Archive of Our Own

your love is such a swamp

you’re the only thing i want

39 | yjh

The first thing Jeonghan does when he gets back into town after his divorce is finalized is meet Jisoo for lunch.

He’s fifteen minutes late (ten minutes because his taxi was delayed and the extra five because Jisoo texted him impatiently and Jeonghan may be humbled by life right now but he’s nothing if not petty).

They’re halfway through a pitcher of beer before Jeonghan decides to just address the elephant in the room. He leans back and lets out a long sigh.

“Joshuji. You had the right idea. Divorced at 25. Hot, young. Makes you mysterious,” Jeonghan says wistfully. He knows that Jisoo notices the way his hands clench in his lap but he dutifully says nothing about it. Jeonghan shakes them loose and then gestures to himself. “Look at me. Divorced at 40. No longer hot, no longer mysterious.”

He injects just the right amount of amusement into it. His voice doesn’t even wobble.

Jisoo looks unimpressed. “I had a gay crisis at 25. And trust me, it wasn’t a mystery to anyone except my ex-wife.”

Jeonghan huffs. Jisoo curls his lips and goes back to poking at his salad.

It’s rainy and cold in Seoul, has been for all 48 of the hours Jeonghan has spent back in this city. Just wet and dark and miserable, even during the day. They’re the only people in this cafe except an older couple by the window. It’s the kind of weather that has everyone staying inside. But Jeonghan’s sleeping on Seungkwan’s couch while he figures out his next moves, and puttering around his friend’s apartment while Seungkwan follows him with concerned eyes holds very little appeal right now.

“Jisoo-yah, look,” Jeonghan pinches a big piece of pajeon between his chopsticks and waves it between them. He points at a curved piece of green onion at the bottom. “It’s frowning. It’s so mad at you.”

Jisoo snorts and shakes his head, watching as Jeonghan shoves the whole piece into his mouth and practically swallows it without chewing. He pushes his now clear plate away from him and slumps in his chair, looking around the restaurant again.

“Are you going to see Seungcheol?”

The prickling sensation that trails up the back of Jeonghan’s neck at Jisoo’s question feels so real that Jeonghan has to fight every impulse to reach back and scratch at his skin. He tries very hard not to react very much because Jisoo is watching him like an evil hawk, looking for tells. He just shrugs.

“I don’t know. Is he around?” he asks casually. He’s a liar. He knows Seungcheol is around. He’d had his Instagram profile up on his phone for an hour the night he packed all of his bags and let Yunseo drop him off at Daegu Station. Seungcheol went out for drinks just last week, he’d been tagged in a photo on his grid by people Jeonghan has never met. Last month he sprained his ankle and posted a pouty selca holding up a thumbs down.

Jisoo looks at Jeonghan for a long moment and then sighs. He gathers all of his things with a murmured sorry Hannie, I’ve got to go and presses a quick kiss to the top of Jeonghan’s head. Over his shoulder he says, “You’ll always be hot. And you’re not 40 yet. Don’t feel sorry for yourself.”

30 | csc

The post had been saved in Seungcheol’s phone for months: a singles mixer in Itaewon that promised to be “thoughtful, queer matchmaking for 30+ professionals.” For weeks, he’d found himself swiping over to look at it in between scrolling his feed and half-heartedly opening the two or three dating and hookup apps he’d downloaded years ago.

Now, he’s standing in a bar feeling overwhelmed by the small but mighty crowd of men in business casual. He’s been nursing the same drink for forty-five minutes and he has to stop himself from habitually glancing at his watch every so often. He doesn’t want to look bored or impatient. He doesn’t know how he wants to look. Like someone somebody will want. He’d worn the same slacks he’d worn to work that day but had changed his plain white button down for a slightly nicer blue silk one. He’d worn his expensive silver cufflinks and he’d freshened up his cologne.

It’s embarrassing to want to be wanted so much. He feels like everyone can see it all the time but he doesn’t know how to be any other way. What else is he supposed to do? Sometimes he worries that he spends too much of his time thinking about all the ways his love goes to waste.

But everyone in this room is here because they want the same thing. It eases something in him when he thinks about it – how much everyone around him wants to be wanted and that maybe, this time, he’ll find someone who wants him specifically.

“Are you drinking that or communicating with it telepathically?”

When Seungcheol turns towards the voice, the first thing he sees is blonde. Slightly wavy blonde hair, just past chin length. Platinum, the kind of blonde that wants attention. Big, startlingly round brown eyes that are only just slightly starting to crinkle at the edges. He’s one of the most beautiful men Seungcheol’s ever seen in his life. It’s astounding to look at him, so much so that Seungcheol trips a little despite standing perfectly still.

“What?” he asks dumbly. The man smiles and gestures to his sweating glass of whiskey. There’s something about his smile…it’s polite but there’s something else hiding in the corner of it.

Seungcheol looks down at his drink that he doesn’t think he’s really touched all night. “Oh…”

“It’s just a joke,” the man says, face relaxing into something amused but gentle. Seungcheol gives himself a shake.

“Sorry, hi. I’m Seungcheol,” he says, bowing his head slightly with what he hopes is an inviting smile. A smile that says I’m so very datable. Everyone here wants to date me and maybe you do too?

The man just keeps smiling at him. For the first time, Seungcheol notices that he’s hip-to-hip with another man with dark hair. They’re close enough to one another that it’s clear they’re either here together or have decided to enjoy each other’s company for the evening. But judging by the fact that they seem to be ignoring each other entirely, Seungcheol chooses to assume it’s a wingman situation. Sometimes he brings his roommate Jihoon with him to these things for moral support; he gets it.

He steps a little closer. “And you are…?”

The man’s grin turns a little wicked. “Hmm…guess.” Absurdly, he reminds Seungcheol of one of those mystical creatures in old folktales, the type to demand answers to convoluted riddles.

“You want me to guess your name? How am I supposed to do that?”

“I believe in you.”

Seungcheol wets his lips. “You don’t even know me.”

The man tilts his head and keeps smiling. He’s waiting expectantly. He’s smiling impishly, lips pulling up just enough to reveal a row of small, imperfectly straight teeth and the sparkle in his eyes is saying there’s a right and wrong answer to this question.

Seungcheol opens and closes his mouth a few times and then laughs nervously. This stranger is trying to wind him up, and it’s working. It’s exciting. It makes him want to perform well, makes him want to do something that earns him more of that grin.

He turns to the man standing next to them on the other side of the stranger. He’s been leaning over the bar for the duration of their conversation, trying to order a drink from the one harried bartender working the bar tonight. But now he’s just kind of standing there, looking increasingly peeved. Seungcheol gets his attention by leaning over and waving.

“Let me help,” Seungcheol says, smiling in a way that he hopes is friendly. Then, he catches the bartender’s eye and waves obnoxiously. It’s a little embarrassing, but it works.

Seungcheol turns back to the man. “What can I get for you…?” he trails off expectantly.

“I’m Jisoo,” he says with a polite tip of his head. Then, just like Seungcheol had hoped, he gestures to the blonde next to him when he doesn’t immediately introduce himself as well. “Have you already met Jeonghan?”

Seungcheol watches as the blonde – Jeonghan – closes his eyes and laughs. Jisoo rattles off the drink order he’d been trying to put in and Seungcheol repeats it to the impatient bartender.

He turns back and gives them both a little wave, grinning. “Choi Seungcheol.”

“Very good,” Jeonghan murmurs.

What that very good does to Seungcheol is between him and God. He lets out a breath and shrugs with a smile, feeling more confident than he usually would talking to someone as beautiful as Jeonghan is. He’s trying to gather a little extra courage to ask Jeonghan if he maybe wants to exchange numbers or grab a private table to get to know each other better when Jeonghan abruptly pulls Jisoo closer to him and gestures between him and Seungcheol.

“Well Choi Seungcheol, this is my friend Hong Jisoo, and he’s looking for a husband.”

Jisoo flushes but stands his ground, rolling his eyes and elbowing Jeonghan lightly in the stomach. “Stop telling people that.” Still, the look he throws at Seungcheol is a little hopeful.

Jeonghan shrugs. “What? That’s why you’re here isn’t it?” Then he turns back to Seungcheol and smiles beatifically. “He’s also divorced. Are you one of those men who thinks divorcees are hot?”

“Stop telling people that!” Jisoo complains. He’s bright red now; it’s cute.

“I-” Seungcheol does a poor job of smothering a laugh into his fist and pretending it’s a cough. “It’s – fine?”

Jeonghan claps Jisoo on the back with a grin and pumps a fist in the air. “Great!”

From that point on in the evening, Jeonghan barely looks at Seungcheol. He holds himself back a little, as if to give Seungcheol and Jisoo space to talk. To mix, because this is a dating mixer. And Jisoo and Seungcheol are here looking for dates. Seungcheol wonders what Jeonghan is looking for. Everyone in this room is looking for someone, that’s the point of the event. But Jeonghan won’t look at him at all.

Jisoo is nice. He’s sweet, with big brown eyes and a pleasant curve to his smile when he talks. Seungcheol learns that he’s in middle management, at an office in Gangnam not that far from Seungcheol’s own. Jisoo even explains his divorce, despite Seungcheol insisting with wide eyes that it’s absolutely not necessary – married and then divorced young, complicated closeted shit, Jisoo says nonchalantly. He gives Seungcheol his number with one of his sweet smiles and tells him to text him if he wants to grab dinner. And he does, as soon as he waves goodbye and hails a cab. Because that’s why they came to the event and that’s what Seungcheol is supposed to do.

Dinner with Jisoo, at an upscale sushi spot after they both get off work a week later, is nice. He likes Jisoo a lot, but he knows approximately twenty minutes into their date that they’ll never be anything more than this. If he’s lucky, Jisoo will be his friend. But the spark isn’t there. Seungcheol can’t help but want to hold out for the spark. He thinks Jisoo knows it too, and at some point they both relax.

There’s not an ounce of attraction between them but Jisoo gets funnier the more relaxed he becomes in Seungcheol’s presence and Seungcheol allows himself to breathe. Before he knows it, they’re slouched over a shared plate of sashimi joking about how much they hate their jobs, how annoying all of their coupled-up friends can be sometimes. Seungcheol wonders if Jeonghan is one of those, but he doesn’t ask.

Jisoo gives him a kiss on the cheek at the end of the night and a promise to text him the name of a book he’d mentioned halfway through their meal. It’s the fourth first date Seungcheol has been on in the last few months, and the fourth one to fizzle out almost immediately. But at least he’s made a new friend; he can always use more of those.

When he runs into Jisoo and Jeonghan together again, a little over a week later, the setting could not be more different from their first meeting. He spots Jisoo first, sitting demurely in the painfully beige dentist’s office waiting room with one leg crossed delicately over his knee, flipping through a magazine. Seungcheol walks over to him, waving to get his attention. Then, he notices a somewhat familiar head of blonde hair next to him. He squints.

“Hello,” Jeonghan waves, mouth pressed into an odd little line. Seungcheol can’t see what his face is doing under the sunglasses he’s inexplicably wearing indoors.

“Hi,” he greets, coming to a stop in front of them. He looks between them. “Are you…both waiting?”

Jisoo and Jeonghan look at each other with twin expressions of surprise, like they just realized they’re sitting next to one another.

Jeonghan pushes his sunglasses up into his hair. He has dark circles under his eyes, but he’s smiling now. It’s a thin smile, no teeth.

“Joshuji has dental anxiety,” he pats Jisoo on the knee and gets a magazine swat in response.

He rolls his eyes. “No I don’t. Jeonghan has separation anxiety.”

Seungcheol likes them both so much. He takes the seat next to Jisoo just as the other man gets called up for his appointment. Then it’s just Seungcheol and Jeonghan looking at each other for a moment over the empty spot where Jisoo used to be. Jeonghan looks away first.

“So,” Seungcheol says, drawing out the word. “What are you doing after this?”

Jeonghan’s head snaps back in his direction, a look of disbelief on his face. Seungcheol thinks for a moment and realizes how that sounded. “Oh, no–”

“You work fast,” Jeonghan says wryly. “First Jisoo at the bar, now you’re scouting out dental offices for lonely men?”

Seungcheol’s face gets hot and he groans, bringing a hand up to pinch between his eyebrows. “No, no. I meant the two of you like, what are you up to today – I just…making conversation?” It’s word soup. He doesn’t know what he’s fucking saying. He sees movement out of the corner of his eyes. Jeonghan’s laughing at him.

“Are you?” he blurts.

Jeonghan looks at him with a wrinkled brow. “Am I what?”

“Lonely.”

There’s no weight to Jeonghan’s gaze when he stares at him in response. There’s not much of anything at all. His face is perfectly placid. Seungcheol regrets saying anything.

Thankfully, the receptionist calls out Seungcheol’s name and he escapes. The only time in his 30 years of living that he’s been relieved to see the dentist.

The waiting room is empty when he leaves his appointment, but someone calls his name when he gets outside. He turns to see Jisoo waving, Jeonghan leaning against the wall behind him. He slings his bag further up his shoulder and makes his way over to them.

“Jeonghan said you wanted to grab lunch after,” Jisoo explains when he sees the confusion on Seungcheol’s face.

Seungcheol squints over at Jeonghan, but he says nothing. Seungcheol wonders if they’ll ever have a normal interaction.

“Sure,” he just says, smiling. Jisoo immediately starts rattling off names of cafes in the area, walking ahead while Jeonghan and Seungcheol fall into step behind him. It’s a beautifully sunny day in Seoul. Seungcheol notices that now Jeonghan is not wearing the sunglasses.

“Listen, Seungcheollie,” Jeonghan says. He’s half-dropped formal speech without asking or acknowledging it. “I’m flattered.”

He says nothing else even though Seungcheol waits for the rest of the sentence. When it doesn’t come, he coughs awkwardly.

“No, look, I really wasn’t hitting on you.”

“This time?” Jeonghan asks, eyebrows raised.

Seungcheol has a feeling that this is just what it’s like, talking to Jeonghan. He’s always going to be one or two steps behind. His face burns, remembering that night at the mixer. He says nothing. He doesn’t have to.

“Do you want to go to the place with the fruity pebble french toast, Han-ah?” Jisoo calls over his shoulder.

“Sure,” Jeonghan agrees. Then he leans closer to Seungcheol again. “It’s not that I wouldn’t be…interested. But I don’t date.”

Seungcheol breezes past the interested part for his own well-being. “At all?” Jeonghan isn’t the first queer man he’s met with a hit-em-and-quit-em policy, but it’s gotten less and less common the older he gets.

Jeonghan hums. “Yeah, I’ve sworn off it.” he sniffs, then looks like he wants to say something but pivots and says something else. Seungcheol desperately wants to know what the initial response was going to be but listens intently when Jeonghan says, “For my thirties. Probably forever but the minute I turned 30, I decided it isn’t for me, right now.”

“Usually people do the opposite,” is all Seungcheol can say. It’s true: nearly all of his friends are either in committed relationships or ramping up their efforts to find one. But, admittedly, the limited time he’s spent with Jeonghan has taught him that Jeonghan isn’t the type to do whatever most people are doing.

Jeonghan just shrugs at him and smiles. “That’s just where I’m at.”

Seungcheol lets out a breath. “Okay. Friends?”

Jeonghan gives him a long look. He’s still smiling. Then, he nods. “Friends.”

31 | csc

For Seungcheol’s 31st birthday, Chan, Seungkwan, and Hansol take it upon themselves to plan a karaoke party. They call themselves The Choi Seungcheol Party Committee.

“That’s a really stupid name,” Jisoo comments with a smile the day they announce it, when a group of them are grabbing dinner one night after work.

“He’s just turning 31,” Mingyu says. He leans toward Jeonghan and says conspiratorially, “For his 30th we did nothing. And that’s the big one. He was so mad.”

Seungcheol huffs but doesn’t take the bait; he just gulps down more of his beer.

“No, no you see. 31 is a big deal. I mean 30, you’re basically still in your twenties. But 31 is like…whoa, you are in your thirties,” Chan explains, eyes wide.

“How would you know? You’re twelve,” Seungcheol laughs, and then immediately slings an arm around Chan’s shoulder and squeezes.

They invite everyone, including Jisoo and Jeonghan, who seems surprised.

“Are you sure it’s okay? That I come?” he asks Seungcheol the same night, when Seungcheol shows up at his apartment with tangsuyuk and beer.

Seungcheol scoffs. “Obviously.”

When the night of the party comes, they fill the private karaoke room with balloons and every other stupid birthday decoration Chan could find at the party supply store, including a sash that says Birthday Princess and a matching crown. They all tease him when he pretends to hate it.

Minghao and Jun bring Soonyoung, who is even newer to their group hangouts than Jeonghan is. He’d been indoctrinated into their friend group after he followed Jun to a bar meetup after one of the dance classes Jun and Minghao take together every Wednesday night. Once he and Chan started making out regularly, he became a fixture in their lives.

Jisoo shows up to the party last, with Jeonghan in tow, and hands Seungcheol a tall bag filled with what Seungcheol suspects is an expensive wine. Jeonghan doesn’t bring anything but he gives Seungcheol a hug at the door that leaves him smelling vaguely of citrus for the rest of the night.

Jeonghan gets pulled into the corner between Mingyu and Seokmin for the first song, and Seungcheol lets himself look. He’s mostly over it, whatever initial thing had existed when he’d first met Jeonghan. Jeonghan has become one of his closest friends, and so Seungcheol is working really hard to be over it. He’s too old to beg for something that someone doesn’t want to give.

The first hour, everyone is civil. Sober. Then Seungkwan sings a ballad that makes Wonwoo tear up and Seungcheol begins to suspect that everyone is passing the line over into tipsy. Soonyoung talks Jihoon into doing a GD x Taeyang song with him and Seungcheol suspects they’re firmly past tipsy.

He joins them next, laughing more than singing his way through “Fantastic Baby”; He tugs at Jeonghan’s shirt until he agrees to accompany Seungcheol on a trot song that has the rest of them in stitches. Seungcheol feels good, he feels loose. He’s letting himself lean into Jeonghan, sinks into him a little when they take their seats, this time next to each other. It’s fine, it’s all good. It’s his birthday. Jeonghan’s arm is around his waist and he’s laughing along.

Then they let songs play out without anyone singing along; they’re all just huddled together in various combinations, eating the snacks that Mingyu brought. Soonyoung’s speech is sloppy and liquid as he asks everyone earnest questions, trying to fill in the gaps of his own knowledge.

“You two have been together how long?” he slurs, wagging a finger between Mingyu and Jihoon. Jihoon turns a soft pink but Mingyu’s chest puffs up.

“Two years in November. We moved in together earlier this year.”

He presses a kiss to Jihoon’s cheek. Soonyoung coos.

“And wait. You guys,” he turns to Jeonghan then. He smiles, all teeth. “Have seriously never…I mean come on…”

He trails off, smiling cheekily and nudging Seungcheol with his elbow, like he’s begging to be let in on a secret. It’s then that Seungcheol processes that Soonyoung means him. Jeonghan and Seungcheol. The two of them. Seungcheol feels his face heat.

It’s like blood in the water. Soonyoung’s eyes widen. “You can be honest.”

“Me and Cheollie? No, never,” Jeonghan swears, popping a handful of chips into his mouth and shaking his head. Seungcheol listens carefully, trying to figure out if Jeonghan sounds offended by the idea or just bewildered.

“Just friends,” Seungcheol confirms, leaning his head on Jeonghan’s shoulder and grinning at the group. The stupid birthday crown slides down into his bangs and he shakes it off his head, picks it up when it falls, and fixes it into Jeonghan’s hair. Jeonghan’s hand comes up to fiddle with it until it’s secure, eyes sparkling when he smiles at Seungcheol.

33 | csc

“Well there was Sungmin,” Hansol says, holding up his hand and counting off names. “Then there was Jungchan – that was weird; our Channie couldn’t look him in the eye the whole time they were together-”

Seungcheol snorts. “Chan can’t look me in the eye most days.” He leans across the table to grab extra napkins and hands them over to Mingyu at his left. He’s got chicken sauce all over his face.

“Hey, he’s gotten better!” Soonyoung claps Chan on the shoulders and gives him a reassuring little shake. “You’re a lot less menacing these days.”

Jeonghan scoffs. He’s got that particular scrunch to his face that means he’s over this conversation. “When was Seungcheollie ever menacing?”

Chan shrugs. “When I was eighteen years old. He seemed so much taller then.”

Seungcheol loves his friends more than he loves most things, but he likes them a little less than usual today, while they sit around the table in this chicken joint chronicling all of his exes. It’s his own fault, really; he’d sent a pathetic text into their group chat after a really bad first date (the guy ordered for him, then he was rude to the server) to see if anyone wanted to commiserate with him. Soonyoung, Hansol, and Chan had been out and about anyway, so they were easy to snag. Mingyu will enthusiastically join pretty much anything. And Jeonghan, well. Jeonghan had been the one Seungcheol had texted first, when he was still waiting for his cab.

“Anyway. Then there was…” Hansol pauses to think and then snaps his fingers in triumph. “Danielle!”

“Right, right. The foreigner noona that Shua-hyung introduced him to. She was nice.”

Seungcheol squirms. “That’s not that many. That’s only three.”

“No one is shaming you hyung,” Mingyu says, with a soft pat to Seungcheol’s shoulder. “You’re just…what do they call it?” he snaps his fingers. “A serial monogamist.”

There’s nothing accusing about it, but Seungcheol feels like he’s being charged with some sort of crime. It makes him feel a strange kind of vulnerable, like someone is shining a spotlight on him, pointing at him and saying hey, look at this guy, how silly. How ridiculous.

“Well, whatever. I have another date tomorrow night,” Seungcheol mutters. “Dahyun at work set me up. Hopefully this one is better.”

Soonyoung crows and claps his hands. “Hyung, I don’t know how you do it. Doesn’t it get exhausting?”

“I just think that the right person finds you when they’re meant to,” Mingyu sighs. Seungcheol shoots him a look and then does a double take; he still has sauce on his face.

Mingyu is a romantic. Seungcheol can’t fault him; he is too. He wouldn’t be able to stomach the constant first dates otherwise. It’s amazing how far hope can take you. He glances over at Jeonghan, who checked out of the conversation some time ago and has taken to scrolling on his phone. Not far enough, Seungcheol thinks.

Seungcheol doesn’t know when it becomes a habit, but at some point he realizes that he talks to Jeonghan after every date. Sometimes – usually when the date goes well – he drives straight to Jeonghan’s place after it ends, to sit on his couch and debrief. Jeonghan just lets him ramble, cutting in sometimes when Seungcheol pauses, waiting for Jeonghan to make some sort of sound to acknowledge that he’s listening. But otherwise he just lets Seungcheol talk, and when Seungcheol finishes with I think this could work or I think we’ll see each other again, Jeonghan always says the same thing, rote: I’m happy if you’re happy, Seungcheollie.

Other times, when the date goes badly, Seungcheol can’t wait. He’ll call Jeonghan from the car or on his way to the train. One time from the restaurant bathroom, hissing for Jeonghan to wait ten minutes and then call him with a sudden “emergency.”

Tonight, it’s different. He goes home, strips off his night date night clothes, drags on ratty sweats and a t-shirt, and calls Jeonghan.

“Can you come over?”

He hears voices on the other end before Jeonghan replies. Jisoo and someone else, maybe Seokmin. The sound muffles, like Jeonghan has closed a door or cupped his hand over the phone. “Seungcheollie? How was your date?”

“Bad.”

“I’ll be right there.”

When Jeonghan keys his way into Seungcheol’s apartment, Seungcheol is sitting in the dark on his sofa with only the light of the muted TV making his living room glow. Jeonghan squints at him and flips on all of the overhead lights.

“Yah,” Seungcheol says, taking a sip of the beer he’s been holding in his lap.

Jeonghan looks at him for a long moment and then Seungcheol follows him with his eyes as he steps out of his sneakers and makes his way to where Seungcheol is. He lowers himself to the floor, wincing when his knees creak.

Seungcheol snorts. “Why do you always sit on the floor? You can never get back up again.”

“Because I have you to pull me up, Seungcheollie,” Jeonghan sing-songs.

His hair is wet, Seungcheol notices then. The collar of his shirt is a little darker than the rest, damp from the ends. He’s wearing a plain black shirt that’s either Seungcheol’s or Jisoo’s – Seungcheol’s, if he had to guess by how big it is on him – and pajama pants that have little bears all over them.

“Sorry, I–” Seungcheol squeezes his eyes shut. He clears his throat. “I shouldn’t have called you so late.”

Jeonghan pokes his knee. “Shut up. It’s fine – Shua and I were helping Seokminnie run lines for his new play. I wasn’t going to bed anytime soon.”

Seungcheol nods. There’s a long silence then, both of them watching a commercial for an air purifier play out with no sound. Jeonghan is waiting for Seungcheol to speak. He won’t ask first, Seungcheol knows.

“It’s stupid,” Seungcheol begins.

“Okay.”

Seungcheol sighs. “I got dinner with that guy, you know the one I’ve been seeing?” He doesn’t bother with a name – he doesn’t want to say it and Jeonghan never remembers them anyway. Jeonghan nods.

“Did he…do something?” Jeonghan prompts, when Seungcheol doesn’t say anything else.

“He – he told me he didn’t want to see me anymore. It’s…like I said, it’s stupid.”

Jeonghan raises an eyebrow. “He couldn’t have told you that over the phone?”

There’s something sharp in his voice that Seungcheol picks up on. It shouldn’t, but it makes a spike of adrenaline shoot through Seungcheol. Everything just pours out of him then.

“It doesn’t matter. He told me at the end. He said he didn’t feel anything – for me. He said he’s been seeing other people. I guess he feels something for them. But not me. And – so that was it. I left.”

He sucks in a breath. He’s not crying but he’s not not crying. His eyes feel heavy and horrible. “I’m just tired of it. Why do I keep doing it?”

After a few seconds, Jeonghan jolts like he’s realized that Seungcheol expects a response. He doesn’t really, he’s just run out of things to say. He’s gotten to the crux of it. He’s already embarrassed by how much he’s said, by how heavy his eyes feel. He wants to crawl into bed and not be seen. He wants a hug but he doesn’t want to ask for it. He’s tired of asking – the first dates, the texts, calling Jeonghan every time for consolation. Seungcheol’s always asking for things and it makes him feel like an exposed nerve getting poked at.

“Cheollie,” Jeonghan says softly. He scoots up a little, lifting himself up onto his knees. His eyes are as big as ever, blinking at Seungcheol like a bug.

Seungcheol loves Jeonghan’s eyes. He gets distracted cataloging how his eyelashes clump together for a moment before he realizes that Jeonghan is looking at him like that because he’s started crying. He wipes roughly at his own eyes. His cheeks are wet. He’s an exposed nerve being poked. He’s embarrassed.

“I’m okay. Fuck this is embarrassing, it’s so stupid.”

Jeonghan shifts so he’s directly in front of Seungcheol’s legs and reaches out. His hands stop a couple of inches from making contact and he looks unsure, but then he just lets them settle on the sofa, close on either side of Seungcheol’s crossed legs.

“It’s not, Cheol,” Jeonghan says seriously. As serious as Seungcheol’s ever seen him, and that’s how he knows he must really look a mess. “It’ll happen. It’ll work out one day.”

“It’s different for you,” Seungcheol argues, rubbing at his nose miserably. “You don’t need – you don’t date.”

Jeonghan’s hands tense and flex. Seungcheol can feel it against the outsides of his thighs. He does some kind of aborted shrug, huffing out a short laugh. “Ah. I don’t know. We all need to revisit our convictions sometimes, don’t we?”

Seungcheol doesn’t know what that means. He can’t make sense of it through the haze of own distress, or how close Jeonghan is to him now.

Jeonghan’s looking at him with a particular look in his eye that Seungcheol responds to but doesn’t understand. It does something to him, the way Jeonghan’s eyes scan his face, following along the shape of it before settling on his mouth. Briefly. So quickly Seungcheol will wonder if he imagined it. It tugs at something in him, in his chest, low in his gut. For a second, he thinks Jeonghan is going to – but he doesn’t. Of course. He slaps the wide expanse of Seungcheol’s thigh softly, just once, and then settles back down on the floor.

“Did you actually eat on your date?” he asks, pulling out his phone.

Seungcheol shrugs. “Not really. We went to some vegan sushi place in Gangnam.”

Jeonghan wrinkles his nose. “Gross. He wasn’t the one, Cheollie.” And despite it all, Seungcheol barks out a laugh that feels too big for the room. He lets Jeonghan order him some chicken.

34 | csc

“Happy new year!!!” Mingyu crows as he throws open the door to the apartment for the umpteenth time to let in whoever has just arrived.

Seungcheol watches from where he’s leaning against the kitchen island with a beer in his hand. He’s talking to Haeun, who is sort of his date. Kinda sorta. They came together, but only because neither of them had someone to kiss at midnight. Haeun is in love with her yoga instructor anyway. She’s one of Seungcheol’s coworkers; she’s nice.

Jeonghan is across the room hanging off Jisoo, and he’s drunk. Jeonghan never gets drunk so Seungcheol has been watching him carefully ever since he noticed Jeonghan pick up his second glass of whiskey.

Haeun plucks a bottle of soju off the island next to them, which is crowded with bottles upon bottles of mismatched alcohol and waves it at Seungcheol with a raised eyebrow. When Seungcheol just shakes his head and waves her off, she shrugs and pours herself a glass.

There’s a loud pop on the other side of the room as Junhui opens a bottle of champagne and Seungcheol shakes his head fondly when Seungkwan marches over from the kitchen with a muttered that was supposed to be for the midnight toast, Moon Junhui!

“Hey hey,” Seungcheol calls out suddenly when he notices Jisoo, turning to grab his sleeve as he passes by. “Is Jeonghan okay?”

Jisoo stops and looks between Seungcheol and Haeun before letting his gaze rest on Seungcheol. He doesn’t know what that’s all about. Seungcheol turns to look at Haeun quickly to make sure he hadn’t cut her off mid-sentence or anything but he hadn’t; Haeun just looks bored, scrolling her phone with her soju in the other hand. Seungcheol faces Jisoo again.

“He seems pretty tipsy is all,” Seungcheol tries, laughing a little like it’s no big deal. It isn’t.

Jisoo sighs. “He’s fine. You know, though, why don’t you go check on him?”

Seungcheol’s eyes find Jeonghan’s shape quickly – he’s in the middle of the room. Kind of dancing next to Seokmin, Chan, and Soonyoung but also by himself.

“Yeah,” Seungcheol wets his lips. “Yeah maybe I’ll go over and check on him.”

Jisoo just snorts and continues on his path, snagging Wonwoo and dragging him out onto the balcony with him.

“I’m gonna go call someone,” Haeun says then, perfectly timed. She’s already bringing her phone up to her ear when she waves at Seungcheol. Probably going to call the yoga teacher. Good for her.

When Seungcheol crosses the room, Jeonghan has stopped dancing and is just kind of swaying happily in place. He smiles hugely at Seungcheol when they get close, and that’s how Seungcheol knows he’s well and truly drunk. Not that Jeonghan isn’t usually happy to see him. But usually Seungcheol has to gather that information from context clues. But here it is being offered to him, with the looseness of Jeonghan’s happiest face as he makes grabby hands in Seungcheol’s general direction.

“Hi, Hannie,” Seungcheol says fondly, letting himself be drawn in. “Happy new year.”

“Seungcheollie,” Jeonghan calls out, even though Seungcheol is comfortably in his space now. “I can’t believe I’m going to be thirty-four.”

Seungcheol laughs. He slides an arm around Jeonghan’s waist and just grabs at him under the guise of helping him keep steady. But then Jeonghan starts swaying them both. They’re dancing.

“You’re going to be thirty-four in October, Han. That’s practically a whole year from now. Remember?”

Jeonghan blinks at him, brow all crinkled up like he’s offended that Seungcheol dares argue with him. Then he leans forward and bites him, hard, on the shoulder.

“Ow!” Seungcheol yelps. He laughs in disbelief at the satisfied look on Jeonghan’s face and just rubs at the spot.

They go back to swaying. Jeonghan’s letting the full weight of his body depend on the solid weight of Seungcheol’s chest, buoy and anchor. A little whiskey sloshes out of his glass and onto Seungcheol’s foot, which is how Seungcheol remembers why he came over here in the first place.

He gently reaches for the glass, but Jeonghan makes an annoyed sound and pulls it out of reach.

“Why don’t we switch you to water, Jeonghannie?” Seungcheol murmurs it into Jeonghan’s ear like he’s coaxing a cat out of a corner.

Jeonghan bats his eyelashes at him, ridiculously, and then shakes his head with a grin. His hands come up around Seungcheol’s neck and Seungcheol feels the glass rest on the back of his neck, warm from where it’s been clutched in Jeonghan’s sweaty hands all night.

“Kissing her at midnight?” Jeonghan whispers the question into Seungcheol’s ear like it’s the second half of a sentence he’d already been saying. It takes Seungcheol a moment to parse.

“Who?”

Jeonghan makes a little huffing sound. “Your date.”

Seungcheol isn’t stupid. He recognizes it for what it is. It’s not jealousy, really, but Jeonghan does this. He’s territorial. He’d get into a pissing match with anyone over something he perceives as his. Like when he locked Chan out of the car one time until Chan admitted that Jeonghan is his favorite hyung. It’s like that. Sometimes he gets a little territorial over Seungcheol when it comes to his dates.

Seungcheol just rolls his eyes and squeezes the spot on Jeonghan’s hip where his hand rests. “That’s Haeun. You know her. She works with me.”

Jeonghan hums. Seungcheol tries again.

“Haeun is in love with her yoga instructor.”

“Well she should be in love with you, you’re her date!” Jeonghan grumbles, looking put out.

He’s so confusing so much of the time.

“What about you? Going to kiss Jisoo like you always do?”

“Joshuji keeps trying to escape before midnight,” Jeonghan pouts. “He keeps saying he has to get up early to jog tomorrow.” He says the word jog the way one might say murder kittens.

Seungcheol laughs and Jeonghan finishes off the rest of his whiskey. Then he tips the glass at Seungcheol to signal he’s going to get more. Seungcheol trails after him and waits while he tips more whiskey into his glass.

“Yah,” he calls out softly to get Jeonghan’s attention. “Why are you getting hammered?”

Jeonghan quirks an eyebrow before looking around the rest of the room where all of their friends are in various stages of drunk.

“It’s a party?” he says it with the kind of implied duh that he’s inherited from his decade-long friendship with Hong Jisoo.

Seungcheol gives up. It’s fine. Jeonghan isn’t hurting anyone and Seungcheol will just stick by his side for the rest of the night.

They wade back into the small crowd – it’s mostly their friends and their dates with a few of Mingyu and Jihoon’s coworkers mixed in. Everyone seems to be in a good mood.

“Have you seen Channie?” Soonyoung’s loud as fuck voice startles Seungcheol and he jumps back from where he’d been cozying up to Jeonghan. He looks around for a moment and then shakes his head.

“No, I haven’t.”

Jeonghan leans forward and says knowingly, “I saw him disappear into Mingyu and Jihoonie’s bedroom earlier. He wanted to lie down.”

Soonyoung pumps a fist in the air. “Great, I want to make out with him.”

Seungcheol laughs and shakes his head, sending Jeonghan the kind of look they often share that means kids. Like Soonyoung isn’t a year younger.

“Wish that were me,” Jeonghan says dreamily after Soonyoung disappears, and Seungcheol sputters. He can’t have heard that right.

“You wish you were making out with Chan?”

Jeonghan wrinkles his nose. “No, gross. He’s a baby.”

But he doesn’t elaborate. When Seungcheol asks, Jeonghan just goes, “Hmm? What?” but Seungcheol isn’t so sure that drunkenness can be blamed. When Jeonghan wants to drop a subject, the subject is dropped.

It’s getting closer to midnight now, and Seungcheol has spent the last half hour with Jeonghan doing their weird dance. That’s fine. That’s where he wants to be at midnight. Even if Jeonghan decides to kiss Jisoo, even if Seungcheol kisses Haeun, he’d assumed they’d be doing whatever they were doing next to one another.

Except Jisoo isn’t anywhere near here. Except Jeonghan has gotten very quiet, looking at Seungcheol through his bangs. His hair is black nowadays, even though he complains that it makes him boring.

“It’s almost midnight,” Seungcheol offers, looking around. Then down at his watch. “Well almost. Twenty minutes or so now.” He’s just making conversation.

“Seungcheol-ah,” Jeonghan murmurs, suddenly intense. “Seungcheollie, I…”

And he’s – he’s leaning in, eyelashes fluttering closed and making shadows on the apples of his cheeks. His mouth is getting closer. Seungcheol can’t stop looking at it, until his body takes over. He leans in a little too. It’s like something has been activated within him. Some code keyed in that syncs up with four years of being hardwired to want Yoon Jeonghan.

He’s going to kiss him. He and Jeonghan are going to kiss. They’re going to – Jeonghan wants to–

Their lips brush, so very barely that it’s almost nothing at all. Seungheol brings his hands up quickly, pushing gently but firmly on Jeonghan’s chest to put some space between them, before letting his hands rest on his shoulders.

“You don’t want to do that,” Seungcheol explains with a patience he doesn’t have because his heart is jackrabbiting in his chest. He gives Jeonghan a little shake and laughs at him kindly. Like ha ha, you are being so silly right now.

“Why?”

“Because, Jeonghan,” Seungcheol draws out. “You told me, remember? You don’t date. No dating in your thirties.” Never mind that kissing isn’t dating. Never mind that Jeonghan kisses Jisoo every year. It wouldn’t be that. Not with the two of them, and they both know that. Even drunk, Seungcheol knows that Jeonghan knows that.

“Nooooooooo that’s not why,” Jeonghan croons.

Seungcheol pauses. Like his whole body does – just everything stops and his hands clench at the fabric of Jeonghan’s shirt on either shoulder.

“What does that mean?” he asks carefully.

Jeonghan’s eyes are wide and he gulps, opening and closing his mouth comically like a drunk goldfish. Then he snaps his mouth shut and giggles. It’s a little bit of a scoff, a little bit of a giggle.

“It wasn’t a good place for it with you all…like that. You know,” he says, like any of that makes any sense at all. When Seungcheol just makes a face at him, he gets annoyed. Like it’s Seungcheol’s fault their communication isn’t the best right now.

“Ugh, I’m gonna be sick,” Jeonghan says, and he does look a little green. Seungcheol’s hands slide down to take him by the wrists and gently tug him over to the ratty loveseat in the corner by the sliding glass door.

“Okay?” he murmurs, ducking his head to look at Jeonghan when they get settled.

Jeonghan nods. He smacks his lips together a few times. He really doesn’t drink like this. Seungcheol’s never seen him so properly drunk.

He looks around to see if there are any abandoned glasses of water nearby. He fears what might happen if he actually gets up to go to the kitchen. Jun catches his eye a few paces away and Seungcheol mouths water? at him, nodding his thanks when Jun brings him a glass.

Seungcheol forces the glass into Jeonghan’s hand and makes him drink, ignoring his eye roll. Jeonghan’s throat bobs as he drains the cup and then lets out a breath when he’s finished, pushing the glass back in Seungcheol’s direction.

“You were saying?” he prompts, and Jeonghan just smiles at him serenely.

“What what?”

“Jeonghan-ah,” Seungcheol sighs. He can’t believe a few minutes ago Jeonghan tried to — and now they’re here. Jeonghan’s mouth is wet. Seungcheol sighs again and twists a little to set the empty water glass down on a nearby table.

“You just wanted it so bad, Cheollie,” Jeonghan says then, and Seungcheol turns back to look at him. He feels a little bit like when you put water in a shallow pan and let it simmer. He becomes aware that whatever Jeonghan says next has the potential to ruin everything.

“Wanted…it,” he repeats. He’s watching Jeonghan’s mouth, as if physically seeing the words form is the only way to make sure he doesn’t misunderstand.

Jeonghan leans into him as he talks. “You know…you were just so…” eager, he doesn’t say. It’s the word that forms but doesn’t fall but Seungcheol sees it plain as day.

It must show on his face because Jeonghan scoots closer to him immediately. He’s so warm. He smells like whiskey and the citrusy cologne he’s been wearing since the night they met. And the thing is that he’s saying so many horrible things but he’s also Seungcheol’s best friend. He’s his best friend.

“You didn’t want to date me…because I wanted to date you?” Seungcheol says slowly.

It’s fucked up Jeonghan logic, and it makes perfect sense to Seungcheol. That’s the worst part. He’s not even upset. He feels like he skipped a step going down the stairs, but he’s not upset.

But Jeonghan is shaking his head vehemently.

“Nooooooo,” he says again. His nose is scrunched up cutely like it always is when he’s frustrated by Seungcheol being obtuse. “You didn’t want me.”

Seungcheol barks out a laugh before he can help it. “I-”

Jeonghan slaps a hand over his mouth. The skin of his palm is sweaty and horrible. Seungcheol shakes his head violently to get away from it.

“You didn’t want me. You just wanted anyone,” and then, as if Seungcheol isn’t completely rooted to the spot looking at him in mild horror, he giggles. Giggles. It’s so incongruent to everything else that it successfully puts a stopper on Seungcheol’s tumbling thoughts, such dangerous ones like I have never once not wanted you.

“It was a date mixer, Cheol. I was there and handsome and close to you and you wanted me then. But you wanted Jisoo and whoever else too.” He waves his hand, like he means to gesture to all the someone elses Seungcheol had supposedly flirted with that night four fucking years ago. If he’s being honest, he barely remembers it. There had been so many dating mixers. To Seungcheol, it was simply the night he met Jeonghan.

And he just – Jeonghan sits back with his hands in his lap and just shrugs. He takes another sip of his drink. There’s a flurry of movement in the room, and then Seungkwan and Mingyu are trying to stand on the same kitchen chair to announce that it’s one minute to midnight.

Seungcheol looks around the room. Jihoon stomps over and drags Mingyu down from the chair with a chastising look and immediately gets scooped up, Mingyu’s arms wrapped around his much smaller torso. Chan and Soonyoung…well Chan and Soonyoung are probably fucking in Jihoon and Mingyu’s bed right now. Various other people in various combinations are getting close, laughing as the countdown starts. Seungkwan has pulled Hansol up onto the chair now, teetering with their arms linked and champagne in their hands. Getting ready to kiss.

When Seungcheol turns his head, he meets Jeonghan’s glassy eyes. He doesn’t know how to read them, whether because Jeonghan is drunk or because the last fifteen minutes have shifted things so exponentially that Seungcheol no longer speaks the language of Jeonghan.

“10…9…8…!” the room chants around them, filled with the kind of hopeful energy that only exists in the flash of time that sits on either side of midnight on New Years Eve.

“Seungcheollie,” Jeonghan calls softly. Voice lilting up like he’s going to say more but then he goes silent.

And it’s then that Seungcheol knows that he’s going to wipe this moment from his mind. The kiss, the talk. The hazy smell of alcohol and oranges. Sober Jeonghan wouldn’t be doing any of this because sober Jeonghan – whether he feels like this or not – doesn’t want to kiss Seungcheol. That’s the decision he’s made and has kept making for four years. And Seungcheol, he wants to keep Jeonghan. He’s going to keep him. So he has to forget.

“5…4…3…!”

“Jeonghan-ah,” Seungcheol calls out then. His voice creaks. When Jeonghan’s eyes flick up, Seungcheol plasters a smile on his face. “I think Jisoo wants a midnight kiss.”

Jisoo probably doesn’t care if either of them live or die at this point. He’s out on the balcony talking to Wonwoo, both of them completely ignoring the celebration happening just on this side of the sliding door. But the distraction works.

Jeonghan bolts upright and jumps to his feet.

“2…1…Happy new year!” The room explodes with noise around them. Someone pulls out a foghorn. Through the glass, Seungcheol sees Jisoo and Wonwoo jump in surprise and then laugh when Jeonghan pushes open the sliding door with too much force and launches himself at a giggling Jisoo, kissing him square on the mouth while Wonwoo pretends to gag.

35 | csc

Jeonghan introduces them all to Yunseo one day in August. Two weeks after Seungcheol’s birthday. He’s fidgety when he does, standing by the bar with a glass of whiskey in one hand and the arm of a taller man wrapped around his waist. Jeonghan doesn’t even drink whiskey. When he introduces Yunseo and says we’ve been seeing each other. A few weeks now. Seungcheol wonders if Jeonghan had waited to tell him so that he didn’t ruin Seungcheol’s birthday and then cringes at himself.

Seungcheol doesn’t say anything while Jihoon and Mingyu step in to wave to Yunseo and ask him questions about himself. Jeonghan doesn’t look at him.

Later that week when Seungcheol drops by Mingyu and Jihoon’s after work to drop off the chef’s knife that Mingyu had left in Seungcheol kitchen last time he’d cooked for their big monthly dinner, he gets called into Jihoon’s studio-slash-gaming room on his way out.

When Jihoon calls out to him, Seungcheol pops his head through the open crack in the door, eyebrows raised. “Yeah?”

At first Jihoon doesn’t say anything, he just looks at Seungcheol silently. When he finally speaks, it’s like it pains him. “Are you okay?”

Escape isn’t really an option, but Seungcheol nearly just leaves without acknowledging that Jihoon has said anything at all. Because he knows exactly what he’s asking. The reason everyone has given him a wide berth all week. The reason Jeonghan keeps Facetiming him at odd hours throughout the day, trying to surprise Seungcheol into answering when he can’t bring himself to open any of Jeonghan’s messages.

Seungcheol sags against the doorframe. He hums but doesn’t say anything else.

Jihoon turns slightly in his chair and drums his fingertips on the top of his desk. Finally he says, “It’s not as noble as you think it is. Pining after him all this time.”

A grotesque laugh bursts out of Seungcheol. “I don’t think I’m being noble. I think I’ve been realistic. He told me from the start that he wasn’t interested. I stopped…thinking about him that way a long time ago.”

“Hyung.” Jihoon levels him with a look over the top of his glasses. “You’re holding him to something he said five years ago after a bad breakup. People change.”

“Yeah. Clearly.” Because yeah. That’s the thing. Isn’t it? It’s not that Jeonghan didn’t want to date. He didn’t want to date Seungcheol. It doesn’t matter what Jeonghan said or didn’t say while drunk last New Years. It’s been a year and he hasn’t said anything since. Not that Seungcheol thinks about it. It doesn’t matter.

“It doesn’t matter,” he says firmly. “It’s okay, Jihoon-ah. I’m okay. It’s good, right? He deserves someone.”

One of Seungcheol’s favorite things about Jihoon has always been that he doesn’t feel the need to fill silence. He chooses his words with purpose, like he’s sorting through them in his mind, picking them up, and neatly putting them in a row. He’s sharp, precise. But times like these, Seungcheol finds himself wishing that Jihoon was careless. He wishes there was a larger margin for error, wiggle room in whatever he says next to let Seungcheol off easy.

When Jihoon speaks, there’s a kindness underlying it that makes something curdle within Seungcheol.

“Sometimes things take time, hyung.”

“Yeah well.” Seungcheol brings his hand up to his mouth, bites at his cuticle. If Jeonghan were here, he’d slap his hand away. He knows all about Seungcheol’s habits, which ones he wants to break. “They can also take too long. Time runs out.”

Seungcheol has always believed in fairness. In welcoming strangers. He’s always loved meeting people, making friends. All his life, he’s always been trying to keep his heart open.

He doesn’t like Yunseo. He won’t pretend it’s for any reason other than he’s always around, always touching Jeonghan. He treats him well, like he deserves. He holds Jeonghan’s hand when he meets them for dinner, he puts a hand on the small of Jeonghan’s back when they move from room to room. He’s soft spoken and kind, and he never gets jealous that Jeonghan continues to spend most of his free time with Seungcheol. It’s more than can be said for any of the people Seungcheol have dated, who have all seemed to pick up on the fact that they’re always going to be in competition with Jeonghan for Seungcheol’s attention.

Not Yunseo. He thinks it’s cute, their friendship. He says as much one night when it’s just the three of them — a combination Seungcheol tries to avoid and fails because he refuses to give up opportunities to see Jeonghan.

“It’s so nice that Hannie has you, Seungcheol-ssi.” Yunseo smiles at him from across the small table, fingers grasping for Jeonghan’s hand on the tabletop.

Seungcheol doesn’t like Yunseo. Hates hates hates him. It isn’t good for him, how much he hates him. It feels rancid.

Yunseo doesn’t get jealous at all. Worse men would be suspicious; they would have doubts about their relationship with Jeonghan in the face of what Jeonghan and Seungcheol share. They would make accusations. Seungcheol knows from experience. But not Yunseo. Because there’s nothing to worry about.

Maybe Seungcheol’s partners had all reacted the way they did because it’s obvious to anyone with eyes that Seungcheol is in love with Jeonghan. Anyone looking at Seungcheol when he’s looking at Jeonghan would know that he’s imagining a different life. Some impossible life that he wants so bad it feels like knives in him; a future he and Jeonghan earn together, laugh lines around Jeonghan’s eyes that Seungcheol gets to take credit for.

But when Yunseo looks at Jeonghan and Seungcheol, he just sees the two of them as they are: Jeonghan and Seungcheol. Best friends. He may see the way Seungcheol looks at Jeonghan but it doesn’t really matter if Jeonghan isn’t looking at Seungcheol back.

And that’s the rub. Seungcheol finds himself hating Yunseo because he gets to have Jeonghan. But more than that, he hates that Yunseo bears witness to what Seungcheol has always known: that he’s alone in the particular kind of love he feels for Jeonghan. That Seungcheol’s love is a lonely one.

39 | yjh

Living with Seungkwan and Hansol is interesting. He feels a little bit like their cat. They’re nice to him, they feed him. They also treat him like they’re not sure how he’ll react to anything, which spots are okay to pat and which are to be left alone. And they shut the door in his face at night when they want to have sex.

Jeonghan makes a home for himself in their living room. He’s a terrible houseguest, always has been. Yunseo used to complain whenever they traveled, because Jeonghan would unpack all of his things and leave them on every surface of the hotel room even if they were only staying overnight. At Seungkwan’s place, he leaves a bag under the coffee table with all of his clothes in it. Some of his socks end up shoved into the side of Seungkwan’s magazine rack. Seungkwan’s eye twitches but he doesn’t complain. It’s annoying. Jeonghan doesn’t want kid gloves. He doesn’t want anyone to be weird around him. If he wanted that, he would have stayed with – he would have stayed somewhere else.

Seungcheol. Jeonghan forces himself to think his name with intention. He’s back in the same city as him, he’s staying with Seungcheol’s friends. He’s going to have to see him eventually, he wants to see him. Seungcheol. They have things to talk about.

“You’re treating me like your cat that’s gotten divorced.”

Seungkwan looks up from the crossword he’d been doing on his phone when Jeonghan plops down on the couch next to him. “What?”

“All cats kind of have divorced energy,” Hansol comments thoughtfully, arm slung across Seungkwan’s shoulders.

Jeonghan sighs and lets himself melt further into the couch until more of his body is on the floor than on the cushion. “I mean,” he exhales, “that it’s fine. You don’t have to be weird around me.”

“We’re not!” Seungkwan’s eyes widen. He turns sideways on the couch to face Jeonghan fully, even though Jeonghan is on his way to fully lying on the floor now. “But it would be understandable, hyung. If you were having a tough time. You know, with the divorce. Moving back here. And you’ve always been weird about being forty.”

“I’m 39,” Jeonghan corrects. Rounding up is only okay when he does it.

Hansol laughs and slaps Seungkwan on the thigh. Then he gives Jeonghan a salute and he’s gone, off the couch and disappearing into the kitchen.

“Hyung,” Seungkwan says tentatively after a beat. At the sound of his voice, Jeonghan twists in place so that he’s leaning on his elbow and looking up at him. Seungkwan licks his lips, looking unsure. “Are you going to see–”

Jeonghan groans and throws a hand up.

“Yes, yes. I’m going to see him okay? I’m going to see Seungcheol. Since everyone is so obsessed over it.”

Seungkwan presses his lips together, silent for a moment, and then he says. “I was going to ask if you were going to see any apartments soon.”

“Oh.”

“But now that you mention it…”

“Kwan-ah.” Jeonghan sighs. He pushes himself until he’s sitting upright, every joint in his body creaking desperately when he moves.

“I texted him,” Jeonghan lies, staring Seungkwan down. He doesn’t waver when Seungkwan just raises an eyebrow at him in challenge.

“Oh? What did he say?”

“He didn’t reply.”

Seungkwan lightly kicks at Jeonghan’s knee with his toe. “Ha! Bullshit. Choi Seungcheol would never not reply to you.”

True enough, before. Now…well.

“I’m working up to it.”

When Seungkwan goes to bed, Jeonghan steals a beer from their fridge and curls around his phone on the couch. He brings the screen so close to his face that it’s just a bright blur, screen open to the chat that hasn’t been used since he’d texted Seungcheol for Seollal and just gotten a thx in reply. He types like that, just muscle memory over the keyboard but unable to actually see what he sends.

Text sent. The beer is half gone, already giving him heartburn, and his hands are shaking. He drops the phone to his chest and squeezes his eyes shut. Why the fuck did he do that.

His phone buzzes gently on his sternum within five minutes and he panics and flings it across the room.

Seungkwan calls out to him through the bedroom door and Jeonghan groans, embarrassed.

“I’m fine!”

He hops off the couch to retrieve the phone, keeping it face down. It buzzes again. He downs the rest of the beer, drops the empty can on the table, and curls around his phone again. He takes a deep breath and flips it over.

To CheollieCheollieCheollie

Hey

From CheollieCheollieCheollie

???

Is everything okay?

Jeonghan?

It’s like a hot, wet spear through his chest. Painful. Funny enough, after everything, it’s more than he expects. Worse. Seungcheol’s last real text is sitting higher up in the chat, just before the Seollal exchange. A bare ha ha ha in response to some stupid joke Jeonghan had sent him to try to keep something going. It’s dated last year. And then, on the screen, today’s date and time. Messages from a few seconds ago. Three dots pop up and disappear.

To: CheollieCheollieCheollie

Seungcheol. Hey.

The phone rings. Jeonghan panics again but this time he grips his phone tighter. He should have known. It’s almost funny. Hysterical, even. Choi Seungcheol never changes. The most consistent thing in Jeonghan’s life for almost a full decade.

“Hi,” Jeonghan whispers into the phone when he accepts the call. Immediately, Seungcheol starts speaking furiously.

“What’s wrong? Are you okay? Are you in Daegu?”

His voice. It’s still the same. It’s like a bell ringing out that tells Jeonghan it’s time to go to wherever he is. To press his nose against the shape of him. After all this time, all this fucking time.

He breathes in shallowly. “No, I’m not. I’m – I’m in Seoul.”

It’s quiet on the other end of the line. When Seungcheol speaks again, his voice is even. The urgency has seeped out of it, leaving nothing.

“How come?”

Rip off the bandage.

“I’ve moved back. We – I’m living here.” He’s answered by more silence. He clears his throat, wrapping his fingers more tightly around his phone. “Seungcheol-ah?”

There’s a faint click and out of the corner of his eye, he can see his phone screen change. The grid of his home screen laughs at him when he pulls it away from his face to check. Seungcheol’s hung up on him.

He sees Seungkwan again in the morning, sitting at the bar in his boxers drinking orange juice watching old MNET performances on his phone while Hansol putters around the kitchen like a zombie.

“I’m going to get him back,” Jeonghan announces.

They both look at him. Hansol looks like he needs about twelve more hours of sleep before he’ll even think about entertaining this conversation, but Seungkwan looks mildly impressed. And that’s friendship, Jeonghan thinks. He’s standing in their kitchen in bunny pajamas.

Seungkwan takes a sip of his juice and sets his phone down. “You never had him in the first place.”

“Oof, that’s harsh, Boo,” Hansol whistles. He nods at Jeonghan – Hansol’s way of showing support – before kissing Seungkwan on the head and grabbing his phone off the table on his way to the bedroom.

Left alone, Jeonghan and Seungkwan let Jeonghan’s declaration settle between them. He takes the spot next to Seungkwan at the bar and peers curiously at the paused phone screen. Red Velvet.

“Okay, tell me,” Seungkwan says softly, and he’s looking at Jeonghan with soft, understanding eyes.

Jeonghan takes a deep breath and tells Seungkwan about his conversation with Seungcheol last night, up to and including getting hung up on.

“So…let me get this straight,” Seungkwan says slowly. “You texted him, scared him out of his mind so he called you. You did not tell him you got divorced, and then he hung up on you…and that’s when you knew you needed to have him?”

Jeonghan opens his mouth and then closes it again. Waits. Then he says, “Yeah.”

Seungkwan sighs and drums his fingernails on the countertop.

“Wait,” Jeonghan says, frowning. “You didn’t tell him about the divorce?”

“Hyung. Do you know what kind of hoops we all jump through to avoid bringing you up to him? He gets so mopey.”

Jeonghan throws his head back and groans. “Seungkwannie, no wonder he hung up on me.” Seungcheol probably thought that Jeonghan had moved back to Seoul with a husband.

“Do you think if he’d known you were divorced he’d – what?” Seungkwan pitches his voice low in a ridiculous imitation of Seungcheol. “‘Come over right now, baby’? Besides, you need to be the one to tell him.”

Jeonghan scrunches his nose up and sighs. He reaches over and steals Seungkwan’s juice glass, taking the last sip of orange juice. He just laughs when Seungkwan tells him, “That was all backwash anyway,” while side-eyeing him.

But then Seungkwan’s face takes on a sober expression and he clears his throat. He’s gentle when he speaks – back to handling Jeonghan with kid gloves but this time Jeonghan finds he doesn’t mind so much.

“You’ve missed a lot, you know,” Seungkwan warns. “He hasn’t just been waiting for you. He worked really hard to move on after you left. He’s going to have questions. And you need to have answers.”

Jeonghan looks down at his hands, picks at his cuticles. Then he nods. “I know.”

Seungkwan hums. “What are the answers, by the way? You never told me why you – you know.”

Jeonghan lets his cheeks fill up with air and then releases it all at once, hunching over a little in his seat. He’s explained this to so few people. Mostly because he doesn’t think he comes off looking particularly nice.

“I–” he starts helplessly. “I did love him. Yunseo.”

“Okay,” Seungkwan says.

“I just didn’t – I wasn’t…and he knew that. Probably knew for longer than I did. But I was such a fucking coward, Seungkwan.” Jeonghan swallows, feeling his face heat with emotion. Then, very quietly, he admits. “I think if he hadn’t been the one to end it, I’d still be married.”

“Oh, hyung.” Seungkwan slides off his stool and steps closer so he can wrap an arm around Jeonghan. Jeonghan lets himself lean into it.

“You need to be really, really sure, hyung,” Seungkwan says into his hair. He’s being gentle with Jeonghan still, but his voice is firm. “With Seungcheollie-hyung. If you’re not serious…”

“I am.” Jeonghan says, voice unwavering. “I am serious about him.”

Seungkwan steps away to look at him. Whatever he sees in Jeonghan’s expression makes his shoulders settle, and he nods. “Okay. You know where he works, right? His office moved.”

Jeonghan smiles weakly at him. He hasn’t cried, but he feels so tired from the effort of avoiding it. “Thanks, Kwannie.”

36 | csc

He should have known something was up when Jeonghan asked him to take a weekend trip to Nami Island. In six years of friendship, Jeonghan has never asked Seungcheol to travel with him. It’s not that Jeonghan doesn’t like to travel, Seungcheol knows. They’ve been on trips with some of their friends: to Busan, one time to Jeju to spend a weekend at Seungkwan’s family’s home. But never once on Jeonghan’s request. Jeonghan just isn’t the type to make swings, big or small. He’s not impulsive. Seungcheol loves that about him. The way he moves through life is steady and unchanging.

Showing up at Seungcheol’s door, eyes a little bit wild, bag slung over his shoulder with the corner of one shirt cuff sticking out where it got caught in the zipper and asking Seungcheol to take a trip with him – that feels impulsive.

It’s only half past eight and Seungcheol is still bleary eyed and unsteady on his feet. He looks dumbly down at his basketball shorts and ratty t-shirt and then back up at Jeonghan, uncomprehending.

“Wha–?”

Jeonghan shoves past him impatiently and drops his stuff in the doorway. He immediately heads for the bedroom, and when Seungcheol follows him in there he finds Jeonghan rooting through Seungcheol’s drawers to grab underwear and socks.

“Jeonghan-ah,” Seungcheol says cautiously. He doesn’t understand what’s going on. “Is everything okay? What are you doing here?”

He’d seen Jeonghan just two nights ago, on a rare Yunseo-free evening at the hole-in-the-wall kalguksu spot they’ve been going to for years. Jeonghan had been fine, easy-going. He hadn’t been worried about anything, just telling Seungcheol about his latest work project and the dinner plans he had with Yunseo the next night.

“Let’s take a trip, Seungcheollie. Namiseom – my friend has a house there he said I can stay at for the night. If we leave now we can be there by noon.”

Jeonghan reaches under Seungcheol’s bed to drag out the duffle he keeps under there and starts shoving clothes in it. Seungcheol watches, transfixed, as Jeonghan reaches into Seungcheol’s nightstand to grab his night guard and the little pill box of pain meds he keeps in there. Because Seungcheol gets headaches, especially when he travels.

Seungcheol springs forward and catches Jeonghan’s elbow, gently holding him still. Jeonghan looks at him with wide eyes. He wiggles his eyebrows a little and grins.

“You’ve always wanted to see the trees,” Jeonghan says a little helplessly. His eyes are sparkling, he looks happy. Excited.

Seungcheol bites down a smile. “I have always wanted to see the trees.”

He takes the duffle from Jeonghan and shoos him out into the living area, leaving Seungcheol standing in his bedroom and looking at the pile of mismatched socks on his bed feeling a little bewildered. With a sigh, he starts filling his dopp kit with his toiletries.

He’s feeling more awake once his overnight bag is packed and he’s splashed water on his face. Jeonghan’s waiting on his sofa, and Seungcheol feels a little thrill run through him when he waves his duffel in the air to indicate that he’s packed and ready and Jeonghan whips his head around expectantly at the sound. Jeonghan’s taking him away for the weekend.

“Are any of the others coming?” Seungcheol makes himself ask. He doesn’t say Yunseo’s name but he knows it’s implied, because that’s just how things are now.

Jeonghan shakes his head. “No. Just us.”

Downstairs in the parking garage of Seungcheol’s building, Jeonghan beeps a key fob a couple of times and follows the honks to a rental car. He rented a car for this. Seungcheol takes the keys from him wordlessly and Jeonghan slides into the passenger seat, and Seungcheol has a hundred questions he wants to ask.

He’s taking the exit out of Seoul proper when he relaxes into the seat a little more. Next to him, Jeonghan is looking out the passenger side window, head turning ever so slightly to follow the disappearing skyline.

“Jeonghan-ah,” Seungcheol starts tentatively, licking his lips. Jeonghan hums for him to go ahead.

“Did…did you and Yunseo break up?”

He sees Jeonghan stiffen. “No.”

“Okay.”

It feels like the kind of impulsive move that Seungcheol or Jisoo would make after a break up, is all. He can’t say for sure what Jeonghan typically does when a relationship ends, of course. It would be a first. But it’s what Seungcheol would do.

He doesn’t ask any more questions because that had been his most realistic guess and all of the other possibilities floating through his mind are delusional. Romantic confessions on the beach, beneath the trees. Over ice cream. He doesn’t let himself linger on any of them, but he thinks them. Quickly and secretly, like flashes of prizes behind secret closed doors. Like Jeonghan’s eyes falling to his mouth that night two years ago, a drunken countdown to midnight. He just turns up the radio and laughs when Jeonghan sings along.

They get to the island just after noon because Jeonghan insists on stopping for rest stop fried potatoes. He reaches over and feeds one to Seungcheol while he drives and Seungcheol scolds him playfully when he leaves a grease smear on his cheek.

When they arrive, they drop all of their stuff at the cottage that Jeonghan’s friend has let them use for the night. It’s nice. Small. Two full-size beds squeezed into a bedroom much too cramped for them. Jeonghan immediately unpacks every single item in his suitcase. Seungcheol watches in amazement as he fills the entire cottage with all of his clutter, as if they’re staying a month and not just 24 hours. It’s annoying and inconsiderate and endearing. The cottage feels a little more homey.

“What?” Jeonghan asks innocently, spreading all of his skincare bottles across the bathroom vanity.

Seungcheol just smiles and shakes his head. “Nothing.”

They go to the nature reserve. The trees are beautiful. Seungcheol really has always wanted to see them, ever since his parents visited on an anniversary trip and sent him photos. He stands under them with Jeonghan and they both tilt their heads back to look. Around them, couples are taking photos, pressing mouths together, cheeks. Seungcheol feels self-indulgent so he brings his phone up to take a selfie, dragging Jeonghan closer to him by the loose fabric of his t-shirt.

He holds up the screen to show the photo to Jeonghan, who smiles.

“Send it to me,” he murmurs, and then he’s turning away to walk along the path.

There’s a small visitor center and gift shop that they browse for a little while. Seungcheol spots a row of postcards at the checkout counter and picks out one that’s inexplicably covered in dancing tigers. He waves it at Jeonghan and laughs. “For Soonyoungie?” and Jeonghan nods.

There’s a big cafe with a garden where they grab an early dinner. It’s all so nice. Seungcheol loves being a tourist. They talk about work, about whether or not Seungcheol should adopt a dog, about Seungkwan and Hansol’s new apartment that they plan to move into next week. Outside, the sun is sinking in the sky but not quite ready to set. For a few moments, he feels almost unbearably young. He wonders what it would have been like if they’d met as teenagers. As children running around the playground with dirt on their knees.

The beach is close by, and the route back to their cottage is a short walk from there, so they decide to go before calling it a night. Jeonghan starts looking antsy again. When they find a bench by the riverbank he sits with his hands in his lap, fidgeting.

“It’s so nice here, really,” Seungcheol says wistfully, looking down the long line of the river and the rough pebbled sand that runs alongside it. He smiles at Jeonghan. “We should do stuff like this more. Maybe we can go to Jeju again.”

“Seungcheol, I have something to tell you.” Jeonghan’s throat bobs when he swallows.

Seungcheol scoots closer, feeling genuinely concerned now. He takes one of Jeonghan’s hands in his and holds it in his lap. “Hey. You can tell me anything, okay?”

Jeonghan stares at him and his hand twitches where it’s enclosed between Seungcheol’s palms.

“I’m engaged. Yunseo and I are getting married.”

Seungcheol thinks he’ll hear it over and over again and again forever. It has a horrible cadence to it, the way it echoes in his ears. His stomach drops.

“Oh…”

Jeonghan doesn’t say anything else. He just waits. When Seungcheol’s hands go slack, he takes his hand out of Seungcheol’s lap and tucks it between his own thighs.

“When did you…” Seungcheol’s voice sounds flat to his own ears and Jeonghan blanches but recovers quickly.

“Last night. He – he asked me and I said yes. I haven’t told anyone else yet.”

Seungcheol’s thoughts race. It feels like time folds in on itself. Last night. That’s why they’re here. Jeonghan wanted some place to break the news.

He’d been so ridiculous. So embarrassing. Like a dog who thinks he’s going to the park on the way to the vet to get his shots. He should have known. He should have – how ridiculous he is.

Jeonghan knows. That’s the thing that Seungcheol thinks immediately and then can’t stop once he does. Jeonghan knows how Seungcheol feels about him, how deep it goes. He knows what Seungcheol has tried so hard to pretend isn’t true. Why else would he do all this? Why else would he look at Seungcheol like that while he says it?

“Listen,” Jeonghan says then, and he’s looking at Seungcheol with a bare, pleading expression that Seungcheol’s never seen before. He turns more fully to face Seungcheol on the bench. “Will you be my best man?”

When Seungcheol says nothing, Jeonghan starts rambling. “It’ll be in Thailand, not here, obviously. But you won’t have to pay for anything. You and Jisoo will have to split the role – you know Shua, he’d kill me if I didn’t pick him. But–”

“No.”

“Hmm?”

Seungcheol takes a deep breath. “Jeonghan. I can’t do that.”

“Oh. Huh. Wow. I don’t think you’ve ever said no to me,” Jeonghan jokes. He reaches up to rake a hand through his hair. His ears are bright red.

Seungcheol laughs humorlessly. “I know. First time for everything.”

“Okay.” Jeonghan slides his hands up and down his own thighs, fidgeting, before standing up. He looks down at Seungcheol, then out at the beach, and then he turns and takes a few steps in the general direction of their cottage. Then, he stops, sets his shoulders, and turns back.

“Why?”

“What?”

“Why can’t you be my best man? Why can’t you do that?”

Jeonghan has been cruel to Seungcheol a dozen times over but never like this. Intentionally. Jeonghan’s cruelty has been something Seungcheol takes upon himself, like a toddler who can’t stop reaching out to touch a hot stove. Never something Jeonghan would do to Seungcheol; just the cruelty of his proximity. The way he looks at Seungcheol from time to time. But this – it hurts. Because Jeonghan knows.

Seungcheol can feel a particular kind of tightness behind his eyes and he needs to be thousands of kilometers away from here.

He stands up. The thirty seconds or so that he stands there in silence blinking at Jeonghan feel more like an hour. Finally, he shakes his head and says, surely, “Fuck you. You know why.”

He brushes past Jeonghan and walks as quickly as he can back to the cottage. Dopp kit, duffel. The stupid postcard he bought for Soonyoung. He grabs it all and calls a cab to take him to the train station, hoping he can get the last train back to Seoul. He doesn’t care, he’ll sleep in the station. He’s working hard every second to fight the impulse to check on Jeonghan, to let him know what he’s doing. To reassure him that he’ll text him when he arrives safely. It’s a struggle, a fight against his conditioning.

Jeonghan doesn’t follow him, whether because he’s too busy fuming on his own or because he knows Seungcheol needs space. Seungcheol has enough time to pack his things, sit on one of the still-made beds and choke out a pathetic cry, and then pour himself into a cab. Jeonghan doesn’t follow. For days, weeks, months, years, Seungcheol will wonder what might have happened if he had.

39 | yjh

He gets a text from Yunseo telling him that he has a few last-minute things of Jeonghan’s to send along to Seoul. Just a few knick-knacks, some photos, and asks for Seungkwan and Hansol’s address. Jeonghan had grabbed all of his most treasured junk when he’d left their shared apartment – his gachapons from their last trip to Tokyo, the pet rock he’d bought as a gag but then started putting in little outfits, a photo he’d taken with his parents when he was little. He doesn’t know what else he could have left behind, but he sends back a thumbs up but forgets the address entirely.

He swipes out of the chat and lets his thumb hover over his chat with Seungcheol from the other night. The last message is still sitting there. Seungcheol. Hey. Jeonghan types several things and erases them. He’s trying really hard not to be a coward these days and laying it all on the line in a KKT chatroom doesn’t feel very brave.

He hauls himself up and sneaks into Hansol and Seungkwan’s bedroom. He shucks off his pajamas, treats himself to some of Seungkwan’s expensive bubble bath. When he sinks into the tub, letting the sudsy water soothe his aching muscles, he takes one long, deep breath. He thinks about his ex-husband. He thinks about Seungcheol.

Jeonghan has always liked to think of his life like a steady stream. Something that just flows along, carrying him forward towards a certain direction. He might not know what’s at the end but he knows the movement. He’s content to sit there, gliding down the smooth surface of undisturbed waters.

Ten years ago, Choi Seungcheol had been a wayward pebble he didn’t expect. It had scared him: the unpredictable nature of skipping stones. Ripples that get bigger and bigger, stretching out beyond his line of sight.

It had been unfair, is the thing. He knows. To want Seungcheol to only want him from the moment they’d met. To put him through a series of mysterious tests that only he understood, setting Seungcheol up to fail every time while secretly hoping that he wouldn’t. Like preemptively taking their relationship and sending it through a rock tumbler for multiple passes until it’s smooth and perfect, as if that’s possible.

He’d described it that way to Jisoo once, when they’d both had one too many mimosas at Chan and Soonyoung’s engagement party, a few months after the New Years party when Jeonghan got drunk and tried to kiss Seungcheol. It had been a year of Jeonghan drinking more than he should at parties.

“With Seungcheol…I couldn’t ruin it. It has to be sure.”

Jisoo had told him it was the stupidest thing he’d ever heard. “You don’t get to avoid all the shitty relationship stuff that we all have to deal with, Jeonghan. That’s not how it works.”

Jeonghan is so tired of his own bullshit.

Seungkwan would say it’s the divorce. Or that it’s that he’s closer to 40 than he could ever picture himself being. Maybe it’s both of those things. It probably is. There had been times when he would stand in front of the sink doing the dishes, and he’d cock his hip out slightly to the left and pull a certain face, and he’d feel like his mother. Or, sometimes, when driving he’d get impatient in traffic and Yunseo would let out a little laugh and say he sounded just like his father.

Not good or bad things, but true things. There’s a truth in them that speaks to time passing. And somewhere along the way, he’s come to the realization that he’s not interested in time passing any more if Seungcheol isn’t caught up in it with him. If he has to get older, he wants Seungcheol to see it. None of these are new thoughts, but he’s been looking at them through gaps in his fingers instead of head-on. They take full shape in front of him now. He can’t avoid them. He doesn’t want to. It’s why he’s come back to Seoul. Jeonghan’s tired of his own bullshit.

He groans out loud and squeezes more of the bubble bath into the water before bringing his knees up and letting his back slide against porcelain until his head goes under.

Jeonghan gives Seungcheol a week after the phone call before he decides he’s had enough of waiting. They’re too old for this. He goes to Seungcheol’s new office building on Monday morning. He lies sweetly to the front desk so that they’ll page Seungcheol for him.

“My brother? Really?”

They’re the first words Seungcheol says to him in a long time. Jeonghan turns around and there he is, neat grey suit and shiny black shoes standing in the middle of the lobby. He’s staring at Jeonghan like he’s seeing a ghost.

“Seungcheol-ah.” Jeonghan nods. “Can we talk?”

Seungcheol sighs. He strides past Jeonghan toward the exit, waving for him to follow. His new office building has a small courtyard where a few employees are eating early lunches. There’s a small fountain surrounded by stone benches and Jeonghan takes a seat but Seungcheol remains standing. Jeonghan prickles at that but doesn’t say anything.

He looks good. He’s keeping himself broad and solid these days, eating well. His hair is a dark chestnut that catches the light whenever he turns his head.

“Your hair is shorter,” Seungcheol comments, and then looks angry at himself like he didn’t mean to say it.

Jeonghan hums and nods. He looks around the area, hoping for something to make more small talk about. Delay the inevitable. His eye catches on a group of storefronts across the street and he can’t help but laugh.

Seungcheol looks at him incredulously. “What?”

Jeonghan laughs again and gestures across the street helplessly. “You hit on me at that dentist. Over there. Remember?”

Seungcheol follows his line of vision to the dental office where he’d once met Jisoo and Jeonghan for the second time, nine years ago.

His eyebrows disappear into his hairline. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

Jeonghan sighs. But then he catches Seungcheol’s eye and he’s – his mouth is twitching at the corner. Jeonghan zeroes in on it. He raises his eyebrows at Seungcheol, grinning slightly, until Seungcheol breaks with a huff.

“I wasn’t hitting on you.” He does a complicated little wiggle with his mouth, like he’s trying to shake off his urge to smile. After a moment, he’s back to glaring, and Jeonghan sighs again.

“Seungcheol-ah. I know you’re upset with me. Let’s talk about it, okay? Let’s get it over with, so we can just go back to the way things were.” It’s not what he means to say, he doesn’t know why he says it like that. There’s nothing Jeonghan wants less than for things to go back to how they were before he left.

“Yah, Yoon Jeonghan. You’re incredible.” Seungcheol shakes his head. Finally, he takes a seat. “I just don’t understand what you’re thinking. I mean where – where is your husband, huh? Why are you here?”

Oh right.

“I’m divorced.”

Seungcheol turns a funny shade of grey that Jeonghan hasn’t seen on him since he’d gotten spectacularly drunk at Jihoon’s 35th birthday party and woke up the next day on their couch with Mingyu’s boots on his feet for reasons no one knew.

After a moment, he blinks a few times and asks, “Are you okay?”

Jeonghan wishes Seungcheol would choose between being angry with him and taking care of him. He finds the former easier to deal with right now.

He shrugs. “I’m fine.”

“Okay,” Seungcheol says finally, nodding. Then he stands as if to go.

“Wait! Jesus,” Jeonghan makes a motion to grab Seungcheol’s arm that he aborts halfway. “Just. Wait a minute.”

“Jeonghan. I have to get back to work. Did you really think this was the time and place for this conversation?”

“Cheol, you hung up on me. What else was I supposed to do?”

“It surprised me! Can you blame me? We haven’t spoken in a year.”

Jeonghan bristles. “And whose fault was that?”

“Don’t.”

“But it’s true isn’t it?” Jeonghan hates what his voice does, how much anger it betrays. “You were the one who stopped talking to me. You got weird the second I told you I was engaged.”

“Fucking unbelievable.”

“Your temper’s gotten worse in your old age I see.”

Seungcheol slams his hand down on the table, just once, and fixes Jeonghan with a look. “Sorry I got weird! You took me on a weekend getaway to break the news like you were giving a dog a piece of chocolate before putting it down.” When he turns to look at Jeonghan, his eyes are as intense as Jeonghan’s ever seen them. In a low voice, almost unintelligible, he murmurs, “You knew what you were doing.”

Jeonghan purses his lips. “I don’t remember you swearing this much.”

Truthfully, Jeonghan had forgotten that Seungcheol had the capacity for this kind of anger. So rarely has it ever been directed at him, even when it should have been. He can feel this conversation getting away from him fast, zipping in all sorts of directions he never wanted it to go in.

Seungcheol huffs but it’s like the fight has gone out of him. He drops back down onto the bench, sure to keep some distance between them.

It’s not great, but it still feels like an olive branch. Jeonghan looks at him hopefully. “Seungcheol. Come on. I’m here. I want to see you. I – I missed you.”

When Seungcheol speaks, Jeonghan knows that what comes out of his mouth isn’t what he’d originally planned to say. It’s been a long time but he still knows him. With a sigh, Seungcheol pulls his phone out of the pocket, glances at the screen, and then tucks it back in.

“A bunch of us are having dinner at Gyu and Jihoonie’s place on Thursday. Are you coming?”

Jeonghan thinks. Seungkwan hadn’t mentioned it. “Still doing monthly dinners?”

Seungcheol shrugs. “Not consistently but yeah. Whoever’s free. I’ll see you there.” It’s not a question, but it does feel like an offering.

Jeonghan nods and he feels himself sway a little, closer to Seungcheol but not touching. “Okay. Yeah, I’ll be there.”

“Cool,” Seungcheol nods, and then he jerks a thumb behind him in the direction of his office. “Seungkwannie has the address. Gotta go.” And then he’s gone.

There’s a part of Jeonghan that worries going to dinner will be a mistake. Seungcheol isn’t the only one he left behind. Aside from Jisoo, who Jeonghan talks to at least weekly or whenever Jisoo remembers to check his texts, and Seungkwan, who would never let Jeonghan go very long without checking in, Jeonghan hasn’t spoken to any of the others regularly in a year or so. If he’s being honest with himself, it had kind of felt like something he shouldn’t be allowed. He hadn’t ghosted anyone completely, he’d just – pulled back. Or maybe they’d pulled back from him. Either way, he’s worried about how welcome he’ll be when he hits the intercom button for Mingyu and Jihoon’s apartment.

After a few seconds, the small screen on the intercom clears and Jihoon’s face appears, squinting.

“Mm?” he grunts a greeting and cocks his ear like he’s listening for a response. He looks like a little old man. Affection swells inside Jeonghan alongside his nerves.

“Hi Jihoonie. It’s me,” Jeonghan clears his throat. He gives a little wave even though he’s not sure the camera catches it. “Jeonghan.”

Jihoon’s eyes widen a bit and he opens his mouth but then he’s quickly pushed out of the way by a quick moving blur.

“Jeonghannie-hyung!” and Jeonghan grins immediately because he’d know the whining cadence of that voice anywhere. Mingyu has pressed himself as close to the camera as possible so that Jeonghan can really only see his cheek.

There’s a clicking sound to signal that the door opens and Jeonghan breathes a sigh of relief, and then he immediately rolls his eyes at himself. What did he think, that they’d literally bar him from entering? Laugh at him through the intercom, pop champagne on the little video screen and taunt him?

When he gets to their floor, the door is already swinging open and soon he has his arms full of two large and wiggly bodies. Seokmin and Mingyu, like puppies, pulling and poking at him excitedly.

“Oof,” he rocks back on his heels from the force of them but wraps his arms around whatever parts of them he can reach. “Mingyu-yah, Seokminnie, my old bones can’t take this.”

They pull back and grin at him. Mingyu looks so overcome that he has to lean forward and squeeze Jeonghan one more time before turning on his heel and disappearing back into his apartment. Seokmin’s smiling from ear to ear when he takes Jeonghan’s tote bag and waves for him to follow him inside. Jeonghan allows himself one short moment in the hallway, just to square his shoulders and breathe. His eyes feel a little tight, but he steels himself.

“Jeonghannie-hyung is here! And he brought gifts!” Seokmin announces, dropping the tote on the entryway table.

“Ah, it’s just wine,” Jeonghan says, embarrassed.

He slips his shoes off at the door and turns to take in the scene inside the apartment. He hasn’t been here before; Mingyu and Jihoon bought it after Jihoon won his first daesang for an album he’d produced, the year Jeonghan had left. It’s huge, by Seoul standards. Perfect size for squeezing in a dozen people.

Mingyu leaps forward to hug him again and Hansol gives him a soft punch to the shoulder and a wave as he passes from the kitchen to the living room with a beer in his hand, which he hands to Seungkwan where he sits on the floor in front of the coffee table. Jeonghan had seen them both this morning before they’d gone to work, promising to see him at dinner later on their way out the door.

Jeonghan scans the room for unfamiliar faces but finds none, to his relief. Instead, his chest swells and he finds himself feeling embarrassed by the weight of his own emotion. He really had missed them so much.

Junhui and Jisoo are sitting hip to hip on the small loveseat, Jisoo’s hand on Jun’s thigh. He can’t see Jihoon but he can hear him, bickering with Soonyoung in the kitchen. Minghao waves at him before turning back to his conversation with Seungcheol on the large sofa.

Jeonghan nods at Seungcheol and disappears into the kitchen before he does anything weird like insert himself into whatever they’re talking about just so he can hear Seungcheol’s voice again.

In the kitchen, Jihoon and Soonyoung seem to be arguing and laughing in equal measure in front of a large pot that Mingyu keeps popping in to check anxiously. When they spot Jeonghan, they get quiet for a moment before Soonyoung makes an excited sound and hops up and down.

“Hyung! You’re here!”

“Soonyoungie,” Jeonghan calls softly, smiling. He returns the hug Soonyoung leaps forward to give.

Soonyoung looks at Jihoon and then back at Jeonghan. “I heard you were in town but I wasn’t sure…” he trails off awkwardly. He’s tiptoeing around what he wants to say, which is new. Soonyoung had always navigated delicate conversations with a bull-meets-china-shop approach. Jeonghan feels the weight of every year he’s been away. He’s so aware of how fragile he must appear to all of them.

“Hyung is back,” he says cheerfully, patting Soonyoung on the back. There’s always been something about Soonyoung that brings out Jeonghan’s strongest hyung instincts. He’s an incredibly squeezable man. Jeonghan gives into temptation and reaches up to tug a little on a chunk of his hair, making him scrunch up his face in a happy little grin. The grin is a little more crinkly around the eyes than Jeonghan remembers but it’s so familiar that his heart aches.

“How’s it going in here?” Mingyu pops his head back in with a manic look in his eye, and goes right for the pot on the stove. Jihoon rolls his eyes.

“I do know how to cook stew, Mingoo.”

Mingyu shuffles in more fully but he has the good grace to look a little ashamed of his backseat chef behavior. Soonyoung pulls away from Jeonghan so that he can go bicker with Mingyu over salt measurements, and Jeonghan feels the weight of Jihoon’s gaze.

“Hi Jihoonie,” Jeonghan nods. He shuffles a little bit, torn between staying here pinned by Jihoon’s sharp eyes or venturing out into the unknown of the living room. He can hear someone who sounds like Jun cackling, supported by Seungcheol’s big, brash laughter.

“Seungcheol said you might come tonight,” Jihoon says, drawing Jeonghan’s attention once more. He shrugs in response, unsure, but Jihoon gives him a small smile. “I’m glad you did.”

Jeonghan lets his shoulders fall and he breathes out. He hums. “Me too.”

And then Mingyu’s grabbing him by the hand and pulling him out into the main living area. “Hyung, come on I’ll give you a tour!”

He can feel Seungcheol’s eyes on him as he lets himself be marched across the apartment and shown: the balcony, where they’ve set up two lounge chairs with a small table in between; Jihoon’s home studio, that’s only lit by bright blue neon strips of light lining the desk; their bedroom, with the nice king size bed and a rainfall shower that looks like it could fix Jeonghan’s entire life. Then Mingyu is pulling him back out into the living room and pushing him down into a squishy arm chair that sits beside Seungcheol’s side of the sofa.

Jeonghan looks around for Jisoo but doesn’t see him, feeling a little desperate for the comfort of his best friend. He brings one leg up and crosses it over his knee, jittering his foot.

“Dinner should be ready soon,” Mingyu announces after peeking into the kitchen once more. Jun and Seokmin give a little cheer in response.

Jeonghan turns to Seungcheol, who has his phone open in his lap but isn’t doing anything except scrolling without looking at the screen.

“Hi, Seungcheollie,” Jeonghan says softly, nudging his knee with his foot to get his attention. He has it immediately.

“Jeonghan-ah,” Seungcheol says, nodding. “Did you find it okay?”

“Hmm?”

“The apartment. You haven’t been here before, right?”

“Ah. No. I mean yes, I found it okay. No, I haven’t been here.”

Seungcheol just hums in response. How miserable, Jeonghan thinks, to do small talk like this. Then, the front door opens and Jisoo enters, seemingly back from walking –

“Kkuma!” Seungkwan coos immediately when Jisoo lets the little white dog off the leash. Jeonghan watches in surprise as it trots to Seungcheol immediately, jumping into his lap.

“Hi, princess,” Seungcheol says softly, stroking her fur so intensely that the fur around her eyes pulls back a little.

Seungcheol has a dog. Seungcheol has a little white princess dog. He supposes it could be anyone’s dog, but judging by the look of pure adoration in Kkuma’s eyes when Seungcheol starts raking his fingers through her fur, this is his dog.

Seungcheol looks up then, catches Jeonghan looking. “Oh,” is all he says for a moment, hand stilling. Kkuma starts bumping his hand with her nose right away. Dutifully, Seungcheol resumes petting her.

“This is Kkuma,” Seungcheol offers. He gestures to her, as if inviting Jeonghan to introduce himself. Jeonghan feels a little ridiculous when he sits up a little straighter, poised with the urge to impress the creature.

“Ah. Hi, Kkuma. I’m Jeonghan.” Somewhere, he hears Jisoo snort. He leans forward a little and extends his hand for her to sniff. He watches as her nose twitches and she looks up at him with suspicion.

“Sometimes it takes her a minute to, ah, get used to new people,” Seungcheol says apologetically. It’s the most he’s let his guard down with Jeonghan since Jeonghan got back, Kkuma acting as some kind of ice breaker between them.

A few moments later, Kkuma sneezes lightly before pulling her snout away from Jeonghan. She gives him a look that can only be described as unimpressed and hops off Seungcheol’s lap, seemingly to follow the smell of pork into the kitchen.

Jeonghan looks down at his hand, now slightly wet with dog snot. He sighs. Dogs usually like him fine. It’s like Kkuma knows all the ways in which Jeonghan has trespassed against her father and she wants him to pay.

“Okay guys, it’s ready!”

Everyone flows into the dining area when Mingyu calls, taking seats around the table. It’s amazing how many people manage to fit, though they are practically in each other’s laps. Jeonghan does a head count. Ten of them. Only Wonwoo and Chan are missing.

He panics for a split second before grabbing a spot in between Jihoon and Soonyoung. On the table sit two big pots of soondubu that steam enticingly, surrounded by rice and side dishes. Jeonghan hasn’t had a home cooked meal in what feels like years; neither he nor Yunseo liked cooking.

Dinner is nice. Everyone is chatty but no one speaks to him directly for the first half of the meal. It’s strange. Everyone in this room is so familiar to him but he feels a little bit like a stranger. It’s not that they’re ignoring him; they’re just following a rhythm that’s become natural to them over the last two years in his absence. Jisoo catches his eye across the table and pulls a face to make him laugh, which is how Jeonghan knows he must have had some kind of wretched look on his face while he sits there.

Kkuma makes a little sound from her spot on the rug across the room and Seungcheol promises her a bite of pork after everyone’s done eating. Jeonghan’s pushing the last bit of stew-soaked rice around on his plate when the sound of his name makes him perk up.

“–well Jeonghan always kissed Jisoo-hyung on New Years,” Seokmin is saying, and a few people around the table laugh at the memory.

Jeonghan looks around, confused. “What?”

“Oh hyung,” Seokmin cranes his neck to look at him as he speaks. “We were just talking about the News Years party last year.”

Mingyu giggles and nods. “Jisoo-hyung snuck out a whole hour before midnight.”

Jeonghan hadn’t been there. Yunseo had made reservations at a rooftop bar. The champagne had been flat. They’d already started talking about divorce at that point but they’d kissed at midnight anyway.

“Oh,” is all he says.

Jeonghan doesn’t look at Seungcheol and he’s sure Seungcheol doesn’t look at him. New Years has always been a topic they’ve avoided like the plague. It’s been so long that he’s partly assumed that Seungcheol just doesn’t remember.

Later when people start to trickle out into the evening, someone snags Jeonghan’s sleeve and gives it a tug. Seungcheol. He’s got his hat pulled down half over his eyes, jacket on, and Kkuma’s leash in his hand.

“Walk us to the train?” he asks, eyes holding Jeonghan steady. Down by their feet, Kkuma sniffs Jeonghan’s socks with the same air of suspicion as earlier. Jeonghan looks back up and nods.

The temperature has dropped significantly in the hours they’ve been in Mingyu and Jihoon’s apartment, and Jeonghan wraps his jacket snugly around himself to stay warm. He falls into step alongside Seungcheol and Kkuma, who trots obediently by Seungcheol’s feet.

“So was everything the same as you remembered?” Seungcheol asks, breaking the silence. When he looks over at Jeonghan, his face is a little softer than before. Jeonghan tucks away a grin. It doesn’t matter how many years it’s been, Seungcheol has never been able to stay mad for long, especially at Jeonghan. He holds anger in him like a balloon: expands so quickly but then it pops and it’s gone.

Jeonghan shrugs and answers the question, “Yes. And No.”

Seungcheol just hums, like that makes any sense at all. Two people on bikes fly past where they’re following the sidewalk down to the train station, giggling loudly like they’re racing one another. Kkuma gets excited and tugs on the leash and Seungcheol makes a calming sound to soothe her.

“When did you get her?” Jeonghan asks, nodding at the small dog. She looks up at Seungcheol like her whole world revolves around him. It just kills Jeonghan that he hadn’t known she existed.

Seungcheol thinks. “Eight…nine months ago? Hyung thought it would be good for me. To have someone in the apartment with me.”

So you live alone. You’re not seeing anyone, Jeonghan thinks but doesn’t say out loud. He keeps his eyes trained on Kkuma.

“She doesn’t like me,” he says and he really tries to inject some amusement into it but he’s not sure it lands.

Seungcheol shrugs. “She doesn’t know you.”

It stings. It’s the truth but it stings. Jeonghan takes a deep breath and reaches out to gently touch Seungcheol’s elbow. He opens his mouth to say – what, he doesn’t know. Something. Any of the dozens of things he thinks he might finally be able to say after ten years.

“I take her to the park on Saturdays. If you want to come.” It’s so abrupt that Jeonghan snaps his mouth shut with a soft click and blinks.

Seungcheol’s ears are bright red, from the cold. He’s looking down at Kkuma tip-tip-tapping by his feet. Jeonghan worries for a second that he hadn’t spoken at all, that he’d imagined it. But then Seungcheol looks up at him and the shape of his mouth isn’t quite what you’d call a smile, by Seungcheol standards, but it’s something.

Jeonghan nods. He’ll go to the park to hang out with Seungcheol’s dog that hates his guts. He’ll do whatever he has to do.

“Okay.”

36 | csc

For days after Jeonghan takes him to Namiseom, all Seungcheol does is go to work and brood and then come home to sulk. It’s his healing process. Texts from Jeonghan go unanswered in his phone, but so do messages from everyone else.

From: Hannie

Where r u

Did you leave???

Cheol?

From: Hannie

I just got back

Can we talk?

From: Hannie

Cheollie~~~~

[crying bunny sticker]

From: Shua

Please put him out of his misery Seungcheol-ah

On the fifth day, almost a full week after the island, there’s a knock on his door that startles him out of a nap. He can’t process the sound at first, with sleep still clawing at him as he sits up in a mess of blankets on the couch. His feet are heavy and clumsy when he shuffles across the room.

He’s still got one eye closed when he opens his door to Jeonghan.

“How–” The intercom hadn’t buzzed.

Jeonghan rolls his eyes and pushes into the apartment. “Your doorman loves me.”

Seungcheol sighs and follows Jeonghan into his living room. He lets himself melt back into his blanket nest and tries to avoid Jeonghan’s eyes as they take in the mess of his apartment.

“So the island was nice!” Jeonghan says brightly, folding his arms in front of him. He nods when Seungcheol’s only response is silence. “Yeah, really lovely. Did you know they do ghost tours?”

Seungcheol stares at him. “You did a Nami Island ghost tour alone?”

Jeonghan groans and drops onto one of the stools in front of the kitchen island. “No, of course not. I packed my stuff and came home after I realized you left. But I had the whole drive back to think about it and I’ve decided you’re being stupid.”

“Oh good.”

“Seungcheol-ah,” Jeonghan says evenly. “Don’t you think you’re being stupid?”

“I think I’ve been plenty stupid, trust me.”

Jeanghan steams. “You weren’t interested–”

“What are you talking about?” Seungcheol cuts him off. He’s not going to let Jeonghan rewrite history. Then he stops. “Jeonghan are you - are you talking about New Years Eve two years ago? You were drunk!”

Jeonghan scoffs. “Please. Seungcheol, I’d had two sips of champagne.” At Seungcheol’s look he concedes, “And some whiskey.”

Seungcheol presses himself further back into the couch cushions and lets out a deep breath. “I can’t believe we’re actually talking about this.”

But they don’t. Of course they don’t. Jeonghan sits there in silence for a moment, fiddling with a pepper shaker on Seungcheol’s kitchen island and looking like he’s miles away. Seungcheol watches him. He sees when the fight leaves him.

“I know you don’t want to come. But Seungcheol I–” Jeonghan meets his eyes, and there’s a sharp vulnerability in his eyes. Like cut glass. Seungcheol’s never seen him look desperate. “I need you there. You’re my best friend.”

The wedding. He’s talking about the wedding. The fucking wedding in Thailand, his marriage. Seungcheol squirms. He pokes his sock-covered toes out from under the blanket and stretches his feet a few times. And then –

“Of course I’ll come. Jeonghan-ah, I – of course I’ll come. I’ll be there.”

The relief that breaks out across Jeonghan’s face reminds Seungcheol that he would, probably, do anything Jeonghan asked of him. That’s always been true but this feels like a real test. He’ll wake up early to go on a road trip he knows nothing about. He’ll do his part of a stupid, complicated scheme. He’ll go to Jeonghan’s wedding in Thailand.

“Okay.”

Sometimes Seungcheol spends so much of his time thinking about all the ways his love goes to waste.

The humidity in Phuket is killer. The wedding is in the fall but it doesn’t make a difference. The heat is so bad that everyone is relieved when the ceremony is short. Jeonghan doesn’t seem like the type to want a long, traditional ceremony anyway. But then again, Jeonghan had never seemed like the type to get married. There are moments, during the reception, when Seungcheol spots him looking happier than he’s ever seen him; head thrown back, body shaking with his silly little giggle, his husband’s arm around his waist while Seungkwan tells a story from some party or other from years back. Seungcheol stands by the bar and watches.

No one can say Seungcheol hasn’t been a good sport. In truth, he’s been compartmentalizing. He’s gotten good at that. He’s happy for Jeonghan, in some abstract best friend way. He really is. He will be really happy for him. He’s actually feeling okay, he’s feeling good. He and Jisoo had both come dateless, joking that as Jeonghan’s co-Best Men, they could just be each other’s dates. When the reception starts, on the grounds of a small resort that Jeonghan and Yunseo had booked for the wedding party to stay at, Seungcheol lets Mingyu grab him and pull him to the middle of the dance floor and they sort of bop around in a clumsy mimicry of dancing. He can feel himself loosening up as the sun fully sets and temperatures drop.

And then. Jeonghan comes looking for him.

“Seungcheollie,” comes his cooing voice, sneaking up behind Seungcheol while he’s picking at the tray of overripe mango on the buffet table. Down the line where he’s been loading up his plate with fruit, Seungkwan shoots Seungcheol a worried look.

Seungcheol pops a slice of mango into his mouth and turns. “Jeonghan-ah. Having fun?”

Jeonghan’s eyes are bright, holding in them some lingering amusement at whatever silly bit Seokmin and Mingyu had been doing at his and Yunseo’s table a few moments ago. The three of them are still over there, giggling.

“You didn’t bring a date,” Jeonghan says, ignoring Seungcheol’s question.

“You know I didn’t bring a date, Jeonghan. Jisoo is my date,” Seungcheol replies. Whatever Jeonghan’s up to, Seungcheol’s doing his best not to rise to the bait.

Jeonghan snorts. His hand hovers over the table as he deliberates before picking up a single strawberry and biting into it. He chews softly and swallows before jutting his thumb over his shoulder in the general direction of wherever Jisoo had last been seen. “Pretty sure your date just disappeared behind a bush with a waiter then.”

Seungcheol laughs and shakes his head but says nothing, and Jeonghan elbows him playfully. “C’mon, why didn’t you bring someone?”

And Seungcheol – he’s been a good sport. He’s been feeling okay, he’s been feeling good. He doesn’t know why Jeonghan can’t just leave well enough alone.

He sets his plate of mango down on the edge of the table and turns to face Jeonghan fully. His face is open and teasing, no hint of any ulterior motive. Seungcheol feels a low, simmering anger start to spread over his skin until his face feels hot. He grabs Jeonghan by the elbow and tugs him along behind him, until he finds a spot near the staff area, just out of sight of the rest of the guests.

“Jeonghan, what are you doing?”

Jeonghan blinks at him, looking bewildered. “What?”

“Did you think we would just keep doing this?”

“Doing what?”

Seungcheol waits. He really doesn’t want to take responsibility for this entire long overdue conversation, but he feels backed into a corner by Jeonghan. And the worst part is that he knows that it’s by design.

“Do you know what I think? I think it’s easier for you like this. I think you’re taking the easy way out by – by marrying him.”

“Seungcheol–” Jeonghan protests, but Seungcheol doesn’t hear him denying it. Or he doesn’t give him the chance to before more words come spilling out. He’s saying things before he has a chance to weigh what they will cost.

“Jeonghan, the truth is that you are so fucking afraid of everything that – that this is what you do. You just poke and meddle until someone makes the decision you don’t want to have to make. Well, if that’s what you want, that’s what I’ll do. I’ll make the decision for you.”

Jeonghan reaches out and grasps his wrist, as if to stop him from leaving. Even though Seungcheol had not been trying to leave, at least not yet. He’d been gearing up to say something that he doesn’t think either of them can ever come back from. But of course Jeonghan beats him to it.

“I might – we might move. To Daegu.”

Out of all of the things he expected Jeonghan to say, it’s so out of left field that Seungcheol’s mouth snaps shut while he tries to process it. “Daegu?”

“It’s where Yunseo is from. And his work…Daegu is big for tech.”

Seungcheol’s stomach is turning unpleasantly and he feels like the grass beneath his feet is receding away from him like ocean waves on sand. “I know Daegu is big for tech, Jeonghan, I was fucking born there. You’re an expert on Daegu now?”

“Seungcheollie,” Jeonghan says, grasping him tighter. His voice sounds thin and reedy. He’s looking at Seungcheol like he wants something from him.

But Seungcheol can’t stand it. It’s all become white noise, fuzzy and harsh. “Okay. Daegu. Sure. Just…go, then. Go to Daegu.”

“I won’t if…” Jeonghan starts and then stops, and all Seungcheol can do is look down at the ground, stomach roiling unpleasantly. He has no idea what was going to come at the end of that sentence and he’s glad Jeonghan never lets them find out. On the other side of the small courtyard, their friends and family – Jeonghan’s husband – break out into loud cheers. Everyone’s tipsy and happy to fall all over one another while they laugh. It makes Seungcheol feel worse.

Seungcheol gently pushes Jeonghan’s hand away from him and puts some distance between them. “Jeonghan just – get back to your wedding.”

37 | csc

Mingyu’s complaining for the fourth or fifth time this week that Seungcheol had skipped the New Years party this year. He’d had work to do, had been his excuse.

Mingyu’s still pouting over it a week later. “Who works on New Years Eve, hyung?” Seungcheol just waves him off.

It’s almost closing time at the bar and several of their friends have coupled up and trickled out. Seungcheol’s eyes are on Jeonghan, who is out with them, solo. Seungcheol assumes that’s unusual, but he can’t say for sure. It’s not that he’s been avoiding Jeonghan, it’s just that he’s been avoiding Jeonghan. The honeymoon phase he assumes he’s been having for the last few months. Now Jeonghan is laughing and hanging off Soonyoung, the bottle of beer he’s been nursing all night dangling from his fingers.

Mingyu follows his eyes. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees him exchange significant looks with Jihoon and tries not to bristle. Somehow, one by one, what had happened at Jeonghan’s wedding had made its way through the group.

Soonyoung – one of the remaining stragglers – appears next to Jihoon’s stool and immediately drapes himself over his shoulders. He’s just drunk enough that Jihoon clearly feels bad, because he doesn’t push him off.

“All things are a go for Jeonghan and–” Soonyoung stops when he sees Seungcheol. If Seungcheol didn’t feel like disappearing into the floor, he’d find it funny how constipated his expression is; it’s the face of someone who has been told that under no circumstances should he mention– “The uh. Thing. Party.”

“Thing Party.” Mingyu repeats flatly, rolling his eyes, but Jihoon just pats Soonyoung’s arm consolingly.

“That’s good, Soonyoung-ah.”

Seungcheol huffs. “It’s fine. You think I’m not going to go to Jeonghan’s going away party?”

Almost like he heard his name all the way across the bar, Jeonghan’s head turns and he meets Seungcheol’s eyes. Hesitantly, he nods and raises his beer. Seungcheol pointedly looks away.

The movers leave ahead of them, leaving Yunseo and Jeonghan in the parking garage of Jeonghan’s apartment building, shoving overstuffed duffels into the trunk of the SUV that Yunseo had rented for the drive to Daegu.

Seungcheol stands a short distance away, keeping himself behind Seungkwan and Mingyu, who both insisted on seeing them off and then threatened Seungcheol if he didn’t at least come to wave. Well, Mingyu had threatened him. Seungkwan looks less sure, shuffling between Jeonghan and Seungcheol with nervous eyes like a child of divorce.

It’s – it’s fine. He’s seen Jeonghan since the wedding. He’s talked to Jeonghan since the wedding. It’s a little like the conversations he’d have with someone he bumps into at the grocery store. Hi, how are you, oh good, yeah the weather sucks, see you.

It’s miserable. But what is there to say?

“Okay, love, I think that’s everything,” Yunseo says a little loudly, letting the trunk close with a beep. Mingyu immediately reaches out to give him a one-armed hug, and Seungkwan grasps his arm with a smile. Yunseo’s eyes trail between them when he pulls away, then to Jeonghan, then to Seungcheol. Then, to Jeonghan, he says, “I’ll be in the car.”

“Hyung,” Seungkwan wails, hopping forward to throw his arms around Jeonghan’s neck, and holding tightly when Jeonghan’s arms immediately wrap around him and squeeze.

Around a tuft of Seungkwan’s hair that has gotten in his mouth, Jeonghan calls, “Mingyu-yah, come on. Give hyung a hug.”

“You’re not dying. We have trains, hyung,” he says petulantly, but his eyes are misty. Then, his long arms wrap around the both of them and they teeter in a three-way hug.

When they pull apart, Seungcheol braces himself. Mingyu and Seungkwan back off Jeonghan, whose eyes hone in on Seungcheol like they’re trying to pin him in place. He steps closer, leaving the other two huddled behind him.

“Seungcheol-ah,” Jeonghan says softly, and Seungcheol hates this, he hates this hates this.

“I hate this.” It comes out whether he wants it to or not and he wants to catch it in his palms and shove it back in. He wants to not want to give Jeonghan anything anymore.

“You didn’t come,” Jeonghan says after a moment. “To the party.”

Seungcheol squirms. His eyes catch on movement in the front seat of the SUV; he can see Yunseo fiddling with his phone through the rear window glass. “Something came up.”

Jeonghan goes silent again. It’s the most defeated Seungcheol has ever seen him.

“It’s past noon, hyung,” Mingyu finally calls softly. “The movers.”

Seungcheol and Jeonghan look at each other for another moment, before Jeonghan rolls his eyes and loosens his shoulders.

“Ah, Cheollie,” he says with a laugh. Like it can just be like that. He steps closer. “I’ll text you, okay? Give me a hug.”

It’s a request, but Jeonghan just pulls Seungcheol to him. Seungcheol goes, rigid. He’s clawing at his own determination like it’s loose ribbon being tugged from his hands. Pulling at it and losing it, because when he falls against Jeonghan, he’s hit with citrus. He breathes him in. He lets out a long, ragged sigh. Everything else aside, he’s shared a city with Jeonghan for seven years.

“Bye, Jeonghan-ah,” he says into his shoulder, and then pulls away.

Jeonghan blinks at him and says hesitantly, “See you soon.” And then he turns quickly, reaching out as he passes to squeeze Mingyu and Seungkwan one last time before walking around the passenger side door.

39 | yjh

Jeonghan’s scraping the bottom of his sneakers on the astroturf at the dog park by Seungcheol’s apartment when he remembers why he prefers cats.

“Ack. I think I stepped in shit, Cheol.”

Seungcheol looks at him and bursts out laughing, pointing childishly. Jeonghan rolls his eyes. “I can’t believe you’re 40.”

Seungcheol stops laughing and puts a hand on his hip. “Yah. I’m not 40 yet. And remember, once I turn 40, you’re not far behind, Jeonghan-ah.”

Jeonghan waves him off and stalks off to find a hose. There’s one attached to the fence, near where an extremely fucked up looking pug is splashing around in a kiddie pool. Jeonghan feels himself swell with pride a little because of how much cuter Kkuma is than most of these dogs. Then he tells himself to get a grip.

It’s the third weekend in a row that Seungcheol has tentatively invited him to tag along to his weekly outing with Kkuma. The first time, Jeonghan had shown up with sweaty palms and a recited script in his head of what he wanted to say to Seungcheol. But Seungcheol had kept throwing him little looks, apprehensive looks, whenever he tried to get the conversation started and something told Jeonghan that they weren’t ready for that yet. Or he was being a coward again. Easily could be a bit of both and probably was.

Instead, their Saturday mornings have been spent thawing out whatever has been frozen between them. He’s learned that Seungcheol has gotten promoted since he’s been gone. He’s moved apartments. He’s dated. Seungcheol doesn’t tell him that last one outright, but Jeonghan knows how to decode everything he says and doesn’t say – even still.

Jeonghan hasn’t talked about the divorce. It’s the big hole in the center of everything he does talk about, ready for them to both dive in whenever, but they haven’t. He can tell that Seungcheol knows when the conversation gets close – how could it not? Two years spent in a different city and a life shared with someone else. He can’t avoid it forever; he doesn’t want to. Today is the day.

Jeonghan’s hopping on one foot, dog shit-covered sneaker in one hand and garden hose in the other, when a younger woman – late twenties, maybe early thirties – approaches him with a smile, gesturing out to the park filled with dogs.

“Which one is yours?”

Jeonghan scans the area until his eyes land on Seungcheol chasing after a wayward tennis ball. He points in his general direction. “That’s him. Seungcheol.”

The woman stares for a moment and then laughs, and her face is red when she looks back at Jeonghan and shakes her head. “I meant which dog is yours. But,” she giggles. “He is very cute.”

“Oh,” Jeonghan says, and his grip loosens on the hose a little, drenching his left pant leg. “Sorry, ah…over there, the little white one. Her name is Kkuma. She’s not mine, though.”

The woman nods, and before she can reply, a large fluffy black dog bounds over and puts its paws right up on her chest, making them almost eye level. She makes a sound like all the air has been knocked out of her but she couldn’t look happier about it.

“This is Gyuri,” she offers, giving the big dog a pat on the head before saying, “Down, Gyuri.”

“Jeonghan-ah!”

Jeonghan’s head shoots up and he looks in the direction of Seungcheol’s voice. He’s on one of the benches across the park now, a tuckered out Kkuma panting between his feet. “Ah that’s – excuse me,” he nods to the woman and turns the hose nozzle off before setting it back on its hook. She nods back, still laughing to herself.

“What happened, did you get peed on, too?” Seungcheol laughs, gesturing to the dark fabric of Jeonghan’s wet pant leg.

Jeonghan groans. “It’s water.”

“Ah.”

Jeonghan takes a seat next to him on the bench, and Seungcheol looks out across the dog park, laughing to himself whenever a dog does something cute. Jeonghan watches him and watches him and thinks about claiming him in front of some random woman who probably lives in Seungcheol’s neighborhood. He knows why they’re here – he knows he’s lucky that Seungcheol even invites him. He knows they’re going to finally have a conversation that’s long overdue.

“I haven’t been in love with Yunseo for a long time,” is what he decides to open with.

And then Seungcheol’s looking at him, head turning so fast it looks like it might have hurt, and Jeonghan – Jeonghan is looking back, even though it’s hard.

“Okay,” Seungcheol says hesitantly, like he’s not sure exactly how to respond to that appropriately.

“I did love him,” Jeonghan says, sitting up straight and willing his voice not to waver. He’s been rehearsing this since his conversation with Seungkwan, determined to come off slightly less pathetic. “But I don’t think I’ve been in love with him for most of our marriage.”

A noise spooks Kkuma then, and she yips a few times, startling them both. Around them, dogs and their owners run around the park, going about their Saturday mornings while Jeonghan has a conversation that has the potential to change his life. Seungcheol reaches down to stroke Kkuma’s head, making a soothing sound at her until she goes back to her spot on the turf under them.

“Who – who wanted the divorce?” Seungcheol asks softly. Now, he’s not looking at Jeonghan.

Jeonghan winces. But he’s in it, he’s all in. “He did. But it was – we both agreed right away. It was – honestly, Cheol, it was painless.”

He watches Seungcheol nod, and his mouth moves in a funny little way, like he’s shuffling all of the possible things he could say next before strategically deciding.

“Did you divorce him because of me?”

“No,” Jeonghan says immediately. But then he lets out a breath and drops his head for a moment. Then he looks back at Seungcheol to find him staring at Jeonghan once more, face neutral. “And yes. No and yes.”

When Jeonghan turns to face Seungcheol fully and reaches out to tentatively rest his palm on the warm bare skin of Seungcheol’s knee, right below the hem of his shorts, Seungcheol’s face finally breaks. It’s such a complicated expression – it’s not happy, but it’s something close. Something on its way to happy; hopeful.

“This isn’t about Yunseo. There are a lot of things to – to talk about and we’re not very good at that but I think we should try to be better at it. Because I…” Jeonghan gives himself the biggest mental push he’s ever given himself in his life. “I’m ready to start over. Here. With you. If you want that.”

All the breath wheezes out of him after that. He feels like he’s run a marathon.

“You’re being very…mature,” Seungcheol says, eyeing him suspiciously.

“Well. I’m 40.”

“You’re not–” Seungcheol protests and then stops, giving up. He just shakes his head, smiling to himself. The sun has moved out from behind the clouds now and the chestnut highlights of Seungcheol’s hair shine in the light.

“I missed you,” he confesses then, squinting at Jeonghan, bringing a hand up to shield his eyes as they look at each other.

There’s a sharp tightening in Jeonghan’s chest and he just says, “Oh. Good. that’s – that’s good to hear, Seungcheollie.”

Seungcheol just nods and it’s – it’s all a lot. It’s not anything, in the grand scheme of, well, everything. But it’s a lot. Jeonghan can see clearly that they’re both feeling the weight of it. Seungcheol hadn’t responded to the real question Jeonghan had asked him but that’s okay. They have time.

Jeonghan clears his throat. “So. Are you one of those men who thinks divorcees are hot?”

Seungcheol looks at him, bewildered, before he remembers. In his defense, it’s been ten years. Jeonghan smiles at him tentatively. It’s been ten years. Seungcheol throws his head back and laughs, and the loud, brash sound of it startles Kkuma all over again.

39 | csc

When Seungcheol gets home from the dog park, he lets Kkuma off her leash, makes sure she has water, and then he collapses onto the lounge chair that takes up most of his very small apartment balcony.

“Jesus,” he whispers to himself. He thinks to call Jihoon, or Mingyu, or Wonwoo – anyone who can sit here and listen to him recount everything that Jeonghan had said to him just so that they can confirm it really happened. But he doesn’t. There’s a part of him that isn’t ready to have answers to questions he knows his friends will ask. There’s a part of him that wants to keep Jeonghan to himself.

If he’s being honest, he didn’t think Jeonghan would actually do it. And maybe he is to blame, somewhat, for leaving the ball in Jeonghan’s court for most of these years. It’s just that they both know that after everything, Jeonghan was always going to have to be the one to push them out of the weird stasis they’ve been in since – since New Years five years ago. Since Namiseom. Since Phuket. All of the times Seungcheol looked at him and said can you just be honest with me. Can you just finally be honest with me, Jeonghan?

And now Seungcheol is sitting here with it all. All of it, and it’s so much. It all feels like so much, at once – so much so that it takes him hours, just sitting in that chair staring at traffic on the highway down below, to actually, really comprehend what Jeonghan is asking of him. Offering him.

Oh God.

Seungcheol checks his watch. It’s almost midnight. He leaps out of the chair, stumbling a little, catching himself on the railing. And wouldn’t that be funny – finally getting what he’s wanted for so long and then immediately cracking his skull on the pavement 30 stories down. He’s up and practically jumping through the sliding door then, just to get inside his apartment and start pacing. He takes a few calming breaths and drags his phone out of the pockets of his shorts.

Jeonghan picks up right away. “Seungcheollie? Everything okay?”

“Jeonghannie,” Seungcheol says, out of breath.

“Are you – were you jogging?”

“No - no…never mind that. I’m ready.”

“What?”

“I’m ready – like you said. To start over. I’m ready too.”

“Oh.” There’s some shuffling sounds on the other end of the line but nothing else. Jeonghan isn’t saying anything. Seungcheol panics, worried he’d somehow misinterpreted things.

“I don’t care why you got divorced. I’m glad you did. I’m still mad I didn’t just let you kiss me on New Years five years ago. I’m mad I didn’t call your bullshit when we were thirty and you told me you didn’t date. I’m mad I didn’t ask you to come back to my apartment after I told you I’ve missed you.” His breathing is ragged, so bad that he can feel his phone screen fogging and sliding against his cheek. There’s a part of him that genuinely worries he might have an anxiety attack. Jeonghan still isn’t saying anything.

“Jeonghan–”

“Seungcheol, shut up,” Jeonghan says finally, sounding exasperated. “I’m coming over. Text me your address.” Then he hangs up, and Seungcheol stares at the homescreen of his phone for way too long before he jerks into action and opens up their texts.

There are seven train stops between Seungkwan’s place and Seungcheol’s apartment. He’s clocked it – it usually takes about twenty minutes. Jeonghan’s buzzing his intercom in fifteen.

“How did you get here so fast?” Seungcheol greets him, swinging open his apartment door to reveal a very harried looking Jeonghan, dressed in sweats and a huge cardigan, haphazardly buttoned incorrectly over a t-shirt.

Jeonghan brushes past him. “I took a cab.”

Seungcheol raises an eyebrow. “On a Saturday night? Jeonghan-ah, that must have cost a fortune.”

“I don’t give a fuck,” Jeonghan snaps. And then he’s grabbing Seungcheol by the shoulders and pushing him further into the apartment, until they’re in front of Seungcheol’s sofa and he can gently push on his shoulders until he’s sinking down to sit.

Then, Jeonghan starts to pace. He’s fumbling a little, hands clasped together and twitching like a nervous mouse. Seungcheol finds himself smiling up at him.

“Jeonghan-ah,” he says, and it’s all he says. It’s enough. There are so many things that need to be said between them, but at the same time, Seungcheol realizes that it’s a conversation they can have later. It’s a conversation they will have later, for days, weeks, years. They don’t have to say it all right now.

Jeonghan stops and looks at him, and Seungcheol knows that he understands. He comes closer, like he means to sit, but then he surprises Seungcheol by reaching out and pulling him back to his feet.

“You want me sitting down, you want me standing – which one is it, Hannie?” Seungcheol teases.

“I just want you.”

“Oh,” Seungcheol stutters. His cheeks heat instantly. “That’s – going to take some getting used to. You saying things like that to me.”

Jeonghan breathes out and laughs awkwardly. He waves his hands in front of himself as if he’s gesturing to the whole of him and says, “Sorry. Lots of years.”

“Yeah.” Because Seungcheol knows. Lots of years.

Jeonghan takes a step closer to him and brings a hand up to his face. He doesn’t touch him immediately; he just stands there like that for a moment, palm hovering an inch from Seungcheol’s cheek, so close with the warmth of wanting to touch.

Seungcheol can be brave. Jeonghan’s done so much, Seungcheol can be brave with this. He grins and wiggles his eyebrows.

“Yah. Yoon Jeonghan. Are you gonna kiss me or not?” He shuffles a little closer so that Jeonghan’s hand is really only a centimeter or two away. And then Jeonghan leans forward to close the distance. His hand is warm and sweaty on Seungcheol’s face, and Seungcheol can feel the rough pricks of the stubble he’d been too lazy to shave earlier rub raw against the soft skin of Jeonghan’s palm.

Jeonghan’s eyes pass over his face, then, until they land on his mouth. It’s crazy – this pull between them. Seungcheol’s always thought that, but he’s giddy with the thrill of knowing this time he’s not the only one.

He slips a hand around Jeonghan’s waist, fingers grasping at the plush knit of the cardigan, and when their mouths finally touch, the first thing he does – entirely out of his control – is laugh into Jeonghan’s waiting lips.

Jeonghan pulls back. “Oh my god,” he complains. “Are you serious?”

“No, no,” Seungcheol laughs, bringing his other hand down on the other side of Jeonghan’s waist and grasping firmingly to keep them close. “I’m sorry it’s just –” he’s still laughing. It’s some kind of involuntary response, more anxiety than amusement, but he can’t stop.

“Yah.”

“Sorry, Hannie,” Seungcheol quiets finally and pulls Jeonghan back against him, and he kisses him for real.

Immediately, Jeonghan opens for him. He goes so easy, like some soft melting thing. Pliant and warm and easy against Seungcheol when he parts his lips and wets Seungcheol’s mouth with the tip of his tongue. If it were anyone else at any other point in his life, Seungcheol would be a little embarrassed by the moan it pulls out of him. But he’s not. He thinks at this point, if Jeonghan asked him to, he’d get on his knees and crawl. It’s just a kiss but there’s something about realizing you’re finally getting something you’ve wanted for so long that you don’t remember not wanting it. It’s like that.

Jeonghan brings his hands back up to Seungcheol’s face and strokes one of his thumbs across the tender skin under one of Seungcheol’s eyes. It all feels so good, when Seungcheol gently presses his teeth into the softness of Jeonghan’s bottom lip. When Jeonghan presses closer and gets his thigh between Seungcheol’s legs. When Seungcheol bunches up the stupid cardigan until he can get his hands on the warm skin of Jeonghan’s stomach.

There’s a trail of spit keeping them connected when they pull apart. Seungcheol is seized with the sudden urge to pull it into his mouth, to keep some souvenir of the kiss that he can roll around on his tongue and hope that the taste will linger. It’s messy; he feels a little sweaty and overheated and he wants to do it again so badly he’s physically shaking with it.

Behind them, Kkuma whines. Jeonghan pulls away to look around Seungcheol where Kkuma is watching judgmentally from her spot next to the couch. Seungcheol starts laughing, dropping his head to Jeonghan’s shoulder.

“She’ll be okay alone for a few hours, right?”

“What? Yeah, I guess…”

“Great.” Jeonghan tugs Seungcheol along, stopping for a moment to stare at the two closed doors in front of them, making what ends up being a good guess as to which one is Seungcheol’s bedroom.

He flips on the light, taking in the sparse furnishings and the half-heartedly made bed before turning and shutting the door behind them. He starts tugging at Seungcheol’s shirt.

“Jeonghan, don’t you think it would be–”

Jeonghan stops and just looks at him. “Seungcheol, we have wanted to fuck each other for a decade.” Jeonghan looks at him impatiently, like that’s a normal thing for him to say to Seungcheol. He’s practically tapping his foot. “Please, can we just fuck each other.”

“I –” and well, honestly? Seungcheol can’t think of an argument against it.

He lets Jeonghan pull his shirt up and over his head and immediately his hands are on Seungcheol’s body, everywhere. Seungcheol’s hands stay down by his side, fighting how badly he wants to have his hands on Jeonghan too. It’s okay. What’s another two minutes of waiting? He can tell by the way Jeonghan’s eyes follow the movements of his fingers across Seungcheol’s collarbones and the hitch of his breath that he needs this. One trembling hand comes up to cradle the back of Seungcheol’s skull, fingertips brushing the coarse hairline they find there. Jeonghan’s other hand stays on his chest, brushing a nipple that quickly pebbles in answer.

“Fuck,” Jeonghan breathes out. There’s a weakness to it that’s so new. Seungcheol steps closer, spurred into action by that. He tentatively brings his hands to Jeonghan’s hips, sliding under the layers of fabric that hang there to get at his skin.

“Fuck,” Jeonghan says again, turning his face away. Seungcheol makes a noise that he can’t prevent, a whine.

“Hey, hey. Hannie.” His hands fly up and grab Jeonghan’s face. His hair is so much shorter than it was the last time Seungcheol saw him, before. But still, there’s enough of it that Seungcheol brushes it behind his ears when he gets Jeonghan to look at him and Jeonghan is – Jeonghan is crying. Has been crying. Has been trying not to cry but there’s evidence of defeat sitting shiny and wet on his cheeks.

“Sweetheart.”

Jeonghan smiles and it’s such a funny picture cut between them: Seungcheol, shirtless. Jeonghan in a huge cardigan, crying and smiling.

Seungcheol waits. He watches while Jeonghan takes a deep breath and physically gives himself a little shake. It seems to work – he looks at Seungcheol again, smiling again. “I’m okay. Come - come on. Come over here.”

He’s the one who says it, but it’s Seungcheol who grabs his hands and pulls him over to the bed. He pushes Jeonghan down to sit on the edge of it and comes to stand between his knees. He looks at him – just lets himself look for a little while. Jeonghan’s cheeks are still wet, the same wetness that clings to his eyelashes when he looks up at Seungcheol. Seungcheol feels a little out of his body with how calm he is about this. He’d imagined it more than he ever wants to admit and he’d always been frantic with it. The idea of touching Jeonghan, kissing him, having him close like this, fucking him…even in his head, it had seemed like such a longshot that he’d known he’d need to give it everything he had once he got it.

But now, he’s calm. He’s taking his time. Jeonghan looks a little spooked, but he’s grabbing onto Seungcheol with such determination. And Seungcheol thinks – he thinks maybe this is what Jeonghan needs. For the first time, at least.

Seungcheol’s hands drop to the tie of his sweats, pulling at the knot until it comes undone and he can push the pants down. He kicks them across the room. He’s watching Jeonghan watch him.

“Okay?” he whispers.

“Yeah,” Jeonghan nods. He slides his hands under the waistband of Seungcheol’s briefs and rolls them down until Seungcheol gets the message and pulls them the rest of the way off, and then he’s undressed in front of Jeonghan. It feels like a line finally crossed, even if he feels a little silly that Jeonghan is still fully clothed.

“You look…” Jeonghan says, following the line of Seungcheol’s waist down to his hips, his soft cock, his thighs.

Seungcheol squirms and his face heats. “Yeah, well.” It’s a lot of build up, ten years. An opportunity for disappointment. It’s strange to stand naked in front of someone and wonder if they’re seeing some amalgamation of the past four or five versions of you or just meeting you where you are, and whether that’s enough. He shrugs. “Probably would have been better to do this ten years ago,” he jokes.

Jeonghan’s eyes snap up to him and his expression changes from the far away look he’s had for the last several minutes to something almost furious.

He presses his lips together in a thin line and studies Seungcheol’s face. Then he says, “I was just thinking that I want to get my mouth on you so badly that I feel crazy.”

Some odd mix of pleasure, desire, and embarrassment floods Seungcheol at that, and he steadies himself with a hand on Jeonghan’s shoulder. “Oh.”

Jeonghan’s cheeks are just as inflamed but he gives Seungcheol a defiant little grin and he’s – it’s Jeonghan. It’s Seungcheol and Jeonghan. Jeonghan shrugs. “Yeah. So…shut up.”

Seungcheol laughs, and it’s like the last bit of strange tension just seeps out of the room.

“Can I please take this stupid cardigan off?” Seungcheol pulls playfully at the loose fabric at Jeonghan’s shoulder, and Jeonghan laughs.

Things move along then, with some unidentifiable hurdle finally cleared. Jeonghan gets his hands on Seungcheol’s ass, kneading it softly while Seungcheol struggles to undress him.

“I can’t – do this with you doing that, Jeonghan,” Seungcheol scolds, but he’s laughing.

Jeonghan sighs wistfully. “Do you have any idea how long I’ve wanted to get my hands on your ass?”

Seungcheol rolls his eyes. “You could have had your hands on it at any time.”

They’re testing the waters. It doesn’t feel so precarious right now. Still, Jeonghan gives him a complicated look and whispers, “I know.” But it’s still good. It’s not so sad anymore. It probably will be again, but not so much right now.

Once he has Jeonghan naked, Seungcheol feels almost overwhelmed with his options. He has to remind himself that he will – ideally – have many chances after this to do all of the things he wants to do with Jeonghan.

“Come here,” Jeonghan says softly, wrapping one hand around the back of Seungcheol’s knee and pulling gently until Seungcheol moves. He’s pushing Jeonghan down on his bed, he’s settling on top of him, knees on either side of Jeonghan’s hips. Slowly, he lets his full weight rest on Jeonghan’s thighs, smiling down at him when Jeonghan’s hands automatically come to his hips.

“What do you want?” Seungcheol asks plainly.

Jeonghan looks at him consideringly, hands wandering: back on the curve of Seugcheol’s ass, sliding across his cheeks, fingertips brushing his entrance and smiling when Seungcheol lurches forward and gasps.

“Right now,” Jeonghan says, pulling his hands away. Seungcheol’s stomach swoops, fast and intense, and he feels the ridiculous urge to beg for Jeonghan to get his hands back on him, in him. He’s not even half hard but he wants Jeonghan there. He wants them to crawl inside of each other in some desperate way he’s pretty sure isn’t even physically possible. But he just breathes and waits patiently.

Jeonghan pushes him off and tips him so that he’s laying on his back and Jeonghan is hovering over him. Seungcheol is still waiting for him to name his request, but then Jeonghan just kisses him, long and deep. Seungcheol hums in surprise but quickly wraps his arms around him and tugs him closer. He can’t remember the last time he just made out with someone. It’s been years, probably. He loves it, he loves the thick slide of their tongues. He loves that Jeonghan kisses him messily, loves the slick pressure of their lips and how gross it is when Jeonghan sucks his tongue into his mouth and a little bit of drool slides out. Everyone he’s ever kissed before this has kissed him neatly. He thinks – he can’t remember. He just knows he’s never kissed anyone like this in his life.

When they pull apart, he can feel Jeonghan’s cock, harder now, against his thigh, and they’re both breathing heavily.

“That’s what I wanted,” Jeonghan says, and Seungcheol can’t take his eyes off him. The tears on his cheeks have entirely dried but he’s traded them for a sheen of wetness across his red mouth. He moves. “And this.”

Jeonghan trails kisses down Seungcheol’s chest and across the softness of his stomach. He stops to nibble on Seungcheol’s hip and Seungcheol laughs.

When Jeonghan looks up at him, mouth hovering just over his cock, with an affronted look on his face, Seungheol buries his hand in his hair and shakes his head softly.

“I should have known you’d be a biter.”

Jeonghan settles in between Seungcheol’s legs and laughs. “I’m sure I don’t know what you mean by that,” and then he’s taking Seungcheol’s cock into his mouth.

Seungcheol’s breath stutters and before he can stop himself he clenches the hand in Jeonghan’s hair and pulls, mumbling an apology immediately. But Jeonghan just shakes his head and hums a little around Seungcheol’s cock and brings his own hand up to cover Seungcheol’s, applying a little pressure and making it clear that Seungcheol’s free to tug all he wants. It makes Seungcheol feel dizzy and he can feel his cock rapidly coming to full hardness in Jeonghan’s mouth.

“Hannie,” he mutters, bringing his feet up to plant them on the mattress. Jeonghan pulls off for a second to pant, letting his hand come up to jerk Seungcheol.

Seungcheol looks down at Jeonghan between his legs, pumping his cock, and feels so overwhelmed at the sight that all he can do is bite his lip and groan, letting his head fall back on the pillow.

Jeonghan gives Seungcheol’s cock another pump before he dips his head down and covers him with his mouth again, letting Seungcheol hit the back of his throat before he swallows around him.

“Oh my god,” Seungcheol says loudly, bringing his hands up to Jeonghan’s shoulders and hitting him lightly. “Okay, you can’t do that or I’m going to come and I really, really need you to fuck me.” He’s whining pathetically but Jeonghan just pulls off and laughs.

“Good; that’s good. That’s the only time I think I could do that anyway,” he complains, rubbing at his throat, and when their eyes meet they both start laughing. Seungcheol pulls Jeonghan up towards him to kiss him, and the inside of Jeonghan’s mouth tastes entirely of Seungcheol.

There’s a panicked search for lube and condoms, some maneuvering (“Do you want to – ride me?” “You just don’t want to have to do anything.” “Yah!”) until they settle: Seungcheol on his side, stomach pressed into the mattress, Jeonghan a solid weight behind him. He’s fingering Seungcheol open slowly and it takes a while for Seungcheol to remember that this is supposed to feel good until Jeonghan’s fingertips brush his prostate and he’s rutting against the mattress, feeling out of his mind.

He reaches behind to grasp at Jeonghan’s hip, pulling him even closer with a huff of frustration. “Okay it’s – I think I’m good. Come on, Jeonghan.”

“So impatient, Seungcheollie,” Jeonghan teases, but his voice is strained. He pulls his fingers back and then he’s gone for a moment, pulled away from Seungcheol. Seungcheol can’t even summon the energy to feel embarrassed by how upset he feels by it, but he waits while Jeonghan fumbles with a condom and slicks himself up with more lube. And then he’s settling behind Seungcheol again.

When Jeonghan pushes inside of him, they both let out guttural sounds that Seungcheol is fairly sure he’ll think about for the rest of his life.

“Cheol – Seungcheollie,” Jeonghan murmurs, covering Seungcheol’s larger body with his own, draped across him, with all of their sweat and heat trapped between their bodies as they move together.

Seungcheol groans and feels his body become some heavy, thrumming thing caught up in the feeling of Jeonghan; he pushes back against him so that they can meet in the middle on every thrust, and the feeling of his leaking cock brushing against the rough rumpled sheets with every move has him sinking his teeth into his own bottom lip so hard that he worries about breaking skin.

Jeonghan leans down to speak into his ear. He asks, “Can you come like this? With just this?”

Seungcheol’s hand grapples helplessly for something to grab onto, finally just latching onto the pillow above his head, and he nods frantically. “I think – maybe.”

It renews some effort in Jeonghan, who had been flagging a little, and he picks up his pace. He shifts slightly, and when he pushes deeper into Seungcheol, he hits his prostate and Seungcheol chokes on air. “Yeah, yep. Yep,” he says then, and doesn’t even care when Jeonghan laughs. He does it again, and again.

Seungcheol’s mind goes blank and fuzzy when he comes, reaching back once more to claw at Jeonghan’s skin, drawing him impossibly closer until he can ride it out, and then his body goes lax underneath him. Jeonghan collapses on him soon after, breathing heavily, and Seungcheol lets out a soft oof. After a moment, he shifts and makes a sound, urging Jeonghan to roll off him so that he can escape the wet spot on his sheets.

When he turns to face Jeonghan, he looks some mix of turned on and exhausted that pulls a soft laugh out of Seungcheol.

“Poor baby,” Seungcheol coos, while Jeonghan lays there panting like he’s run a marathon, legs splayed with the condom still on his dick. Seungcheol loves him in ways even he doesn’t understand.

He scoots over and looks at him, eyebrows raised. “Are you…?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Jeonghan says, pushing himself up. He winces when he pulls the condom off and drops it beside the bed, ignoring Seungcheol when he makes a noise of disgust. But then Jeonghan is turning back to him, and tired or not, the heat in his eyes is impossible to look away from.

Seungcheol pulls him close again and wraps a fist around his cock. He can tell it won’t take long, he can feel how close Jeonghan is. He brings their mouths together again and jerks him off quickly, relishing the way Jeonghan gasps into his mouth. He swallows the sound down happily, his whole body soft and happy in its post-orgasm haze. Jeonghan’s hand drops to Seungcheol’s thigh and squeezes. It’s a signal. Seungcheol squeezes his fist gently and brushes a thumb over the tip of Jeonghan’s cock and then he’s coming over Seungcheol’s hand, the sheets, his own thighs.

“Fuck,” Jeonghan breathes. He looks at Seungcheol then, an almost disbelieving look on his face. “Fuck.”

The grin that fights its way across Seungcheol’s face is something he’s incapable of fighting, not that he wants to. He just nods tiredly. “Yeah.”

“Who’s that?” Seungcheol mumbles, when he wakes up again. They’d both dozed off after they’d washed up, but now Jeonghan is propped up on one arm texting someone. Seungcheol’s eyes follow the line of his bare torso, hover over the faint marks he’d left on his hip earlier.

Jeonghan startles a little and his eyes get shifty. “Oh. It’s – it’s Yunseo. He keeps bugging me about this package…I don’t know why it’s so important. He wants Seungkwan’s address.” He’s mumbling, squinting at the phone screen. Seungcheol smiles at the sight. He’ll make sure he keeps a pair of reading glasses in the empty nightstand drawer from now on.

“Give him this address,” Seungcheol says. “Tell him to send them here.”

Jeonghan just looks at him. He rolls his eyes but the corner of his mouth quivers. He’s always loved when Seungcheol is a possessive brat, as long as he’s a possessive brat about Jeonghan.

Seungcheol just hums and stretches with a yawn. Then he turns on his side to face Jeonghan. “I never liked him.” It’s ugly and petty. He says it just because he can.

Jeonghan snorts. “Yeah, well. I know. I divorced him.” He drops his phone next to the bed and slides back down on the mattress. “Yunseo is…a nice guy. He didn’t do anything wrong.”

Seungcheol takes a shallow breath. Jeonghan is so warm and soft next to him and all of this feels unbelievable. There’s a haze around the conversation that feels almost dreamlike, and if Seungcheol’s being honest, there’s a part of him that thinks he’ll wake up and Jeonghan will be gone. Married in Daegu where he’s supposed to be. Seungcheol twists slightly so that the wet press of his mouth can meet the sharp jut of Jeonghan’s shoulder.

He whispers, “I wish it had been me.”

Jeonghan pulls back and scoffs. “You wish you’d been the one I divorced?”

“Yeah.” Seungcheol nods. “Because at least then we would have – sometimes I think that would have been better than all of this, you know?”

He can tell it catches Jeonghan off guard by the way he stiffens. But then he curls himself closer to Seungcheol and brings his hands up to his cheeks and grasps him. His face is alarmingly confrontational when he makes Seungcheol look him in the eye.

“Yah,” he says softly. “I would rather have fucked up a hundred times with someone else as long as I get it right with you.”

Seungcheol lets out a little laugh that gets silenced by the press of Jeonghan’s palms against his face. They probably look ridiculous right now: naked in bed, bodies poised for a fight, Seungcheol’s cheeks squished in between Jeonghan’s hands in a way that makes his lips purse.

He’s not sure he’ll ever get used to them like this, just coming right out and saying what they mean. Imagine that.

“Besides, if you’d been the one to divorce me, I’d just hunt you down and marry you all over again.” Then Jeonghan gently slaps both of Seungcheol’s cheeks and lets him go. Seungcheol doesn’t want to touch any part of that statement with a ten-foot pole. Maybe another day. It’s so delicately hypothetical.

“The best way to do it,” Seungcheol says then, casual with the way he runs his big toe along Jeonghan’s shin and grins when Jeonghan hisses at him to cut his toenails. “Would have been to never fuck up with anyone else and to only have gotten it right with each other.”

Jeonghan swats at him and they laugh, and the haze is shattered. It’s not a dream, it’s real. Seungcheol’s apartment is slightly too cold even with all of the heat they create between them. There are car horns that filter up from the bridge below, heard faintly even through the thick glass of the bedroom window. Jeonghan’s not in Daegu because he’s here, he’s here, he’s here.

Seungcheol turns and curls up, turning his head slightly and waiting, pleased when Jeonghan scoots closer behind him and presses his front to Seungcheol’s back. To the curve of him. Seungcheol tugs the covers over them. There’s a clacking sound and some scratching at the door and he feels rather than hears Jeonghan’s rumbling laugh behind him.

“Kkuma-yah,” he calls out. “Go lay down, baby.” He can picture her put-upon look when she turns and makes her way to the small dog bed in the living room. He’ll put extra treats in her bowl tomorrow morning.

“Jeonghan-ah,” Seungcheol calls out softly, checking to see if he’s still awake. He’s kind of hoping he isn’t. There’s one thing left to do, intimidating in the stupidest way. After everything else.

It takes a moment but Jeonghan hums to show he’s listening. Seungcheol swallows and says, “I love you.”

Immediately, as if he doesn’t want to give Seungcheol even a second to doubt he’s been heard, the hand that’s been resting on Seungcheol’s stomach bears down and clenches gently. The slightest bit of pressure, some weight.

“I love you, too.”

30 | csc

When Seungcheol gets home from the bar to the apartment that he and Jihoon share, his roommate is sprawled across their sofa watching a Youtube documentary. He mutes it when Seungcheol walks in and pokes his head over the back of the couch to look at him.

“How’d the mixer go? Meet anyone?”

Seungcheol has Jisoo’s number in his phone and plans to get dinner. He’s thinking of Jeonghan’s blonde hair and tiny, straight teeth.

“Maybe.”

40 | yjh

“I can’t believe I didn’t get my own birthday party,” Seungcheol complains as Seungkwan is shoving an obnoxious party hat onto his head. “That’s bullshit. You made me wait a month.”

Jeonghan wiggles his fingers in Seungcheol’s direction. “I get my party a month early.”

Jihoon rolls his eyes, smashing a similar hat onto Jeonghan’s head. “This is what happens when you get married. You two are basically one person in our eyes.”

Seungcheol huffs again but smiles. “We’re not even married.” There’s a yet at the end there, just the phantom of one, that Jeonghan smiles at. Everyone hears it and gags. They’d gotten over the excitement of Seungcheol-and-Jeonghan pretty quickly and now treat them like they’re a set of impossibly embarrassing dads.

They’re all gathered in the living room of Seungcheol and Jeonghan’s house for their joint 40th birthday party. Jisoo and Mingyu had been the ones to plan it – mostly because Jisoo apparently needed to honor a 20-year long commitment he’d made to throwing Jeonghan a 40th birthday party and because Mingyu wanted to bake the cake – and they’d kicked Jeonghan and Seungcheol out of their own house to keep up the pretense of a surprise. When their friends had arrived, they’d all complained good-naturedly about the drives they’d had to make to the outskirts of Seoul where Jeonghan and Seungcheol live.

The living room is crowded with all of them, though a much easier fit than the days of cramped apartments. Seungcheol and Jeonghan are sitting across from each other in soft armchairs, waiting patiently.

Soonyoung is bustling around, shaking presents on the gift table and stopping to bother Jihoon. He throws himself onto the sofa next to Wonwoo and gestures to the framed photo on the bookshelf.

“I love this photo,” he says, leaning over to look at it.

“Where is that?” Seokmin asks, coming over to pick it up.

Jeonghan looks at Seungcheol when he says, “Nami Island.”

They can’t see it, in the frame, but if they were to open it up and take it out, the back of the photo has a scribbled Namiseom, 2031 on the back. It’s a photo of the two of them, younger, grinning under the shade of the famous Namiseom trees. Taken and forgotten in the aftermath. Printed on a whim at a kiosk in Daegu. Sent to Seoul in a box of junk that shows up at Seungcheol’s apartment one day.

Seokmin makes a confused sound. “When did you go to—“

Junhui makes a sound suddenly, leaping up to hit the light switch and plunge the room into darkness, and Mingyu appears around the corner with the cake. The tiny flames on the candles – not forty of them, but still far too many for Jeonghan’s taste – make pretty little dancing shapes in Seungcheol’s eyes when Mingyu sets the cake down on the table between them.

“Okay, hyungs,” Seungkwan says excitedly, looking between them. “Make a wish!”

“Shouldn’t they both get a cake? Will the wishes come true if they make them on the same cake?” Soonyoung wonders, looking genuinely worried.

“I think if they can both blow out the exact number of candles, they both get a wish. Or something,” Wonwoo offers.

Jisoo hits him lightly on the chest. “How would they even do that?”

“Yah. Can you guys shut up,” Seungcheol complains.

He meets Jeonghan’s eyes again, and Jeonghan lets his lips curve up in a small smile to match the one blooming across Seungcheol’s face. There’s wax dripping on their cake and Kkuma is nudging Seungcheol’s calf under the table. When he doesn’t give her the attention she wants, she gives up and starts bothering Jeonghan instead.

“Go on,” Seungkwan says again. “Make a wish.”

Jeonghan grins at Seungcheol, then he pulls a silly face just because he feels like it. Seungcheol gets up and moves, coming to sit in the same armchair that Jeonghan is in, even though there’s barely enough room for them both. He brings an arm around his shoulders and helps him hold up the curtain of his hair that’s gotten longer over the last year. Together, they lean over the cake, and blow.