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"Youngjae-hyung and I are dating now," Jihoon announces, sporting a bashful smile on his face.
A loud silence follows.
The type of silence that pierces your hearing the longer it stays.
What comes next is a loud ringing, an ambulance echoing faintly from across the city. It fades slowly, giving back the suffocating air it has stolen momentarily.
And with that, Dohoon's long-standing, meticulously built wall of defense blows up in his face.
The once-lively living room feels too still, a little too fragile for his liking. They aren't the best at being subtle, and he can feel all the attention directed towards him for a split second. Even Kyungmin has his mouth agape, eyeing him carefully through those thick lenses of his, as if Dohoon is a ticking bomb waiting to blow up any moment.
It's almost as if Junghwan's role as a leader glares at him to take the wheel of the situation, as he lets out what seems to be an obligatory speech—a cheery congrats, a blanket warning, and a closing positive wish as a friend. How to Leader 101 by Shin Junghwan: his trusted formula of a compliment sandwich.
Dohoon sees through all of its practiced gestures, exhaustion bleeding through its cracks. And like the trustworthy co-leader that Junghwan once claimed he is, he throws a pointless comment here and there, some laughter, some nods in agreement, filling the gaps between Junghwan's lengthy sentences. He likes to think that he's good at that, saying a bunch of casual nothings, detached from all his feelings. He says all the right words, the expected words, plays the role of someone who takes on the world lightly, someone so carefree that nothing bothers him.
Just for a second, he feels Jihoon glancing at him with those curious, uncertain eyes of his, a rare moment where the entirety of his pupils' circumference can actually be seen. He's waiting for Dohoon's actual response, for how he truly feels behind the assumed co-leader façade. Dohoon would rather die than admit that behind the makeshift defense wall that's shielding him, there's a frantic version of himself, running around as he tries to rebuild the wall that just broke.
It shouldn't be hard. After all, Youngjae and Jihoon are expected—a natural result of time, of all the choices they have made. He can't just sit there and act like a victim when he had a big part in their eventual union. Dohoon is aware of what he has done to himself years ago, so they should just let him bear the consequences of his actions.
And once Junghwan exhausts himself, looking at the others in the eyes to make sure nothing is left unspoken, Dohoon gets up, excusing himself to go to the bathroom.
He wishes he could say that he's there to cry all of his feelings out—this nameless, nagging lump on his chest, wedged somewhere in between his lungs, making breathing ten times heavier than usual—but truly, he's just there to empty his bladder, the cold air the AC blasts makes him want to pee.
Youngjae must have assumed he's going for all the wrong reasons, judging by how he follows him hurriedly, by how cautiously he peeks inside the bathroom.
"Dohoon-ah?" he calls, standing awkwardly, blocking the entrance.
Dohoon looks up from the sink, staring at his friend's reflection in the mirror with eyes void of any emotion, "What?"
Apathy hurts even more when it comes from a friend, and Dohoon's hands are dealt with nothing but sharp knives. Despite all of his efforts to stay collected, blood is all he wants to see now. He wants to show Youngjae that he has become callous, that despite their history, he has grown indifferent towards him.
The subtle surprise in Youngjae's eyes stings, pressing a wound in his chest like how you would press on a bruise to enjoy the pain. Dohoon figures he needs to step away before it does more damage to their already irreparable relationship, for the sake of the team.
There's hesitation when Youngjae opens his mouth once more, his words barely coming out in fluent strings.
"Are we good?" He dares to ask. An outstretched hand compelling Dohoon to hold it.
And in another universe, maybe, there's another Dohoon with less self-control, too engrossed by all of his unlabeled feelings to care about team dynamics and the career he spent almost a decade working towards. That Dohoon would say, truthfully, We haven't been good in a long time.
But this Dohoon, along with this Youngjae, has gotten used to the thousands of unspoken words—the elephant has moved in permanently to the gap between them, tired of waiting to be addressed. Years of wasted youth flash before his eyes, reminding him of what he'll lose if this ever gets out of control.
So he swallows the truth along with his pride. Turning down Youngjae's hanging hand with a light slap. "Yeah. Don't worry, Youngjae-yah."
Choi Youngjae was 15 when Dohoon first got to know him.
Lanky kid with round cheeks and a thick countryside accent, his cheery voice echoed in the hallways as he waved goodbye. Always bright, enthusiastic, eager to show what he's capable of. He listened to the hyungs so well—he was the perfect, ideal maknae that the group needed. The perfect maknae that Dohoon could never quite mold himself into.
Desperation and panic clouded everyone back then, so much so that sleep deprivation was expected—it was needed to get ahead of the others. But they were only fifteen, too young to have dark, persistent eye bags, yet too much had been sacrificed that they couldn't afford to get caught slacking off.
So after one too many yawns coming from Youngjae, Dohoon took him to his spot.
One of the shower stalls, the one that had shitty water pressure, had hot water stop flowing out of it after merely 5 minutes of using it. Far from a high-end hotel, but the only space that had guaranteed him minutes of uninterrupted, quality sleep.
Dohoon was never one to lend a helping hand to a struggling new trainee, let alone share something as valuable, but Youngjae felt different. Dohoon, to this day, was unsure of what he saw back then, but he knows that they once shared the same hunger, felt the same kind of desperation, yearned for the same life.
Ever since that day, they had been attached to the hips, nursing their shared dreams in the only place free from surveillance, sneaking in illegal naps in between classes.
And that's supposed to be their only act of rebellion, coming from a place of utter necessity instead of teenage disobedience. But as they sat side by side on the cold tiles, hugging their knees up to their chest in hopes of making it warmer, Youngjae revealed,
"I didn't even know they had penguins in Lotte World. I've never been." He had said casually, recalling the conversation they had with the younger group of trainees, ten to fourteen-year-old kids who were unfortunate enough to be perceived so early, who spent their childhoods dwelling in basements with nothing but mirrors as walls.
Dohoon was one of them just a couple of years ago, treating practice rooms full of stressed-out teens as a very sad, swing-less, slide-less playground.
"Let's go tomorrow, then." Dohoon blurts out, as if it were that easy. "I'll skip school if you really want to."
Dohoon's rebellious streak started soon after, with a gentle push from a wide-eyed boy from the countryside, fascinated by all the grandiosity that came with life in the city. And Dohoon, a Seoulite born and raised, was too determined to make this hell a little less hot for him. So they sneaked out, as often as they reasonably could, hand in hand as Dohoon excitedly showed him around the city he grew up in.
They were punished. A lot.
It's only some dumb, tedious tasks to punish a misbehaving teen, but it used to piss Dohoon off enough to deter him from going outside the lines. But Youngjae's giddy, guiltless smile was worth it, and he got to see it again every time the rookie development team noonas finds out, banishing them to clean the bathroom or run around the practice room with sandbags on their legs.
Then months turned into years. The road outside had once again been covered in white, the third time Youngjae had witnessed snow since he left his hometown, and the red lines beside their names that signified each one of their offenses had stopped growing.
Not because they stopped making new memories, but there were just not that many guys to keep track of anymore.
Six. They'd be debuting in a group of six. They had made it, together.
Group life was different. New. None of them really knew how to navigate it properly. They bumped into each other a lot, and then they’d overcorrect it by tiptoeing around each other way too much. But they made it work. Youngjae and Dohoon had stopped sneaking out so much, pouring all they got into something more important.
Sleeping was still taboo, though. So the shower stall trips continued.
And nothing was supposed to happen, not from Youngjae's side of the story. Dohoon had done his best to maintain their delicate distance, to resist the eventual descent from the slippery slope that came with looking at a friend too fondly.
But Youngjae was no longer so green and naive—he had stopped fitting onto Dohoon's lap, gotten used to suppressing his accent, and grown accustomed to Seoul's excessiveness. It was as sad as it was beautiful, seeing Youngjae growing into the man he'd become.
It hadn't quite hit Dohoon, just how much Youngjae had grown, not before their last sneaky nap.
It had been especially cold that day, and a snowstorm had been pouring down since the night before, asking the city to slow down. It had been a rare blessing then—the empty halls, dimly lit practice room—managers and trainers stuck in traffic kilometers away, nowhere to be seen.
So they sneaked into their usual spot, cold tiles and humid shower rooms that aren't properly insulated, as sleepy teenagers do when there's no authority figure.
But Dohoon had never been the best when it came to coldness—his body shivered as his fingers turned a deep shade of red. It had bumped into Youngjae's warmer hand, the temperature difference startling the guy to the point of flinching.
"You're cold, aren't you?" He had asked, there was fondness in his tone as he enveloped Dohoon's shaking hands in his, sharing his warmth.
Dohoon didn't say anything back then. He merely hummed in response, too stunned at Youngjae's action. Youngjae had been doing a lot of those nowadays, initiating touches that had actually mattered. Maybe it was his growth spurt, but the gestures had lost all of their innocence in Dohoon's eyes.
"Dohoon-ah, come here."
Youngjae had called softly as he patted his lap, coaxing Dohoon to sit there instead of the cold tiles. His voice drowned out by the sound of Dohoon's own heart thumping louder than it should, making his blood rush to his cheeks. Flustered him to the point of absurdity.
They were almost the same height at that point, and clearly, it's uncomfortable to hold a guy your size on your lap for more than half an hour. But Youngjae had insisted, confident that he could hold Dohoon's weight now that they possessed a similar build.
And Dohoon caved in, eventually, because it seemed logical to do so—he had convinced himself. Because Youngjae was warm, and Dohoon had been freezing to death.
Not simply because he wanted to, even without all the freakish cold air hitting his skin serving as a convenient excuse.
The gentle buzz from Dohoon's phone timer had woken them cruelly—their precious 45 minutes were up. In a trance, Dohoon found himself in a less-than-ideal position, with his face tucked into the crook of Youngjae's neck. And his eyes had met Youngjae's as he lifted his head, blinking his sleep, his brain still dizzy from the much-needed sleep.
There was suppressed laughter coming from an equally dazed Youngjae as his fingers combed through Dohoon's messy hair. His face was inching way closer than it needed to.
It was clear that Youngjae had been leaning in for a kiss back then. And in hindsight, there had been a part of Dohoon, too, the one with nothing but stars in his eyes, who wanted to close the gap between them. That Dohoon had dared to wish that this could be the start of something new between them.
Still, this had been uncharted territory for Dohoon, whose life had been endless restrictions and surveillance—years of his life had been neatly recorded in a thick binder, tucked somewhere in Pledis' rookie development headquarters.
He wondered whether he could truly risk it all, whether what they had—if anything—was worth making years of their life turn futile.
Dohoon, back then, had concluded that they were not.
So he pulled away, a little too harsh, too forceful than what he had intended. He stood up in a panic, the phone in his grip still pulsating in frequent buzzes as a reminder of their upcoming responsibility.
"Let's go, Youngjae-yah, group practice is in 5 minutes."
Kim Dohoon was 18 when he first gave in to his fear.
Park Seeun:
saw your fuckass face plastered on a bus just now
(Photo attached)
it's been so long since I last saw you in the flesh
when can we meet again ㅠㅠ
You:
hey, just got off from a team meeting
can we meet? are you busy rn?
Park Seeun:
right now, like, right now???
are you okay?
You:
yeah
i think i might need you
and a drink or two
only if ur free tho
Park Seeun:
uh,,
give me like
30 minutes
i'll be there
You:
thanks man
Dohoon climbs down from his bed, putting on a mask as he grabs his coat from the partition that separates him and Jihoon.
Just then, Jihoon emerges from the bathroom with a toothbrush still in his mouth. "Where are you going, hyung?"
Park Seeun:
i'm outside
You:
give me a sec
“Out.” Dohoon puts on his coat. “Don’t wait for me.”
Unlike Choi Youngjae's gradual and steady presence, Han Jihoon had come into Dohoon's life with a loud, flashy bang. Nothing about him was ever subtle. Not his smile, not his love, heck, not even his sneezes are subtle.
Jihoon arrived at their doorstep on a sunny afternoon, just when the snow was about to melt. He came suddenly, with arms gently cradling what was left of his shattered hopes and dreams. He handed pieces of it to each of them right away, unafraid of scrutiny despite repeatedly experiencing rejection.
Standing tall and proud with a smile on his face, acting like he couldn't hear the whispers about him echoing in the large practice room, he was brave in ways Dohoon could never be.
And Dohoon had the honor of accessing the depth of Jihoon's pain, months later, in the privacy of their shared room. He had asked bit by bit, because stupid curiosity got the best of him. Jihoon, however, had welcomed every one of them, even if it meant losing his sleep just to talk, even if it meant that he'd have puffy eyes the next morning.
He was such an open book. So willing to be vulnerable.
They always said that crying is for the weak, but as Dohoon held a sobbing Jihoon in his arms for the nth time that month, he could see nothing but strength in him. Dohoon had wondered what it was like to be so unafraid of confronting even the ugliest parts of himself.
Jihoon was so good at that. Acknowledging what needed to be acknowledged, no matter how horrid it is. He pointed out all their wrinkles, insisting on straightening them instead of pretending like they never existed and chucking them in a corner haphazardly to be forgotten.
Dohoon truly believed that Jihoon had made him better. He had made all of them better.
Han Jihoon, with all his bravery of baring his soul to those he trusted the most, was the easiest man to love.
And Dohoon should have known he couldn't hide his feelings forever from Jihoon, not when it was obvious he felt the same.
It came on a rainy spring night, not long after finishing their very first promotion. A giddy smile lingered on both of their faces as they got into bed.
Dohoon couldn't remember how it happened, but he ended up in Jihoon's embrace on his bed, watching as the younger splurged on new clothes for his favorite villager, the one who resembled Youngjae. He was seconds away from falling asleep when Jihoon admitted to having feelings for the man.
He had known, too, about Jihoon's not-so-platonic adoration for Choi Youngjae. How could he not? When Jihoon spoke of Youngjae as if he had been grazed by God's presence, when he held stars in his eyes each time Youngjae did so much as to acknowledge him.
Dohoon had paid no mind before. Because, contrary to popular belief, Han Jihoon had never once been Kim Dohoon's. He was always Choi Youngjae's to begin with. It stayed that way even on the late nights, as their noses bumped when sleep deprivation got the best of them, even when they had spent lazy mornings huddled on each other's beds, softly whispering sweet nothings until alarms eventually demanded their attention.
What was he supposed to respond with? “Me too”?
Or should he question what they had, instead? Interrogate Jihoon on the undefined us that they held through uncertain days and sleepless nights. It had echoed in Dohoon’s head as the younger stared at him expectantly, as if Dohoon’s response could make or break his soul.
Dohoon settled with a noncommittal chuckle, a casual I know to ease him.
Then came the second half of the thing that broke Dohoon whole.
“Youngjae-hyung says he likes me too, but also that he still likes you.”
Jihoon had said it so easily, beaming as he relayed the information to Dohoon’s poor, unprepared soul. He was hopeful as if the discovery had unlocked a new possibility.
And to Jihoon’s credit, it kinda did, back then.
Dohoon was just too stubborn, too stuck in his old ways to acknowledge its existence. Accepting it easily would require admitting that the pain he inflicted on both Youngjae and himself, in the past, meant nothing. They had bled for nothing.
Happiness wasn’t supposed to be this easily obtained.
“What about you, hyung? How do you feel about us?” He had asked fondly, fingers carding through Dohoon’s hair as if it belonged there.
It’s almost as if this whole thing had been meticulously planned, and that Dohoon had walked into the trap the second he set foot in their room, obliviously snuggling onto Jihoon’s chest as if it were no different than any other night. Jihoon had planned an ambush, and Youngjae got to sit pretty, guiltless, watching from a safe distance after signing his name under the consent form.
“No.” He had said then, unwavering and final.
Dohoon withdrew himself from Jihoon’s warmth, getting up to put the necessary distance between them for the sake of his defense. “Whatever you—you guys—are trying to propose to me, the answer is no.”
Jihoon had tried to convince him then, frantically grasping onto Dohoon’s wrist to reason with him. They could see that Dohoon wanted them, too. Even with all of his denials and sharp quips, they had seen through him, and they still want him.
Dohoon hated it.
“Did Youngjae really approve of this?” Dohoon scoffed as he looked down on a pleading Jihoon.
Jihoon nodded desperately. There was determination in his eyes—Dohoon knew he had been truthful.
Dohoon yanked his hand away from Jihoon’s. “Trying to date your teammate is just gonna turn the team into a hell without an exit hatch, and you’re trying to date two?”
He got up and backed away into his corner of the room, a cowardly move poorly disguised as rationality.
Dohoon had to position himself this way. I am protecting us, he had convinced himself, not realizing that he was holding on to a crumbling castle. He was doomed to fail regardless—there was nothing to protect, not when he had severed his ties with them.
Pride was the only thing he managed to protect, along with a glimmer of hope that one day he could point at the rubble that was all the things they had built together and say, See, I was right all along. We would never get out of this unscathed.
He let himself foolishly believe that the first crack didn’t materialize soon after his first forceful withdrawal.
“You guys can do whatever you want, just don’t include me.”
The smell of baby powder in Youngjae’s fresh linen is the first thing Dohoon’s brain registers, and the faint recollection of yesterday night’s happenings follows right after.
This, too, is inevitable. Dohoon has done nothing but delay their unavoidable mess.
A sense of shame eats him alive as he lies still, squished between the figures his heart deemed as most dangerous. Dohoon doesn’t deserve their grace, let alone their care and affection.
Dohoon groans, rubbing his face with the strength only a suicidal man could muster. He considers being one for a second.
“Don’t move, Jihoon will fall,” Youngjae mutters. He has his arms sprawled across Dohoon’s torso, reaching to hug Jihoon tighter and keep him from falling.
There is no movement coming from Dohoon’s right side. Jihoon is still asleep. His head is buried into Dohoon’s shoulder, and his left leg is fully outside the bed.
“Do you guys always obsessively stalk your reluctant third to show up and heroically save the day when they had their eventual drunken mental breakdown over you guys, or am I a special case?”
Youngjae scoffs. There’s a trace of amusement in his voice, laced with that resigned fondness that comes with knowing someone's bad habits a little too well. “You were very visibly struggling.”
“I deserve it,” Dohoon replies as he stares at the ceiling intently, pretending like there are more interesting things up there than Youngjae’s eyes. “You’re not supposed to welcome someone who has rejected you twice with open arms like this, you know?”
“What can I say, I know what I want,” Youngjae says, the corner of his mouth twitches as he holds back a smirk.
Dohoon covers his face with his palm, “I’m starting to think all the years that I went a little drama queen were for nothing.”
"It wasn't for nothing, Dohoon-ah," Youngjae whispers, his hands caressing Dohoon's waist to comfort him. "It sucks, but you made the right call. We had bigger fish to fry. Trying to make us work in the midst of debut preparation would have been hell."
"But we have time now, yeah? And we have Jihoonie with us, wouldn't it be worth a try? What's the point in denying yourself happiness, choosing misery in the name of responsibility?"
Dohoon frowns. He shifts to look at Youngjae in the eyes. “If we fail, the group fails.”
“Then we'd better not fail,” Youngjae replies.
It baffles Dohoon how shameless his answer is. “Wow, you’re stubborn.”
“Learned it from the best.”