Archive of Our Own

The story starts out like this: Jung Sungchan uproots his life and settles into a neighbourhood he has only ever heard of in passing — all the way in Insa-dong, where the rent would make the average Joe dizzy with the numbers listed. It's quite a long way from Cheongdam-dong, where he had barely lived and he had merely stayed for the sake of it. His mother calls it a midlife crisis. His father, on the other hand, calls him every Sunday and offers to pick him up — come home, Sungchan-ah. His voice is getting hoarser by the day; what with his lovely job down at the historical park and museum, and his day-long shouting riddled with his terrible nicotine addiction, he figures it might have been inevitable. He doesn't drink much of the tonics he sends them; Sungchan can tell by the faux enthusiasm in his voice every time. Had he taken them regularly, then he would've complained about the subtle centella taste that lingers in your mouth after. Sungchan can’t hold it against him. It’s not his father’s fault that he will never be a good son.

Jung Sungchan had been twenty-three and a rising star. Then, he had been twenty-five and a household name: the Nation's First Love. He had started out from a smaller agency, one that could barely afford a front desk, where the power would be out every day between 4 P.M. to 6 P.M. So, he had learned to dance in the dark, too, with a little battery-powered light in the corner and a bluetooth speaker that sometimes did not charge because the charging port slowly became rickety from all the abuse he had subjected it to. Then, he had moved from the first agency to a bigger one — they'd gotten swallowed up by it in all honestly. But they had paid homage to all his trudging and toiling so sensationally; all those hours he'd spent in the dark while everyone else he'd trained with huddled in groups towards internet cafes for the air conditioning. Sungchan doesn't blame them, regardless of how hostile they had been when they had found out why he never went along. It all came to a head by the time he was moved out of their shared dorm, fizzling out in his periphery, and they’d retold the story so beautifully.

The point is that Jung Sungchan had been twenty-three, then twenty-five and growing, and by the time he was twenty-six he had been sending money back to his parents with that certain kind of uneasiness thrumming down his spine — where he had wanted both praise and nonchalance. It had to have been worth it, when he sits down to think about it, because so much of his hard work he had been punished instead for. First by his mother, who had been kind despite the stern disapproval — when she would leave him soup by his study table and cry so quietly when Sungchan would come home haggard and disheveled. He had disintegrated right in front of the woman who loved him the most, and he had been so torn every time she would whisper so quietly from the doorway: Sungchan-ah, let's give it a rest now. When will it be enough? Is this not where I'm supposed to tell you to give up? You can go back to school. If not now, then next year, too. Sweetheart, I'm your mother. Can't you listen to me just this once? He had learnt to breathe shallowly under the covers, enough to be presumed asleep but so carefully leveled that no one would be able to tell that he'd been crying.

Then, it had been by his friends, who had first dragged him along, wide-eyed and lost, until he settled in enough to abandon them altogether. It had been Jungwoo first and foremost; Kim Jungwoo — who never quite knew how to take no for an answer. Then, it had been Haechan, whom on the other hand, gave up too easily. They'd grown apart in the same way they'd first learnt to be friends. Then, Jaemin and Jeno came next, but despite how desperately Sungchan wanted to be a little team, they'd gotten along far too well — just the two of them. So, he'd stepped back and let that run its course without him. There's very little he remembers of the people after that.

But in his last training year, back when he didn't know it would be his last, in came Osaki Shotaro and Song Eunseok.

When he says punished, he means it metaphorically. It had been torture to be blindsided by universe, as he kept being handed people to care about in a time period of his life where it was the last thing he could afford to do. Still, he had cared; he had cared and cared and then he had abandoned them all. Shotaro loved him like a brother. He'd iron his uniform for him and stack coins by his headboard — for snacks, he would write in very, very methodical hangul. Sungchan would count every single ₩100 coin of the stack with his heart in his throat and then he would run to the corner store, buy the snacks, and then he'd run back, hamstrings tight and calves aching, and he would place half of them on Shotaro's bed. They lived months upon months that way; skirting around each other, incapable of not caring but never quite affording affection.

Despite how carefully he'd lived, there had always been something to throw him off of his track.

The biggest something had been Song Eunseok, who would blush so high in his cheeks that it would bleed up to his ears, and all the way down the sides of his neck. He had lived carefully too, as far as Sungchan could see, and he never quite knew how to take up space without letting it consume him instead. Much to his chagrin, Sungchan had discovered very early on that unfortunately for everyone involved, he was now the sunbae tasked with showing the others the ropes. At most, there had been ten of them, and that had been the maximum capacity. They would interchange between six and seven and eight; really, it depended on the season. Spring saw the most amount of new people. If they made it through the summer, they would leave in the winter.

Eunseok had arrived just in time for the winter, and Sungchan had called him stupid for it.

He had called him a lot of names — some to his face, others in his head. A friend. A fleeting presence. A loser. A pushover. It didn't change the fact that three months later he had his hands shoved down the other boy's pants as he learnt to suck a hickey on skin for the first time. Eunseok knew things — things that Sungchan never had the privilege of discovering — and he had taught them all to him. The knowledge was imparted bit by bit, with every kiss, and every touch, and fleeting caresses, and fingers circling his nape, and every orgasm that felt like what they had was bigger than the both of them. For the first time in his life, he had tasted youth and suckled on the cusp of adulthood — of life — and he had crashed just as hard as he had fallen.

With every tainted promise, Sungchan learnt to abandon more and more. Mostly it was himself, and sometimes it had been principles. But every once in a while, it had been friends , and hyungs and dongsaengs , who all abandoned him right back; spat in his face like it was owed. Then, in the universe's pathetic attempt of maintaining equilibrium, Sungchan presumes, finally it had been Song Eunseok.

"Was he your first love?"

The voice disrupts his train of thought.

Park Wonbin is sitting on the edge of the kitchen island, and in his hands lie the little polaroid he keeps of him and Eunseok — the one he used to hang up on the fridge with a little boat-shaped magnet, back when he and Eunseok could still look at each other in the eye. Now, he keeps it inside his phone case, because he never quite learnt how to trust other people to look after the things he cared about, so he had snuck it in there before the movers came. And now, weeks later, he doesn’t have the heart to hang it back on there. Even if no one will see, even if there are no guests to expect; Sungchan feels of it as something akin to baring his skeletons to the scrutiny of people’s gazes.

"Please don't touch that," Sungchan tells him flatly. Wonbin seems taken aback, as he hurriedly places the polaroid back and puts his phone case back on.

He turns back to the task at hand: unclogging the stupid sink of his neighbour's, which he discovers is slowly becoming a recurring thing against his will — him in Wonbin's apartment, or Wonbin in his. A couple of weeks ago the boy had rung his doorbell a few dozen times, almost rambling into the intercom, and then he'd pretended not to know him when they did cross paths. Or at least, Sungchan thinks he'd been pretending at the time. Against his better judgement, two days later he'd opened the door, and Wonbin had cried and asked why his house smelled so strongly of gas. Long story short: he'd fucked up the gasline knob and they had to evacuate the whole building. So much has happened in the disproportionately short time he's lived in Insa-dong, and somehow it all has to do with a certain long-haired boy with the survival skills of a soggy marshmallow.

So, the story actually starts like this: Jung Sungchan is thirty-one, but once upon a time he had been twenty-eight and an idol. He had been twenty-eight and worshipped , twenty-eight and loved, and most of all he had been twenty-eight and burnt out. Then, he had been twenty-nine and emotionally crippled — the way his producer likes to describe him — and it came to a point where the only reasonable thing to settle on was to request for a long break. Though, now, he thinks it’s starting to look a little bit like he’s been discarded (which would be a lie, because the realization had already set in the moment he stepped back into his former apartment after that final meeting). Still, Sungchan has no complaints. He has had a good run, and it's more than enough for a lifetime, he thinks. So, he had been twenty-nine and somewhat retired. His mother's questions did nothing to placate the escapist ideals building in his head, so he had stayed home for a total of three days before returning to his apartment.

And then, worst of all, he had been thirty and stalked, and harassed, and he had been given the full sasaeng package — special delivery, because of how accessible his old apartment complex had been. There’s very little money can’t do in Cheongdam-dong. So, he had uprooted his life, and gotten his agent to look for serviced apartments in Seoul, because he’s no better off moving somewhere remote than he is living in Seoul. In the city, at least he has SOS services, and his manager on speed-dial. He has his emergency contacts and regulations and guarded buildings. The point is that the countryside would leave him far more exposed and unprotected. So, he had taken his deposit out and then he had gotten his ass to Insa-dong.

He had moved in on Friday, the 22nd of November, and he had slept through the weekend despite the fact that the most he had to do was put on fitted sheets and fluff his pillows. The moving company had done a splendid job, and he barely had much stuff to move for that matter anyway.

On Monday, he had gone out in full celebrity-in-disguise get-up, and he had gone to the nearest Haidilao to meet his sister; the oldest of their sibling tree. Then, he had taken a cab home, because the subway still gives him jitters, and the bus has so little room for escape. His psychiatrist said agoraphobia, and his manager said get a bodyguard, but his sister said stay home, be safe Sungchannie. The highly questionable rounds of tinky-winky, dipsy, laa-laa, po he has with himself somehow always land on home anyways.

On Monday evening, the southwest gate had opened for him, just as a figure decked in all black hurried in behind him. In the semi-darkness of early evening, and the gradual setting in of dusk, Sungchan had assumed it might’ve been someone well-known . The guard hadn’t stopped them, so he’d simply accepted that the man lived there, too. Except… he’d followed him all the way to the northwest complex, where he lived a few stories too high up from the ground, on a floor that was otherwise inhabited — save for himself, and the other suite that had been empty at the time of his moving in. Sungchan had cautiously looked back, over and over, and he’d picked up his pace and the figure hadn’t caught up, and he’d been too terrified to turn back and check if they were still following him. He’d stumbled into the elevator with his heart caged in his throat, fingers haphazardly pressing on the close button as well as his floor number.

It had taken him two hours to calm down after, and one bottle of wine in the bin for the sake of it. He’d circled between texting his manager and his sister, and his fingers had hovered over the call button multiple times. Then, he’d abandoned the arduous task awaiting him of being questioned endlessly of details he did not know — how did they get in, what were they wearing, how old did they seem, were they doing anything evidently discernible, did they seem like a girl trying to pass off as a man — and the less intolerable scolding that would come from his noona. So, he’d stepped outside onto the balcony for a well-deserved breather, because any second more inside and the walls would’ve collapsed on him.

He had been greeted immediately by a flash going off to his right, and Sungchan had been mortified to find the same figure by the gate standing on the balcony adjacent to his. “Sorry,” he hears, “I was trying to take a photo of this orchid. I didn’t realize my flash was on.”

Good presence of mind at least, Sungchan had thought to himself. Then, he had stepped back inside, in long, hurried strides, and dialled his manager up despite how hard he had fought to not do so.

Doyoung-hyung, I’ve got a situation.

Thursday had rolled around with a new problem. Sungchan had been planning to meet Yujin for coffee — a long-standing commitment he'd made both towards his friend and himself. One, to curb his paranoia. Two, to retain some sense of normalcy. The more he stayed away from the public eye, the less courage he had to step out and live a regular life. He had imagined it to be the contrary initially. He had imagined it would all boil over, and within a year he would have less eyes on him, and he would be able to walk the streets without feeling a second set of footsteps behind him always. He had grown out his stubble and looked haggard on purpose, because his acting teacher had called his face discernable — which had only felt like a compliment at the time. But now, though, it's the complete opposite of what he desires for himself.

He had missed Yujin's birthday entirely, even though he had received the invite and promised to be there. A part of him had dreaded being in a room full of people he knew and had to know, and he had been terrified that the dread would only grow the more he socialized in that crowd again. So, he had made a promise: I'll make it up to you, I swear. So, he had downsized their plans multiple times, and finally they settled on somewhere close by, because at the end of the day Yujin cares and she understands, in spite of all the insults she'd hurled at him in jest.

He had stepped out of his apartment a quarter after noon, and he had stepped into the elevator with his hands clinging to the strap of his crossbody bag. The seams were starting to fray from how often he would tug on it. Then, there had been a hand reaching in right before the doors closed, and Sungchan had to hold onto the side rails in alarm. Then, the door had closed, and the same figure from Monday evening had turned to him and smiled. "Is it crazy if I feel like I've seen you somewhere?" the boy had said, grinning so openly as he ran a hand through his long strands.

So, this is how I die then. Sungchan had every cell in his body on high alert, mumbling, "I don't think so." Heartbeat a ragged pattern of painful thumps, and his hands had gone clammy, and his vision had swam. By the time they reached the ground floor, his legs had been halfway from giving out, but the boy next to him had simply smiled and bid him goodbye.

He had mustered up every last nerve, and he'd gone and sat down with Yujin. He had levelled his voice and carefully mapped out his actions, and then he'd taken a different route home, just in case. His next phone call with Doyoung had brought out tears of frustration, as he tried and failed to explain that the situation might be even worse than I thought . Doyoung hadn't believed him. Not even his panic attack had been proof enough, so Sungchan had hung up and laid down on the floor like an inanimate object.

On Saturday, there had been a voice from the intercom — one Sungchan had been trying his best to not pay any mind to. I’m really sorry about the other day, but I kinda need help with my gas pipes. Are you home by any chance? Hello? Mister Neighbour? Then, it had stopped almost as quickly as it came, and Sungchan had given himself a metaphorical pat on the back for being able to detect a stalker all on his own for once. It wouldn’t be the first time a crazed stalker obtained his address and bought out or rented an apartment close to his. But his manager had lived with him then, and his hypervigilance had done him much more good than not. Sungchan is willing to admit that much.

The next Monday, the 2nd of December, he had heard crying over the intercom, and weak pleas from a quivering voice. And an hour later, they had been evacuated, and Sungchan had stepped out into the outside world with mismatched socks and a budding hatred in his heart. Park Wonbin . His name is Park Wonbin and he would not stop following Sungchan around. You're the only person I know here, he had insisted, even though they barely knew each other at all. They had sat face-to-face in a nearby cafe, with his manager to his left, and Sungchan had done everything in his power to never take his glare off of Park Wonbin.

They had gone over the misunderstanding, and a stern lecture from Doyoung had Wonbin sitting so meekly in his spot that Sungchan almost, almost had to urge to save him.

He’s biting his nails. Sungchan fights the urge to swat at his hand.

Then, they had gone over contracts, and legal agreements of the non-disclosure kind, and by nightfall the three of them had found themselves in Wonbin's apartment eating dinner as Doyoung painstakingly explained to him how the national gas pipeline system works. Wonbin had been wide-eyed, and the genuine surprise in his face had softened something inside Sungchan.

On the first Wednesday of December, Doyoung had called him at 7 A.M. to scream in his ear about Park Wonbin, twenty-two, trust fund baby . Sungchan had blinked awake and croaked, "And what does that have to do with me?" Then, he had hung the call up and he had gone back to sleep.

Park Wonbin, twenty-two, trust fund baby.

He lives in the apartment adjacent to his because the penthouse above them got bought out by some bigshot. Otherwise he would've preferred it over the apartment, or so he says. Wonbin, twenty-two, doesn't know how to boil an egg. He has never seen a rice cooker turned on, and he imagines garlic is too strong of a flavourant in fried rice. He lives off of cup noodles and soft boiled eggs he makes in his electric steamer, and instant rice he pops into the microwave.

On Sunday, Wonbin had stood still and smiled into the camera of Sungchan's intercom, hands tied neatly in front of him. Hyung-nim, he had said, and Sungchan had laughed out loud. Hyung-nim, please let me in. Jung Sungchan has never reckoned himself to be an easy man, but make him laugh and suddenly you have access to his kitchen. On Sunday, Wonbin steals his leftover rice. He sits on the kitchen island and scoops mouthfuls of rice into his red little open mouth, with little to no grace at all, and Sungchan had simply stood and watched him, back pressed to the counter in front of Wonbin.

"You can't order take-out?" he had asked the boy, mindlessly scrolling on his phone for the complex's lunch services and dishes his neighbour might like.

"I got cut off," Wonbin had simply told him.

Then, he had looked straight into his eyes, and he had smiled — a sad little mask enclosing his features, so softly that it would've been easy to miss. Sungchan, consequently, had fumbled over his phone and pressed on dolsot bibimbap. Later, he had tried his best to understand as Wonbin mumbled something about money on his debit card and his black card declining, how he had enough for groceries but not much else, and how his brother will possibly be paying his rent in the near future. He's supposedly in university but he'd gone and taken a break without informing his father of his grand plans. So, he had run away from home — his words, not Sungchan's — both in fear and in retaliation. (Exactly to what, remains uncertain.)

Last week, Sungchan had taught him how to use his rice cooker. The simplicity of that sentence could never convey the near-tears effort and frustration behind his struggle. See the thing with Wonbin is that he listens well. But does he retain anything? Absolutely not. He listens, and he smiles, and he nods along from his spot on Sungchan's couch — sprawled over it like he owns the place — and then he goes home and forgets everything. He had come back around dinner time, face pulled into a sad little expression, and Sungchan had thought to himself: at least he has the decency to look apologetic. Then, he had sighed very deeply and let him in, going over the details once more, even though he had done it while scooping a second bowl of rice. Wonbin never did ask why he had enough rice for the both of them, and Sungchan doesn't think he could offer an explanation even if he tried.

So, here he was now, huddled into the space under Wonbin's kitchen sink, because apparently the boy doesn't quite understand how sinks work either.

"Do you miss performing?"

Wonbin has a kind of childlike curiosity that is both annoying and flattering. But when you are amidst pipes and wrenches and wet rags and your old back injury is flaring up from the contortions you subject it to, it is more irritating than not. Still, Sungchan answers, even when his ears heat up from the absolute determination it takes to bite his tongue — a kind of primitive self-control, one that follows him around these days, one that would make his ancestors nod in approval.

"It's not really something that I sit down and think about," he mutters. "I know the job description sounds extravagant, but at the end of the day, work is work. You know how it is."

At that, the boy jumps up with a little thud when he lands, stalking over to where Sungchan is working, crouching right next to him. "Actually, I don't," he admits, meek and sheepish. "I've never had a job."

How surprising . Sungchan berates himself in his head. Park Wonbin, twenty two, trust fund baby. He cannot get that sentence out of his mind ever since Doyoung told him. "Are you on bad terms with your dad?"

When he lifts his head to look at Wonbin, the boy tilts his head slightly. "No?" He seems flabbergasted. "This has nothing to do with him."

Sungchan chuckles very dryly. "So, you ran away from home, at the ripe age of twenty-two, all the way from Seongbuk-dong, which is what, ten minutes away? And somehow I'm supposed to believe that there wasn't some sort of late teen angst involved?" He's almost done now, and the only thing left to do is to reconnect the main drain pipe. Sungchan feels more than sees Wonbin's pointed stare as he's working on his last task at hand.

"It's not my dad," Wonbin says, voice small. "It's his wife."

When the pipes are remerged, and Sungchan resurfaces from under the sink, hands pressed flat behind him on the floor, legs sprawled open, Wonbin is right in front of him. His arms are crossed over his knees as he squats, pupils widening ever so slightly as he stares at Sungchan. The flicker of his gaze; the tenacity of the rugged pulse Sungchan's body conforms into — it's a wonder that it doesn't fall flat. Park Wonbin is pretty. That has nothing to do with him. And yet the twitch of the corner of his lips, and the way his hair drapes into his face like a soft curtain has Sungchan holding his breath. His little gold chain dangles and catches the light when Wonbin scrambles to move back, almost stumbling, muttering curses under his breath. Park Wonbin is beautiful. And somehow Sungchan has been chosen by the universe to be the one fucked over by that fact, withholding all sense of normalcy, as his entire nervous system goes haywire, unbeknownst to the boy in front of him.

"His wife?" Sungchan squeaks, all grace betraying him.

The embarrassment settles on his tongue, something akin to a weight, and he feels his ears flush, all the way down the base of his neck. There are questions in his head, some curiosity he cannot curb without it scratching the back of his mind. But Wonbin hadn't said mother and Sungchan wouldn't know how to pry even if he wanted to.

"She doesn't like me much," Wonbin simply says, even though for a small moment his gaze drops and goes unfocused. "Thank you, hyung, for fixing my mess again." Then, the boy blinks, gaze meeting Sungchan's once more, and any remnant of the odd moment gets washed away.

"It's nothing," Sungchan attempts feebly to dismiss it. He vaguely remembers being so annoyed a few minutes ago. He had been livid to have been woken up from his afternoon nap, and the entire time he had regret giving his number to Wonbin so much that a part of him had a fleeting consideration of changing his number. It wouldn't be the first time he did so just to ghost someone, and it sure as hell wouldn't be the last.

"Hyung," Wonbin starts, rubbings his palms over the fabric of his jeans, right over his shin. "I know I've been imposing an awful lot. I don't know why you keep entertaining me, but thank you." Sungchan's swallows around the dryness in his mouth. It helps that Wonbin has no idea who he is, because then he has no expectations to fulfill, and no image to uphold. For the first time in his life, and after a long, long time — he gets to just be Sungchan. It's almost visceral how liberating that feels.

When Sungchan stands in his own kitchen half an hour later, dazed, still smelling the remnants of the awfully sweet perfume Wonbin wears, he can't quite recall how he'd answered the boy, or if he even did for that matter. I like being needed. But that would've been too heavy of a conversation. I only know how to be useful. But Wonbin doesn't deserve the guilt that would linger in the air so mutedly. Sungchan might've brushed him off in his daze, probably, something along the lines of never mind you, happy to help. Yeah, that's probably it.

Wonbin had gotten up and fussed around, pretending to be busy, almost like he wanted him to leave but didn't know how to ask, so Sungchan had left. Now, he's standing like a guest in his own home, trying to recall how alienating twenty-two had felt for him. Everything he knows, Doyoung had taught him — one burnt egg, one overboiling pot, and a couple nicks and scratches at a time. Because once upon a time, he had been twenty-two, and in the real world he had been nothing but a high school drop-out. In the real world, it didn't matter that he got up at daybreak to head to fancy salons and had at least a dozen people wait on his every move. In the real world, he was Jung Sungchan, twenty two, high school drop-out, barely knows how to work a microwave.

Maybe I've been too hard on him, Sungchan thinks. The thought alienates him from all his sense of self; it only makes him feel like a hypocrite, because he has been condemning Wonbin of the same crimes he'd committed against himself at a similar age and somehow only he deserves to be cut some slack because he'd gone and done his best to redeem and rid himself of that chapter of failure? It's nothing short of hypocritical, and the more that truth settles inside him, the more nauseated it makes him feel.

He hangs the polaroid back on the fridge.

⊹

"I watched a couple of your old shows."

Wonbin's eyes crinkle when he smiles freely. Usually they don't. But when the joy is larger than him, and he looks like he hasn't quite figured out how to contain it, he looks as he does now — like a happy idiot. Sungchan chuckles at the thought.

"Why are you obsessed with me?"

It makes Wonbin scoff. "Listen here old man, I was just curious." A stab straight to the heart. "Can you believe I was in middle school when you made your debut?"

Sungchan's wounded heart throbs. "That is the most awful thing you have ever said to me."

"You can't think of worse?" Wonbin mocks, leaning against the table, making it wobble. Sungchan's hand shoots out at the speed of light, grabbing his coffee right before it spills, sighing in relief as Wonbin's tongue peeks out, face pulled into a nonverbal apology. Sungchan breathes deeply; a futile attempt to calm himself down. Then, he laps at the foam gathered on one edge of the cup, threatening to spill over.

"Go on, let me have it." Wonbin's tone is curt.

Sungchan blinks, taking a sip as he says, "Let you have what?"

"The talk." Wonbin's gaze is piercing. "How I'm never careful, how I'm such a mess, and how I can't do anything right. It's a couple weeks late, but I'll let you say it now."

The realization sets in in waves. "I don't think that of you," Sungchan admits. Because as much as he'd thought of Wonbin's lack of life skills as immensely crippling, somehow it hadn't made him think of Wonbin as any less. He's young, and he's barely lived at all; Sungchan knows how that feels, he remembers it so vividly, and how everything felt so much larger back then. And yet, Wonbin lives like he's down on his last wish and he has to make it count somehow.

"You say that, but you always look at me like this," Wonbin mumbles, eyes flitting across his face to look for something . In the background, Sungchan hears the jingle of chimes as people leave the cafe.

"Like what?"

Wonbin drops his gaze, turning to his own drink as he fiddles with his straw. Sungchan thinks it's downright psychopathic to order an iced drink in the middle of winter, but he knows enough to not mention it to the boy.

"Like you're seeing through me." Then, he adds, "With so much scrutiny."

The question in his mind lingers. Did someone tell you that? Why should that matter to anyone? Twenty-two is a good age for fucking up, don't you think? But it wouldn't make much sense to Wonbin, who barely knows anything about himself at all. He's going to have to find out the hard way, and Sungchan cannot share with him the peace he had pried out of life's unforgiving hands himself.

"I look at everyone like that, Bin-ah."

His therapist had told him to see more of the world. To settle in more places that were unfamiliar. To see sights he had very little chance to see — theme parks, playgrounds, high school fields and the blossom of cherry trees in spring. Travel if you have to. And move out of your apartment, it's not doing you any good staying there. You're going to have to rebuild that trust from scratch. Sungchan had understood every word, and yet he had understood nothing at all. At the end of the day, when every passing gaze felt as though it was trained on him, and every package that arrives to his door could very well be his demise, everything the medical professionals had told him were just words .

"Well, then," Wonbin starts, face pulling into a grin reflecting mischief — the way he usually looks when he's about to say something out-of-pocket. "Clearly not enough people have told you to fuck off with it."

It makes him laugh, whole-bellied and hearty; it topples out of him with so much familiarity.

See, therein lies the problem. Sungchan has never been easy to please. He's a perfectionist by design and he would very much prefer to not have done anything at all rather than have it come out sloppy. So, he doesn't do casual, he doesn't do much of noncommittal friendships either, and he rarely, rarely lets himself indulge in meeting and getting to know new people. But there's something about Park Wonbin that feels so foreign yet so distinct that every laughter the boy pulls out of him feels like a death sentence waiting to happen.

Maybe his fight or flight responses are indeed going haywire. Maybe his therapist was right about the anxiety , and the thing she had said about him and his abandonment issues. Maybe his brother had been right to call him soft, even if he hadn't attributed any sort of malice with it. Maybe he's the only one who has been wrong all along, because Park Wonbin makes him laugh, and he feels twenty again, however pathetic that sounds. Wonbin exists around him like it's the easiest thing he has ever done with his life, and he settles into the space like he's always been there. He cracks jokes both at his expense and Sungchan's, and for someone who has only had people walking on eggshells around him — and his miserable attempt at mirroring that — it feels liberating, and fresh. When Wonbin laughs, he laughs along. And suddenly he cannot remember a time when that had felt so unattainable for him, even though he remembers the feeling as something akin to a vague memory.

Wonbin means what he says, and says it like he means it. Sungchan's bar might have been lowered quite extremely as a poignant result of his life experiences, or lack thereof, but that hardly matters when the bigger picture is the pressure on his shoulders dissipating, and the tightness behind his eyelids unfurling.

"You laugh like a kid," Wonbin adds a little while later.

And all Sungchan does is stare at the foam clinging to the side of his lips.

⊹

The winter holidays roll around like an unwanted guest lying on your doorway. It's not glaringly obvious until you move and it's right in your line of sight and suddenly it's all you see. Sungchan had gone out and bought a pathetic excuse of a wreath for his front door and he'd ordered a Christmas tree to be delivered on the weekend. It's almost a few weeks too late but his friend had facetimed him and did nothing but mock the dullness of his apartment.

It doesn't feel like you, Sung Hanbin had said, and Sungchan had gone to bed blinking at his ceiling because he couldn't quite grasp what that meant. For the bigger part of his life, he had never allowed himself to feel at home anywhere except on the stage. But now that that's done and he's begrudgingly slamming that chapter close, Sungchan realizes he doesn't quite remember how to be just Jung Sungchan.

So, he had put the wreath up, and had tried his best (and failed miserably) at decorating the tree. He didn't realize how much he would need to hang up to fill the tree-to-deco ratio, so he had given up and merely wrapped it in fairy lights. And then he had settled for it, mainly because he doesn't care much for the holidays, and partly because at some point he had been so exhausted by the idea of having to take it all down in January that he figured less is better.

By the 20th of December, Sungchan had had enough of the so-called Christmas spirit. All his favourite quiet spots around the neighbourhood were crowded now, and he had to mourn the loss of his favourite fall drink — replaced and knocked right off by a minty cinnamon abomination. Don't get him wrong, he would sit down with mint-choco flavoured drinks any day, but for Christmas and the winter holidays? Not a strong choice.

Through all this, Park Wonbin exists in his periphery.

He comes in and leaves a trail of diamond dust, and it settles into the nooks and crannies, and then he goes home like he'd never been there at all. His presence has become so fleeting that Sungchan doesn't quite understand why it feels empty without him there. There had been a time when Sungchan recounted his days in relation to how much of Wonbin he'd seen in a particular day and what favour he'd done for him — on Tuesday I helped him with his dryer, so the package must have come in on Wednesday because that's the only day of the week I didn't see him. Now, the days bleed together, and the Wonbin-less days stand out the more Sungchan fails to ignore the looming feeling of loneliness waiting by the foot of his bed.

Doyoung comes by to drop lemon tarts on the 24th of December, because his family had accidentally ordered three batches instead of two, and all Sungchan does is ask if there's enough for Wonbin. Sometimes, late at night, he would wonder why he's seen so little of the boy a couple hundred feet away from him, divided by walls upon walls, but other times he imagines he hears a voice singing his songs. Sometimes it sounds like himself. Other times it sounds like Wonbin entirely.

"I didn't know you guys were close like that," Doyoung remarks as he unpacks the tarts on the kitchen counter, onto a white tray that looks drab against the white marble underneath. He cannot stop thinking about that word ever since Hanbin had used it to describe his home (and well, him ).

"We aren't," Sungchan insists. Even though he goes on to add, "But if he's also spending Christmas alone, might as well, you know."

Doyoung doesn't look the least bit interested, and his face does little to hide it. He leaves before Sungchan can tell him about the new chopping board he ordered from an artisan and the set of Japanese knives he thinks are worth displaying somewhere. Doyoung is barely a friend, and he has always been good at drawing the subtle grey line between business and friendship.

Sungchan can appreciate his efforts at least.

⊹

Christmas arrives on a snowless day.

Despite all the forecasts foretelling for snow right around noon, and the somewhat childish hope Sungchan had held for a white christmas, the streets are dry as a bone and every glance he spares at the cityscape from his floor-to-ceiling windows sours his mood further.

Wonbin comes over in the evening with wine and a pair of socks he swears was made for Sungchan and Sungchan alone. It's red, and long, with white stripes up to the heel, and a reindeer embroidered onto the rim, with vertically protruding three-dimensional antlers in its design. It's not his favourite gift in the world, but he still accepts it with a smile because Wonbin's excitement is contagious.

"Do you celebrate Christmas, hyung?"

"I used to."

With Eunseok mostly.

Most of the things he has done in life had been with Eunseok. Sungchan used to believe that the more time passes, the more he would've cared for him — remember him with a longing that he imagined would eventually become familiar. But honest to god, the most disheartening thing he realizes, is to discover that that revelation and the regret he also imagined to encounter never will arrive at his doorstep. How isolating; to be so detached from his own self that he cannot bear to bring himself to wonder about his first love at all. Sometimes Sungchan thinks about him — when a certain song comes on, or when the lights are dim and low in just the right way. But the moment passes by him like any other, and then he forgets about it in the blink of an eye.

His number has changed — that much Sungchan knows. But he couldn't be bothered to ask around to see if Eunseok would ever talk to him again. And even though Shotaro still texts him sometimes after their very uneventful reconciliation in the Music Bank toilet, it's like the older man makes it a point to pretend they've never met a Song Eunseok before in their lives. So, Sungchan honours his efforts, and doesn't ask. But when Christmas rolls around and the streets reek of loneliness and desperation again, Sungchan thinks of him in every corner of every street — like a ghost he keeps around willfully.

Eunseok loved Christmas.

So, he had tried his best to love it, too, but it turns out he hadn't been very successful at that either. They had decorated a sparse and slim little tree — artificial, even though Eunseok had refused to treat it like it was — back in their last year together, right before it all went to waste. Remembering it comes with a dull ache he doesn't wish to address, even when it's a decade too late to tell Eunseok how much he cherishes that memory still.

"Do you think it looks good?" Eunseok had whispered close to his ears, and Sungchan's heart had stuttered in its confines.

"It feels full," he had replied, hand over his heart, even though the tree itself had felt and looked so pathetic and unimpressive at the time.

Sungchan's family, on the other hand, never cared very deeply for the holidays. They're not even Christian, and they would very much prefer going all out for Chuseok if anyone was asking. But Wonbin seems to be obsessed with Christmas. Over the last few weeks, he has made several trips to the store to grab supplies, and often sends Sungchan updates of how his apartment looks. And he has to hand it to him — his own apartment appears so drab in comparison.

"It looks like you've barely lived here at all," Wonbin had said, very early on.

And now, even more than before, it makes him think long and hard about his life because that's all he knows, and all he has been taught to be — to never leave lasting traces, marks, to live somewhere so barely that the next person who comes along to own the space won't have to live with his ghosts. In a less poetic sense, he'd never allowed himself to own a space and call it his very own. It had been the same in the dorms, and then in his dorm too — the one he'd been moved to when his name had been highlighted in red ink on the debut line-up sheet. Then, his apartments thus far had all been leased, because he'd been uncertain, and still is to an extent. There's no part of Seoul he wants to settle in and call home when he really ponders about it.

Unfortunately, even though he would never admit it to the press, it had also been the same with his career. He had been allowed to shine, but he had known it would be momentary since day one. All along, he had felt like a short-lived seasonal item on sale, and no one did anything to convince him of the contrary. Sungchan doubts they could have, in hindsight, because if anything the people on his team had probably been on several other teams too. So, above all else, they truly would have been the ones to know the most accurate version of that reality — one Sungchan is slowly finding himself being thrown into more days than not.

But Wonbin doesn't treat him like he is. He allows Sungchan to exist in the moment. Maybe too much, sometimes. So, it barely comes as a surprise to him when he's being convinced to drive through the evening rush hour just because Wonbin had called his holiday decorations empty . It's an odd word to use, one he hadn't realized he'd been unconsciously avoiding for so long, because the deeper thought that follows is one that comes with a slight twinge of remorse. He didn't want to call Eunseok's tree empty, in the same way he refuses to admit that his life is just the same now.

Three locations later, and a frustrated Wonbin making small remarks about Sungchan going over the speed bumps a little too roughly, and Sungchan's gentle explanation of I haven't driven in over a year, forgive me your highness, finally lands them back home with bags full and legs sore. They grab dinner on the way home, and Wonbin complains the whole elevator ride up about his favourite spot being closed. And his overdramatic mumbling of how could they do this me makes Sungchan forget about how exhausting their shopping trip had been.

Half an hour later, when the halls have red and green, and the tables are covered in festive fabric and his throw pillows have little jackets, Sungchan stands at the center of his living room and looks around in awe.

"How does that feel, hyung?" Wonbin asks, cheeky and proud.

It takes him a minute to think about it. He spends half of it staring at the side of Wonbin's face. "My heart feels full," Sungchan tells him truthfully.

And when I say my heart is full, I mean like a landfill. It's weighing me down. All these scraps and slivers of people I have loved or, at the very least, tried to love — what do I do with them now?

The fir reminds him of Eunseok. The candles of Jungwoo. The stockings of Shotaro. Haechan... most days Sungchan can no longer remember his face. In the warm glow of the living room, Sungchan realizes the lights are going to remind him of Wonbin for a long, long time.

The realization settles in his bones with a slight hint of trepidation, and it keeps worsening when they're settled into the dining table and Wonbin sits in front of him like he's always been there. And Sungchan has a moment of complete disorientation while staring at the boy eat.

When did you get here?

He doesn't remember quite clearly just what made him decide to let Wonbin into his life, but here the boy was, with his improvident behaviour and his all-or-nothing ways. Here he was sitting in front of him, on his dining table, eating his food, and suddenly Sungchan has so much difficulty remembering how his life had been before him.

When did I let you in?

Sungchan lived carefully. He didn't text people back with intent, and his deliberation bled into every corner of his life — even moreso in the bonds he made. He would craft them with such care and calculation that every friend he has, he can account them to a certain and specific need or occasion. But Wonbin had slithered in like a shapeless blob and he'd taken the form of whatever space Sungchan hadn't known he had in himself.

"Why are you staring?" Wonbin blurts, unimpressed.

It makes him laugh, all airy and bright that it almost sounds outlandish to him.

Because it's Christmas. Because it's the first Christmas in almost five years where there's someone uninvited but welcome, sitting down with him for dinner. Because Sungchan had lived so carefully that he had almost forgotten how awful it was to be so lonely all the damn time. Because now Sungchan has something to think about other than the emotional closet he has to clean out by spring. Because Wonbin doesn't know how to treat him like anything other than just Sungchan.

Because it's Wonbin.

"Nothing," Sungchan mumbles. "Merry Christmas."

Wonbin grins, toothy and child-like. "Merry Christmas, hyung. Tell Doyoung-hyung I said thank you for the tarts." Then, after a slight pause he adds, "They were amazing, weren't they?"

Sungchan wouldn't know. He gave them all to Wonbin.

⊹

January bites into your marrows.

The new year settles into his home with hostility and with little to no regard for his well-being. Sungchan falls sick on the third day of 2025, and his mom still insists it's a midlife crisis. What once was a stubble has grown thicker and wider, and whenever she looks at the photos he sends her, she calls it a beard. He looks haggard, he knows, and not in the same way he had a couple of years ago. 

Wonbin sits at the edge of his bed, and reads off of his phone a list of things he wants to ask Sungchan. It's all minuscule stuff — about bills, and shitty tutorials on Naver, and the basics of cleaning a home, how to undo an extra rinse cycle, where not to use bleach — that sort of thing. And Sungchan keeps answering him despite his sore throat and the ringing in his ears, even as he keeps his eyes closed with a hand thrown over it because the light worsens the throbbing of his headache.

"Am I bothering you?" Wonbin asks after a long silence.

Sungchan chuckles dryly. "A bit too late to ask."

"It's just— Doyoung-hyung said to watch you until he gets back. I can leave if you want." Sungchan can feel him fiddle with the sheets, despite not being able to see him at all. "I should leave," he decides abruptly, and Sungchan shoots up before any thought to grab the boy.

Wonbin's wide-eyed expression blurs at the edges. "I never said you should."

"Yeah, but you want me to, no?" The innocence of the question is heavily outweighed by the rejected look he sports. Sungchan's chest tightens.

"Will you stop putting words in my mouth?" He deadpans, eyes straining with the effort it takes to stare at the boy in front of him. "Just stay. Doyoung-hyung will be back soon." With that he tugs at Wonbin's arm until the boy settles on the mattress again. It dips so slightly, and Sungchan feels it inside him.

"Keep talking," he insists, shuffling to lie back down. "It keeps me distracted." The beaming smile Wonbin rewards him with is worth every strain his body exerts. So, Sungchan listens to the quiet rambling, of summers in Maldives and a beach house in Taipei, and his one year exchange program to Florida, and his childhood dog named Aegi. "Why was he called Aegi? Who named him?"

Wonbin rolls over onto his stomach to stare up at him from where he's lying halfway up the bed. "Hey, I was four." His indignation makes Sungchan laugh quietly. "It was the only nickname I knew at the time. I was always Wonbinnie or uri aegi and I was convinced it was the prettiest name in the world."

There is this debilitated air of subtle sadness that lingers around Wonbin some days. Sungchan didn't notice it very much until recently, like when the boy talks about love, and being loved, and the inapparent lack of it now — in prettier words, in small muted pauses between sentences — and suddenly it's all he can see. Talking about his brother's first winter in Germany enshrouds the room in a chilly subdued silence, and when he gets to his first Christmas at his grandparents' place Sungchan can see why the Christmas lights brought him the kind of joy it did.

So much of your being gets suspended in small fragmented moments, until it creates an amalgamated mass of an entity you would believe to be an adult, with chunks of your self immortalized in all the memories of childhood you always rescind back to. Sungchan remembers twenty-two with a bone-deep longing; if anything he would go back in time to tell himself that he was still a child, that the forthcoming void of adulthood wasn't the scary, looming thing he believed it to be, that he was still much closer to his childhood than he was to being old and forgotten.

Sungchan stares at Wonbin, and he remembers. Despite how hard he'd fought to forget it, and how hard it had been to try and recall it later. If Wonbin tells him I was a happy, well-loved child, Sungchan would believe him. And if Wonbin tells him that thinking about it makes me sad now, Sungchan would also believe him. It's conspicuous to him, because sometimes the love comes back insignificantly, in ways you can hardly recognize, so in the end it's all for naught.

The warmth of a hug and the burn of a fire feel the same.

It's why he still keeps Eunseok's picture in his phone case, and now on his fridge. It's why Wonbin's father still calls every Sunday despite the fact that he never picks up. The happiest memories turn into the most bitter souvenirs, but when the days are long and the night haunts you like you owe to it suffering of the strangest form — the kind where you endlessly reminisce things you would undeniably forget by daybreak — it's right then that the warmth and the burn feel all the same. It is proof of the love, no matter how much that love maims you.

"You would tell me if I was bothering you, right?" Wonbin asks a little while later.

Sungchan wouldn't.

Honesty has never been his strong suit. All he's learnt in all his years of training was to pretend. And when push came to shove, he lied his way out of it. The better he lied, the more convincing he was — the better he was rewarded. But Wonbin is young, and he feels even younger than what Sungchan remembers himself to be at around the same age, and he has barely figured out how to be himself, much less how to be less of himself. It would be unfair to dogpile on it now, so early, always too early, in a pathetic attempt of self-preservation.

"I would," Sungchan tells him. It's all he knows. It's all he's been taught to do. Yet, it shocks him how genuine it sounds coming out of his own mouth. "But for what it matters, I enjoy your presence." Then, he backtracks and adds, "I think."

At that Wonbin laughs and wiggles up further up the bed, and he throws his head back a little, leaning sideways, and Sungchan stares at the mole on his jawline. There's that odd, funny feeling again. When did you get here? Wonbin doesn't seem to realize his dilemma. How could he? Sungchan has never told him about twenty-seven and the boy in his backseat who kissed him like it had been some divine intervention. He has never told him about Song Eunseok and his brown hair that looked golden in the sun. When did I let you in? Wonbin will never know about the rendezvous and the career-threatening hook-ups and all the people that cried over him and his abandonment.

His therapist calls it an issue, but Sungchan prefers to think of it as a skill. One he's honed for years, and one he so carefully crafted to suit just him and him alone. It takes so much courage to leave, and to not look back and linger on the things he had deemed insignificant, and now that he's done more than enough leaving for a lifetime, Sungchan doesn't think he'd know how to return to the things he has forsaken even if he tried.

And when Wonbin finally leaves him alone, when Sungchan no longer piques his interest and he's just some older dude who lives the next door, Sungchan will accept it with grace.

⊹

On the third week of January, Jung Sungchan crumbles.

It goes a little something like this: on Tuesday he lets Wonbin convince him to join the gym in the next building. Good security, good equipment, and ample space, and the younger man makes a convincing case. Sungchan had been petrified to discover, with his feeble attempt of a new year's resolution, that he has long since forgotten how to pick up a new hobby. At most, he games, and runs errands, and lately he feels he's becoming something akin to an exhibit of failed attempts. So, really, that might have been what drove Wonbin's point home.

His cold had been getting better, so in his boredom he had ordered a crocheting kit because the advertisement online had made it seem relatively easy. Next came a piteous attempt at making tiramisu from scratch — truly a humbling moment to be faced with a cackling Wonbin right as he retrieved his burnt ladyfingers. Then, came air-dry clay, and oven-baked ones, until eventually it got to the point where he considered getting a UV lamp because the clay variety kept increasing. Maybe he could give the lopsided mandu keychain to his mom and she could look at it through a mother's eyes, and maybe then it wouldn't seem so pathetic anymore.

So, he hasn't faired very well in the hobby section. Big deal. Maybe when he deems himself convincing enough he could talk about how he'd been meaning to join the gym anyway. On Wednesday, he signs up and trudges behind Park Wonbin who waltzes into the space like he has lived there his whole life. That's the deal with rich kids, Sungchan thinks — they somehow always appear to be brimming with unbridled confidence that almost seems innate.

On Thursday, Wonbin runs late meeting with a friend and asks him to go ahead without him. Sungchan had found amusement in the fact that they were acting like little girls, holding hands on the way to the toilet and giggling the entire way there.

An hour later he had stood next to the fountain in the middle of the complex, and then he'd shaken off the almost dizzying bout of anxiety and then he'd gone on his way. A few reps in and he had given up, because unfortunately for him, the one time he didn't have someone with him, he had been recognized. The girl had been soft-spoken, maybe sweet even, but there's this subtle air of entitlement that always seems to follow supposedly long-time fans that seem to think he owes it to them to be extra attentive to their requests.

The anxiety lingers the whole walk home, hoping to god his rugged face doesn't get posted on a random forum, or worse, that his residential information doesn't get sold off for something as stupid as a few ten thousand Won (again).

The feeling simmers, and bubbles, until it boils over and he crumbles by the doorway. The anxiety crawls and it crackles and some days it feels like his entire body would implode. The numbness of his limbs, the tingling of his soles, the crawling feeling down his back and the weight on his chest — five, four, three, two, one.

Nothing grounds Sungchan anymore.

Five, four, three, two, one.

It feels like floating, except the weight presses right where his lungs feel most sore, and it feels like water in his airways.

Five, four, three, two, one.

Sungchan remembers being seasick at his first tour in Macau. Wonbin lived almost two years there, back when his parents first divorced.

Five, four, three, two, one.

Wonbin had called him empty. Hanbin had said the same thing in different words. All his life Sungchan had always felt too full and too much. When did he become so empty?

Five, four, three, two, one.

Wonbin had said something about foie gras and yangnyeom chicken the other night. Sungchan had been to sleepy to respond but he had listened to the smalls breaths Wonbin would take in between his words, with his phone pressed to the pillow. He had answered the call thinking it might have been an emergency, seeing that it was close to midnight, but all Wonbin did was tell him about the bakery seventeen minutes away from his home.

His home — in Seongbuk-dong.

Park Wonbin, twenty-two, trust fund baby .

The thought jerks him back to a sense of sobriety almost akin to an ice bath.

Park Wonbin, twenty-two, trust fund baby .

The thought comes with such immense guilt that Sungchan forgets about the griping pain his nerves impose on his chest. He cannot recall why it was so important for him to label Wonbin as something so distant, something so alien to him. Maybe he didn't want to feel like he had any business in the boy's life. Maybe it proved to be some sort of reminder that Wonbin was essentially a stranger, and that Sungchan wasn't allowed to care for him; so he wouldn't. A pathetic attempt to keep his distance — to make sure Wonbin stayed at arm's length and not any closer.

Park Wonbin, twenty-two, trust fund baby .

Sungchan worries about him. Wonders about him. Thinks about if he has fared any better at living alone. Often he ponders if Wonbin would go back home in any of the coming months, if he would come to a head with whatever qualms he had and decide he's had enough of the supposed freedom he had told Sungchan he had earned. The godawful truth is that lately all he thinks about is:

Park Wonbin, twenty-two, freckles on the back of his neck.

Park Wonbin, twenty-two, has orchids on his patio.

Park Wonbin, twenty-two, loves mashed potatoes.

Park Wonbin, twenty-two, his favourite colour is midnight blue.

Park Wonbin, twenty-two, whispers endlessly because he grew up in a quiet, empty home.

Sungchan slumps against his door in complete surrender.

⊹

On the first of February, Wonbin invites him over for ramyeon at lunchtime.

It's all fun and games until a paper towel is smoking and Sungchan has to sit him down by the kitchen island. Time out. Wonbin had smiled cheekily, almost like it had been intentional. Sungchan knows it isn't, as calculative and impressive as that would seem.

"Hyung, have you considered shaving your face?"

Wonbin is so polite until he isn't. Sungchan chokes on his noodles.

"I do shave," he reasons, to which Wonbin waves his hand dismissively.

"I mean like a clean shave. Not this old man get-up you have going on."

Ouch.

Sungchan's face betrays him by pulling into the slightest smile. It's difficult to not mirror the boy, not when he looks this happy pulling his leg. "I don't know. I feel like that would make me easier to recognize."

Wonbin nods and ponders for a moment. "I was just wondering what you would look like, that's all." He sounds almost disappointed.

It's been a while since he's kept his facial hair. Neatly trimmed, but somewhat unkempt in comparison to what his face had been a while ago. The most the public had seen him in was a slight stubble. It had been his safety net for a few long months now, but lately it's got to the point that his face feels foreign to him.

His sense of self is depleting with every life-altering decision he makes. A singer? He hasn't picked up the microphone in months. A dancer? The floor to ceiling mirrors make him anxious, even if he still hits the studio at least once a week. An idol? All Sungchan receives is judgement and ridicule. His self-worth is at an all time low, and the disorienting state of his face is not helping his case.

"I should shave, then," Sungchan decides, face impassive as he stares at Wonbin to monitor his reaction.

The boy seems to light up very slightly. "Can I help?" His glee permeates the space; his excitement is contagious.

And Jung Sungchan is a weak, weak man.

So, that's where he finds himself: in Wonbin's bathroom, shaving foam lathered on his skin as the boy peers over him from where he's perched on the sink countertop. The dual bladed razor in his hands were brand new; somehow it almost feels like Wonbin had been a little too prepared.

"Let me do it," Wonbin insists, like it's the most thrilling experience for him.

Sungchan stares at the mirror for a second, and at the way Wonbin is blocking his view, and sighs before he hands it over.

"This is my first time shaving someone else, though," Wonbin backtracks, almost seeming like he hadn't been expecting for him to agree. "Are you sure?"

The blades are safe enough, with a textured silicone guard at the bottom. It would take a lot of effort for Wonbin to nick him, unless it would be on purpose.

"Have at it," Sungchan admits defeatedly.

Wonbin is careful, almost too careful actually, and he breathes in Sungchan's face so softly even though he doesn't realize it. Sungchan figures out too late how close they'd have to be in order to do this, and two long stripes in later, he admits to himself that it might have been a mistake.

"Hyung, you probably hear this a lot but," Wonbin exhales in his face as he glides the razor across his face once more, "you're really handsome. Like genuinely."

There's no weight to his words — only a light sense of awe lingers.

"I've seen your pictures, your old pictorials, your videos. It's almost difficult to integrate that with you ," he whispers. "Not that that's anything bad. Just — I can't imagine my neighbour Jung Sungchan as a superstar."

"Thanks, I guess?" Sungchan mumbles, eyes flickering between Wonbin's face and the ceiling. When the boy spreads his knees and pulls him closer between them, Sungchan chokes on his breath.

"Good thing you are, though. Or else this face would've gone to waste." Wonbin chuckles lowly, eyes almost crossing in his focused daze.

The next few minutes feel like torture. The dangling gold chain hanging off of Wonbin's neck is distracting, and looking at it comes with a regret so awful because in the bright lighting of the bathroom, Sungchan sees too much .

He pulls back slightly and stares at the ceiling. "I think I got it from here," he says, voice barely above a whisper.

There's just a small patch left by his chin, and it doesn't help that following Wonbin's gaze so clearly tells him where he's looking at. Sungchan licks his lip subconsciously. "Wonbin-ah," he calls softly, trying to pry the razor out of his fingers.

The boy blinks and exhales heavily, then he leans back and hands it to him. The coldness of his fingertips almost throws Sungchan off when it comes it contact with the back of his hand. "I'll go grab a towel," he says almost hurriedly, and waddles out of the room, completely avoiding Sungchan's eyes.

Thump.

Thump.

Thump.

Sungchan's grip falters. The razor hits the floor in a muted thud. Somehow it feels like his heart follows.

⊹

A few weeks later, Doyoung comes bearing less than delightful news.

"They want you back in the studio."

It's not the first time since his hiatus.

You can take your time with it, but leaving a few demos won't hurt. Sungchan had accepted it too, because he figured maybe it would bring back even an inkling of his spark. The scrap collection on his studio computer is probably accounting for so much carbon footprint, seeing that he leaves them untouched for months at a time; zero progress, because there's not a single file he wants to rework or reopen for that matter. Sometimes it's the song, sometimes it's the way his voice sounds, but mostly it's everything else. He remembers it so barely — the feeling of pure excitement that comes with working on a new project. Maybe he should accept that he might never feel it again.

So, Sungchan decides the middle of the week is as good a time as any to resume a life he had put on hold. Only, he'd tossed and turned in bed for two hours too long on Wednesday night, thinking about the padded walls and the Bobby Caldwell poster in the recording booth. The dread looms over him in a million different ways — unwanted flashbacks, and a vague recollection of certain feelings, and faces of people, whom he had let down so terribly despite his best efforts.

to: Park Wonbin Neighbour

will you go somewhere with me tomorrow

from: Park Wonbin Neighbour

where? the nursing home? ><

to: Park Wonbin Neighbour

never mind 

goodnight

from: Park Wonbin Neighbour

kiddingggg sorrie :(

ofc hyung I'm free in the afternoon

and psa I don't kiss until the 2nd date

to: Park Wonbin Neighbour

—_—

from: Park Wonbin Neighbour

fsdfsjkhdf u prob look like that rn lol

as long as it's not a strip club

or like a really dark alleyway where a man hands u saran-wrapped stuff...

to: Park Wonbin Neighbour

what kind of movies do you watch?

??

from: Park Wonbin Neighbour

u don't wanna know fr

see u tmr

dress pretty bcs I'm going to

lowkey don't wanna show u up bcs I care abt u

to: Park Wonbin Neighbour

go to sleep

goodnight

from: Park Wonbin Neighbour

yes sir!

goodnight

dream of me hehe

to: Park Wonbin Neighbour

—_—

On Thursday afternoon, he kisses Park Wonbin against his studio desk.

It happens like this: he presses the doorbell to Wonbin's front door at 1 P.M. sharp, and too many minutes later Wonbin walks out smelling of something woody and sweet. He fixes the collar of Sungchan's flannel without a word, and skips his way to the elevator. Last night after the good nights had been bid, Wonbin had texted him again with something along the lines of I usually wake up late, and take really long to get ready. And all Sungchan had told him in exchange was it's okay, I'm patient. He doesn't think he’s ever been particularly patient, and hardly believes anyone else he knows would agree. But the least he could do is pretend.

It goes like this too: they had grabbed a very quick lunch, at a nearby EGG DROP outlet and they’d eaten it with coffee Sungchan had ordered through the company’s card.

Wonbin had been curious about so much around Sungchan’s studio, so he had shown the boy around — painstakingly explaining cables and midi pads and other equipments, signed albums on the wall and wax spots on the carpet. As per Doyoung’s instructions, he had plugged in the USB with a little sticky note stuck to the side — denoting the tracklist — into his computer and then he had tuned out the sound of Wonbin’s little fiddling with everything else in the room.

It all boils down to the beginning of the end — Wonbin settles and perches next to him, upper body resting on the table as he peers at Sungchan’s monitor in something akin to child-like wonder. There’s a moment where they’re talking, about old songs and the Y2K feel, and Sungchan’s favourite singer who no one ever remembers. Wonbin doesn’t know her either, but he asks about it like he cares. Then came the bubbling feeling again, in the calm glow of the computer illuminating both their faces, and Sungchan had held his breath for a second, and then he had drowned in the scent of the boy in one heavy inhale.

“You’re staring,” Wonbin had said, eyes flitting across his face.

Sungchan had gulped nervously, seemingly frozen. “I’m just looking at you,” he had insisted.

“No,” Wonbin’s refute had him caged in his spot. Then, the boy had leaned even closer, “You’re staring at my lips again.”

It’s the boldness that has him dizzy. Sungchan has always been the one to make people twirl and blush around him. He’s always had it easy, he’s never had to work hard for attention; people usually handed all that and more on a silver platter to him. At most, he would attempt some semblance of reciprocation if he deemed it a good waste of his time. And he’s always been known to be criminally passive as a boyfriend, too, and as anything else really. The most he had ever done for himself was make really, really bad choices, and then he would watch his own life fall apart bit by bit from the backseat. Nothing a call to Doyoung-hyung can’t fix. Nothing hush-money can’t indemnify. Until he’s well into his thirties now and he hasn’t figured out how to be on his own at all.

Wonbin’s stares are convicting. And all Sungchan does is stare back.

Until the boy feels like a breath away and the warmth pooling in his eyes seem to trickle down Sungchan’s back instead, and somehow the shared air and bated breaths no longer seem close enough.

So, Jung Sungchan goes. And Park Wonbin follows.

It feels like a gentle caress at first, as their lips meet in slow, bated movements; Wonbin’s lips are soft. For a split second he worries that his might be chapped, but Wonbin kisses like he doesn’t care. He smells like coffee, and he grips Sungchan’s neck like it’s all he knows.

Then, comes the greed, and the desire to swallow down every little sound Wonbin lets out. Sungchan doesn’t know where to grab, so he cradles Wonbin’s jaw gently, too afraid that his touch might leave any sort of mark. Wonbin on the other hand, makes grab for whatever he can. It’s funny really — Sungchan always believed Park Wonbin to be more timid than he was. What a miscalculation, he thinks, as Wonbin’s hands climb all the way to the back of his neck, and up into his hair, where he all but yanks . And somehow the moan he lets out gets drowned out by Wonbin’s own.

Park Wonbin. Twenty-two.

Sungchan pulls off in utter shock.

“Oh,” Wonbin remarks rather flatly. Except his eyes are still on Sungchan’s lips, and he gulps like he’s thinking about going in a second time.

Sungchan pulls back even further. “We—”

Wonbin sighs and screws his eyes shut. “Hyung, please don’t say something stupid.”

Something inside him halts at the convicting gaze resting upon his; like Wonbin is begging, almost. “I— I think that—” except it doesn’t come out at all. It doesn’t help that he physically cannot take his eyes off of Wonbin, no matter how much the sirens are going off in his head. Retreat! Retreat! He can still feel his breath, can still taste him on his tongue, and he’s so warm and so close and somehow all Sungchan feels is the cardinal urge to feel it again — feel him again — just once; just one, small, short-lived second more.

“I’m thirty-one,” he settles finally. His tongue feels like a foreign limb in his own mouth.

Wonbin looks unimpressed. If Sungchan really lets himself pry, he almost looks like a minute away from sighing in defeat.

Sungchan goes on. “I’m thirty-one and I never quite figured out how to be a good person.” Wonbin really does sigh, then. “And I can say this with ease: I don’t deserve to waste your time, Wonbin-ah.”

“It’s just a kiss,” Wonbin cuts in, tone as flat as his expression. “A harmless, little kiss.”

Oh, but it’s so much more than that. When Wonbin’s phone rings, it’s Sungchan’s voice that resonates. Last week, he’d found a couple of his old albums on the display shelf of the younger boy’s living room. They were new, too. Wonbin has his entire filmography — albeit limited to smaller series and awfully short lived in its lifespan — downloaded on his laptop. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out how such small, harmless things lead to awful infatuation; even bordering obsession. It has happened to him before, with a boy a year or two younger than him, who he’d clung onto for dear life in the back of his car, in storage closets and in deserted parking lots.

Now that Sungchan thinks about it, he’d looked an awful lot like Wonbin too; except he’d been softer around the edges, and taller, and he’d been way cruder in the way he spoke. That makes matters worse.

“I wish it was,” Sungchan says wistfully. “I really, really wish it could be just a harmless, little kiss.”

For a second, Wonbin looks puzzled, unsure how to approach the situation.

“You know what hyung is trying to tell you, right, Bin-ah? You have your whole life ahead of you, and I’m just a washed-up wannabe who happened to live next door.” The boy grimaces at that, and Sungchan hardly knows what to think of it. “I can’t take that away from you.”

There’s a short, bated moment where Wonbin looks heated, like his gears are turning and he’s ready to raise hellfire. His mouth opens and closes, and he huffs sharply, until it dissipates as quickly as it came and suddenly all Sungchan can think about is: Park Wonbin, twenty-two, grew up in a quiet home. It makes his head spin, and there’s a bout of displaced vexation that courses through him, because the boy barely knows how to be angry at all. Sungchan knows it has nothing to do with him, and yet the feeling simmers and loops a dozen vices around his heart.

“Even if I’m not the only one who wants it?”

How incriminating. Sungchan can barely keep a straight face through it. “Even then.”

When Wonbin smiles, it looks half-hearted. And when he raises a hand to thread his fingers through the front of Sungchan’s hair — the softest retaliation — Sungchan’s eyes threaten to close. “So, what you’re saying is… we shouldn’t do this at all?”

Sungchan nods and tries to shake off the phantom feeling crawling through his scalp when Wonbin retracts his hand.

“Right,” Wonbin says, grinning; staring at him like he knows something Sungchan doesn’t. “You should be meaner about it, then.”

When Wonbin leaves a while later, uncaring of the tension and still smiling as he bids goodbye to him with a very pointed kiss to his cheek, the world slows down. Or, at least for Sungchan, it does.

The Christmas lights were already such a hassle.

Now, he won’t find peace in his studio either. Jung Sungchan is fucked.

⊹

The last day of February brings buried demons back to life.

The forecast said it still might snow in March, and Sungchan’s winter had stilted and got icier with a little package left for him down by the front gate.

Doyoung had arrived with the regrets of a thousand generations scribbled in every bit of his stance, and when he opens the cardboard box for a second time, he winces at the bloody mess inside. All through this Sungchan sits slumped sideways on a kitchen chair, knees pressed to his chest as he nibbles on the tip of his thumb in a daze. The wind picks up outside, and Sungchan swears he can see the angry swirling motions in the air. The room gets smaller. Every passing minute feels eternal, and Doyoung's nervous fidgeting reminds him of his mother.

"Hyung, can you stop pacing?" Sungchan croaks. It's barely 11 A.M., and yet it feels as though a lifetime has passed. 

The man stops in his tracks, but in his periphery, the repeated motions of his hands running through his hair sticks out like a sore thumb. The floor feels like it's sinking. Briefly he thinks of his older brother, and his newborn baby. Sungchan hasn't gone to see her yet. He figured it might be too soon, and taking into account that his sister-in-law hasn't reached out to invite him over either, his eagerness to meet his niece does not trump over the dread. Maybe Sungchan should have done that too — fall in love and settle down with the first person he met, and play house for the dog-year equivalent of eternity. Maybe, maybe. He doesn't think he'll last more than a decade, though.

It makes him think of Eunseok.

Song Eunseok and his chapped lips.

Song Eunseok and his short, neatly-trimmed nails.

Song Eunseok and his kind, kind eyes.

Maybe, maybe.

Sungchan could barely make that work either.

The first time Eunseok met any of Sungchan's family, it had been his brother. His reliable, firm-as-stone brother, only because of whom Sungchan could play pretend and idealize and do absolutely nothing with his life (in hindsight). Sungchan thinks: maybe he knew, then. Maybe. Because he had been too terrified to be the one in a dingy basement with malnourishment apparent in the way he had been gaunt and lifeless and so, so frail; the one who had to greet his hyung by the front door with mismatched socks begging to be treated to lunch. Just this once, just once. The burgers his brother bought for them had been the one thing keeping him going for so many months. Even now, he thinks of cold offices and red neckties and the hunch of his brother's frame. Eunseok had been too quiet then; could barely even say thank you without choking, and Sungchan had despised that the most.

Maybe he should have told his brother back then, that there was this boy who slept next to him, and that he made him tuna sandwiches with stale bread and the wrong kind of mayonnaise. But something in the air felt like his brother knew, and Sungchan had been too terrified to open his mouth at all. Now, it's too late for all that. Song Eunseok no longer sleeps in the bed adjacent to his and he hasn't texted him in a good few years. He probably no longer likes Veg Mayo and he most probably despises Jung Sungchan now. Maybe, maybe. Thinking about it is fairly easy, but accepting it is a different feat.

"What do you want to do?"

Doyoung's question pulls him out of his reverie.

Nothing .

Sungchan wants to do nothing.

He wants the ground to swallow him and end him for good.

He hopes the earth is warm when it holds him under.

The nightmare has lasted for too long.

Sungchan wants to do nothing at all.

"Do you think we should warn Park Wonbin-ssi?"

Sungchan's feet fall flat on the ground, hitting it with a quiet thud as he loses his footing over the edge of the couch. He blinks in shock, until his eyes trail from the hands on Doyoung's hips, all the way up until they land on his face. Sungchan had moved mostly for himself, and partly because his neighbours had suffered a lot of his misfortunes. It didn't matter much to him then, despite how apologetic he had felt; but his neighbours then had been the kind of people who were used to it, the kind that would open a bloody package and be capable of going about their day just the same. And they had been strangers. Most of them he could barely remember the faces of, especially off-stage and off-screen. 

Wonbin doesn't deserve it, though.

The first call doesn't go through, and Sungchan's feet hurt from the pins and needles.

The second call doesn't go through either, and Doyoung settles on the floor to reign himself in.

A millisecond before the third call, Wonbin calls him back instead. 

"Hyung, open the door." 

It feels like a mistake, telling Wonbin, because it takes all of their combined effort to stop him from opening the package; because he's stubborn and he doesn't listen, and most of the time he's annoying on purpose, but seeing him somehow makes the ceiling stop feeling like it's closing in. Sungchan doesn't understand it initially, and he doesn't notice how his mood changes until he's laughing at something Wonbin says in passing. 

By the time Doyoung leaves for a meeting, it gets easier to talk about. Sungchan tells him about the funeral wreaths and the dead birds and the blood on his floor. He talks about the difference between chicken and pig's blood and the different methods he had employed to remove the stains. He talks about paranoia and bedroom windows, and shower curtains that started looking human, and the hiking trip that almost ruined his life. Wonbin leans closer and closer until his head is rested on Sungchan's shoulder and somehow it helps. It no longer feels like the worst thing that ever happened to him . Instead it feels like he's talking about a random Tuesday in his life and a faint memory of a nightmare he once had. 

"Hyung, what if my apartment got ransacked because of you?" There's mirth that dances in his voice, and Sungchan pointedly scrolls on his phone to trick himself into believing Wonbin's eyes aren't fixed on him. 

Feigning nonchalance comes easy. "That would suck because I would have to move again," he mumbles. He feels Wonbin's pout form before he can see it. When he does see it, his heart somersaults to his guts.

A light huff. Wonbin moves away, wiggling until his head rests on the opposite armrest of the couch, looking at everything except him. He's picking on his fingernails again; not so much as his nails as it is the flesh around it. Sungchan tugs gently at his sleeve to make him stop. He grabs him by the wrist to inspect the damage, only to find that most of it is sore and bitten raw. A childhood habit, he had explained when Sungchan first asked. "Would it kill you to act like you worry about me a little?"

He sounds less playful now. Sungchan digs down on his lower lip, squishing it right in between his teeth. Wonbin wrings his hand free to continue his nibbling.

“I worry about you regardless, Bin-ah.”

Maybe in hindsight Sungchan can argue that he didn't mean to make it sound the way it did. But it's too heavy to pretend and feign insouciance, and Wonbin is blinking at him so innocently. For a moment, he wants to tell him about a hundred security tapes in a hard drive, and friends that no longer call him even on his birthdays. He wants to tell him about everyone that has ever left him, and people he should've cared more about. On top of it all, he wants to tell him how much he cares, how much it matters to him that his problems don't leave marks on Wonbin's life, and how much of his time he spends worrying over him too. 

"Hyung," Wonbin says, straightening up sluggishly. "If you're going to reject me, you have to do it in a way I understand." He smiles very slightly, in a way that makes it almost look pathetic. "You should try harder, too."

Sungchan mirrors his smile. When Wonbin is right next to him again, breathing in his space, and the lights are too low and the space between them is too small, he asks, "I'm not trying hard enough, then?" 

Wonbin shakes his head with a full-bellied laughter. 

"I can't do this," Sungchan admits again, except it's quieter than he's ever heard himself speak. "Not to you, especially."

"I know," Wonbin says casually. 

"You're twenty-two," he argues.

"I know," Wonbin shoots back. "I'll be twenty-three next month."

How devastating; he'll never understand Sungchan's dilemma until he's lived his life a few years longer, and he has to look back in anger at the things he had put himself through. Sungchan wants to protect him from everything, even if that includes himself. 

"Why do you even like me?"

The exasperation bleeds into every bit of his being.

Wonbin laughs again, choppy and light. "I like your face."

Sungchan whips around, staring dead at Wonbin for an elaboration; anything. Maybe the tabloids were right. There's nothing interesting about him save for his pretty face , and there's nothing under the surface to keep anyone hooked for long. Maybe that's why he never did launch a very successful acting career despite his training and lessons, and the numerous hands he had shaken for it. 

"Because you look kind," Wonbin adds like an afterthought. "Don't get me wrong, you have this blank look on you most of the time. But every once in a while, I think I can see the person you were before all of it. And I think you were kind then, too."

It makes his nose bridge burn; a telltale sign of his tears stinging. He screws his eyes shut and turns away. Wonbin follows like he knows he should. 

Sungchan barely remembers who he was before the stage lights, and before the callouses on the soles of his feet had become so permanent. He was never a good son, that much he knows, but his parents never make him feel like he wasn't. He wasn't a good friend, or brother, or lover; he barely knew how to keep himself afloat so in that desperation he had clawed at anything and anyone. 

"Since day one, you looked like the type to care for things. Gentle, too. That was new to me."

"What if I wasn't, though? What if you only think that because I was kind to you and you alone, and no one else?"

When Wonbin rests his chin on Sungchan's shoulder, everything inside him somersaults. It feels like flying off a roof and hitting the pavement under him very, very softly. "I think I would know, Sungchan-hyung. Good people stick out like a sore thumb to me now." Then, he nuzzles into him slightly, and Sungchan can feel him smile. "Even if that kindness was only extended to me, it still counts. I think only you get to decide that."

It feels like a stake has unlodged itself from his chest.

A good person.

How foreign. Sungchan hasn't felt like one in so long. 

And just this once he's willing to accept that he's the one who leans in first, that he's the one reaching for Wonbin's hands before the boy has the chance to react, that he's the one who cries into the kiss and delve into it like his life depends on it. If Wonbin tallies accusations upon accusations, and lists his wrongs like scripture on stone much much later in both their years, Sungchan will admit to it then too. 

Later that night, when the city is winding down a few miles from his bedroom, Sungchan has his phone clutched to his chest, a certain Park Wonbin on the other line. I thought maybe you wouldn't be able to sleep. The package had been thrown out hours before. Sungchan barely remembers the sinking floors and the crumbling walls. Do you want me to stay on the line? Sungchan's heart had hammered down so hard he swears it could leave a dent on his mattress. Do you think we'd ever be able to live on Mars? Sungchan had grown teary-eyed at that too. 

Maybe that could be his new driving force.

Find Mars.

Label it.

Make it say 'we were here.'

Because Wonbin makes him feel like a person again, one wrong joke and one right reassurance at a time. 

When Sungchan tells him good night, Wonbin no longer replies. His soft, steady breathing is so clear through the receiver. Sungchan goes to sleep like that, phone clutched in hand and so entirely unsure why he doesn't have the heart to hang up.

⊹

On the first of March, Song Eunseok returns to his life.

It feels like someone has cursed him almost.

It's a slow Saturday, and grocery runs are peaceful when there's no Wonbin wheeling him in the opposite direction of where he wants to go. It's highly counterproductive, but at the very least he makes the mundane feel tolerable. If Sungchan were any braver he would admit that he enjoys it.

The way home alone had felt longer, too. Sungchan doesn't know who it is initially, only a slight feeling of uneasiness simmering inside at the sight of the masked man already inside the elevator when he steps in. He presses the button for Floor 17 like routine and scrolls on his phone. He reacts to Wonbin's awaiting message with a sticker and laughs softly to himself. 

A second later, the man behind him speaks.

"Are you done avoiding me yet?"

He would recognize that voice anywhere.

It takes him five more floors to turn around. The quiet humming of machinery and the faint dings designating the floor levels fill his head like blaring sirens. Eunseok has his mask pulled down now, and his smile looks so painfully familiar that Sungchan forgets how to move. 

"Sungchan-ah."

If there was any more room to run, Sungchan would do it. He would leave his bags on the ground without a second thought and he would sprint back to wherever he had come from. Anywhere but here. 

Eunseok looks disheartened by his obvious reaction, and palpable shock coursing through him. "Don't look at me that way," he pleads. 

"Sorry, I wasn't—" expecting to see him here. Expecting them to be talking at all. At least not when Eunseok is looking at him so kindly, talking to him so casually. Staring at him like years hadn't bridged between the two of them, forming an irreparable rift. "What are you doing here?"

The next thing Eunseok says makes his grip falter. "I live here."

"Huh?"

Eunseok's hair is white. Platinum, Sungchan realizes. 

"I'm guessing you do, too?" He asks tentatively, like he's trying to gauge Sungchan's reaction. He's always careful like that; Sungchan has always hated it a little. "I was away on tour. Went back to the dorm for a few months because my bedroom was getting refurbished."

Ah. The eighteenth floor, then. The penthouse.

"Taro-hyung didn't tell you?"

It feels a little strange, mentioning Shotaro in this situation. Eunseok should know how things were, he's sure someone would've mentioned something about it at least — how he and Shotaro were barely friends anymore, how they tried but couldn't quite rekindle the decaying friendship of theirs. Something in the way Eunseok asks makes him realize Taro might have never mentioned anything about the other to either of them. He's considerate like that, too. But with it comes the suspicion that Eunseok might have asked him anyway; pried it out of him stubbornly, like he always does.

"Not that I recall of," Sungchan admits, hands tightening the clasp on his bags at the effort it takes to be civil and polite and normal to Song Eunseok (of all people).

When the elevator opens on the seventeenth floor, Sungchan hurriedly steps out, awkwardness lingering between them. It's even more boggling when Eunseok does, too. "What are you doing?"

Eunseok lifts a hand from his pockets to run his fingers to his hair skittishly. "You got a minute to talk?"

Everything inside Sungchan wants to say no. Instead he quietly gestures towards the hallway, past the reception, until they reach the end of it, where they find themselves in front of his apartment door. He's not ready for it at all, he realizes belatedly. He's got laundry to do. And Wonbin wanted to eat pan-seared tofu for dinner. He has to change his bedsheets and replace the living room rug. Still, he leads Eunseok inside, where suddenly everything feels foreign to him again — especially when Eunseok takes a seat on the dining table as Sungchan puts the groceries away. 

That's odd. A few hours ago, he was so sure he had looked at the mess he had left around the house and thought of it as home.

"Are you okay?" Eunseok's voice fills the space; fills it too much actually, that Sungchan almost squishes the tomato in his grasp in response.

What's it to you? The questions in his head all sound wrong, and straight up mean. Why do you care? But there's a part of him that knows Eunseok might've never stopped caring about him. Why are you so late? Except he doesn't get to ask that at all. 

Sungchan sighs as he resurfaces from inside the fridge, heading to the counter to grab more things to stuff inside. "In general? I'm great. No reason to not be."

There's a pregnant pause that follows, and Sungchan shoves the broccoli in with more force than necessary. He straightens up and finally gathers the courage to steal a glance at Eunseok.

"You haven't made the headlines in a while."

Right. Of course, everyone in South Korea keeps up with him. Of course, that also includes Song Eunseok, whether he likes it or not. "I'm in hiding," Sungchan jokes, even though the laughter that follows it scratches his throat on the way up, and sounds more dry than anything.

"Can you sit down at least?" Eunseok pleads. "I have a lot to say, even if you don't want to listen to them."

Sungchan takes a minute to contemplate, stacking the yakult packets in a way that doesn't make sense at all. Wonbin will make a mess of them again anyways. Finally he drags himself over to where Eunseok is fiddling with his glass of water, perspiration dripping down his index finger. He pulls a chair further out than necessary, and plops down, leaning back even further. Eunseok just smiles at him, a tiny huff of air escaping him; Sungchan must look ridiculous to him.

"Sungchan-ah," he says softly, peering up from between his lashes as he says it. "Why did you never call me?"

Because you said to never talk to you again. Because you changed your number and I was the only one who didn't have it. Because you avoid questions about me in interviews. Because you wouldn't even meet my gaze at music shows. Because you probably made Shotaro-hyung promise to never mention you to me. Because I thought you would be better off without me, and I hate that I might have been right. 

"I lost your number," Sungchan blurts. Eunseok doesn't look the least bit sold. They have too many common circles, too many mutuals for that to be an excuse.

"You could've asked Beomgyu." Eunseok's snark is nothing new to him. In fact, it's too familiar that Sungchan wants to bite back. But he can't, because the boy in the back of his car had indeed been a Choi Beomgyu, and when Sungchan touched him the right way he sounded an awful lot like Eunseok. Sungchan has nothing to say in order to save himself.

Sungchan shrugs, feigning nonchalance. "He blocked me everywhere."

Eunseok doesn't look deterred at all. "When it first happened, I thought you would call me for sure."

He looks too earnest like this. He looks like he cares. He's not allowed to, though; Sungchan almost scowls.

"And when it kept happening, I thought: 'oh, Sungchan must be going through a hard time. Maybe he'd contact me by now'. I thought that every day. And I was waiting." He pauses to rub his palms down his face, frustration apparent on him. "Or at the very least, I thought you would have called Taro-hyung. But you never did. And then I thought: 'oh he must still need some time alone'. And even then, even after all that and months had passed, you never called."

Sungchan feels like a little kid. It's unfair to be scolded like this, to be blamed so entirely for something that was way too nuanced. "I didn't think I was allowed to," he admits truthfully. Eunseok's face falls.

He remembers those nights when it felt like the entire universe was against him. When articles upon articles came out, when bad things kept happening and nowhere in the world felt safe, when he reacted to what was so obviously trauma and the tabloids would blame him instead. He remembers the amount of times he tried to reach out to people who only gave him radio silence in return. The amount of times his finger hovered over Shotaro's contact card. The amount of times he fought the urge to try and find Eunseok's number, to shoot his shot in the dark by leaving him a DM on Instagram at the very least. The guilt outweighed the desperation, and Sungchan had shamefully sunk into himself instead.

"I kept thinking to myself 'Were we even friends?' and ' Was this how little he thought of me?' and every time I lost sleep over it, the angrier I became. So, I grew angrier, and pettier, and I vowed to myself to not reach out unless you did first. Now it has me thinking that maybe I didn't know you that well either."

The sad little smile he has on breaks Sungchan's heart. "What changed, then?"

"I don't know," Eunseok admits, grin widening. "I think I'm starting to realize that something actually horrible could've happened to you. Something that you couldn't come to anyone with. Had that been the case, I wouldn't have been able to forgive myself. And we're too old now to beat around the bush like this." 

He lets out a little laugh, shaking his head slightly. "I had my suspicions that you were here. Taro-hyung was too cryptic about it."

"I don't think I told him either," Sungchan cuts in.

Eunseok chuckles lowly. "You're not difficult to figure out, Sungchan-ah."

No one had ever told him that; he's never been an open book to anyone at all. But he reckons Eunseok is observant in that manner when he wants to be. When Sungchan imagined them reconciling, he had imagined more anger and screaming. More accusations. More jabs and finger-pointing. Like this, he doesn't quite know how to react.

Eunseok leaves with promises of housewarming dinner on Monday evening. Sungchan agrees because he's tired of running, too. 

from: Park Wonbin Neighbour

I think I just saw

the person

from your photo

on the fridge

to: Park Wonbin Neighbour

where?

from: Park Wonbin Neighbour

in the

elevator

his hair was white

crazy face ㅋㅋㅋ

to: Park Wonbin Neighbour

yeah he lives here now

from: Park Wonbin Neighbour

???? 

haaa????

here where???

with you???

to: Park Wonbin Neighbour

no. upstairs.

from: Park Wonbin Neighbour

oh he's RICH rich

to: Park Wonbin Neighbour

weren't you planning to live there? ㅋㅋ

from: Park Wonbin Neighbour 

well

yea

but like

I wasn't going to

be the one paying

im personally dirt poor

speaking of

...

rmb how u said

ur mom had a tofu recipe

i might like

...

to: Park Wonbin Neighbour

door's unlocked

from: Park Wonbin Neighbour

>< you didn't have to

to: Park Wonbin Neighbour

I'll just think of it as charity.

from: Park Wonbin Neighbour

no I meant 

the door

I know your passcode

to: Park Wonbin Neighbour

what do you mean???

from: Park Wonbin Neighbour

I look over your shoulders sometimes

hehe ><

also it doesn't take a genius to figure out 111000

to: Park Wonbin Neighbour

text me before you get here.

I need to take a painkiller in advance.

from: Park Wonbin Neighbour

>:(

⊹

Wonbin shows up on Sunday afternoon with a cake and two candles.

"I decided I wasn't going to celebrate this year, but then it felt a little empty," he explains, while opening a bottle of sparkling water from Sungchan's fridge. The most confused part of him wants to ask if Wonbin has any friends. Sungchan doesn't think of himself as the best company to have, especially on birthdays. He's boring, and he's bad with celebrations in general, and planning birthdays is something he's known to be notoriously horrible at.

"You should've mentioned something," he scolds, while grabbing a bottle wine from his cellar in the pantry. The clink of wine glasses being taken out from his display shelf can be heard distinctly. "I didn't even get you anything."

"There's nothing I want, really," Wonbin says, as Sungchan approaches him with the wine. He nibbling on a piece of strawberry he stole from the cake. Sungchan feels little shame to stare at his lips.

"We can go out for dinner, at least?" He offers. "My treat."

"Hyung, you don't have to," Wonbin insists, reaching for the wine to inspect it like a curious little cat.

Sungchan hands it to him, and pours himself a glass of the sparkling water too. "It's the least I could do. You deserve it."

Wonbin pauses his ministrations to pout at him. "Are you sure? I wouldn't want to impose." It's a funny thing to hear, especially after everything that has happened between them. All Wonbin has done in the past few months was impose, and Sungchan remembers it with more fondness than displeasure.

He bites back the a bit too late for that sizzling on the tip of his tongue and heads to his bedroom to get dressed instead. Wonbin follows like it's second nature, and plops down on his bed uninvited. Sungchan just smiles absentmindedly at the sight of him lazing on the patch on sunlight that hits his bed. For a second he considers pulling the blinds on, but Wonbin looks like he's enjoying the warmth. Like a little house cat. 

Pulling his shirt off rewards him with a low whistle, and when his head resurfaces Wonbin is grinning cheekily at him. "Stop that," he scolds, albeit half-heartedly. The rest of the time he spends getting dressed is relatively quiet, and the quieter Wonbin gets, the more suspicious it becomes. When he realizes Wonbin is taking photos of him, there's a part of him that curls up inside; it's so familiar in the worst way.

"Hey," he begins gently, "Can you— Will you—" it's so difficult to get it out. A part of him preens at the attention, knows that Wonbin is taking his photos for himself and not to sell on the internet, but a part of him will always be stuck in his old apartment floor, phone clutched to his chest as the world around him crumbled. 

"Oh." Wonbin sits up abruptly. "Hyung, I'm so sorry. I didn't realize." He's frantic as he wobbles on his knees towards where he is, and for a second Sungchan worries he's going to topple off the edge of the mattress and land face-first on the wooden floor. His photos are getting deleted in the speed of light, and Wonbin shows the empty trash box very carefully, and Sungchan feels so terrible at the sight of him — so innocent, so earnest. 

"Thank you," he chokes out, even though at that point he no longer feels grateful in the least bit. It's difficult — navigating that part of himself, especially when he rarely, rarely lets himself acknowledge it. "I'm sorry," he still offers, for good measure. 

Wonbin's face pulls into a sad little look, one full of guilt and apology. Sungchan doesn't let him dispute though, throwing out a quick, "Let me just do my hair and then we're good to go."

By the time he locks the bathroom door behind him, it's too late to admit that it's too early to leave for dinner. He's a mess. Sungchan feels it physically, too. He's not thinking straight at all. Maybe he should go out and tell Wonbin that he can take the photos, and that they were definitely not going on a date. Maybe. Or maybe, just maybe, instead of doing all this, Sungchan slumps against the bathroom counter and groans silently. He washes his face just for good measure, and hopes that sobers him up. 

It's all in vain, though, because when he steps back out, Wonbin is lying on his bed with his hair tied. His eyes subconsciously roam over his frame, and the slope of his neck. This was a mistake. Sungchan holds back a sigh. "Do you want to kill time?" he suggests, eyes fixed on anything but the boy in his bed. 

"I don't wanna move," Wonbin argues, eyes thankfully trained on his phone screen. "God, I hate birthdays," he groans. Sungchan looks at him, puzzled, as he shuffles towards his bed. Wonbin scoots over to make room. "There's always too many messages to reply."

Sungchan wouldn't know how that's like; only a handful of people has his phone number. His burner phone though, the one Doyoung keeps with him, might be a different story. "Okay, mister popular," he teases as he plops down next to him, their shoulders brushing. 

"Do you want to see me when I was a baby?" He says excitedly, scrolling through his library to look for it. He shows Sungchan the photo: a fat, chonky baby. Oh dear lord. "Isn't it so cute?" He's squealing at himself. Sungchan wants to throw up.

"I would push you down a flight of stairs," he deadpans.

Wonbin whines loudly. "Hey!" 

Sungchan laughs, too endeared by the sight of him. Maybe he never quite knows how to think straight around Wonbin, but that's a good thing, he decides. Being around Wonbin makes him not think at all , which feels more like a privilege to him now. "I know you probably know better places," Sungchan says nervously, "but I called a friend to make a reservation at his place. It's quiet." And safe. But Sungchan doesn't mention that.

"Anything is fine, hyung." Wonbin beams at him. Sungchan's ribcage hurts at the sight.

They lie there for a few more hours, until the sun has set and they're starting to run out of silly videos to show each other. Until Wonbin gets tired of talking about his childhood pictures and his favourite nanny, and the indigo painting in the living room whose frame he had broken when he was seven. Sungchan tells him about cartoon shows on Sunday morning and his grandmother's rosary. Wonbin doesn't ask about the first bone he had broken and Sungchan in return doesn't ask him why he never learnt how to ride a bike. 

They bring the cake along, with missing strawberries and all, as well as the two candles.

Hanbin greets them by their table, and brings the cake back to the kitchen to have it redecorated. Wonbin's sheepish expression as they discuss it might have been the best look on him yet, he thinks. Sungchan requests more strawberries please to his friend, and pretends he knows what he's doing as he orders a 1982 Chateau Lafite Rothschild. It's pleasant, and mild, he realizes, as he swirls it around his mouth after the server pours them both a glass. It's all mimicry; he doesn't have a single clue if he's doing it right. But Wonbin looks at ease, mouthing something about the notes and layers, and Sungchan nods along like he understands.

Wonbin's cutting into his prime ribeye as he finally asks, "So, your friend. Eunseok, was it?"

Sungchan nods. He wants to be a gentleman, pretend he's here for the score and cut Wonbin's meat for him. But Wonbin looks like he knows what he's doing, and Sungchan would most definitely be doing it wrong.

"Have you talked to him, yet?" He asks as he takes a bite. Sungchan's eyes follow the motion of his tongue when it darts out to lap at the glaze stuck to his lips.

"I did. He came over the day he moved in."

Wonbin looks slightly taken aback. "Really?" he quips. "I was under the impression that you guys weren't on talking terms."

Sungchan downs a chug of wine. "We weren't. But I'm guessing we are now."

It's one hell of a packed admittance. One that Sungchan isn't sure how to unravel, so he doesn't elaborate.

"Were you close to him?" Wonbin takes a sip of the wine, and steals an asparagus from Sungchan's plate.

Sungchan takes a moment to answer. "He was my best friend," he says, and pauses. "The only one I ever had, I think."

The boy blinks a few times, processing his words. "Was?" 

"We broke up a year before my debut," he explains. "We were supposed to be in a group together." It feels foreign to talk about it casually. Especially after everyone he had brought it up to had called him an asshole over it. Sungchan learnt to not tell that story very early on in his life.

"What changed?'

"Management," he says at first. Then, he backtracks, "Me." A pause. "Him." A pause. "It was everything, really."

Wonbin looks at him dead in the eye, hand hovering with his fork in his grasp. "Was he your first love?" He takes his next bite still staring at Sungchan. It feels deliberate.

It's not the first time Wonbin has asked. And nothing has changed since then, because Sungchan still doesn't know the answer. "He might've been," he admits, despite the fact that not even Eunseok himself would know the answer to it. "If I ever was in love, he might've been."

Wonbin doesn't look satisfied with his answer, but he doesn't press. 

Instead, he picks on his hang nails, and by the time Sungchan swats at it, it's already bleeding. In response, Wonbin only smiles sheepishly at him.

They end up drinking too much wine, and they hardly finish the food. Sungchan asks Hanbin to pack the cake back up, and pockets the two candles. Then, he calls for a designated driver, just to be safe, and helps Wonbin settle into the backseat. His phone dings with the message tone.

from: Sung Hanbin

do you realize who ur with???

to: Sung Hanbin

yeah?

his name is Wonbin.

from: Sung Hanbin

exactly

that's PARK WONBIN

to: Sung Hanbin

I'm aware.

what does that have to do with anything? 

from: Sung Hanbin

ur hopeless

omg

u have no idea who he is

to: Sung Hanbin

I've read some stuff online about his family.

but I don't know much about him.

we're just friends.

also the ribeye was really good (thumbs up)

from: Sung Hanbin

i'm going to cry

ur

an

idiot

i'm trying to save u from heartbreak

and u want to talk abt steak

do u hate me be honest

to: Sung Hanbin

I'm so lost

from: Sung Hanbin

ur an idiot

to: Sung Hanbin

thanks.

you too (thumbs up)

They get home half an hour before midnight, and Wonbin sleeps the whole car ride home. Sungchan takes the chance to stare at the cityscape and the rare moment of peace where he gets to be in the backseat. It has been a minute, and he hardly gets to ride this serenely, because nine times out of ten, car rides were just him being transported places to places, venues to venues — a race against time to make sure he wasn't late and to make sure that the golden carriage revealed the diamond inside for all to see. A lot of it was for show, and for so long he hated the stuffiness of them. 

Now, there's no one yelling on phone calls, no one honking angrily, and no one is forcing him to take a forty-minute nap because he looks like he needs it. Instead, Park Wonbin lies on his shoulders and mumbles sleepily about ice cream and beaches. Sungchan fears he might get used to this. 

Once inside Wonbin's apartment, Sungchan insists that the birthday boy blows out his candles at least. The sleepy, grumpy boy props himself against the kitchen counter and stares as Sungchan lights them for him. "Happy twenty-third birthday," Sungchan says as he pushes the cake closer to him, ignited candles and all. Wonbin grins, blinking the sleep away as he straightens up. Then, he closes his eyes for a second, and opens them again as he blows them out, and Sungchan gives him soft cheers that Wonbin chuckles at. It's all so childish, and yet a part of Sungchan wiggles around in glee. 

"Aren't you going to ask me what I wished for?"

Sungchan shrugs. Then, he decides to humour him. It's his birthday after all. "What did you wish for?"

Wonbin smiles as he picks another strawberry off of the top. "For many more days like these. For more people like you. For more love and happiness, and birthdays where I don't cry."

It sounds awful, but he's smiling so widely that Sungchan doesn't know what to think of it all. "You sound sad," he remarks, keeping his tone as light as he can.

"I'm not," Wonbin insists. "No one has ever thrown a whole day away just to spend my birthday with me."

"Does that make you happy?" Sungchan asks, stepping closer until he's sure Wonbin can't run from him.

The boy sheepishly replies, "Does that matter?"

It's all that matters. Sungchan doesn't know how to tell him this. He's had to realize it himself through so much turmoil, through so much self-abandonment. Retelling that in words would never have the same impact living through it did. "It does," Sungchan reiterates. "That's not something you negotiate, Bin-ah." It's all he can offer, but at the very least, he hopes it gets his feeble point across.

"Okay," Wonbin says simply. "I'm happy, then."

He hands Sungchan a half-sliced strawberry like they didn't just have the most heart-wrenching conversation known to man. Then, he stares at him for even longer, nibbling on his own strawberry messily, until Sungchan swallows around a lump lodged tight in his throat at the sight of juice dripping down the other's chin. So messy, he berates in his head, but his mouth on the other hand, does not move. He just gapes and gapes and gapes, until Wonbin's lips pull into a smirk and Sungchan realizes he will never have the upper hand with him.

It's too late to back out now, he thinks; not when it's moments later and he has Wonbin's hair tie around his wrist, and his fingers wounded tightly in between his long strands. Not when Sungchan should've left minutes ago if he didn't want to be half naked in Wonbin's bed, with his cock halfway down Wonbin's throat. Not when he's moaning Wonbin's name like he means it. Not when he was the one who leaned it, the one who lapped a trail up from Wonbin's chin to his lips, not when he was the one who kissed him tongue-first and with desperation clinging to his hands. He could blame it on the wine; he should. 

But Wonbin swirls his tongue around his tip and Sungchan forgets how to think.

 And when he tugs on his hair just like Wonbin asked him to, he moans around him, and Sungchan's leg twitches just as he sinks back down. It's either a soft hell or a rough heaven, he can't decide. All he knows is that Wonbin's mouth is divine and he works his tongue like it's the only thing he knows, and Sungchan gets a kick out of knowing (and seeing that) Wonbin can't fit him completely into his mouth. He strokes what he can't fit, and chokes when his head stabs at the back of his throat. If Wonbin didn't look like he enjoyed that, Sungchan would say something about it. Instead, every time it happens, Wonbin's eyes roll back with a soft groan. Holy shit. He's not going to last. 

When Wonbin swallows around him deliberately, Sungchan drags him off, hips still twitching against his will. "Slow down," he says, out-of-breath and dignity in a ditch. Wonbin smiles up at him cheekily, tongue grazing over his canine. "Can't keep up with me?" he taunts, and Sungchan wants to shut him up. 

So, he pulls him up, all the way until Sungchan can kiss the attitude out of him. His grip on Wonbin's face is rough he knows, pressing into his lower cheek and jaw; squishing it in a death grip as he lets Wonbin drool into the kiss. It mostly just tongue, and a mess down both their chins at this point. Sungchan lets his hand roam, pressing a dry finger right down on Wonbin's rim, the boy moans open-mouthed against him — a soft little haa that Sungchan swallows right in, inflating his ego a little more than he would like to admit. He's rough as he kneads the flesh of Wonbin's ass cheeks in his palms too, but there's no room for apology when Wonbin is this reactive and downright desperate. He presses the tip of his finger in just to make a point, and Wonbin slams a fist softly against his chest in protest.

"That hurts," he whines, but it doesn't look like it matters to him all that much. Instead, he's kissing a trail over Sungchan neck, sucking harder on spots that get him a reaction. Sungchan lifts him slightly, until he can press his face into Wonbin's nape, right between the shell of his ear and where his hair is the longest. He smells sweet, with a certain depth to it that makes him take a long, shameful drag. "Aren't you being a little to romantic?" Wonbin teases, and Sungchan retracts his finger to pinch the toned flesh of the back of his thigh. Still, he doesn't pull away; instead, he pressed his face harder into Wonbin's flesh — like it could satiate the bone-deep longing he had harbored in secret — and licks a stripe up the slope of his neck.

Prepping Wonbin humbles Sungchan. He has always been known for his self control, but Wonbin makes it so difficult. It's not deliberate, and most of his reactions are so unexpected that even the boy under him looks caught of guard half of the time, but when Sungchan presses the pads of his fingertips over his prostate and Wonbin's broken moan does not subdue the squelches and the filthy, filthy sound Sungchan lets out in response; it's right then that his core quivers and he feels seconds away from spilling completely untouched. It doesn't make sense at all. All his past sexual partners had always called him unreactive, and it always took a lot for him to get to full hardness. But with Wonbin, his pelvis almost feels like the simmering heat around it is turning awfully physical. Like you could touch his cock and feel the heat on there. Sungchan leans down to gnaw at Wonbin's Adam's apple just so it doesn't feel like he lost so grandly

"Why do you—," Wonbin trails off into a whimper right when Sungchan spreads the three fingers apart, pressing harder against the soft, velvety walls inside. "How the fuck do you look worse off than me?" Sungchan gulps dryly. His cock is rock hard and weeping, turning a concerning deep red shade, and when he jostles too hard it slaps against the skin of his torso. 

It's been a while.

Except that isn't the case at all. Wonbin can't know about the nights under his covers he'd spent imagining a flushed face and a red mouth under him; when his tongue would wrap around a name in a broken moan and he'd wake up washed in absolute guilt. The lazy afternoons when he'd imagine hands intertwined and the mental image would break something inside him. All the early mornings when sleep evaded him, the sound of mechanical birds and machine lungs in the air — when Sungchan felt most vulnerable and human and all he would think of would be a joke to tell Wonbin. He hasn't been honest at all; not to himself, not to Wonbin, and possibly to anyone, really. 

Jung Sungchan doesn't dream of love and a warm home; in fact, he no longer dreams. He sold it all off when he was thirteen and he first looked at stage lights in a new perspective, and he let that little voice inside his head beckon him towards the cliff of stardom. He has sold his dignity too, multiple times; maybe Beomgyu will find it in the pocket of his denim jacket or the back of his car, and maybe Eunseok will write about it in his diary and call Sungchan by every name but his own. He doesn't know love, not because he has never felt it, but because he has never been able to produce it on his own. The most he could ever do was share someone else's — Eunseok and Shotaro's love for him; the candles, the ₩100 coins, the callouses on his mother's hands; the Christmas lights and Wonbin's glimmering eyes at the sight of them. 

"Hyung?"

The worried tone throws him off. 

When he stares down at the boy, Wonbin doesn't look like anything. He just looks like Wonbin, and he's looking at him like he's just Sungchan. His hair cascades over his pastel blue pillows — ropes and ropes of ebony, so soft, right where he smells most like a dream. When he imagines sinking down with him, Sungchan's heart stutters; what a privilege it would be to stare at Park Wonbin every night and call him his.

Wonbin pats at his damp cheeks but doesn't press him about the tears. "Is it too fast?" He asks, like it's his fault . And Sungchan succumbs to the weight on his shoulders and buries his face into the crook of Wonbin's neck. Wonbin wants to ask if he's okay; Sungchan can tell by his tense frame, and yet he holds him in silence and litters kisses wherever he can reach.

Sungchan wants to tell him that he's sorry; for everything, for taking advantage of him, for being a mess even right where he's being held together by the softest hands, for letting Wonbin believe he didn't care about him like that , and for so much more that Sungchan doesn't have the courage to list. Instead he pushes himself up by a forearm, fingers still halfway inside the boy under him, and he makes it a mission to convey it in his actions instead. 

"Do you need a minute?" Wonbin says, hands clasped around the wrist of Sungchan's occupied hand. How fucking embarrassing. "Hyung? If you change your mind—"

Sungchan doesn't want to hear what he has to say. Whether the sentence ends in it's okay or I'll kill you , it really doesn't matter. With Wonbin, there are no ghosts in his basement and the monster under his bed is only himself. Sungchan kisses him instead, because he owes him honesty at least; because Wonbin had walked into his life by fate, asked for everything and yet he's taken nothing at all. Sungchan looks at him and feels what he thinks might be affection pouring out of his poorly-sealed crevices, like it has just been waiting to overflow. 

"I want you," he says definitively, and it might be the most truthful thing he has told Wonbin thus far.

He's never been this careful with anyone; hasn't ever felt the need to, either. Wonbin cranes his neck and stares at the ceiling like he can't bear to look at Sungchan; "Bin-ah, look at me, please," he begs in response. Wonbin screws his eyes shut and moans around his name. A crook of his fingers earn him a wail. "Look at me," he repeats, and finally Wonbin obliges. Sungchan's heart soars at the sight of little droplets of tears gathering on his lashes, clumped together, red mouth parted and slick with spit. Sungchan kisses him again. Am I making you feel good?

Wonbin answers with a twitch of his hips. 

It's all too much. Sungchan drags his fingers, pressing it down against his walls, right as Wonbin clenches around the length of them, and he feels it on his cock instead.

"Inside me," Wonbin's breathless plea resonates through the chambers of his heart. "Put it in." There's a silent promise of I can take it that Sungchan can't bring himself to hear, so terribly unsure of himself now that he has Wonbin pliant and soft under him. He's too soft, too small in his hands; he'll break. Sungchan frets over the most useless things. With one final curl against where he feels the most tender, Sungchan drags his fingers out. Wonbin clenches like he mourns it.

Sungchan feels as though he's been lit on fire.

He's never had sex like this. Not this tenderly, not with lights this soft and warm and golden, and not with a boy who looks at him this way. All the molten pleasure he has chased came with uncertainty, in dingy storage rooms and dark, clustered spaces, in hotels that he had checked into under a different name, and in sheets that smell of laundry detergent and not enough sun. Wonbin's sheets smell like him, and Sungchan doesn't understand why that makes him throb. He tears the condom open with his teeth and rubs the hard nubs of Wonbin's nipples to distract himself. He's so soft everywhere, so tender, so frail. Sungchan doesn't want to leave a mark anywhere.

Wonbin's thighs shake against his when Sungchan wraps them around his waist, and the wail he lets out when the tip breaches is one that will haunt him for so many more nights. 

"I'll be gentle," he promises, stealing another kiss. "Tell me if it's too much."

Wonbin is everything Sungchan isn't. He's confident and certain and he takes what he wants without so much as a request. He braces his heels on the mattress and sinks down on him instead. And it's right then that the slow, torturous pace of being enclosed in warm, velvety walls feels like a vice around his airways.

The choked out, garbled moan he lets out fills the space, as Sungchan holds his breath and lets him take and take and take; until he's bottomed out and his ball press flush against soft flesh, and Wonbin looks ethereal — all spread out and breathless.

"You're so fucking big, " he complains, halfway incoherent. 

There's a stupid apology at the tip of his tongue; Wonbin feels it from a mile away and pulls him down to suck on his tongue instead. 

Sungchan pulls off to pant in his face a breathy, strained, "You're so wet."

Wonbin's hips stutter on their own. "I told you you used way too much lube," he scolds, albeit there's no bite at all. The cautious thrust of his hips has Wonbin shutting right up, lips pursed and hands flying to hang onto Sungchan's neck. Fuck, he says, barely audible at all, and yet Sungchan hears it crystal clear. 

The slow gyrations turn into quick, pistoning thrusts, and Wonbin stops talking altogether. The most he does is groan, or whimper, or whine, and soft high-pitched sounds that resonate from the back of his throat. Sungchan tries to kiss the moans out of him, and all Wonbin does is yank at his hair in retaliation. He slows his thrusts down to say, "I didn't peg you the type to be quiet in bed."

Wonbin shakes his head fervently, and at a particularly angled thrust, he lets out whine — high and reedy — that goes straight to Sungchan's guts. Still, he keeps his lips stubbornly pursed together; tight and secure. Sungchan nips at his jaw in annoyance; Wonbin lets out a sharp ahh that betrays him. "I'm going to—" he grits, with a furrow of his brows, "— fucking embarrass myself." Oh, how Sungchan wants to break him. 

"You do this often?" He asks, punctuating his words with slow, languid thrusts that he knows is hitting right at his sweet spot. 

"Seducing my neighbour?" Wonbin says with a little giggle. "You're the first."

Fuck. His cock throbs against Wonbin's walls.

"There's no way you don't get around," Sungchan insists, almost petulantly. He sounds more upset that he's willing to be. "You're too fucking pretty." 

Wonbin gasps at the praise.

"You've never called me that before." 

Sungchan might've never said it, but it's all he thinks about. "I should say it more often then." He loses his footing and somehow he thrusts even deeper than before, and a wanton moan escapes from Wonbin. And then it keeps going, one after the other; it's like once he starts, he can't bring himself to start. He's shaking slightly too, rambling about so good, so fucking good, hyung you're so big, oh god right there, shit you're going to ruin me. Sungchan's heart feels five seconds from giving out. 

"Do you know how people look at you," he bites out, "at the gym? I want to punch the shit out of your trainer." The admittance comes out rougher than intended, and yet Wonbin's thighs quiver in response. God, Sungchan is going to die. 

"I fucked him before," Wonbin says with a little giggle. 

Sungchan pauses slightly, unprepared for what he just heard. Wonbin's rim flutters against his cockhead. Sungchan wants to fuck the soft smirk off of his face. 

"I moaned your name in his face," Wonbin says lowly, grabbing Sungchan by his chin, one hand still hanging over his shoulder. "He told me to never contact him again." He's shifting slightly, and Sungchan follows however he's being guided. Wonbin's heels are flat on the mattress again, as Sungchan slowly slips out. Then, he pushes against his chest, firmly, until Sungchan is on his back with Wonbin looming over him. His hair kisses Sungchan's face, and every part he touches ignites in sparks. "And then I went home," he says, slowly straddling him, "and fucked myself on a toy," he's guiding Sungchan back to his rim, "and pretended you were under me," the breach has them both wincing, "just like this." 

Sungchan thinks it might be him who thrusts in, or maybe it was so perfectly timed with Wonbin sinking down that he doesn't have the chance to tell. Either way, he lets out a guttural moan, and pretends his hands aren't shaking when Wonbin intertwines them with his — pressed flat against the mattress, on either side of his head. "Hyung," Wonbin calls, face oddly serious despite his smile. "I like you a lot." Then, his lips pull into a small pout. "You know that, right?"

There's a silent plea hanging off of him; one that begs for Sungchan to not hurt him. And yet the determination in his eyes make it seem like he would let it happen anyway. 

"I like you so much," he pants, lifting his hips to sink back down firmly, "that it drives me crazy." Sungchan wants to grab his waist, to cradle the back of his head so that he can stare into his eyes and make promises that would soothe the lingering uncertainty in his voice. "There's no one like you." He sounds so sure now. Sungchan wants to believe him. "I'd rather you break my heart, than to not have you at all."

Sungchan doesn't deem himself worthy of the risk. Yet, when Wonbin starts riding him like his life depends on it, like it's all he knows, like it's everything he has ever needed — moans high and broken and drawn-out — Sungchan realizes he might just have to share the sentiment, one last time. Until he's ready. Until he can look at Wonbin and call him something else. 

Wonbin's cock spurts and shoots his load three consecutive times. He still has Sungchan's wrists pinned to the sides, and Sungchan doesn't have the heart to pull away. So beautiful, he thinks, concern dying in the back of his mind when Wonbin doesn't stop; only the sight of him riding out his high has his attention. His neck is flushed red, and Sungchan wants so badly to kiss it. He's soft and sweaty, and glowing, and he clenches around Sungchan's poor cock like a vice. When Sungchan makes a move to pull out, wringing his wrist free to do so, Wonbin tuts him.

"I'm not done," he scolds, tone sharp.

Sungchan whimpers and settles back down. 

He can't quite tell when his orgasm hits; it just feels long-winded and unending. He has Wonbin's tongue in his mouth at the peak of it, and all Sungchan can do is suck on it desperately, unsure what to do, or where to hold him. Wonbin milks him ruthlessly, and still Sungchan doesn't stop him even when his poor cock twitches in oversensitivity and every drag makes his toes curl in subtle discomfort. 

"Are you done, yet?" Sungchan pants out, head still spinning. 

Wonbin smiles sheepishly. "Never," he says, tone light, but he's still pulling off and getting up slowly. 

Sungchan's limbs are jelly appendages, stuck on just for show. It's Wonbin who pulls off his condom and ties it off. He thinks he might've missed the trash can judging from the faint thud and the way Wonbin winces at his aimless throw. Still, he laughs, because Wonbin is endearing, even when he's a bit of a mess like this; especially when he's a bit of a mess like this. 

"Can we count this as a first date, then?" Wonbin asks, settling back down with him. Sungchan opens his arm and lets him use it as a pillow.

His opens his mouth briefly to answer, before Wonbin slaps a hand over it. "You're going to say something stupid," he whines. 

Sungchan shakes his head with a laugh. Wonbin retracts his hand suspiciously. "Gross," he remarks, "you just touched my dick with that."

He earns himself an eye-roll. 

"Do you still want me to be meaner about it?" It's supposed to be a slight jab, because it's funny to him how awfully he had betrayed his own words. But Wonbin's smile falters, and Sungchan can't bring himself to see it, so he presses a kiss to his cheek in response. "I couldn't if I tried, Bin-ah."

The relief is apparent, and a soft breath escapes Wonbin's parted mouth. Sungchan nibbles on them softly, just a touch shy of a kiss. "Actually," he says, pulling back slightly to stare at Wonbin better, "I already tried it and I think we can both agree that it didn't work."

Wonbin rolls his eyes with a soft laugh. "That was you trying?" he mocks. "You making me dinner and texting me 24/7 and picking up all my calls on the first ring?" Sungchan hadn't thought about it like that. His cheeks burn with the realization, and Wonbin laughs harder at him. 

"There might have been an attempt," Sungchan tells him, and laughter bubbles out of him too. 

They should shower.

Sungchan should get dressed and leave to go sleep in his own bed; even if only to dream of Wonbin and his lips. 

Still, he doesn't move, because Wonbin is soft, and warm, and he looks at Sungchan like he's allowed to stay. The thought of leaving dissipates completely about an hour later, when he sinks down on Wonbin's pillows with him, his head cradled in Sungchan's chest. And Sungchan dreams of love blossoming in him for the first time since he first learnt how to kiss a boy. 

⊹

The next morning greets him with chaos. 

Wonbin sleeps through his raging alarm, and Sungchan's blaring ringtone, and Sungchan takes the call from Doyoung in the bathroom. He takes a shower, and contemplates waking Wonbin up for a good few minutes, before he decides to shake him gently. Wonbin groans and protests, and Sungchan sighs in defeat before telling the half-asleep boy, "I have to leave for work." Wonbin nods, face pulled into a displeased frown with his eyes still somewhat closed. Sungchan worries if he comprehends or even hears what he just told him, and lingers around him for a minute more before he leaves the apartment. 

He sits for the three-hour meeting that he feels could've been an email — about pressing charges, and tracing the package back to a high-schooler, and how Doyoung feels Sungchan should sign off on it this time. His consent is the only thing stopping his team from raining hellfire, and Sungchan asks for more time. Then, he figures since he's there anyways, he should at least waste an hour in his studio. There he goes through the motions, and fulfills expectations, and gets his own work done. He thinks of Wonbin maybe five times, and leaves his messages unanswered because he knows he won't be able to bring himself to stop replying. Not when Wonbin triple texts, and doesn't know how to end a conversation without having it ended for him. 

The five times spans across the hours; five long times — the curve of Wonbin's neck, his long, bony fingers, and the soft gasps by his ear, and the breath that would tease his lobe. It's torture, and yet Sungchan gets a kick out of indulging in it. 

He packs up at 3 P.M. and requests to be driven home.

It's the question that Doyoung asks him over the loud sip of his coffee that stills him.

"So, what do you want to do now?"

Sungchan doesn't know how to start thinking about it. He has let his greed consume him all him life; all he ever did was want and want and want . And now everything he has ever wanted is in his grasp, and still he has absolutely nothing at all. It feels as though it's dematerializing right in front of him, even if he wounds himself tighter around it. It never feels tangible enough; like a borrowed dream. 

Jung Sungchan no longer wants. He no longer hopes, and he no longer dreams.

Once upon a time, he had indulged in it. He would pray, and he would have expectations larger than himself. All the signed CDs and albums and vinyls he had handed out hoping it would end up on someone's display shelf or Instagram post, and all the wishing wells he had never walked past without throwing a coin in. He had rubbed lamp posts and routinely bought three bottled waters on the third floor of the MBC building, right after his first prerecording for a comeback stage — because someone had said that guarantees a successful comeback — and Sungchan had wished on all that and more. Every superstition he had believed, every rotting tree he had carved, every talisman under his pillow; Sungchan recalls it all in slight resentment and self-pity.

He had looked at everything around him covetously. And now...

Now, he no longer covets. He no longer yearns.

He doesn't want the world to forget him, and yet he wants to forget the world.

"Can you give me some time?" Sungchan says, fiddling with the hard drive in his hands. Doyoung's gaze is fixed on it, too.

In his periphery, his manager nods. "Take all the time you need."

It's the first time Doyoung has ever said that to him, because Sungchan is pretty sure prior to today, his manager has always said all you want ; because that's all Sungchan has ever remembered himself doing. Regardless of who suffered for it, he did everything exactly the way he wanted. It didn't matter if he left casualty upon casualty in his trail; it doesn't matter because he didn't mean to do it, and at the end of the day, won't his intentions matter more than the damage? Wasn't that always the case?

But Doyoung's hunched frame and tired eyes look different to him now. Sungchan thinks he might've gone about that all wrong too. The small smile Doyoung sends his way earns him a bout of courage. "Thank you, hyung," Sungchan tells him, intently, "for always being on my side."

Doyoung's grin widens, and there's a slight shock that paints itself across his face. "Always," he replies, and it feels as though a part of him settles upon hearing it; like he had always been waiting to hear it, and like it's both right on time and a few years too late. Sungchan basks in it either way.

⊹

When he gets to Eunseok's front door, assorted fruit basket clutched tightly in his hand, it's Shotaro who opens it and greets him. 

"Hyung," Sungchan calls in mild surprise. The word feels peculiar on his tongue, and it rubs him in a weird way; like the first time the other man called him Sungchan-sunbae in public , and not Sungchannie like he was used to. 

So much for a friendship rekindled — Sungchan never knows how to act around him.

"Just on time," Shotaro says with a warm smile.

It's a small group; awfully small taking into account how wide Eunseok's circle actually spans. He meets familiar faces, and pretends he knows what they've been up to. Sungchan excels at pretension because it's all he has been taught. He excels because it's the only skill he has honed to perfection. But there's a part of him that cheers when he realizes Beomgyu isn't there. Maybe Eunseok is still too considerate for his own good; whether that was extended towards him or the old flame he hardly remembers, Sungchan will take it. 

The thank you Eunseok gives him is earnest too, as he hands him the basket he had contemplated on buying for a good hour. Is it too much? Is it enough? Sungchan swallows the questions down, and refuses to let the uncertainty to bleed out of him just this once.

Dinner is fairly casual, and he doesn't feel like he's sticking out like a sore thumb. Most of Eunseok's friends are familiar to him, and they're polite, so they ask the right questions and tread carefully around the wrong ones. He locks eyes with Eunseok just once; right as Shotaro tucks a strand of his hair behind his ear for him. Eunseok only smiles back.

After, Sungchan stays and helps him clean up. Shotaro hums a faint tune in the background as he stacks the clean dishes in the cabinet. It all feels too familiar, too easy. Before he bids them good night, he hands Sungchan a card. Sungchan fiddles with it a couple more minutes after the front door had closed, and he pockets it before he can ask the stupid questions plaguing his mind.

 "I didn't think you would come," Eunseok says on the patio later, smoke veils enveloping the both of them where they lean on the railings. 

Sungchan grins. "I didn't think I would either."

Or rather, it was the fact that he wanted to. So much. And yet he had spent the whole day in his studio trying to kill time, because if he were back home in the safety of his own bedroom, he would've never left. 

Silence envelopes them for a while. Eunseok stabs the cigarette butt to death. "Do you think about me sometimes?" Sungchan laughs, caught so completely off-guard.

"Sometimes, yeah," he admits, "when it gets hard." He leans down against his forearms, staring up at Eunseok who barely looks like anything he remembers. "What about you? Are you okay now?" Does looking at me still make you angry? Sungchan digs down on his lower lip, bracing himself for the answer. 

"I am." The finality in his tone isn't convincing.

Sungchan averts his gaze for a second. "About everything ?" 

The wedding invitation in the inner jacket burns a hole through the pocket. Sungchan doesn't want to assume, but Eunseok's eyes are always too telling. It's more apparent now when he looks at him again, and Eunseok offers him a strained smile. 

"He's getting married in June."

Everything settles into place.

Eunseok can be as cryptic as he wants; Sungchan will still understand him. "Is that why you took me off the blacklist? Because you were going to be alone now?"

Eunseok swats at his arm indignantly. "You know that's not the reason!"

Sungchan finds amusement at this reaction. 

He wants to ask what happened; how it happened, mostly. But it's not Sungchan's place to reopen old wounds for him, so instead he asks, "What ended it?"

Eunseok shrugs, but his rapid blinking makes it futile. "I was unsure. I think in a way, I still am. He had dreams — plans — for a secret matrimony in Bangkok, and when he told me about it... I flaked." His hands dart straight for another cigarette, and Sungchan lights it for him like he used to back when they still had the same dreams. Eunseok smiles like he's reminded of it, too. "And there's always someone else. If it doesn't work with one, there's always another." He takes a long drag and chokes on it. 

"Now," he says, with a soft cough, "he's remodeling our plans with someone he met eight months ago." 

It sounds bitter. Sungchan thinks he deserves to be.

"Do you love him, still?"

Eunseok snickers. "Not as much as I loved you."

Sungchan doesn't believe him at all. But just for his best friend's sake, and for his sanity, he pretends he does. 

⊹

Sungchan discovers that his phone had died on the elevator ride down. The beep of his door lock makes him anxious, and when his phone is plugged in and turned on, a flurry of messages come in, along with multiple missed calls. It makes him uneasy, for no apparent reason, when he finds that they're all from Wonbin. 

from: Park Wonbin

hyung

are u home 

hyung????

are u still outside??

oh

u aren't home? 

my msgs arent going thru

hyung???

to: Park Wonbin

I'm home.

The reply comes almost instantaneously.

from: Park Wonbin

you 

werent 

to: Park Wonbin

I'm home now.

Sungchan waits a couple of minutes after the seen mark appears. When his call doesn't go through for the second time, he gets up and dashes towards the front door, and in his haste, he leaves the apartment in his house slippers. He strides the hallway, through the adjacent wind, and abuses Wonbin's doorbell once he gets to it, worry growing the longer he's met with silence. The door lock beeps and Wonbin peeks out skittishly, and the first thing that stands out to Sungchan is the fact that he looks like he's been crying.

"Can I come in?" 

It's the easiest thing to utter.

Wonbin steps aside and lets him wander in. 

Then, the younger man shuffles behind him quietly, and makes a detour to the kitchen to pour Sungchan a glass of water without a word. Sungchan waits in the living room, nails kneading into the soft flesh of his palms. Wonbin hands him the glass, and sits down so gently that it almost feels out of character for him. Sungchan takes a sip, and another, just so he buys himself some time.

"Did something happen?"

Wonbin's breathing is so shallow. 

"I'm sorry, my phone died."

The younger man has a bad habit of picking at his hang nails, Sungchan recalls. It's a very silent crime he subjects himself to, and by the time Sungchan sees it, the damage is already worse than intended. His index finger is bleeding. Sungchan unearths a handkerchief from his back pocket and grabs Wonbin by his wrist, firmly , because he's met with resistance from the younger man. "Are you mad at me?" he asks, pressing the cream-white cloth to the suppurating sore. Wonbin winces with a soft sniffle, and Sungchan's heart squeezes.

"Is it because I wasn't replying?"

It comes as a surprise to him when Wonbin actually shakes his head. Still, he remains mum.

"Because I got home late?"

Another shake.

Sungchan leans over him, until he's face to face; until Wonbin can't hide. "Tell hyung why you were crying, hmm?"

It starts out as a wobbly little sound emanating from deep in his chest, that grows to a pained cry, that quickly turns to huffing sobs; until Sungchan has to thumb at the high point of his cheekbones to make sure the tears don't fall. It's all in vain because Wonbin screws his eyes shut and the tears spill over, in streams, and endlessly. So, Sungchan holds him instead, still so utterly confused by the ordeal; but in the same way his happiness is contagious, Wonbin's sadness is too. Sungchan coos, and pats, and comforts him with soft, hushed whispers, but he doesn't ask him to stop. It's not his place, and he probably doesn't have the right to ask Wonbin of that either. 

"It's going to—" he chokes, and gives up all of his restraint and whines in Sungchan's face, "—going to sound fucking stupid." 

His chortle makes Wonbin's eyes fly open. It pools brown and golden, and it's all Sungchan will imagine for many, many months before bed. "That's nothing new," he teases, because it's impossible to resist.

His worries dissolve when Wonbin mumbles nothing happened, and Sungchan puts two and two together and tells him of his day instead. He doesn't miss the purse of Wonbin's lips when he gets to dinner at Eunseok's, and the flash of something in his eyes.

"Your first love?" Wonbin asks, voice sounding small.

And oh, it's so obvious to him now.

"He's in love with someone else." Then, he back tracks and says, "I think I might've failed at letting him be my first love, too."

Then, Wonbin explains it too: the coldness of the empty bed, and radio silence that he's used to but still has a hard time accepting. Sungchan hopes he never learns to accept it. He goes on — on and on , about how Sungchan was the only thing on his mind, and how for so many hours he'd imagined only of Sungchan's belated rejection, and regret; all in his head, albeit so real to him. 

"I'm terrified that I might be too early to be your last love, hyung. And I'm already too late to be your first."

Sungchan falls apart, still rooted in his spot, where he holds Wonbin in his hands, and he doesn't feel tangible at all. It's Wonbin who kisses him then, as if to remind him I'm right here , and that he's as real as Sungchan is, and Sungchan is as real as he is. 

"My dad wants me to come home," Wonbin says a little while later.

There's a pause where he's waiting for Sungchan to ask about it. "Will you?" 

Wonbin grins, leaning further into Sungchan's space, until he's nestled right into his chest. "I don't know," he says, face buried and voice muffled. "I think I want to be your next-door neighbour a little longer."

It's not the worst thing that could happen. Wonbin knows how to work a rice cooker now. He knows how to apply for part-time jobs without sneering at the idea, and he wants to get a barista license. It's either that, or a sushi shop; he still hasn't made his mind up. Sungchan has taught him everything he knows. But he'll never be ready to let him out of his sight, not any time soon. 

So, he tells him about the metaphorical cliff — how sometimes he stares down at it and it feels steeper than it did when he was twenty-five. He tells Wonbin about the hands that reach up from it, and the wobbly steps he still takes towards the edge sometimes. "I think I might no longer be fit for the stage," he admits. 

Wonbin doesn't react at all. "Do you still want it?"

Therein lies the problem.

All Sungchan knows is to want, and unfortunately for him, a big part of him still yearns for it; still stares at his past selves covetously. 

"It's okay if you do," Wonbin starts, "and it's okay if you don't."

Sungchan listens to him this time, choosing to hear him through. 

"You're thirty-one, hyung." 

Sungchan can't fight his scowl, unsure where the conversation was going. Wonbin cackles quietly.

"Hear me out," he insists. "It's okay if what you want at thirty-one isn't the same as what you wanted when you were twenty-five. I know I make it sound worse sometimes, but you've barely been an adult for a decade. That isn't as bad as you imagine it is, or at least that's what I think. I think you're allowed to change your mind, and I think you can choose to start again without it being a betrayal to everything you have always been."

Sungchan holds him even closer, pressing a kiss to the crown of his head. Wonbin smiles into his flesh.

"You can be something else now; someone else. Jung Sungchan is allowed to be whoever he wants to be."

It feels both like long-winded relief and a stab to the heart. "When did you get so wise?" It comes out choked up and garbled. Sungchan strokes at his nape gently, to try and coax Wonbin to look at him. It heals some of the ache when Wonbin stares up at him with glimmery orbs and concern so genuine that Sungchan has to wonder if he cares about everything this much, or if he just got lucky to be on the receiving end. 

"For what it's worth, hyung," he whispers against the tingling skin of Sungchan's chin, "I think you were meant for the stage. Even when you're fifty. Even on life support." There's not a part of him that is brimming with mirth, but still Sungchan laughs. 

"You'll cheer me on, then? When I'm fifty and I have to walk up to the stage with a cane?"

In a solemn tone, he replies, "I'll be your cane."

And god, is it easy to believe him. 

⊹

Two months later the tabloids read: Where is Jung Sungchan?  What has he been up to?

Next to it is a picture of him with Wonbin, out on a stroll, hands linked together. It's going to be some abomination of assumptions, and Wonbin peeks over his shoulder and reaches out to scroll the article away.

"Hey," Sungchan protests, "I haven't even started reading yet."

 Wonbin bites his shoulder and snakes a hand up his shirt. "Boohoo. Don't even click those, they're all pay per click. Do you want to pay their bills, hyung? Is that what you want?" He twists his left nipple unforgivingly. Sungchan bites his yelp back just to match scores.

"Behave, or I'm sending you back home to your dad."

Wonbin tugs at him to turn him over on his back, where he can loom over him menacingly. His stare is unforgiving. "That is the least attractive thing you have ever said to me." Still, he kisses Sungchan, huffing in annoyance.

When he pulls off, Sungchan breathes out, "You can't think of worse?"

Wonbin rolls his eyes first, and then he leans down to kiss Sungchan's neck. "Fuck, I want you so bad."

Sungchan lets himself be pushed around, because when Wonbin gets in his moods, whatever he says goes; there's no fighting it. Sometimes it's picking him off the counter that gets him going. Sometimes they'll just be cuddling on the couch before his boyfriend jumps him. Other times, he's attacked in the doorway after a date out. Point is, Sungchan can't predict it, so he learns to accept it. 

He sleeps in Wonbin's bed more than his own lately. Eunseok still lives upstairs. Sungchan's apartment still doesn't feel quite like home, but he's beginning to discover that Wonbin's does. 

When their clothes are off, and Sungchan tastes Wonbin on his tongue every time he swallows, and the younger man has him propped up against the head board as he sinks down on him — Sungchan has a thought. "We really should restock on condoms."

That's another unattractive thing he has said. Wonbin can make a list; Sungchan won't stop him.

"Don't wanna," Wonbin whines.

Sungchan bottoms out with a loud groan. 

"Is it because of your breeding kink?"

He thrusts up slowly, testing the waters, eyes trained on Wonbin's expression to search for a sign of discomfort. He resumes, head leaning on Wonbin's forearms, where they're holding onto the headboard behind him for support. "I don't have a breeding kink," Wonbin bites out, but from the sharp yip that follows, Sungchan can tell just where his dick hit. 

He lets him have it at first; doesn't press because he's marinating it. It's a slower rhythm tonight, because they're both tired and it's too close to midnight, regardless of how high both their libidos are. A long day is a long day, despite all the other factors. Wonbin rides him with soft little gasps of pleasure falling out of him, and Sungchan lets him take what he wants, and the more used he feels, the harder his cock throbs. 

Sungchan can tell he's close to coming when Wonbin slumps against him, thighs quivering against his sides. "Have I always been this sensitive?" It sounds like a complaint, but it dies into a drawn-out moan when Sungchan starts thrusting again. " God, I'm so close," he whines. "If I come, don't pull out. Fuck me longer." A petulant little command. Sungchan can't tell if it's his cock or his heart that throbs harder. His whines and pants are soft warm puffs against the back of Sungchan's neck, and the tight locking of his arms around his shoulders feel like being cradled.

It's his turn to be mean, then. "I have to pull out," he insists. "I'm not wrapped up."

Wonbin's nails dig down on his back. " Hyung ," he mewls.

Sungchan smiles to himself..

"I'm being responsible."

"Fuck you."

He's always too soft on Wonbin. And just this once, he wants to push the limits. He unwinds one hand from around Wonbin's waist, snaking its way to stroke his abandoned cock, weeping against his torso. Wonbin jolts in his hold. "I'm just worried," he drawls, thumb pressing into the tip of his cock, where it's wet and leaking. "What if this one takes? What if I accidentally knock you up?"

Wonbin whimpers in his ear, thighs twitching; hole clamping down on him in an unforgiving grip. " Holy shit."

"But you'd want that, won't you? To be pumped so full that there's no way you won't end up pregnant? Isn't that why my raw cock is pressing against all your soft spots right now? Nothing stopping my seed from taking?" 

"Hyung, stop talking." 

He barely sounds coherent; like it took all his energy just to utter that sentence alone.

Sungchan feels sinister when the cock in his hand twitches, and the first spurt almost catches him off-guard. Wonbin's self-restraint is phenomenal. "You'd look so pretty like that, though. All plump and full, glowing from the pregnancy. Wouldn't let you lift a finger. And then, I'd keep knocking you up just to keep you looking like that."

Wonbin's whole body quivers with his orgasm. It's the most silent one Sungchan has ever pulled out of him, and for a moment he actually fears that the boy in his arms has stopped breathing. The nails digging into his back must have left permanent damage by now. Sungchan fucks him through it, and a minute later Wonbin starts crying into his shoulder. "You're so fucking mean," he babbles. Sungchan kisses his neck and keeps fucking up into him just like he asked.

His orgasm, on the other hand, hits him like a freight train. Wonbin feels it coming before he does. Inside, hyung inside, he had mewled, tongue shoved a second later into his mouth. The broken moan that falls out of him is the loudest yet, and still it gets drowned out by the wail Wonbin lets out, but really, it's a pretty close call. Wonbin rides it out on him, and everything he feels and sees makes Sungchan suspect that he might've come a second time. "Fuck, did you just have a dry orgasm?"

Wonbin's hip twitches. "Don't fucking cuss at me, hyung" he grits, "I'll get hard again." It's almost realistically impossible, but the thought still makes him throb nonetheless. He pulls back to inspect his mess, and nods absentmindedly. "Yeah, I think I did."

Sungchan wants to jump off of the nearest hill. 

Wonbin will probably follow him, though.

"I might have a breeding kink," he admits sheepishly, fingers rubbing over the mess he made on Sungchan's belly.

The raised eyebrows make him back track,

"Yeah, I definitely have a breeding kink."

Sungchan laughs and bites his cheek. Wonbin giggles through it.

There will be more paparazzi photos, and more tabloids, and more phone calls from both their families. The months will turn to years and Sungchan will finally understand why Wonbin wanted to be his last. Maybe he will never stop wanting, and maybe it is so terribly innate for him that he will never escape that part of himself. 

But the next morning, when Wonbin wakes him up with a kiss and accidentally says I love you instead of good morning, Sungchan learns to forgive himself a little better too. 

It rained in December.

And it snowed in March.

And by July, all Sungchan wants to do is watch the rain with Wonbin in his arms. He thinks he finally understands longing now, now that he's allowed himself to feel it. He finally understands what it means to be alone, in a way he never did before — it's why he trails after Wonbin like he has never had a life of his own. He packs him lunches in the morning, and goes home straight from the gym to start dinner. Wonbin's starting an internship. Sungchan never quite got what it was for. 

Hanbin tells him about Park Wonbin, twenty-two, trust fund baby, and Sungchan tells him about Park Wonbin, twenty-three, the love of his life . 

Doyoung is still waiting for his decision. Sungchan is still waiting, too. Take your time, he says, at the end of every phone call. 

For the first time in his life, the world slows down. No one is two steps behind him; he isn't three steps behind anyone else either. Maybe all he knows is pretension and mimicry, but Wonbin lets him learn the calm and drags him along one tiny footstep at a time. He feels braver somewhat, and not in the way where he feels like he could do anything. No, it's more in the way where he feels like he could try and do anything, and it would be okay if he can't. That's something Sungchan could never quite grasp all his life.

"Do you think... if we ever broke up... you would regret being with me?" 

It was his most shameful doubt.

Wonbin had stared at him impassively. "No." Certain and blunt. "But if I didn't get to have you, I would've imagined it at least." He had smiled then, with his palm pressed gently to Sungchan's face. "And I would've looked for you in everyone I met."

Sungchan thinks he gets it. 

He would've imagined, and imagined, and imagined.

And no one would ever, and could never, be Park Wonbin.