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It’s not like Sangwon meant to become a smoker.
He didn’t mean to have 'addiction and a dysfunctional dopamine pathway' written in his book of life. But things happened, as they always do, —familiar excuses of “I wanted to try” or “It made me feel good when I wanted to forget.”
Yes, excuses maybe, but it really had been because he had wanted to forget how shitty his life had become. Now part-time barista and occasional DJ, he wouldn’t say that he had accomplished anything his young, putty-brained self had envisioned himself doing. Trainee A fell through, and the promise he’d once made under a panorama of a starry sky with Leo, to debut together no matter what, broke the moment he left.
They still talk about the what-ifs sometimes. But does it even matter anymore?
He sighs, breath puffing ash in the cold air and takes a long drag of his vape, the relief that floods his chest a momentary respite for the sharp bite of the cold wind that hits his skin. The scent of passion fruit cloys the air around him when he exhales. Behind him, the building booms with reverbs and bass that threaten to tilt the world over.
Across him, Leo stands sentinel, a faint frown marring the softened edges of his face. He scrunches his nose when the vapour hits his face, "You’ve been vaping a lot recently, I thought you switched to vaping because you wanted to quit?"
"Well, you got any better ideas?"
"Have you tried nicotine patches?"
Sangwon groans. He did try nicotine patches, for a couple of weeks, even. But it had only worsened his withdrawals. On day ten of his cessation, tremors raked his whole body, fingers twitching over the ghost of a cigarette. Smoking, for Sangwon, wasn’t just about the relief that blanketed him as smoke filled his lungs; it was also the act of holding his cigarette between his fingers. Anchoring and grounding him all at once. Not to mention all the side effects that came with wearing them. By day fifteen , he had dumped all the patches in the dumpster behind his apartment.
He takes another drag, "They didn’t help."
Leo stays silent for a while, studying him. Sangwon knows by the look on his face, —all quiet pragmatism that translated itself into a pout—, that Leo was conjuring some sort of solution to his problem, ever so eager to help a friend in need.
He doesn’t know if he should consider that a flaw or a blessing.
He shifts his weight, suddenly uncomfortable. He’s always a little bit nervous when Leo looks at him like that.
After what feels like a lifetime, Leo finally speaks up, "What about kissing me every time you get the urge to smoke?"
Huh.
Leo looks at him expectantly, like he didn’t say the most insane thing ever.
"You want me to kiss you every time I want to smoke?"
"If that’ll help you forego smoking and vaping altogether, then yes."
"You’re insane."
He smiles, a little bit smug, "Is that a yes?"
Sangwon drags a hand over his face, "Maybe."
They don’t speak much after that, enjoying the silence before Sangwon ultimately decided that he had enough of the cold and gestured to Leo to follow him back inside.
"Your vape," Leo says, tone decisive, palms out as they reach the threshold of Leo’s apartment. A tiny one-bedroom thing the size of a shoe box, too cramped for two male adults of their size.
Sangwon kicks off his shoes, his eyebrow shooting up, "We’re actually doing this?" Still, he relents, hands feeling for the vape in his pocket. When he finds it, he takes it out and places it on his palm.
Leo smiles softly, satisfied, "Thank you, Wonie."
Then, to Sangwon’s surprise, Leo rushes to the window in the living room, opens it and throws his vape out of the window.
"Oh my god, Hyung!", he exclaims, rushing to his side. From the window, his vape lies comically underneath a flickering street lamp, like a lone discarded thing in the empty street. "You could’ve just thrown it away in the trash like a normal person!"
"And risk you fishing it out at night when I’m sleeping?"
Okay, point taken.
Leo yawns, already retreating from him, heading towards his bedroom. "Come on," he calls out, "Let’s go sleep."
Sangwon wakes with the telltale signs of needing a smoke; his skin feels dry and itchy, and he already feels restless despite having just woken up.
He hastily untangles himself from Leo, sitting up, and perches over, hand blindingly reaching for his nightstand. His vape should be around here… amongst a heap of books Leo’s borrowed from Sangwon and other miscellaneous objects he can’t quite make out in the dim light.
His hand comes up with nothing.
Oh, right, Leo had thrown his vape away the night before, out of the fucking window at that. He groans, his hand flying to his hair, pulling at his strands in frustration.
Meanwhile, the cause of his anguish mumbles incoherently in his sleep, his hand unconsciously padding against the sheets like he’s looking for something, then opens his eyes when he doesn’t find it.
"Sangwon," he mumbles sleepily, half-lidded eyes flickering to the clock above them. He makes grabby gestures at him, like Sangwon’s a plushie he’s lost hold in his sleep —he might as well be one, with how Leo damn near suffocates him every time he finds himself in his bed—, "It’s like 5 a.m., come back to sleep."
"I can’t," he whines out, "You threw my fucking vape away!"
Leo's eyes softened in understanding, "Oh, sorry, I forgot."
"Yeah."
Sangwon slumps back in defeat. Silence settles down in the quiet night, then, as if struck with realisation, Leo sits up abruptly, the covers slipping to his hips.
"Kiss me then."
Sangwon looks at him like he’s grown a second head, "I thought we were joking back there."
"I wasn’t."
Sangwon sighs in frustration, "That ain’t going to fucking help, is it?"
Leo shrugs, sliding on his back and pulling the covers back over him, "Then I guess you’ll just have to suffer through your craving."
"Hey, hyung!" He shakes him uncontrollably. Leo doesn’t get to do that, leaving him to sleep when he’s the one who got him in that situation in the first place —he promptly ignores the part where he’d given him his vape without preamble—, it was unfair.
"Nuh uh, not listening!"
"Okay, oh my god, okay," he says loudly in disbelief, running his palms over his face, "Let’s fucking kiss."
Leo sits back up in a heap, downright beaming as if he’s won the lottery.
Sangwon wonders if Leo had even considered the optics of friend-on-friend kissing for a brief second, before filling away that knowledge for himself. He’ll take any chance he can get. Even if it came in the form of a genuine attempt to help a friend in need.
And this was stupid, so insanely stupid. Leo opens his mouth like he’s about to say something, but Sangwon, brimming with all the courage and frustration that he’d gathered in the last few minutes, grabs his face and crashes his lips against his.
He feels Leo smirk against his lips, humming approvingly, like he expected this all along and warmth pools in his tummy, hot and invasive.
Fuck the optics, Leo knew exactly what he was doing. That motherfucker.
In retaliation, because Sangwon is utterly humiliated for falling so easily in his trap, he shoves his tongue, tries to bully his way in but he ends up lapping like a dog at Leo's lips as they stay tightly shut. Embarrassment floods his body, thick and heavy.
God, he wants to die. He’s never going to live this down.
Leo breaks away from him, a low, deep chuckle rumbling through his chest.
"A little desperate, aren’t you?"
Sangwon blushes, "Please shut up."
Leo plants a chaste kiss on his lips and places a hand against his chest. He then gently pushes him until he’s falling down on the cramped bed. "Is this okay?" He asks, eyes searching his, as if Sangwon hadn’t tried to aggressively French kiss him just seconds prior.
He swallows thickly, suddenly shy. He nods once, then a second time more firmly.
It’s all the confirmation Leo needs. He kisses him again, soft lips pressing against his and Sangwon shudders at the contact, tears pricking his eyes.
He’s kissed many people before, but none of them could ever come close to this.
They played the game for far too long. Letting the silence carry every word left unsaid. Every brush of skin against skin had been an excuse for proximity. Tangled limbs on a far too cramped bed had been because it was easier than to have him sleeping on a couch with chipped leathered skin and an old smell that held far more history than they ever will in their lifetime.
He almost laughs into Leo’s mouth at the absurdity of the situation. To think that all it’d take to lead them to that tipping point would be Leo kissing him under the guise of helping him through his addiction.
Leo’s hands trail down until they rest at his waist, it’s the barest touch, almost unnoticeable if it weren’t for the way all of his nerves seemed to set alight like a broken fuse. Sangwon clings to him in response, fingers clutching at his shirt as he pulls him down closer. His instinct calling for proximity, even when he feels like he should pull away. Show that he hasn’t craved for this as much as he has, because this was crossing a bridge they had never dared to cross before.
Each press feels like a brand. A claim for all the time they lost when they should’ve been kissing like long lost lovers a long time ago. Their mouths slotted together like pieces of a puzzle. Slightly frayed at the edge but meant to fit. Leo licks at the seam of his lips, asking for permission and Sangwon grants it with a greed that surprises himself. He opens his mouth, letting him in, their tongues dancing in tangled circles of spit and something that is distinctly theirs.
It may not be scientifically possible, but Sangwon thinks he can taste Leo down to his very atoms too.
"Sangwon–," Leo attempts, as he breaks off the kiss, but Sangwon yanks him back down to his lips, gasping into his mouth, as if Leo had denied him of oxygen.
And holy shit, this really felt ten times better than hitting that damn vape. He only needed Leo to fuck him senseless to seal the deal. He bets that it’d feel better than the dopamine rush he gets from a cigarette.
Leo shoves his tongue one last time, roaming the inside of his mouth like he’s on his own little excursion. Tongue licking the inside of his cheek, the underside of tongue before ending at his teeth, where Leo seems to find great pleasure in exploring his three front teeth in great detail. Mildly gross, Sangwon thinks, saliva pools at the side of his mouth, but Leo seems to be enjoying himself so he’ll take it.
Finally, Leo pulls away, not before pecking his lips one last time. He notices the drool and wipes it away with his thumb.
"So?" Leo asks, voice breathy as he flips them over so that Sangwon rests atop him, hugging him tightly.
Sangwon sinks into him, "I think my craving’s gone."
“Yeah?”
Sangwon buries his face in the crest of his neck, "Yeah." He mumbles shyly.
It’s a half-truth. He still itches for a smoke, but he does feel less restless, irritation replaced with something steadier.
Silence settles in the room again, their shared breath filling the quiet. He thinks over the logistics of the ‘kissing-to-help-with-Sangwon’s-addiction’ plan. As if any of this was clinically sound. If they were to enact the plan, that meant that Sangwon would need to have access to Leo at all times. It’s not like he could rush over for a kiss every time his craving returned. And as it currently stood, despite them both living in Seoul, Sangwon and Leo lived far away from each other.
That wouldn’t do.
He lifts himself from Leo, "But, what about when I’m away from you?"
"Then, live with me for a while?"
Sangwon stares at him, face flushing red once more. It’s a sound arrangement, the most logical thing to do. Yet the words coming out of Leo’s mouth practically sound like a confession. Granted, what just went down couldn’t have happened if they considered themselves anything but best friends, the lines having blurred in between heaps of kisses and shared saliva.
Still, his heart leaps when Leo’s hand comes up to grab his hand, his eyes earnest, his thumb running circles around the sensitive spot at the centre of Sangwon’s wrist,—learned sensitivities that occurred after years of quiet observation.
They were anything but not meant to be.
Sangwon fake snorts, he hopes that it’s enough to conceal how flustered he is, "Is this you confessing to me?"
"Do you want it to be?"
Sangwon might as well short-circuit on the spot. It doesn’t help that Leo holds him like he means the world and everything under the sky to him.
Instead, because now he can, he peppers his face with tiny kisses, more air than anything, but it’s the thought that counts.
"Sorry, got a craving again." he says unabashedly.
Leo huffs, rolling his eyes playfully, "Is that going to be your new excuse from now on?"
Sangwon throws a light punch at his chest, giggling, "You literally caused this."
Leo laughs, a pure, unfiltered sound that resounds like music to his ears, "Point taken."
Leo drifts off soon after, his familiar warmth and scent washes over him. The steady heartbeats beneath his ear slowly lulls him. It’s nice, he thinks, falling asleep like this. He could drown in it, his lungs and whole being full of Leo, Leo, Leo.
Maybe it won’t solve his smoking addiction, but for now, this could be a silent reprieve from the vapour in his lungs.