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The last bit of sunlight had finally died down. Junghwan and Jihoon are wrapped around each other, cramped on Junghwan’s bed. They had stopped talking a while ago. Jihoon doesn’t remember when exactly, only that at some point, the laughter and conversation he doesn't even remember thinned into a silence and neither of them bothered to try and keep it going.
Usually, they’re all teeth and bite. Always pushing against the other, poking the bear, prodding, waiting for the other to push back. To the rest of the world, maybe that’s all they were. But they could be this too.
Outside, the city is alive. Tall buildings, the noise of traffic, people living their lives. But here, there is only the sound of two people trying not to breathe too hard. Trying not to ruin the little bubble of quiet they’ve found themselves in.
Jihoon is sprawled on Junghwan, his cheek resting against Junghwan’s chest, listening to his heartbeat. Steady in a way Jihoon had never quite managed to be. Junghwan’s fingers moved slowly and aimlessly against his shoulder blades, no real pattern to it, only shapeless figures and lines. Just contact. Though Jihoon feels the slight tremble every now and then before the pressure eases, a change small enough that you’d miss it if you didn’t take the time to pause and stay still. Junghwan’s fingers keep moving as if his hands needed something to do or they’d start doing something bigger— like reaching further. Like asking for things neither of them are brave enough to say out loud yet.
This was fairly new. Jihoon doesn’t really know when it exactly started— this thing where he couldn’t fall asleep unless he could feel Junghwan’s steady pulse against some part of him.
Maybe this started a week ago. Or maybe a month. Maybe far longer than he is willing to think about. He had stopped keeping track around the same time he had stopped pretending he wanted to.
He’d never done this before. There had been a version of him— not so long ago but long enough for it to feel like a stranger— who left before mornings could carry any weight, who left his shoes by the door out of habit instead of convenience or politeness, who had learned very early on that the easiest way to survive wanting someone is to never stay long enough to need them.
Jihoon has to stop himself from laughing out loud. Because that Han Jihoon would have found all of this ridiculous— lying still in the dark, obsessively cataloguing a boy’s breathing and heartbeat like it was information he needed to keep breathing himself.
Sometimes, when it gets too quiet, Jihoon wonders if that version of himself is gone for good. Or perhaps he’s just managed to make that version of him smaller. Letting it wait in the closet for the first good excuse his traitorous mind recognizes to allow for it to come out again.
“You’re doing it again,” Junghwan murmurs, voice low and rough, traces of exhaustion pulling at its edges, the words landing against the crown of Jihoon’s head. He feels Junghwan inhale deeply into his hair, the arms around him tightening slightly, not enough to hurt— just enough to pull him closer.
“Doing what?”
“That thing you do where you think so loud I can hear it,” Junghwan teases lightly. One of his hands comes up to smooth the hair down at the back of his head.
Jihoon huffs, not quite a laugh but something close to it. He burrows his face further into the warm skin of Junghwan’s collarbone, like there was more room there than there actually was. Like if he tried hard enough he could just disappear into his lover. The ugly part inside him that he tries so hard to stomp down wants nothing more than to break open Junghwan’s ribs and curl up in the hollow of his chest, right beside the beating animal caged there.
Junghwan smells faintly of the soap he remembers specifically complaining about, the same one that Junghwan bought in bulk just to spite him, the takeout they’d scarfed down for dinner, and something warmer underneath it all. Something Jihoon has not yet found a name for yet something he knows like the back of his hand. Something Jihoon had come to learn is just so undeniably Junghwan. It’s like that— learning Junghwan. It’s like learning a foreign language slowly until one day you don’t even realize you’re thinking in it.
“I like this,” Jihoon murmured into his collarbone, pressing closer and closer like an inch of space is unacceptable. “It scares me a bit.” It was barely above a whisper, like saying it quietly might remove the weight of it. “Because I’m beginning to want this every night.”
From where he’s pressed against Junghwan, he felt it before he heard it— the way Junghwan’s breath caught, just barely, his chest stalling for half a second right under Jihoon’s cheek before it went back to normal. His hand stopped moving on Jihoon’s back. It takes Jihoon a great amount of control to stop himself from reaching for it and guiding the hand to moving back into the lazy strokes it’s been doing for the past hour.
“Scares you,” Junghwan repeats the word carefully, like he was turning the word over, looking at it at all sides before deciding what to do with it. He brushes hair away from Jihoon’s forehead gently and he waits. Unlike how they usually are with each other, Junghwan knows better than to push Jihoon when it comes to things like this.
Jihoon exhales in a way that seems like it takes a great weight off his body. He sags further into Junghwan’s embrace, cheek nuzzling against the fabric of his boyfriend’s favorite sleep shirt— a stupid thing, really. A plain white shirt with Jihoon’s face on it and the words ‘I Love My Boyfriend’ that Jihoon had gotten him a few months after they started dating that Junghwan has worn to sleep as much as he could despite Jihoon repeatedly telling him to throw it away. Jihoon hums, half a response, half because he feels comfortable like this.
“Why?” Junghwan asks, glancing down at the comfortable boy on his chest.
Jihoon doesn’t answer right away. He lets the question hang over them long enough that Junghwan’s fingers started moving down his back again, slower than he did earlier, waiting some more. Junghwan knows this version of Jihoon too. Knows when to push and knows when to make enough space for Jihoon to decide whether he wanted to fill it or not. It annoys Jihoon because somehow this makes the wanting much worse— easier to fall into, harder to admit out loud.
“It’s just dangerous,” Jihoon finally says after a beat.
“For who?”
“For me.”
Junghwan shifted then, enough that Jihoon had to lift his head. When he does— Junghwan is already looking right at him, not with worry exactly. But something close to it. Like he was trying to read something too far for him to make out in the distance. His hand travels from where it rested against Jihoon’s back, up to his nape, then along his jaw, and finally cradling one cheek. His fingers gently sweep over Jihoon’s cheekbone. Jihoon instinctively leans into the touch, eyes fluttering close.
“Jihoon baby,” Junghwan whispers, his warm breath fanning over Jihoon’s face. He’s close, close enough that it’s easy to close the distance if Jihoon moves even an inch forward. “You really think I would hurt you?”
“No.” Jihoon braves himself to hold his gaze because looking away now felt like telling a lie he didn’t want to tell. Not tonight, not to him. “But I think I might let you.”
Something shifted in Junghwan’s gaze, fast, then gone before Jihoon could make something out of it. Junghwan says nothing for a long moment. Jihoon stayed there on top of him and watched him not say anything. For a second, Jihoon thought, a little wildly, that the silence was worse than any answer could have been. The silence leaves too much room for every version of the ending Jihoon has spent his whole life bracing for.
“Jihoon.” Just his name. Said with quiet tenderness, almost as if Junghwan wasn’t sure yet what he wanted to attach to it. His hands, one holding Jihoon’s face and the other wrapped around his waist, had gone still. For a second, Jihoon had half-expected for him to pull back. To get careful the same way people usually did once you handed them the entire truth of what they’re really dealing with.
It would have made sense. Perhaps it might have even been easier in the long run for the both of them. But Junghwan stayed there, close still. Like being handed the truth did not change a single thing about where he already decided he wanted to be.
Because the ugly truth underneath this truth is this:
It wasn’t that he thought Junghwan wanted to hurt him. It was that Jihoon had carefully built a life where no one got close enough to have the option to hurt him in the first place. He has spent his whole life being the one holding the door half-shut, body already angled towards the next exit before he ever fully enters a room. Just in case. Just to be safe. Just because safe had always mattered to him above anything else there is to offer.
However, safe also meant alone. Safe also meant having the burden of carrying loneliness so heavy, it felt like dragging a dead body chained to your feet. He had gotten so used to this that he had stopped registering it as a choice— just the price of admission. Something he paid so quickly he didn’t have time to stop and ask whether it was worth what it bought him.
And somehow, somewhere in the past months— longer, if he was brave enough to be honest with himself— he had let that door swing open without meaning to. Until it was too late. And now here he was, standing in front of a door wide open that had stayed close for so long. Here he was, not knowing how to close it again. Not even entirely sure if he wanted to.
He thought about the last time he’d let himself want someone this much. The specifics don’t even matter anymore. Not really. Not when the details have worn smooth with time the way most hurt and grief eventually do if you carry it long enough without ever setting it down. He doesn’t even remember the ending. But what he does remember is how ordinary the beginning had felt. How safe it was, right up until he wasn’t.
That was the part that stuck with him even after all this time. There were no warning signs, none that he could name anyway. Not the kind where you could point at a specific point in time later and say ‘There. That’s where I should have known.’
Instead there’s just the sudden realization of loving someone. The kind that creeps up on you. There’s only being hit with the realization of how much of yourself you handed over without ever quite meaning to and how little say you got in whether any of it came back to you.
Love was scary that way. That’s the part of love that nobody warns you about. Or perhaps they did and you just didn’t believe it until it was your turn to find out that being loved wasn’t a soft thing. Not really.
Being loved was a surrender. It was handing someone the one thing capable of undoing you completely and trusting they’d never use it. Giving someone the kind of trust that can’t be proven in advance. Trust that could only be given— again and again and again. A little more each time.
Because what was love if not that, right? What is love if not letting someone hold that kind of power over you and choosing, every single day, in small ordinary ways, to let them continue holding onto it instead of wielding it.
Jihoon had never let anyone hold anything. Not until now.
Not until Shin Junghwan.
Junghwan’s thumb started moving against his cheekbone again, breaking Jihoon out of his reverie. “Hey,” Junghwan says softly. Quiet enough to not disturb whatever it is hanging between them. “Jihoon, look at me.”
“I am looking at you.”
“No, baby. You’re looking past me and right at everything that happened before me,” Junghwan says lightly. “I’ve looked into your eyes enough times to know the difference.”
Jihoon’s throat does something complicated, tight and dry. He doesn’t trust himself enough to answer, so he didn’t. But what he does allow is for himself to be looked at, which is its own kind of terrifying. Being seen all the way through, past the careful walls he’s built over the years, until there is no time for him to arrange his face into something more closed.
With trembling hands, he holds Junghwan’s face. Junghwan lets him, eyes closing as he leans into them. He was so good, so good for Jihoon. Always. Even when Jihoon gives him reasons not to be, Junghwan would always choose to be so good to him. Jihoon doesn’t want to think too much about it or else he might start crying.
Junghwan turns his face slightly and presses his mouth against the center of Jihoon’s palm. Jihoon feels it everywhere at once. The warmth of the small deliberate kiss climbed up his arm and settled somewhere between his chest, where it had no business going, but where it stayed anyway.
“Hyung…”
Junghwan says nothing, placing his own big hands over Jihoon’s trembling ones still cradling Junghwan’s face like he was scared he’ll somehow break him.
He turns his head and places a tender kiss on the other palm, eyes never leaving Jihoon. Reaching and meeting Jihoon where he is, looking at him the same way he did all those nights Jihoon almost hadn’t. The nights where he had rolled his eyes and stubbornly held onto Jihoon, hadn’t let go even when Jihoon gave him every reason to.
He leans forward and places a lingering kiss right on the mark underneath Jihoon’s eye, staying there. Pressing with intent, like he was trying to prove something to Jihoon that he didn’t trust himself to say out loud. The kiss seared into Jihoon, like Junghwan had trusted his mouth to say something for him in a way no sentence ever could.
Jihoon stays still and stays right there under Junghwan’s hands, under his mouth, where it’s safe. He feels the fear loosen its grip— not gone completely. He doesn’t think it will ever fully go away. But now, right here, it feels smaller. More survivable like this, the fear sitting next to something warmer. The warmth taking up more of the room it used to own alone.
Somewhere deep in the back of his mind, he thought about all the ways he had rehearsed saying no to things like this. He thought about all the exits he used to map out of rooms before he had even finished saying yes to entering them. None of them applied here. Not now, not under Junghwan. In fact, he hadn’t reached for a single one.
Junghwan pulls away then shifts to a sitting position, bringing Jihoon with him. Jihoon lets himself be pulled, sitting on Junghwan’s lap now, knees bracketing Junghwan from both sides. An arm wraps itself around Jihoon’s waist, hiking him up closer and closer. Fingers delicately tucked a stubborn strand of hair behind Jihoon’s ear, then stayed there, holding his jaw. Junghwan’s fingers pressed lightly against where his pulse was. Jihoon distantly wonders if Junghwan can feel how it’s slowing down instead of racing.
Then, Junghwan presses forward, their lips slotting together, like it was rehearsed. Jihoon lets out an inaudible sigh, pressing closer, his fingers gripping Junghwan’s shoulders like he was anchoring himself— like he was making sure he was really here. The grip on his waist tightens slightly, the kiss unfurling the way flowers do in spring. Unhurried and gentle the way Junghwan always is when Jihoon needs warm palms instead of teeth.
When Junghwan pulls away, Jihoon distantly hears a small whimper make its way in the back of his throat as he tries to follow his mouth. The sound makes Junghwan smile before he presses a chaste kiss on his mouth. Then he kisses both corners of Jihoon’s mouth, down his jaw, and his neck, each kiss warm against Jihoon’s pale skin. The warmth of the kisses reminding him that this was real, that Junghwan was really here telling him he loves him without the need to use words.
Junghwan presses the last lingering kiss right where his pulse would be before pulling Jihoon into him, closing the last bit of distance between them. His arms wrapped around Jihoon, chin hooked over his shoulder, their cheeks pressing together. Jihoon lets himself sink into the hug and closes his eyes, feeling the way their breathing synced without them even trying.
“I’ve wanted this since the first week I knew you,” Junghwan admitted, voice near Jihoon’s ear, close enough to hear something in his voice that might have been embarrassment if it weren’t so plainly sincere. Jihoon could hear it. Could hear the ‘I wanted you’ he really wanted to say. “It took me so long to act on it because everything about what I feel for you felt like too much too soon. It’s probably still too soon.” A pause. “Doesn’t feel like it though.”
He had said it lightly but something shifted underneath it that Jihoon almost missed. Mostly because he wasn’t used to looking for it in him. Junghwan didn’t usually let his calm slip. He didn’t usually let himself be caught wanting anything out loud, not unless he’s a hundred percent sure he was ready.
“For what it’s worth,” he added, voice barely above a whisper now, like the sentence cost him something to hand over, “you’re not the only one who’s scared.” Junghwan lifts his chin from where it was hooked over Jihoon’s shoulder before placing a kiss there. He pulls away to look at Jihoon, fingers drawing slow circles from where they’re on Jihoon’s waist. A small smile tugs at Junghwan’s lips. “I just decided a while back that I’d rather be scared with you than safe somewhere without you.”
Jihoon says nothing then, opting to bury himself into Junghwan’s chest. Junghwan accepts it, making room for him automatically without even thinking about it, leaning back until they’re laying down again, hand rubbing Jihoon’s back in long languid strokes.
Jihoon didn’t know how to hand back what he’d just been given. He didn’t really have Junghwan’s fluency with tenderness, the way he could reach out and take Jihoon apart with nothing but his mouth and hands and make it all look so effortless. But he wanted to try anyway. He wanted, for once, to be the one closing the distance instead of just allowing it to be closed for him.
He thinks if he waited for the day he’d be brave enough to run towards instead of waiting to be met where he felt safe, then that day might never come at all. Jihoon isn’t really brave but sometimes he thinks he is made brave by love. By Junghwan most of all.
He pushed himself up, feeling the way Junghwan went still beneath him. Watching, waiting the way he had always waited, giving Jihoon the space to decide. Jihoon propped his chin on Junghwan’s chest, looking up at him. Jihoon watched him for a second— really looked. The line of his jaw, the softness that lived permanently at the corners of his mouth, at the way his eyes had remained open for Jihoon to look into, no walls left standing anywhere Jihoon could see.
Then, Jihoon leaned down and pressed his lips on Junghwan’s chest, right through the thin cotton of his shirt, right where his heart would be.
He felt it then— the way Junghwan’s pulse stuttered under his mouth, faster than it had any right to be from just something as small as a kiss through fabric and skin. Something in Jihoon’s chest cracked open at the proof of it. At the proof that Junghwan wasn’t as steady as he liked to pretend he was. That this mattered to him too. That Jihoon wasn’t the only one standing in a doorway trying to decide whether to walk all the way through.
That Jihoon had been handed the power to undo Junghwan too.
He stayed there for a moment, forehead dropping to rest where his mouth had just been, listening to the fast unsteady rhythm slowly returning back towards calmness. Junghwan’s hand came up to rest in his hair, not guiding, just resting there. Like he was afraid too much pressure might scare Jihoon away and make him change his mind.
A beat passes as they stay there, basking in the silence.
“Still scared?” Junghwan asked eventually, no triumph in it, no gentle teasing, not this time. There was only a real question, asked because it mattered.
Jihoon doesn’t answer right away, thinking about it honestly. He figures he owes Junghwan that. The fear was still there— he didn't have to reach that far into his mind to feel it. The fear is an old animal curled up low in his chest that had never really learned or believed in safety, no matter how many times it had been offered and proven. It’s lived with Jihoon for as long as he could remember, grown up with it.
But now, it wasn’t alone in there anymore. There was this too: Junghwan’s heartbeat steady and even again under his cheek, his fingers threading through Jihoon’s hair slowly, the warmth of his kisses still lighting him from the inside out. More importantly there was a room holding two people who had both— somehow in some way, against every instinct either of them had spent years perfecting— decided to finally stay.
“Yeah,” Jihoon whispered. He felt Junghwan’s breath catch again under his cheek before he continued. “But I’d rather be scared with you than scared alone. You said you were scared too. I don’t think I really believed you until just now.” One of Jihoon’s hands slides up, resting against where he’s resting his cheek. He feels Junghwan’s pulse stutter underneath his palm.
“Believe it,” Junghwan said, voice low, no trace of hesitation in it. “I don’t really know how to do this either. I think I’m just better at hiding it than you do.” A slight tease in his voice as he says it.
He reached for Jihoon instead of saying anything more. He tightened his arm around Jihoon’s shoulders and pulled him up until Jihoon had no choice but to lift his head up and look at him. He pressed a kiss on his forehead like a promise with a weight neither of them knew how to carry with grace yet. And Jihoon lets him.
He lets himself be held together by someone who had every opportunity to take him apart tonight. Who had chosen instead again to be gentle with what he had been given.
Perhaps when tomorrow comes, the fear will weigh heavy again as it always does. Tomorrow, they will come home to each other again and hold each other through the uncertainty of it all.
But right here, right now is a little world within a cruel world where two people who have, at least just for tonight, had stopped counting all the ways this could go wrong and let themselves settle in the warmth and that terrifying miracle of being wanted back.