lie of the night—the one he told himself.
For a few days, things improved. Messages came more often. Dinner together happened twice in one week. Jaemin kissed Renjun’s temple absentmindedly while passing by.
Jeno asked about his latest shoot and actually listened to the answer. Renjun let hope creep back in.
That was his mistake.
The night it all fell apart was quiet. Too quiet. Renjun was alone again, scrolling mindlessly through his phone while waiting for them to come home. He wasn’t even anxious anymore—just numb, suspended in a state of expectation he pretended not to have.
And then he saw it.
A headline on an entertainment portal, bold and impossible to ignore.
“Rising Business Icons Jaemin and Jeno Steal the Spotlight at Annual Global Gala”
His fingers froze.
The photo loaded slowly, as if the universe wanted to be cruel about it. Jaemin and Jeno stood side by side in tailored suits, radiant under flashing lights. They looked perfect.
Powerful.
Untouchable.
A couple. Renjun’s chest tightened as he opened the article.
Jaemin shared during his interview, “I wouldn’t be where I am today without Jeno’s love and support. He’s been my anchor through everything.”
He scrolled.
Jeno followed with heartfelt words of his own, stating, “Meeting Jaemin changed my life. He inspired me to believe in myself and dream bigger.” Renjun read the words again. And again.
There was no mention of him. Not once. Not as a partner. Not as a support.
Not even as an afterthought.
His phone slipped from his hands and hit the floor with a dull sound. This time, the silence was deafening. He laughed then—soft, broken, almost hysterical. “Of course,” he whispered to the empty room.
“Of course.”
All the promises. All the reassurances.
Reduced to nothing more than something they said to make him stop hurting in private, while in public, he didn’t exist at all. The front door opened an hour later.
Renjun didn’t turn around.
Jaemin’s voice was cheerful, unaware.
“Jun! You’re still up.”
Jeno noticed first. The way Renjun’s shoulders were tense. The phone lying face-down on the floor. The air thick with something sharp and wrong.
“Renjun?”
Jeno said cautiously. Renjun stood up slowly.
He turned to face them, eyes dry, expression eerily calm. “So,” he said, voice steady despite the storm raging inside him, “when did I stop being part of your life?”
And just like that, everything shattered.