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COME FIND ME AFTER THE SHOW by EARTHMYLIKENESS
PART ONE
Choi Seunghyun wakes up and finds himself on a business seat landing at Narita Airport in five minutes. He cracks his eyes open, holding perfectly still. Jiyong is on the seat beside him, curled up slightly, music beating inside his tiny hooded head and one side of his leg warm against Seunghyun’s own.
He stares at Jiyong’s sleeping face for a while, feeling self-destructive. It was a three hour flight but Jiyong hasn’t slept at all last night, evident in his three-hour nap. It’s the rarest sight when Jiyong’s defenses are down, mouth slack and eyelids wavering, and Seunghyun gets his fill while it’s available to him.
His body stopped listening to his brain sometime during the flight, and Seunghyun’s arm is a searing line against Jiyong’s shoulder, his whole body steered towards him. Seunghyun looks at the blue sky out the window, worrying his lips.
Here it goes again.
Four days. For a show, a couple of meetings, a day for leisure and they were going back to Seoul on Monday.
Japan is a bad place, where everything comes loose at the seams. Where the edges become blurred and the heat of the place forces you to lose layers of yourself. Sweltering. This plane, with these seats too close together. This city with its too-bright lights. Everything is the worst, Seunghyun broods, five years-old.
Seunghyun’s eyes drift down to Jiyong’s slim hand hanging off of the armrest, his middle finger brushing Seunghyun’s thigh- and it’s like a timebomb counting down in his head. Seunghyun averts his eyes quickly as a staff walks past him through the aisle. But it’s pretty obvious to all concerned, anyway, that recently, his whole world seems to revolve around the slight kid passed out beside him.
The point is, he was never being subtle in the first place. That’s not how he worked, and everyone but Jiyong knew it to an extent. Jiyong was the most oblivious out of all of them. Either that, or he was really good at pretending it wasn’t happening. Seunghyun thinks maybe it’s a bit of both, and wants to strangle him.
They’re friends. Brothers. Both the closest and the farthest of all the members, but they deal. They barely ever really fight, neither of them the type to get on the other’s nerves. Leaving the shortcomings be, focusing instead on inducing dimples and forcing giggles from each other. Mumbling lyrics under their breath, so the other will finish the song. Perfectly imbalanced, as sane as they never are, and it’s good. Exactly as they should be and have been. Seunghyun’s going out of his mind about it.
It’s not that he’s not content. It’s just — he- He can’t, he’s not allowed. He’s the older, and he needs to be reasonable. Despite the fact that he has no mental control over what he wants, trapped helplessly inside his own head.
The fact of the matter was: they liked each other. Enough that it was noticeable. Enough that the idea was conceivable, and they joked about it daily, calling each other baby, and yeobo, and whatever else that came out naturally. Complimenting the other’s good looks, making dumb hand-shakes that changed everyday, adjusting each other’s tie like characters in a silent film. Normal things, except laced heavily with unbridled and more often (especially on Jiyong’s end) sarcastic affection. But that was par for them anyway. The other members referring to them as boyfriends and newlyweds, and scrunching their noses whenever they walked in anywhere together. And it was hilarious for a while.
Then they started hanging out constantly, their albums and the promotions, dance practices, whole months spent in the crevice of the recording room… his life consisting solely of Jiyong and his bitten lips and fingers and- and it’s become a bit more than a joke to Seunghyun.
And it’s always been just him. He was the one who always made it go on longer, pushed it a little further; made sure Jiyong was late to wherever he was supposed to be like an hour ago. Seunghyun’s the one staring helplessly at Jiyong’s smiling profile, nudging him into another fit of airy laughter - calling him motherfucker just to hear him choke on his soda. He’s always pulling him by the collar, pushing his hand through his short hair, darkened and smooth with sweat. Always pressing his face in the small spot beneath Jiyong’s ear to yell nonsense at him above the music. He’s always reaching for Jiyong’s fingers across the table, across the arm of the seats — and anyway, the point is- The point is he was never going to actually do anything. Grab his hand, pull it towards him, because that’s weird - even for them. And what would he do with it if he did? He hasn’t thought it through.
It wasn’t his fault though, he thinks as he peers down at Jiyong’s sleeping face. Even just being in the vicinity of Jiyong shuts down your brain, all your nerves rendered useless. The sight of him makes all the songs in the world make sense. Every cheesy line in the movie bearable. Singable. Like this one.
Seunghyun dares anyone not to be drawn like a star to a black hole.
And everything is infinitely worse when it’s just the two of them like this. On a plane, in the changing room, in the car - sharing earphones, arguing about shoes and pineapple slices. It’s Jiyong imitating Seunghyun’s every word, to the voice and nuance, for two hours straight. It’s Seunghyun stealing Jiyong’s drink even though he doesn’t even like orange crush — but it gets Jiyong’s attention, so.
It’s knowing when to leave the other be. Knowing the difference between worried and nervous. And sad, thinking of home.
It’s becoming an expert at what riles Jiyong. A sort of cabin fever running between just the two of them. Seeing him pissed, eyes rolling, chewing on the inside of his lip. Seunghyun likes to make him livid, a furious flush blooming across his cheeks, teeth flashing - hotter than anything. Never lasts more than a minute though, Seunghyun always cracking a joke, pressing a finger against Jiyong’s temple and calling him ‘a scary kid’.
When the rest of their group are across a sea, and their lives are devoid of Seungri’s small tantrums, Youngbae and Daesung’s quiet hilarity - None of them here to distract Seunghyun and his wandering mind, leaving every moment of the day jarring and blinding and so full of images of Jiyong’s mouth Seunghyun might go insane. It’s always a near thing.
Every night, lying in a hostel room alone, gazing up at an unfamiliar ceiling - Imagining Jiyong getting ready for bed just a door away, flashes of white sheets, pale skin and pink tongue rushing through his head like a bad secret until the light of dawn. And having to wake up the next day to the smell of room-service, and Jiyong shuffling into his room, disheveled hair, always coming in last and drowsy like a boy, and demanding orange juice with an impossibly easy smile on his soap-clean face. And Seunghyun can’t help but smile back, even if he only got two hours of sleep last night.
He doesn’t remember how long it’s been. He can’t remember a time when he hasn’t wanted more from Jiyong. Things he could never ask for because they’re perfect as they are. Because he doesn’t want to add creases to Jiyong’s brows, darken his eyes — he’s done enough already.
But mostly, because what if Jiyong pulls away. He doesn’t think he could take a hit like that.
Seunghyun breathes out as slowly as possible, feeling incredibly hot under his clothes, and looks around feverishly in his seat. He feels trapped, and he wants to get up - stretch his legs - leave Kwon Jiyong here forever if possible. Seunghyun’s always been good at running from his problems— he thinks he can lose him.
It doesn’t last. Because Jiyong jerks awake at Seunghyun’s fidgeting, looks around dazily, removing his headphones and grinning slightly at nothing. He sticks his feet haphazardly into his shoes and yawns behind his hand- a habit learned from years of public exposure. He flicks his eyes to Seunghyun and his lips twitch in amusement, eyes suddenly alive with mischief— and jesus, Seunghyun is so fucked.
Jiyong stretches his arms dramatically, pushing the palm of his hand on Seunghyun’s cheek as if by accident. Seunghyun flinches away and gnashes his teeth. “Stop it.” Jiyong’s foot falls on Seunghyun’s ankle, digging in with malice, his mouth barely hiding a full-on grin. “Bad dog,” Seunghyun growls.
“You love it,” Jiyong says, closing his eyes again blissfully. And that’s an insane thing for him to say right now, because Seunghyun is being so obvious, the entire cabin is aware of it. This was not his life.
The plane shakes and Jiyong’s hand falls palm-up against Seunghyun’s leg, and the whole world needs to end immediately.
They land safely, much to Seunghyun’s distress, and they shuffle out and routinely proceed with immigration. Seunghyun’s lost in his head, recovering, regaining any sense of composure, and steeling his entire existence for the days ahead. He rubs absent-mindedly at his leg, and nearly misses his baggage passing him on the conveyor for the second time.
He watches Jiyong tapping his passport wallet against his lips and wandering down the hall, all sleep-drunk. Seunghyun’s mouth goes dry and he reaches into his jacket for a cigarette.
Four days.
96 hours of this - and he knows there’s going to be nothing left of him after that.
“Wait,” Seunghyun calls, barely recognizing his own voice.
Jiyong looks back at him, brows crooked in confusion and slight annoyance. His default response: what now, hyung, ever-suffering. His eyes widen a little as Seunghyun stops in front of and slightly above him. Seunghyun holds onto Jiyong’s sleeve for a second and loses his breath - but what’s new.
Seunghyun sticks the cigarette between his lips and slumps down on one knee. He ties Jiyong’s laces that have come undone, and he’s so out of it right then that he barely recognizes that this might be a little weird. He can’t tell- he might still be asleep on that plane. He forgets to come up for air for days.
“Child.” Seunghyun mutters between his lips, standing back up. His head spins from the effort, and he hides it with a familiar smirk, flicking his hair away from his face. He aims for mocking, but he’s sure his face is the very picture of endearment. His life as a T.O.P. cosplay.
Jiyong isn’t fooled, and he looks at him for a second, his face blank and vaguely startled. Seunghyun watches him back, and it takes all his strength not to walk the hell away. Not to shake Jiyong until all their teeth fall out, not to place his palm on the inside of Jiyong’s collar and pull. It takes everything in his power.
Jiyong smirks back in the end, like, that’s rich, but his eyes aren’t smiling, remaining cryptic. There’s a flush creeping up his neck and Seunghyun wants to lick the heat of it.
The point is, he has never, ever been subtle about it. Never once in six years.
He wants this all to stop. He wants his prize at the end. He wants this heat-heavy building to collapse down around them as they stand here, lost, like they forgot their lines. Fuck the lines.
His eyes roam along Jiyong’s cheeks, and he screams at him internally against the wall of his head: figure it out.
But someone calls them from down the hall and Jiyong looks away then.
“You’re so mean, hyung.” Jiyong says. He drops his gaze and scuffs Seunghyun’s shoe with his laced foot spitefully. He pushes his shades up his nose with a finger and curls his lip- once again unreachable. He moves away, leaving Seunghyun standing stark in the middle of the hall.
PART TWO
They got out of the airport safe and sound, with only a few occasions when further security measures became necessary due to the crowd. But Jiyong didn’t mind. Jiyong was fostering a literal heat stroke under his wool cap and scarf, being pushed incessantly forward by a large man which must have been unpleasant but he barely registered it. He was distracted, staring at the back of TOP hyung’s head, riveted by the way his ears were turning so red it might burst.
Jiyong sighed inwardly, closing his eyes against it all, because things were getting a bit out of hand. And he was inadvertently becoming the asshole in this situation when all he ever wanted was the opposite of that. Story of his life, really - all of his best intentions gone to hell.
**
Let it be known to all concerned that Kwon Jiyong was not clueless.
And he was certainly not ignorant. He was not a flittering mess of clumsy idiocy and lack of self-awareness that plague all manner of characters in lovey mangas schoolgirls so enjoy. He was not by any stretch blind. Which you would need to be to miss the obvious fact that Choi Seunghyun was attracted to him. It was not like he was being subtle about it; he’d never been subtle about it.
Yes, Jiyong knows perfectly well what he is doing to the great T.O.P.
The thing is,
He doesn’t see what TOP is doing to him.
Kwon Jiyong was not dumb, just emotionally constipated and forgets to remember that he sometimes has feelings too. It really isn’t his fault: he barely has time to eat these days let alone realize the biggest and only blind spot in his life is Choi Seunghyun, and what he has come to mean to him. Which was a lot. More than he would ever have expected. More than he could ever admit to, and it was not a pride thing.
GD&TOP weren’t called GD&TOP for nothing.
They were in better sync than a well-oiled drum machine, and as such, they decided without prompt from either party that the whole Airport Incident with the shoe and the lace and prolonged staring- thing would be better off completely ignored.
And so went on the barely-concealed infatuation of TOP and the half-assed denials of GD.
**
They’re in Japan.
There is a screw loose in Seunghyun’s head and he doesn’t think he would ever revert back to his prior lucidity, if he ever were before.
He finds himself staring at the mirror mid-button, thinking about knocking on the door adjacent, the one to Jiyong’s room, and then gives up on that useless train of thought. They’re going for stage rehearsal anyway, he can live without looking at Jiyong’s face for thirty minutes. Christ.
Jiyong’s room two doors over and it’s that feeling of being trapped again. At least in Seoul there were places he could escape to. Twenty beds he could name at the top of his head, miles away from Jiyong if necessary. Here, it was like 2007 all over again. Jiyong’s hair and skin and bitten lips at his fingertips and all he ever has to do is reach out.
Back in 2007 when all he had to do was yell through the bathroom door to get the fuck out of the shower already and Jiyong had swaggered out, warm and damp and looking so fucking edible Seunghyun’s head had spun.
Every day spent staring at the back of Jiyong’s head, following him around through hallways and waiting rooms, hoping he wouldn’t turn and catch him shamelessly looking, rapt. Back then when all Seunghyun had to do was sit on the couch a particular way, look at him with a particular expression and Jiyong would double over in breathy laughter, pushing at him with slight hands and that had been enough at the time.
It seems like a lifetime ago, being in those cramped rooms of their hostel. All five of them sharing the air and mildly obsessed with each other anyway so Seunghyun’s massive, embarrassing crush on Jiyong hadn’t been a big deal.
All of them leaning against each other on the too small couch watching the TV with dead eyes; Daesung imitating the people on the screen, and Seungri whining about being squashed against the armrest, as Seunghyun told him to shut that cute trap. And Jiyong had a leg resting on top of Seunghyun’s thigh like he owned it, grinning at the screen.
Choi Seunghyun was in so deep. In for life, at that point. And he was what- nineteen?
Seunghyun holds those days like a reverent history. When he could push Jiyong around all day and no one would notice. He could send dumb, love-drunk texts to his members. Say nothing when Jiyong fell against his side in the van in fatigue - when he could pretend he was asleep and hadn’t known, hadn’t been completely and bodily aware of his weight on his body. Days when nothing had consequence, and he could do or feel or act in anyway he felt was necessary, and his young age and precocious talents would excuse him. And all of these people who he admired and loved would be there, pressed at his side in the sweltering heat of the shoddy apartment, and they would laugh and cry and dance alongside him like it was destiny.
Now.
Now Jiyong is this unreal, intangible thing just hanging around him all the time, like a mirage, always just out of reach and it’s as if that last thing had all been a dream. He doesn’t remember the last time he had hands on him. It’s a weird thought.
There were weeks that went by when he couldn’t find a trace of Jiyong anywhere he went. Only stories and rumors that were passed to him secondhand, how he was doing, his sunken eyes. There were times when it took Jiyong days to answer a text - and even then it was stunted and cryptic - Seunghyun had stared at it for hours trying to decode the words.
Seunghyun had woken up one morning and they were suddenly in different countries, and he thinks maybe Jiyong learned to fly to get away from him. Jiyong always knew how to leave this place. He had just never felt like it. Seunghyun remembers not being hungry for the first time in a while, living through whole days with just vitamin water – which he didn’t even like – but he remembered how GD drowned in the stuff while working, and it was an unconscious adaptation he’d made.
So forgive him if he’s a little stunned to find himself in this blisteringly humid country, all of a sudden smothered by Jiyong’s presence. Seunghyun’s never been very susceptible to overexposure. He’d much rather hide.
Seunghyun shuffles out of his room forgetting maybe half a dozen things but not his coffee, never that, and he sees the elevator arrive at the end of the hall.
Jiyong is standing in it crowded amidst the staff and managers, looking perfect and adjusting the cap on his head. His hand freezes, eyes lighting up from miles away – noticing Seunghyun – and he flashes a grin, half-hidden behind people’s heads. His hand shoots out to hold the door open and he calls in his light husk of a voice, “Run, Forrest, run!”
Seunghyun winces, distantly shocked at how much the universe has it out for him. He fingers his lips and thinks maybe he’ll wait for the next one to come, but that might be a little obvious, and Jiyong is sharp enough to catch shit like that, open enough to call him out on it – and what will he do then. What would he say?
I’m fucking in love with you already, so can you please- just, stop existing or something?
That would go well.
Stuffed in the elevator, Jiyong snickers, pointing at Seunghyun’s untucked shirt. Before he could reach over and tuck it in for him (because jesus, if Seunghyun would survive that), TOP shoves the shirttail down his trousers and looks away, hiding his eyes behind shades – a petty revenge. Jiyong smiles at the ceiling and presses his right foot down on Seunghyun’s left, and he forgets to complain about it. For the whole two-minute ride, he leaves his shoulder pressed against Jiyong’s chest, blaming the crowded space and jetlag, Jiyong’s heartbeat reverberating against his bones like a steady drum driving him slowly but definitely crazy.
**
It’s one of Jiyong’s good days today, it was one of the small gratifications allowed of them in Japan, where they could stay in and sleep in until mid-afternoon, walk in the streets with relative anonymity. Jiyong seems to have slept his fill for the first time in months, and he’s all dancing limbs and smiles that reach his ears. Seunghyun grins at all his jokes and raps his part in a high-pitched voice making Jiyong fall against the side of the stage clutching his sides. Skipping over to him at the end of rehearsal to grab his hand and bump shoulders, shaking his head like he can’t even, muttering, “ah- TOP hyung is the best,” to the cameras in broken Japanese that makes his voice sound huskier than normal.
Jiyong tries on ten different jackets, his undershirt riding up from the effort every time, revealing a strip of pale skin in the hollow of his stomach. His voice muffled and light behind the coat-racks, his fingers working deftly, his rings making clinking noises against his belt buckle.
Jiyong steals someone’s latte resting on the make-up table, licking the foam from his lips like he’s euphemism for sex and Seunghyun can’t be expected to take more of this. He thinks quite seriously about blinding himself.
Instead he repeats over and over again, a rushed mantra circling in his head– three days left. 72 hours. Two and a half days left.Two.
**
There was a moment when Seunghyun was so sure that Jiyong had figured it out. Solved the grand mystery of his elusive bandmate and realized his all but obvious adult crush on him.
It was August, and the nights got hot very quickly. A particular summer evening when Seunghyun was being less subtle than he already wasn’t. At a small party held by PSY hyung in a hotel bar in Busan, Seunghyun had about three glasses of wine in him, and a hand firm on Jiyong’s shoulder in the crowded hall. He was well into his own revelation about his feelings for Jiyong at that point. Though still unaware of how far it stretched, where it ended. The extent of the things he wanted from Jiyong that he couldn’t have, couldn’t possibly ask for. He was also having these dreams at that time, dreams where Jiyong was still his best friend, always that, but he was also painted against his sheets, face buried in the pillow, biting, snapping, sleek hot, breaking him down everywhere he’d turn.
The real Kwon Jiyong was no better, coming back from his solo stages, tired and happy, light hair damp with sweat and falling in his eyes, asking Seunghyun in a serious tone how it was, voice still giddy with adrenaline. It was destroying him in a fundamental way, cutting away at him like the heat of the summer. The inside of his cheeks were worn from being bitten.
It was a weird night, music blaring, faceless people smudged out of his memory as the ground shook, and the only solid thing, the only constant he had was Jiyong by his side, white-blonde hair turned platinum in the blacklight, smile as white as his shirt and laces, and Seunghyun could not believe it. It was not at all okay.
He fell against Jiyong somewhere as they were heading up the stairs, pushing both of them hard against the wall, the world reeling in his blurred vision, and Jiyong’s arms had come up around his back, and it was so much like one of his dreams that Seunghyun lost ground. Didn’t really compute that this Jiyong was something real, and something that he should never, ever fuck up if it meant his life. And he blissfully burrowed his face in Jiyong’s neck and rubbed his nose, lips brushing on the place where Jiyong’s pulse beat fast and off-rhythm.
But then Jiyong placed his cool fingers against Seunghyun’s forehead pushing it off of his shoulder, and laughed, calling Kush hyung for help from above the flight of stairs, his light voice echoing in the hollowed hall, telling him, “okay, man, no more wine for you. You’re done.” And he was right.
Seunghyun had woken up the next day, remembering most of it in a heart-falling minute and horrifically appalled at himself, he stayed away from Jiyong for a week or two after. Not for much longer, because Seunghyun couldn’t really take complete abstinence like a champ.
Jiyong hadn’t changed much after that incident, maybe more aware of Seunghyun when he drank, teasing him to ease off, because remember that one time? Embarrassing. But Seunghyun knew. Knew that he’d been too open. He’d given his whole hand away, and there was nothing he could do to retrieve that depravity. All he could do was hope that Jiyong would forgive him, maybe even forget, and let him continue to be TOP hyung, the often-hilarious, always-irritating colleague and friend. He knew it was too much to ask. The very definition of too much to ask, but Seunghyun always wanted a little more than he deserved.
**
Despite what Seunghyun thought, Jiyong had figured it out way before Busan.
It was in the middle of stage rehearsal at the end of a year, and GD maybe slipped on a shoe lace or lost balance standing on a wheeled staircase and took a sizable fall, landing with a wooden sound against the floor. He bruised his shoulder and scraped the side of his hand badly enough to break skin.
He hadn’t slept properly in about a week, and was standing upright purely by processed sugar and a sandwich, and really, it was just incredibly dumb on his part, he couldn’t stop laughing with a hazy grin at every concerned face that followed him. It was that point in the concert preparation stage when everything was hilarious.
Youngbae had been there when he fell, and after he had made sure Jiyong was alright, told the crew that he’d take his place in line for solo rehearsal. Jiyong made an indignant gesture at that, but Youngbae just tsked in a motherly way and waved him off. He was brought into the dressing room to get patched up and Daesung and Seungri stood around with a sort of disoriented look, as if it was hard to believe that GD could be in an accident, that he bled red. It was such a rarely realized concept. Seungri asked with half-cheek and half-sincerity if he wanted some painkillers (‘cause he got some in his bag), and GD laughed harder and kicked the little bastard in the shin, one arm holding his shoulder intact, because maybe it was a bit dislocated too. Not that he would ever voice that suspicion out loud in fear of prolonged time away from stage.
TOP hyung was late, as per usual, by about 20 minutes which meant he’d be buying dinner that night, and GD was idly thinking up a fake, elaborately ridiculous story to tell about his injury to make him laugh (Daesung suggested a confession that he’s actually Ironman), when the door burst open with a bang and TOP rolled in with an arm still in a jacket and hair a mess, eyes unbelievably wide and fervently searching the room until it froze on Jiyong.
Yes, it was that moment, when all of Jiyong’s previous doubts were confirmed in a rush – years of this pseudo-attraction, barely veiled by brotherly closeness and professional admiration – crumbling down to nothing. And it was so easy, he felt stupid about it for months after.
When in that moment Seunghyun looked at him with that pained expression, cataloguing every detail as if it was crucial, as if he’d find something devastating in the crook of his leg or the angle of his hand, and Jiyong realized that Seunghyun hyung may have heard from someone that he had an accident, fell down a staircase, which would have sounded horrible on its own so it was understandable he was freaking out.
Seunghyun cracked a knee on the floor in a hurry to meet Jiyong’s eye level, hand automatically reaching for his shoulder but reconsidering the move last minute seeing the ice pack pressed against it – and with all the depth of emotions TOP was capable of showing, Jiyong had never seen that specific look of distress on his face before, like the very ground on which he stood had shuddered open, like the sky had shut down, black like tar. Like he could not bare any of it, not a second more.
“I heard you were hurt,” Seunghyun had said, voice shaking imperceptively to anyone else, except Jiyong had spent years scrutinizing the way TOP hyung’s voice worked, the bass of it rumbling in his headphones for months at a time, repeated and altered with every hearing, every breath inbetween takes roaring like a storm in the studio, as he asked him, ‘again’. And it all came reeling back as Seunghyun looked at him, eyes wandering around his body carefully as if Jiyong could feel it, and maybe he could.
“I- just- um, my hand stings a bit.” Jiyong achieved. He raised the appendage up from being clasped at his shoulder to show him the white bandage, grinning a little, because he was still dead tired and excuse him if he couldn’t control his face. He regretted it immediately, as Seunghyun’s brows cringed and mouth formed a grimace. Seunghyun held the hand gingerly in his palm for a moment, and it was just so unlike how he’d normally act in these situations, Jiyong forgot the dull pain of it in surprise.
It was a long time before he spoke again, telling him in a subdued voice, that he shouldn’t move around so much like a kid. After spending a few minutes staring fixedly at Jiyong’s hand, he got up, wandered around the room for a while before leaving, the door swinging shut behind him.
In the end, the occasion was passed by all witnesses as another episode of one of Choi Seunghyun’s over-serious moments, like the times when he’d respond to a joke Daesung told with a worldly philosophy that turned the mood solemn. Or when Jiyong turned to him in the van one time and found him looking down at his mp3 player, music pounding in his earphones and a tear falling off his cheek onto the screen, and Jiyong had quickly averted his gaze, feeling as if he’d intruded.
He always bounced back from those moments though, right back into his usual routine of imitating Seungri’s voice or dancing ridiculously to make them all laugh. Choi Seunghyun was emotionally volatile, they all knew, and the extent of which never failed to surprise them all. But from this occasion, Seunghyun had never completely reverted since.
Maybe it wasn’t an occasion, Jiyong thinks, but how he’s been from the beginning, and it had run like an MR forever and he’d just never heard, this unfaltering affection playing endlessly in the background, muted but undeniable. In any case, he could hear it now. It was deafening.
PART THREE
Seunghyun wakes with a jerk, as the song being played somewhere by his head does a crescendo into its chorus.
He cracks an eye open and is faced with Jiyong sitting knees-up on the couch beside the bed, notebook in hand and a mug pressed to his leg. He’s wearing a vintage shirt and ripped jeans, small face framed by thick glasses and he was in Seunghyun’s room.
Why was he in Seunghyun’s room?
“Mmhgh..” Seunghyun attempts, and then cringes at the excruciating pain at his temple. It hurt to blink- let alone breathe, his fingertips searing and eyelids burning as if in lye… and yes – he was hungover as fuck.
He checks the time and sees it’s well into 4pm, which was just great; his last day in Japan wasted on uncomfortable sleep. He looks down at himself and sees his still fully suited form hanging off the edge of the bed. There is glitter everywhere and light-colored chalk on his lapel. A stripe of pale pink on the white sheets. His hair in a wreck and a bruise forming just below his jaw, throbbing like a second heart. At least his shoes were off, whether that was his doing was up for debate. He looks back at Jiyong and sees him flinch minutely- which was just fascinating. What had happened? Did he want to know?
“Afternoon,” Jiyong says, with a weird smile. Then he looks away and down at his book. “Since you’re awake, help me with my homework. How do you say in Japanese, ‘TOP hyung doesn’t like to drink’?”
“G-Dragon wa heartless bastard desu” Seunghyun growled. It felt like a cat gave birth in his throat. “Edible liquid,” he demands.
“Coffee?” Jiyong thrusts the mug in Seunghyun’s direction, and Seunghyun just wants to keep this kid forever. The perfect leader. He had endless praise for him.
Seunghyun takes the mug with tentative hands, his motor skills shot to hell by the prolonged inebriation and the excruciating headache, raising his head from the pillow just enough that it wouldn’t kill him, and that he could take a sip. He spit-takes. He promptly drops the mug on the floor and sputters, choking on everything – because that is not coffee.
Jiyong is laughing in that breathless, airy way, hand covering his face in glee, and Seunghyun does not want to keep the little fucker. Not ever. “What is that?” he yells, drowning the radio.
“It’s the health juice Boram nuna made us for our trip, remember? That aftertaste you are experiencing would be beetroot. Jesus, you got it all over the carpet.” Jiyong laughs. He puts the notebook down on the side table and saunters towards the bathroom. Seunghyun’s head is in halves and there is a dull echo of pain reverberating in his chest. But the sound of Jiyong’s laughter is spreading dopamine throughout his system, and it may be enough to fix his life, much to his disgruntled pleasure.
“That better not have gotten on any of my shoes, GD, or I will throw up on everything you love.”
Seunghyun groans into the pillow. He raises his head a little, then, remembering what is weird about this picture – “Why are you in my room, anyway?”
Jiyong returns with a glass of water and a wet towel, and Seunghyun’s eyes stick on the way his hair is tousled like a boy’s, eyes clear and hazel in the light shining through the windows. “You do realize this is my room, and any potentially ruined shoes would be mine. In which case you would not be alive right now, hyung.” Jiyong threatens.
Seunghyun vaguely becomes aware that the music playing on the dock is not something on his mp3, and though the room has the same interior structure as his own, this one is a lot tidier.
“Here, I’m sorry about your pain and discomfort, et cetera.” Jiyong hands him the glass and Seunghyun takes it, looking up at him suspiciously.
He takes a sip and feels a little bit more alive, feeling better enough to ask in a normal voice, “Why am I in your room?” because that is, if anything, weirder.
Seunghyun can’t remember a thing that happened last night. They arrived at the U&I club at around 11pm, performed.. and came back to the hotel..?? There was no reason for him to have left the perfectly fine bed of his own to come and sleep in Jiyong’s. There was no logical explanation for it and it boggles him as he stares vacantly at Jiyong’s silent face.
It’s to no avail. “Don’t ask me, I’m the victim here. I had to sleep on the couch in the living room.” Jiyong smirks, still not meeting his eyes. It wakes Seunghyun up effectively enough. Jiyong is shrugging into a light jacket and donning a cap, sticking his phone in his back pocket, his head turned resolutely away from Seunghyun, as if consciously done. “I’m gonna go shopping with Namgook hyung, so I’ll uh- see you tonight or whatever.”
But Seunghyun is not done, because what? Who? “Why didn’t you kick me out? I may have been drunk but I would’ve gone eventually.”
Jiyong half-smiles, his eyes unreadable through the thick rims. “You passed out. I can’t even wake you when you’re sober.”
Something is still off, but Seunghyun is struck first by a lingering guilt. “I’m sorry, man. Why’d you sleep on the couch? You could’ve squeezed in beside me, it’s a massive bed.” Seunghyun thinks it might be a bit too early since The Airport Incident to insinuate anything like them sharing a bed, but— they were still friends.. were they not? They could still do normal things that six-year-long bandmates do, right? Seunghyun doesn’t know. He feels disoriented, not knowing exactly how to approach anything that concerned Jiyong now. It was foreign ground to him.
Jiyong’s face falls a little, which stops Seunghyun’s already induced heart for a split moment. But it immediately reverts into a worn grin again, like nothing happened. “I can’t sleep with your liquor breath stinking up the whole room, and it’s- it was fine. It would’ve been too hot in here anyway.” Jiyong shrugs.
Seunghyun doesn’t really have anything to say, and his fuse is still pretty blown for him to be able to provide a coherent argument. So he stares instead at Jiyong’s turned back moving around the room busily, and waits until he’s left alone without another word, the door clicking shut behind Jiyong.
He reaches over to turn the music off, playing quietly still, hoping to slip into a coma that will last until the plane ride home tomorrow, and stops- reading the track title. It’s the demo version of one of their unused songs off their album, and it has been playing on repeat.
It strikes him, jarring him fully awake. The day breaking and breaking out in the streets, sunlight heating the back of his neck.
I’m just another boy
I’m an ever-returning boomerang
So selfish, you and I
I’m so in love, I’m so in love
Just another broken heart.
—
And it all comes screaming back and Seunghyun jerks up from the bed and yells ‘fuck’ into his hands. Last night. Last night he did something stupid.
He finds himself out the door running down the hall, out of breath and out of mind as he reaches the elevator doors just as they are about to close. He shoves a shaking hand between them and they shudder open, and Kwon Jiyong is revealed to him like a freaking miracle.
Jiyong looks up, lips apart in shock but hands in fists, already braced for impact. And – and it’s that sensory memory again: the warmth of Jiyong’s breath, the flickering of his eyelashes on his cheek, so vivid Seunghyun almost sways into him. And Seunghyun thinks maybe Jiyong knew all day. Let it fester in his maze of a head, growing like weeds into a fucked up song and Seunghyun hadn’t known. Was fucking passed out.
“What,” Jiyong asks barely above a whisper, and he doesn’t even make excuses this time. Doesn’t hide or run. There’s nowhere to swim but up.
And Seunghyun breathes out, his legs nearly giving out beneath him, “I remember.”
The elevator bell buzzes, lights blinking on and off above them both, signaling that it was enough.
**
Jiyong remembers Last Night like an age-old trauma engraved on his skin, mind filled to the brim with it.
The door had rapped in a familiar rhythm at around four in the morning, and he opened it to find an incredibly drunk Choi Seunghyun - still dressed for performance - swaying dangerously in the hallway. And Jiyong had barely flinched.
Seunghyun had chalk on his fingers, pink dye smudged on his cheek, and he looked the very picture of royalty from a dystopian future. He was missing a cufflink, and Jiyong thought he would get very upset about that when he sobered up.
Jiyong frowned a little, confused. Hair still wet from the shower, dripping dark on to his shirt. Seunghyun hyung was grinning, eyes sharp and destructive, drink on his breath. It was suffocating.
“Wow,” he drawled, leaning heavily against the doorframe, voice twenty leagues below ground. “lookin’ fresh, GD.” And Jiyong rolled his eyes with a dramatic sigh, because this was routine. It’s been happening since one week of their dorm sharing, the way Seunghyun would get a certain amount of liquor in him, and the only person he’d search out in a stupor was Kwon Jiyong. Every time, wherever he was, Seunghyun would find him or call him, leaning into him on the bus, in the cab, like a well-planned siege over unguarded territory.
“You should’ve stayed, man.” Seunghyun said, eyes stuck somewhere on Jiyong’s forehead.
Jiyong should not have stayed. Earlier in the night they had attended the after-after-party held in the club where they performed for the last time in Japan. Jiyong had maybe a couple scotch-on-rocks and had smiled mutely at a hundred people that were introduced to him before tail-lighting it out of there, looking forward to a goddamn shower and drunk-dialing his dog.
Jiyong remembers Seunghyun hyung at one point, squeezing past people apologetically to reach him, looking brand new and unfamiliar under the flashing lights and smoky air - flushed and eyes-wide and asking him, “are you leaving me?”
And Jiyong didn’t have anything to say to that so he just grinned tiredly. Seunghyun had looked at him petulantly for a second, and told him to sit his ass down and he’ll go get him some water. He disappeared into the crowd and Jiyong took his chance and left before he’d be stuck there forever in his capable hands. Jiyong hadn’t felt good about it, but he was experiencing a brain shortage, that last performance crumbling the last of his defenses, and that was not a good state to be hanging around Choi Seunghyun. In Japan of all places.
So yeah, Jiyong had left Seunghyun. Tugging at his manager hyung’s sleeve and demanding a ride back to the hotel.
And Seunghyun had come to him at the end of the night as always.
Jiyong realized that Gaho was still barking on the other side of the receiver at his ear, and he told his nuna he had to go and hung up, Seunghyun pushing past him into his room like it was his own. Jiyong wasn’t the type to be aware of his personal space or his mess in front of his members, but it felt weird anyway, having Seunghyun in his room, looking almost too bright and alien against the bleak furniture.
“Where are those Mochi cakes the fans gave you? Why do they give you sweets and all I ever get is medicine?” Seunghyun whined, drifting across the room in a lost sort of way, and Jiyong eyed him at a safe distance, amused but guarded. Seunghyun couldn’t be trusted at this state, and Jiyong never trusted himself in any state. They were going home in a day. They were almost there.
“Because you’re getting on in your age.” Jiyong smirked, and Seunghyun flashed a look at him like he’d just noticed he was there. Jiyong felt dizzy as if alcohol was transferrable by proximity. “Being drunk is not a good enough reason for you to come in here and demand food, hyung.”
“You’re not a good enough reason”, Seunghyun pointed at him, not making any sense. Jiyong thought about getting mean, making biting remarks and kicking Seunghyun out of his room, but he didn’t want to do that, nor did he have the energy to. No one would win that fight.
Seunghyun tripped then, toppling down to the floor at the foot of the bed.
“Whoa, whoa” Jiyong rushed forward, grabbing ineffectually at his shoulder, hands brushing against skin too warm to be anything human. Seunghyun even fell down in an attractively graceful way as almost everything he did, the genetically gifted bastard. Jiyong couldn’t help but laugh. “If you danced like this normally, maybe Jaewook hyung would let off easy”
“Ah, you’re just jealous,” Seunghyun leaned against the bed, smiled up at him in that childish way that clenched uncomfortably in Jiyong’s chest. His fingers were pulling at his collar as if it was choking him, licking his lips, and Jiyong swallowed, eyes stuck on the movement. “I dance better than you.”
Jiyong wanted to get out of this stifling room, away from Seunghyun’s piercing black eyes, asking for everything - it was getting harder and harder to ignore them. But he just stood there above his hyung’s crumpled form and smiled back. “You’re just- a sight. I can’t believe I’m not recording this right now and selling it to the internet. My life would be set.”
Seunghyun snorted, hand reaching for Jiyong’s bare ankle but missing and landing on his shoe. “The internet is not an entity, dal-go-na.” He mumbled fondly, eyelids drooping dreamily, and it shook Jiyong on a fundamental level, he almost lost ground. Seunghyun only called him that when he was being particularly confessional.
That one time Jiyong made Seunghyun and Daesung melted sugar crackers on a ladle in the cramped kitchen of their first dorms. All three of them giggling under their breaths to not wake the others, blurred sleepless nights that seem like eons ago, rushing back with the uttered word. And Jiyong knew, it was just a breath away from saying the three irretrievable words.
Jiyong turned on the TV to a music station to break the weighted silence and sat against his pillows. Seunghyun drifted up off the floor to glare at him. He was listing to the side like he had been wounded in an irreversible way, a vital part of him that was taken out a long time ago - and Jiyong was in some way guilty of that.
“You left, you have nothing to say.” he said cryptically.
Jiyong smiled and avoided his hyung’s eyes. “No one forced you to stay there.”
“I’m going to trash your room, just- wait a second until it stops spinning,” Seunghyun huffed, wavering. He sat down at Jiyong’s side, leaning against his knees smelling of smoke and sweat and wood. Jiyong raised a hand to do something, maybe to push him off, maybe to cover his face, he didn’t know. Before he could decide, Seunghyun had snatched it out of the air by the wrist.
Their eyes met with a crack, and Jiyong remembers how young he had looked, how sure yet unsure. Seunghyun lost focus in his eyes, and pulled Jiyong toward him for a second, then pushed him back, following with his whole body - and all Jiyong could do was let him.
He found himself pressed against the back of the bed with Seunghyun towering over him, his hair falling in his eyes and he could hear somebody’s shaking breaths rushing- thrown water sound against the wall of his head, and Jiyong had thought - that’s it then. All the fight draining out of him. This was how it would go. There was a hand at the nape of his neck, an arm pressing hard against his waist, and he thought he could feel it trembling. Jiyong’s hands clenched in the sheets, heartbeat stammering, and it was nothing like he’d ever expected, how affected he was by Seunghyun hyung’s breath on his skin, his light hair curtaining his view, and Jiyong’s fingers had itched to be buried to the wrist.
Then Jiyong blinked, barely a flicker, but it was enough.
Seunghyun was moving away. Eyes still dark and trained on his lips, but something distinctly closed off in the line of his mouth. Jiyong wished desperately that they would stop this. Stop doing this.
“Chicken.” Seunghyun breathed, lips just inches from Jiyong’s own. Seunghyun was snickering, moving away and away and falling back on to the foot of the bed, borrowing into the sheets. “You lose.”
“I… lose?” Jiyong asked, his voice barely working, scraped up from the bottom of him in something like exasperated sadness.
“You always do.” Seunghyun slurred against the blankets, halfway passed out already. Jiyong looked up at the ceiling, his chest feeling bruised and blue, believing every word.
PART ONE
Choi Seunghyun wakes up and finds himself on a business seat landing at Narita Airport in five minutes. He cracks his eyes open, holding perfectly still. Jiyong is on the seat beside him, curled up slightly, music beating inside his tiny hooded head and one side of his leg warm against Seunghyun’s own.
He stares at Jiyong’s sleeping face for a while, feeling self-destructive. It was a three hour flight but Jiyong hasn’t slept at all last night, evident in his three-hour nap. It’s the rarest sight when Jiyong’s defenses are down, mouth slack and eyelids wavering, and Seunghyun gets his fill while it’s available to him.
His body stopped listening to his brain sometime during the flight, and Seunghyun’s arm is a searing line against Jiyong’s shoulder, his whole body steered towards him. Seunghyun looks at the blue sky out the window, worrying his lips.
Here it goes again.
Four days. For a show, a couple of meetings, a day for leisure and they were going back to Seoul on Monday.
Japan is a bad place, where everything comes loose at the seams. Where the edges become blurred and the heat of the place forces you to lose layers of yourself. Sweltering. This plane, with these seats too close together. This city with its too-bright lights. Everything is the worst, Seunghyun broods, five years-old.
Seunghyun’s eyes drift down to Jiyong’s slim hand hanging off of the armrest, his middle finger brushing Seunghyun’s thigh- and it’s like a timebomb counting down in his head. Seunghyun averts his eyes quickly as a staff walks past him through the aisle. But it’s pretty obvious to all concerned, anyway, that recently, his whole world seems to revolve around the slight kid passed out beside him.
The point is, he was never being subtle in the first place. That’s not how he worked, and everyone but Jiyong knew it to an extent. Jiyong was the most oblivious out of all of them. Either that, or he was really good at pretending it wasn’t happening. Seunghyun thinks maybe it’s a bit of both, and wants to strangle him.
They’re friends. Brothers. Both the closest and the farthest of all the members, but they deal. They barely ever really fight, neither of them the type to get on the other’s nerves. Leaving the shortcomings be, focusing instead on inducing dimples and forcing giggles from each other. Mumbling lyrics under their breath, so the other will finish the song. Perfectly imbalanced, as sane as they never are, and it’s good. Exactly as they should be and have been. Seunghyun’s going out of his mind about it.
It’s not that he’s not content. It’s just — he- He can’t, he’s not allowed. He’s the older, and he needs to be reasonable. Despite the fact that he has no mental control over what he wants, trapped helplessly inside his own head.
The fact of the matter was: they liked each other. Enough that it was noticeable. Enough that the idea was conceivable, and they joked about it daily, calling each other baby, and yeobo, and whatever else that came out naturally. Complimenting the other’s good looks, making dumb hand-shakes that changed everyday, adjusting each other’s tie like characters in a silent film. Normal things, except laced heavily with unbridled and more often (especially on Jiyong’s end) sarcastic affection. But that was par for them anyway. The other members referring to them as boyfriends and newlyweds, and scrunching their noses whenever they walked in anywhere together. And it was hilarious for a while.
Then they started hanging out constantly, their albums and the promotions, dance practices, whole months spent in the crevice of the recording room… his life consisting solely of Jiyong and his bitten lips and fingers and- and it’s become a bit more than a joke to Seunghyun.
And it’s always been just him. He was the one who always made it go on longer, pushed it a little further; made sure Jiyong was late to wherever he was supposed to be like an hour ago. Seunghyun’s the one staring helplessly at Jiyong’s smiling profile, nudging him into another fit of airy laughter - calling him motherfucker just to hear him choke on his soda. He’s always pulling him by the collar, pushing his hand through his short hair, darkened and smooth with sweat. Always pressing his face in the small spot beneath Jiyong’s ear to yell nonsense at him above the music. He’s always reaching for Jiyong’s fingers across the table, across the arm of the seats — and anyway, the point is- The point is he was never going to actually do anything. Grab his hand, pull it towards him, because that’s weird - even for them. And what would he do with it if he did? He hasn’t thought it through.
It wasn’t his fault though, he thinks as he peers down at Jiyong’s sleeping face. Even just being in the vicinity of Jiyong shuts down your brain, all your nerves rendered useless. The sight of him makes all the songs in the world make sense. Every cheesy line in the movie bearable. Singable. Like this one.
Seunghyun dares anyone not to be drawn like a star to a black hole.
And everything is infinitely worse when it’s just the two of them like this. On a plane, in the changing room, in the car - sharing earphones, arguing about shoes and pineapple slices. It’s Jiyong imitating Seunghyun’s every word, to the voice and nuance, for two hours straight. It’s Seunghyun stealing Jiyong’s drink even though he doesn’t even like orange crush — but it gets Jiyong’s attention, so.
It’s knowing when to leave the other be. Knowing the difference between worried and nervous. And sad, thinking of home.
It’s becoming an expert at what riles Jiyong. A sort of cabin fever running between just the two of them. Seeing him pissed, eyes rolling, chewing on the inside of his lip. Seunghyun likes to make him livid, a furious flush blooming across his cheeks, teeth flashing - hotter than anything. Never lasts more than a minute though, Seunghyun always cracking a joke, pressing a finger against Jiyong’s temple and calling him ‘a scary kid’.
When the rest of their group are across a sea, and their lives are devoid of Seungri’s small tantrums, Youngbae and Daesung’s quiet hilarity - None of them here to distract Seunghyun and his wandering mind, leaving every moment of the day jarring and blinding and so full of images of Jiyong’s mouth Seunghyun might go insane. It’s always a near thing.
Every night, lying in a hostel room alone, gazing up at an unfamiliar ceiling - Imagining Jiyong getting ready for bed just a door away, flashes of white sheets, pale skin and pink tongue rushing through his head like a bad secret until the light of dawn. And having to wake up the next day to the smell of room-service, and Jiyong shuffling into his room, disheveled hair, always coming in last and drowsy like a boy, and demanding orange juice with an impossibly easy smile on his soap-clean face. And Seunghyun can’t help but smile back, even if he only got two hours of sleep last night.
He doesn’t remember how long it’s been. He can’t remember a time when he hasn’t wanted more from Jiyong. Things he could never ask for because they’re perfect as they are. Because he doesn’t want to add creases to Jiyong’s brows, darken his eyes — he’s done enough already.
But mostly, because what if Jiyong pulls away. He doesn’t think he could take a hit like that.
Seunghyun breathes out as slowly as possible, feeling incredibly hot under his clothes, and looks around feverishly in his seat. He feels trapped, and he wants to get up - stretch his legs - leave Kwon Jiyong here forever if possible. Seunghyun’s always been good at running from his problems— he thinks he can lose him.
It doesn’t last. Because Jiyong jerks awake at Seunghyun’s fidgeting, looks around dazily, removing his headphones and grinning slightly at nothing. He sticks his feet haphazardly into his shoes and yawns behind his hand- a habit learned from years of public exposure. He flicks his eyes to Seunghyun and his lips twitch in amusement, eyes suddenly alive with mischief— and jesus, Seunghyun is so fucked.
Jiyong stretches his arms dramatically, pushing the palm of his hand on Seunghyun’s cheek as if by accident. Seunghyun flinches away and gnashes his teeth. “Stop it.” Jiyong’s foot falls on Seunghyun’s ankle, digging in with malice, his mouth barely hiding a full-on grin. “Bad dog,” Seunghyun growls.
“You love it,” Jiyong says, closing his eyes again blissfully. And that’s an insane thing for him to say right now, because Seunghyun is being so obvious, the entire cabin is aware of it. This was not his life.
The plane shakes and Jiyong’s hand falls palm-up against Seunghyun’s leg, and the whole world needs to end immediately.
They land safely, much to Seunghyun’s distress, and they shuffle out and routinely proceed with immigration. Seunghyun’s lost in his head, recovering, regaining any sense of composure, and steeling his entire existence for the days ahead. He rubs absent-mindedly at his leg, and nearly misses his baggage passing him on the conveyor for the second time.
He watches Jiyong tapping his passport wallet against his lips and wandering down the hall, all sleep-drunk. Seunghyun’s mouth goes dry and he reaches into his jacket for a cigarette.
Four days.
96 hours of this - and he knows there’s going to be nothing left of him after that.
“Wait,” Seunghyun calls, barely recognizing his own voice.
Jiyong looks back at him, brows crooked in confusion and slight annoyance. His default response: what now, hyung, ever-suffering. His eyes widen a little as Seunghyun stops in front of and slightly above him. Seunghyun holds onto Jiyong’s sleeve for a second and loses his breath - but what’s new.
Seunghyun sticks the cigarette between his lips and slumps down on one knee. He ties Jiyong’s laces that have come undone, and he’s so out of it right then that he barely recognizes that this might be a little weird. He can’t tell- he might still be asleep on that plane. He forgets to come up for air for days.
“Child.” Seunghyun mutters between his lips, standing back up. His head spins from the effort, and he hides it with a familiar smirk, flicking his hair away from his face. He aims for mocking, but he’s sure his face is the very picture of endearment. His life as a T.O.P. cosplay.
Jiyong isn’t fooled, and he looks at him for a second, his face blank and vaguely startled. Seunghyun watches him back, and it takes all his strength not to walk the hell away. Not to shake Jiyong until all their teeth fall out, not to place his palm on the inside of Jiyong’s collar and pull. It takes everything in his power.
Jiyong smirks back in the end, like, that’s rich, but his eyes aren’t smiling, remaining cryptic. There’s a flush creeping up his neck and Seunghyun wants to lick the heat of it.
The point is, he has never, ever been subtle about it. Never once in six years.
He wants this all to stop. He wants his prize at the end. He wants this heat-heavy building to collapse down around them as they stand here, lost, like they forgot their lines. Fuck the lines.
His eyes roam along Jiyong’s cheeks, and he screams at him internally against the wall of his head: figure it out.
But someone calls them from down the hall and Jiyong looks away then.
“You’re so mean, hyung.” Jiyong says. He drops his gaze and scuffs Seunghyun’s shoe with his laced foot spitefully. He pushes his shades up his nose with a finger and curls his lip- once again unreachable. He moves away, leaving Seunghyun standing stark in the middle of the hall.
PART TWO
They got out of the airport safe and sound, with only a few occasions when further security measures became necessary due to the crowd. But Jiyong didn’t mind. Jiyong was fostering a literal heat stroke under his wool cap and scarf, being pushed incessantly forward by a large man which must have been unpleasant but he barely registered it. He was distracted, staring at the back of TOP hyung’s head, riveted by the way his ears were turning so red it might burst.
Jiyong sighed inwardly, closing his eyes against it all, because things were getting a bit out of hand. And he was inadvertently becoming the asshole in this situation when all he ever wanted was the opposite of that. Story of his life, really - all of his best intentions gone to hell.
**
Let it be known to all concerned that Kwon Jiyong was not clueless.
And he was certainly not ignorant. He was not a flittering mess of clumsy idiocy and lack of self-awareness that plague all manner of characters in lovey mangas schoolgirls so enjoy. He was not by any stretch blind. Which you would need to be to miss the obvious fact that Choi Seunghyun was attracted to him. It was not like he was being subtle about it; he’d never been subtle about it.
Yes, Jiyong knows perfectly well what he is doing to the great T.O.P.
The thing is,
He doesn’t see what TOP is doing to him.
Kwon Jiyong was not dumb, just emotionally constipated and forgets to remember that he sometimes has feelings too. It really isn’t his fault: he barely has time to eat these days let alone realize the biggest and only blind spot in his life is Choi Seunghyun, and what he has come to mean to him. Which was a lot. More than he would ever have expected. More than he could ever admit to, and it was not a pride thing.
GD&TOP weren’t called GD&TOP for nothing.
They were in better sync than a well-oiled drum machine, and as such, they decided without prompt from either party that the whole Airport Incident with the shoe and the lace and prolonged staring- thing would be better off completely ignored.
And so went on the barely-concealed infatuation of TOP and the half-assed denials of GD.
**
They’re in Japan.
There is a screw loose in Seunghyun’s head and he doesn’t think he would ever revert back to his prior lucidity, if he ever were before.
He finds himself staring at the mirror mid-button, thinking about knocking on the door adjacent, the one to Jiyong’s room, and then gives up on that useless train of thought. They’re going for stage rehearsal anyway, he can live without looking at Jiyong’s face for thirty minutes. Christ.
Jiyong’s room two doors over and it’s that feeling of being trapped again. At least in Seoul there were places he could escape to. Twenty beds he could name at the top of his head, miles away from Jiyong if necessary. Here, it was like 2007 all over again. Jiyong’s hair and skin and bitten lips at his fingertips and all he ever has to do is reach out.
Back in 2007 when all he had to do was yell through the bathroom door to get the fuck out of the shower already and Jiyong had swaggered out, warm and damp and looking so fucking edible Seunghyun’s head had spun.
Every day spent staring at the back of Jiyong’s head, following him around through hallways and waiting rooms, hoping he wouldn’t turn and catch him shamelessly looking, rapt. Back then when all Seunghyun had to do was sit on the couch a particular way, look at him with a particular expression and Jiyong would double over in breathy laughter, pushing at him with slight hands and that had been enough at the time.
It seems like a lifetime ago, being in those cramped rooms of their hostel. All five of them sharing the air and mildly obsessed with each other anyway so Seunghyun’s massive, embarrassing crush on Jiyong hadn’t been a big deal.
All of them leaning against each other on the too small couch watching the TV with dead eyes; Daesung imitating the people on the screen, and Seungri whining about being squashed against the armrest, as Seunghyun told him to shut that cute trap. And Jiyong had a leg resting on top of Seunghyun’s thigh like he owned it, grinning at the screen.
Choi Seunghyun was in so deep. In for life, at that point. And he was what- nineteen?
Seunghyun holds those days like a reverent history. When he could push Jiyong around all day and no one would notice. He could send dumb, love-drunk texts to his members. Say nothing when Jiyong fell against his side in the van in fatigue - when he could pretend he was asleep and hadn’t known, hadn’t been completely and bodily aware of his weight on his body. Days when nothing had consequence, and he could do or feel or act in anyway he felt was necessary, and his young age and precocious talents would excuse him. And all of these people who he admired and loved would be there, pressed at his side in the sweltering heat of the shoddy apartment, and they would laugh and cry and dance alongside him like it was destiny.
Now.
Now Jiyong is this unreal, intangible thing just hanging around him all the time, like a mirage, always just out of reach and it’s as if that last thing had all been a dream. He doesn’t remember the last time he had hands on him. It’s a weird thought.
There were weeks that went by when he couldn’t find a trace of Jiyong anywhere he went. Only stories and rumors that were passed to him secondhand, how he was doing, his sunken eyes. There were times when it took Jiyong days to answer a text - and even then it was stunted and cryptic - Seunghyun had stared at it for hours trying to decode the words.
Seunghyun had woken up one morning and they were suddenly in different countries, and he thinks maybe Jiyong learned to fly to get away from him. Jiyong always knew how to leave this place. He had just never felt like it. Seunghyun remembers not being hungry for the first time in a while, living through whole days with just vitamin water – which he didn’t even like – but he remembered how GD drowned in the stuff while working, and it was an unconscious adaptation he’d made.
So forgive him if he’s a little stunned to find himself in this blisteringly humid country, all of a sudden smothered by Jiyong’s presence. Seunghyun’s never been very susceptible to overexposure. He’d much rather hide.
Seunghyun shuffles out of his room forgetting maybe half a dozen things but not his coffee, never that, and he sees the elevator arrive at the end of the hall.
Jiyong is standing in it crowded amidst the staff and managers, looking perfect and adjusting the cap on his head. His hand freezes, eyes lighting up from miles away – noticing Seunghyun – and he flashes a grin, half-hidden behind people’s heads. His hand shoots out to hold the door open and he calls in his light husk of a voice, “Run, Forrest, run!”
Seunghyun winces, distantly shocked at how much the universe has it out for him. He fingers his lips and thinks maybe he’ll wait for the next one to come, but that might be a little obvious, and Jiyong is sharp enough to catch shit like that, open enough to call him out on it – and what will he do then. What would he say?
I’m fucking in love with you already, so can you please- just, stop existing or something?
That would go well.
Stuffed in the elevator, Jiyong snickers, pointing at Seunghyun’s untucked shirt. Before he could reach over and tuck it in for him (because jesus, if Seunghyun would survive that), TOP shoves the shirttail down his trousers and looks away, hiding his eyes behind shades – a petty revenge. Jiyong smiles at the ceiling and presses his right foot down on Seunghyun’s left, and he forgets to complain about it. For the whole two-minute ride, he leaves his shoulder pressed against Jiyong’s chest, blaming the crowded space and jetlag, Jiyong’s heartbeat reverberating against his bones like a steady drum driving him slowly but definitely crazy.
**
It’s one of Jiyong’s good days today, it was one of the small gratifications allowed of them in Japan, where they could stay in and sleep in until mid-afternoon, walk in the streets with relative anonymity. Jiyong seems to have slept his fill for the first time in months, and he’s all dancing limbs and smiles that reach his ears. Seunghyun grins at all his jokes and raps his part in a high-pitched voice making Jiyong fall against the side of the stage clutching his sides. Skipping over to him at the end of rehearsal to grab his hand and bump shoulders, shaking his head like he can’t even, muttering, “ah- TOP hyung is the best,” to the cameras in broken Japanese that makes his voice sound huskier than normal.
Jiyong tries on ten different jackets, his undershirt riding up from the effort every time, revealing a strip of pale skin in the hollow of his stomach. His voice muffled and light behind the coat-racks, his fingers working deftly, his rings making clinking noises against his belt buckle.
Jiyong steals someone’s latte resting on the make-up table, licking the foam from his lips like he’s euphemism for sex and Seunghyun can’t be expected to take more of this. He thinks quite seriously about blinding himself.
Instead he repeats over and over again, a rushed mantra circling in his head– three days left. 72 hours. Two and a half days left.Two.
**
There was a moment when Seunghyun was so sure that Jiyong had figured it out. Solved the grand mystery of his elusive bandmate and realized his all but obvious adult crush on him.
It was August, and the nights got hot very quickly. A particular summer evening when Seunghyun was being less subtle than he already wasn’t. At a small party held by PSY hyung in a hotel bar in Busan, Seunghyun had about three glasses of wine in him, and a hand firm on Jiyong’s shoulder in the crowded hall. He was well into his own revelation about his feelings for Jiyong at that point. Though still unaware of how far it stretched, where it ended. The extent of the things he wanted from Jiyong that he couldn’t have, couldn’t possibly ask for. He was also having these dreams at that time, dreams where Jiyong was still his best friend, always that, but he was also painted against his sheets, face buried in the pillow, biting, snapping, sleek hot, breaking him down everywhere he’d turn.
The real Kwon Jiyong was no better, coming back from his solo stages, tired and happy, light hair damp with sweat and falling in his eyes, asking Seunghyun in a serious tone how it was, voice still giddy with adrenaline. It was destroying him in a fundamental way, cutting away at him like the heat of the summer. The inside of his cheeks were worn from being bitten.
It was a weird night, music blaring, faceless people smudged out of his memory as the ground shook, and the only solid thing, the only constant he had was Jiyong by his side, white-blonde hair turned platinum in the blacklight, smile as white as his shirt and laces, and Seunghyun could not believe it. It was not at all okay.
He fell against Jiyong somewhere as they were heading up the stairs, pushing both of them hard against the wall, the world reeling in his blurred vision, and Jiyong’s arms had come up around his back, and it was so much like one of his dreams that Seunghyun lost ground. Didn’t really compute that this Jiyong was something real, and something that he should never, ever fuck up if it meant his life. And he blissfully burrowed his face in Jiyong’s neck and rubbed his nose, lips brushing on the place where Jiyong’s pulse beat fast and off-rhythm.
But then Jiyong placed his cool fingers against Seunghyun’s forehead pushing it off of his shoulder, and laughed, calling Kush hyung for help from above the flight of stairs, his light voice echoing in the hollowed hall, telling him, “okay, man, no more wine for you. You’re done.” And he was right.
Seunghyun had woken up the next day, remembering most of it in a heart-falling minute and horrifically appalled at himself, he stayed away from Jiyong for a week or two after. Not for much longer, because Seunghyun couldn’t really take complete abstinence like a champ.
Jiyong hadn’t changed much after that incident, maybe more aware of Seunghyun when he drank, teasing him to ease off, because remember that one time? Embarrassing. But Seunghyun knew. Knew that he’d been too open. He’d given his whole hand away, and there was nothing he could do to retrieve that depravity. All he could do was hope that Jiyong would forgive him, maybe even forget, and let him continue to be TOP hyung, the often-hilarious, always-irritating colleague and friend. He knew it was too much to ask. The very definition of too much to ask, but Seunghyun always wanted a little more than he deserved.
**
Despite what Seunghyun thought, Jiyong had figured it out way before Busan.
It was in the middle of stage rehearsal at the end of a year, and GD maybe slipped on a shoe lace or lost balance standing on a wheeled staircase and took a sizable fall, landing with a wooden sound against the floor. He bruised his shoulder and scraped the side of his hand badly enough to break skin.
He hadn’t slept properly in about a week, and was standing upright purely by processed sugar and a sandwich, and really, it was just incredibly dumb on his part, he couldn’t stop laughing with a hazy grin at every concerned face that followed him. It was that point in the concert preparation stage when everything was hilarious.
Youngbae had been there when he fell, and after he had made sure Jiyong was alright, told the crew that he’d take his place in line for solo rehearsal. Jiyong made an indignant gesture at that, but Youngbae just tsked in a motherly way and waved him off. He was brought into the dressing room to get patched up and Daesung and Seungri stood around with a sort of disoriented look, as if it was hard to believe that GD could be in an accident, that he bled red. It was such a rarely realized concept. Seungri asked with half-cheek and half-sincerity if he wanted some painkillers (‘cause he got some in his bag), and GD laughed harder and kicked the little bastard in the shin, one arm holding his shoulder intact, because maybe it was a bit dislocated too. Not that he would ever voice that suspicion out loud in fear of prolonged time away from stage.
TOP hyung was late, as per usual, by about 20 minutes which meant he’d be buying dinner that night, and GD was idly thinking up a fake, elaborately ridiculous story to tell about his injury to make him laugh (Daesung suggested a confession that he’s actually Ironman), when the door burst open with a bang and TOP rolled in with an arm still in a jacket and hair a mess, eyes unbelievably wide and fervently searching the room until it froze on Jiyong.
Yes, it was that moment, when all of Jiyong’s previous doubts were confirmed in a rush – years of this pseudo-attraction, barely veiled by brotherly closeness and professional admiration – crumbling down to nothing. And it was so easy, he felt stupid about it for months after.
When in that moment Seunghyun looked at him with that pained expression, cataloguing every detail as if it was crucial, as if he’d find something devastating in the crook of his leg or the angle of his hand, and Jiyong realized that Seunghyun hyung may have heard from someone that he had an accident, fell down a staircase, which would have sounded horrible on its own so it was understandable he was freaking out.
Seunghyun cracked a knee on the floor in a hurry to meet Jiyong’s eye level, hand automatically reaching for his shoulder but reconsidering the move last minute seeing the ice pack pressed against it – and with all the depth of emotions TOP was capable of showing, Jiyong had never seen that specific look of distress on his face before, like the very ground on which he stood had shuddered open, like the sky had shut down, black like tar. Like he could not bare any of it, not a second more.
“I heard you were hurt,” Seunghyun had said, voice shaking imperceptively to anyone else, except Jiyong had spent years scrutinizing the way TOP hyung’s voice worked, the bass of it rumbling in his headphones for months at a time, repeated and altered with every hearing, every breath inbetween takes roaring like a storm in the studio, as he asked him, ‘again’. And it all came reeling back as Seunghyun looked at him, eyes wandering around his body carefully as if Jiyong could feel it, and maybe he could.
“I- just- um, my hand stings a bit.” Jiyong achieved. He raised the appendage up from being clasped at his shoulder to show him the white bandage, grinning a little, because he was still dead tired and excuse him if he couldn’t control his face. He regretted it immediately, as Seunghyun’s brows cringed and mouth formed a grimace. Seunghyun held the hand gingerly in his palm for a moment, and it was just so unlike how he’d normally act in these situations, Jiyong forgot the dull pain of it in surprise.
It was a long time before he spoke again, telling him in a subdued voice, that he shouldn’t move around so much like a kid. After spending a few minutes staring fixedly at Jiyong’s hand, he got up, wandered around the room for a while before leaving, the door swinging shut behind him.
In the end, the occasion was passed by all witnesses as another episode of one of Choi Seunghyun’s over-serious moments, like the times when he’d respond to a joke Daesung told with a worldly philosophy that turned the mood solemn. Or when Jiyong turned to him in the van one time and found him looking down at his mp3 player, music pounding in his earphones and a tear falling off his cheek onto the screen, and Jiyong had quickly averted his gaze, feeling as if he’d intruded.
He always bounced back from those moments though, right back into his usual routine of imitating Seungri’s voice or dancing ridiculously to make them all laugh. Choi Seunghyun was emotionally volatile, they all knew, and the extent of which never failed to surprise them all. But from this occasion, Seunghyun had never completely reverted since.
Maybe it wasn’t an occasion, Jiyong thinks, but how he’s been from the beginning, and it had run like an MR forever and he’d just never heard, this unfaltering affection playing endlessly in the background, muted but undeniable. In any case, he could hear it now. It was deafening.
PART THREE
Seunghyun wakes with a jerk, as the song being played somewhere by his head does a crescendo into its chorus.
He cracks an eye open and is faced with Jiyong sitting knees-up on the couch beside the bed, notebook in hand and a mug pressed to his leg. He’s wearing a vintage shirt and ripped jeans, small face framed by thick glasses and he was in Seunghyun’s room.
Why was he in Seunghyun’s room?
“Mmhgh..” Seunghyun attempts, and then cringes at the excruciating pain at his temple. It hurt to blink- let alone breathe, his fingertips searing and eyelids burning as if in lye… and yes – he was hungover as fuck.
He checks the time and sees it’s well into 4pm, which was just great; his last day in Japan wasted on uncomfortable sleep. He looks down at himself and sees his still fully suited form hanging off the edge of the bed. There is glitter everywhere and light-colored chalk on his lapel. A stripe of pale pink on the white sheets. His hair in a wreck and a bruise forming just below his jaw, throbbing like a second heart. At least his shoes were off, whether that was his doing was up for debate. He looks back at Jiyong and sees him flinch minutely- which was just fascinating. What had happened? Did he want to know?
“Afternoon,” Jiyong says, with a weird smile. Then he looks away and down at his book. “Since you’re awake, help me with my homework. How do you say in Japanese, ‘TOP hyung doesn’t like to drink’?”
“G-Dragon wa heartless bastard desu” Seunghyun growled. It felt like a cat gave birth in his throat. “Edible liquid,” he demands.
“Coffee?” Jiyong thrusts the mug in Seunghyun’s direction, and Seunghyun just wants to keep this kid forever. The perfect leader. He had endless praise for him.
Seunghyun takes the mug with tentative hands, his motor skills shot to hell by the prolonged inebriation and the excruciating headache, raising his head from the pillow just enough that it wouldn’t kill him, and that he could take a sip. He spit-takes. He promptly drops the mug on the floor and sputters, choking on everything – because that is not coffee.
Jiyong is laughing in that breathless, airy way, hand covering his face in glee, and Seunghyun does not want to keep the little fucker. Not ever. “What is that?” he yells, drowning the radio.
“It’s the health juice Boram nuna made us for our trip, remember? That aftertaste you are experiencing would be beetroot. Jesus, you got it all over the carpet.” Jiyong laughs. He puts the notebook down on the side table and saunters towards the bathroom. Seunghyun’s head is in halves and there is a dull echo of pain reverberating in his chest. But the sound of Jiyong’s laughter is spreading dopamine throughout his system, and it may be enough to fix his life, much to his disgruntled pleasure.
“That better not have gotten on any of my shoes, GD, or I will throw up on everything you love.”
Seunghyun groans into the pillow. He raises his head a little, then, remembering what is weird about this picture – “Why are you in my room, anyway?”
Jiyong returns with a glass of water and a wet towel, and Seunghyun’s eyes stick on the way his hair is tousled like a boy’s, eyes clear and hazel in the light shining through the windows. “You do realize this is my room, and any potentially ruined shoes would be mine. In which case you would not be alive right now, hyung.” Jiyong threatens.
Seunghyun vaguely becomes aware that the music playing on the dock is not something on his mp3, and though the room has the same interior structure as his own, this one is a lot tidier.
“Here, I’m sorry about your pain and discomfort, et cetera.” Jiyong hands him the glass and Seunghyun takes it, looking up at him suspiciously.
He takes a sip and feels a little bit more alive, feeling better enough to ask in a normal voice, “Why am I in your room?” because that is, if anything, weirder.
Seunghyun can’t remember a thing that happened last night. They arrived at the U&I club at around 11pm, performed.. and came back to the hotel..?? There was no reason for him to have left the perfectly fine bed of his own to come and sleep in Jiyong’s. There was no logical explanation for it and it boggles him as he stares vacantly at Jiyong’s silent face.
It’s to no avail. “Don’t ask me, I’m the victim here. I had to sleep on the couch in the living room.” Jiyong smirks, still not meeting his eyes. It wakes Seunghyun up effectively enough. Jiyong is shrugging into a light jacket and donning a cap, sticking his phone in his back pocket, his head turned resolutely away from Seunghyun, as if consciously done. “I’m gonna go shopping with Namgook hyung, so I’ll uh- see you tonight or whatever.”
But Seunghyun is not done, because what? Who? “Why didn’t you kick me out? I may have been drunk but I would’ve gone eventually.”
Jiyong half-smiles, his eyes unreadable through the thick rims. “You passed out. I can’t even wake you when you’re sober.”
Something is still off, but Seunghyun is struck first by a lingering guilt. “I’m sorry, man. Why’d you sleep on the couch? You could’ve squeezed in beside me, it’s a massive bed.” Seunghyun thinks it might be a bit too early since The Airport Incident to insinuate anything like them sharing a bed, but— they were still friends.. were they not? They could still do normal things that six-year-long bandmates do, right? Seunghyun doesn’t know. He feels disoriented, not knowing exactly how to approach anything that concerned Jiyong now. It was foreign ground to him.
Jiyong’s face falls a little, which stops Seunghyun’s already induced heart for a split moment. But it immediately reverts into a worn grin again, like nothing happened. “I can’t sleep with your liquor breath stinking up the whole room, and it’s- it was fine. It would’ve been too hot in here anyway.” Jiyong shrugs.
Seunghyun doesn’t really have anything to say, and his fuse is still pretty blown for him to be able to provide a coherent argument. So he stares instead at Jiyong’s turned back moving around the room busily, and waits until he’s left alone without another word, the door clicking shut behind Jiyong.
He reaches over to turn the music off, playing quietly still, hoping to slip into a coma that will last until the plane ride home tomorrow, and stops- reading the track title. It’s the demo version of one of their unused songs off their album, and it has been playing on repeat.
It strikes him, jarring him fully awake. The day breaking and breaking out in the streets, sunlight heating the back of his neck.
I’m just another boy
I’m an ever-returning boomerang
So selfish, you and I
I’m so in love, I’m so in love
Just another broken heart.
—
And it all comes screaming back and Seunghyun jerks up from the bed and yells ‘fuck’ into his hands. Last night. Last night he did something stupid.
He finds himself out the door running down the hall, out of breath and out of mind as he reaches the elevator doors just as they are about to close. He shoves a shaking hand between them and they shudder open, and Kwon Jiyong is revealed to him like a freaking miracle.
Jiyong looks up, lips apart in shock but hands in fists, already braced for impact. And – and it’s that sensory memory again: the warmth of Jiyong’s breath, the flickering of his eyelashes on his cheek, so vivid Seunghyun almost sways into him. And Seunghyun thinks maybe Jiyong knew all day. Let it fester in his maze of a head, growing like weeds into a fucked up song and Seunghyun hadn’t known. Was fucking passed out.
“What,” Jiyong asks barely above a whisper, and he doesn’t even make excuses this time. Doesn’t hide or run. There’s nowhere to swim but up.
And Seunghyun breathes out, his legs nearly giving out beneath him, “I remember.”
The elevator bell buzzes, lights blinking on and off above them both, signaling that it was enough.
**
Jiyong remembers Last Night like an age-old trauma engraved on his skin, mind filled to the brim with it.
The door had rapped in a familiar rhythm at around four in the morning, and he opened it to find an incredibly drunk Choi Seunghyun - still dressed for performance - swaying dangerously in the hallway. And Jiyong had barely flinched.
Seunghyun had chalk on his fingers, pink dye smudged on his cheek, and he looked the very picture of royalty from a dystopian future. He was missing a cufflink, and Jiyong thought he would get very upset about that when he sobered up.
Jiyong frowned a little, confused. Hair still wet from the shower, dripping dark on to his shirt. Seunghyun hyung was grinning, eyes sharp and destructive, drink on his breath. It was suffocating.
“Wow,” he drawled, leaning heavily against the doorframe, voice twenty leagues below ground. “lookin’ fresh, GD.” And Jiyong rolled his eyes with a dramatic sigh, because this was routine. It’s been happening since one week of their dorm sharing, the way Seunghyun would get a certain amount of liquor in him, and the only person he’d search out in a stupor was Kwon Jiyong. Every time, wherever he was, Seunghyun would find him or call him, leaning into him on the bus, in the cab, like a well-planned siege over unguarded territory.
“You should’ve stayed, man.” Seunghyun said, eyes stuck somewhere on Jiyong’s forehead.
Jiyong should not have stayed. Earlier in the night they had attended the after-after-party held in the club where they performed for the last time in Japan. Jiyong had maybe a couple scotch-on-rocks and had smiled mutely at a hundred people that were introduced to him before tail-lighting it out of there, looking forward to a goddamn shower and drunk-dialing his dog.
Jiyong remembers Seunghyun hyung at one point, squeezing past people apologetically to reach him, looking brand new and unfamiliar under the flashing lights and smoky air - flushed and eyes-wide and asking him, “are you leaving me?”
And Jiyong didn’t have anything to say to that so he just grinned tiredly. Seunghyun had looked at him petulantly for a second, and told him to sit his ass down and he’ll go get him some water. He disappeared into the crowd and Jiyong took his chance and left before he’d be stuck there forever in his capable hands. Jiyong hadn’t felt good about it, but he was experiencing a brain shortage, that last performance crumbling the last of his defenses, and that was not a good state to be hanging around Choi Seunghyun. In Japan of all places.
So yeah, Jiyong had left Seunghyun. Tugging at his manager hyung’s sleeve and demanding a ride back to the hotel.
And Seunghyun had come to him at the end of the night as always.
Jiyong realized that Gaho was still barking on the other side of the receiver at his ear, and he told his nuna he had to go and hung up, Seunghyun pushing past him into his room like it was his own. Jiyong wasn’t the type to be aware of his personal space or his mess in front of his members, but it felt weird anyway, having Seunghyun in his room, looking almost too bright and alien against the bleak furniture.
“Where are those Mochi cakes the fans gave you? Why do they give you sweets and all I ever get is medicine?” Seunghyun whined, drifting across the room in a lost sort of way, and Jiyong eyed him at a safe distance, amused but guarded. Seunghyun couldn’t be trusted at this state, and Jiyong never trusted himself in any state. They were going home in a day. They were almost there.
“Because you’re getting on in your age.” Jiyong smirked, and Seunghyun flashed a look at him like he’d just noticed he was there. Jiyong felt dizzy as if alcohol was transferrable by proximity. “Being drunk is not a good enough reason for you to come in here and demand food, hyung.”
“You’re not a good enough reason”, Seunghyun pointed at him, not making any sense. Jiyong thought about getting mean, making biting remarks and kicking Seunghyun out of his room, but he didn’t want to do that, nor did he have the energy to. No one would win that fight.
Seunghyun tripped then, toppling down to the floor at the foot of the bed.
“Whoa, whoa” Jiyong rushed forward, grabbing ineffectually at his shoulder, hands brushing against skin too warm to be anything human. Seunghyun even fell down in an attractively graceful way as almost everything he did, the genetically gifted bastard. Jiyong couldn’t help but laugh. “If you danced like this normally, maybe Jaewook hyung would let off easy”
“Ah, you’re just jealous,” Seunghyun leaned against the bed, smiled up at him in that childish way that clenched uncomfortably in Jiyong’s chest. His fingers were pulling at his collar as if it was choking him, licking his lips, and Jiyong swallowed, eyes stuck on the movement. “I dance better than you.”
Jiyong wanted to get out of this stifling room, away from Seunghyun’s piercing black eyes, asking for everything - it was getting harder and harder to ignore them. But he just stood there above his hyung’s crumpled form and smiled back. “You’re just- a sight. I can’t believe I’m not recording this right now and selling it to the internet. My life would be set.”
Seunghyun snorted, hand reaching for Jiyong’s bare ankle but missing and landing on his shoe. “The internet is not an entity, dal-go-na.” He mumbled fondly, eyelids drooping dreamily, and it shook Jiyong on a fundamental level, he almost lost ground. Seunghyun only called him that when he was being particularly confessional.
That one time Jiyong made Seunghyun and Daesung melted sugar crackers on a ladle in the cramped kitchen of their first dorms. All three of them giggling under their breaths to not wake the others, blurred sleepless nights that seem like eons ago, rushing back with the uttered word. And Jiyong knew, it was just a breath away from saying the three irretrievable words.
Jiyong turned on the TV to a music station to break the weighted silence and sat against his pillows. Seunghyun drifted up off the floor to glare at him. He was listing to the side like he had been wounded in an irreversible way, a vital part of him that was taken out a long time ago - and Jiyong was in some way guilty of that.
“You left, you have nothing to say.” he said cryptically.
Jiyong smiled and avoided his hyung’s eyes. “No one forced you to stay there.”
“I’m going to trash your room, just- wait a second until it stops spinning,” Seunghyun huffed, wavering. He sat down at Jiyong’s side, leaning against his knees smelling of smoke and sweat and wood. Jiyong raised a hand to do something, maybe to push him off, maybe to cover his face, he didn’t know. Before he could decide, Seunghyun had snatched it out of the air by the wrist.
Their eyes met with a crack, and Jiyong remembers how young he had looked, how sure yet unsure. Seunghyun lost focus in his eyes, and pulled Jiyong toward him for a second, then pushed him back, following with his whole body - and all Jiyong could do was let him.
He found himself pressed against the back of the bed with Seunghyun towering over him, his hair falling in his eyes and he could hear somebody’s shaking breaths rushing- thrown water sound against the wall of his head, and Jiyong had thought - that’s it then. All the fight draining out of him. This was how it would go. There was a hand at the nape of his neck, an arm pressing hard against his waist, and he thought he could feel it trembling. Jiyong’s hands clenched in the sheets, heartbeat stammering, and it was nothing like he’d ever expected, how affected he was by Seunghyun hyung’s breath on his skin, his light hair curtaining his view, and Jiyong’s fingers had itched to be buried to the wrist.
Then Jiyong blinked, barely a flicker, but it was enough.
Seunghyun was moving away. Eyes still dark and trained on his lips, but something distinctly closed off in the line of his mouth. Jiyong wished desperately that they would stop this. Stop doing this.
“Chicken.” Seunghyun breathed, lips just inches from Jiyong’s own. Seunghyun was snickering, moving away and away and falling back on to the foot of the bed, borrowing into the sheets. “You lose.”
“I… lose?” Jiyong asked, his voice barely working, scraped up from the bottom of him in something like exasperated sadness.
“You always do.” Seunghyun slurred against the blankets, halfway passed out already. Jiyong looked up at the ceiling, his chest feeling bruised and blue, believing every word.