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Martin is twelve the first time he sees James in the Big Hit building. It’s everything he’s ever wanted in his short life, and then more; yet it completely misses all his expectations. The hallways are empty, grey and cold, almost sterile. If not for the distant sounds of music, shoes squeaking and singing voices trying to stay stable, he’d hardly believe there’s anyone there.
He’s walking around, wide eyed and trembling, still hardly believing that he passed the audition, and he’s following the staff member, dutifully looking into every single classroom he shows him and a couple of other new trainees. Then they stop by a dance studio/practice room, and there’s music blasting from the inside. Martin peaks inside and the trainees stop dancing when they hear the creak of the door. Their dance coach pauses the music.
“Oh! Fresh meat!” One of the trainees exclaims as he claps his hands. He’s probably as tall as Martin, but clearly older. He is dressed all fancy, the buckle of his belt showing off the Balenciaga logo, his hoodie carrying the same symbol.
A different boy, adorable with fox-like features and round cheeks, slaps the first one’s arm. “Hyung, you’re scaring the kids.” He skips over to the new trainees, waving at them. “I’m Sunoo!”
“Martin,” he says quietly.
“I’m Jay,” the first boy speaks up again, and reaches out to Martin to shake his hand.
“American?” He asks in English.
“Canadian. Like, half Canadian.” Martin explains. Jay nods, then turns around. “James! We got a new foreigner!”
Martin wants to argue, explain that he’s lived in Korea for longer than he’s ever lived abroad, but then a new face emerges. Martin is a talkative boy, rarely has nothing to say, but at that moment, he’s speechless. The boy’s features are sharp, his eyes narrowed at him. He looks mad, but then he puts on his glasses that a different trainee hands him, and his eyes are suddenly big and soft. Martin stands there probably looking dumb with his mouth agape. James, as Jay called him, is quite frankly, beautiful.
“You look young,” he says to Martin. He has an accent, but Martin can’t pinpoint what kind. His voice is smooth, flowing around and inside Martin’s head.
“I’m twelve.”
“Twelve?” James asks, in Korean this time. Martin grins, stupidly impressed by James’s multilingual abilities. “You’re still a baby.” He then pauses and looks over his shoulder where their dance coach is trying to get his attention, gesturing for him to go back to practicing. “I’m fifteen,” James then adds. His chest puffs up a little bit, like a bird trying to establish dominance; Martin has seen enough of nature documentaries to recognize that. He bites his tongue, but wants to mention that he’s not that much older than himself. Instead, his grin grows wider. “I’m as tall as you though, hyung-nim.”
“It’s ‘cuz you’re a freak,” James switches back to English, his smile teasing but warm around the edges, then struts back over to his spot.
The staff ushers the new trainees outside, the practice room music still loud in the hallway. Martin’s heart is hammering in his chest, and he clutches at the fabric of his t-shirt. There’s another boy next to him, definitely older, Martin recalls his name to be Yixiang. “He’s quite popular in Taiwan,” he tells Martin, who lets out a sound that could be vaguely described as a gargle. “James. The guy you spoke to.” The older boy adds.
“You know him?”
“No, not really,” Yixiang shakes his head. “But we’re both from Taiwan, and he’s a quite famous dancer on social media.”
Martin is listening intently, storing all the information away in his head. His attention then turns to the staff member and he lets himself forget about James for the rest of the day.
~*~
He is fourteen when the announcement drops. Trainee A is no longer. The trainees disperse, leave for better opportunities, different agencies.
He sees James wandering the hallways, like a ghost haunting the HYBE building. He’s itching to walk up to him and.. say what? That he’s sorry? He didn’t do anything.
But his heart aches watching James lose his sparkle, even though he barely knows the guy. They were advised not to engage with the other trainees too much, since the industry is so cutthroat and the coaches don’t want moping teenagers in their lectures, but Martin can’t do that. There’s a magnetic pull between him and James, even if the older boy isn’t aware of it, yet. Red thread pulling them closer together. Martin already feels it in his heart, the mellowness of his person slowly mixing with the bright energy James used to carry himself with.
“Can I sit here?” The canteen is basically empty; he could sit anywhere. But he saw James and just had to talk to him. James looks up and nods, forcing out a smile that doesn’t reach his eyes. The sparkle from his eyes is gone, sharp features dulled by heaviness that he shouldn’t be dealing with at such a young age.
“Thanks, hyung.”
“Nuh uh,” James pushes his glasses up his nose bridge. “Don’t call me that.”
“James sunbaenim?” Martin tries again, pushing away his disappointment at the rejection.
“Drop the honorifics, Tokyo tower,” James grins. “I’m not used to that, we don’t really do that in Taiwan.”
Martin pushes a piece of kimchi around on his tray. “Not even gege?”
James narrows his eyes. “You did your homework, I see. If you insist, you could call me James-ge, but it’s kinda silly.”
“Or Phi James?” Martin tries again, his chopsticks rattling from how much his hands are shaking. This is probably the longest conversation he’s had with the boy in front of him, just the two of them. Now that seven of the trainees debuted in Enhypen, and some others are ready to try once more in a Japanese group project, there’s even less people that Martin knows and is comfortable around. James is obviously one of them, but he is a social butterfly, so he just kind of talks to everyone. All the time. James’s voice brings him back to reality: “You really did your homework. What’re you, my fan?”
“Yes,” Martin says, a little too quick. His face grows hot. He knows he’s all red. He clears his throat awkwardly. “I’m sorry, by the way. About your group.”
James cocks his head to the side, and Martin could swear something shifts in his eyes. The older boy then shrugs. “It is what it is.”
“If you ever want to vent-“ Martin starts, but stops himself. “I’m here for you, okay?”
James chuckles and pokes Martin in the forehead. “You’re still a baby.” His voice is warm and sweet, like honey, and Martin feels his face heat up once again. He has the fattest crush, and it’s embarrassing. “I’m fourteen.”
“Baby.” James says again. Martin shudders, then shoves a piece of meat into his mouth.
“Have you seen the new trainees all over each other the other day?” James says after a while.
“Who?”
“Eh, I don’t know the names, they look alike though. Kind of. One of them also looks like B.I from Ikon.”
Martin purses his lips. “Oh, Seonghyeon and Keonho?”
“I guess? They were like, glued to each other. There’s some romance brewing.” Martin carefully watches James’s face who grins at him. “No worries, I’m not homophobic.”
Martin visibly relaxes and James laughs. “Eat up, big boy, so you can grow big and strong.”
“I’m already taller than you,” Martin smiles teasingly.
“Don’t provoke me.”
~*~
He turns fifteen when HYBE finally wants to use his talents for something. He’s in the studio, getting over his demo for the final time, when James steps into the room, too.
“Oh, hey.” Martin scratches his head awkwardly. “You’re here, too? I’m waiting for the choreographer-“
“That’s me,” James interrupts him and stands behind him to look over his shoulder at the screen. From anyone else, he’d find it rude, but he came to realize that it’s just who James is: too blunt for his own good, but never meaning anything bad, his mouth just rarely is catching up to his intentions once he starts speaking. “Finished the demo?” He’s so close Martin can smell his perfume, even the lingering scent of his shampoo. Martin moves, albeit unwilling, and lets James listen to it. He recorded the vocals himself, so he’s a little shy and a little self conscious, but James is fully focused solely on the melody and the beat. “I love your vocals. Especially in the deja vu part.”
Martin preens at the praise, back straightening to appear even bigger.
“I think this song would suit your vocal range, too.” He pauses. “Don’t get me wrong, I think it makes sense for this song to be given to sunbaes, but I hope that when we debut, they’ll let us make a cover.”
“Together?” James asks. “You think they’ll let us debut together?”
“Obviously! We’re going to be unstoppable! A duo not to be reckoned with!” Even though the company really doesn’t want the trainees to be too close, he and James became really friendly in the past few months, much to Martin’s delight.
He’s always thought of himself as a deep, soft person. If he had an aura, it’d be pastel yellow. Bright but not too much. James is fiery red. Loud, confident, skillful and proud of it. Under usual circumstances, Martin would pull away, keep his distance, draw the lines in the sand; but James’s energy is just that powerful, washing away any traces of Martin’s boundaries, perfect red bleeding into his yellow.
All that being said, he’s careful not to let his affections be too obvious, but Keonho already noticed a few times, asked him about it, then subsequently shut his mouth when Martin asked him back about Seonghyeon.
They work together in relative silence, bar the music Martin is replaying over and over, while James is listening carefully, his arms moving on their own accord, feet tapping against the tiled floor. Martin is once again taken aback at how easily James can feel the music, how natural it is for him to translate notes into movements.
He adjusts his glasses and runs his fingers through his hair, blonde highlights catching the artificial light in the most whimsical way. “I think I have a couple ideas. I’m gonna work on it later on, too, and I’m meeting the coach tomorrow.” He explains. “Could you come with me?”
“Do you want me there?”
James puts his hand on Martin’s knee, the touch searing hot through the material of Martin’s sweatpants. “Obviously. We’re a pair, no?”
“Two peas in a pod,” Martin smiles softly while his heart is trying to jump out of his chest.
~*~
When the music video for Go! drops, Martin is seventeen years old. It also marks five years of his unyielding, relentless feelings for the oldest member of Cortis.
They’re in LA, in a rented house that looks exactly like those Martin used to see in movies. He’s on the roof that’s way too easily accessible through the balcony, his shoes tapping against the tiles excitedly.
He lies down and shields his eyes from the relentless Californian sun with his arms over his face. The warmth of the air feels a little suffocating, sweat soaking through his shirt.
He hears grunts to his left, then a shadow covers his face. “There you are. Juhoon is looking for you.”
Martin doesn’t need to open his eyes to know who it is. “Please tell him I’m working on our new album, thanks hyung.”
“Drop the hyung,” James mumbles and sits down next to him. “How’re you working?”
Martin taps his temple. “Up in here, cooking up some new lyrics.”
James’s foot taps against Martin, his hip pressed to Martin’s thigh. “Are you writing a love song?” That makes the group’s leader laugh. Those are hidden away, in a notebook no one has access to, that will never see the light of day. He started writing those when he was thirteen, they’re absolutely unusable. “As if.”
James is warm and a little damp with his own sweat when he lies down next to him, their bare skin touching. “I’d love to write something romantic one day.”
Something painful twists in Martin’s chest, drilling its way through the thick tissue of his heart, until he feels like he can’t breathe. “For Hyein?” His tongue burns when he says that, but he finally gets it out of his system; he’s been meaning to ask what’s the deal between them since their dance battle video surfaced. He was jealous then and is jealous now.
“Hyein?” James asks incredulously. “My god, no. She’s-“
“Too young?” Martin supplies. Every new words feels like an allergic reaction, his throat closing up, leaving him breathless and gasping.
“Whoa, slow down Curious George. What’s up with you?” James pokes his shoulder and sits up. Martin can feel him staring. “Look at me, Mart.”
His arm uselessly slings back to his side and Martin opens his eyes, squinting at the sunlight shining straight into his eyes. James is leaning over him, expression kind but there’s a glint to his eyes. The light reflects off his orange hair in almost a halo effect, the color a perfect mixture of Martin’s yellow and James’s own intense, burning red. He wants to run his fingers through it. He raises his hand to do it before changing his mind, and his arm falls back down with a thud against the roof tiles.
“What’s bothering you?”
He fights off the urge to say you, and sighs instead. “I think.. I like someone.”
James tenses next to him, and Martin’s heartbeat doubles. “But I.. I’m probably too young.”
“How old is she?” James asks, his eyes glued to Martin’s face.
“He.” A deep breath. “He, hyung. It’s.. it’s a he. And I’m sure he thinks I’m too young for him. Has always called me a kid.” James breaks the eye contact to get fixated on his lips instead. “Anything else he calls you?”
Martin’s whole body feels like it’s been set ablaze, anxiety curling around every bone in his body. James knows him, truly knows him, but is it possible that he’s catching what Martin’s been throwing his way?
“Called me a freak the first time we ever met,” Martin says. James remains frozen next to him. “Also called me Tokyo tower once.”
“How much older is he?” Martin is so fucked.
“Hyung-“
“Drop it. Drop the honorific.” James shakes his head, then rubs his face, groaning. “You were twelve when I first met you.”
“Which I’m not anymore,” Martin reminds him.
“And you were just fourteen when you came to me in a cafeteria, towering above me, talking about being there for me.” They’re tip toeing around it still, even though it’s obvious. Martin’s ready to pass out.
“James-“
“I watched you grow up, literally. Mart, you- I’m twenty for fuck’s sake-“ but then he’s leaning in and Martin props himself up on his elbow, and they’re so close Martin can smell the cherry soda on James’s breath. He tastes like cherry soda. James lets out a pained sound as he tries to coach Martin a little, leading him into what could be considered an actual kiss, and Martin belatedly realizes that this is the first time he’s kissing anyone, and that he doesn’t know what to do.
They pull apart, and James rests his palm on the back of Martin’s neck. “I might’ve lied a little. Juhoon is not looking for you. I just needed an excuse to talk to you.” Martin chuckles. “Figured.”
They lie back down, their fingers intertwined. Martin feels lighter , like a huge load lifted off his shoulders. He turns to James who shuffles even closer, his whole body pressed to the leader’s.
“Will you write love songs about me now?”