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The edges of the mirror in the rehearsal room is fogging up from the sheer heat and sweat in the air after a couple of hours of five big men practicing in such a small room. Jinu is breathing hard, limbs burning. The routine they’re doing is not perfect, not yet, but if he runs them into the ground before they’ve even begun they’ll never get anywhere. He closes his eyes briefly, before opening them again. "Okay, everyone! Take five!"
He sees Baby give a sigh of relief as they halt, even as Mystery slumps against him, using his head as an arm rest. He’s likely to get bitten once Baby has some breath back in his body, Jinu thinks, but he can’t really be bothered to break up that fight before it even starts now.
He sits down on the floor and slumps against the mirror, letting his head thunk back against it. He takes several deep breaths… only to realize the room positively stinks of sweat. Ugh. That’s disgusting.
Sometimes he forgets just how much his fellow demons still have to learn about this modern age, and when he remembers, he despairs. There’s just so much of advancement they’ve missed, and so much regression as well. Many demons don’t keep and eye on the human world after they’ve been turned: it’s too painful to see the world you used to be part of moving on without you. Jinu always has followed what was going on, if only out of a sense of self-punishment. Out of remorse, perhaps, he’d have said if he was now not using it for bad ends again. Self-interest is always what he returns to in the end.
No gain without pain, he can almost hear Abby say, though.
He forces himself to concentrate on them again instead. Useful thoughts only.
Dance, song, appeal, his boys have it all… from a distance. Deodorant is a must for this modern age, and he’s going to have to take extra steps to ensure the mirage of Kpop perfection over the Saja Boys holds up.
He can lend them his own deodorant for now, but they will need their own products. Only one thing to do about it.
"Everyone, take a shower. A field trip is in order."
And if the whooping that ensues amuses him, he makes sure to keep his smirk to himself.
The bright lights of Olive Young shine down on Jinu’s merry band of demons. The green colors of the logo washes them out, and the bright fluorescent beams of the store itself don’t really help. Mystery is gaping, his open mouth in danger of catching his own hair at this point. Romance and Abby aren’t much better, and Baby has a calculating sparkle in his eyes that ought to frighten Jinu if he didn’t know he had an iron grip on these men just by virtue of the sheer opportunity they’ve gotten by being allowed to be part of this.
The endless aisles stretch on in front of them. A paradise of a thousand tubes and bottles, of skincare, of serums, of make-up and haircare and endless, endless press-on nails. It almost sparkles even without getting into the eyeshadow powders first.
Mystery takes one step forward.
Jinu already sees how this is going to go and quickly rattles off, "Only try out testers, figure out what it’s supposed to be first, gather what products you want in a basket, and for the love of Gwi-Ma, don’t walk out of the store before I’ve paid for everything."
Abby, the only person who has not yet stormed the store on sight and left a dust cloud behind, salutes, and goes after the others.
At least they’re enthusiastic?
Jinu spends the next few hours explaining what all of the products are for, but Baby has gotten hold of a phone and figured out how to play youtube videos about make-up and selfcare items. He’s learning frightfully quickly, and Mystery is watching the videos over his shoulder.
Jinu is a little worried they might misconstrue what they find on the internet, but with the way Baby’s hunched over the screen posessively, he’s more scared of what might happen if he takes it away. It’s better to leave them to do their thing, anyway, and Abby really does take up a lot of his attention here in the press-on nails section.
There are about fifteen different types in Abby’s basket now, and explaining to him not only nail sizes but also how this will be perceived is a headache and a half. "It’s fine if you want to wear them," he says, "but you have to be aware of gender expectations in this day and age. Subverting them is fine, as long as you know what you’re doing."
"I couldn’t wear them for performances?" Abby asks, a little disappointed, but quickly reading between the lines. He, too, is picking up things quickly now he’s out in the wild, and Jinu wonders if he should’ve taken them out of their dormitories way earlier, however unprepared they were before.
"I mean, you could, but it would need to suit the concept. If you want something more lowkey and easy to make part of it all, I’d look into nail polish instead of press-ons. Pink nails to go with your pink hair, maybe?"
Abby perks up. "Show me that section."
Jinu does.
The boys take to the beauty products a bit too well. Jinu barely has any time to be relieved they aren’t walking around while smelling rank anymore before he starts getting exasperated.
Several of them won’t leave the full face masks at home and are constantly taking under-eye masks out of their pockets, even though it makes them look like total posers in public. And if Baby takes his guacha out one more time, Jinu is going to scream.
Abby’s obsession with nail polish is benign, but his preoccupation with lip oil is not because he’s constantly making these popping sounds with his lips and it’s driving Jinu crazy.
At least, he thinks to himself as he walks towards the bathroom, Romance and Mystery’s love for haircare isn’t hurting anyone. With a nod to himself, he opens the bathroom door, walks in and - promptly slips on a pool of spilled conditioner.
He windmills, attempting to catch himself on the sink, but all he gets for his trouble is the fact that he brains himself on it as he goes down. Starbursts of pain hit his head like stabbing knives.
Clutching his aching head as he kneels - still in the goddamn slimy puddle - on the cold tiles, he thinks that’s it. "I’ve had enough! Every single one of you, get your products put them in the closet, I’m going to lock it down until you can use it responsibly!"
Romance, peeking past the shower curtain, conditioner still in his hair, looks at him with wide eyes. At the door, the three other miscreants file in.
Mystery’s mouth turns down, as he cradles a bottle of sunscreen like it’s his baby. Baby outright hisses when Jinu ever so carefully turns to face them and his guacha also comes into view. Abby clutches the nail polish he was using in the hand that is not currently still drying. "You can’t!"
It sounds desperate.
Jinu tries to think through the pain. It’s just products. Why are they overreacting?
Something niggles at him. Something about their expressions, the way they hold the products, like he might snatch them away but they need them to survive and-
Jinu stops short.
He has seen faces like these once before, at a palace gate, where the door shut behind him and his family remained behind them. Their cheeks are hollow and so hungry. Jinu had been hungry too. It is a painful excuse, but a true one. He’d been hungry and greedy to such an extent that when he was offered the chance to survive at the cost of them, he’d accepted it with both hands.
He closes his eyes and just breathes through it for a moment. Yes, he knows these faces. recognizes himself in them too, when he finally had food to eat and ate so much of it he got sick.
He opens his eyes again. Yes, he thinks, looking at them, these are starving men suddenly faced with abundance. They’re like this because they’ve been deprived. Because the demon world is so utterly devoid of anything worth living for, is so man-eat-man that anything soft, anything made to care for yourself or others is utterly alien.
His heart breaks for them. He looks at them, at furious Baby, at shaking Abby and white-knuckled Mystery, at Romance and his wide, wide eyes. And he thinks: this time, I refuse to slam the door.
He takes another deep breath. "I’m sorry," he says.
Baby looks at him like he’s just said the sky is green. That’s alright. This, too, will not come easy. There’s no "sorry" in the demon world, after all. Maybe they’re all learning, here.
"That was unfair to you."
Romance laughs, a little awkwardly. "I mean, I’m sorry about that conditioner on the floor, man, that looked like a nasty fall."
Two demons apologizing in one day. Who’d thought.
"You know what?" Mystery says, stepping into the bathroom and worming his way around Jinu to the sink. "I know just the thing. Seventeen-step skin care routines are soothing, you know? Calms you down."
Jinu, rubs his head. "If you’ve got a cold compress somewhere in there, I’m in. Teach me."
Abby beams as Mystery gives a thumbs up. "I’ll go get the compress!"
Baby huffs, but also shuffles into the bathroom. It’s a tight fit - even tighter when Abby also squeezes in. Jinu is grateful for the cold compress, though, and sighs in relief when it numbs the ache in his head.
Mystery starts explaining the various products he’s selected, and they pass through their hands one by one as they follow the steps of his routine. It really is calming, Jinu thinks as he looks at them in the mirror. They look happy, and relaxed, and just at home.
Something they never had before, but they perhaps, now can have here, together.
It makes him smile.