Work Text:
There is something quietly cruel to this. This desperation flooding Jaeyun’s mouth and gut, this embarrassing, vulnerable need to plead with every turned back to face him again. You’re supposed to learn to let go by adulthood, to face loss with a harder shell, but Jaeyun is shrinking and crumbling apart.
He just wants Jongseong to be thinking of him.
Jaeyun is not conceited, but he isn’t stupid—he knows how many others would take his hand, which girls and their genuine kindness would soften his future. God, he can’t stop thinking about the ease. Hand holding in bright midday, homecomings under a spotlight. Jaeyun is fussy, neat, particular, and still clumsy. He can make his life so much easier. If he can ignore the stiff seams of a sock not fitted right, if he doesn’t care about mistaken grammar and wrong accents and loving the tan of just one boy. He could, but still; he steps into the shade and out again, waltzing from closet kisses to approved distances.
There have to be some wires twisted in him—he’s ashamed of all the wrong things, proud of what destabilises him. Or maybe he’s just drunk right now. Jaeyun is looking at Jongseong’s turned back, taking in what he feels he can. He wants to know what he’s thinking. He used to know so easily. Whatever monologue Jongseong is serving to the little group gathered around him, enamoured just like Jaeyun pretends not to be, he can’t guess it. What do you do with a lifetime of love that doesn’t translate into the right words anymore? What does Jaeyun do with all this love, disintegrating and powdering all over his hands, drying in the crannies of his hands. Cracked and bleeding. Jongseong is so beautiful.
Turn around, he wants to say. Look for me. Find me. Ask about. Don’t make me do it, don’t let me.
He’s embarrassed because nothing ever ended, because nothing ever began. It’s like every time they entered the same page, Jaeyun had to flip back. He doesn’t know what scared him so much. It’s scarier being so distant from the one man who has shared so much with him, so scary because being apart is like floating through life on Jaeyun’s part. He doesn’t know how to be whole without him.
Jaeyun’s loved so many people. It’s not enough. He cried his eyes out at the airport every time his father flew abroad, and so he didn’t let any of his friends know the day he left home. And when he let the ones who finally felt like forever in, they exited quietly too. He thinks about how Heeseung is not by Jongseong’s side. He thinks about sharing meals together, thinks about the three of them singing in their school’s music rooms. He thinks about how they’ll never have that again. He loved every moment of it, but that won’t revive it.
In a missed moment, a hand falls before his foggy eyes. Jongseong’s nails are short, and there’s a band-aid on his index. He grabs his hand and they walk over to the balcony, where the late night wind breathes a small essence of consciousness back into him, enough for him to squeeze the soft rough hand in his so it doesn’t let go.
“We’re too drunk to talk about it now,”
Jaeyun thinks he’s missed something, but all he can do is enjoy the sound of Jongseong’s voice. Sweet like a honeyed melon.
“You look cute,” Jaeyun somehow manages to say.
Jongseong drops his head down, a small smile on his face as he shakes his head.
“You didn’t hear a word I said, did you?”
Jaeyun stares at his mouth as he speaks. He nods, whatever Jongseong said is probably true. He does know literally everything because he’s a little nerd and Jaeyun admires it.
Jongseong laughs, and the sound is so nice Jaeyun’s stomach hurts, spinning and squeezing itself.
Jongseong whisks up a cup of water, and tells Jaeyun to drink so they can talk. They shuffle so that their backs are against the glass door, staring into the empty street and the skyline of their city, no stars in sight. Jaeyun’s head feels so heavy, he drops it onto Jongseong’s shoulder. The other man’s head knocks into his in a soft position soon after. He wonders how Jongseong moves through the world, how anyone does. Is Jaeyun the only one frightened of it all?
“You’re so, kind,” Jaeyun murmurs. He thinks about Jongseong’s willingness to share all that he has, thinks about all the apologies he’s given and accepted.
“It’s worth being kind to you.”
There is something skin-to-skin between them, Jaeyun feels warm and right for the first time in so long. He still asks himself if Jongseong is thinking about him. His eyes are drooping, he doesn’t want another drink but his heart is starting to beat too fast.
“Let’s just stay here a while, okay?”
Jaeyun’s never met anyone who could give 100% to him before, not the way Jongseong does. He thinks about how scary the admittance of love is, how he cherishes it too much to deliver it properly. He doesn’t want to break the bridge between them. Their bodies are side by side in a way that reminds him of home and a time before all the messes he made with his careless speech and tendencies to flee. Jaeyun tries to be the rational one, but it’s Jongseong warm approach that always seems to work for them.
“You know I love you too, Yunie?”
Jaeyun doesn’t ‘know’ a thing, but he can believe it if it’s Jongseong saying it. Afterall, he’s usually right about these things. Jaeyun grabs his hand and they sit there. How does he ask Jongseong how long? How long will it last? What do I do when it stops?
“You love me but I ran away.”
“And you love me and ran away, they don’t cancel each other out.”
Jaeyun is exhausted, he just wants to let whatever Jongseong is giving him in. He tilts his head so he can make eye-contact with him, so that Jongseong can see he’s just too tired to voice out anything properly. At least Jongseong knew the most important thing Jaeyun couldn’t say, it took a weight off his shoulder.
“Feel like I don’t know how to do this properly, like I’ll just walk away when I feel bad again. Feel like I can’t even understand it, forget explaining it.”
Jongseong shrugs, “So what, we don’t try? You don’t? We leave here and never try and always wonder and then beat ourselves up for not taking the chance? Either way, we have something here, doing something with it or not won’t get rid of it. It’ll change it but it won’t go.”
Jaeyun feels dizzy. He knocks his head into Jongseong’s with a barely open mouth, kissing the corner of his lips. He still feels that exposing desperation in him, but he’d rather sit with it whilst getting something from it than drowning in nothing but the feeling of need.